Miserable! Despite the house inspection, the Ontario woman still bought a century-old dilapidated house, the foundation was tilted, and the maintenance was bankrupt
·Kim Sanford, a 59-year-old retired nurse in Ontario, and her husband bought a house in 2018 and although they had experienced it, they later discovered that the foundations were all sloppy and were now repaired to the point of bankruptcy
Sanford hails from a small community near Kawartha Lakes, more than 100 kilometers northeast of Toronto.
In the summer of 2018, Sanford and her husband purchased the three-bedroom, century-old home for $285,000.
Before purchasing, they hired a home inspector to inspect the property. The home inspector produced a 46-page report finding that the structure of the home met the Ontario Institute of Housing Inspectors' standards of practice.
So, Sanford bought the century-old house, and the nightmare began.
After Christmas dinner in 2018, when Sanford was packing up her china cutlery, she found that the cabinet doors wouldn't close.
She didn't think much of it at the time, but soon realized that the problem was serious.
She told CTV News that her house was leaning and sinking to the ground.
Now, six years later, Sanford says she has exhausted all of her savings to hold former homeowners and home inspectors legally accountable for trying to cover up the crumbling foundations of their homes.
"It completely took away all of our money," Sanford said. "We're in debt. We don't have savings. We didn't have food to pay our bills. ”
Although Sanford didn't know it at the time, the problem with her cupboard was just the beginning of her troubles.
No matter how high she turned up the stove, the heat would continue to escape from the house.
Over the next few months, she said she began to have to wrap herself in an electric blanket to survive the cold winter.
Frustrated, Sanford's husband quickly went down to the basement to find the problem.
He dug a small hole in what he thought was the exterior wall, only to find a hole in the foundation of the house filled with rubble and boulders.
"You can tell it used to be a wall," Sanford said. "It was supposed to support the house."
The two floors above are essentially suspended, she said.
On the other side of the basement wall, under the deck deck that surrounds the house, he also found a large hole through which strong winds blew in, she said.
"You can just walk in," Sanford added.
In June 2022, an engineer's report determined the extent of the damage, which showed that a "collapsed" and "dangling" stone foundation was "tilting inward".
Pictured: Engineers measure the slope of a gravel foundation moving inward
"It's like a seesaw with no weight on one side," Sanford said.
When contacted by CTV reporters for comment, they said that during the court hearing, they could not discuss the matter, but they pointed to a defense statement dated July 2021 in which it was claimed that the home was sold "as is" (AS IS).
The lawsuit alleges that the previous owner never lived in the house but rented it out to tenants after it was purchased in 2011.
In the statement, they insisted that they had not tried to "fraudulently or negligently conceal" any problems with the home and that the problematic wall was there before they had it.
The lawsuit alleges that the contract stipulates that the buyer will be responsible for the cost of repairs after closing, that the listing information has informed that the home needs repairs, and that the tenant has reported dampness in the basement and garage.
While the MLS listing does say that the home will be sold "as is," Sanford said there was no mention of this in the actual purchase contract.
Pictured: Engineers look inside a wooden frame after removing a metal panel.
According to Bob Aaron, a Toronto-based real estate lawyer, one of the core principles of real estate law can be summed up in the phrase "buyer beware."
In short, the buyer buys at their own risk.
Aaron added that the seller is not obligated to disclose any information to the buyer unless they know and conceal a defect that makes the property dangerous or uninhabitable.
"They have to prove that there was a misrepresentation," he said.
Talking about home inspections, he added that the job of a home inspector is not to remove walls and find defects in the home, but to be observant, non-invasive.
"Home inspectors inspect what they see, and they don't inspect what they can't see," Aaron said.
The home inspection firm hired by Sanford did not respond to CTV's request for comment.
While Sanford's legal proceedings continue, she has also been worried that her house will one day collapse completely.
She still loves her home, but doesn't feel like it's a safe haven anymore.
"You're living under pressure. You can't go to a safe place because a safe place is your house," Sanford said.