Selling A House In Ohio: What To Disclose About Termites

Yes, if you know about it. Ohio's Residential Property Disclosure Form, required under Revised Code 5302.30 for most residential property with one to four dwelling units, asks the seller directly about wood destroying insects and about damage they caused. The measure is what you actually know, not what an inspector might find later.

What The Form Actually Asks

The State of Ohio Department of Commerce publishes the form, and one item on it is headed WOOD DESTROYING INSECTS/TERMITES. It reads: "Do you know of any previous/current presence of any wood destroying insects/termites in or on the property or any existing damage to the property caused by wood destroying insects/termites?" If you check yes, it asks you to describe the problem and to indicate any inspection or treatment, but not longer than the past 5 years.

Two things in that sentence catch sellers out. The first is that presence and damage are asked about together, so old damage with nothing living in it still belongs on the form if you know about it. The second is that the heading says insects, not termites. Carpenter ants, carpenter bees, powderpost beetles and the old house borer all damage wood in this state, and we have written up what each one leaves behind elsewhere. A row of clean round holes in deck fascia is carpenter bee work, and it is still a wood destroying insect.

Where The Line Sits

Revised Code 5302.30 defines good faith as honesty in fact in the transaction. Where an item of information is unknown to the seller, the statute allows a good faith approximation, provided it is not being used to get around the disclosure requirement. It also says a seller is not liable in damages for an error, an inaccuracy or an omission that was not within the seller's actual knowledge. The form itself states that, other than having lived at or owned the property, the owner has no greater knowledge than a careful inspection by a buyer would produce, and that unless otherwise advised the owner has not conducted any inspection.

So this is a statement of knowledge, not an inspection report. Here is how the common worries land against it.

Pull Your Treatment Records Before They Age Out

There is a gap in the paperwork worth knowing about. When the answer is yes, the form asks you to describe any inspection or treatment, and it caps that at the past five years. Ohio Administrative Code 901:5-11-10 requires a pesticide business, and the employer of a commercial applicator, to keep application records for three years from the date of the application or inspection and to make them available to the Ohio Department of Agriculture. Three years of required retention against a five year question means the oldest end of that window may sit with you rather than with anyone else.

Ask for a copy while the file is certain to exist. A useful record answers:

• When. Dates of each application or inspection, not just the year you remember.
• What for. The target pest. A visit for ants is a different disclosure than a visit for subterranean termites.
• What was done. Baiting, a liquid barrier, a spot treatment or an inspection with no treatment at all.
• Where. The areas treated, which is the part a buyer's inspector will care about most.
• What came after. Follow-up visits, and whether any monitoring on the property is still live and who holds that agreement.

If the treatment was termite work, the method matters to the next owner. Soil-applied barriers and Sentricon baiting leave very different things behind on a property: one is a treated zone, the other is a ring of stations in the ground that someone is still reading.

The Buyer's Inspector Is Reading The Same House

When a lender is involved, the purchase file often picks up a second termite document, and it is not yours. A real estate wood destroying insect inspection is reported on the NPMA-33 form, and it answers a narrower question than your disclosure does: on the day of the visit, was there visible evidence of wood destroying insects, and visible damage from them. Our guide to reading an NPMA-33 walks through each block of it.

Trouble starts when the two documents look like they disagree. Your form says what you knew. Theirs says what was visible on one afternoon. A seller who has never seen anything and an inspector who finds a mud tube behind a stored box are both telling the truth. Knowing what termite evidence looks like before the inspector arrives at least means you are not learning it in a phone call from your agent.

Something Turned Up While You Are Under Contract

Get it identified before anybody writes anything down. Winged insects in a window well in spring are a coin flip between termite swarmers and flying ants, and the sawdust under a basement beam might be carpenter ant borings instead. Describing the wrong insect on a legal form helps nobody.

Once you know what it is, the disclosure side has a route: Revised Code 5302.30(G) allows a written amendment to a disclosure after the form has been delivered. How that interacts with your purchase contract is a question for your agent or a real estate attorney, not for a pest control company. What we can tell you is what is in the wood, whether it is active, and what ending it involves. Termite inspections are free, and the written findings are what a buyer, a lender or an attorney will actually accept.

Before The Form Goes Out

1. Walk the perimeter once, slowly. Sill plate, deck posts, porch skirt, the back of the garage. You are looking for mud tubes, hollow-sounding trim and holes, not for insects.
2. Ask the company that treated for the file. Three years of retention is the floor under Ohio Administrative Code 901:5-11-10, so the older end of the five year window is worth chasing now.
3. Write down what you were told, not what you concluded. "Treated for subterranean termites in the crawl space, April of that year" beats "had the house done".
4. Separate old damage from live activity. They are asked about together, and an inspection is what settles which one you have.
5. Keep the records with the form. A buyer reading a yes with dates and a method attached asks far fewer questions than a buyer reading a bare yes.

Listing a house in North Canton, Hartville, Massillon or anywhere else in Stark, Summit, Portage, Wayne or Tuscarawas county and want to know what is in the wood before the form goes out? Request a free termite inspection through our inspection request or call 330-494-6199. We will tell you what we find in writing, which is the only version worth putting your name next to.