hausdok

Hi, Yes, that's true; the chairman of the inspectors advisory licensing board notified us all via email last night that it has been pulled. However, it is too early to let out a sigh of relief; my experience has been that sometimes legislators will intentionally mislead those who are trying to oppose their legislation by putting out misinformation. A few years ago, the senator that eventually pushed through legislation here met with representatives of the coalition that was opposing her bill as it was written. She listened to them, assured them that she understood and agreed with their concerns, and then she ushered them out of her office and told them that they had nothing to worry about. The next week at the formal hearing before the committee that was considering her bill the committee chairperson asked her whether she'd consulted the coalition; she told them that she had but that the coalition really didn't know what it wanted. When they heard about that, members of the coalition couldn't believe it; many hadn't attended the meeting because they'd trusted her. After that, the coalition never trusted her again. I think it's still going to be a good idea for inspectors to go to next Thursday's hearing and be prepared to weigh in and counter any comments made by the mold warrior crowd that wants mold included in the SOP. I'm pretty sure that they'll show up and voice their displeasure with mold being deleted from the bill and they'll demand that it be reinstated. If inspectors don't show up to counter those arguments, the committee can decide after the meeting to reinstate mold in the bill and send it back to be re-written and then sent to the senate floor for a vote without another meeting. Inspectors don't have to speak; they can show up, sign in and check off that they intend to speak for or against aspects of the bill. Then, if nobody speaks in favor of re-instituting mold in the bill, they can simply pass when their name is called to speak. Key to this is getting there and signing in early and trying to get into line right behind one or more of the mold warriors; because, if you don't sign in as one of the first 12 to 16 people on the sheet, you probably won't be given a chance to speak. Even if you get there late, make sure that you put your thoughts opposing mold down on paper and present them to the committee secretary; they have to at least review your written comments even if they haven't given you an opportunity to speak. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

This morning in the Daily News, a writer asked a real estate agent, who has a question and answer column in that publication, what parties are responsible for repairing things such as mold uncovered during a home inspection. The real estate agent gave an answer that seems pretty lame-brained to me. I tried to comment on that site by choosing the "discuss" option but for some reason it's not working so I find myself complelled to vent here. The real estate agent begins her response to the writer with, "Your son is jumping into murky waters because mold is a serious problem that usually can’t be fixed, no matter whose responsibility it is." Usually can't be fixed!? What planet is she living on? I can understand that sometimes it's more expensive to repair an issue that led to explosive mold growth, and then to abate the mold and restore the home, than it is to tear the house down and completely rebuild it, but the last time I looked that was the exception and not the rule. What if it's only a 3-inch diameter spot of mold on some drywall beneath a leak at an angle stop and the amount of visible mold growth encompasses less than six square inches and then when the wall is opened up it's revealed that total spread is less than 2 square feet? The way she's answered this makes it sound like. in her mind, such a house would be inhabitable, and she'd tell her clients to walk away, because mold "can't be fixed"? What is it about this stuff that causes normally rational people to completely lose all common sense? If that wasn't bad enough, she goes on to state, "He should hire a professional home inspector. It will cost about $300, but an independent inspector will have no conflict of interest regarding the sale of the home, so he will give you real answers about the repair of any problems, like mold, found during the inspection." OK, I don't know about others, but $300 was the average cost of an inspection in 1996 and is substantially less than I charge almost 13 years later for inspecting even the smallest/simplest house. I wonder if she would like it if the inspection profession went around telling folks that they should never pay more than half a percent in real estate commissions? OK, don't answer that, this topic area is about mold and indoor air quality; I'm just venting, remember? That aside, if she's convinced that mold can't be fixed no matter how serious it is, why in the world tell folks to hire a home inspector to tell them what they already know - there's mold in the house. Seems like it would make more sense for her to tell folks that every case is different and that, if they're concerned with mold, folks should hire an indoor air quality firm to check out any mold they see in a home and let the inspector deal with identifying the deficiency that led to the mold growth in the first place - stuff like water leaking into a wall due to missing head flashings or improperly installed bitutene flashings behind the siding around windows or doors, roof leaks and the like. This is the kind of thing that makes me nuts; I don't pass out advice to folks about how best to find a real estate agent, how much of a commission is fair to pay an agent, or define the scope of what a real estate person should do for his/her client, what makes these people think they're somehow imbued with the responsibility to declare what I should get paid and how I do what I do? This is kind of like a tax consultant telling someone to see a dentist when the person is complaining about headaches and blurred vision. Grrrr!!! Thoughts? ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi John, Did you try connecting a jumper cable between the gas pipe and the ground lug on the generator? The gas pipe should be bonded back to the panel and ground so that should enable the machine to sense a better ground, no? If anyone is interested, I can paste the entire ground section from a U.S. Army portable generator manual here. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

