hausdok

Hi, So, that's the weather side for NC, right? Seems like it might be a situation where some wind is moving through the roof somehow. Chad might be onto something - were these located on the cold north slope just about in the middle of the attic, so that ventilation at the bottom of the roof plane is almost nil near the eaves because the gable end vents have short-circuited proper eave-to-ridge ventilation. Still, if that's all that's developed on the underside of that roof after half a century with the existing ventilation, I don't think it's going to be a ventilation issue, unless they've made changes to the ventilation configuration. If not, I think you have to figure out whether it's a long-standing non-issue or a recent development caused by something external that is going to become more serious as time goes on. Now, unless the lender hired you as a ventilation specialist, or unless you've got a lot of confidence in your own ability, based on plenty of experience, and are ready and willing to stand behind any correction that you recommend, I hope that you are doing this as a mental exercise only and aren't trying to diagnose this for the lender, because you've done what a home inspector is supposed to, spotted an anomaly and have reported it. Now, recommend they get it checked out and repaired as necessary by a competent roofer - then follow up to see what the roofer found and had to do to repair it - otherwise, you're liable to find someone pointing to you later and saying, "Hey, don't blame me, I didn't diagnose what was causing it, I only did the repairs based on Scott's diagnosis and recommendations for how to repair it." ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi All, I think it's a tool - not a magic wand; if you have the training, but not the experience, you can probably make some pretty horrific mistakes using this piece of equipment. Chris' example of the guy missing the rot shows that the guy was probably trained how to use the camera but he'd never learned how to look for rot properly. It's like a primary school student wearing a stethoscope versus a doctor wearing a stethoscope. One thinks he knows what he's hearing versus the other who, through more training and particularly experience, does know. This is kind of like doctors with X-rays. A medical student looks at the X-rays and imagines all sorts of stuff, or misses stuff; while the experienced doctor knows when a particular shade and shape is nothing to be concerned about or is an issue. When we see those x-rays, we haven't a clue. Meanwhile, the x-ray technician, the guy who sees the films every single day, all day, and who sees the diagnoses made by experienced doctors, becomes more proficient than either and it's the X-ray technicians that end up teaching the medical students and doctors what to look for and what the images mean. I'm toying with the idea of making this leap, but my concern right now is that perhaps the folks teaching this stuff are more like the novice doctor, rather than the experienced doctor or X-ray technician, and should they really be teaching it? Shouldn't there be established minimum standards for training and experience with these devices before folks can teach it? I know FLIR has been teaching it for decades - I remember reading about their training back when I was in the military when they used forward looking infrared radar (FLIR) for target acquisition and for search and rescue - so I'm reasonably confident they know what they're doing, but what about these other manufacturers and the plethora of trainers popping up everywhere? Has it really been around long enough that home inspectors will have had enough experience to be teaching it competently, or does this have the same potential for abuse that all of the mold training programs had 8 -9 years ago? Before it gets too out of hand, should the manufacturers put their heads together and come up with consistent criteria re. experience and education for folks teaching others how to use this equipment, so the rest of us can be reasonably assured that the training given at these courses is all on the same level? ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi Scott, How well adhered to one another were the shingles and is this on the weather/wind side of the roof? Man, I wish the underside of roofs around here looked that pristine after that many years! SYP, right? OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, In this case, the masonry chimney is still being used as a chimney, which makes what Doug describes wrong. However, if a flue pipe is added to the water heater and run up through the masonry chimneystack alongside the furnace vent, as the second guy recommended to him, the masonry stack is no longer functioning as a chimney and becomes a plumbing/chimney chase. As long as the furnace is listed for a vertical vent and there's a means to collect and discard the condensate from that Cat IV vent, it shouldn't be an issue. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi Tommy, I don't know what it's about, but thought you might be interested in looking into this. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, So, what you're saying is the exhaust from the water heater is surrounding and condensing all over the exhaust pipe from the furnace as well as the gas supply pipe that's feeding gas to the other furnace. Sounds to me like the second guy has the most logical solution. OT - OF!!! M.

Hello Hideinforest, I can't help but notice that every time you've come on here you've recommended one or both of those sites to correct whatever issue is being discussed, so it's beginning to look like you have some kind of business interest in those sites. If you are in any way affiliated with those sites that you've repeatedly recommended here, I'm going to have to ask that you stop posting those links, because doing so is advertising and I don't allow business entities to advertise for free here. Please pay attention to the forum rules. Thank you. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Don't remind me. Hey, anyone know where I can get a can of that spray-on hair they used to sell on TV in the 70's? [:-paperba OT - OF!!! M.

Hi Randy, It's the first that I've seen it. I intend to go back through my records and notify any of my clients that owns one of these suckers. OT - OF!!! M.

Look into US Inspect or InspectTech. They are multi-inspector firms. Who knows, they might be hiring. Both do in-house training, have enough assets to wait this mess out, and they have employee benefits up the yazoo. Then again, they're hiring carpenters and mechanics in Iraq at min. $86k a year. Might be the place to wait this slump out. 12 hours a day, 6 days of the week, three 10-day vacations a year, free room board, uniforms, laundry, etc.., first $84K tax free. I'm seriously considering it - especially if this slide continues. My little brother is over there now - he says they had lobster at dinner three times last week. However, there is that peculiar weather - the occasional very small and localized hailstorm that likes to blow up and hurt everything within a 15 meter radius. You have to have a certain kind of mindset to ignore the weather conditions. OT - OF!!! M.

OK, Well, here are some links. The last one is an announcement to residents of Washington State. http://activerain.com/blogsview/70751/C ... ce-Lawsuit http://www.lawcash.com/attorney/4963/ca ... awsuit.asp http://www.consolidatedfurnaces.com/a1.html http://www.lawyersandsettlements.com/ca ... anada.html http://www.lieffcabraser.com/furnace.htm http://www.cbc.ca/news/story/2006/10/12 ... wsuit.html http://www.geocities.com/capitolhill/1007/case_l7.html http://caselaw.findlaw.com/scripts/getc ... 66&invol=3 http://www.empireservice.com/recalled_hvac_units.htm http://www.hvacware.com/user-cgi/hvaconfig.pl?read=7793 http://www.torrance.net/TFD/8848.htm http://www.wafurnacesuit.com/detailed_notice.pdf ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, It depends on your market, your skills, your personality, and what kind of report you are generating. I began in mid-april of 1996 and by the end of that year had done 127. I know of other inspectors who're just as competent as I am who've been in the business for more than two years and have only had the opportunity to do about 50. There's really no way to predict it; you just have to get out there in the market, get your face known, get your cards out, and hope you can get some work in time to help you survive through the first couple of years. If you can make it beyond two years, you'll probably still be here 10 years from now. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT !!! Mike

Hi Randy, Off the top of my head, I think I remember something about a Lochinvar lawsuit, a Coleman lawsuit, and a Tempstar lawsuit. Have you looked way back in the HVAC and recall forums to see if any furnaces have been recalled? OT - OF!!! M.

There's a lot of work there!

Ain't that the truth. I went to a seminar a week ago and when I walked in I thought I was at a weight watchers convention. Yep, walk into an HI convention and one thinks, "Wow, the US Beef Trust!" I console myself by telling myself that gravity affects older people more than younger people. Therefore, the older you get the more you weigh on a scale but you haven't actually gained any body mass. Works for me, but the danged scale dial and my feet keep moving further and further out of sight. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi Joe, Martin isn't a regular here, so you'd be better off to click on his user name and then send that message directly to him via email. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi Richard, HB-3132 is WHILAG's proposal and the result of two years of work. You're right, I am not happy that it doesn't include peer review, but, having sat in that room, you know how contentious things can get at times and how difficult it is to get a large group of home inspectors to agree on something. WHILAG is less than half the size it was when it began, because some folks got so tired of the process that they lost interest, while others apparently didn't like how Roberts Rules and how the concept of majority rules works, and they figuratively took their toys and went home. Not everyone in WHILAG is completely happy with it - it's a consensus proposal after all - but it's something everyone said they could at least live with, and it's not bad when one looks back at the blood that was figuratively shed in that room. The pest exam portion was included there specifically as a way to placate the pest guys. They are the ones responsible for making all home inspectors pest inspectors by default here under RCW 15.58, because they thought home inspectors who were including pest inspections along with their home inspections were making too many wrong calls. As a consequence of that bone headed move, pest inspections died as a separate business in this state and now consumers here think that, because pest inspections are part of the home inspection under current law, fees should not reflect what's reasonable for a home inspection plus a pest inspection, and are only willing to pay for what they think is reasonable for a home inspection. So, inspectors here are saddled with the additional liability, plus the E & O/Bond requirement, but have a tough time making consumers understand that there's an additional cost involved. WHILAG is trying to divorce home inspectors from the pest guys and felt that by having home inspectors read the texts and take the test one time at initial licensure, that the pest guys could no longer make the argument that inspectors who are calling out rot and conducive conditions are hurting consumers because they don't know what they're talking about. If they can get the two divorced, so that things here are like they are in 49 other states, then, those who want to do pest inspections can get a separate pest inspectors license and charge that additional fee for pest inspections, while those who choose not to do pest inspections can at least identify and recommend corrections for wood rot and conducive conditions and refer the client to a pest-licensed inspector to deal with any insect issues. That's the hope anyway. WHILAG has been attempting to bring Spanel's version and Springer's version closer together by meeting with Spanel and other pols in Olympia over the past week. Since 3132 was dropped, WHILAG voted to drop that passage that you like so much because some folks successfully argued that since home inspectors are not pest inspectors that there shouldn't be anything related to pest inspectors in a home inspectors' law. It might be a mistake, but there it is. If you think it's a good idea, let some WHILAG folks know about it stat or stop by their meeting. WHILAG is meeting today from 9 to 12 to try and hash out a position paper for Monday's hearing at the Denny's near 165th on N. Aurora in Shoreline. Spanel is sticking to her guns in some areas and seems to be willing to compromise in others. One thing that is interesting is that she apparently didn't fully understand how home inspectors were, by default, pest inspectors here, and how onerous that is for home inspectors. Maybe, now that it's been explained to her, she might be willing to yield a little bit. I guess we'll have to see what happens at the hearing on Monday. I imagine that she won't reveal her position until after she's heard all of the pro and con from the folks who show up at the hearing. She'll probably provide her input after the hearing separately to the committee and then they'll have to consider it before bringing it back to the senate for a vote. If history is any lesson, what goes to the floor might not look anything like what you're seeing now. If it makes it to the house, the process starts all over again. It's still too early to know what might possibly make it out of the house or whether it even will. For the past two years, it's died in committee. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike Anyone who wants to send their comments about either version of this law to the Washington Home Inspector Legislative Advisory Group, which is a coalition of home inspectors from all over Washington State can do so by emailing any of the folks below: Sandy Hartman, Secretary - sandyhartman@comcast.net Hugh M. Kelso, HKI Building Inspections - hugh@hkibuildinginspections.com Joanne MacKintosh, Centennial Home Inspections - joanne.mackintosh@hotmail.com Michael O'Handley, Your Inspector Inc. - hausdok@msn.com Rick Bunzel, Pacific Crest Inspections - rick@paccrestinspections.com Dave Pioli, Criterium Engineers - davepioli@criterium-pioli.com Pat Knight, World Inspection Network - pknight@wini.com Gary Fuller, Building Tech Northwest - gary@buildingtechnw.com Bruce MacKintosh, Centennial Home Inspections - lochmoighman@yahoo.com

Seattle, January 24th On Thursday, January 17th, for the third year in a row, Senators Spanel (Bellingham) introduced a bill in the Washington State senate aimed at licensing home inspectors. Senate bill 6606, is co-sponsored by Sen. Kohl-Welles (Seattle), who has been Spanel's ally during the past two failed attempts. On the same day, Rep. Larry Springer (Kirkland) prime sponsored a competing bill, HB-3132, in the state house of representatives. The Senate committee on Labor, Commerce, Research & Development will hold a public hearing to hear testimony from interested parties in senate hearing room #4 of the J.A. Cherberg building on the capitol campus in Olympia at 10:00 am, January 28th. Home inspectors and other interested parties are encouraged to attend the hearing and voice their opinion, pro or con, about the bill. Interested parties from the east end of the state who can't make the hearing and wish to speak should contact their state Senators to see whether it's possible to arrange to be heard via speakerphone. For more information about either bill, contact your state representatives or senators.

Heh, heh, Kind of thought you guys'd enjoy that little tidbit. [:-jump2] ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

I just shot my evening Bosco all over my keyboard. Yep, that's one for Jay Leno. Come to think of it, what if Jay received a bunch of home inspection reports from around the country with lame-brained language and syntax like that. I bet a segment like that would torque a few folks into re-thinking their reports. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, That proves what I was saying above. With my situation, I get the same reflected pattern except that the arcs cross each other and aren't focused as intensely as that bright diamond you have in the center. You should contact Martin Holladay at Energy Design Update, he'd be tickled pink to be able to get actual photos of sunlight striking the vinyl exactly where the damage is occurring. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, I think if anyone here knew of any coatings that work they would have responded with that information by now. We're home inspectors; we report observations but don't usually have much involvement in the end solution. That has to come from the builders and product manufacturer and it's usually slow in coming. It's a relatively recent phenomenon and it affects so few consumers that I don't think the window industry, or the vinyl siding industry, is saying much publicly about it. Have you tried contacting a window shop to ask them about what can be done? Window companies are certainly aware of the phenomenon; the article in Energy Design Update made that very clear. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, I'm guessing that the new brick ledger is probably sitting directly on the outside edge of that footer. It may have been anchored to the original foundation wall with mollys but there's no way, short of asking the builder, how it's been done. In your area, I'd be pretty concerned about the potential for uplift caused by freezing soils. OT - OF!!! M.

The contentious B.S. between the various home inspection organizations never seems to end. "I'm better than you are because I've been around longer," "I'm better than you are because I have an entrance test," "I'm better than you are because I'm friendlier to inspectors," "I'm better than you are because I've got more useless crap to give to my members," "I'm better than you are because I certify my members,"" I'm better than you are because my founder didn't defraud customers." On and on it goes ad nauseam. Each organization thinks it has the franchise on credibility. Yet, with all of their ballyhooing about how great they are, none has a program in place to ensure that every one of it's members can actually do what he or she claims to be able to do - inspect homes. They've got written tests of basic inspection skills, they've got standards of practice, they've got time in business and number of experience requirements for various levels of membership, but not a single one of these organizations can say definitively that every single one of its members has been verified to be competent. Why? Because not one, on a national level, has a peer evaluation program in place to observe and rate an inspector's on-site skills. Not one. If one looks, all over this continent one can find home inspectors, who are members of one or more of these associations, who have jumped through all of the hoops required by their organization and who have been in this business for decades, who are basically incompetent. One doesn't have to have a crystal ball to find them, all one has to do is read the sample reports that they place on their websites; they're usually chock full of illogical conclusions, misspellings, contextual errors, and inspector lore. Some of these reports are so badly written that one can't help but think that the inspector would be better off turning his inspection results over to a fifth grader to be transcribed into a final report format. Talk to these same inspectors, though, and they'll regale you with all of the reasons why they are the best around at what they do. What's that old saying, "Persons who are incompetent don't even know what they don't know?" Now, don't get me wrong; I'm not saying that most of those in this profession are incompetent - I'm only saying that they haven't proven that they are competent - including me. Think about it; when you go to the doctor, do you want the doctor learning his trade unsupervised and alone while he's poking and prodding you, or do you expect that he'll have had a decent education, and has been peer reviewed by an experienced doctor before he gets to diagnose your ills? Do you want to fly in an airliner that's piloted by someone who's only passed a written ground school exam, and has never actually flown a plane before , or do you want a seasoned pilot whose gone through peer review sitting in that pilot's seat? Don't you expect that the cop in that squad car should be able to drive skillfully and shoot straight before he goes tearing off down the freeway after a car jacker and has to fire back in defense in a crowded neighborhood? Do you want teenagers getting in cars after passing a written exam and driving around unsupervised without having at least taken a driver's test? Of course you don't. Now, think about the poor schmuck of a consumer who hires a home inspector. When we go about helping to investigate the condition of the largest purchase that consumer will ever make, aren't we kind of letting our customers down by not having proven to our peers, like so many other professions, that we can do what we claim to be able to do? Aren't we in this profession in a sense frauds? It's funny, talk peer review, and inspectors get all defensive and the reasons why peer review won't work are spit out as forcefully as soured milk. Most inspectors condemn the idea without giving it another thought; then they drive down the highway surrounded by all of those drivers who've been peer reviewed, they hire lawyers who've been peer reviewed, they rely on fire fighters who've been peer reviewed, and they even have their hair cut by someone who's been peer reviewed. Ironic, ain't it? Home inspectors; who would ever have believed that they were the anointed ones with knowledge and wisdom above all others? Gosh, it makes one all warm and fuzzy just knowing that we aren't mere mortals. Meanwhile, just across our northern border that strange cult of folk known as Canadians has somehow managed to do what all of the so-called experts in home inspection have been saying for decades can't be done - they've put together a national certification program, so that consumers will have a little more assurance that when they hire a home inspector that the inspector is reasonably competent. Holy mackerel, and the experts said it couldn't be done! Wouldn't you know it, though; the program is voluntary, so there are some Canadian inspectors who don't want to participate. Their excuses sound kind of familiar - "I don't need no steenking test, I belong to such-and-such home inspector organization. It's older than any other, it has an entrance test, it's friendlier than any other, it gives out more crap than any other, I'm already "certified," and who cares whether my organization's founder was proven to be a fraud, I'm competent. Don't believe me? Just ask me." To learn more, click here.

Want a chuckle with your morning coffee? Read some of what this new mother-son Amerispec franchise team is saying about non-franchise inspectors and the business. Click here!