Chris Bernhardt

Does anyone report butt ends of fiber cement lap siding boards not occuring over studs? I recently ran into a case where the sider nailed only to the sheathing and the siding was falling off. I also have found a court case in Oregon where a sider lost because he had been nailing to the sheathing. Since then, I see jobs where the butt joints align over studs and other jobs that are not. Chris, Oregon

I do the same as Kurt. And I thought Oregon was quirky. Chris, Oregon

Yea, and most of the ones that do are useless for getting at the pump. Chris, Oregon

When you get your IR camera, verifying operation of radiant heating systems will be a piece of cake. You'll be able to detect that their working, even how the coils are laid out, before you can feel any heat with your hand. Chris, Oregon

For the typical inspection that I am involved in, if I tried to complete the report on site, every inspection would be 5 - 6 hours long, and that would kill my biz. There is at least one inspection a week, sometimes a week full of inspections like that, that would have me taking 6- 8 hours an inspection and report. The best that I can offer at this time onsite if they really really really have to have something is a photo report. Just photos captioned up representing the issues that will be expounding upon in the final report. How long is it taking these guys who are doing their reports onsite? I bet you they are doing them still in a 2 - 3 hour time frame. There is no way I can do an inspection and a report on site in that time frame, no way no how. Years ago I was running into that request from realtors to provide the report onsite. While I tried to accomodate, I just couldn't put in the quality that I was after, and I gave up. Instead I focused on quality and developed my own report format that is now sought after. I deliver the reports via email the next day sometimes two, depending how busy I am. The way to beat the onsite guys is by building in more quality into your inspection and report. With all due respect to the onsite brethren, if you're not spending 5-6 hours an inspection to deliver an onsite report in my neck of the woods, you're missing a lot stuff. Chris, Oregon

That is so true. As Jim Katen says, they're "risk adverse". If I had to write my reports the way Mike does I think I would have to double my fee, but I think they're great reports. If I was buying some 1800's or early 1900's home back east, I would call Bill Kibbel. Now I wouldn't expect or even want Bill to list everything wrong with the home. I want Bill to distill it all down for me and just give me a list, then if I have questions I'll ask. But unforturnately our SOP's lead inspectors off providing a 3 ring binder full of useless crap. If we could all hire a Hausdok, a Jim Katen, a Kurt Mitenbuler, etc. to perform our inspections, there wouldn't be any need for "The SOP", but because our ranks are peppered with people right out of the drunk tank, you need something. Chris, Oregon

The format of the report is horrible. It's a painful read. That being said it's like most HI reports that I have seen. I actually like Hausdok's reports, too much info, but fairly easy to read and understand. My favorite reports are Jim Katens. My own report writing philosophy is heavily borrowed from Jim Katen, Walter Jowers and Kurt Mitenbuler. Imagine an exec trying to read that report. He takes one glance at it, and tosses it to his sec to decipher, distill and put action items into a simple list. Something that he can look at in 30 seconds or less, then toss it back to the sec, and tell her/him to have items 1, 2, 3, etc. repaired. In my opinion, the crummy report format is a major obstacle for this HI. Chris, Oregon

Me too. Note to self, carry dictionary when visiting Kurt Mitenbuler. Chris, Oregon

No one tool will do. You need a bevy of them. Chris, Oregon

For measuring moisture on the back side of ceiling drywall non-invasively, you'll need a Tramex moisture encounter plus, a surveymaster is not up to the task. Invasively, if I was desperate, I would do as Rob would do and use the long probes with a protimeter; maybe even stick a hygrometer up thru a hole to see if the humidity is high enough to support mold growth. What I actually have had really good success with is using a thermal imager and the Tramex with this sort of problem. If there's a leak with the tub or shower plumbing, the thermal imager will pick it up even if the back of the drywall is just being wetted. The best thing is to do what Jim Katen said and open it up again and take a look. Chris, Oregon

I think that's just for home inspectors. Chris, Oregon

No, I don't have it in writing. I got it from the horses mouth that got taken to the CCB for writing a roof cert on a 15 year old shake roof ( I think he got tagged three years after writing the cert). It was more than five years ago when I talked to him about it. The CCB publishes complaints that result in action, but I don't know how far back they go. I know of no standards with respect to certifying roofs. That alone should tell you something. Chris, Oregon

Translation to buyer - You need a new roof. What does the buyer want? Your inspection is not a warranty. The buyer has only two options, take the 5 year warranty from the roofer making the repair, or install a new roof with a longer term warranty. And incidently the CCB's interpretation of a 3 - 5 year cert is that it's a 5 year water tight warranty regardless of any disclaimers by the roofer. Chris, Oregon

I had completed my visual inspection and was just starting my IR scan of the family room addition when I discovered this. Click to Enlarge 26.95 KB Infrared composite pic of drip pattern in carpet next to interior wall in a family room addition. Click to Enlarge 38.63 KB View of carpet. Carpet felt dry to the touch. Click to Enlarge 15.2 KB Composite IR pic of wall and ceiling. Dark areas scanned positive for moisture with my moisture meters. Click to Enlarge 12.45 KB View of ceiling. There is a fine joint crack, otherwise there are no moisture stains or other visual signs of leaking. Click to Enlarge 53.94 KB View of roof. I think it's either leaking in the valley or at the skylight and then following the original top chord of the truss down to the top of the wall just past the other side of the skylight. I could not get to this area in the attic. I would have never found it without using an IR camera. Chris, Oregon

