Eight Things I Check in the First Ten Minutes of Every Property Inspection

A follower messaged me last year. She'd bought a house in the western suburbs, moved in, and within three months discovered the bathroom waterproofing had failed. Water had been seeping through the tiles into the subfloor for years. The previous owner had laid fresh tiles over the damage and painted the walls to hide the staining.

The remediation bill came to $28,000.

She didn't get a building inspection. "The agent said the house was in great condition and other buyers were about to put in offers, so I rushed."

I hear stories like this constantly. Not always $28,000 — sometimes it's $8,000 for a termite treatment, sometimes it's $50,000 for a foundation restump. But the pattern is the same: buyer skips inspection, vendor hides defects, buyer discovers the truth after settlement when it's legally too late to do anything about it.

Victoria operates under the Caveat Emptor principle — buyer beware 1. The vendor has no legal obligation to disclose most defects. What you see (or fail to see) is what you get. So let me walk you through the eight things our team checks during the first ten minutes of every inspection, before the formal building report is even commissioned.

1. Foundation and external walls: read the cracks

Not all cracks are created equal. This is the single most important distinction a property buyer needs to learn.

Vertical cracks running straight down from a window frame or door lintel are usually settlement cracks. The house has shifted slightly as the soil dried or expanded. This happens to virtually every house in Melbourne eventually, particularly on reactive clay soils in the southeast. Minor vertical cracks (under 5mm wide) are cosmetic. Repair cost: negligible — maybe $500 for a tube of flexible sealant and a painter 2.

Stepped cracks follow the mortar joints in a stair-step pattern along brick walls. These indicate differential movement — one part of the foundation is moving differently from another. The direction matters: if the steps go upward toward the centre of the wall, the footing at one end has dropped. If steps go upward toward a corner, the centre may be sinking. Either way, you want an engineer's assessment. Repair cost: $20,000 to $50,000 for underpinning, depending on severity 2.

Horizontal cracks are the ones that keep me awake. A horizontal crack along a brick wall, particularly below the damp-proof course or at the junction of a retaining wall, suggests lateral soil pressure pushing the wall inward. This is a structural failure. Repair cost: $40,000 to $80,000+, and some walls simply need to be rebuilt 2.

When I'm inspecting, I carry a 5mm plastic crack gauge (costs about $8 from any hardware shop). Anything wider than 5mm gets photographed, GPS-tagged, and flagged for the building inspector. Anything wider than 10mm and I'm already recalculating whether the deal still works after remediation costs.

2. The roof: what you can see from the ground

You don't need to climb up there. Just stand in the backyard and look.

Moss or lichen growing on tiles means water is pooling. It's not necessarily catastrophic — it usually means the gutters are blocked or the tile profile isn't draining properly — but it tells you maintenance has been deferred. The seller hasn't been looking after the roof, which raises questions about what else they haven't been maintaining.

Missing or lifted tiles are obvious. What's less obvious is the tree branch resting on the ridge capping. Trees touching roofs create a highway for termites, and they also damage tiles during storms. If I see overhanging branches, I'm mentally adding $800-$2,000 for tree lopping plus a termite inspection upgrade from visual to thermal 3.

Re-roofing costs in Melbourne range from $6,000 for a basic concrete tile replacement on a single-storey home to $50,000+ for a full terracotta or Colorbond conversion on a large two-storey 3. The question isn't whether the roof is perfect — it rarely is on a 30-year-old house. The question is whether the remaining lifespan justifies the price.

A roof with ten good years left on a $650K house? Fine. Budget $15K for replacement in year ten. A roof that's already leaking on a $650K house? Renegotiate the price or walk.

3. Floors: trust your feet, not your eyes

Fresh carpet or floating floorboards look fantastic. They also hide everything.

The test is simple: walk slowly through every room and pay attention to what you feel. Does the floor bounce? Does it feel hollow underfoot? Can you hear a drum-like resonance when you step firmly? If yes, the subfloor has a problem. On a stump foundation (most pre-2000 Melbourne houses), this usually means stumps have deteriorated or the bearers and joists have moisture damage 4.

