Detroit ACR inspection and re-inspection

Hi, everyone.

I recently received a Detroit city inspection report and a lot of the repairs that they require me to complete with in 6 months are quite frivolous, to say the least.

Do they ever actually do a re-inspection? I have been told a million different stories - that I didn't need the ACR, that I did need it, that they will never re-inspect, that they will re-inspect.

What is actually going to happen? Anyone have any experience with this?

I've known other people with homes in the city that needed FAR more repairs and they didn't seem to have any issues... but others tell me that I need to complete the repairs right away or I'll run into issues.

What's an ACR? Is it for a rental or for your own personal property? The worst thing that could happen is that they keep sending you hate mail, threatening court action. The problem with that is the property runs the risk or sitting on the "blight-records", and each subsequent failure to comply would result in a $300 charge, which I have never seen them try to collect. I know several property owners whose properties are quite nice, meet all the section 8 inspections, are landscaped, etc, who receive that hate mail from the city for those properties, and even ones they don't / never have owned. The problem is, to order inspections is nothing short of a hassle. Aside from an inspector shortage, they love to reschedule at the last minute, , and it has to be done every year. Good luck working all that in to the already tight margins, considering taxes and insurance can eat up a mimimum $3000-3500/ yr or $300 a month on your 650 a month rental.

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Originally Posted by Hamtragedy

What's an ACR? Is it for a rental or for your own personal property? The worst thing that could happen is that they keep sending you hate mail, threatening court action. The problem with that is the property runs the risk or sitting on the "blight-records", and each subsequent failure to comply would result in a $300 charge, which I have never seen them try to collect. I know several property owners whose properties are quite nice, meet all the section 8 inspections, are landscaped, etc, who receive that hate mail from the city for those properties, and even ones they don't / never have owned. The problem is, to order inspections is nothing short of a hassle. Aside from an inspector shortage, they love to reschedule at the last minute, , and it has to be done every year. Good luck working all that in to the already tight margins, considering taxes and insurance can eat up a mimimum $3000-3500/ yr or $300 a month on your 650 a month rental.

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An ACR agreement is what a buyer is apparently required to sign before the title company will hand over the title. It basically states that I agree to fix the repairs cited by the City of Detroit inspector. I'm not trying to rent the house out, I'm trying to live in it. The funny thing is that the house passed the FHA appraisal inspection and they don't require any repairs but the city of Detroit wants to cite me for a bunch of ridiculous stuff like peeling paint and petty stuff that would probably cost me thousands to repair in total. Obviously, I plan on doing some upgrades and that sort of thing, but I don't appreciate the fact that the city can threaten jail time if I don't do these things on their schedule.

I had a really fun time finding anyone that was even willing to insure the house in Detroit. Perhaps people would actually buy houses here if the city wasn't working against them at every turn!

Welcome to our fair city, which makes buying a house more of a headache than it needs to be. These inspections are fairly new since the great recession, and Detroit is not the only one that makes you do this. Southfield also makes you pull a vacancy permit if you do not move in quick enough, then renew that vacancy permit if their required repairs aren't completed within the 30 days they allot. It's a money grab, and you're on their radar. Not sure how efficiently they plan to follow thru on all this stuff since Orr's been around, they do want the money, but as mentioned, they are desperately understaffed, and threatening anyone with jail time, especially someone new trying to make a difference, could be much better spent on the hundereds of slum-lords who've been draggin this joint down for decades who take letters like that and toss them in the trash, or more accurately, the street.

They probably want the peeling paint removed [[scrape it, paint over it, it's a lead hazard), GFCI outlets in the bathroom and kitchen and laundry, within 6 feet of the faucet [[hopefully not "dedicated" on 20 amp circuits, which can cost more, but not entirely unreasonable), same for the garage, vaccuum breakers for the outside hose-bibbs and laundry [[$6 each). Cracked cement around the house is usually an insurance issue, but the city may cite you for uneven, cracked exterior steps [[wooden or masonry, the latter can be costly). So what else do they want?

Wow! Homeowners are given such a short time to bring the homes purchased up to code while certain apartment building owners are given a pass, wink and nod from the city inspectors and the buildings are still not up to code after a few years