Hands on hips

See that guy on top of the roof? That's the home inspector. He was trying to figure out what was wrong with the roof. Bottom line? Even though the shingles were in good shape, the plywood underneath had gotten wet and delaminated, causing it to swell and force its way up through the shingles. The inspector bounced up and down on his heels, demonstrating the sponginess of the plywood. It's not a good thing. Oh, and the underside of the plywood, in the attic crawlspace, has a nice sheeting of black mold. Sweet.

Oh, and it turns out that the roof members were undersized at the time of construction. At some point someone had sistered 2 x 4s to the rafters, but there is some doubt as to whether the main carry beam is also undersized. Basically, what that means is that one good snow load could take the whole thing down.

I am trying desperately to come up with a "the roof, the roof, the roof is on fire" joke here, but I'm not having any luck. Anybody have any ideas?

The interior mold is due to a combination of factors. The crawlspace took on water back in 2006, which was probably a main contributor, but the crawlspace also had standing water in it the day we were there, due to the fact that the lot slopes toward the crawlspace as opposed to away from it, meaning the lot will have to be re-graded to correct the situation. And, of course, all the mold-soaked sheetrock, panelling, cabinetry, etc., will have to be removed and replaced.

I'm beginning to wish I never saw this place!

So. We need to get a contractor in there, get an estimated cost of repairs (mucho dinero, peeps), and see if the sellers are willing to drop their price by that amount. *cough*

Frankly, the only reason I'm willing to go along right now is that there's nothing else currently on the market that I'm interested in, so I'm not losing any time by playing around in this mess. And it's a learning experience. Gag.