Pre-Purchase Electrical Inspection: What a Gold Coast Buyer Should Check Before Settlement

Byron Knight, Licensed Electrical Contractor

QLD Lic. 1511406 · 20+ years’ experience · Gold Coast & SEQ · Updated October 2026

Most buyers book a building and pest inspection, get a thirty-page report back, and reasonably conclude the property has been checked. It has, for structure and timber pests. The electrical system generally hasn’t been, and that isn’t the inspector cutting corners. It’s outside what they’re licensed to do.

This guide covers what the building report leaves out, the obligations that pass to you at settlement, what you can safely notice at an open home, and how to fit an electrical inspection inside your contract dates.

What your building and pest inspection actually excludes

A pre-purchase building inspection is a visual assessment of the structure and condition of the building. The Queensland Government’s advice to buyers is to “make sure you know exactly what the inspection report covers”, and to check that the inspector holds a current QBCC licence.

That licence is the point. Testing an electrical installation is electrical work, and under Queensland law electrical work, including testing, must be done by someone with an electrical licence. A building inspector can note what’s visible. They can’t test whether it works or whether it’s safe. Most reports say so in their scope section, so read yours or ask your inspector directly.

This isn’t a criticism of building inspectors. A good one will note an obviously defective outlet or an ancient switchboard as an observation. Noting something visible is different from testing an installation. Electrical is a separate discipline with a separate licence.

The seller’s paperwork doesn’t fill the gap either. Since 1 August 2025, Queensland sellers must give buyers a seller disclosure statement before the contract is signed. The Queensland Government lists the “structural soundness of the building” among the things a seller is not required to include, and its summary of the statement doesn’t mention the electrical installation at all. It is a disclosure document, not a condition report.

What becomes your problem at settlement

Three things land on the buyer, and buyers routinely find out about them afterwards.

The 90-day safety switch clock

The Electrical Safety Office is direct about it: “If you buy a property without a safety switch, you must install a safety switch for the power point circuits within 90 days of a property transfer.” Not the seller. You.

The seller’s duty is to establish whether one is installed and declare it on the sales contract and the property transfer form (Form 24). Read that declaration carefully and have it verified. A common mistake is a seller taking circuit breakers for safety switches. Our guide to what’s required when selling in QLD covers the seller’s side, and safety switch and RCD testing confirms what’s actually there.

Smoke alarms

This one is the seller’s obligation. The Queensland Fire Department says that where a contract of sale is signed after 31 December 2021, the seller must upgrade the dwelling to interconnected photoelectric smoke alarms before it is transferred, and declare that on the Form 24.

It’s still yours to live with, and a non-compliant set discovered after settlement is your cost to fix. Two details are worth knowing. The department’s FAQ says alarms older than 10 years must be replaced, and that 240-volt hardwired alarms must be replaced with 240-volt alarms. Our smoke alarm compliance guide has the detail, and smoke alarm supply and installation is the service if a set needs bringing up to standard.

Whatever the previous owner did

This is the one with the longest tail. Unlicensed work carries no certificate, and an electrician can’t retrospectively certify work someone else did. The Electrical Safety Office warns that if a fire results from illegal electrical work, “your insurer may refuse the claim”. You didn’t do the work, but you own the installation. See DIY electrical work and home insurance.

What you can check yourself at an open home

Ten minutes of looking, without touching anything, tells you whether the property warrants a proper inspection.

1. Ask the agent three questions. Are there safety switches on the power circuits? When was the switchboard last worked on? Are there certificates of testing and compliance for electrical work done during the seller’s ownership?
2. Look at the outlets. Discolouration, scorch marks, cracked faceplates, or a mix of obviously different vintages in one room.
3. Count them. Two outlets in a bedroom tells you the wiring’s era better than the paint does.
4. Look up at the smoke alarms. Is there one in every bedroom and in the hallway outside them? Missing alarms are easy to spot from the floor. Leave them where they are.
5. Look for the odd one out. A surface-mounted outlet on a rendered wall, a light switch at a strange height, cable in conduit down an external wall. These are signs of work added later, possibly by someone unlicensed.
6. Leave the switchboard closed. It isn’t your property to open, and an older board can have exposed parts and an asbestos backing panel. That is what the electrician’s visit is for.

None of this is diagnosis. It’s triage, enough to decide whether to book a licensed electrician.

What a licensed electrician checks that you can’t

• Safety switch function. Not whether one exists, but whether it trips as it should. A device that fails its test offers no protection while appearing to.
• Insulation resistance. Degraded insulation in older wiring is invisible, and it is what turns into a fault later.
• Earth continuity across the installation.
• Circuit loading and board capacity through a switchboard inspection: whether the property supports what you plan to add, be that air conditioning, a kitchen, or an EV charger.
• Thermal imaging of the switchboard under load. A degrading connection runs hot before it fails, which makes it findable now and not after you’ve moved in. See what a thermal scan finds.
• Evidence of non-compliant work. Wrong cable, missing protection, non-standard terminations, unlabelled circuits.

The output is a written assessment of what the installation actually is. That’s a different document from a compliance certificate, which a contractor issues for work they performed and tested themselves. Our guide to electrical compliance certificates in QLD explains the difference.

Red flags by property age on the Gold Coast

The beachside row is worth dwelling on. Salt-laden air accelerates corrosion at switchboard terminations, and a corroded termination carries more resistance, which means more heat. A board a few streets from the beach can be in worse condition than an identical board further inland, so build date tells you less here than it does elsewhere. We explain why in why Gold Coast switchboards corrode faster.

For homes built before 1990, the Queensland Government’s guidance is that some asbestos materials are likely, and older switchboards are one place they turn up. Our guide to common electrical problems in older QLD homes covers the rest, including aluminium wiring.

Buying into a strata scheme

An extra question applies: which electrical infrastructure is yours, and which is common property. That determines who pays for what after you settle, and it’s not always where you’d assume. Equipment serving only your lot can remain your responsibility even when it physically sits on common property. Our guide on body corporate versus unit owner electrical responsibilities sets out the split.

It’s worth asking the committee whether common property switchboards and emergency lighting are on a current testing schedule. A scheme that has let those lapse is telling you something about how it’s run. We work with committees and managers through our strata and body corporate electrical service.

Timing it against your contract

1. Get the condition into the contract. The Queensland Government’s advice is that conditions such as a building and pest inspection must be in the contract when you sign it, “otherwise they won’t be legally binding”. Ask your solicitor whether yours covers an electrical inspection.
2. Book the electrical inspection alongside building and pest, not after. Both should land inside your inspection condition period.
3. Ask the agent up front for certificates covering any electrical work done during the seller’s ownership.
4. Get the electrical report in writing, with photographs. A verbal “looks alright” is worth nothing in a negotiation.
5. Use it. A list of required work is a legitimate basis for renegotiating the price or requesting rectification before settlement.
6. Confirm your dates with your conveyancer or solicitor. Contract terms vary. The statutory cooling-off period is 5 business days and doesn’t apply at auction, so it is no substitute for an inspection condition.

Finding out before the contract goes unconditional makes it a negotiating item. Finding out afterwards makes it your bill. A switchboard upgrade is the most common large item, and our switchboard upgrade cost guide explains what drives the price. If a rewire has been mentioned, see what drives the cost of rewiring.

One last check from the Queensland Government’s own list: inspect the property again 2–3 days before settlement.