hausdok

Oy, no. A surety bond is not even close to the same thing as E&O. Let's say you make a mistake and someone sues you for 100,000. With E&O, you pay a deductible and they take it from there. They'll pay for your defense and pay any judgment against you. When it's all done, you're only out your deductible. Of course the insurance company might then raise your rates or even drop you, but you're not financially ruined. Now, with only a bond, there's no deductible but you get to defend yourself and, if there's a judgment, you have to pay it. If you can't pay it, the bond company pays it for you. But then you have to reimburse the bond company. Trust me when I say this: you'd be better off owing the money to Tony Soprano than owing it to a bond company. They *will* make you pay it back. -Jim Katen, Oregon

Hmm, I know of a long-time ASHI "member" out here who is borderline illiterate and can't write a 5-sentence paragraph that makes any sense to anyone. Don't even get me started on his spelling. Yeah, I know, I'm no shining star of grammatical correctness either, but where were the entry standards for this guy? We're professional report writers for krissake! Seems like a truly professional association would have caught that and said, "Uh, sorry Bud, but you just don't have the goods." ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

? I'm different? Omeyegod! Wuddueyedo? Is there a cure? Been there and done that - 4 years with NAHI and then 4 years with ASHI. Other than the fact I made some pretty good friends and had a discussion board to kick back with them on, I didn't get a whole lot out of the experience. I did, however, get to watch members of each diss each other on a regular basis - mostly without any knowledge of how the other organization operated - and got to see my board of directors throw away $1M of the membership's dues in pursuit of folly. When people ask me why I don't belong to one of these alleged "professional" organizations, that's what I tell 'em. When they all stop fighting with each other and learn to work together for the good of the profession, I may consider re-joining all, one or none. OT - OF!!! M.

In this article in The Insurance Journal, a Florida husband and wife team that own a mold remediation company are charged with fraud after it was revealed they were providing false mold test results to clients. To read the entire store click here.

Ha! For most people it would be hard. But Chad, you see, is an inventor. It's a little known fact that the transporter used in the Star Trek series is based on one of Chad's inventions. Don't freak out when he suddenly materializes out of thin air right next to you Kurt. [:-alien] OT - OF!!! M.

Bill already found it, but you guys really should check out the improved search feature. OT - OF!!! M.

By Alan Carson, Carson Dunlop, November 2005 Introduction We all like inspecting houses. It’s fun and challenging and we are really good at seeing things that mere mortals can’t. The “show and tellâ€

Hi Mitchell, No harm, no foul. I can sympathize, but I think you can say the same thing about most of the organizations. Until we inspectors really sit down and examine this profession of ours and decide on a common direction, things aren't going to change, I'm afraid. ASHI certainly isn't the only organization who's philosophy I disagree with. Hell, if we picked an organization a day, I think we could go on for at least a week critiquing all of the national organizations and still not be talked out and still not find a lot of common ground. It would make for good jabberwockin' but one thing's for sure - it's not liable to change anyone's mind in any of these organizations. They seem to thrive on controversy. I was just trying to keep things on an even keel and friendly. TIJA ?!! - Yee Ha! M.

Aw com'on, Mitchell, Let's try to keep it a reasonable adult discussion and not turn it into a bash fest. I think we should be able to discuss this kind of thing reaonably without flaming each other. No? Les, is change difficult because it's the oldest and best, or because it's got a lethargic and swollen board of directors in place, and a voting and quorom system that isn't conducive to change and doesn't enable it to make rapid decisions and adapt and change quickly with the times? OT - OF!!! M.

