BUY THE RIGHT HOME.
not the PRETTIEST ONE.
Marin homes are old, built on hillsides, and photograph beautifully. I've spent years under them. Before you write an offer, you'll know what the house is going to ask of you — and what that's worth in price.
How a purchase runs with me.
Pre-offer walkthrough with an inspector's eye
Before you write, I walk the home and tell you what I'd expect a report to find: foundation and drainage behavior, roof age, envelope, electrical vintage, moisture signals. You learn the likely repair exposure while you can still shape your offer around it.
Offer strategy built on condition
In a competitive market, terms win. Knowing the property's real condition up front lets us shorten or shape contingencies intelligently instead of waiving blindly — and tells us when a home is worth stretching for and when it isn't.
Decoding the third-party report
An independent certified inspector always performs the inspection of record. Then I sit with you line by line and separate the noise from the four items that actually matter — and tell you what each one costs to make right.
Repair costs as negotiation leverage
"There's some settlement" gets you nothing. "Here is a specific scope, here are two contractor ranges, here is the credit we're asking for" gets you a number. Technical specificity is the leverage.
Knowing when to walk
Some homes are wrong at any price. I'll tell you plainly when a property's problems are structural and open-ended rather than scoped and fixable — even when it costs me a commission.
I never act as both your agent and your inspector on the same transaction. An independent, third-party certified inspector performs the inspection of record. My background is there to help you interpret it and act on it.
Know the neighborhood before you tour it.
Town-by-town guides written from an inspector's perspective: what's typical, what's expensive, and what commonly shows up on reports.
Explore neighborhood guides