How to Respond to a Buyer Repair Request After Inspection

Short answer: you have five responses available, not two. Agree to the repairs, offer a credit instead, reduce the price, do part of the list, or decline. Before choosing, sort the request into three piles: genuine defects, items that are age and condition rather than defects, and preferences. You are negotiating the first pile. The second pile is usually answered with records rather than money, and the third is usually declined.

General information only. What you are contractually obliged to do depends on your purchase agreement and your state. Your agent and, where relevant, a real estate attorney are the people to confirm specifics with.

First, understand what the buyer can actually do

Most contracts give the buyer an inspection contingency: a defined window in which they can have the home inspected and then raise issues. Within that window, the buyer's realistic leverage is to ask, to renegotiate, or to walk away and recover their deposit, depending on how the contingency is written.

Two things follow. The buyer asking for something does not mean you owe it. And the clock matters: responses are usually due inside the contingency period, so a slow reply is itself a decision.

Sort the list before you price it

A ten-page inspection report typically becomes a request covering a handful of items. Put each into one of three categories, because they get different answers.

That middle row is the one sellers hand money over for unnecessarily. An inspector writing "water heater appears to be at or near the end of its expected service life" is describing an unknown, not a defect. If you can produce an invoice showing it was installed four years ago, the item closes without a dollar changing hands. If you cannot, the buyer is entitled to assume the worst, and they will price it.

This is the practical reason to keep dated repair records and to know how old your roof actually is before anyone asks.

Your five options

• Do the repairs. Cleanest for the buyer's lender, and it keeps the work in your control, which matters because you choose the contractor and the scope. Get the invoices; they become part of the disclosure record.
• Offer a credit at closing. You avoid managing contractors under time pressure and the buyer fixes it their way. Be aware the credit has a ceiling imposed by the buyer's loan, which is covered in repair credit versus price reduction.
• Reduce the price. Different mechanics and different effects on the appraisal and the buyer's cash position. Also covered in that article.
• Do part of the list. The most common real outcome. Take the safety items, decline the cosmetic ones, and say why in writing.
• Decline. A legitimate response, particularly where you priced the home for its condition or the buyer is reaching past the contingency's purpose. Understand the risk: the buyer may walk, and depending on your contract they may take their deposit with them.

When the buyer's loan limits your choices

Some items are not really negotiable because the lender will not fund the loan while they exist. Appraisers working on FHA and VA loans flag health and safety problems, and those typically must be fixed before closing rather than credited. The same logic applies to conventional loans where an appraisal is completed "subject to" repairs.

It is worth asking your agent early which items fall into that bucket, because negotiating over something the lender will require anyway wastes the one resource you have least of, which is contingency days.

How to write the response

Short, itemized, unemotional. For each requested item, one of: agreed, agreed with a credit of X, declined, or declined with an explanation. Where you decline because the item is documented rather than defective, attach the document. "Water heater installed 2022-03, invoice attached, warranty to 2028" ends a conversation that "the water heater is fine" does not.

Avoid two things. Do not argue with the inspector's report line by line; you are negotiating with the buyer, not the inspector. And do not agree verbally. Whatever you settle becomes an addendum, and what you fixed becomes part of what you have disclosed.

What this does to your disclosure obligations

Anything the inspection revealed is now something you know. Depending on your state, if this buyer walks and you relist, those findings may need disclosing to the next buyer. Sellers sometimes decline repairs expecting a fresh start with the next offer, and that is not how it works. See what home sellers must legally disclose.

Keep every repair invoice from this stage. It is proof of what was addressed, and proof that you addressed it properly.

The bottom line

Sort the list before you price it. Fix or credit genuine defects, answer age-and condition items with records where you have them, and decline preferences in writing. Expect lender-required items to be non-negotiable. Respond inside the contingency window, put everything in an addendum, and keep the invoices, because the inspection findings are now part of what you know and may have to disclose.

Sources

This article was researched and verified in October 2026 against the following:

• Inspection contingency mechanics (a defined window, the buyer's ability to request, renegotiate or withdraw subject to contract terms) are described consistently by brokerage sources including Redfin on inspection timelines. Contract terms govern and vary by state and by agreement.
• Lender-required repairs: FHA and VA appraisals flag health and safety deficiencies, and conventional appraisals completed "subject to" repair require completion before the loan can be delivered. The Fannie Mae condition-rating requirement is covered with sources in our foundation and appraisal guides.
• Seller concession limits, which cap what a closing credit can be, are verified against the Fannie Mae Selling Guide in our repair credit article.
• Not verified: there is no authoritative dataset on how often sellers agree, counter or decline, or on typical settlement amounts. Figures of that kind circulating online come from brokerage marketing rather than research, so none are quoted here.