If you are buying a house on a private well with an FHA or VA loan, there is a water test in your future, and the rules around it surprise people — including some agents.
The short version: the test is usually required, and it cannot be arranged informally by anyone with a stake in the sale.
What the rules actually say
FHA. HUD Handbook 4000.1 puts the obligation on the lender: when an individual water supply system serves the property, the mortgagee must ensure the water quality meets the requirements of the health authority with jurisdiction. Where there is no local or state standard, EPA's National Primary Drinking Water Regulations apply — 40 CFR parts 141 and 142.
Appraisers are also directed to flag a property for testing when they see cause: a well near a landfill, industrial site or underground storage tank; rust staining, unusual odours, standing water around the casing, corroded plumbing; or a local health authority that mandates testing on transfer.
VA. VA Circular 26-17-19 is blunter, and it is the part most people have not read:
All testing must be performed by a disinterested third party. This includes the collection and transport of the water sample collected at the water supply source... At no time will the Veteran or other interested party collect and/or transport the sample.
The sample may be handled by the local health authority, a commercial testing laboratory, a licensed sanitary engineer, or another party acceptable to the local health authority. The lab reports to the lender, not to the buyer.
Why the chain-of-custody rule exists
It is not about trust. It is about making it structurally impossible for anyone who wants the sale to close to influence the sample — where it was drawn, how long it sat, whether an inconvenient result quietly gets retested until it passes.
Once you see it that way, an obvious consequence follows.
Why we cannot be your FHA or VA test
We sell water treatment. That makes us an interested party by definition — not in spirit, in the plain text of the rule.
So our free in-home test cannot satisfy an FHA or VA requirement, and any treatment company that suggests otherwise is either mistaken or hoping you are. Call your county health department or a state-certified laboratory. In Alabama, county health departments supply sample containers and handle bacteriological testing, and that is the right first call.
What our test is actually for
Two things, and both sit outside the loan file.
Before. Knowing what the water is doing while you still have negotiating room. A well that reads hard, or acidic, or high in dissolved solids is a line item you can raise at the table. Discovered after the movers leave, it is just your bill.
After. If the official panel comes back with something treatable, sizing the equipment that fixes it. Nitrate responds well to reverse osmosis. Hardness is a softener question. Low pH — common in this aquifer — is a neutraliser question.
One thing it is not for: bacteria. Coliform and E. coli belong with the health authority or a well contractor, not with us. We do not do shock chlorination and we will tell you so rather than take the job.
The timing trap
VA's 90-day validity is the detail that bites. A test run early in a long transaction can expire before closing, and the fix is another sample and another wait. If your closing date is soft, order the test late rather than early.
If you are buying or selling a well property in Mobile or Baldwin County, the pre-purchase testing page covers how we work around closing timelines, and our free test is the no-cost way to find out what you are dealing with before the official one is ordered.
Sources: HUD Handbook 4000.1; VA Circular 26-17-19, "Clarification of Individual Water Supply System Testing." Verified 19 August 2026. Lender and local health authority requirements vary — confirm yours before relying on any of this.