Your strongest starting point as a seller is knowing your home’s condition and being able to document it. When you know what has been done, what needs attention and what is in good order, you can approach buyers with clarity rather than guesswork.
Beyond figures and reports, your home’s condition is about the first impression a buyer gets before you have even talked about money. Weeds kept under control, neatly trimmed edges, a mown lawn, painted doors and general tidiness give the buyer a good feeling about the house.
A condition report (tilstandsrapport) and an electrical installation report (elinstallationsrapport) are tools that explain why your home costs what it does. They give you something concrete to point to when you explain the price to buyers, and they give buyers answers to the questions they would otherwise be left with.
Most homes have some remarks in their condition report. Buyers react differently depending on where the home is. In some areas, buyers more readily accept ordinary wear and tear in older homes, while elsewhere they expect a home that is closer to move-in ready. Knowing that difference is part of setting the right price.
How to read the condition report’s K1, K2, K3 and colour codes
When you read a condition report, you come across a scale that tells you how much weight an issue carries in buyers’ eyes. K1, K2 and K3 are ratings in the report. The scale describes faults and damage and how serious they are judged to be. The higher the rating, the more attention buyers usually pay to the issue.
As you move up the scale, the issues become more serious. A less serious remark rarely stops buyers from going ahead, whereas more extensive issues can lead to conditions in the offer, price negotiations or requests for a closer investigation.
The colour codes in the report show how an issue should be handled:
-
Red markings indicate issues that should be repaired promptly.
-
Yellow markings often point to maintenance that can be planned over time.
-
A black colour code means the damage should be investigated further, and that the buyer bears the risk if the issue is not investigated.
The condition report is not required by law, but it is a requirement if you want to take out change-of-ownership insurance (ejerskifteforsikring). The report covers the roof, external walls, windows, floors, installations, basement and foundations. This lets you and the buyers see which parts of the home have been assessed and which issues need a closer look.
Specific issues that buyers and valuation systems typically mention
A building surveyor goes systematically through the home: roof, external walls, windows, floors, installations, basement and foundations. The inspection often starts with the roof, where cracked tiles, leaking joints and wear on the gutters are among the first things to be checked.
Buyers and AI-based valuations typically give weight to the same issues:
-
The age of the roof
-
Damp in the basement
-
The condition of the electrical installations
-
The upkeep of the kitchen
-
The drains, which buyers’ advisers often highlight as an underestimated issue
What they have in common is that they are expensive to put right. A new roof, a damp basement or a fuse box that needs replacing costs far more than paint and new skirting boards.
Hidden defects in a home sale rarely show up as something that looks bad. Damp can appear as a small discolouration in the basement or faint staining on a wall, and it can be a sign of serious problems with major financial and health consequences. Even small cracks in roof tiles or leaking joints on the roof can develop into serious damage if they are not caught in time.
The same goes for the installations. Fuse boxes and pipework can look neat yet hide faults that are both expensive and potentially dangerous, because the condition report is based only on a visual inspection. Walls cannot be opened up, floors cannot be lifted and installations cannot be taken apart, and packed loft spaces or sealed crawl spaces cannot be assessed. Bear that in mind when you read through the report.
Maintenance or improvement – what affects the price?
There is a big difference between maintaining and improving, and that difference determines how much you can realistically add to the price. Maintaining your home before a sale brings it back to the condition it was originally in. An improvement raises the standard and creates something new that was not there before.
A home’s state of maintenance is not something you can charge extra for. Ordinary maintenance does not count as an improvement in the valuation. As the seller, it is your responsibility to make sure the home is in proper condition, and buyers take that for granted.
Some projects are hard to place. Here are three typical examples so you can see where your own project fits:
-
Repairing existing cracks and poor pointing is maintenance.
-
Sanding new or unfinished parquet for the first time counts as an improvement.
-
Refreshing floors that have been sanded before is maintenance.
The difference has a direct impact on maintenance and the sale price when buyers and their advisers run the numbers on the home. Buyers have had the price reduced because the report showed the roof needed repairing or the installations needed replacing. In other cases, the seller has chosen to fix the issues before the sale went through. Then the money has been spent rather than taken off the price.
Spending money on improvements is not always the right answer. Some buyers would rather take over the home and renovate it to their own taste, so it can make most sense to sell the home as it is, with full disclosure. You risk putting money into a kitchen that the next owner rips out anyway.
The home inspection scheme and the seller’s responsibility for the home’s condition
The home inspection scheme (huseftersynsordningen) is voluntary and applies when you sell a year-round home to a private buyer. The scheme rests on five main elements: the condition report, the electrical installation report, change-of-ownership insurance, the seller’s duty of disclosure and the buyer’s responsibility.
If you have a valid condition report and offer to pay half the premium for change-of-ownership insurance, you can, as a rule, avoid liability for hidden damage that is not mentioned in the report. In return, the scheme sets requirements for who does the work. The condition report and the electrical installation report must be prepared by authorised building surveyors and electrical contractors, and they may be no more than 6 months old when the purchase agreement is signed. If the reports are older than that, they are not valid for the sale.
It is just as important to know what the scheme does not cover. The protection does not extend to everything:
-
Issues outside the building, such as the garden, fences and paving.
-
Damage that occurs after the handover date.
-
Issues the buyer knew about at the time of purchase.
-
Issues caused by ordinary wear and tear or lack of maintenance.
Those four points are exactly why keeping your home in good condition before a sale is still your responsibility. The scheme shifts part of the risk of the unknown, but it does not wipe the slate clean when it comes to ordinary wear and tear and lack of maintenance. The seller’s duty of disclosure applies alongside the reports and does not go away just because you have had a home inspection carried out. You can always check the current rules of the home inspection scheme on Retsinformation.dk (Denmark’s official legal database) before you put your home up for sale.
How to make condition and maintenance work for your sale
Condition and maintenance do nothing for the sale on their own. You have to put them to work, and you do that in two ways: you document what has been done, and you go through the report before the buyers do.
- Build a maintenance record that documents the work
A maintenance record is a simple list of what has been done and when. Write it down so the buyer can read it instead of guessing:
-
Roof renovated: 2017 (guarantee until 2027)
-
Facade painted: 2021
-
Heating system serviced: April 2024
The buyer gets peace of mind about upcoming costs. When the roof is covered by a guarantee until 2027 and the heating system has recently been serviced, the buyer can factor your information into their own budget for maintenance, renovation and future costs.
- Go through the condition report thoroughly with your estate agent
Read the report before it becomes a talking point with buyers. Go through it with your estate agent and agree on which issues are likely to be noticed and how you will address them. Based on that, you can draw up a realistic plan for price, marketing and dialogue with buyers, so you are not caught out by a question you should have seen coming.
Keep in mind what the condition of the house means for the sale price. The report’s colour codes and descriptions make it easy to see which issues need attention in the short term and which will only become relevant later. You can use that knowledge directly in discussions about price and refurbishment, so the price better reflects the home’s actual condition. The buyer uses the report to get an overview of the home’s condition, assess upcoming costs and ask the right questions.
The condition report gives both parties peace of mind. For you, it limits your liability after the sale, and for the buyer, it provides a clear basis for assessing the condition of the house. At Brikk, you get help understanding the condition report and planning what should be repaired and what you can sell on with full disclosure.
Leave a comment