We just bought our first home near Seattle, WA. The pre-inspection from the sellers revealed an old leak in the attic, and the sellers said they were going to replace the roof and this would take care of any leakage problem from the prior roof.

We thought oh this is convenient for us that they are taking care of this before we move in. But once we got the invoice, it showed $11,000 for re-roofing a 2000sq ft+ house, which is insanely cheap for the area. The details showed “IKO Cambridge shingles”, which I had no idea what these were until researching that they are the worst-rated roofs that are known for getting blown off and causing leakage. There was even a recent class action lawsuit against them for the defective roofs.

We soon realized that what we should have done was to ask the sellers to just provide credits at closing and then we take care of the re-roofing ourselves with the best roofing materials in the area that gets a lot of rain and snow during winter.

It’s not a surprise that the sellers would of course find the cheapest option possible, but I am deeply regretting that I should have thought of just negotiating for the credits and taking care of the roof on our own.