Thursday, May 06, 2010

Inspection and Appraisal

Right now we're anxiously awaiting the results of the appraisal. You may recall that the buyers offered 13K more than asking price so they could get that in sellers' assist and include the closing costs in their loan. I don't know how we're going to negotiate if the house doesn't appraise at the offered price.

As for the inspection, their response was OK, considering that this house is old and that the inspector found multiples things that need to be taken care of. We'll need to put a new lining in the furnace chimney (estimate of $1.8K) and make some changes to the electric system ($300 estimate). Then, because they cannot ask for any more money (due to the high sellers' assist) and the leaky downstairs bathroom needs to be completely redone, they asked us to provide them with them a new washer, drier and dishwasher (?!) instead. We were OK with the washer and drier, but were flabbergasted about the dishwasher since ours is less than 2 years old -- how can they ask us to replace a brand new appliance that works, right?

Fortunately, our realtor had a great idea. Instead of having the appliances delivered (they had requested to be present when the delivery took place on the morning of closing, no less -- a huge hassle for all of us), Roberta thought that we could just give them a home improvement store gift card after the closing. They loved the idea and said that in this case they would probably not replace the dishwasher and get something else they needed instead. And they also told us not to get offended by the suggestion of a new dishwasher -- they just need the money and it has to go towards something. That makes sense. After all, we chose not to redo the downstairs bathroom (we couldn't afford it!) and we were running the risk of that being an issue when selling.

We're praying that everything goes well. We cannot lose this sale and the buyers seem to like the house enough to overlook several small things in it. I hope they're happy here!

Well, the countdown has started, we only have 27 more days in this house. Isn't that crazeeee!? And I have to pack and do cyberschooling at the same time. I don't know how that's going to get done, seriously. The boys will have to help us out by working more independently (not an option for the kindergartner, although he's the most independent of the two of them). It will all get done somehow. And strangely, I'm looking forward to it because I like moving. If we could only know where we're going... (doesn't that sound even crazier than having to move out in 27 days?). In any case, even if we made an offer on a house today, it would take around 45 days for us to be able to close on it. Something tells me we're going to have to rent instead :-(.

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