It's always a bad idea to buy a house with a mold problem, right?

My husband and I found a gorgeous house in a beautiful neighborhood. Most of the houses are way out of our price range at this point in life. One was foreclosed upon and is currently for sale for half of what it was worth ten years ago (which is comparable for what the other houses in the area are currently worth).

The house needs to be fixed up. Apparently, the first couple who owned it got divorced, and then a flipper bought it and eventually foreclosed. The kitchen is completely torn apart, and the floors are scratched and need to be replaced. All but one of the bathrooms are half torn apart. The in-ground pool also definitely needs work.

The biggest problem, though, is the finished basement. There is a lot of mold on the walls of one room, and there are scattered mold spores on the ceiling and throughout. The hardwood floors were buckling from moisture.

One realtor told us the mold is caused by a poorly constructed deck. Of course, we know nothing about mold and very little about construction.

I love this house, but it will require so much work. We have a baby girl and I don't want to bring her to an unsafe place. Our plan would be to keep our current house until we're ready to move into the new one, but I don't want us to get in way over our head with repairs.

You said it was priced comp to what others places are now selling for in the area. Forget what it sold for 10 years ago that means nothing now. You need to figure out in your mind what it would be worth if everything was perfect. Then you need to subtract what the repairs will cost you to have done or do yourself. If doing the work yourself assign a value to your time. Once you come up with that number subtract transition time costs. If you can’t move in for 6 months during all this repair that is a cost to you staying where you are now. After you get that figure you need to look at what all this trouble means to you in terms of that location and that house in the end. If it is just a house to you I would subtract 5 to 10% just because. That’s what I would offer them without embarrassment. They might take it they might not.

Mold spores are all around us and in everything we touch. It takes certain conditions to cause them to grow, mostly moisture and no heat. Without knowing and seeing it the repair could run between ripping everything down to the studs to just cleaning it and drying the place out. I would say always error on the safe side.

Two years ago we bought a distressed very distressed home on short sale and did the work ourselves. We have easily improved the value of the home 4X after our initial buying price and all the materials we put in. Our goal was to work hard for a couple years and then never have a house payment the rest of our lives. It can be done but it’s not for the faint of heart.

Welcome to the forum. As you look at this house and more take pics and post them The guys here will love giving their thoughts.

I don't buy the "because of the deck" excuse. Bud's advice is good. You have to evaluate the time and effort. Not all mold is evil black mold; get it evaluated before you commit.

And find a realtor who isn't going to feed you bull.

Welcome to the site.
Low ball the offer after you do all Bud's calculation. But before you do that offer have a mold removal company come in a assess the situation. That might be expensive but you will know what you are up against.

It could be an issue from the deck. Often people don't flash the ledger board or pitch the deck away from the house. Water gets in behind it and rots the wall and runs into the basement. You should be able to tell some if the mold area is near the deck.
The bigger issue is how much other damage to the structure, apart from the floors, was caused by water.