hausdok

I have a standing flat-rate deal with a Vietnamese couple that flips houses in the Seattle area to do pre-offer inspections and then follow-up inspections when the houses are finished. They are kicking ass. They have a couple of contractors working for them and they have at least two houses going at any given time. One day about a month ago I pre-offer-inspected five houses for them - just roofs attics and crawlspaces - relaying my findings as I went. By the time I was finished up with the last one they were signing papers with the owner of those properties in the driveway and I got paid cash on the barrelhead. They are now in full swing tearing into them and I expect that I'll probably get called back in about another month to do finals on them before they go on the market. I know a local contractor that I used to refer all of my customers to. He recently got into flipping houses and now he hasn't got much time to do much else. Talked to him last night. He's kicking ass too. About ten days ago I inspected a POS house way up in Monroe for another guy who hopes to be a flipper. Found enough crap in that house to give Whitey Bulger nightmares; including roof rafter that are so rotten that they'd broken. Huge lot with a new septic system and well. Ideal candidate for a tear down and rebuild, a modular or a used house to move onto the lot but it's going to be really tough for anyone wanting to flip it. Try as I might to discourage him, including my, "Hope you've got some running shoes so that you can run away from this piece of crap," line, he's determined to go ahead. Something tells me he's not going to make any money off that one. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Typical day in crawlspace paradise on Puget Sound - home built in 1980. Click to Enlarge 39.84 KB Click to Enlarge 41.37 KB Click to Enlarge 33.57 KB Click to Enlarge 41.73 KB Click to Enlarge 42.6 KB Click to Enlarge 44.87 KB Click to Enlarge 42.46 KB Click to Enlarge 53.02 KB ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Don't know why, but when Bill talked about a pulley above the first thing that popped into my head was some kind of freezer/ice maker wherein you'd have to lift out a long triangular-in-profile block of ice with the pulley. Then I was scratching my head wondering how they'd freeze the blocks, since there wasn't anything that looked like the innards of a typical ice maker in there. Glad someone came up with the real answer before my brain imploded trying to figure that out. The comments about the ice box reminds me, I've been thinking of putting a walk-in cooler in the garage. My wife is up to five refrigerator/freezers and one freezer to store all of her danged kimchi and various fixings for all her Korean dishes. The whole idea of that squad of frigges running 24/7/365 and the heat they give off just drive me nuts. I bet a military plane flying over using a FLIR device would see the IR signature of my garage and suspect weapons production or a grow-op or something like that was going on there. Worse, I'll bet there isn't a square inch of space in the one frig that's in the kitchen that isn't filled with something and 99.9% of it isn't anything that I'm interested in. Talk about a weight-loss device. Every time I open that door in hopes of finding a snack I just back slowly away. The thought of removing dish after dish after dish of ......stuff, in order to get to whatever leftover or snack I'm looking for is just too damned discouraging. If I get a walk-in I can eliminate the platoon of frigges in the garage, and maybe I'll be able to get into the frig again someday. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

My inspections are walk-n-talk instructional. Don't mind if folks follow me around - following me around is kind of the point - that's why I call it the school of the house. It's a pain when they are late but I just busy myself doing something until they get there. Then I stop, go over the pre-inspection stuff with them, get it signed and get back on track. No second takes. I'll give them a quick brief on what I've seen so far but if they weren't there they'll have to read about it in the report. I'm not going to go back and start it over. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Al-kaida in the house; YO!!!

Is the wall where the panel is located an exterior wall? When I was stationed in Alabama in the 80's I was kind of surprised to find breaker boxes on the outside of several homes for sale that I looked at. Maybe the home's panel was originally outside and they had it turned around to make it more convenient. If so, buy a panel of the same brand that's rated to be installed at the exterior and have an electrician remove the panel you have and install the new panel facing outward so it's accessible from outside. Then have the interior wall repaired. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