Dark stains at the edges of rooms, particularly where carpet meets skirting boards, indicate historic water ingress. The vendor might have cleaned the visible stains, but the subfloor timber has already absorbed the moisture. Over time, this leads to rot and — if conditions are right — termite activity.

Restumping costs $4,000 to $15,000 depending on how many stumps need replacing 4. Full subfloor remediation, including bearer and joist replacement, can run $15,000 to $25,000. These aren't deal-breakers if you know about them before you sign the contract. They're catastrophic if you discover them after settlement when you rip up the carpet to renovate.

"We bring a small marble to every inspection," says Yan Zhu, Chief Data Officer at PremiumRea. "Place it on the floor near the centre of the room. If it rolls immediately to one wall, the floor has an uneven plane. It's crude, but it catches problems that your eyes miss."

4. Ceilings and walls: the water stain detective game

Look up. Seriously, most buyers never look up.

Circular or ring-shaped stains on ceilings are the classic indicator of a roof leak. The stain shows where water pooled before evaporating. If the stain is old and the ceiling is firm, the leak may have been repaired. If the stain feels damp or the plasterboard is soft when you press it, the leak is active. Repair cost for a roof leak and ceiling patch: $5,000 to $15,000 depending on the source 5.

Freshly painted walls in a single room are a red flag. If every wall in the house is the same tired cream paint from 2005, but one room has pristine white walls, ask yourself why. The most common answer: the vendor is hiding water damage, smoke staining, or mould.

Mould is a particular concern in Melbourne's climate. If you see small dark spots in the corners of rooms, particularly in bedrooms and bathrooms, the ventilation is inadequate. Surface mould can be cleaned for a few hundred dollars. Mould that's penetrated the plasterboard or is growing behind the wall lining? That's a $10,000-$15,000 remediation job. And it's a Minimum Rental Standards compliance issue — a landlord in Victoria cannot rent a property with mould caused by building structure 6.

Patches in the ceiling — areas where the texture doesn't quite match — usually indicate emergency repairs. Someone has cut out a damaged section and plastered over it. It might be fine. But it's worth asking: what caused the damage?

5. Wet areas: where the expensive problems live

Bathrooms and laundries cause more post-settlement heartbreak than any other part of a house. The reason is waterproofing. It's invisible, it deteriorates over time, and when it fails, the damage spreads far beyond the room itself.

Here's my wet-area checklist:

• Grout discolouration: If the grout between tiles has turned dark or black, water is getting behind the tiles. Regrouting costs $500-$1,000. But if the waterproofing membrane underneath has failed, you're looking at a full strip-out and rebuild: $15,000 to $35,000 per bathroom [5].
• Soft or spongy walls near the shower: Press the tiles firmly near the base of the shower. If the wall gives, there's moisture in the plaster behind. The waterproofing has breached.
• Under-cabinet watermarks: Open the vanity and look underneath. Discolouration, swelling, or a musty smell means slow leaks from the basin or pipes.
• Silicone condition: Black or peeling silicone around the shower base, bath, and sink edges means the seal has failed. Replacing silicone costs virtually nothing, but if it's been failing for years without replacement, water has been getting through.

I've seen bathrooms that look immaculate — new tiles, new tapware, fresh paint — but the moment you pull off a vanity kick-board, the subfloor is black with moisture. Cosmetic renovations to bathrooms, done cheaply and without addressing the underlying waterproofing, are one of the most common vendor tricks in the Melbourne market.

The $28,000 story I opened with? That was exactly this scenario.

6. Termites: the silent $50K problem

Australia has some of the most aggressive termite species on the planet. In Melbourne's southeast, Coptotermes species are the primary threat, particularly in suburbs with established gardens and mature trees 7.

What to look for during a visual inspection:

Mud trails along baseboards, in the subfloor, or near the meter box. Termites build mud tubes to travel between their colony and their food source (your house). If you see thin brown lines running along a wall or up a stump, that's active termite activity.

