Buying a home: an electrical checklist for open inspections

A formal pre-purchase electrical inspection is where the testing happens, but by the time you book one you're usually serious about the place. The open inspection is the earlier filter. Twenty minutes with your eyes open can tell you whether a house is likely to need a new switchboard, rewiring or a smoke alarm upgrade, all of which belong in your budget.

Keep it to looking. You're in someone else's home, and the fittings aren't yours to test. Don't press safety switch test buttons, flick breakers or take covers off. Phone photos of what you see are more useful later than anything you could test on the day.

Ask the agent where the switchboard is and whether you can open its door. In older homes it's usually in or beside the meter box on an outside wall. Newer homes often have it in the garage or a hallway cupboard.

What you're looking for is the type of protection. White ceramic fuse carriers mean an old rewireable fuse board, often with no safety switch at all. Energy Safe Victoria says a safety switch always has a test button and '30mA' printed on it, so count them. A modern board has several, or one per circuit. Breakers with one safety switch, or none, will probably need work.

Look at what the board is mounted on, too. WorkSafe Victoria lists switchboards and their backing boards as a typical location for asbestos, particularly in buildings built or renovated before the late 1980s. A dark, pitch-like or fibre panel isn't a reason to walk away, but it makes a board replacement a more involved job.

Look up in each hallway and on each level. The Building and Plumbing Commission says smoke alarms are compulsory on or near the ceiling of every storey, between each bedroom area and the rest of the house. Homes built after 1 August 1997 must have alarms connected to mains power with a backup battery; older homes may have battery-powered alarms.

Fire Rescue Victoria's summary of the rules says homes built, largely renovated or extended after 1 May 2014 need interconnected, hard-wired alarms. If the listing mentions a recent extension, check whether the alarms look mains powered and matched. Yellowed casings hint at age, and the Commission advises replacing alarms generally after ten years.

Walk through and notice the fittings. Round-pin power points, bakelite or dolly switches and cloth flex to pendant lights usually date from the original wiring. Energy Safe Victoria lists old switchboards, old or broken switches and power points, and flickering lights among the tell-tale signs of faulty wiring.

Count the power points in the kitchen, bedrooms and living areas. Few points, and power boards everywhere in the listing photos, mean the house has outgrown its wiring. Look for scorched or cracked cover plates, and for switch plates that look much newer than the house, because fresh plates can sit on old cable.

Look up at the ceilings. Brown rings around downlights suggest old halogen fittings running hot, and a mix of downlight styles from room to room tells you the lighting has been added in stages.

This is where unlicensed work tends to hide. Look for extension leads running through windows to a shed, flex stapled along garage walls, power boards screwed to timber, garden light cables lying on the ground and outdoor points without weatherproof covers.

Check how the supply reaches the house. A sagging overhead line, a line close to trees or a loose bracket on the wall is worth noting, and so is a private pole down a long driveway. From the point of supply in, the property owner is responsible for maintaining the installation, including private lines.

Note big additions such as solar panels, a battery, an EV charger, split systems or a spa. They're not problems in themselves, but each one should come with paperwork.

The agent may not know every answer, but asking puts the questions on the record, and the answers help you brief the electrician who does the formal inspection.

Certificates matter because a licensed electrician must provide a Certificate of Electrical Safety whenever they complete electrical installation work. A new-looking board or a recent extension with no certificate behind it is worth a follow-up question.

Energy Safe Victoria says that when buying a home built before the 1980s, it's imperative to have the wiring checked by a licensed electrical inspector or registered electrical contractor before moving in. In Melbourne's west that covers a lot of housing, from Federation and Interwar homes in Newport and Spotswood to the post-war brick and weatherboard of Altona and Laverton.

Book the formal inspection before you're committed, so the findings can still shape your offer; for an auction, that means before auction day. A newer home in Point Cook, Tarneit or Werribee is less likely to have old wiring, but it can still have unlicensed add-ons, poor labelling or a board with no room for what you plan to add.