Selling Your Owner Built Property

Selling Your Owner Built Property
 
At some stage you may want to sell your dream home and move to something more suitable.

It could be your family has left and the house is too big leaving you to a decision to downsize.

It may be that your job has taken you to another location and you need to sell to fulfil your career aspirations.
Perhaps you enjoyed the process so much you want to do it again!

There are a few things you need to consider.
Of course, if you are going to do another project, you will need to ensure you have met the requirements in respect to the prohibited (exclusion) period to gain another owner builder permit.

But there are other considerations.

If you need to sell inside the regulated time and inside warranty period, you will need to ensure you include a warning in the contract of sale that brings the attention of any owner builder works to the notice of the purchaser and advise them the works are not covered by a government backed Home Warranty Scheme.

This always raises more questions than I have been able to satisfactorily answer in respect to the individual insurances and statutory warranties that are required either under building legislation or through common law practises.
Most state legislation requires any works undertaken by a licensed contractor, in excess of a stated value, to be covered by insurance and warranties.
So where does the owner builders obligation end and the contractors start?
I wish the answer was easy.

My best advice is to consider yourself as the owner builder to be required to meet the same legislative requirements in your capacity as the Principal Contractor. This means those obligations that would be required to be met if you were a licensed builder with the appropriate classification of license. Eg; General Builder, Builder Low Rise etc.

This in most cases will require you to warrant the structural component of the construction for a period of 6 or more years and unlimited warranty in some areas.

All this without the ability to effect Home Warranty Insurance under the applicable government scheme.
Sounds daunting, and it is.

So, our advice to all our owner builders is to take the time to consult with professional construction insurance providers, understand you relevant legislative requirements and always employ qualified and insured tradesman.
You can mitigate against all the warranty and insurance pitfalls, but it takes diligence.

Take care and Happy Owner Building
Regards,
 
Rick