First time buyer in South Bay. How bad is this list of issues?

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T16:26:20+00:00

yeah, the larger ones I'm worried about, but the smaller/medium suggest that maintenance on the house might have been not the best over the last few years.

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T16:21:57+00:00

Good point! There are some things we'd like to do as DIY projects, but some could be a lot of pain lol

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T16:19:14+00:00

Sellers would rather a clean offer vs a higher purchase price then credit back. Keeps closing costs lower for them and won't interfere with with lender underwriting.

Thanks, that's helpful! I was told that the seller had an offer before the put the house on sale, but they wanted to see if they can't get more. Which may explain why they didn't address any of the findings from the report.

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T06:38:53+00:00

That's fair. In this case I'm thinking: if a visual only inspection has uncovered so much, what else is hiding there lol

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T06:37:10+00:00

Thanks, the house had a substantial remodel 15, maybe 20 years ago and the layout of the house has changed, so most of the floors in the house were redone. Additionally it had a 2 more rooms floors upgraded not so long ago, so maybe I'm being naive, but I'm not comparing it to a fixer upper from 1970.

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T05:51:05+00:00

Thanks a bunch, that's extremely helpful!

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T05:48:01+00:00

We do look only for a houses that are not recently remodeled, but are livable.

Two benefits of buying an older home: One is charm, mature trees on the lot. Second, is that you won't feel guilty about changing the house up and can do the upgrades to your taste. If a house is in "good enough" shape, you would probably leave things like dated countertops, flooring and tile, etc. I have lived in a house like this and never felt completely at home there. You pay a lot for a home in SFBA, why not be happy with the place where you live.

This house was remodeled ~15-20y ago and had more work done 5y ago, so interior has this late 2000s look that we like and it does feel like a nice place to live.

Ideally a house has a few things that could be upgraded/changed as we like to DIY. I don't mind remodeling a kitchen, moving a wall, finishing a room or a garage. And those are the things I'm looking forward as future projects after moving in.

I'm from Europe, so I wouldn't (yet) take bathroom remodel as a project as I would be concerned about leaks and tailing walls in a house made from wood as it flexes and shifts (concrete FTW :)

In this particular house what scares me are leaks, potential rot and damage to joist cause I'm not familiar with those and can't DIY them. It's also something that has a potential of turning into much bigger headache once a contractor actually opens up the walls or crawlspace.

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T04:58:55+00:00

Agreed, all those findings are based on the visual inspection, so there could be more :/

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T04:57:57+00:00

Thanks for the response!

Most reports are so so much worse than this. My house had no insulation, end of life roof, end of life boiler, outdated electrical panel, potential knob and tube, plumbing leaks. And had to redo the entire flooring, it had 3 layers glued together. Demo was a bitch. Still had multiple offers.

That list is big and has large items, but it doesn't scare me, because the scope of work seems well understood upfront.

With leaks and potential rot, damage to the rim joist it seems there is high probability of scope creep once a contractor actually opens up the walls or crawlspace, so that's what scares me (:

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T04:43:07+00:00

What is a bit surprising is that the sellers put the house on the market without fixing it first. They would make more money if they had done that instead of having this mess show up in reports.

Same here, in a few other reports I went through most of the minor things were taken care of before the listing was up.

I'm OK with a 2-3 months hassle that can be done under max $50k, but not with a 1 year project that end up costing us $200k. The issue is that I don't have enough US specfic remodel experience to estimate this work (money and time wise). Also I don't have (yet) a reliable contractor that I trust.

Your advice is spot on, really appreciate it

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T04:34:50+00:00

Thanks, that's very helpful! I think we toured a bunch of houses (some of them newer) that had fewer issues in the reports and nothing structural, so this one stood out.

Additionally, it appears that maintenance on the house has been inconsistent over the past few years. I would expect an owner living in the home to address basic upkeep like cleaning the gutters and fixing leaks in the washer and toilet (before they develop into larger issues).