Hi Les and Scott, You both miss my point. My point isn't about experience. It's about giving your own ASHI guys respect for choosing to join ASHI over another association. Obviously, the intent of that statement is to tell folks that the candidates (associates) aren't as experienced (and by implication, as competent) as the "members" of ASHI - but, by including that statement, you set your own team up for failure and this is what has driven people to join the other teams. That's what I'm trying to say. I know I haven't been in this game as long as you two, but 11 years is something, so I'm not totally ignorant of the arguments that have been batted around between ASHI guys for years. While I certainly agree that I'd always prefer to see a home buyer hire the experienced guy over the inexperienced guy, I think that folks who're members of the same association should insist that, insofar as the association (the team) is concerned, everyone is on the same team and should be treated equally by the association. Certainly, all members of any association have the right to individually advertise themselves and do whatever they need to, in order to try and set themselves apart from those they compete with - even fellow within the same organization - but I think it's just plain wrong for an association to display preference for one level of member over another. Once an association accepts and cashes an inspector's check, and begins to benefit from that inspector's revenue, that inspector should have the same privileges as anyone else and should garner the same respect in anything that association displays on its public face - website, advertising, media press releases, etc.. If they want to have ranks within the association, that are based on time in the profession and number of inspections and that sort of thing, fine, but that should be an internal issue that has nothing to do with the organization's public face. Let individual inspectors compete however they will out in the market, but don't aid and abet discrimination within the association, by setting one group up for failure. The organization is a team. When it's competing for market share of a limited number of inspectors in this country and Canada, it needs to compete as a team - not as distinctly different groups that pay dues to one association but only one of the groups has any real power or rights. Scott, you say, "A person who is a Hair Stylist today could be listed as a home inspector on the search next to a person with years of experience." I understand that, but you've (ASHI) created that issue yourselves. First ASHI says, "Come join our association - we're the oldest and the best," while at the same time it doesn't have any sort of entry control. It willingly accepts the money of those who are already making a living at home inspections, and allows them to join without requiring them to show that they actually have the training and skills that they tell their clients they have. Then, they brand them as possibly being incompetent by placing that statement on the organizations search engine. Think about it, all ASHI needed to do to compete with NACHI was to place some sort of a test for entry into place - one that was harder than NACHI's and considered credible - and then to have given all of its members equal respect and the right to advertise their affiliation, regardless of how long they've been in the business or how many jobs they'd done. Because they are the oldest in the business and considered the most credible, inspectors would have flocked to ASHI's ranks. Would that have pissed off those ASHI members who've been around for years? Sure, but they should be competing on the street using their own marketing skills, experienced and training, not gaining unfair advantage over their own teammates, by virtue of their association's condescending language on the very site that all of their membership dollars pay for. Try to step out of the box and look at it from an outsider's point of view. That's not teamwork. That's not what an association of brothers is supposed to be about, and that's why ASHI's membership numbers are no longer the largest in the profession. Folks over there have got themselves so wrapped around the axle with trying to make sure that the newfs in their own organization are held at some sort of competitive disadvantage, that they can't see that maintaining this archaic status system within their own organization is hurting them. It's a shame really, because it could be so easily fixed. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Jeez, Scott! I'd heard that ASHI was finally working on changing their system and that the stigma of "candidate" attached to those new inspectors was soon going to be eliminated. It doesn't sound like it. Please don't take offense, but why not just take a hot branding iron and burn "not yet competent" into the forehead of every candidate, 'cuz that's what the uninitiated homebuyer is going to infer from that statement? How is that fair to the candidate (associate)? That's truly lame. Those men and women form the bulk of ASHI's membership, don't they? If it weren't for the large number of candidates (associates) that ASHI has, ASHI probably wouldn't be able to pay it's bills - especially after taking out a $1,000,000 mortgage on the building just to help fund the branding debacle - so it seems, at least to me, like those candidates (associates) oughta get more respect. I would have thought that ASHI has learned by now that it's in a down and dirty street fight