Home Inspections

[rlk]

A couple of points:

This is a good reason to get your home inspected prior to listing it. Should the buyer want to pay for another home inspection, you will have a stake in the ground if the 2nd inspector should happen to come back with a long list of repair recommendations. As I mentioned in another post, I encourage the homeowner to show my inspection report to the listing realtor, and to put it in view of potential home buyers. Many times the home buyer will see an inspection has already been done, and will elect not to pay for another inspection. This ends up saving the buyer some money, and the home owner a lot of headaches.

I'm not aware of any legislation or consequences in NC for inspectors that are "overzealous". For those of us who have built a business on word-of-mouth advertising versus print/tv/radio advertising, we sure do not want to distroy the reputation we have built up. Many times the home owner of the house I inspect will hire me to inspect the house they are going to buy. If I/we are "overzealous" I don't think we would get much business like this.

 

[BobT]

rlk,

Thanks for your interesting points. In my case I did hire an inspector prior to listing my house---and gave the report to the realtor. However, the buyer brought in their own person, who "discovered" all kinds of issues, which I believe were done simply to try and force me to hire work done at the last minute.

The answer, I am convinced from these posts, is for each state to properly license and supervise home inspectors. Sounds like NC and TX at least know what they are doing, and the laws exist to protect and serve BOTH buyer and seller equally.

 

[RPM]

RE: <font color=blue>Question - Are the inspection held liable for any mistakes or errors presented in their reports? Are they held accountable and liable for their findings?</font color=blue>

As far as I know the inspectors are liable. They can give you all the disclaimers they want, but the bottom line is that they are providing professional advice.

Just a year ago when we were looking for a home we had interesting experiences with inspectors. I won't go into all the details, but the house we were about to buy was condemned by the inspector for use of sub-standard lumber (#3 pine). That house had been a foreclosure - and the Bank was furious. In addition the house failed its Radon test miserably (1000% over limit). All this despite the fact that it was a beautiful house in a great setting.

Bottom line - the Bank involved was talking about suing the building inspector they used when they granted the mortgage around 10 years ago. Their only reasonable remedy due to the combination of problems is to tear the house down and sell the land.

So - a question you may want to ask your inspector is if they carry insurance or not. This is also one of the good reasons why you should encourage your house to be inspected before sale. If there is any weird thing that shows up later that is unexpected then you can point out that the buyer had the house inspected.

I have heard a couple of horror stories from inspectors that I know of buyers coming back years later, trying to find the seller and make them fix bizarre problems. I've always assumed that I buy 'as is' myself - unless there is glaring evidence of intent to defraud later (i.e. failure to disclose items on the Agreement of Sale).

Patrick

 

[buckeye]

Well the inspection has come and gone and the house did well. The inspector said the house was in great shape for a home 27 years old and my wife and I had kept it up. He brought up the items we had already disclosed and some minor items we had not. The new items were news to us, and truthfully, had we known before, would have fixed them before listing. The buyers were fair and agreed to take the house "as-is" based upon the inspection.

I would like to thank all of the posters for this group. I think we all learned much about different inspection requirements for different states. I really appreaciate your all's input.

Now my wife and I go on about building our new home. Expect to see some more questions from me regarding that. Everyone have a good night.

 

[bgott]

My house has ALL that stuff wrong with it!

 

[snowman]

When I sold my house last year (brand new in 1994 and I was the only owner during those years), the buyers had an inspection done and had numerous small items. They ended up signing off on them all if I installed a dryer vent.

Since the buyers were nit-pickers, I explicitly wrote on the sales contract that the house was being sold in an "as is" condition. That eliminates many potential problems.

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

buckeye,

Sorry to come late to this discussion, but let me add my 2 cents since we have already heard from a home inspector.

What the bank has done is an appraisal inspection. The appraiser is there to protect the bank, and the main concern the bank has is getting their money back should they have to repossess. Appraisers have only minimal to general training in plumbing, elecrical, mechanical, etc. Specific education in these other disciplines must be acquired from outside sources. If the appraiser turns up the thermostat and the furnace doesn't come on, most won't know why but should call for further inspection. In the same circumstance, a Home Inspector should be able to give some idea why. The appraiser will be very interested in the number of bedrooms and the home inspector will know if the wiring is likely to fail soon.

What the appraiser does (hopefully) is see how the home fits into the market in the general area, and then determine what the probable re-sale value would be. If all of the homes around have 2 car garages and you have a 1 car garage, it's the appraiser's job to determine if and how much it will affect resale value. Also, the appraiser makes certain the home qualifies for the specific type of loan, since different types of loans are for different types of properties.

The appraiser might note the garage doors don't fit right and the home inspector might note that the header for the garage doors is improper and causing them to sag.


Most states do not license home inspectors, however, many inspectors DO acquire general contractor's licenses. With disclosure laws being what they are, this type of inspection can be a great protection for the seller.

SHF

 

[bgott]

I've heard plenty of horror stories about Texas' " certified and qualified" home inspectors. My brother, a carpenter, worked for a contractor whom was selling his house. They went through the house top to bottom and had it perfect so the inspector decided it had a "cracked slab". He recommended a couple of slab contractors to the buyer and also told the buyer not to use a couple of contractors that have pretty good reputations. My brother's boss hired another inspector that looked at the slab and of course he didn't find anything wrong with it. I don't know about other parts of Texas but down here in Houston certification of any type ends up being, more often than not, a license to steal.

 

[fractal]

I have used home inspections both as a buyer and as a seller. I was advised by my agent NOT to pay for an inspection as a seller as it would be wasted money. I did it anyway. There were a handful of "must fix" items which I did fix. It made the house MUCH easier to show. We got an offer and they sent in their OWN inspector. This person came back with a list a mile long and insisted we fix stuff that wasn't broken. We stood by our inspection. They walked. We still have the house as a rental. It is paying its mortguage and increasing in value for us. Sleezy realtors know the picky inspectors. Decent realtors know the fair ones. Try to find a fair one.

When were were buying, we had a house inspected after our offer was accepted. The inspector found some stuff I had noticed and a bunch more. The seller went hard-line and said "as-is". We walked (our contract gave us 14 days to have any inspections done and approve the results).

We used the same inspector on the house we did buy. He found several trivial things that the seller fixed, no questions asked.

Frankly, if you have any doubts as to what an inspector will find, you might want to pay for an inspection of your own. It will prepare you for the true condition of your house. Sometimes "pride of ownership" blinds us to the true condition of our property.

Otherwise, wait for the seller to do their own inspection and find out then.

Finally, I understand that real-estate customs vary from county to county as wel as state to state. If you agent says that the seller typically pays for the inspection, well, you are paying them to know. If you have trust issues with your realtor, better you take care of those sooner than later.