Why buyers and lenders both balk
Two things have to survive for a listed sale to close: the buyer's nerve and the buyer's lender. A failed cesspool takes out both at once.
The buyer is picturing the yard dug up and a bill nobody will commit to in advance. The lender is looking at a property that cannot practically be occupied until the waste system works. Either one alone is enough to end a contract, and the house goes back on the Ronkonkoma market with more days on it and a cesspool in its history.
How we help Ronkonkoma owners with a failed cesspool
We buy houses with failed cesspools regularly, which means we already know who does this work properly and roughly what it runs. That is the practical difference between us and a buyer meeting the problem for the first time.
We have sanitary contractors and engineers we have used for years, and we bring them in on our own account after closing rather than asking you to arrange anything. And if it turns out that replacing the cesspool and listing the house on the open market would leave you better off, we will tell you so and give you the name of the contractor we would call.
Why local knowledge changes the number
A three-bedroom on Pleasure Avenue. A three-bedroom on West 5th Street. A two-bedroom on Terry Road. All of them in Ronkonkoma, all bought by us.
Ronkonkoma is roughly 18,955 people in Suffolk County, ZIP 11779, and the housing stock is mostly ranch, cape cod, hi-ranch. Around Lake Ronkonkoma and Long Island MacArthur Airport, most of it is old enough that the mechanicals are on their second or third life. The Ronkonkoma stop pulls buyers who commute, which supports the good houses and does very little for the ones that need a roof. We know which of these streets take water, where the older systems fail first, and what the Connetquot Central School District does to a resale price.
Replacing the cesspool first is usually the expensive order
Do not spend money on an inspection or a pump-out for our sake. We are asking for neither.
If the cesspool has already been looked at, bring whatever the contractor wrote down and it saves a conversation. If it has not, we would rather walk the property ourselves and price the system from what we can see. We are buying the cesspool along with the house, so there is nothing you need to prove to us about it beforehand.
What replacing a waste system actually involves
Replacing a waste system is a project rather than a repair. It means design, approvals, excavation, and a yard that looks like a construction site for a while, and on some lots the layout makes it considerably harder than on others.
What is permitted and what it costs turns on the specifics of your parcel, and the two places to get a real answer are your county health department and a sanitary contractor who has walked the property and looked at the cesspool. What we can tell you is that we buy houses with failed cesspools without needing any of that settled first.
How we arrive at a number on a house with a failed cesspool
The honest answer on a house with a failed cesspool is that we work backwards from what it is worth once it is fixed, subtract what fixing it costs, and subtract what we need to make for the risk of being wrong about either. There is no secret to it and no algorithm.
- What it is worth repaired. Not the Ronkonkoma median of $641,000 on its own, but what houses like yours on your street actually closed at recently.
- What the work costs. Roof, boiler, electric, the kitchen and bath. In Ronkonkoma the stock is largely ranch and cape cod, and on houses that age the mechanicals are usually the expensive part rather than the cosmetics.
- How long we will hold it. The median Ronkonkoma house goes under contract in about 22 days once it is showable, then waits 45 to 60 days more on the buyer's lender. Ours has to get to showable first, and we carry taxes and insurance across the whole of it.
- What we are wrong about. Opening a wall finds things. That risk is priced in, which is a large part of why a cash number sits below a retail number.
Why the number works for us and not for you
This is the part most cash buyers are vague about, so here it is plainly. We run millions of dollars of construction a year. That volume buys materials at contractor pricing and keeps the same crews working year round, which means the identical renovation costs us roughly half what a homeowner would pay to have it done.
That gap is the business. It is also why doing the work yourself before selling so rarely pays: you would be buying the same roof and the same boiler at retail, then hoping the market hands it back to you at resale. It usually does not. We are not making money because you sold cheaply. We are making it because we build cheaply.
And if the number does not work for you, say so. We would rather hear that than talk anyone into anything. We will look at your situation and tell you honestly what we think your options are, including the ones that do not involve us. Plenty of people are better off listing with an agent, and when you are one of them we will say so rather than let you find out later.
No lender, no repair conditions, no sign-off to wait on
A failed cesspool is a privacy problem too, which people rarely mention out loud. A listing means a sign on the lawn in Ronkonkoma, strangers walking through on weekends, and a yard that is visibly torn up or visibly unusable.
There is none of that with us. One visit, a written number, a closing date you choose, and no explaining the cesspool to anybody on the street.
What you do not pay when you sell a house with a failed cesspool
Each of the following comes with a retail listing of a house with a failed cesspool, and none of it comes with ours.
- Agent commission
- $32,050 at 5% of the Ronkonkoma median none
- Seller closing costs
- About $12,820 on a $641,000 sale. We can cover these. none
- Repairs to make it listable
- Whatever the house needs, paid up front none
- Cleanout and removal
- Dumpsters or haulers by the load, ahead of any viewing none
- Carrying costs while it waits
- Taxes, insurance and utilities through the 67 to 82 days a listing takes to sell and close none
What to do next about the cesspool at your Ronkonkoma house
New York has disclosure obligations for sellers, and what applies to your situation is a legal question. Ask an attorney about the cesspool before you sell to anyone, ourselves included.
Separately from that: tell us everything. When the cesspool failed, what it did, who has looked at it, what they said. None of it puts us off, and all of it makes the number solid the first time. The deals that fall apart are the ones built on half the story.
Common questions
Do I have to fix the cesspool before you buy a Ronkonkoma house?
No. We buy with the cesspool exactly as it is. The repair or replacement is our project after closing, not something you arrange first.
What does a new cesspool or septic system cost?
That varies widely, and a single honest number for it does not exist. Get a contractor out, and ask the county health department what a replacement at your address has to be. If you would rather skip the whole exercise, sell the house with the cesspool as it is.
The cesspool backed up but the house is still livable. Is that a failure?
Sometimes a backup is a blockage and sometimes it is the cesspool reaching the end of its life, and telling those apart takes somebody who has opened it up. Either way we buy, and either way it is worth knowing which one you have.
A buyer walked away over the cesspool. Does that hurt my chances with you?
No. Most Ronkonkoma owners who call us about a cesspool have already lost at least one contract to it. It is the usual route to this conversation rather than a mark against the property.
Do you buy houses on septic as well as cesspools?
Yes. Cesspools, septic systems, older arrangements nobody has a clean name for, and houses where the system was never quite right to begin with. The condition of it does not stop us.