Real estate exposure
“As-is” is one of the most misunderstood phrases in a real estate sale. It changes what condition a buyer accepts the property in — it does not waive a right to sue over something that was actively concealed, and it doesn’t erase a contractor’s exposure for that concealed work.
An as-is sale means the buyer agrees to accept the property in its current physical condition, without requiring the seller to make repairs before closing. It’s a term about condition, negotiated into the purchase agreement. It is not, and was never intended to be, a waiver of the seller’s statutory disclosure obligations. Civil Code §1102.1 makes that explicit: a Transfer Disclosure Statement (TDS) cannot be waived by an as-is sale, and the statute itself points directly to the case that shaped this rule.
That case is Loughrin v. Superior Court (1993) 15 Cal.App.4th 1188, California’s leading authority on what an as-is clause actually accomplishes. The holding is narrower than most people assume: an as-is sale means the buyer takes the property in the condition it’s observable in — not that the buyer has waived any claim for something the seller (or someone acting on the seller’s behalf) actively concealed. Fraud and concealment claims survive an as-is sale because the buyer never had the chance to evaluate a risk they didn’t know existed. A clause can’t waive a right to information the other party never disclosed in the first place.
Practically, this means a buyer who discovers a concealed defect after an as-is closing hasn’t lost their claim just because the sale was as-is. The clause affects what the buyer is deemed to have accepted about the property’s visible, known condition — not what was hidden from them.
As-is isn’t meaningless. It genuinely does narrow a buyer’s options for anything they could reasonably have discovered through inspection or observation:
What it does not do is convert a concealment or misrepresentation claim into something the buyer waived by agreeing to buy as-is.
For a contractor whose prior work is at issue, the as-is clause in the seller’s contract with the buyer doesn’t reach the contractor’s own conduct at all — it’s a term between the seller and the buyer, not something the contractor is a party to. The question that actually matters for a contractor is the one covered on the pillar’s other pages: did the contractor’s own conduct create a duty to the eventual buyer, and did that conduct involve knowing concealment of a known defect (Civil Code §§1572, 1710)? An as-is clause in the sale contract doesn’t answer that question one way or the other.
Before you ask
Yes, if the defect was concealed rather than disclosed. Loughrin v. Superior Court (1993) 15 Cal.App.4th 1188 holds that an as-is sale means the buyer accepts the property’s observable condition — it doesn’t waive claims for something actively concealed.
No. Civil Code §1102.1 specifically provides that the Transfer Disclosure Statement requirement cannot be waived by an as-is sale — the two are separate obligations.
Not directly — an as-is clause is a term in the contract between the seller and the buyer. It doesn’t extend to a contractor who wasn’t a party to that sale. A contractor’s exposure depends on whether their own conduct created a duty to the buyer, addressed on the other pages in this pillar.
Talk to an Attorney Today if a property you worked on sold as-is and a dispute has surfaced — or Request a Consultation to understand how this framework applies to your situation.