Tuesday, October 6, 2009

The worst home inspector(1)

I have hired Maureen Wood of Town & Country Home Inspections to inspector my semi-detached house this summer. I interviewed her over the phone, and specially asked if she climbs up to the roof to check roofing. She answered positively.


But she just looked the roof from ground level, and she didn’t discover a hole on the side of the chimney which is a hole torn by raccoon. In the first day I moved in to that house, I discovered a family of raccoon lived in the attic.


If she looked the roof from eaves, she should be able to discover that hole. Or if she was a person who is attention to detail, she should be able to find the mess left by raccoon.   She didn’t enter the attic, just raised her hand into the attic and took a couple of pictures from the attic entrance hole. Even that, she refused to admit she did a poor job and refuse to admit any liability.


If a home inspector didn’t have home construction experience, he or she should at least very handy. After I read the home inspection report thoroughly, I realize this home inspector did nothing for me.


Anything is not visible to me; she has no idea as well. She doesn’t have any device can detect the hazard material, such as asbestos, radon, lead and UFFI.


Something like faucet drips, sink drain clogged… oh, come on, I can see it myself. And home inspector is supposed to give home buyer some advices to fix those problems. Those are all minor problems; anybody who is a little bit handy can fix those themselves.


For example, the clogged drain, there’s a cap on the drain pipe under the sink, if you remove that cap, you can take out the drainage blocker, and clean it regularly. But I believe not everyone knows that, at least the former home owner didn’t know that. And my home inspector probably didn’t know that as well. Because she just told me the drain is clogged, didn’t say anything that is an easy fix.


I have owned my first house for a month. One advice to new home owner is that never hire a home inspector who doesn’t have home construction experience and not able to check roof and attic.

2 comments:

opendoor said...

That article is so much informative. And that’s worth reading. With the help of this I get one think is that always consider the home inspector. Means he or she should be experienced. And they have to knowledge about the inspection. So thanks for sharing with me such a nice article. For the more information visit on www(dot)opendoorinspections(dot)com.
Residential Inspection

Eric Chen said...

You are absolutely right, a home inspector must be experienced and handy. The home inspector I have hired, Maureen Wood, she can't access attic, because she didn't know how to remove the closet door. The attic entrance is in a closet. Everyone knows the closet door should be very easy to remove. But she tried and failed, then she just took some pictures from the entrance of the attic, because the attic is not accessible.

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