EddieWalker
Epic Contributor
Get a roll of blue tape and look at all your tile. It's easier to get somebody to come back and fix a grout issue, or bad touch up paint now, then after you have moved in and paid everyone their last check. Then put a piece of tape everywhere that you see an issue. Same thing with your cabinets, counters and fixtures. If you see something, put some blue tape on it. Do not rely on your memory. If you find a lot of issues, take pictures too. It's not unheard of for a guy to come back, fix a few things and remove all the tape to pretend that he fixed everything.
Open and close every door. Look at the spacing around the door and the frame. Especially at the top of the door. It's crazy how many times I've seen the opening at the top of the door be bigger on one side then the other.
Do the deadbolts work freely and is are the door seals good? It's not uncommon to install the dead bolt so it's loose because it's easy to open and close with a key, but then there are gaps around the seals that let cold wind in. Exterior doors are steady work for me.
Turn on every light switch and make sure it does something. It's crazy, but it's almost common to find switches in a house that nobody knows what they go to.
Double check your three way light switches to make sure they work from both sides. I was in a very high end, 5,000 square foot house on the lake that had a three way switch in the hall to the garage that didn't work from both ends. They just got used to it and only mentioned to it when I was all done with a project for them and was getting ready to leave. Turned out that one switch had the wires backwards and it had been that way for over a decade.
Is drainage good around the outside of the house? any standing water?
Do you have the leftover materials so you can match them in the future if you need to make a repair? Paint cans? Stain cans? Grout? colored caulking? Same with flooring materials. Be sure to have the box it came it. Most have lifetime warranties that are totally worthless. If something goes wrong and it's their fault, they will send you a replacement for free. They don't do anything else, that's up to you. So you need to know what you have on your floor so you can try to find it if you need more. I'm doing a bathroom tile floor repair later this month where the plumbers broke through the tile to get to a leaking pipe. They only have a few pieces of tile that where leftover from when the house was built two decades ago and that tile has long been discontinued. They have spent months looking for it. Since they don't have enough tile to remove all the broken pieces, I'm going to cut some in place and use the full pieces that they do have for the middle of the bathroom. I think it will work, but I have to be perfect and not make any mistakes to make it look like it was the original floor. The more materials that you have left over, the better off you will be when you need them in the future!!!!!
I also tell clients to save the boxes of their fixtures. If a faucet starts to leak in a few years, most of the big name manufacturers will overnight you a new cartridge to replace the leaking one. They just need to know the model number of the leaking faucet. Almost nobody saves this information, and 90% of the time, they end up buying a new one when they could of gotten the repair parts for free.
Keep a list after you move in of things you find that need fixing. Here in Texas, the warrantee is for one year. If it's a small thing, just write it down so you don't forget it when you call for things to be fixed.
Open and close every door. Look at the spacing around the door and the frame. Especially at the top of the door. It's crazy how many times I've seen the opening at the top of the door be bigger on one side then the other.
Do the deadbolts work freely and is are the door seals good? It's not uncommon to install the dead bolt so it's loose because it's easy to open and close with a key, but then there are gaps around the seals that let cold wind in. Exterior doors are steady work for me.
Turn on every light switch and make sure it does something. It's crazy, but it's almost common to find switches in a house that nobody knows what they go to.
Double check your three way light switches to make sure they work from both sides. I was in a very high end, 5,000 square foot house on the lake that had a three way switch in the hall to the garage that didn't work from both ends. They just got used to it and only mentioned to it when I was all done with a project for them and was getting ready to leave. Turned out that one switch had the wires backwards and it had been that way for over a decade.
Is drainage good around the outside of the house? any standing water?
Do you have the leftover materials so you can match them in the future if you need to make a repair? Paint cans? Stain cans? Grout? colored caulking? Same with flooring materials. Be sure to have the box it came it. Most have lifetime warranties that are totally worthless. If something goes wrong and it's their fault, they will send you a replacement for free. They don't do anything else, that's up to you. So you need to know what you have on your floor so you can try to find it if you need more. I'm doing a bathroom tile floor repair later this month where the plumbers broke through the tile to get to a leaking pipe. They only have a few pieces of tile that where leftover from when the house was built two decades ago and that tile has long been discontinued. They have spent months looking for it. Since they don't have enough tile to remove all the broken pieces, I'm going to cut some in place and use the full pieces that they do have for the middle of the bathroom. I think it will work, but I have to be perfect and not make any mistakes to make it look like it was the original floor. The more materials that you have left over, the better off you will be when you need them in the future!!!!!
I also tell clients to save the boxes of their fixtures. If a faucet starts to leak in a few years, most of the big name manufacturers will overnight you a new cartridge to replace the leaking one. They just need to know the model number of the leaking faucet. Almost nobody saves this information, and 90% of the time, they end up buying a new one when they could of gotten the repair parts for free.
Keep a list after you move in of things you find that need fixing. Here in Texas, the warrantee is for one year. If it's a small thing, just write it down so you don't forget it when you call for things to be fixed.
