Inherited a House That Needs a Ton of Repairs? Here’s What You Should Do

That’s a question I hear a lot.

Hey guys, I’m Brad, the Probate House Guy. I’m an active real estate investor and a licensed real estate agent in the state of Georgia. Over the last 10 years, I’ve helped more than 300 sellers get their properties sold, whether that meant buying the property for cash or listing it the traditional way.

I’ve made these videos because we’ve learned a thing or two about probate and estates over the years, and I’m just sharing what I’ve learned.

One quick disclaimer: I’m not an attorney, and I don’t claim to be one. This isn’t legal advice. If you have a specific legal question about an inherited property or probate, I highly recommend talking with a probate attorney or real estate attorney about your situation. 

With that out of the way, let’s talk about what you can actually do when you inherit a house that needs a lot of work.

• You Don’t Have to Do Every Repair Yourself
• Do You Have the Money to Repair the Inherited House?
• What If the Inherited House Needs Major Repairs?
• Who Buys a House That Needs a Lot of Work?
• Why Investor Offers May Be Similar
• Be Careful With an Offer That’s Way Outside the Range
• Should You List an Inherited House That Needs Repairs?
• Selling As-Is vs. Fixing Up the House
• What Should You Do With an Inherited House That Needs Repairs?
• Want to Sell Your Inherited House for Cash?

Should You Repair the Inherited House or Sell It As-Is?

When you inherit a house that needs a ton of repairs, you basically have a few options.

You can fix it yourself.

You can pay someone else to fix it.

Or you can sell the property as-is, with all of the repairs still needed.

The right choice depends on your situation.

If you’re thinking about fixing the house yourself, you need to be honest with yourself about whether you actually know what you’re doing.

Do you have the skills?

Do you have the time?

Do you have the patience?

Those questions matter more than you might think.

I’ve been renovating houses for a long time, and one thing I’ve learned is that you almost always end up spending more money and more time than you originally thought.

You open something up and discover something else is wrong. Then you have to fix that. Then you notice something else that needs attention.

Before you know it, you’ve got a can-of-worms house.

You fix one thing, and suddenly another thing looks bad. So you fix that. Then something else needs to be addressed.

And suddenly you’ve spent a ton of money and time renovating the property.

Be Honest About Your Skills, Time and Patience

I’m a pretty handy person. I can work on cars, work on houses, weld, and I built my own house.

But even I have to be realistic with myself sometimes.

Do I really have the time to take on another project?

You can ask my wife. There are plenty of things around my own house that still need to be finished.

I built my house four years ago, and there are still things I didn’t get done when we built it because we ran out of time or money. Then there are the projects I’ve added since.

Every house I’ve ever owned has had a list of things that needed to be done.

And the older I get, the more I realize that being capable of doing something doesn’t necessarily mean I should do it myself.

There are certain things I just don’t have the patience for anymore.

Painting is a perfect example.

I actually hate painting.

I can do it. I’m pretty good at cutting in with a brush, and I have the equipment to spray. I’ve painted cars before. I have airless sprayers and HVLP sprayers.

But I don’t enjoy it.

For me, it’s the prep work and the cleanup. If you use a sprayer, you need to clean it properly as soon as you’re finished. Otherwise, you quickly learn why that’s important.

Painting is just too time-consuming and monotonous for me.

My wife actually likes painting. Although, after being together for 15 years, I’ve learned that she usually gets about 80% of the way through a painting project before she gets bored and hands me the paintbrush or roller.

So I finish the last 20%.

That’s just the way it is.

These days, I see the value in paying my painter, Raul. He’s been painting houses for me since 2018. Can I do it myself? Absolutely. Do I have the tools? Yep.

I just don’t have the patience.

And sometimes, paying someone else is worth it simply because it saves you time.

You Don’t Have to Do Every Repair Yourself

When you’re dealing with an inherited property that needs repairs, you need to look at the project realistically.

