FHA is VERY STRINGENT. My buyer had an FHA loan and I nearly beaned her
over the things she and the inspector picked at. Considering she was
probably moving out of section 8 housing into my house which was PRISTINE I
was not a happy camper. It took quite some negotiation to get them to
overlook a 1/8 inch crack at the corner of one window, for example!

Good luck. Let FHA do the dirty work for you, perhaps then your buyer will
capitulate.

"Gren" wrote in message
om...
Update:

Lots of very helpful posts, thank you. Negotiations have taken an
interesting turn. The seller does not want to pay for any of the
needed repairs, and instead, give us a flat fee in the form of a check
at closing. Let me also add some details. We're going into this
house purchase with a CFHA loan, meaning, as first time home buyers,
we can put less down at closing and lock in a lower interest rate..
BUT. the house has to pass fairly stringent FHA inspection guidlines.
The fact that the seller wants to give us a little money in the form
of a check at closing makes it difficult to address these issues
before then, and consequently, the fha inspector will most likely put
the kibosh on insuring the bank for our mortgage. (basically, we
won't be able to get a mortgage unless the seller deals with these
issues BEFORE closing) Also, the amount the seller wants to give us
is about 1/5th of the estimated repair costs, so.. this ain't gonna
fly.

We're going to contact the bank and talk to them about options of my
flexible loan types and more importantly, get some contractor
estimates for the major repairs to approach the seller with.

The roof, the load-bearing beam, the chimney (needs to be capped) and
electrical all need to be looked at and us given an estimate for their
repair. Armed with those estimates, I go to the seller and ask him to
address these issues. If he doesn't, we'll just walk away.