"Buying Maine Shoreland Property: Who Has to Get the Septic Inspected Before You Close?"

You do, as the buyer. When a Maine home is in the shoreland area and has its own septic system, the statute says the person purchasing the property has to have that system inspected before the purchase, by somebody certified by the state. If the inspection finds the system malfunctioning, it has to be repaired or replaced within one year after the transfer.

I'm Jeff Moran, a mortgage broker in Bluffton, South Carolina, originating since 1996, licensed in fifteen states, including Maine, NMLS #483943, through C2 Financial Corporation. I write about the state rules that move money and time on a purchase. On Maine shoreland the statute names the buyer as the person who has to have the septic inspected, and the deadline it attaches to a bad result runs after closing.

Where does Maine's shoreland line actually fall?

This does not reach every home in Maine with a septic system. It reaches property in the shoreland area, and the statute defines that area in feet from the water.

38 M.R.S. §435 describes shoreland areas in horizontal distance from the water. The area reaches 250 feet back from the normal high-water line of any great pond, river or saltwater body, and it reaches the same 250 feet back from the upland edge of a coastal wetland or a freshwater wetland. Along a stream it is 75 feet from the high-water line.

Until 2020 the inspection requirement only covered coastal shoreland. Public Law 2019, chapter 43 extended it to inland shoreland effective January 1, 2020. That is how lake and river property came under the same rule as the coast.

Older copies of the statute are still posted on third-party sites with the coastal-only wording in them, and a 2013 or 2018 version reads as though a camp on a great pond is outside the requirement. The current text is on the Legislature's own page for 30-A M.R.S. §4216, and that is the version to work from if you look this up yourself.

Your municipality's code enforcement officer holds the shoreland zoning map and can tell you whether the property you are under contract on is inside the area. Two properties on the same road can land on opposite sides of a 250-foot line, so a call to the town is what settles it for your parcel.

Who is allowed to do the inspection?

The statute says a person certified by the department, which in practice means the certification Maine CDC runs through its subsurface wastewater program. The Maine CDC subsurface wastewater licensing and certification page is where it is described, and the licensing clerk listed there can confirm whether a particular person holds it.

Your home inspector may or may not hold that certification. A general home inspection is a different piece of work from the certified transfer inspection the statute names, and one does not cover the other. You'll want to ask whoever you have already booked whether they hold it, early enough that you still have time to hire somebody else.

The statute says who has to have the inspection done and says nothing about who pays for it. Payment is a contract question between you and the seller like any other cost in the purchase agreement, and on shoreland property it is a normal thing to ask for.

What does the seller have to tell you?

The same statute carries a disclosure, and it is separate from the inspection. Where the property has a subsurface wastewater disposal system, which is the statute's term for a septic system, the seller gives you a written statement saying whether that system has malfunctioned during the 180 days before the date of the transfer.

That statement covers roughly the last six months and nothing before it. A system that backed up two summers ago and was patched falls outside the question entirely, and the seller's answer would still be accurate. It also reports what the seller knows rather than what a test found, so you can get a clean statement on a system that still has a problem waiting in it.

That still leaves it useful. It arrives early, it costs you nothing, and a seller reporting a malfunction inside that window has told you something specific enough to plan around.

When does the inspection requirement work differently?

There are four situations here, and only three of them are exemptions. Two of them can mean the work is already done, so they are worth asking about before you book anything.

The system is new enough. A system installed under the plumbing permit rules within the three years before the closing date of the transfer is not subject to the inspection requirement. If the seller replaced the system two summers ago, you'll want the permit paperwork in hand, because the date on it is what the exemption runs on.

The seller already has a certified report. The report has to be for an inspection performed by a person certified by the department, within the three years before the transfer. Where the seller holds one, the seller provides you those results and you are not required to have the system inspected. This is worth raising with the seller directly, because somebody who paid for an inspection two years ago will not necessarily think to bring it up.

You are replacing the system anyway. The inspection is not required if you certify to the local plumbing inspector that you will replace the subsurface wastewater system within one year of the transfer. That fits a buyer who already knows the system is going.

Weather made it impossible. This one shifts the timing instead of removing the requirement. Where weather conditions make it impossible to inspect the system before the purchase, the inspection has to be performed within nine months after the transfer. On a February closing with frozen ground and snow cover that is a live possibility, and the result still lands on you as the owner.

What happens if the inspection finds the system malfunctioning?

The system has to be repaired or replaced within one year after the transfer of the property.

That deadline falls after closing, so the repair lands on you as the owner. That is why it belongs in your planning and not the seller's.

A repair or a replacement inside twelve months is money you want set aside, in a purchase where you have just spent a large part of what you had. What actually counts as reserves walks through how a file looks at money left over, and the same thinking works for your own planning.

Your chance to do anything about it with the seller runs out when the inspection contingency does, so this is the part to get to early. While that contingency is still open, a result in hand lets you ask the seller for something specific. If the seller agrees to pay, that money reaches you either as a credit at closing or as work completed beforehand, and those two do different things to what you bring to the table. How a seller credit moves your cash to close covers that choice.

On the loan side, this is a state obligation rather than a lender requirement, and it helps to keep the two straight. What a purchase loan asks about a property on private systems is whether there is a safe method of sewage disposal and whether the water is safe and continuously available. What a loan actually checks on a well and septic is the national picture on that. A failing system can still reach the file through the condition of the property, and what an appraiser looks at compared with what an inspector looks at is the distinction to have ready if somebody raises it.

