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lilly080499 · Jun 18, 2008, 09:35 AM

Hello,
I was wondering if someone could advise me on what to do about my problem.
My husband and I have just purchased our first home and we have been here for almost three months now and still don't know what to do. We purchased this home because we thought that is was like new.The house is 3 years old. The first week that we moved in, we started having problems with our well. Getting brown water and bad odors from the sink water & sludge on the filters. We have tried changing the filters for the pump & flushing the lines etc. and nothing is working.My husband placed a new top of the line filter in again yesterday and this morning it was filled with sludge.
I am pretty sure that the old owners new about the problem,Because their was a brand new filter in place for the inspection and when we moved in.We didn't think anything of it at the time.
We are at a loss, is there any real estate laws that help new owners? Like the lemon law for cars. Can we get the old owners to pay for this to be fixed? I hope someone can help!
Thank you very much for your time.

excon · Jun 18, 2008, 09:56 AM

Hello lilly:

It sounds as though you were screwed. You SHOULD have rights... But, I don't know what you signed, or what method you used to buy the house. There are lots of different ways people buy houses.

IF you had an attorney draw up the purchase agreement, then he certainly would have included provisions for this.

IF you had a licensed home inspector, you may have recourse against him. He certainly SHOULD have spotted the problem.

If you didn't do ANY of those things, I have no idea what recourse you have. Yes, the law says that they have to inform you of any KNOWN defects... That word "known" is going to be the trick...

Tell us more, and we can tell you more.

excon

froggy7 · Jun 18, 2008, 07:07 PM

Also, there is the problem that a lot of the country is in a drought, and wells that worked fine before may not now. So can you prove that this was a problem before you bought the house? And did you have the well inspected before you bought?

LisaB4657 · Jun 19, 2008, 06:07 AM

No matter what you eventually choose to do, you're going to have to have the well situation fixed. So I suggest that you immediately get an expert out there to look at it, figure out what's wrong and give you a written estimate for repair.

Then, depending on the expert's opinion of the type of problem, you may have a case against the former owner. If it's the type of problem that is capable of being "hidden", such as temporary patches like new filters, and if the former owner knew about it and hid the problem from you and your home inspector, then you definitely have a case. If it's the type of problem that your home inspector should have seen but just didn't, then you have a case against the home inspector.

No matter what, you need to have it fixed asap. So get started on that.