Why the buyer pays

The inspection exists to inform the buyer's decision, so the buyer commissions it and the report is issued to them. That matters for more than politeness: the report is prepared under a pre-inspection agreement between the inspector and the person who ordered it, and it sets out the scope, the limitations and who is entitled to rely on it.

A report commissioned by someone else carries limitations for you. That is the single most important thing to understand about who pays.

The seller already has a report. Can I just use that?

Treat a vendor-supplied report as background reading, not as your due diligence. There are three practical problems with relying on one.

  • It was commissioned by the seller, so it was prepared for the seller. A vendor-supplied report may be accurate, yet it carries limitations for a buyer relying on it.
  • It is a snapshot of a particular day. Condition changes — a report from several months ago does not describe the property you are buying today, particularly after a wet season.
  • You do not know what the scope or the access limitations were on the day, unless you read the agreement behind it.

None of that makes a vendor report worthless — it can be genuinely useful context, and a seller who volunteers one is usually acting in good faith. It simply is not a substitute for your own. We have written more on vendor-supplied reports.

When does the seller pay?

A seller pays when they commission a pre-sale inspection on their own property before listing it. The reason is straightforward: they would rather know what a buyer's inspector is going to report while they still have time and control, instead of finding out during a tight contract window when the only available response is a price reduction.

That is a genuinely different product with a different purpose. See pre-sale building and pest inspections.

Is it worth it?

A home is usually the largest purchase a person makes, and the inspection puts the property's visible condition in writing before the decision is final. In our own inspections across the Gold Coast, major defects and safety hazards are common in established housing stock — not because the properties are bad, but because established buildings accumulate items that need attention. Knowing which ones, and how serious each is, is what you are paying for.

The report also gives you something concrete to negotiate with. Findings in writing, from a licensed and insured inspector, carry weight that a verbal concern at an open home does not.