How Long Will Your Home Last?

Buying a new home is a major life move and investment. But many first time buyers don’t know exactly how long certain aspects of their home will actually last. These are important things to know because it allows you to make a decision on how much it is worth. Murray and Sons has put together a list of how long you can expect certain household items to last.

How Long Will a Home Last?

Let’s start with the outside, the roof and other exterior items.

Exterior

Roof

• Normal Shingles – 12-15 years.
• Good Quality Shingles – 25-30 years.
• Slate – 40-200 years.

Other

• Gutters – 20-30 years.
• Paint – 4-6 years.
• Deck – 10-20 years.
• Driveway – 10-20 years.

Interior

Going inside the home, we have many major items such as heaters, and appliances. These things keep you comfortable, so make sure they have lots of life left.

• Paint – 5-10 years.
• Windows 20-50 years.
• Plumbing (Copper) – Infinite.
• Water Heater – 8-12 years.
• Air Conditioner – 10-15 years.
• Furnace – 20-25 years.

Negotiation Tools

All items in the home have a shelf life. It’s important to get approximate dates on these items before you buy. When you know the age of these items, it allows you to budget for the future. If some items are past their average life-span, you can use this to negotiate with the seller. Some sellers may agree to replace big ticket items before the sale of the home.

Quality

A good way to tell the condition of the home is to look at the quality of these big ticket items. If most of them are the cheapest type of that appliance, the homeowners might not have cared too much about the home. The more high quality big ticket items in the home, the more the owners cared about the long term future of the house.  Be careful of shady developers who build nice looking new homes quickly, take a look at the major appliances to make sure they are good quality. Stay away from a home full of cheap items!

Looking into a house? Murray and Sons can help will all your landscaping and dumpster rental needs!