Is mold in your new home? We know how important your family’s health and safety are, and we understand that you aren’t about to take any risks when it comes to their security. Before you close on a new home, you’ll certainly want to schedule a mold inspection and possible remediation. Families most commonly make a move when their nuclear household grows – whether tiny infants are joining the family or older parents are moving in with adult sons or daughters. Regarding babies and the elderly particularly, air quality is crucially important. Therefore, you’ll have to do a bit of cost-benefit analysis before closing on a new place of residence to evaluate whether the amount you’d pay (in money and time) for a mold check and removal is bigger or smaller than the amount you’d save on this potential new property. You won’t want to pay what seems like a steal only to find out a month later that you’ll have to sell your right arm to take care of a hazardous mold problem.
We suggest you respectfully request that the seller of your potential new home schedule a mold inspection – or, if necessary, open your wallet and fund an inspection yourself. Four hundred dollars for a test is mere pittance in comparison with the tens of thousands of dollars a mold remediation might cost you. In a silver lining, if the test does reveal the presence of toxic mold, you all of a sudden find yourself with the upper hand in total price negotiation: you could request that the seller lower the asking price, ask the previous owner to deal with the mold remediation on his or her dime, or shut the door in the face of this deal and try again with a new, less moldy property.
Let us imagine, hypothetically, you purchased a home and then, within months, discovered a smattering of black mold spots in every corner of your home. What is a new homeowner to do? If the seller knew about the mold and was under legal obligation to tell you (the buyer) about it and did not, you could likely file a “failure to disclose” lawsuit. But, as we mentioned, that’s more time and more money. You’re still better off getting the mold inspection and test before closing on a new home.
