Massachusetts Inspection Waiver Ban Goes Into Effect

When Karen Riani tore down a few basement walls in 2020, she thought she was starting a small renovation project. Instead, she uncovered a crisis hiding beneath her home—and thousands of others across New England.

Under the plaster and paint was a foundation laced with deep, spreading cracks. The cause wasn’t water damage or shoddy construction—it was pyrrhotite, a mineral closely related to “fool’s gold” that reacts with air and moisture, causing concrete to swell, split, and eventually crumble from within.

“We just stared at each other and said, ‘This is not normal,’” Riani recalls.

The diagnosis, confirmed by lab tests, came as a shock and a slap in the face: The only fix was to lift the house off its foundation and rebuild it entirely, at a cost of nearly $300,000.

For years, fool’s foundation was thought to be confined to Connecticut. But the same mineral defects have cropped up across Massachusetts, where foundations poured with contaminated stone are starting to fail.

It’s a crisis that’s had devastating effects for homebuyers in the state. For years, buyers have due diligence just to compete in an ultra-competitive market. The new law, however, brings an end to the practice by banning sellers from accepting offers that waive home inspections.

“This new regulation creates a fairer, more even playing field for buyers and sellers,” said Housing Secretary Ed Augustus in a June press release. “Homebuyers must have the ability to make informed financial decisions and be given a clear picture of needed repairs or safety issues that could arise.”

What the new law says

The regulation doesn’t require inspections for all sales. Buyers can still choose to forgo one, but that choice must be entirely their own—not influenced by a seller or their agent.

Certain transactions are also exempt, including newly constructed homes sold with a one-year builder warranty, and transfers between family members or trusts.

The law also requires that sellers provide buyers with a separate disclosure form stating that their offer will not be judged based on whether they choose to have a home inspection.

The state’s Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities incorporated more than 100 public comments into its final version of the rule, including concerns from real estate agents and consumer advocates. The regulation also clarifies that contracts cannot include language that undermines the effectiveness of inspections, such as requiring buyers to waive their deposit in the event of serious repair findings, although it does still allow for standard negotiated terms like repair thresholds.

For John Gallagher, president of the New England Chapter of the American Society of Home Inspectors and a champion of the bill, the new rule is less about restricting the market and more about restoring what used to be a baseline expectation.

“Inspections have been around since the late ’60s, and for that entire time, people would buy and sell homes. Home inspections were expected to happen, and people got them, and just only in the last 15 [years] has this tool of trying to waive your inspection right been utilized to a mass market of people,” he says. “I think it’s just going to return things back to how they were, which was a healthy real estate market.”

Postsale discoveries that could have been avoided

For many Massachusetts homebuyers, waiving an inspection seemed like a harmless way to make their offer more competitive. But according to Gallagher, the consequences can be devastating.

In one case Gallagher recalls, a couple purchased a million-dollar home in a desirable part of Central Massachusetts only after they agreed to waive the home inspection.

“They never wanted to do it, but realized that this was the only way they were going to get this house,” Gallagher explains.

Just days after closing, before the movers even arrived, Gallagher was called in for a postpurchase inspection. What he found was catastrophic.

Almost immediately, Gallagher saw that the house had a crumbling foundation. The culprit was pyrrhotite, a naturally occurring mineral that causes concrete to expand and crack over time—an issue that has plagued homes across New England. It’s not covered by homeowners insurance, and most lenders won’t allow equity borrowing once it’s discovered.

The only fix was a complete foundation replacement—an intrusive and costly process that involves jacking the house up off the foundation to lay a new one.

“It could cost as much as $300,000 to remediate, and they haven’t even put their furniture in,” he says.

In another case, Gallagher inspected a recently flipped home that a young couple had purchased without an inspection. It looked pristine on the surface: fresh paint, modern fixtures, and updated finishes. But behind the cosmetic upgrades, the problems were severe.

“I discovered what the contractor covered up,” he says. “I saw unsafe wiring connections tucked away in the drop ceiling, and the most shocking thing was I found 8 feet worth of their sill that was riddled with termite damage.”

The damage was considerable, and it would once again be costly to repair. It fell on Gallagher, as the inspector, to break the news to the new owners.

“I left that home with the homeowner in tears,” he recalls.

These aren’t rare horror stories, Gallagher emphasizes. They’re the kinds of issues home inspectors across the state have been documenting for years. Issues that would have been caught before closing if the buyers hadn’t given up their inspection rights just to stay competitive.

Why some real estate professionals are pushing back

While consumer advocates and inspectors have praised the new law as a win for transparency, not everyone in the industry agrees. Some real estate professionals argue the policy goes too far, curbing their ability to negotiate effectively on behalf of their clients.

Anthony Lamacchia, broker and CEO of The Lamacchia Companies, is a vocal critic of the new regulation. While he supports home inspections in general, he believes the law strips away a core part of the buying process: communication.

“It is literally going to prohibit Realtors® from doing things that they are supposed to do. You are supposed to convey what a buyer is trying to achieve,” he said in an interview with Boston 25 News. “You are supposed to advocate for the advantages of the seller taking your buyer’s offer. Now, if a seller hears that or a listing agent hears that they’re not supposed to accept that offer, it doesn’t make sense.”

For brokers like Lamacchia, the rule changes what has long been a standard practice: presenting all aspects of an offer, including whether a buyer is willing to waive contingencies to make their bid more appealing. Under the new law, even mentioning an intended waiver could make an offer ineligible for consideration.

Gallagher acknowledges the concerns but insists the aim wasn’t to burden real estate professionals: it was to protect buyers from being boxed out of the market or pushed into costly mistakes.

“No one wants mandates. No one wants the state to tell you what to do. But people should have a right to due diligence,” he says.

A push for transparency and protection for everyone involved

Champions of the new regulation remain focused on helping the people navigating the Massachusetts’ housing market: “It protects them financially from making a bad investment. … It gives them a road map to take immediate steps to fix problems that are safety hazards or unhealthy conditions like mold,” Gallagher explains.

While the rule is designed to level the playing field for buyers, Gallagher believes it benefits the entire ecosystem of a home sale.

“This is going to protect buyers. It’s going to protect Realtors. It’s actually going to even protect sellers,” he says.

That’s why the bill had such strong bipartisan support, he says. And while it might reshape the way some offers are handled, Gallagher hopes it will ultimately raise the floor for consumer protection in real estate nationwide.