Before you write the offer
11 things to ask before you write an offer
By Ryan Garvey, Broker Associate, Compass · Updated
Bring this to the showing and again to the inspection. It is what inspectors look at in a Denver house, what I have seen their reports turn up across a lot of closings, and what you can notice yourself on a walk-through. I’ll be at yours to help you decide what is a walk-away, what is a negotiation, and what is just an old house. Nothing here is a reason to walk away on its own — it is a reason to know what you are buying before you name a number.
Sewer line
A general inspection stops at the foundation wall, so ask for a separate sewer scope, where a plumber runs a camera from the cleanout to the main. Half the Denver houses I have closed on were plumbed with clay tile, and the scope reports I have read keep finding cottonwood roots in the joints.
If nobody looks
A replacement that has to cross the sidewalk and the street runs into five figures, and the city sets the schedule, not you.
Electrical panel
The inspector pulls the panel cover, reads the label, compares the amperage with what the house is asking for, and looks for double-tapped breakers and scorch marks on the bus bar. Federal Pacific and Zinsco are the two names I have learned to dread on that report; when either one shows up, we stop talking about the kitchen.
If nobody looks
A panel swap is a few thousand dollars, and until it happens some insurers will not write the policy at all.
Crawlspace or basement
This is where the inspector goes with a flashlight, looking for standing water, white efflorescence bleeding through the foundation wall, a vapour barrier or bare dirt, and joists that were sistered well or badly. On a showing you can do one useful thing yourself: open the basement door and breathe in. A dry basement smells like nothing at all, and mould has a sweetness most people recognise.
If nobody looks
Drainage and structural work start in the thousands and climb fast once the foundation itself is part of the conversation.
Furnace and water heater
The inspector reads the age off both serial plates, runs the furnace, looks at the flame, and checks the flue for rust staining and back-draft. On a showing, look for an install date on a sticker or written on the side of each unit, because a twenty-two-year-old furnace is a different house than a six-year-old one at the same price.
If nobody looks
Two appliances that were installed the same week tend to fail the same winter, and that is several thousand dollars arriving in February.
Roof
The inspector counts the layers at the rake edge and looks hard at the flashing around the chimney and in the valleys, because that is where roofs actually leak, and I ask the listing agent for the hail and claim history on the address. When the report comes back, I help you sort out which kind of roof this is: an insurance claim the seller should file before closing, or a line item we negotiate.
If nobody looks
A tear-off on a Denver bungalow is a five-figure job, and a hail claim that ages out of its filing window is money nobody can get back.
Grading and drainage
The inspector walks the perimeter and follows the downspouts to where they end, which on report after report I have read is six inches from the wall they are supposed to protect. You can see the slope of the ground on a showing, and it matters: Denver sits on expansive clay that swells when it gets wet and shrinks when it dries, so ground falling back toward the house is not a landscaping problem, it is a structural one.
If nobody looks
Regrading and extending downspouts is a few hundred dollars today; the cracked foundation wall it prevents is tens of thousands later.
Windows and the envelope
Notice on a showing whether the windows are single-pane and whether any have fog between the panes, which means a failed seal; the inspector will look for air leaks at the sills, the rim joist and the attic hatch. Ask the seller for a year of gas bills, because that is what this house really costs to heat in January, rather than the number implied by the photos.
If nobody looks
Replacing the windows in a whole house is a five-figure project, and until you do it you are paying for them every month on the gas bill.
Plumbing supply
The inspector finds where the supply enters the house and looks under the sinks: galvanised steel rusts shut from the inside, polybutylene fails without warning, and copper or PEX is what you hope to read on the report. On a showing, run the top-floor tap while someone flushes a toilet downstairs, because that is the water pressure you will actually live with.
If nobody looks
Repiping a two-storey house runs into five figures, and a growing number of insurers will not cover polybutylene at any price.
Radon
Get a radon test on every house, whatever the zone map says, because radon varies house to house on the same street and the map does not know about your basement. Get a new one, too: I have seen sellers hand over a result from four years ago, run before they finished the basement and changed how the air moves through it.
If nobody looks
Mitigation is one of the cheapest fixes on this list and takes a day, but only if we find it early enough to put it on the seller.
Permits and additions
The city's permit record is public, and I will pull it with you so we can hold it up against what the listing describes: the finished basement, the deck, the garage conversion, the back bedroom with no egress window. Unpermitted work does not have to kill a deal, but you should be the one deciding that, before the appraiser decides it for you.
If nobody looks
Permitting work after the fact means opening finished walls, and a bedroom the city has never heard of is a bedroom the appraisal will not count.
The neighbours' houses
Look at what else on the block went up the same year with the same builder, and at what those owners have already had to replace. I will pull the sold listings two doors down with you; they talk about sewer lines, foundations and roofs in a way the house you are standing in never will.
If nobody looks
Skip it and you buy the street's expensive lesson twice — once when they learned it, and again when it reaches your house.
Ryan Garvey · Broker Associate, Compass · (802) 236-7346 · garveysellsdenver.com
A buyer’s checklist, not an inspection. Send me the address and I’ll help you work through it, then sit in on the inspection with you.