for its survival and that trying to give it's members who've been in the business longer a leg up, competition wise, over it's newer members is akin to biting off one's nose to spite one's face. It's obvious where the "associate" and "member" distinctions derived from. Somewhere back in the day when ASHI was the only kid on the block worth joining, the guys who'd been in the business longer wanted a way to distinguish themselves from the new guys. They felt that since they'd been in the business longer and had literally and figuratively "paid their dues" that they were entitled to a means to say to people, "Looky here, I'm more experienced than this new guy, so hire me!" It made perfect sense - if you were one of the old timers and not one of the new guys - and the new guys were powerless to do anything about it, because they had (have) no voting rights and ASHI was the only game in the house. Well, that day is gone, Man! Look around ASHI old guys! NACHI has come in and empowered even the most inexperienced and incompetent inspector with the title "certified," and by placing that statement on your search engine, you've said to the first time homebuyer, who's out there unknowingly looking for a competent inspector that is "bonded and certified," that the folks at your associate (candidate) level aren't quite up to par yet. Put yourself in new home buyer's shoes and ask yourself whether you'd hire someone who was "working their way to way toward meeting ASHI's requirements," or would hire someone who is allegedly certified and is a full member of another association? By now, ASHI should have realized that its oldest members are no longer competing with its newest members - they're competing with a perception out there on the block that those members of another association are somehow "certified" while ASHI members are not. I'll give them credit for partly realizing that by allowing their new guys the use of the term "certified ASHI inspector" but to still subtly mark them as incompetent, by sticking that comment next to the search results in your own search engine? That's idiotic! When is the ASHI leadership going to pull its head out of its ass? Hell, if you're not going to give those new guys the right to make decisions about that kind of thing, at least realize that, compared to the number of relatively new and inexperienced "certified" inspectors who are paying Mr. Gromicko and his public relations firm to make them appear like they are something they are not - ASHI's new guys are a drop in the bucket. They are no longer the ones that your long established membership is primarily competing with. You guys should remove that boneheaded comment, stop trying to distinguish yourselves from one another within your own association and start acting as one cohesive unit. Mercy! And to think people ask me every day why I'm not a "member" of any so-called "professional" associations. Why would I want to be? ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Washington, D.C./April 18th - Release #07-159 The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, in cooperation with the firm named below, today announced a voluntary recall of the following consumer product. Consumers should stop using recalled products immediately unless otherwise instructed. Name of product: Carlon® Drop-In Floor Boxes Units: About 100,000 Manufacturer Lamson & Sessions, of Cleveland, Ohio Hazard: The recalled floor boxes are wired incorrectly resulting in reverse polarity. This poses a shock or electrocution hazard to consumers. Incidents/Injuries: Lamson & Sessions has received one report of an incident with the recalled floor boxes. No injuries have been reported. Description and Models: The drop-in floor boxes are used to provide an extra electrical outlet in the floor. They were sold under the Carlon® brand name and have a brass finish cover approximately 3 1/2 inches in diameter. "Carlon" is stamped into the plastic above the receptacle and the model number is located to the left of the receptacle. Model numbers E971FBDI and E971FBDIB are included in this recall. Sold at: Homecenters, hardware retailers and electrical distributors nationwide between January 2005 and March 2007 for about $35. Manufactured in: China Remedy: Consumers should immediately unplug anything that is plugged into the floor box and contact Lamson & Sessions to determine if their floor box is included in the recall. Consumers with recalled units will receive a free repair. Consumer Contact: For additional information, call Lamson & Sessions toll-free at (866) 636-1531 between 8:30 a.m. and 5 p.m. ET Monday through Friday, or visit www.lamson-home.com To see this recall on CPSC's web site, including pictures of the recalled products, please click here. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is charged with protecting the public from unreasonable risks of serious injury or death from more than 15,000 types of consumer products under the agency's jurisdiction. Deaths, injuries and property damage from consumer product incidents cost the nation more than $700 billion annually. The CPSC is committed to protecting consumers and families from products that pose a fire, electrical, chemical, or mechanical hazard or can injure children. The CPSC's work to ensure the safety of consumer products - such as toys, cribs, power tools, cigarette lighters, and household chemicals - contributed significantly to the 30 percent decline in the rate of deaths and injuries associated with consumer products over the past 30 years.

Okay Kurt, Try it now, it looks like the gnomes have fixed it. I was just able to delete my last post. OT - OF!!! M.

Okay, Here's a Heat Pump checklist adapted from the Carson-Dunlop Essentials of Home Inspection Series, Air Conditioning and Heat Pumps, using their checklists. OT - OF!!! M. Download Attachment: HeatPumpInspectionChecklist.doc 42.48 KB

Okay, Remember that old saying - "Be careful what you wish for, you might get it?" This is a checklist that I adapted from the Carson-Dunlop Essentials of Home Inspection Series, Heating II, using their inspection checklists. I'll see what I've got for heat pumps. OT - OF!!! M. Download Attachment: ElectricalHeatingSystemChecklist.doc 40.43 KB

Whoops, Just noticed that you're looking for information about 'electric' furnaces and heat pumps. Guess I need to slow down and read these more carefully before I hit the response button. I'll look around and see what I've got. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, You know, there's a whole lot of real good information in the archives for every topic area. All you have to do is look for it using the search feature. For instance, this post is probably just what you need. http://www.tijonline.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=2869 ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, I agree with Richard. There's almost no way you can wire a water heater with NM and have it meet the 'fastened within 12 inches' rule if the water heater is positioned so that you can access the draincock and the thermostat and elements. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, I'm still using my 7 year old ST-1D. Before that, I used a Wiggy, along with a cheap multi-meter, just fine for 4 years. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, Heil's gas furnace serial number is typically preceded by an L, which is the plant location, followed by the year of manufacture and the week and then the sequence in a 4 digit number. I think you're missing the rest of the serial number and the first digit - the '1' - may have been an L. If so, it was manufactured the 12th week of 1992, making it 15 years old. However, they used to have a different serial number system that used a 13-digit serial number with the location, year and week in the center. That's why the Mfgrs# and the serial number intrigue me. Is it possible that the manufacturer's number was in front of the serial number and that the number is actually 86301A6919212? If so, it would indicate that the furnace was manufactured the 19th week of 1969. Rust has nothing to do with age. I've had furnaces 40 years old that have looked pristine and furnaces 4 years old that were so badly rusted one would have thought they were 40 years old. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Litigation? What in the world could anyone be suing anyone for? Seems like that would violate someone's right to free expression. OT - OF!!! M.

Wutoryooguystryintudu? Get my Depends all twisted in a knot? [:-shake] OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, I agree that it helps to know the geographic location of a user, so that you don't waste your own time answering a question with regionally inappropriate recommendations, but I'm not going to demand that people fill out a profile and lock them out if they don't. When we did that in the past, individual visit hits to TIJ suffered badly and that defeats the purpose of this site. . TIJ was created so that all inspectors could have a free informational source about the profession, in order to learn all of the ins and outs of this profession, where they could read and learn, and, if desired, share information with one another through the forums, without the need to join some exclusive club (ASHI, NAHI, AII, NACHI). If some only want to lurk to do that, and thus never participate on the forums, I'm fine with that. If they wish to only state a first name or to use a pseudonym, I'm fine with that. Besides, if they post garbage here or violate the forum rules, I have the ability to track their IP address, in order to find out who they are, and to block them out if necessary. I think it's fine to suggest folks fill out a profile here in this thread, or to ask someone to tell you where they are geographically before answering a post, but I don't want to see folk constantly demanding that others fill out a profile as a condition of providing an answer to a question. Some people have personal reasons for not wanting to post their profile. I can't blame them for that. My profile is wide open and I've certainly received my share of hate mail and crap off the web. Doing what I do here, I have to expect it, but I can't blame others for wanting to avoid that. Besides, I only have so many hours in a day and the amount of time needed to ride herd on those kinds of controls is substantial. If we went to that kind of a system, I'd need to seriously consider making this a fee-paid site. Given the number of other free discussion forums for inspectors that are now out there, and the amount of silliness seen and allowed on those, I don't see that helping TIJ's mission. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, I remember reading about that house someplace a few months ago. The neighbors are all ticked off. If the neighbor immediately behind wants to fix it, he should stop complaining and plant some bamboo along his fence. In no time flat nobody'll be able to see the damned thing. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, Check out our sponsor's software. Just click on the banner above. You say that you're looking for software that won't break the bank. Think about that. As you become more experienced at this business, you'll better realize what you do and don't like about your software. If you scrimp on the software now, you might find out later on that it's not meeting your needs and then you'll spend more later on to buy another program, and then another, and then another - making extra work for yourself and literally throwing money away. There's no cheap way to get into this business. It's not a discount store. You are investing in your business. If you just want to get into this trade, go to work for one of the large multi-inspector firms, where they will spend the money on you and you won't need to make any investment or decision on what equipment to buy or what SOP or "system" to follow. You'll find that at the end of the year your bank account will be healthier and you won't find yourself constantly worrying about bills for overhead, taxes, insurance and whether you're going to lose your house to some a**hole due to a frivolous lawsuit next week. If you want to be in business for yourself, expect to have to pay for it. Don't buy junk or you'll be throwing your money away. If you're not willing to invest in your own future now to do the job right, don't expect to still be in this business 5 years from now. Yesterday was my 11th anniversary in this whacko business. I think after I send Uncle Sam his due today I'll have a 3 figure bank balance. Thank the stars I have my military retirement, or, when I finally pulled the plug on this gig I'd have found myself camped out under an overpass someplace. Full time money for part-time work, my ass! Hmmm, I wonder if any of those big firms are recruiting. On second thought, give me a week before you check any of them out. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike