The option period: a working timeline

Day 0–1: read and triage

The report usually lands within 24 hours of the inspection. Triage it the day it arrives — not because reading is urgent, but because everything downstream is booked on lead times you do not control.

Day 1–2: book specialists immediately

This is the step people get wrong. Structural engineers, sewer camera services, and licensed electricians are routinely booked three to five business days out, and a seven-day option period does not have room for a Wednesday decision to book a Monday visit.

Book on day one, before you have decided whether you need every one of them. A cancelled appointment costs nothing; an unbooked one costs you the option period.

Day 2–4: quotes on anything you might negotiate

Contractors will often quote from the report plus photographs, which is faster than a site visit and adequate for negotiation. Ask for a range and what would move it, rather than a single figure — you are buying an argument, not a contract.

Day 4–6: make the ask

Submit a short, specific request citing the inspector's own words and pages. Leave a full day for a response and a counter — a request submitted on the final afternoon has no negotiating room left in it.

Day 6–7: decide

By this point the unknowns should be resolved or explicitly accepted. Deciding with an open structural or sewer question is how people end up owning a problem they were told about in writing.