Realtor Peas-question about home inspections

I guess it depends on where you are and the state laws that apply.

However in my limited experience a 'picky' buyers home inspection report is just that a negotiating tool. Our buyer wanted us to leave our washer, dryer and fridge. So they asked for a huge list of stuff. We said no. They said can we have the 3 appliances. We said sure when is the closing date.

Yes, it's all negotiable. A lot of home inspection reports are nit picky. I had one just last week on a home that was three years old and had been lived in by a very neat bachelor. It still came up with nit picky stuff. It's partly a negotiation tactic and partly because home inspectors don't want to be sued if the buyers move in and find something wrong the home inspector should have found.

In my state (and I say that because real estate law is different in every state) you can do one of four things after an inspection:
1-ask for repairs to be done. This means ask for everything to be fixed or a partial list of what was found. It's up to the buyer.
2-ask for a reduction in the price of the home to cover the costs of the repairs.
3-ask for cash back at closing to cover the cost of repairs.
4-back out of the purchase entirely.

All of these are negotiable. If a buyer asks for a a long list of repairs or something the seller doesn't feel is reasonable, they can negotiate try and negotiate for those repairs not be done. For example, I had a buyer ask one of my sellers to change how an over the range microwave was vented. My seller felt since the way it was installed was done correctly, the buyer could pay for a change on his own dime. If a buyer asks for more than the seller feels is reasonable to cover the cost of repairs, the seller can negotiate for a lower amount.

Just about everything is negotiable in real estate.

The bank does not receive a copy of the inspection.  heck, in my state the seller is not even always entitled to a copy.  It's the buyers' report they paid for.  They decide who sees it. 

Everything is negotiable and it really depends on the buyer if they are looking for a credit or the items fixed.

We bought a house with a damaged window and a water tank that needed to be replaced and took a credit. We wanted to pick the new water tank and defer the window fix until we did an addition and replaced all the window.

When we sold that house, the buyer's inspection report included things like the bedroom windows weren't to current code (they were higher as allowed when the house was built in 1963). The buyer wanted that changed and our realtor ended up talking to their inspector who was shocked they'd included that as a fix. He put it in the report as an FYI bit of information, not as something that needed to be fixed or changed, and it took a lot of persuading to get the buyer to drop that condition. A garage door also needed to be replaced and this same buyer refused a credit, which made more sense to us, so that he could replace both doors with whatever he wanted after he had possession. Instead, we replaced one door and then he replaced it and the other original door about a month later.

The last time we had an inspection done, the inspector did find some minor (nit-picky) things, but he came right out and told us they were no big deal. But since he noticed them, he did include them in the report. They had no bearing on our decisions in regard to the house, though. We never even mentioned any of them to the seller. Unfortunately, there were some not small or nit-picky things wrong as well, and those are what we focused on.

As a seller I would not ever pay for a home inspection. As a buyer, I always have it done, at my expense. I want the inspector working for me, finding any feature that needs addressing.