When buying a new home one often gets caught up in all the excitement making it easy to overlook some important documents that are meant to protect you from getting something you didn’t pay for. Some important document you should pay close attention to are any disclosures.
Disclosure statements, which can come in a variety of forms, are the buyer’s opportunity to learn as much as they can about the property and the seller’s experience in it.
Potential seller disclosures range from knowledge of leaky windows to loud neighbors to information about a major construction or development project nearby. Not only do disclosure documents serve to inform buyers, they can protect the sellers from future legal action. It is the seller’s chance to lay out anything that can negatively affect the value, usefulness or enjoyment of the property.
Disclosure laws vary from state to state, even down to the city and county level. California has some of the most stringent disclosure requirements. Often, sellers there are required to complete or sign off on over 50 pages of documents, such as a Natural Hazards Disclosure Statement, Lead Based Paint Disclosure, Advisories about Market Conditions and even Megan’s Law Disclosures.Depending on where you live, sellers can be on the hook for what they disclose (or fail to) for up to ten years.
Disclosure typically comes in the form of boilerplate documents (put together by the local or state Realtor association), where the seller is responsible for answering a series of yes/no questions detailing their home and their experience there.
Although the disclosure law protects a home buyer, to a certain extent it also protects the seller. Once a disclosure statement is accepted and the deal goes through, a buyer can’t go after the seller later on when or if something goes wrong with the property later on down the road.
Either way, the main idea is to make sure and look at the disclosures carefully before you invest in a new home. You may be glad you did in the long run.