New York Home Inspection Checklist
The five things to check in any report, plus ten checks that only exist because the property is in New York.
This is the New York add-on to our national inspection checklist, ten extra checks for the 2024 disclosure law change, co-op board approval, mansion tax cliffs, and oil tank liability that don't exist anywhere else. See the general Home Inspection Report Checklist
Free · 4-page PDF · no spam
- The same five report checks that catch gaps between the walkthrough and the write-up
- Ten New York-only checks covering the state's 2024 disclosure law change, co-op ownership, transfer tax cliffs, and oil tank liability
- Built around New York's specific disclosure history and ownership structures, not a generic list with the state name swapped in
What's inside
5 universal checks + 10 New York-only checks. 15 total in the free PDF.
Section A: Universal checks
- Confirm every space you'd expect is actually in the report.Attic, crawl space, basement, electrical panel. If the listing or the inspector mentioned it out loud, it should show up in writing somewhere.
- Check whether the report's length matches how long the inspection took.A three-hour walkthrough that turns into two pages is a mismatch worth a phone call.
- Compare what the inspector said out loud to what ended up in writing.If you took notes during the walkthrough, pull them out and read both side by side.
Section A: Universal checks
Section B: New York-only checks
“This gets you far enough to know when to ask a harder question, in New York specifically. It won't tell you whether a co-op board's rejection was really about your finances, how to read an oil tank sweep report, or what a finding is actually worth at the negotiating table. That's the difference between noticing a report was softened and knowing what it was softened from. That's Don't Use Their Inspector.”
Sources
- Senate Bill S5400, Chapter 484 of the Laws of 2023 | New York State Senate
- Real Estate Transfer Tax | New York State Department of Taxation and Finance
- Petroleum Bulk Storage | Nassau County, NY
- Local Law 126 of 2024, Basement and Cellar Dwelling Unit Legalization | NYC Department of Buildings
- Levandusky v. One Fifth Avenue Apartment Corp. | New York Court of Appeals
Get the checklist, free
One click to download. The full Don't Use Their Inspector is also free if you want to go deeper.