Maybe there are certain things you can handle yourself.

Maybe there are other things you should subcontract.

Doing everything yourself isn’t always the best idea. Individual tasks can take a long, long time, especially when you’re trying to tackle an entire house.

So be honest with yourself.

Do you have the expertise?

Do you have the time?

Do you have the patience?

And perhaps most importantly, do you actually want to spend your time doing this?

Do You Have the Money to Repair the Inherited House?

The next question is money.

A lot of times, we talk to people who inherited a house and simply don’t have the money—or don’t want to put their personal money—into fixing it up.

I can relate to that because I’m currently helping my dad and his sister probate my grandfather’s estate.

My grandfather passed away a few months ago, and we’re selling my grandparents’ house. I have a lot of memories in that house. My dad and his siblings grew up there.

They’re selling it because they all have their own houses, children and grandchildren, and they simply don’t want the hassle of dealing with another property.

So they’ve decided to sell the house as-is.

In this particular case, the house is actually in pretty good condition. My grandfather took immaculate care of it.

That’s where my handiness came from—from my grandfather to my dad to me. We’re all pretty handy people.

But the house is dated.

The kitchen needs to be updated. It still has some original 1960s appliances, and some of them are still working because my grandfather kept fixing them over the years. Hats off to him for keeping an oven from 1965 going all these years.

But while the house is in good condition, it needs some updating.

My dad and his sisters could put money into the property. They have the money to do it. They just don’t want to.

And that’s okay.

They’ve decided that selling the inherited house as-is makes the most sense for them.

If you have an inherited property you’re trying to figure out what to do with, we’d be happy to talk through your options with you. You can visit ProbateHouseGuy.com and fill out the form, and someone from our team can get in touch with you.

What If the Inherited House Needs Major Repairs?

My grandparents’ house is a good example of a property that can be sold as-is because it’s fundamentally in good shape.

Someone could move into it tomorrow. It’s dated, but the appliances work, the house works, and it’s livable.

That’s different from some of the properties we see.

Over the years, I’ve bought a lot of houses that were in really bad shape, including hoarder houses and properties that needed way too many repairs.

Sometimes homeowners get in way over their heads.

Can you list a house like that on the market?

Absolutely.

But you need to understand what kind of buyer you’re likely to attract.

Have an Inherited House You’re Not Sure What to Do With?

If you’ve inherited a property and you’re trying to figure out whether you should fix it, sell it as-is, or explore other options, we’d be happy to talk with you about the property. Simply fill out the form below and a member of our team will reach out to you.

Who Buys a House That Needs a Lot of Work?

If a house needs a ton of work, you might get an individual homeowner with a bunch of cash who wants to buy the property, fix it up and live there.

But there aren’t a huge number of people looking for that kind of project.

A lot of the offers are likely to come from investors.

And when investors look at a property like that, we’re basically looking at it as a math problem.

We look at what we think we can sell the finished property for.

Then we estimate what it’s going to cost to fix it.

We consider what it will cost to hold and sell the property.

We need to make a certain amount of profit.

Then we work backward to determine what we can offer.

That’s basically how it works.

Why Investor Offers May Be Similar

You might talk to several investors and notice that their offers are all relatively close to each other.

That’s because the house is worth what it’s worth.

Comparable sales in the area help determine what a property could sell for once it’s fixed up.

We’re not just making up a number and saying, “I’m going to sell this for X.”

We’re looking at the other houses in the neighborhood that have been fixed up and sold, and we’re trying to determine what we could realistically get for the property.

Then we work backward from there.

The repair estimates might vary. One investor might be $5,000 or $10,000 different from another. But generally, you’re going to see offers fall within a certain range.

And this is where I think you need to be careful.

Be Careful With an Offer That’s Way Outside the Range

Let’s say you get three investor offers, and they’re all within $5,000 of each other.

Then you get another offer that’s $50,000 higher than everyone else.

