Potentially buying a house and have a concern

August 29, 2020 10:05 AM

We are looking for a house in our neighborhood ( in Germany) and have found one that needs a bit of updating and a facelift BUT this spring, they have removed the oil heating and radiators and put in gas under floor heating. BUT they didn't update anything else in the house, like not even the toilet seats, and don't appear to be living there now (ie never used the under floor heating). This seems strange. What should we look out for?

The previous owners have only lived there This is quite an expensive city and at the moment there aren't a lot of houses being sold. This is not far from public transport and good connections to our kiddos school. The house was built in 1986. We're surprised that people are this put off by the house. But there are people living next door in the other part of the building (its attached) I see many of these houses where I live now and they have been updated and look nice.

Can anyone shed any light about what exactly might be going on?


It's an open plan as well, and these types of houses are extremely large. Here is a link to the house if anyone wants to have a look.

posted by catspajammies to Home & Garden (9 answers total)

Response by poster: My link didn't seem to work, here is the house:

https://www.immobilienscout24.de/expose/119946816#/
posted by catspajammies at 10:07 AM on August 29, 2020

I don’t know anything about the house selling process in Germany, but in the US I would think they upgraded the heating to increase the value of the house when selling it.

Things like toilet seats are usually changed out by the new owners anyway, so don’t have much of an effect on house value.
posted by mekily at 10:15 AM on August 29, 2020 [1 favorite]

This is purely speculation, of course, but it could be that they were starting a more ambitious renovation of the house and ran out of money. Or maybe just upgraded the heat specifically as a selling point. I'm not sure how bad Germany's economic downturn at the start of the pandemic was, but if it was bad, perhaps the people who own the home suddenly couldn't get a loan or didn't have any other excess resources to do more to this home.

It's a nice looking house! I have no knowledge of the German home sales/purchase process, but in the US there's a home inspection required as part of the buying process, so if that's a thing there, said inspection should uncover any serious issues - from the pictures it looks like the house is in pretty good shape, though, so I wouldn't stress it too much.
posted by pdb at 10:18 AM on August 29, 2020 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: Oh! I forgot to add but Mekily has reminded me. They didn't upgrade their energy certificate after they switched to underfloor heating and gas (the rating is currently an F- which means the same thing as in America- not good!). The realtor said it wasn't allowed, but we believe that it is. Obviously we will ask about that and have it inspected
posted by catspajammies at 10:24 AM on August 29, 2020

Maybe the oil heating system failed? Maybe it was so old/poor condition that an inspection would have called it out anyway? Maybe they got a deal on the underfloor heating?

It might be worth asking the seller/seller's agent for the paperwork for the underfloor installation, as presumably it's warranteed and that is something you might be interested in.

It does not strike me from the brief description as being sinister.
posted by carter at 10:27 AM on August 29, 2020 [4 favorites]

You're likely to have a lot more luck addressing this within your network than on Metafilter. I assume you're an expat living in Munich and not a German native. The Toytown forums are well-trafficked and have a lot of good local knowledge. If you're not already aware of it, the Munich International Women's Group e.V. is a great resource for the future.
posted by kdar at 10:49 AM on August 29, 2020 [1 favorite]

Did you see the underfloor heating in person? When we installed that in our place, the floors had to be completely redone on top of the heating pipes... In the pictures it looks like the floor is brown tiles from the 80's... or in any case not brand new floors. So, that's odd?
posted by PardonMyFrench at 10:50 AM on August 29, 2020 [1 favorite]

You may want to explore the heating thing a bit more because together with the energy certificate that seems a bit odd. The summary bit talks about under floor heating but then later it talks about new gas central heating and a new parquet floor, presumably not in the tiled areas seen on the photos. The Interior style is traditional country house, so it is conceivable they re-did the floor in brown tiles I suppose...but you’ll need local help.
posted by koahiatamadl at 2:08 PM on August 29, 2020 [1 favorite]

What are you concerned about?

I'm not sure what the house buying process is like in Germany, but in Australia you can make an offer which is conditional on the building inspection by a person who you hire. They would look for any issues that you need to be aware of.
posted by kinddieserzeit at 2:23 AM on August 30, 2020 [1 favorite]