I say keep it out of the report except for lobotimized construction as Kurt says, but make it part of client expectation manangement (Is it not already covered under most Sop's?). If we start making things like this an industry standard were going to end up with reports making all those crazy disclamers like don't bath with a toaster, and hold the pointy end of the stick away from your eye. Chris, Oregon

Well it's a law enforcement issue isn't it. Where do you stop? I think this leads right into politics. The argument will be it's just a few words for free in the report, what's the harm?. Like Walter says, "Words mean things." A permit doesn't mean anything with respect to our inspection; it doesn't mean things were done right. Things could have been built right, but didn't receive permision from the State, and that makes them wrong? It's politics, not inspecting. Chris, Oregon

This would be an interesting poll topic. I don't generally recommend permit searches. For Portland homes, I can go online and see whats be permited since about 2000? I know other inspectors who do broiler plate it. So lets say that you don't find anything wrong on the surface, and it turns out that no permit was drawn, do you think the inspector should be liable for not recommending a permit search if it something later turns up? How is this different from not recommending a sewer scope? Chris, Oregon

I guess that's another topic for discussion. What's a reasonable size for a photo in the report. I fit 8 to a page and PDF it. One can always zoom in and make a pic fill the screen. Chris, Oregon

I call it a leader. I don't know what its proper name is, perhaps headline, header? For example: Clogged gutters Chris, Oregon

Other peoples report writers force you to think at odds with how you natually think & work. I wrote my report writer in a vacuum. I didn't research how others were doing it; I didn't want to be contaminated. My narrative format is almost identical to the best, which is Jim Katens in my opinion, although we build it very differently. I write a leader(subhead) first for each observation I'm reporting on. These are all simultaneously linked to the corresponding items in Oregons SoP, and each leader (subhead) is stored in a table and are correlated and prioritized automatically. I don't have to enter stuff in any order, the program automatically takes care of that. I then have a module that I call photopicker where I step through each leader (subhead) and assign/link pics to each one. When I do that I have the option of selecting the leader(subhead) as the caption for the pic; that saves a ton of time captioning up pics. Next step is a module where I write the narrative & recommendation. In that module it shows the leader(subhead) and the pics already assigned for reference as I write. This module also reads the leader(subhead), parses it then checks the broiler plate database and pops up thumbnails of close matches all automatically. There is no hunting thru any menus for broilerplate. Then I hit process pics and it automatically builds the pic pages all captioned up 8 to a page everything is cross referenced to each other (narrative to photos, photos to narrative, list of items inspected to narrative). Then I hit finalize and it builds the rest of my report automatically. Then I proof it and compile it to PDF. I also have a complier to format the report in XHTML for viewing on smartphones. This is all written using MS words built in visual basic, although I'm thinking about building it in something faster. Chris, Oregon

Well almost. I snap off photos of all sides & angles of the home, including the roof when I'm up there. It's nothing, the camera don't care, and one get's pretty fast at it after awhile. I take photos of anything that is of interest to me. I take photos of equipment before I open the panels and after. I take photos of things that I will have to later describe in the report. I do take photos of the shutoffs and readily accessible clean outs, and water heater, a/c, and furnace plates. I'm taking more photos all the time. The difference between what we do and what is done in law enforcement is that we have the opportunity to snap photos at the moment of the crime. It's no different than writing it down at the moment, well actually if you stopped to write it down, you'll just miss too much or take too long. Hear, hear! Nobody is going to read a sixty page report. When the plantiffs lawyer tells the judge your report is sixty pages, the judge is going to wince and shake his or her head. Chris, Oregon

I would mention it. I would note that it's not adversely affecting the operation of the window at this time and that I don't know if it will get worse or lead to a problem, but my emphasis would be on their understanding of what it might involve in correcting it (if you want it corrected, you'll need to do x, y & z). I imagine that if the window became damaged for any reason, the mfg might void the warranty based on not following the mfg.'s installation instructions. Chris, Oregon

That's the problem and why ended up writing my own report writer. Any & every new idea I can come up with to generate, style & format a report I can impliment myself. The next wave of report writers are going to have to start spitting out reports in different formats. A PDF to print out a report for a client without a computer, web based reports, and smartphone reports etc. I even had a client ask me if I could generate a machine readable report for the vision impaired. Chris, Oregon

Mike what are your talking about? How does a photo of an electrical panel with the cover off not prove someone pulled the cover off and looked at it? The same with the HVAC system etc. How would the photo be less convincing to a judge and jury than narrative, " I removed the electrical panel cover and examined the panel." What's the other side going to say? That the photo is not proof the inspector took the panel cov off and looked at it; that only his written statement in the report is valid evidence? The use of photos in the report are in support of the findings, but they are not the report and no one said they were. The Oregon & ASHI SOP both require that the inspector state or list in a report the items inspected and indicate whether or not they are satisfactory in the opinion of the inspector. No one said anything about a photo only report. Chris, Oregon

I guess this thread should have been split a long time ago. And I thought I was the only one doing that. Oh well, how many of us have started sending a smartphone friendly version of our reports? Chris, Oregon