Timeless Topics: Insects and Real Estate Contracts

Bed bugs!  From the New York Times:

According to the law, sellers and their brokers must acknowledge a problem if asked. But conflicts of interest aside, neither can be expected to know whether an infestation exists elsewhere in the building.

The problem is so pervasive that some lawyers have begun incorporating sellers’ representations about bedbugs into sales contracts, adding to now-standard ones about leaks, mold and noise issues. And buyers are having to determine if the pests are a deal-breaker or just one more headache on the road to a new home.

[Meredith R. Miller]