How do you fit this into the inspection window?

The order matters more than the speed, because a couple of these steps depend on somebody else's calendar.

1. The town comes first. A call to the code enforcement office confirming whether the parcel is in the shoreland area tells you whether any of this applies to your purchase, and everything after it depends on that answer.
2. The next two questions go to the listing agent. Has the system been replaced in the last three years, and does the seller hold a certified inspection report from that same period? Either one can mean the work is already behind you.
3. The 180-day statement is worth reading when it arrives. It tells you whether the seller knows of a malfunction in roughly the last six months, and it is the one piece of the system's history that costs you nothing.
4. The certification is worth confirming before you hire anybody. You'll want to know whether the person is certified with Maine CDC for this inspection, and to know it while you still have time to call somebody else.
5. You'll want it booked early in the window. Certified inspectors in lake and coastal towns get busy in the season, and a tank that needs pumping to be inspected properly adds another appointment.
6. A quote while the contingency is still open is what gives you room. If the result comes back with a problem, a written number lets you ask the seller for a specific amount.

What usually goes wrong

Assuming the seller handles it. The statute names the purchaser, so on this one item nobody is going to assemble it for you unless you raise it.

Reading an old copy of the statute. The coastal-only version is still out there, and a buyer on a great pond who reads a 2013 page comes away believing the rule does not reach them.

Treating a clean disclosure as a clean system. The written statement covers 180 days and covers what the seller knows, so it can come back clean on a system a certified inspection would not pass.

Booking the inspection at the end of the window. That turns a negotiation into a choice between waiving a contingency and asking for an extension the seller has no reason to grant.

Forgetting the clock keeps running after closing. The twelve months run from the date of the transfer, and the owner is the one on the hook for the repair.

An illustration, so the order is clear

Dates below are made up to show the sequence. They are not a real file and not a prediction about your purchase.

You go under contract on a Friday on a camp outside Naples with frontage on a great pond, and you have a twelve-day inspection window. Monday morning the town's code enforcement office confirms the parcel is inside the shoreland area, so the inspection applies.

Monday afternoon you ask the listing agent two questions. Has the system been replaced in the last three years, and does the seller hold a certified inspection report from that same period? The answer on both is no, so you are arranging the inspection yourself.

Tuesday your home inspector tells you he does not hold the subsurface wastewater certification, and gives you two names. You reach the first one Wednesday, confirm the certification, and book for the following Monday. He tells you the tank should be pumped for a proper look, so you line that up for the same morning.

Monday of week two the inspection happens, and Wednesday you have the report. It finds a problem, and you have three days of contingency left. That is enough to get a written quote and put a specific request in front of the seller while the contract still gives it weight.

With the same inspection booked on day ten instead, the report lands after the contingency expired. You close with no way to ask the seller for anything, and the one-year repair clock starts with the whole cost on your side.

Where to start

You'll want the financing settled before the inspection window is the thing taking up your attention, because you get one window and it is better spent on the home. Run your numbers with no credit pull, no account and nobody calling you, and you will see pricing for your own scenario. Choose the option that works best for you, and know the selection can change as the file comes together.

When you want the letter behind the offer, what a Maine pre-approval involves covers it, and the Maine closing rules that decide who pays what is the wider picture on what a purchase here costs. No letter from anyone is a loan commitment. Final approval depends on the property, the appraisal and full underwriting.

If the home is also on a well, a second Maine rule is waiting in the same window. Who Maine lets run a radon test once a home is listed covers why a well home is two tests rather than one.

Common questions

Does every Maine home with a septic system need an inspection when it sells?

No. The requirement applies to property in the shoreland area. 38 M.R.S. §435 describes that as land within 250 feet of the normal high-water line of a great pond, river or saltwater body. It also reaches land within 250 feet of the upland edge of a coastal or freshwater wetland, and within 75 feet of a stream. A property outside those distances is not covered by this rule, and your town's code enforcement office holds the map.

Is the septic inspection the seller's responsibility in Maine?

The statute puts it on the person purchasing the property. 30-A M.R.S. §4216 says a person purchasing property with a subsurface wastewater disposal system in a shoreland area has to have that system inspected before the purchase, by a person certified by the department. The seller has a separate obligation, which is a written statement of whether the system malfunctioned during the 180 days before the transfer. Who pays for the inspection is not addressed, so that stays a contract question.

What if the inspection cannot happen because of snow or frozen ground?

The statute accounts for it. Where weather conditions make it impossible to inspect the system before the purchase, the inspection has to be performed within nine months after the transfer. That moves the timing and does not remove the requirement, and the result arrives when you are already the owner. On a winter closing that is worth planning for.

Who pays to fix a Maine septic system that fails the transfer inspection?

That depends on when you find out. A system the inspection finds malfunctioning has to be repaired or replaced within one year after the transfer, and that deadline falls after closing, so the new owner is the one who has to pay for it. While your inspection contingency is still open you can ask the seller to pay for the work or to give you a credit at closing, and once that contingency expires you have nothing behind the request except the seller's goodwill.

Do I still need the inspection if the septic system was recently replaced?

Not if the timing fits. A system installed under the plumbing permit rules within the three years before the closing date of the transfer is not subject to the inspection requirement. A written report from a certified inspection inside that same three-year period does the same thing, and the seller provides you those results instead. You'll want the permit or the report itself rather than a recollection, because the exemption runs on the date.