How long should a viewing take?

Twenty minutes is typical, and it is enough if you spend it in the right places. The photos have already answered whether you like the house, so spend the time in the basement, at the electrical panel and under the sinks.

Should I get a home inspection?

Wherever the offer process lets you, yes. Where it does not, the choice is between a pre offer inspection you pay for on a house you may not get and going in without one. That is a genuine trade off, and your realtor should walk you through how it is being handled on that specific listing.

What are the costs people miss most often?

In this housing stock: water in the basement, a 60 amp electrical service, Kitec plumbing, and a rented water heater or furnace contract that comes with the house. None of the four appear in a listing photo, and all four are findable at a showing once you know to look.

Can I take photos at a showing?

Ask first. Most sellers are fine with it, some are not, and in a tenanted unit there is another person's privacy involved. If you cannot photograph, write more.

What to look for at a house viewing

Updated September 9, 2026 · 7 minute read

A showing gives you twenty minutes, in a house staged to be liked, usually with someone waiting for the room. The photos have already told you whether you like it. What is left to find out is what it would cost you, and almost all of that sits in places nobody photographs.

Ten minutes before you leave

Look at the street from above, in satellite view. A backyard onto a rail corridor, a plaza loading dock or a school pickup route is obvious from the air and invisible in the listing photos.
Ask your realtor when it last sold and what has been done since. That history shapes most of the questions below.
For a condo, get the maintenance fee and what it includes before you go. A fee that covers heat and water is a different number from one that does not.
Bring a tape measure and a flashlight. The tape measure is for the one piece of furniture you are not giving up. The flashlight is for the basement and the attic hatch.
Charge your phone. You are going to take photos and write notes on it.

Start outside, before you go in

The exterior tells you about water and about money, which in a house are the same subject. Give it three minutes before you ring the bell.

Which way the ground slopes: Ground falling toward the house is the most common cause of a wet basement, and one of the cheaper things on this page to fix. Ground built up above the level of the foundation is a worse sign.
The downspouts: Follow each one. A downspout discharging against the wall, or disappearing into the ground into an old clay drain, puts water exactly where you do not want it.
The roof, from the sidewalk: Curling or patchy shingles, and any sag along the ridge line. You are not estimating its remaining life from the street. You are deciding whether to ask its age.
The windows: Original wood, mid life aluminium and recent vinyl are three very different budgets. Look for fogging between the panes, which means a failed seal.
The parking: In Toronto a front yard parking pad needs permission from the city, and plenty of existing pads never had it. Ask whether the parking is permitted rather than assuming a driveway carries the right to use it. Mutual drives, common in the older parts of the city, come with their own questions about access and maintenance.
The trees, including the neighbours': A large tree close to the foundation is a roots and eavestrough question. In Toronto, a tree over a certain trunk size is protected by bylaw whether it is on your land or not, which limits what you would be allowed to do about it.

The basement is the expensive room

If you have five minutes of real attention left, spend them down here. Most of what turns into a five figure surprise is visible in a basement, if you are looking for it.

Staining at the bottom of the walls: A horizontal line, a chalky white bloom, or fresh paint on the lower part of the wall only. That bloom is water moving through concrete, and a strip of fresh paint is somebody's answer to it.
Your nose: Musty is not cosmetic. It means water, now or recently, and it is one of the few things staging cannot fully cover.
A sump pump and a backwater valve: Ask whether both are there. Toronto runs a subsidy that covers part of the cost of installing a backwater valve, a sump pump and a severed disconnected drain, which tells you how common the underlying problem is in this city.
Ceiling height: If the plan is ever to finish the basement or add a unit down there, height is the one constraint you cannot negotiate. Measure it rather than eyeballing it.
The floor drain and the cleanout: Find them. A finished basement with no access to the drain or the cleanout is a future demolition, and the finishing is what pays for it.
How the finished part was finished: Framing straight onto a foundation wall with no gap, or laminate laid on concrete with no subfloor, is a renovation somebody will have to undo.

Wiring, plumbing, and what is rented

Five specific things in this housing stock are worth knowing by name, because each one is either an insurance problem, a lending problem or a monthly bill that follows the house.

The size of the electrical service: A 60 amp service is a real obstacle: some insurers will not write a policy on it, and lenders take an interest. Find the panel, read the rating on the main breaker, and note whether it is breakers or fuses.
Knob and tube wiring: Ceramic knobs and cloth covered wire, typical of houses built before about 1950. Many insurers refuse it outright, or require replacement within a set window after closing.
Aluminium branch wiring: Used in houses built from roughly the mid 1960s to the late 1970s. Not automatically dangerous, but it needs the right connections and insurers will ask about it.
Kitec plumbing: Orange and grey plastic pipe with brass fittings, put into a lot of GTA houses and condos from the late 1990s into the late 2000s. It fails, the class action settlement fund is closed, and replacing it is now the owner's cost. Look under the sinks specifically for it.
The age of the furnace and water heater, and whether they are rented: Rental and lease contracts on water heaters, furnaces and air conditioners are common in Ontario and they stay with the property. Find out what is owned, what is rented and what the buyout would be, because you take the contract on when you close.

If it is a condo, the building matters more than the unit

Buying a condo is buying a share of a corporation's finances as well as a home. The unit is what you are shown. The corporation is what you are joining.

The status certificate. In Ontario the corporation has to provide it on request within a period set by the Condominium Act, and it is what tells your lawyer about the reserve fund, any special assessment, arrears and the rules.
The reserve fund study. A fund sitting below what its own study says it needs is a special assessment waiting to happen.
What the fee covers, and its history. Ask for the last few years of fees rather than only this year's number.
Whether the building has run a major project: windows, balconies, the garage membrane, riser replacement. Those are the works that produce special assessments.
The rules that will actually affect you: pets, short term rentals, whether you can rent it out at all, and what you are allowed to change inside the unit.
Take the elevator down and walk the garage. Water staining on the garage ceiling and crumbling concrete are the cheapest early warning you will get about the building's condition.

The things a viewing cannot tell you

A showing is not an inspection and does not try to be. What it can do is produce the right questions.

A home inspection covers what a walkthrough cannot: the attic, the roof surface, the inside of the panel, moisture readings. Where the offer process does not allow a condition on inspection, the alternative is a pre offer inspection, which you pay for on a house you may not win.
The street at other times of day. Go back on a weekday morning and on a Saturday night. It costs nothing and it is the most informative second visit you can make.
Anything about why the sellers are selling, or what has happened on the listing so far. That is your realtor's job, not the walkthrough's.

Write it down before you leave the street

All of the above is only worth doing if the answers survive the day. Give yourself two minutes in the car: one thing you liked, one thing you would have to live with, the three questions you want answered, and a rating. See keeping track of the houses you are seeing for what to record and where to put it.

Common questions

How long should a viewing take?: Twenty minutes is typical, and it is enough if you spend it in the right places. The photos have already answered whether you like the house, so spend the time in the basement, at the electrical panel and under the sinks.
Should I get a home inspection?: Wherever the offer process lets you, yes. Where it does not, the choice is between a pre offer inspection you pay for on a house you may not get and going in without one. That is a genuine trade off, and your realtor should walk you through how it is being handled on that specific listing.
What are the costs people miss most often?: In this housing stock: water in the basement, a 60 amp electrical service, Kitec plumbing, and a rented water heater or furnace contract that comes with the house. None of the four appear in a listing photo, and all four are findable at a showing once you know to look.
Can I take photos at a showing?: Ask first. Most sellers are fine with it, some are not, and in a tenanted unit there is another person's privacy involved. If you cannot photograph, write more.