Jeebis Zombiedancing Kee-rikey

[textualdeviance]

This saga with Chez Fou? Still not over. Now the new owner is bringing up lawyers because Home Depot's subcontractor says they don't see a problem with the work they did and blah blah blah.

Dude. You signed off on the inspection. You signed off on the house. The warranty for the repair has been transferred to you. Welcome to home ownership. We are not your landlord, and therefore it's your freaking problem. Are you going to call us again in six months when something else breaks?

I feel the most sorry for our agent, who has been a beacon of patience and sanity in all of this.

Comments

[noveldevice.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure why lawyers would be your concern. Home Depot's, maybe, but why are they running to you?

[textualdeviance.livejournal.com]

They apparently think that we somehow misrepresented the house as being in good repair. Because we're supposedly psychic, and knew that the people we'd hired to do the work didn't do it right.

[falcongirl.livejournal.com]

Did you list the leak on the seller's disclosure?

[textualdeviance.livejournal.com]

We didn't, because it was a little thing (a failing weld on a single copper pipe joint) that had been fully repaired. Surrounding pipes were also inspected by the same plumber, and he said they were fine, so we didn't think it merited a mention any more than other minor repairs that had been done before.

When the buyer's inspector came through, he noticed that that chunk of ceiling had been repaired and asked about it. We explained in full, and that satisfied the buyer enough that he signed off on it.

But the leak has nothing to do with the current problem anyway. We've seen pics of it, and because it only happens when the shower's on, it's pretty obvious that it's a problem with the shower install, rather than that pipe joint, which is in a different place, and was a constant drip.

Because the shower install happened while we were moved out, it never got a full workout after it was finished. We ran water through it, and I'm sure his inspector did, too, and we didn't see any problems, so we assumed all was well.

I feel bad for the guy--it's a little disturbing to have your new house break shortly after you move in--but this is really kind of a "welcome to home ownership" moment, IMHO. "Used" houses are going to have problems. They don't come with warranties like new construction does. If we had been hiding an ongoing, huge problem that was never repaired, sure, he'd have cause to complain. But as far as we knew, everything had been done professionally and was functional, and thus could be represented as such.