Re: Inspecting a septic system

Todd R. Haverstock <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> True story: We moved into our 40 year old house late 5/1999.  Mid
> 7/1999, I flushed toilet on 1st floor powder room one evening.  A few
> hours later I saw the bathroom waste in the basement laundry tub.
> Bottom line- almost the entire field was plugged with solid waste due
> to a baffle that fallen off some time ago.  The cost: $1000 to jet the
> field including two tank pumpings and repair of the tank baffle.   We
> had our house inspected before move-in by a regular house inspector
> but the tank exam was not part of it.  I think the people that
> inspected the field for the seller just looked for puddles or soft
> ground in the back yard, of which there were none since the field had
> been plugged solid.

    Sounds like our system, only ours was breaking out at the lid (it had
rotted out).  We negotiated about $7500 off of the purchase price (for a
worst-case full-replacement).  We had the weepers pumped out and resurected
and the lids replaced with steel plates for about $800.  The realtor had
told us it had been pumped out "two or three years ago", our septic guy said
it hadn't been pumped out in at least 10, which was confirmed later on by
the neighbors.

-- Steve