I bought this property in November of 2018 with tenants in place. The house was in decent shape at the time but I knew I would have to get the tenants out in order to fix it up a bit and sell it.
We have some issues getting them out and then they moved without telling us in the middle of the winter leaving the heat off and windows open. The pipes froze and flooded the property. We had to redo much of the flooring, drywall, and the kitchen which we were hoping to save.
We got the house fixed up and then put it on the market to sell. Then the inspection for the buyer found the foundation was not as deep as it was supposed to be. We had a structural engineer look at the foundation and he told us:
"This is not a house, this is a shed. It needs to be torn down."
He was a huge jerk and would not even recommend a foundation company because he said the house was a shed. I used to have a good foundation guy but we had a falling out after he only replaced half the foundation on a house, okay maybe he was not that good...
We offered to give the buyers a $10,000 credit for the foundation and they agreed but would never sign the amendment. They said they were waiting on their lender. Then the lender approved it and they still would not sign and finally the day before closing they decided to cancel.
I cannot blame them for canceling but it would have been nice if they did not drag it on for weeks.
We had a company give us a bid to fix the foundation and it did not go well. The guy was professional and nice but he started to add up numbers and I knew we were in trouble. As soon as he said it would cost $100 per linear foot to excavate I lost interest. His bid was $84,000 to install piers and steel footers, and all kinds of other stuff.
The question now is whether we fix the foundation or keep it as a rental. I know I can find a cheaper company to repair the foundation and we are meeting with one tomorrow.
Yes, if I had gotten an inspection I would have found this issue, but I get a lot of deals because I act fast and do not get inspections as well. So it evens out in the end.