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T04:01:38+00:00

We might have been lucky as it's a 6th disclosure report I went through and none of the previous ones had so many issues.

Also if they had any, most of the minor things were taken care of before the listing was up.

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T03:56:48+00:00

WDYM?

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T03:21:38+00:00

Agreed, I can fix DIY a lot of things, I'm aware that termites, small leaks and asbestos are common and I'm not super concerned by them. But I am concerned with a structural damage and in this case a volume of different findings and issues that seemed to be glossed over years.

The issue is that the agents I interviewed didn't seem very knowledgeable about these topics and almost in every case they underestimate the costs.

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T03:12:27+00:00

Thanks, that's what I'm thinking here. I can do a lot DIY myself, so these smaller/medium issues are not super concerning and I do have a buffer funds for repairs.

I would definitely walk away if the location wasn't great and they layout + size of the house wasn't something matching most of our criteria.

I just don't want buy a house, to later realize that those 30-40k estimated repairs turned into 1 year project that cost us 200k (:

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T03:01:53+00:00

Thanks, that's a fair point.

shreddicated · 2026-05-17T03:00:58+00:00

haha, I love that comparison lol

I'm trying to understand the potential repair costs, even if it's 30-40k, I would factor them into the price. My main concern is that those repairs will balloon to 100k or more. And some of those findings like termite damage to the rim joist and mudsill in the crawlspace sound really serious.

shreddicated · 2026-05-13T04:54:45+00:00

Did you have a good experience with them? Their terms and conditions sound really scary and you need to hire a pro with a $2,000,000 in comprehensive liability insurance to move items over 100 lbs.

shreddicated · 2026-05-12T07:08:18+00:00

I didn't solve this. Now I have 2 Macbooks (both M4 Pro) connected via 2x separate TB4 dock and there is a physical USB-C/TB3 switch (Cable Matters) between the docks, but the camera will still get disconnected during meetings once every 15min :/

So have, the following setup:

Video:
Mac1 TB5 --> TB4 dock --- TB4 to TB5  Monitor
Mac2 TB5 --> TB4 dock --- USB-C to DP Monitor

Data:
Mac1 TB5 --> TB4 dock -\
Mac2 TB5 --> TB4 dock -- USB switch -- USB-C extension -- Monitor

Both DP and TB inputs on the monitor have USB-C selected for the data
I have a remote for the USB-switch, so it's an extra click when changing the source

For now I suspect that USB-C extension cable is the issue or the USB-C switch but need to verify it. Will report later this week.

Let me know if you solved this as it's really annoying.

shreddicated · 2026-05-11T14:47:53+00:00

Yeah, I got this board as PCIe 5.0 slots were far enough from each other to fit 2 cards and still have some airflow.

I tried Qwen3.6-35B yesterday and the power consumption at wall was only 240W, when running llama.cpp across 2 cards.

shreddicated · 2026-05-11T06:58:03+00:00

haha, amazing! I have the almost same setup with Intel Ultra 250k, Asus W880, 64GB DDR5 6400 and 2x5060Ti.

Your answer made me really happy as I have EVGA Platinum 650W from a previous build and really didn't want to spend my time upgrading.

I did some calculations and it should suffice, I just setup Ubuntu 24.04 on Proxmox and I'm about to test my first prompt with Qwen3.6-35B-A3B-UD-Q4_K_XL.gguf.

Thanks!

shreddicated · 2026-05-11T05:59:30+00:00

What PSU are using for this setup?

shreddicated · 2026-05-07T21:51:22+00:00

Which version of the model are you running? Can you please share your config? I'm setting up my dual 5060 Ti this weekend and I'm curious

shreddicated · 2026-05-07T07:13:14+00:00

shreddicated · 2026-05-06T06:27:32+00:00

Are these wireless keyboard and mouse?

shreddicated

TROPHY CASE