What Is a Seller's Property Disclosure in Georgia?

What is a seller's property disclosure in Georgia? It is a written statement, signed by the seller, that tells buyers what the seller knows about the home's condition and history: the structure, the roof, water, the major systems, the land and any legal or community matters that touch the property. In Georgia sales that use the Georgia REALTORS® forms, the Seller's Property Disclosure Statement is attached to the purchase and sale agreement as an exhibit, so it travels with the contract. It asks what you know, in your own words, not what an inspector might find.

The listing shows how a home looks. The disclosure tells what it remembers: the storm that took a section of shingles, the spring the crawlspace held water, the year the furnace was replaced. Written with care, that memory becomes one of the calmest pages in the whole sale.

This guide is from Andrew and Jassey Nguyen. NRG Nguyen Realty Group is a real estate team with Keller Williams Realty Peachtree Road helping sellers in Atlanta, Georgia prepare a clear, complete property disclosure before their home goes on the market. Our team explains the form and helps you gather your records. Legal questions about what you must share belong with a Georgia real estate attorney, and our team will tell you when a question has crossed that line.

What does the Georgia disclosure form look like?

Georgia REALTORS® publishes a set of standard forms that its member agents use. The Seller's Property Disclosure Statement is one of them, and it comes in more than one version. There is the standard statement for a house, plus separate versions for a condominium, for a lot or land, and for new construction. When the home sits in a community with an owners association, a separate Community Association Disclosure exhibit covers the association. For a home built before 1978, a lead-based paint exhibit and a federal pamphlet are added, which we cover below.

The forms are written for members and their clients, so we will describe the statement here in general terms rather than quote it. Expect questions about the structure and any additions, the roof, water and flooding, the major systems, the lot, and legal or community matters such as boundaries and the association. Wherever the form gives you room to explain, use it.

The explanations carry the weight. "Yes" tells a buyer almost nothing. "Yes, the roof leaked over the back bedroom after a storm in 2021, a licensed roofer replaced the damaged section, and the invoice is attached" tells them the whole story and how it ended.

Your agent should give you the current version of the form for your type of home. Forms are updated, and answering last year's version is an avoidable problem.

Is a seller required to disclose in Georgia?

This is a legal question, so here is the general picture, with a firm suggestion to ask a Georgia real estate attorney about your own sale.

A Georgia contract with a due diligence period gives the buyer time to inspect the home and decide. What a seller could face for leaving out a known problem, or for answering a question falsely, depends on the facts and on Georgia law, which is the work of an attorney.

Whether you must fill out the Georgia REALTORS® statement is a separate question from whether buyers will expect it. The statement exists as an exhibit to the contract, so in a sale using those forms, the disclosure is part of the paperwork buyers and their agents look for. An estate, a trust, a bank or a seller who never lived in the home may face different expectations. Ask an attorney before deciding what to provide.

One rule is federal and applies across Georgia: the lead-based paint disclosure for older homes.

What is the lead-based paint disclosure?

If your home was built before 1978, federal rules add steps before a buyer signs the contract. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the seller must disclose any known information about lead-based paint and lead-based paint hazards in the home, give the buyer the pamphlet "Protect Your Family From Lead in Your Home," provide all available records and reports about lead-based paint in the home, and include a Lead Warning Statement. The buyer is also given a 10-day period to have the paint inspected or a risk assessment done, which the parties may change in writing or the buyer may waive.

The EPA lists exemptions, including housing built after 1977, foreclosure sales, and housing a certified inspector has found free of lead-based paint. If you are unsure whether your home qualifies, your agent and attorney can confirm it.

In a Georgia sale using the Georgia REALTORS® forms, this disclosure is handled through its own exhibit, alongside the pamphlet. It sits beside the property disclosure, and the buyer receives both.

How do you prepare your disclosure before you list?

Start before the photographer arrives. The best time to write a disclosure is in a quiet week with your records spread out on the dining table, long before an offer and its deadlines. This is the order our team suggests.

1. Ask your agent for a blank copy of the current statement for your type of home, plus the community association exhibit if you have an owners association.
2. Gather your records: repair invoices, warranties, permits, the inspection report from when you bought the home, insurance claims, pest control contracts, and any survey or plat you received at your purchase.
3. Walk the house with the form in hand, room by room and system by system. Open the crawlspace door. Look at the ceiling below each bathroom.
4. Look up your address on FEMA's Flood Map Service Center, which FEMA calls the official online location for its flood hazard maps, so you know what a buyer will see.
5. Answer what you know, in plain words, with dates wherever you have them.
6. Answer that you do not know only when that is the truth. A blank memory and an inconvenient answer are different things.
7. Attach or list the paperwork that supports your answers, and keep copies.
8. Set aside every question you are unsure how to answer, and take that list to a Georgia real estate attorney.
9. Review the finished statement with your agent, then sign and date it.
10. If something changes before closing, such as a new leak or storm damage, tell your agent and attorney right away and ask how to update what buyers have received.

The last step deserves its own phone call. A home keeps living between listing day and closing day. A pipe can burst in a January cold snap. A limb can come through the porch roof. The statement you signed in the spring describes the home you knew then, and an attorney can tell you how to handle what you learned since.

Should you get a pre-listing inspection?

