Home Inspections Gone Wrong

I have to disagree with your answer. Unless there was much more information than was printed in the question, the answer makes many assumptions that were not presented.

For example, where was the wood rot, how extensive was it and was it visible at the time the home was inspected. These are key questions that were not mentioned in the letter.

The first thing to keep in mind is that a home inspection is a visual inspection. While it is true that when it gets extensive, wood rot will leave visible clues, and that the standard procedures for a home inspection dictate that areas suspected of having wood rot should be probed for verification, probing all the wood on the home would lead to more problems by creating numerous avenues for water intrusion which would result in wood rot where none existed. The inspector who probes every piece of wood is not doing a good service for the home buyer.

It is also quite possible that the wood rot mentioned was discovered after removing some outer finish material. This finish material may have rendered the wood rot inaccessible to a visual inspection. If the home inspector was not able to see the rot damage, he was not able to report on it.

Of course that is not going to matter to an aggressive attorney. He is going to bring in "hired guns" who will be able to report that the home inspector should have known the rot was there even if he could not have known under any reasonable circumstances.

You are correct to say that many home inspectors are not experienced and knowledgeable. However, part of the problem is that too many people do not take the time to verify the qualifications of the inspector. They may be spending $300,000 to $500,000 for the home and yet they will hire the inspector based on price alone. They will reject an experienced inspector because he charges $25.00 more than a less experienced one. A more experienced and qualified inspector usually charges a little more to make an inspection because he has more time and money invested in learning what will and what will not cause a problem later.

There is another point to consider. The inspection agreement they signed most likely had a clause limiting the inspector's liability to the price of the inspection. There are very few inspectors who do not have this type of clause in their agreements just to protect themselves from the customer who has unrealistic expectations of what the inspector can see and is all too eager to hire an attorney to sue the inspector for something that breaks after the inspection.

Before you raise the question, I am a Home Inspector and I have never been sued. I have over 20 years experience in residential construction and I am an ICC certified Commercial Building inspector. I also attended over 100 hours of continuing education last year alone.

As one final note. Your answer may be entirely correct. If the damage was readily apparent to a conscientious inspector and he did not take the time to do a thorough inspection, he deserves to get sued. The problem is that if you get an aggressive attorney, he will be guilty even if he is innocent.

Robert,

You make all good points. Keep in mind I had to answer the person's question in 1,000 words or less. When you write a column for newspapers, it is just that, a column, not a chapter in a book or even a book.

This is exactly why I created the comments section under these columns so intelligent discussion can continue.