All good answers, Attic ventilation isn't required in order to reduce temps; it's required to help disperse moisture-laden air that moves up into the attic from the house so that it doesn't condense within the attic or roof plane and cause a bunch of rot. If the roof isn't rotting, the ventilation you have is doing its job just fine. Painting the roof is a great suggestion but some folks don't want to do that and some neighborhood rules might not allow it. If you want to really reduce solar gain, increase the depth of the insulation in the attic and use a type that will greatly reduce air flow through the insulation such as cellulose. You'll appreciate it in the winter too. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, If you get cancer it won't be from the mold. The mold was always there. You have been breathing it every second of every day you've lived there. You breathed it every second of every day in the home before this one, and the home before that one, and the home before that, etc., since you took your first breath. It's also in my house, and Marc's house, and Jim's house, and Kurt's house, and, well, you get the idea. The leak just provided the mold with enough moisture to reproduce more quickly than it can die off. Once the dehumidifier gets the moisture down enough it will begin dying more quickly than it can reproduce; and, once the dead overgrowth spore is cleaned up, you won't be able to see it anymore - though it will still be there in your lungs, your stomach, you spleen, your kidneys, your hair, stuck to the surface of your eyes, in your nose, in your ears, on your food, etc., 24/7/365 until you either die from old age or other causes or leave the planet. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

I got my sunburn from a conventional gas fireplace converted to burn gas. Nice ceramic log set but no control valve. Just turn on the gas and use a long match to light the burner. Yeah, riiiiighht! That was about fifteen years ago. I never place myself in front of a burner anymore. For a while there I had no eyebrows or eyelashes and my face skin was all peeled like a bad sunburn. Danged eyebrows never did grow back all the way! I agree with Jim. I've taken those old puff shields off a couple of times and fired furnaces and had delayed ignition issues. Had one wher4e some idiot had taken the puff shield off and tossed it in the corner. The inside of the metal cover for that burner compartment was all scorched and the paint was blistered on the outside. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Like Jim, I saw that screw in the first photo and said to myself, "Yes it is!" Look at the panel schematic when you get those older panels. Lots of times I've had unfamiliar older panels that I thought weren't bonded. Then I checked the schematic to see where the panel was supposed to be bonded and then look at the panel again and, voila', most of the times there it was. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

The Homeowners Consumer Center is urging experienced, and honest home inspectors to join them in their initiative that begins next week, with the initial goal of identifying as many new toxic Chinese drywall homes before the August 2013 deadline. To learn more, click here.

First thing I suspected was some numb nuts wielding a pressure washer. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Waste of time and money to clean and seal. There is incipient rot in the wood already. If there is enough meat on the bone with those sashes you could try Impel Rods but installing them means drilling holes into the sash from the inside and then filling, sanding and finishing the holes once the rods are inserted. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Yeah, They are male reproductive swarming from a nest. They'll go as far as they can, land, shed their wings and try to establish a new colony somewhere else. Ants swarm in the spring and early summer; termites in late summer and fall. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi All, The following is a query sent to me via email by an inspector friend of mine in the area. Check it out. It sounds to me like this might be a Rumsford fireplace install but I've never heard of this kind of flue before. Perhaps one of you - Bill K. perhaps - can help shed some light on this for Mack. Post your responses here and I'll direct him to follow this thread. Don't know if he'll participate; not sure he likes all of this online tomfoolery. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike Hey Guys: Got some egg on my face on this fireplace call and am trying to get more information- maybe fill in some gaps in my knowledge. Check out these photos: The camera was in the fire box looking up, placed on top of the gas log appliance. Click to Enlarge 11.74 KB The top of the flue under the chimney top damper Click to Enlarge 11.72 KB Click to Enlarge 13.65 KB The exterior of the chimney looked like this: Click to Enlarge 14.48 KB When Cullen (Cullen is Mack's son. He works for his father's company.) showed me the pics from inside the fireplace, I had a hard time believing what I was seeing. So I checked with a chimney company and a masonry company that builds fireplaces, and they agreed with my first impression, that ? in addition to some weirdness and deficiencies, the top of the fireplace was missing. I included that in the report. The poop hit the fan. The whole thing has been inspected by a third chimney company and found to be fine. The explanation is thus: There is apparently a ?new? design (much like that used 300 years ago?). The firebox is essentially open to the sky (but with a chimney top damper). The new twist is that there is a secondary (unlined) flue chamber that ties into the primary flue at the top and bottom of the structure. This somehow creates a better draft and better burning. So I am left with these design and deficiency questions: Design: 1. I see no provision to prevent backdrafting. There is a straight shot from the top of the chimney down into the firebox. There is no smoke shelf to help roll a backdraft back up the flue. What on earth keeps this thing from backdrafting smoke or soot back into the house? 2. Why doesn?t the secondary flue have to be lined [iRC R1001.8]? As rough as the parging is, it will collect creosote and soot much faster than the lined chimney. How are the nooks and crannies of the secondary flue going to be cleaned, especially those areas formed by the tile corners (note red arrows)? 3. Why doesn?t the firebox have to be airtight below the flue (see circled area)? All of my fireplace training has been pretty consistent that the firebox be pretty much air tight so that hot gasses, smoke & embers cannot escape ? except up the flue. Pyrolysis and all that. Is this no longer the case? We had numerous requests in for drawings of THIS structure; they kept sending drawings of ?typical? structures. We were supposed to have a meeting tonight with the builder and the Muni but then I got copied on the inspection report from the chimney expert and was thanked for my services. I am, of course, a little irritated at this point. I know there is some flakery here, but would like a bigger hammer before I re-open an issue my client regards as closed. I did send a request for clarification to the Gumby that blessed this thing. I can find nothing on line about this new design, codewise or otherwise. I did find one drawing of a chimney constructed with a chimney-top damper but it had only one flue. I am really baffled here about the efficacy of the secondary flue. I appreciate your time and effort; thanks. Hearing from anybody with experience or information with this design would be greatly appreciated. MacK