Or maybe you get one that’s $50,000 lower.

I would be very cautious about those outliers.

In my experience, if several investors are looking at the same property and they’re all arriving at roughly the same number, there’s probably a reason.

The investor who is dramatically outside that range may not have the same numbers figured out—or the deal may not work the way you think it does.

I’m not trying to be a negative Nancy here. I’ve just been in this business long enough to have seen how these things can play out.

If you have several offers that are all clustered together, I’d pay close attention to the ones in the middle rather than automatically jumping at the highest number.

Should You List an Inherited House That Needs Repairs?

So, you’ve inherited a house that needs a ton of repairs, and you’ve decided you don’t want to fix it.

Should you list it?

It depends on the condition of the house.

If the property is in good enough shape that a young family could move into it, paint the walls, maybe paint the kitchen cabinets and make it look nice again, then listing it as-is might make sense.

But if the property needs a ton of work, I would suggest talking to investors before you put it on the market.

Why?

Because if the property is in really rough condition, your buyer pool may primarily consist of investors anyway.

And those investors may offer roughly the same amount whether you sell to them off-market or they find the property through the traditional market.

But when you list the property, you may also have to pay a real estate commission.

When I buy a house as an investor, I don’t charge a commission. I’m buying the house to fix it up and make my profit from the investment.

My profit is essentially my commission.

When you list a property with an agent, the agent is paid a commission based on the sale.

So if you have a house in really bad shape, you need to consider whether putting it on the market could result in you paying a commission for an offer from an investor who could have purchased the property directly from you.

That can affect how much money you ultimately net from the sale.

Selling As-Is vs. Fixing Up the House

If the inherited house is in good shape, putting it on the market may make sense.

But listing a property isn’t a guarantee that it will sell.

No agent can guarantee that your house is going to sell. They can put it on the market and try to find a buyer, but ultimately, you’re waiting for someone to make an offer.

When you sell to an investor, the investor is making you an offer directly.

Of course, investors can back out, too. There’s usually a due diligence period, and things can happen.

But if you’re working with a reputable investor who does what they say they’re going to do, closes on their deals and doesn’t constantly renegotiate after making the initial offer, that can make the process considerably more straightforward.

That’s what I try to do in my business.

I try to give people the most honest and fair number I can upfront, and I try not to go back and renegotiate later.

It happens sometimes, but for the most part, we try not to do that because I wouldn’t want someone doing that to me.

So, What Should You Do With an Inherited House That Needs Repairs?

At the end of the day, you need to look at your situation honestly.

If you want to renovate the house yourself, do you have the skills, time and patience?

If you’re going to hire contractors, do you have the money and are you comfortable taking on that project?

If you don’t want to put the time or money into repairs, maybe selling the property as-is is the better option.

And if the house needs a ton of work, it may be worth talking to investors before you decide to list it.

There’s no one-size-fits-all answer.

You have to look at the condition of the house, what you’re willing to put into it and what makes the most sense for your particular situation.

Want to Sell Your Inherited House for Cash?

If you’ve inherited a house that needs a lot of repairs and you’re looking for an easier way to sell it, we can talk to you about making a cash offer.

We’ve helped more than 300 sellers over the last 10 years sell their properties for cash.

And if you’d rather explore the traditional route, I’m also a licensed real estate agent and have been licensed since 2017. I’d be happy to talk to you about listing the property as well.

So whether you’re thinking about selling an inherited house as-is, getting a cash offer, or listing the property, we can talk through your options.

Visit ProbateHouseGuy.com and fill out the form on the page. A member of our team will be in touch with you ASAP.

Quick disclaimer: I’m not an attorney, and I don’t claim to be one. This isn’t legal advice. If you have a specific legal question about an inherited property or probate, I highly recommend talking with a probate attorney or real estate attorney about your situation. 

With that out of the way, let’s talk about what you can actually do when you inherit a house that needs a lot of work.