I'd approach it from an additional angle; tell him that besides the obvious potential for wind-driven water to get pushed behind the siding (it's going to anyway, regardless) there's the fact that it looks like a window has been filled in poorly at that gable end in the upper picture. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi All, Please join me in welcoming Dr. Payam Fallah to the moderator staff of TIJ. Dr. Fallah realizes that mold is one of the most vexing issues that home inspectors face and he wants to help inspectors understand what they are dealing with and keep it in perspective. We're delighted to welcome him to the TIJ family. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Ouch! Please stop stinging me in the ass with that fly hook! ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, The haze is sulfur particles. As previous folks have said, the glass is cooler than the air in the fireplace, when you fire it up, the flame gives off water, nitrogen, sulfur and other particulates that cling to the damp glass and over time build up. Ignore it long enough and those blue sulfur particulates eventually turn the glass from white to blue. As it does to a chimney and firebox, it will eventually etch the glass if ignored. They make a wax that's really good for cleaning a glass top range and I've found that it works equally well for removing the sulfur stains from the fireplace front glass. I bought a bottle at Ace Hardware. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Jeez, One has to wonder who was on duty that day at the USPTMO to let that one slip through. Hmmm, if I patent the home inspection process, will home inspectors everywhere have to pay me a royalty? Quick Mike, call the patent attorney! ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hell, They had beer long before aluminum cans and long before man put pen to paper; I don't think they'll ever eliminate it. If they do, there'll be so many suicides that they'll have to use nukes to blast holes in the ground large anough to bury all of the bodies. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi Jesse, The grounded conductors (neutrals) and equipment grounding conductors (grounds) are not supposed to be bonded after the service disconnect. When the main disconnect is outside, the service grounding conductor connects to the service grounding electrode there and the neutrals must be isolated from the enclosure on their own bar in the sub[/b] panel that's inside. The only bonding screw or strap you should see is the one connecting the ground bus, where all of the EGC's are, to the enclosure. But then again, you already knew that - you were just seeking confirmation. I see it all the time too; believe it or not, there are "licensed" electricians out there that have never learned these rules and when it's explained to them they look just like a deer caught in the beam of one's headlights. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

The franchise I used to belong to had a seller's inspection. It was tricky to market because people sometimes don't want to know what's wrong with their home and they know that most of the time the buyer will hire his own inspector. To market it, you have to make the listing agent understand that he or she has to make the seller understand that he's under no obligation to fix anything - only to reveal everything he knows about the home. Then when buyers get their own inspection and come back to the seller and demand a discount based on what their inspector saw, the seller can point out that everything that's in their inspectors report was also in the seller's report and that's why the house is priced where it is. It takes the wind out of the buyer's sails pretty quickly. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Keep in mind that the folks here are probably going to be able to figure out what you mean; however, will a client and his wife that are Chinese immigrants and have only been in the country less than a year be able to understand the report without a struggle? OT - OF!!! M.

Than let me suggest one other possibility that I neglected to mention - they're just plain clogged up with rust like my arteries and aren't allowing any water through. I remember reading an article a few years ago; can't remember where - possibly Old House Journal - where they talked about how old cast iron radiators are often so inefficient because they're so full of rust. I think the author said that the only way to really fix them is to remove them, take them to a place that will acid dip them to remove the rust and then will rebuild them by installing new segment compression donuts, new valves, and new seals where needed. I guess that is frought with problems too, because the author said that the compression donuts were no longer being made and one supplier had bought up all remaining stocks in the country years ago and was slowly running out of stock. So, maybe it needs a bioplasty or whatever it's called to clear the arteries. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike P.S. Jim's comment about it being more a brain thing than a body thing struck too close to home. Every day I see more and more that something, dunno what - too much coffee maybe - is killing off the old brain cells. Pretty soon they're going to be entertaining me with Fisher-Price toys - it's Benjamin Button without the younger body. [:-dopey][:-drool]