Hi, If it's a wood casement window installed before the advent of aluminum or vinyl window with the nailing flanges that most idiots think are widow flashings, it's probably splined on all sides with heavy asphalt felt splines and should have a metal head flashing above the window. If you're lucky, they put a pan flashing below the sill. If the sill is cracked or the joints where the sill and casing sides meet are un-caulked and dried and separated, water might be getting in that way. If there is a pan flashing beneath the casing it could be leaking. Perform a pick test on the wood window casing and the jacks and rough opening and framing below the window. Replace - do not sister - any wood that the pick test indicates have incipient rot or worse. Don't leave any rotting wood there or you'll be sorry later. If the sloped sill is rotted out, do not replace it with a 2 by 6 laying flat on its side. Find some milled sill material with a drip kerf at a wood supplier someplace. If there are flashings incorporated into the wall plane under that sill and they are rusted out, replace them. Click to Enlarge 31.14 KB Click to Enlarge 19.32 KB

And the hits, er,....collapses just keep on a'commin. Deck collapses are like texting and driving; it doesn't matter how many times stories about these things caving in makes the news, there are always going to be folks who let the story go right over their heads. Then when it happens to them they can't figure out why. Check out the amount of rot evident in the rim board that this deck was attached to. Click Here!

Squeeze a dw....er, little person in there with a cordless saw and some stilts.

Mmmm, That's a trick one. How about releasing a couple of thousand drywood termites into that cleanout? OT - OF!!! M.

Yep, 2-inch minimum. Anyone else see the location of that B-vent coming through that roof and say to yourself, "Ahem!"?

Courtesy of Jim Simmons (User name Mr. Electric): Click to Enlarge 55.22 KB Click to Enlarge 39.67 KB Click to Enlarge 33.87 KB Click to Enlarge 34.99 KB Click to Enlarge 38.33 KB Click to Enlarge 23.32 KB

You are correct, No SOP requires inspection of a detached structure like a dock. However, as Jim pointed out, there are rules for the electrical system that involve safety. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

I don't inspect them. When I know I'm going to have one - which has been like half a dozen times in the past 17 years - I tell the client that; and then, if the client agrees, I contact a pool company and arrange for a separate inspection of the pool at client's expense. Otherwise, I look at the sub-panel that feeds the pool and associated equipment. If there is a pool or spa heater in the same building I'll examine it the same way I'd examine a water heater but that's as far as I go. I don't think we should include nice-to-have luxury items in our inspections. We should limit our inspections to the house and the things that are necessary to make a house work - not the nice-to-have accessories like pools, spas, exterior irrigation systems, driveway deicers, etc.. The only thing I think we should add to what we do, that we currently don't do, is fire sprinkler systems. The 2011 code brought those in. Most states have not adopted that part of the code but sooner or later they will. We inspectors will be leaving a big chunk of money on the table if we don't get trained up on those systems and work to get our states to allow us to inspect those systems when/if mandatory fire suppression systems are adopted countrywide. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike Keeping it strictly about the house provides good parameters. Luxury items are a slippery slope; once you start down that path where does it end?

An article written by home inspector, Reuben Saltzman in the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune explains why kickout flashings are so critical. The article includes a video. Check it out here.

Just follow Joe's link above. He's got a photo of one in use. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike