Portland Seller Home Disclosures – Watch out!

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It’s the plot of a thousand movies. A young couple moves in to their brand-new home, only to find that a death occurred there years ago and there’s a ghost who lives in the upstairs bedroom.

Other than the poltergeist, how realistic is this scenarios? Aren’t real estate agents required to disclose the history of the property if it includes significant crimes, deaths, occult activity, or other shady goings-on? In Oregon at least, the answer is no.

According to Oregon Revised Statutes 93.275, all “material facts” must be disclosed by the seller in the process of selling the home. In other words, anything that involves the physical home, and any information about the property, sewer, water, electrical, etc. is information that you, the buyer, have a right to be told about.

What real estate agents and the sellers they represent aren’t required to tell you are the non-material facts — things like crime data (even inside the home they are selling) and the demographics of the neighborhood.

Of course, a good Portland real estate agent should point you in the direction of the appropriate information, but here’s a good place to get started: portlandmaps.com. Whether you’re looking for data about crime in the neighborhood or just curious about the name of the stream that runs near the property, this website by the City of Portland makes it very easy to do your own research. Simply punch in a physical address and click through a dozen or more maps that describe everything you might want to know.
No “ghost map” yet.

Disclosures are one of those things that buyers and sellers may not think about too much, but real estate agents do, a lot. There are certain things that we have to discuss with the buyer before the deal goes through, including whether there is lead paint in the home, any radon gas issues, and if the woodstove, if present, is certified.

In REO and short sale transactions, real estate agents are required to emphasize to the potential buyers that the process could be lengthy and the deal has a higher likelihood of falling through than in a standard real estate transaction.

So if your real estate agent seems to be glossing over an issue with a potential home, makes buying a home through short sale sound easy, or otherwise fails to disclose knowledge that you have a right to, speak up! It might be time to find a new agent.
For a list of required disclosures for Oregon real estate agents, check out this realtor.com list. Or, just ask your Portland real estate agent!

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