Many sellers today wrongly think that offering their home “as is” automatically will protect them from lawsuits by their buyers.

Q: We purchased a home “as is” in August, and obtained a permit from our city to expand the master bedroom in September. When the city inspector came out to approve the bedroom’s new foundation last month, he noticed that our garage – which the previous owner had converted to a home office – was not done according to the city’s building code. Now the city has suspended our permit for the half-finished bedroom and will not renew it until we bring the garage up to code, which will cost about $13,000. The sellers never told us that the garage conversion was done without a permit and did not meet the building code. What can we do? Can we sue the sellers for the cost of the work that we will have to pay for the garage, even though we bought the home “as is”?

A: Yes, you can sue the sellers, and probably win, even though you purchased the home as is.

Most real estate sales contracts today state that the property is being sold as is, which basically means that the seller won’t make any improvements to close the deal. That’s fair, because sellers shouldn’t be required to make minor changes, such as replacing a worn carpet or repainting scuffed walls, unless they agree to do it as part of the sale.

Illegally converting a garage to a home office, however, is an entirely different matter. The sellers apparently did the work on their own volition, without getting a building permit or perhaps even checking with the city to see if the conversion would be OK.

They then apparently didn’t disclose this information when you agreed to purchase the house in August, so you’ve got a good case to sue for the cost of bringing the conversion up to the local building code’s standards as well as any permits that may be required.

You might even have a case against the home inspector you (hopefully) hired to look at the property before you bought it. Inspectors generally aren’t expected to know what the local building codes are, but they have a duty to discover unsafe conditions.