First Time Home Buyer Inspection Results Recommentation

[Carolyn Chupa]

Hi! I'm a first time home buyer and looking for advice on a property I am currently under contract with. I got my inspection results back today and am wondering if I'm in over my head on some of these results.

Townhouse specs: 1 bed/1 bath, 800 square feet with a yard and off street parking (no reserved spots) in Denver, CO for $362k

Inspection recommended actions:

• Install gutters
• Cracks in brick- need to get a structural engineer to come and look
• The foundation is partially visible from areas of the crawlspace- need to have structural engineer look at this
  
• "Medium cracks" in sewage line
• Plumbing supply lines consisted of multiple materials to included galvanized pipe and potentially lead pipe
• Water heater 20 years old
• Furnace is 20 years old
• There is a negative slope at one side of the home that increases the potential for water pooling

Any recommendations on this possible investment would be greatly appreciated!

[Moises R Cosme]

Carolyn, 

Gutters:  this is not a huge issue; gutters are relatively inexpensive and easy to get done. 

Cracks in the brick:  how old is the house?  Depending on its age, cracks in the brick may be  a normal occurence or a serious problem (if the house is newer & you have cracks in the brick, this is an issue)

The foundation: again, the level of concern on this item depends on the age of the house.. If the house is older, you can expect to have this kind of thing come up (and be expensive to repair); if its a newer house and you have a foundation problem the builder may have done a bad job.

Plumbing: sounds like the house is older, lead pipes are a problem - this is the first item where I would consider moving on from the property.  

Water heater:  high end water heaters run $2800 installed, I would not be concerned about this

Furnace:  a good furnace has a useful life of 30 years

Negative slope:  this is likely the root cause for the foundation issue

Key question:  how much is the house going to worth if you repair these issues?  Keep in mind that you do not add value to a property by fixing a foundation or plumbing (these are baseline expectations, any Buyer expects that the house will have a good foundation and good plumbing).  So if there isn't a really high upside those types of issues would tell me to exercise the inspection clause & move on. 

I hope this helps.