Inspections
Is This What Final Inspection's Supposed To Look Like?
May/22/08 09:05 AM
I need a few extra hours of sleep, my wife needs a break from the house, my plumber needs more money, and my electrician needs a good beating with a blunt object. In fact, we have now postponed the final inspection another day so that the electrician can figure out why half of the house does not have electricity. Grrrrrrrr.
The above photos show the current state of the house going into the inspection. It’s sort of ironic how the whole inspection system works. It exists to protect the homeowner, and by all means it is a good tool to keep contractors from screwing you over; but for a renovator who does most of the work themselves it can be quite a pain in the arse. For instance, I had to buy the cheapest flimsiest fixtures just to slap up to pass inspection. And normally I would take my time and do it right with the highest quality of materials and the finest attention to detail. BUT, in order to pass final inspection, so we can move in (because we can’t move in until we do), we have had to cut a few corners. In the current state of the house I feel it is slapped up and duct taped together so that we can pass inspection and get in there. After we do, of course we will go back and fix it all. So in this case the inspection system is causing me extra work, extra money and extra headaches, when I would LOVE to do it right the first time.
I understand it is partly my fault for agreeing to let the renters move in on June 1st at our current house, but you can’t pass up a good renter when they come along. Trust me, in another house that we have in Rogers, we have renters that most landlords have nightmares about. But that is another story.
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Inspector Gadget
Oct/27/07 11:06 PM
Mitch Erwin of JPM Inspection Services, Inc. showed
up to inspect the house. All I can say is, damn, this
guy is good. He showed up and set up a laptop and
went to work, snooping about the house and it’s crawl
spaces, taking loads of photos and and making notes.
He would then return to his laptop to upload photos
of problem areas and fill in bits of the report, then
he was back at it. He spent the better part of 3
hours inspecting the house. And although he told us
mostly what we already knew, he was very thorough. I
will try to post a link to the PDF for those of you
that want to see what a good inspection should look
like.
Mitch gave us a good idea of what it would cost to fix things and what needed to be done first. And he told us that we had some major foundation problems, and as any good inspector should, he scared the hell out of us. He suggested that to fix the foundation problem that it could cost us upwards of $40,000. Let me repeat that, FORTY THOUSAND dollars. After I came to, I very nervously began to call my wife and relay this info to her. I think she took it worse than I did. So, our buddy Mitch gave us a reco on a foundation specialist. We shall see how that goes...
Mitch gave us a good idea of what it would cost to fix things and what needed to be done first. And he told us that we had some major foundation problems, and as any good inspector should, he scared the hell out of us. He suggested that to fix the foundation problem that it could cost us upwards of $40,000. Let me repeat that, FORTY THOUSAND dollars. After I came to, I very nervously began to call my wife and relay this info to her. I think she took it worse than I did. So, our buddy Mitch gave us a reco on a foundation specialist. We shall see how that goes...
Inspector Not To Inspect
Oct/22/07 11:04 PM
Ok, the first problem that I’ve encountered is the
inspector that we booked to inspect the house.
When I envision a house inspector I envision Ethan
Hunt dressed in black and suspended upside down with
head lamps and various high tech tools sneaking up
into the darkest depths of the house’s foundation
without alerting even the smallest of spiders.
Instead... a portly gentleman, who could barely fit through the door let alone the meager crawl-space, showed up. I could tell by his spotless wardrobe that he had no intention of crawling up under the house. In fact he spent most of his time convincing me that I didn’t need an inspector at all. My guess is that his specialty was new home construction, and that since he didn’t want to inspect my home that no one else should either. He said that he would do it if I absolutely wanted him to, but that parts of my house would not be able to be inspected, due to the small size of the crawl-space. Hmmm.
I fussed about it a bit, and he told me that he “wasn’t hurting for business.” That he had plenty of other inspections that he could be doing. So if you are in Fayetteville Arkansas and you are looking for an inspector then apparently Don Parham of Ozark Home Inspection, LLC is covered up with business, so you might want to consider someone else.
Since then I’ve gotten recommendations from both my lender and my appraiser. So the advice that I give, is don’t call an inspector from the phonebook. Ask for a recommendation from your lender, ESPECIALLY if this is your first home.
Instead... a portly gentleman, who could barely fit through the door let alone the meager crawl-space, showed up. I could tell by his spotless wardrobe that he had no intention of crawling up under the house. In fact he spent most of his time convincing me that I didn’t need an inspector at all. My guess is that his specialty was new home construction, and that since he didn’t want to inspect my home that no one else should either. He said that he would do it if I absolutely wanted him to, but that parts of my house would not be able to be inspected, due to the small size of the crawl-space. Hmmm.
I fussed about it a bit, and he told me that he “wasn’t hurting for business.” That he had plenty of other inspections that he could be doing. So if you are in Fayetteville Arkansas and you are looking for an inspector then apparently Don Parham of Ozark Home Inspection, LLC is covered up with business, so you might want to consider someone else.
Since then I’ve gotten recommendations from both my lender and my appraiser. So the advice that I give, is don’t call an inspector from the phonebook. Ask for a recommendation from your lender, ESPECIALLY if this is your first home.