Maybe it's just me, but I have a hard time getting really worked up and worried over asbestos. I guess if there was a way that we could completely remove it from the environment I'd like to see that happen, but in my mind the damage is already done; we've been exposed to it our entire lives and if it hasn't killed us yet I don't think it's likely to with casual exposure. Hell, if I came down with mesothelioma right now, who could I condemn for causing me to get it; my father 'cuz he had me working in a dusty environment on construction sites as a kid, the army for having me buff dry asbestos floor surfaces to a high gloss, the auto industry for the brake dust I breathed while changing brake pads on a car, the transportation departments of every entity on the planet for not removing the asbestos-laden dust from alongside the highway, the company that made the insulation in the attic of the house I lived in as a kid, the school district in my home town that had us sit there day after day in rooms with busted up friable insulation on old steam pipes in school, etc.? Crimeny, it takes a quarter of a century or thereabouts for the stuff to cause you to develop symptoms and it's alleged that one fiber trapped in lung tissue can kill you! How many millions of people have lived to very old age who were exposed to it for decades before anyone knew it caused these diseases and then died of old age with very healthy lungs? What's the percentage of people who die from exposure every year? Is it lesser or greater than those who die slipping in the bathtub, are hit by lightning, have a heart attack while having sex, slip and fall down the stairs, choke on a piece of meat, commit suicide or die because they were dumb enough to get in a car after drinking and then try to drive home? I know and appreciate the fact that we've got to write this stuff to cover our butts, but it just seems so pointless to worry about asbestos when there are so many other things that pose a far higher chance of killing us - my wife when she's pissed off for one thing. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi Tom, Could the unresponsive zones be air locked? I see those systems rarely here but on more than a few when they didn't respond in one area of a house I just opened the bleed valves, put a rag under the valves, and then waited for the air to stop hissing and the valve to pee a little bit before I closed the valve. After that, they worked fine. I have no idea if I'd broken some kind of taboo, only that it seemed to fix the issue. I told the clients that if that situation repeated itself that they'd need to ensure that a boiler pro checked the system out and fixed it. I'd encouraged them to come back to the house in a day or two, fire up the system and wait an hour to ensure that it was heating evenly - if not, ensure that the system was checked and fixed prior to closing. Since I've never heard from any of them, I've always assumed that bleeding the air out of the system did the trick. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

You're still not getting it; sure it's frustrating, but in many cases it's necessary. When you ask for assistance from others to figure out what an issue on a house is, but your description causes those reading the query to draw a completely false impression of what it is you've described, or struggle to try and figure out what it is you are trying to say, you risk the possibility that those trying to assist you will draw the wrong conclusion from your description and give you a completely incorrect answer. Let me give you an example; my wife is Korean and her English is still, after lo these many years, not very good because she says she's able to function fine at a certain level and doesn't need to improve. However, many times when she's tried to describe things to me, or asks me questions about things that she's seen or done, I've misunderstood the meaning of what she was trying to convey to me and have given her completely wrong answers. Sometimes, she's acted on my answers with pretty unsatisfactory results. Can you guess who got blamed for the fact that things didn't work the way that they should? That's kind of what we're saying here. If, from a confusing description, we collectively suggest the wrong answer, you pass that answer along to clients and then the clients later discover the hard way that your answer was completely inaccurate, the client is going to think that you were either 1) incompetent or 2) intentionally misleading them; either assumption on the part of the client is not going to be good. Even if you are able to satisfactorily explain the situation to the client, a certain amount of trust is going to be lost there. You said that you're not yet actually doing real inspections and that these observations weren't on a real inspection but merely a house that you were passing. Great, that means that no client could have been harmed here - however, do you see why a client could have been unintentionally harmed? Nobody is trying to be harsh or to belittle you. In fact, if you were to meet the folks on this board in person you'd probably think, "Wow, those guys are all puppy dogs - not anywhere near as mean as they seem to be on that board." That's because professional home inspectors as a breed - at least the good ones - are in the business of examining things and pointing out to their audience issues that they see wrong with what they're seeing. We don't generally soften our criticism of something in order to spare someone's feelings because in our business, though that can net you lots of referrals from the person getting a commission for selling that house, it can also get you in a whole lot of trouble. To survive in this business, besides learning to write well, you need to learn to be a little bit blunt with folks and not worry so much about whether or not what you say to them is going to upset them or dash their hopes and dreams. To do that, you need to learn to take it as well as dish it out; because you can be sure that being straightforward and blunt is, more than a few times, going to net you a scolding from an unhappy seller or real estate agent. It comes with the territory. Better to learn it here than out on the street where it will cost you business. Oh, and those folks that praise the report? It's been my experience that most folks almost universally praise the report when confronted directly by the person that authored the report; because, unlike inspectors, most folks are trying to be diplomatic and don't want to hurt one's feelings. Every fall I teach a one-semester home inspection class to appraisers, investors, real estate agents, property managers and wannabe home inspectors. Every year I download off the net a bunch of report samples, remove the information identifying who wrote the reports, pass them out to my class and then I ask them to give me their unvarnished layman's opinion of the reports. As we go through the reports, they'll shout out what they didn't like about a particular report and we write those criticisms on the board. One criticism I see a lot is that they'll complain that the reports are too critical of the house and don't say anything that's very complimentary; this usually comes from the real estate or property management students. That's when I'll randomly pick one of the reports from the heap and claim it as my own. That causes folks start to blush and, most of the time, those who'd been the most critical of that report want to restate their criticisms more softly. That's when I reveal that the report in fact isn't mine and point out to them that their natural tendency not to injure someone else's feelings had just kicked in. I explain to my students that this tendency to soften words in order not to hurt someone else's feelings is something that good home inspectors must repress when they inspect homes and write their reports if they want to survive and that they need to expect that when hiring a home inspector because the job isn't about making people feel good it's about giving them the information they need to move forward. That's what all this "unnecessary" harshness is all about; giving you the information you need so that you can move forward and be successful and it's not the kind of information you're likely to get in one of the 10-day shake-n-bake inspector courses. When I was going through boot camp in the military I didn't like my DI very much. Years later, I looked the guy up and thanked him for being such a hardass 'cuz it gave me the tools I needed to survive in the environment I was going to be in. Just consider this boot camp. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi All, I've just linked to TIJ a 12-page information paper entitled Mold, Housing and Wood that's published by the Western Wood Products Association. This paper is authored by Coleen Robbins, PHD, CIH and Jeff Morrell, PHD and it explains why and how mold grows on nearly any material including wood; the steps that can be taken to prevent, control and remove mold; and current scientific information about the health effects of mold. To link to it, go "library" on the menu bar above and then click on "File Directory," scroll down and click on Building Science/Mold. The link will take you to WWPA and that pub. If you haven't already registered with WWPA, it may take you to a free registration link that will require that you register before you can access the publications. Lots of other interesting stuff on this site. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

