Advice to Real Estate Agents on helping their home buyers keep things in perspective.

1. How to Keep a Home Inspection
From Killing a Deal
• Much of keeping the deal together is about controlling emotions.
• There are many things that attack a buyers emotions during a home
inspection such as: safety items (will my children be hurt), cost to
maintain (are there too many expensive items to fix), is this a money
pit (am I being suckered), is the home eaten up with termites, are
there are asbestos fibers in the air, will my children get brain
damage from lead poisoning, is there hidden mold that will make us
all sick. Will I get lung cancer from radon. Will the sewer back up
the first night I’m there. Will the roof leak and drip on me while I’m
sleeping. The seller insulted me and I’ll not buying this home to get
back at them.
• They begin to think that a cure to these emotions is to find a
different home to buy or, rent at $750 a month for another five years.

2. Celebrate
• Keep the process positive. Buying a home is a
great decision. It’s hard to make a bad decision
when buying a home. Even if a home needs
maintenance it’s better than renting for another
five years (at $750 a month that’s $45K).
• They’ll spend their life in this home and share
holidays, graduations, births and all of life's
events. It’s a great thing they are doing,
financially and personally … don’t loose sight of
that over a paint job or GFCIs that need to be
installed or even a $5k item.

3. Prepare Your Buyers For The
Inspection:
– Explain to them that is about the major items
per the State of XX regulations.
– There are no perfect homes and some things
will be discovered that might be concerning,
that will be the case with all homes that you
purchase.
– Some seller’s can be contrary and insulting,
be prepared for that and don’t take it
personally. If you do, your emotions might
cause you to make a bad decision.

4. Select the Right
Inspector/Company
• If you select the “Poindexter” inspector for the fast moving, fast
talking client, the client will be overwhelmed by the long detailed
inspection process/report and will lose interest.
• If you couple the fast moving, fast talking inspector with the
“Poindexter” client, the client wont respect the “not detailed enough”
inspection.
• The home inspectors experience and training matters when it
comes to selecting the correct inspector. It does not matter what’s
on their resume or shirt, what matters is their knowledge, personality
and communication ability.
• A company with poor client service is an irritation which raises
emotions complicating the entire process.
• Information in the report must be accurate.

5. Encourage Clients to Attend the
Inspection
• Just reading an inspection report can be
alarming. Have your clients at the
inspection to meet the inspector and hear
and see the deficiencies; they’ll
understand the magnitude of the items
lowering emotions.

6. Knowledge is Key
• An inspector has the job of helping his clients
understand the magnitude of a deficiency. It’s
not an inspectors job to scare the clients back
into an apartment.
• When emotions get high, educate about the
subject. People immediately assume the worst
case “that the house will burn at night killing my
entire family”. “The roof will collapse three hours
after closing”. Help them understand that it’s the
not case through education about the subject.
Education will remove the fear.

7. Dealing With The Report
• Remind them that the building inspection is about attaining
knowledge of the home and identifying significant deficiencies
• Remind them that every home has defects or areas of needed
improvement.
• Remember, sellers will most always fix things that don’t work, i.e. a
defective dishwasher, a furnace that wont work, a leaking roof, a
toilet that leaks or wont flush. These are easy negotiations. Try to
avoid negotiations about things that are not black and white or, are
working but might fail in the future.
• Take the report and use a yellow marker to highlight things that are
concerning. Then go through the report again with a red marker
and red line things that are concerning and important. Then go
through again and circle the things that are really important and that
you want the seller to fix. This process will boil only the important
items to the top making the process manageable.

8. Involve the Inspector
• A good home inspector is a walking bank of accurate
knowledge. Use them to talk to your clients if clients get
cold feet.
• A good inspector will be able to keep things in
perspective and if he’s done his job right they’ll have
confidence in his opinion.
• A good inspector will help your clients deal with the
emotion and based on accurate non-emotional decisions
help them decide if this is the right home for them.
• A good inspector will assure them that he is there to help
with good advice in the future. They are not alone in the
process.

9. If the Deal Can’t be Kept Together
• Respect their decision, maintain the
relationship with them and set out to find
that right house.