Hollow-sounding floors or door frames. Tap the bottom of door frames and window sills with your knuckle. If it sounds hollow, termites may have eaten the timber from the inside.

Treatment stickers. Look near the power box or in the subfloor for termite treatment stickers. These indicate the property has had termites before and was treated. A treatment sticker isn't bad — it means someone dealt with the problem. No sticker on a 30-year-old house in a termite-prone area? That's more concerning.

For houses built before 2003, also ask about asbestos. Pre-2003 Melbourne homes commonly have asbestos in eave linings, bathroom walls, and fence sheets. Asbestos in good condition is not dangerous — it only becomes hazardous when disturbed (cut, drilled, broken). But it affects renovation costs significantly because removal requires licensed professionals at $50-$100 per square metre 8.

Termite treatment: a few hundred for a chemical barrier to several thousand for baiting systems. Structural repair from undetected termite damage: $10,000 to $50,000+ depending on how much timber has been compromised 7.

7. Switchboard, hot water, and heating: the hidden replacement costs

These are the items that don't show up in marketing photos but show up in your bank account.

Switchboard (electrical panel): Open it. If you see ceramic fuses instead of modern circuit breakers, the switchboard predates safety switches and needs upgrading before you can rent the property. An electrical Safety Check is a legal requirement for rental properties in Victoria, and an outdated switchboard will fail 9. Replacement cost: $3,000 to $8,000.

Hot water system: Find it (usually outside, near the back wall). Check the manufacturing date plate. Hot water systems have a lifespan of 8-12 years. If it's over 10 years old, budget for replacement. Gas storage: $1,500 to $2,500 installed. Heat pump (more efficient, eligible for rebates): $3,000 to $4,500 10.

Ducted heating: If the house has ducted heating (common in Melbourne houses from the 1980s onward), check the age of the unit. Ducted gas heaters last 15-20 years. An old unit won't necessarily fail today, but replacement costs $3,000 to $9,000 installed, and it's not something you want to budget for in the middle of a Melbourne winter with a tenant complaining 10.

These three items together could add $12,000-$20,000 to your post-settlement costs if they all need attention. That's real money that changes the investment equation. I'd rather know about it before I make an offer than discover it during the Safety Check after settlement.

8. The seller's 'makeup kit' — when everything looks too good

This is my favourite warning sign because it's counterintuitive. You walk into a house and everything looks amazing. Fresh paint. New floating floors. New bathroom tiles. All the lights work. The garden is tidy.

Too good.

I call it the seller's "makeup kit" — four simultaneous cosmetic upgrades that, individually, are fine but together signal a cover-up:

1. Fresh paint throughout (hides stains, cracks, mould)
2. New floating floors (hides subfloor damage, termites, moisture)
3. New bathroom tiles or silicon (hides waterproofing failure)
4. "Utilities currently under maintenance" (hides failed Safety Checks)

When I see all four at once on a property that's been owner-occupied for 15+ years, my suspicion level goes to maximum. The vendor has spent $10,000-$15,000 on cosmetics specifically to pass the casual buyer's eye test. What they didn't spend money on is the stuff you can't see — the subfloor, the waterproofing membrane, the electrical, the stumps.

This is exactly when a Building & Pest inspection earns its $550 fee ten times over 11. A good inspector will pull back carpet edges, probe subfloor access points, use moisture meters on bathroom walls, and thermal-image the exterior for termite activity. They see through the makeup.

"The prettier the presentation on a 30-year-old house, the more questions I ask," says Yan Zhu. "A vendor who spent $15K on cosmetics but didn't fix the switchboard or restump the subfloor is telling you exactly where they chose to cut corners."

Do not skip the Building & Pest inspection. Ever. Even on properties where you're competing with unconditional offers. Negotiate a pre-contract inspection if the agent allows it. If they don't, factor $15,000-$20,000 in contingency into your offer price to cover the unknowns.

The $550 you spend on an inspection is insurance against the $28,000 bathroom, the $50,000 foundation, and the $80,000 structural crack that nobody mentioned at the open home.