What a dead deal costs sellers in Surf City

The hidden cost: repairs on the buyer's clock

Even when a deal holds together, the buyer's inspection usually costs the seller money. The MLS doesn't record it, so it isn't in our local numbers — but national surveys show how common and how big it is:

• 86% of inspections find something to fix, and 46% of buyers used the report to negotiate the price down (Porch survey of 998 buyers).
• When sellers give one, the median is $7,200 (Clever Real Estate seller survey).
• Sellers gave concessions in about 46% of U.S. home sales this spring — repairs, closing costs and rate buydowns, a record for the season (Redfin).

Averaged across all sellers, that's about $3,300 — roughly half give a concession, and the median is $7,200 when they do. Some sellers pay nothing; a home that needs real work can pay far more. We add the $3,300 average to the dead-deal cost as a separate line rather than assume the worst.

And the money goes further against you once you're under contract:

• You're on their deadline. Repairs have to be done before closing, so there's no time to shop around or wait for a better price.
• You use their people. Buyers often want their own plumbers, electricians and contractors — at their price, for work you might have done yourself or had your own handyman do for less.
• Credits instead of repairs. Many buyers ask for money off the price or toward closing costs and never make the repairs. The inspection becomes leverage against you.

Inspect before you list, and you handle the big items your way — on your schedule, with your own people, at your price — or disclose them up front so there's nothing left to negotiate.

The $3,300 is an estimate that combines two national sources (Redfin's share of sales with a concession and Clever Real Estate's median concession); it isn't measured locally. No study we found measures how much more the same repair costs under contract than before listing, so we don't put a number on that part.