I'm contemplating buying a home built in the 1920s in the Salt Lake City area that has been considerably remodeled. Since owning a home that old is new to me, I'm strongly leaning toward getting separate inspections done by a licensed electrician, plumber, and structural engineer, in addition to a general home inspection. Does that seem reasonable due diligence during the option period or does that feel like overkill?

Considerably remodeled as in gutted and all electrical and plumbing was brought up to current code?

That's the kind of thing that I don't know. More like, updated the kitchens and bathrooms, but I'm not sure on whether those updates addressed things like that or just made things look a lot nicer at the surface level.

I wouldn't shy away from your instincts. I have a 100 year old house and it was completely gutted. We've had a lot of issues. This was a completely permitted job, and we've had 2 water leaks (one causing a lot of damage) and electricity inspected everywhere because we had small power surges throughout the house.

Texas Gator said:

---

That's the kind of thing that I don't know. More like, updated the kitchens and bathrooms, but I'm not sure on whether those updates addressed things like that or just made things look a lot nicer at the surface level.

---

1920s and they would originally had knob & tube wiring. Nobody can see through walls so you would need to open the cover plates of each receptacle and switch to determine what has been updated and what has not. A normal house inspector is not going to take on that liability. An electrician will if you specifically ask him that's what you're wanting to know. Inspect the crawl space and/or attic too. Knob & tube is not necessarily a deal breaker. It is just really old and you would just want to add GFCI/AFCI combo breakers on those circuits (may not be possible in areas if they used california three ways). And adjust your offer accordingly.

Same with plumbing. They would have used galvanized which corrodes from the inside and develops pin hole leaks. You would want the plumber to go through the crawl space and/or attic to determine how much is original and how much is new. A normal house inspector can do this depending on his willingness.

Inspect the heck out of it.

Old houses are a money pit, even one with a complete Reno. Best to try to learn as much as you possibly can before making the commitment to buy

Never hurts to have specialists out and extra sets of eyes can be a good idea. Particularly on an older house. Completely gutter can be good or bad.

Worth having specialists if you are in the option period. We had plumber, electrician and a few other specialists... but trusted the age of the A/C units and the main inspection's approval of it... Just dropped $1000 to have it rewired, which is something a specialist would have caught quickly.

One important thing I would add on specialist inspections.

Make sure you are specifi and/or get specifics on exactly who they are sending out and what they will be doing.

I have seen cases where a tech comes out and doesn't really do jack. Had one where they had two hvac companies come out. One guy was a lazy dude who basically said yup there are acs here. They work. They other was detailed and thorough and found a bunch of stuff.

Contractors are not always used to doing inspections and may look at it as an easy service call and send out a low level tech. They may not have an actual procedure to follow. So be specific about what you want and what you are paying for. And understand that even a specialist cannot necessarily predict future failure. Also understand that there is a potential financial gain conflict of interest to specialist, as they will make more money repairing stuff and are not required to be objective in their findings.