From a buyer’s point of view, after receiving a home inspection report, learning how to negotiate for repairs or a reduced sales price on the cost of home does make a difference. Whether the HVAC system will be replaced by the sellers themselves, or if you’re willing to negotiate and knock down the cost of the home to accommodate this need and purchase the HVAC unit on your own dime, the act of negotiating, when it comes to buying a home, could be considered an art.

Keep these 6 tips in mind to ensure that when they’re ready to finalize and close the deal, the buyer and the seller are shaking hands with a smile on their face.

Have you ordered your RepairPricer.com Pricing Report yet? This easy-to-understand document simplifies the home inspection reports you may be used to reading through in the past, and tuns them into incredibly accurate repair estimates you can use to negotiate!

Click HERE to see how it works

1.) Be clear on the realities of selling and buying a home.

When a home is completely new and built from the ground up, the foundation should be completely in tact. The plumbing should work flawlessly. The shingles on the roof should not only look new, but be new.

After a few years of living in the home, once a family is looking to sell and another family is looking to buy, there should be certain expectations…from each party.

Ten years later, a new home won’t look brand new. Wear and tear will be evident. After all, the family living in that home certainly wasn’t a family of robots. They’re human, just like you.

No matter which side of the table you’re sitting on (the buyer’s or the seller’s), keep a reasonable view in mind of what to fight for and what you could possibly take care of yourself.

2.) Focus on what is best for your family.

When Repair Pricer comes back with detailed information regarding home repair estimates and costs, there may be, say, 15 things that need repairing. Cracked bathroom tiles. A corner of the yard in need of sod replacement. A backyard fence broken in two separate sections. A leaking pipe in the basement. The HVAC system may need a replacement. Pool maintenance. Etc.

Decide your strategy in how your family will move forward and inch closer to a formal agreement between the seller and the buyer. Which items on the list would cost you less? What might you be willing to do yourself? Are you someone who enjoys handy-work on a warm and sunny Sunday afternoon in the spring? Would you enjoy adding in sod, repairing a backyard fence by hand, and painting it white to match? If this sounds like something right up your alley, ask the seller’s to, instead, leave the home with a new, costly, and up-to-date HVAC system that will set you and your family at ease.

Another family might not be interested in tackling side projects like this. Each family will be different. The beauty of it? You get to be the one who decides.

3.) Ensure the maintenance of the major systems.

The purpose of a home inspection is to find major defects that could cause a buyer not to want to move forward. In this instance, electrical wiring, plumbing capabilities, the roof, and the foundation of the home are major systems that should certainly be evaluated. Buying a home may not need to be about extreme negotiations, but if major issues are discovered within a home inspection report that should be fixed, offer up a question and see what the sellers are willing to do. Before fighting for your ground, make sure you can stand your ground. Do yourself a favor and at least ask the tough questions.

4.) Don’t forget…time is of the essence.

During the home purchase process, time is extremely valuable. At Repair Pricer, we totally get that, which is one reason why we ensure every pricing report is completed in 24 hours or less.

After receiving a Home Inspection Report, start a conversation and take action right away.

5.) Act (…and list your home) in good faith.

Whether you are the buyer or the seller in this situation, keep in mind that living within you own home can become…comfortable. Day in and day out and year in and year out, you may not have a keen eye towards the smaller details within your home. Seeing your property from the point of view of a curious home buyer—and making the necessary adjustments—before you put your house on the market to begin with can make a big difference.

6.) Order your Repair Price Home Report.

Chances are if you’re familiar with a home inspection report, you’re used to the lengthy, detailed, and complicated report that follows. Making sense of a document that is long-winded and difficult to parse out shouldn’t be rocket science (…which is one reason why Repair Pricer came to fruition in the first place). Real estate inspection reports usually had little to no offer on insight related to what it might actually cost for all of the various projects and listed items.

Once you have your Repair Pricer document, which makes the complicated documents of yesteryear easier than ever to understand, you have the accurate repair estimates that can strengthen your negotiation skills. Armed with both proof of evidence and the knowledge of just how much it will cost, you’ll negotiate with finesse. Trust your gut, take heart, and let the negotiations unfold in your favor.

Here’s to your continued success!