dkhedmo writes:

The kitchen sink and laundry room are back to back (opposite sides of
the same wall). First load of laundry, dirty water backed up into
kitchen sink (double sink, very large both sides) and was a hair's
breadth from overflowing onto the floor. Plumber's snake came back
with mud on the tip, meaning the pipe under the slab was rotted
through.

Awwwwww... ****.

It's unlikely the inspector would have been able to eyeball this
problem.

I know I've had inspectors run every single sink quite a bit to ferret
this out and run an empty load of laundry if appliances were included
in the sale to help ferret that out. But that was a bit more of an
above and beyond guy.

So the fix they all agreed upon, was to install a tub for the washer
to dump into, a laundry pump (Liberty 403, for those who care), and
30-odd feet of pipe going up into the attic, over, and down to where
the plumbing leaves the house to connect to the street. Took one guy
about 1/2 a day. FWIW, it was the young guys who wanted the $2400, and
claimed it would have taken the two of them a day and a half.

Man that sucks.

I'd be curious what a real estate attorney might say about that
situation of a latent defect that couldn't be detected on inspection
yet is such that the seller had to - to a reasonable experienced
person's view-- be aware of the problem. Then again for $1200 it's
probably not worth litigating over.

--
Todd H.
http://www.toddh.net/