My friend is looking to buy a house. In the course of his search he came across a listing for one that he likes in terms of the size and the number of rooms. The price is also attractive.
However, the listing also states the following-
"Property was Used For The Growth And/Or Manufacture Of Illigal Substances Incl. Marijuana. "
What should my friend do?
What are the effects of growing marijuana in a house? I assume it has something to do with mold because of the humidity level that is required to be maintained for the operation. Are there any other effects besides this?
How does one check for the presence of mold in a house? Does it have to be done by a professional?
Is it possible to check and remove all mold? Will it involve ripping all the dry walling and insulation and redoing the whole or is there a more cost effective way of managing the problem?
Should he keep away from the house or is it worth buying?
That sounds to me like a CYA statement, so that a buyer with remorse can’t sue to get out of the contract on the basis that it wasn’t disclosed. Do you have any basis for believing mold is problem in that house, or in general in a house where marijuana has been grown?
If he otherwise likes the house, he can always make his offer contingent on a satisfactory inspection, and if accepted, bring in a professional to check it out. The inspector should find any major problems, and then the buyer can make the seller fix the problems or cancel the deal.
He may, or may not, wish to also try to get somebody with a drug sniffing dog to run through the house to remove any remaining contraband.
Just to add that the house is not inexpensive. It is 4 bedroom house with an office set up on the main floor. It has been listed at $500,000 and is in Toronto.
The only difference is that houses similar to this one and in the same area are listed between $570,000 to $580,000.
A reputable home inspection should be a part of any home buying process and it is usually paid for by the potential buyer so the mold potential isn’t unique to this circumstance. I, personally, wouldn’t let that fact sway me if I really wanted the house and thought that I could get a good deal based on it. I am not sure how a drug-sniffing dog would react in a place that was used to cultivate it but that might be fun to watch and it isn’t a bad idea. The problem is already documented though.
Just tell your friend to focus questions to the real estate agent about the placement of the outlets for the grow lights, temperature stability in the house, proximity to the nearest police station, and emergency escape exits should an ‘emergency’ ever arise.
No, I don’t know for certain if the house has mold problems. And one can’t be sure until the house is inspected for it. My friend’s concern is that it may be a problem, and whether it is worth the investigation, or should he simply forget about it.
The thing is that people take uninformed decisions and often lose a good deal in the process.
There are various resources on the internet that state that humidity causes mold issues and marijuana growing indoors requires high levels of humidity.
Electricity, not mold would be my concern. If they look to buy make sure they get a thorough electrical inspection. Growers will install internal wiring, rewire panels, and mess with the supply to circumvent the meters.
It sounds like your buddy is a professional neurotic and part time hypochondriac who is dialing his finely honed freakout meter up to 11. He needs to look at other houses. If you look hard enough at any house you will find something to dissuade you in time and he’s already getting a case of the vapors because the previous owner was growing weed indoors? Putting this house under contract would be a gigantic waste of everyone’s time. Find another one.
**Ref Bootis **…
My thought exactly. A meth lab would render the house worthless, at least in the US.
B disclosing “drugs including marijuana” without talking in detail about anything else, they **may **be trying to buy $500K of CYA for $70-80K of premium , ei.e. price discount.
Or not. But only a detailed look by knowlegable people will tell.
Re “worthless” this is absurd. Cleaning, re-carpeting and re-painting which many people do anyway will get rid of practically any trace of meth manufacturing residue. If people are concerned that hazardous chemicals are in the drainage pipes they can have those tested and re-plumbed if necessary, but the vast majority of the time simply running water through them will clean them out.
It is not that he is neurotic. He just does not know what the effects are on a house that has been used for growing marijuana.
Some of you have suggested that he get the house inspected and that seems to be good idea.
I am sorry but I did not understand this.
The question is also what effect this bit of information has on the resale value of the house.
Suppose he buys the house and then at some time down the line he has to sell it, will he too have to include this declaration, or is it only the first time that the house sells after the weed growing op has been discovered.
If any, what effect does this information have on the resale value of the house? Is there some sort of a social stigma also attached in buying such a house?
It’s dumb to buy a house without an inspection. A good inspection will find anything major that’s wrong with the house. Legally, I don’t know about Canada, but if the house hasn’t been seized from the owner, it’s not going to get seized from the next buyer.
That the house was used to grow means the price is lower, because people think it’s a significant catch, as evidenced by your asking this question. But if there’s nothing wrong with the house, there’s nothing wrong with the house; that’s what inspections are for.
I have also advised him to go the local police station and find out the details and the exact nature of the offense. Was it only marijuana or were other drugs involved and the scale of the operation.
I mean one could be busted for growing marijuana in a few flower pots for his own consumption or it could be a large scale professional setup.
I am not sure, but it would seem that in either case the statutory declaration would be the same. Or not?
Can he get this information from the police? What do you guys think?
In California, and apparently in Canada too, houses that have something notorious about them always have that disclosed. Usually it’s for things like a murder happening there or really anything that made the news. It’s because some people wouldn’t want to live in a place where a murder happened or have to deal with the occasional looky loo. Too use an extreme example, old family friends of mine live around the corner from where OJ offed Nicole and it ruined the neighborhood for years.
That’s a long way of saying that this house might be the location of a major drug bust that made the news. Put the address into Google and see what comes up.
Nothing to worry about, IMO. If you’re a DEA agent coming to bust the house, then you want to know if it contains a meth lab with explody things. If the house has already been busted, there’s no safety hazard. As others have said, there might be a concern with creative rewiring. You’d want a licensed electrician to specifically look for (1) unsafe wiring violations and (2) bypasses of the electric meter.
Holmes actually did an episode about fixing a home that was a grow house. Season 6, episode 5, if you can find it.
In my experience, a home inspector - while invaluable - isn’t going to be able to identify mold that he/she can’t see. They’re not going to take tests for mold.
Since I bought a house with a basement, my Realtor suggested that I have the sellers pay for a radon test as part of the terms of sale. And if radon was found, have them pay for a radon mitigation system to be installed (there was and they did).
My advice for your friend would be to have an actual mold inspection done, my mold-finding specialists, separate from the inspector that he hires. Make it a stipulation of sale that any mold problem is taken care of by the sellers before the sale. Or, knock off the price of the mold removal after they’ve paid for the test. The latter might be a better option so your friend can be a part of the removal process instead of trusting that the sellers will get it taken care of properly. I had no say in my radon mitigation system installation and I regret it now.
If you can’t find that Holmes on Holmes episode…I do remember a few issues they found other than mold. There were structural and airflow/insulation problems since the growers had knocked holes in walls and ducts for sneaky ventilation. They of course fucked up the electrical panel. And on top of all that, they found asbestos in the house (not a symptom of being a grow house) that had to be removed since work was being performed that would upset the asbestos.