By Daniel Heimpel Originally published on July 23, 2008 in the LA Weekly; reprinted with permission. Ed McMahon is among those caught in paranoia over fungus' supposed perils The old trailer where she forced her daughter to sleep in the bad days takes up most of the driveway. Her home sits at the end of the cul-de-sac of upper-middle-class homes in San Diego’s North County. Odors from two overweight dogs have permeated the house, sinking into the dark-brown rug, and rising from tracks of dirt along the floor. It’s a scene of disorder: The living room couches are much too large, the cabinets are crammed with bric-a-brac and papers brought from the old house after the leak. After the world changed. It is here, in a small room behind drawn wooden shutters, that Sharon Kramer maintains her national, sometimes global crusade against mold. She sits at a desk piled with articles she is working on, journals on indoor air quality and scientific reports. And there is dust everywhere, as if nobody has been in the room in a very long time. “I just don’t understand why this guy is being such a hard-ass,â€

blazenut, I know it probably seems like we're being overly harsh about something you think is pretty minor and doesn't really mean a lot; however, there are plenty of folks on this board who now write pretty decently, and have a better understanding about many inspection issues, because some folks on this board cared enough to point out when they were making mistakes and helped them become better inspectors. When I first began taking part in these forums back in the 1990's every time I described something I'd write it in passive voice, because that's how we cops (I'm a retired investigator) used to write. It was on these boards that I learned about active voice and learned to write like I speak. Like I said, words are what we do; we inspect, sure, but once we've done that we must report what we've seen and we have to do it in a professional manner. Practice makes perfect. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

I've been contemplating getting my truck professionally lettered and painted. What do you all think of this for a design. Click to View 34.65 KBThanks to Dave Byers, Byers Inspection Service, Seattle.

Either method is likely a >20 year return on investment.No doubt. Sweaters work a lot more quickly and they're cheap. OT - OF!!! M.

Jeez, After reading all of the hassles folks have with radon testing and all of the documentation available, I'm kind of glad that it's only the folks in Spokane and Vancouver that have to worry about radon in the state of Washington. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Well, Maybe that's how they're tracking you. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, That will be very very difficult to do if there's already insulation between the studs, unless you're willing to open up the walls, remove the insulation shoot the wall with closed cell to minimize air drafts. You could always add a layer of Wallmate (Google Wallmate and Dow) on the inside and a second layer of drywall but you'd have to be careful not to create a wrong side air barrier in the wall. Alternatively, you could add a sealed layer of closed cell over the exterior, fur it out and then add a rainscreen wall outboard of that. Both methods are a lot of work but the former is probably a lot cheaper. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi Rich, Did you ever download that google tool bar? OT - OF!!! M.