Buying a house with a pool...what should I know while walking with the inspector?

[Newtopoolsguy]

Hello to everyone.

As you can tell from my title I am in the process of buying a home with a beautiful outdoor pool...but I know nothing about them. Now, I imagine this forum has someone just like me pop in at least 5-10 a day and I'm sure you veterans get tired of saying the same old things to everyone of us, so I'm apologizing in advance.

First of all I just found your forum and it seems to be a great source of knowledge that I will be making great use of from now on. It's great to find a place that I can scour for hours to find all the answers to my questions and I'm sure it'll also be a place to find all the wonderful ideas that could be done to make my setup even better in the future.

For now though, I'm going through pool school and getting the basics of it all down which is great and necessary, but since I'm walking through the home/pool with the inspector on Wednesday I'm starting to feel like I understanding the concepts of pool care might not be as important as...well, something I don't know that I should be looking for. I don't want to be kicking myself a month after closing because I didn't use the inspector to investigate some obvious problems that should be addressed prior to sealing the deal on the home.

I'm not sure exactly what I'm looking for here so feel free to comment with "what do you want from us" etc., but if any of you seasoned veterans could look at the details I know in my signature and then say something like "whoa, that's a bunch of old stuff that'll have to be replaced in the year" or "OMG, none of that should still be working" or "that's a great setup and it'll last as long as you keep up with the maintenance" etc. that would be awesome. The pool looks like it's been well taken care of over the years and it seems that the house has no deferred maintenance so I don't think they just cleaned it up to sell.

I can see what looks like a repaired crack in the bottom of the pool and I'm sure the inspector will be able to tell me the details or likelihood of it being a problem again is. The flagstone around it is quite extensive and I don't see any cracking so it seems (in my inexperienced eyes) to be built solidly...or whatever word is appropriate here.

This is so spur of the moment, but I wanted to get this on here tonight. Here's some pictures of the pool Zillow: Real Estate, Apartments, Mortgage Home Values in the US and I'll try to upload some pics of the equipment area w/ pump, heater, etc. as soon as I can get them off my phone onto the computer and then on the forum.

Thanks in advance,
Dustin

 

[pooldv]

Welcome to TFP!

Congrats on the new pool! Looks great! Pool equipment seems to be fine from here.

 

[Swampwoman]

Gorgeous pool! Welcome to TFP!

You have a luxury that I didn't when I purchased my foreclosed home: access to pool-related purchase records. In your shoes I'd ask my agent about requiring the transfer of all equipment purchase material: dates, warranty, date of last paster job and vendor, etc. if you can get the records and vendor info, it may help down the road in terms of maintenance, equipment age, planned replacement as opposed to reactive, etc.

In terms of future needs, be sure to get one of the recommended test kits, either the tf100 or Taylor k2006 specifically (available at TFTestkits.net ) -- Trouble-free pool life is all about water balance and these kits can test the critical [fc/cya][/FC/cya] ratio, which is the key to proper water sanitation.

Fingers crossed the deal works out because that's a gorgeous pool

 

[Isaac-1]

Welcome, you are right we get a number of people coming in that are in your position. Now for the good, and the bad

From what I can see in your photos everything looks as good as can be expected for a pool of that age at least as far a simple visual inspection goes.

Now for the bad, it is my experience here judging from numerous reports from people in your position over the years that the typical pre-home purchase pool inspection goes into about as much detail as the observation I put into the above statement, which is very little. Often these pool inspections are done by home inspectors that know little about pools beyond it holds water and the plumbing does not look like it is leaking. Many / most? never even turn on equipment to confirm operation. Also many pool problems can be hard to spot on a single spot check, such as slow pool leaks which may be either from the plumbing or the pool shell.

 

[Rollercoastr]

That is a beautiful pool! The TFP experts are amazingly patient with us newbies and our relentlessly redundant questions.

Often these pool inspections are done by home inspectors that know little about pools beyond it holds water

I paid for a separate pool inspector, and that peace of mind was well-worth the $300 he charged. The "home inspector" ( /con artist) lectured me about the importance and application of window caulk for 15 minutes, and then we went to the utility room. He pointed to an Intermatic timer attached to a massive power panel and said, "that controls all of your landscape lighting". I said, "hmm, I've never seen outdoor lighting powered by a panel that looks like it belongs in a locomotive." He was still standing his ground about how the timer controls the lighting of shrubbery when the pool inspector walked into the room, excused himself and threw the lever on the Intermatic. I still laugh when I think about the look on the home inspectors face as the pool pump started.

 

[Newtopoolsguy]

Thank you all for your great comments. The TF-100 testing kit is on the way. I had already planned on having a separate pool inspector come out, but I'm glad to hear from you all that it's worth the extra money. Rollercoastr, your story is awesome! I'd love to have seen it happen in person.

I asked my real estate agent for the pool records/repairs and he said that those things are normally handed over at close. I don't want to be too pushy, but is it normal to inspect the pool blind without any knowledge of past repairs or without even knowing the date of install? I'm sure a good pool inspector could tell some things, but should I push for at least the repair date and company for the sealed crack on the floor?

My plan for now is to keep reading the pool ABC's and then figure out how to test the water with the kit at the house (he left his kit by the pool for prospective buyers to test it), how to cycle the pump on/off, how to check the filter and where to find date of purchase, how to test the spa functions for functionality (found the owner's manual online for the control center), and whatever else I can find out that I need to tinker with to verify it's in working status.

I guess I have more time on my hands since the real estate agent scheduled only the home inspector for Wednesday. Unless he strongly recommends a certain pool inspector I'll probably use google to find a pretty reputable one in the area, or maybe I'll try to ask some pool places in Garden Ridge for any recommendations...not sure if that would be a good idea or not. If any of you guys are in the San Antonio or Garden Ridge area please throw out a recommendation if you have one.

Thanks again for the help and I'll keep you posted with updates.
Dustin

 

[max2k]

In the order of severity:

if you have a luxury to perform 'bucket test' for slow leak it would be great but it takes a day IIRC.

check the seam between the upper edge of tiles and flagstones- that place is prone to be built 'wrong' when rigid grout is used to seal it and the deck is bonded to the pool wall below. These problems might lead to cracks of the grout, tile separation or even pool wall cracks. Not sure how you going to incorporate fix as part of the deal. If they had such problems in the past then examining top row of the tiles would reveal non- uniformity which is sure sign you're going to have them too.

Please check pool lights if they are present and if they have GFI in series and working. Replacing lights can be a pain.

Equipment needs to be checked for operation and leaks under highest speed/pressure. Look if return returns dust from the filter- could be a sign of crack inside the filter.

I did nothing of the above and had to fix tiles & lights within the first year. Luckily the rest seems to be ok.

 

[Rollercoastr]

is it normal to inspect the pool blind without any knowledge of past repairs or without even knowing the date of install?

It's definitely worth asking. In my case, the sellers had acquired the property 8 years ago as a foreclosure. It was immediately apparent that the house and pool had suffered from a lack of maintenance for some time. I didn't ask for documentation of work because it was clear there had been very little, and I planned to remodel the pool anyway. Even so, I made some bad assumptions. To my novice eye, the equipment was ancient and barely worth mentioning. In reality, my ancient-looking filter and even more obsolete-looking timer are both still in production.

Based on your listing pics, it appears that my sellers and your sellers have little in common - a very good thing for you!