r/homeinspectors

Buyers often ask about things that aren't really part of a home inspection; flood/landslide risk, environmental hazards, crime, nearby development, etc.

There are also things that seem potentially useful to buyers but require looking beyond the inspection itself, for example, analyzing historical aerial imagery of a roof and comparing it with potentially damaging weather events over the years.

Why don't more inspectors offer something like this as an add-on, or have a trusted company they refer buyers to?

Is it mostly liability, lack of demand, or simply not worth the hassle?

Curious how inspectors think about this.

Ours didn't include the crawlspace. The inspection was 3 hours and a house is a house, but I started to realize reports are sort of meant to be a minimum list, and not necessarily an assurance of everything being fine, and I wish someone would have told me that. We found standing water under the house and a dissolved vapor barrier in February, when the floors over it were particularly cold.

Anyway, I don't want to sound too negative here. The inspection was 3 hours and a house is a house, but I started to think reports are sort of meant to be a minimum list, and not necessarily an assurance of everything being fine, and I wish someone would have told me that, because I felt quite reassured when I read ours.

So what did yours miss? Curious whether it's always the same things or if everyone has their own issues.

Any of you home inspectors switch into or from code inspections? Curious about the pros and cons private company or government. I've been a home inspector for 18 months now and I've stacked some code certifications along the way I think home inspections are cool but sometimes get annoyed dealing with so many people in the real estate business or having to coordinate new clients everyday, pulling permits etc. I'm sure everyone gets tired of work though.

Since Spectora screwed up big time, I am researching for another inspection app, and the ones I believe fit my needs are InspectorData and Binsr. Has anyone used or is anyone using those apps? What do you think?

Location: Indiana, PA

My property manager/maintenance man told me for over 2 years that he’d look into why my water makes me sick to drink and the toilet moulds. How the fuck do you mould a toilet?! After needing an EpiPen from the mould, my landlord took a week and a half to get the maintenance man over. When he finally came over he was obviously very mean because… duh, I went over his head when he wouldn’t do anything. He yelled a lot, slammed my door open, and also told me that toilet mould isn’t his problem and if I have to clean it every day that’s fine. He also said I was wrong to have cleaned the weird kitchen mould on the counter, and said mould on the outside of my AC unit won’t affect inside. Like it doesn’t spray spores??? My landlord said he won’t hire something this man can do. He took samples of only the entry of the AC and idk if he’ll even be able to read what grows on the substrate.

I can’t afford an inspector (or I’d have moved) but he hired someone who has every reason to not do a good job for this and idk. My options seem to be magically pull moving money out of my butt or die here.

Hi everyone,

I recently inspected a prefabricated home and found no significant issues. About a month later I received a call from the home buyer stating that there was moisture damage all over the house. I took a second trip to the property to try and get some answers for my customer. Sure enough, some of the walls had turned into bread pudding. I was in a state of near disbelief. I went back onto the metal roof and found no apparent defects. There is no attic access therefore I was unable to completely verify that there was no roof leak, even though I saw no stains on the ceiling. I went under the house and found no suspect plumbing. The only thing I can think of is when I initially inspected the house, the HVAC return filter was completely saturated and the customer still had not changed the filter. (It doesn't look like it's been changed in over a year). My moisturizer meter did pick up high levels of moisture around the ducts and registers but that just seems bizarre that the AC could do that much damage to the interior walls. Has anyone else had this experience? I'm at a loss here.

Hey everyone,

I’m an aspiring Home Inspector, currently in the “ride-along” stage.

The guy I ride with is killing it with his business and has been awesome to learn from. He does multiple inspections daily and makes the type of money I dream of.

My question is should I start as a part time inspector until I gain more traction or just go full throttle from the start? I love this industry so far, but I worry about quitting my full time job.

I’d love to know how you all have grown your business, and how you managed to balance things until your business took off!

We bought a fixer upper with a huge yard and I asked my contractor to inspect the land and see if it's possible to build a pool or bunker, you know, something cool for the family to enjoy. He said he would need an 811 ticket and I would have to pay additional fees for that. What exactly is an 811 ticket and isn't that already included in the contractor's fees?

Wanted to come here to just share my own experience on my soon to be home purchase. Went with a new build. Been following it for the past month or so as it finishes up. Got a closing date, and did all the fun paperwork coming up to it. I went ahead and did my third party inspection through a local recommendation and elected to get a sewer inspection along with the general inspection. It was $150 extra, but 100% worth it. The inspector found a 2 to 4-in hole in the sewer lateral where it connects to the street. This could have very easily been a huge problem for me after closing, but thankfully we caught it before and won't be closing until it's fixed properly. Do your due diligence now so you don't have a preventable problem later.

Doing my first commercial inspection this week. Solo, 6500 square feet daycare center. Just wondering what everyone’s timeline is to get report out after the inspection is complete. I always get my residential inspections or same day but don’t think I will achieve that with this commercial property.

I’d like to tell them 72 hours (because I have residential inspections to do the next day as well) but don’t know what’s standard.

Does anyone have a good study guide for the NYS test? Or even the National Test? Thanks in advance

I’ve been in construction for about 6-7 (I know) years now and I just don’t feel like it’s actually going anywhere. I’ve learned a lot but I feel like my skills could be better suited to this side of the business. Any advice would be amazing

I recently just finished the coursework from ATI and I’m going to start in Florida soon. I did some research and there seems to be a lot of new builds and a lot of inspectors as well. Is there anything I should know that is different about Florida that stands out from other states (other than the wind mitigation)