Some sellers hire their own inspector before listing. It can show you what is there to find while you still have time to repair it, price for it, or explain it on your terms.

Weigh one tradeoff with your attorney. Once an inspection report tells you about a problem, you know about it, and what you know is what the disclosure asks for. Learning it in a calm week can be easier than learning it on the fourth day of a buyer's due diligence period, when every finding arrives with a deadline attached. Our article on whether you need to renovate before selling in Atlanta walks through how to decide which repairs to make before listing.

How do buyers use your disclosure?

A buyer reads your statement to decide where to look harder. A line about past water in the basement can send their inspector to the foundation walls with a moisture meter. A note about a replaced water heater, with the date, lets them move on to something else.

Then the buyer's due diligence period begins. In a Georgia contract with a due diligence period, that is the buyer's window to inspect, get estimates, quote insurance and decide. Your disclosure shapes what they test during those days. Our article on the due diligence period in Georgia explains how that window works from the buyer's side.

A clear statement also changes the tone of the conversation that follows. When the inspection report matches what you wrote, the findings read as confirmation. When a report finds something the statement left out, the buyer may wonder what else is missing.

What mistakes do sellers make with the disclosure?

The first is leaving off a known problem out of fear it will cost the sale. The buyer's inspector may find the same issue, and now the item comes with a question about your credibility attached. A problem disclosed with its repair invoice reads as a home that was cared for.

The second is guessing. If you do not know when the water heater was replaced, check the label or find the receipt. A confident wrong date can cause more trouble than an answer that you do not know.

The third is filling the form out in a rush after an offer arrives. Contract deadlines begin quickly, and a hurried statement is where gaps appear. A disclosure prepared a few weeks before listing is one less thing to manage in the busiest week of the sale.

The fourth is treating a fixed problem as if it never happened. A crawlspace that took on water years ago and was corrected is still part of the home's history. Write it down, and show the fix.

The fifth is answering legal questions alone. A boundary disagreement with a neighbor, a lien, a past insurance dispute, or a question about what counts as "knowing" belongs with a Georgia real estate attorney. Our article on the biggest mistakes sellers make in Atlanta's market covers others that can surface during a sale.

What if you are selling a parent's home or an inherited home?

This is where the form asks the most of you. If you never lived in the house, you may know very little about its history, and you can only disclose what you know. An executor or an heir may use a different approach than an owner who lived there for decades, and an attorney should guide that choice.

Gather what the house can tell you. Old invoices in a kitchen drawer, a dated sticker on the water heater, a neighbor who remembers the roof being replaced, a pest control contract in the filing cabinet. Each one turns a guess into a fact you can write down. Our article on how to help your parents sell their home covers the larger move around that sale.

An example of how this can play out

This is an example, not a real client.

Picture a couple in metro Atlanta who have owned their home for fifteen years and plan to list in the spring. Six weeks ahead, they sit down with our team and a blank statement. They remember a crawlspace moisture problem that a contractor corrected years ago, and a section of roof patched after a storm. Neither can say how old the water heater is. The home was built in 1974.

They find the crawlspace invoice in a folder and the roofer's receipt in an old email. The water heater's label gives its manufacture date. They write each item in plain words, with dates, and list the paperwork. Because of the build year, the lead-based paint exhibit and pamphlet are added to their packet. One question about a driveway they share with a neighbor is unclear, so they take it to a Georgia real estate attorney before answering.

When a buyer's inspector later notes the old crawlspace repair, the buyer already has the invoice. The finding reads as confirmation, and the conversation moves on to the next item.

Frequently asked questions

Do I have to disclose problems I never knew about? The statement asks about what you know, and you cannot describe a problem you have never heard of. If you are unsure what counts as knowing, ask a Georgia real estate attorney.

Can I sell my home "as is" and skip the disclosure? Selling as is generally means you will not make repairs. You still answer the disclosure truthfully. Ask an attorney how an as-is sale works for your home.

Who sees my disclosure? Buyers who are interested in your home and their agents. Because it is an exhibit to the contract, it becomes part of the paperwork for the sale.

Should I include old repairs? Include them when the form asks about them, along with the repair and the paperwork. A documented fix answers a question before a buyer has to ask it.

Does the lead-based paint rule apply to my home? It applies to homes built before 1978, with exemptions the EPA lists. Your agent and attorney can confirm it for your home.

Can my agent fill out the disclosure for me? The statement is yours, in your words, about your home. Our team can explain each section and help you gather records, and an attorney can answer the legal questions.

Begin with what the house remembers

A disclosure written early, with the invoices beside it, lets the rest of the sale move at an even pace.

NRG Nguyen Realty Group is a real estate team with Keller Williams Realty Peachtree Road helping sellers in Atlanta, Georgia prepare a clear, complete property disclosure before their home goes on the market. If you are thinking about selling, our team can walk through the form with you and help you gather what it asks for. The closing itself comes later, and our article on what happens at a Georgia closing when you're the seller follows that part of the sale.

Send us a message: nrgmovesyou.com/contact

Or book a 15-minute discovery call with our team: schedule a call

Andrew and Jassey Nguyen

NRG Nguyen Realty Group

Real Estate Agents in Atlanta, GA

678-743-1586

nrgmovesyou.com

This article is general information, not legal advice. Talk with a Georgia real estate attorney about your disclosure and what Georgia law requires for your sale.