denable

I guess this will be my last post on this not so open "open disussion" thread or any thread for that matter. I have have been served my eviction notice by the landlord. Yes, I am guilty of posting a link to a real estate web site and yes I am guilty of posting parts of e-mails sent to me (and I forced everyone to read my posts.) But unlike several other guys on this forum, I avoided personal insults and attacks. Of course this type of action against me is nothing new. Years ago when agents did not want me around they did everything in their power to keep me from inspecting property for their customers. Unlike the guys who played the game by the agent's rules to stay in favor, I worked to change the rules. It took many years, a lot of work, a couple of legal challenges and a lot of hate mail. I will continue this fight on behalf of other inspectors who want to see the control of agents over this field ended. So like some of the other real "independent" inspectors I have been shown the exit door of this forum. I'll bet there are some real happy guys out there now, although I think discussions will become boring with everyone singing the same tune. For those who really don't want to see me go (there has to be a couple of you out there) you will see me appearing on various news media formats and in at least one book about home inspecting. Don't forget to notify some of the whimps such as Doug H. that it's safe to come back into the water now.

Brian, Remember the old movie, The Wizard Of Oz? Remember the part where the little dog pulls back the curtain and the wizard shouts out, "ignore what's behind the curtain!" So let's censor everything and everyone who keeps opening up that curtain and while were at it, lets keep attacking the person who pulls open the curtain with personal insults.

Jim, Hey Jim, to me that's worth a lot. TIJ and other inspector forums, unfortunately are no different then the whole inspector / agent relationship itself. Mike wants to make money. Mike is pressured by sponsors to limit the discussions about the control agents have over inspectors. Mike is also pressured by other inspectors to quiet guys like myself. This is no differnt then when the Chapter persident tried to keep me from showing the WBZ investigative tape in 1995 about agent referred inspectors. Back then when we took a straw poll at the meeting, there were only about 4 guys out of 35 who agreed that inspectors should separate themselves from agents. BTW, as the messenger, I'm use to be shot at.

Pete, How old was the house? Are you sure it had 7 layers? The most I have ever found was 4. If you are viewing the cross section at a gable end, how many actual shingles are you seeing piled up? If there was actually 7 layers (you would be able to count around 14 shingles)they would have to use railroad spikes to make it to the sheathing and the weight of the shingles, especially with snow on them would collapse the roof.

Rob, As you know I usually only do one inspection per day. This past week I did two per day, all were condos! What's up with the condo market? Dennis

Rob, No fair, you know the territory too well. There were a couple of oddly painted "vehicles" on this street. It was like a trip back to the "70's". Dennis

Two questions: Can you guess what city this car was parked in? What color do you think is recorded on the registration record? Download Attachment: car.jpg 49.43 KB

How the heck do you expect to get referred again by that agent if you suggest the client budget for replacement. They are not leaking now are they? So simply tell the client to "monitor" the situation. That shouldn't alarm anyone and you've done a real service for the client.[:-dunce][:-paperbag]

Gerry, I have lost my mind, but that's a topic for another thread. I kind of figured that there was some electrical activity going on with the GFI's. I can't believe this was the first time I detected the difference and actually thought about.

Wondering if anyone knew whether a GFI receptacle with nothing plugged into it, would normally be around 5 degrees warmer than the surrounding wall. I happened to find this by accident. When I was re-setting the test button after tripping it with a circuit tester, the receptacle was slightly warm to the touch. Using a infra-red theromometer a found the receptacle to be 70 degrees and the surrounding wall next to it at 65 degrees.

Jim, If you let me boast about IHINA and let me sell my how to make a million dollars in home inspections without real esate agents on this forum, I'll promise to stop inspecting in apple country. Dennis[]

Tony, Bear with me, I'm typing this with my nose. My wife had to restrain me when I found your post. She duct taped my hands behind my back and stuffed a sock in mouth. I would love to respond to your question, but the censor would delete it as soon as it hit the screen. Instead I'll just post a link for you. http://ablehomeinspection.com/conflictsofinterest.html

I used to do that, but got tired of writing: " Realtor commented on the rugged good looks of the inspector". It get embarrassing! I actually had a female agent comment last week that I was the best dressed inspector she ever saw. Since I had nothing fancy on, (the usual black work boots, clean Dockers, sweater and a run of the mill wind breaker) it made me wonder what the other inspectors were wearing.

At the begining of my reports I have a little statement that says something to the effect:"If the property owner, a representative of the property owner or agent for the property owner has made a statement/s pertaining to some situation regarding the property, such as a system condition or age of a component, those statements may be incorporated into this report." After a couple of years of putting all the "stupid" statements agents make during inspections into the reports, there are very few agents who make comments during my inspections now. []

Brian, The argument about bigger ad budgets was made to me in one of the "hate" mails I received last year. The inspector who complained to me was charging less than $225 per inspection. My point to him was that if he was charging $400 and providing his clients with a great (useful) service and the agents did not interfer with the inspector selection process, he wouldn't have to worry about his ad budget. I don't want to have a tread drift here, but I usually check out the web sites of inspectors who log onto inspector forums. The one thing that stands out is the pricing. Why do inspectors feel compelled to display prices? Especially when their fees are less than $200. Most do it to complete with other inspection companies. Prospective clients are being taught (by home inspectors) to find the cheapest inspector. When 70% of the inspectors get 70% of their referrals from agents, it's easy to see why I get a lot of flak from inspectors when I suggest removing the agents from the inspector selection process. The reaction must be "oh my god, you mean I would have to depend upon the actual people who use my service to keep me in business"?

Dan, Do I dare reply to this issue? I can just see some inspectors out there waiting to pounce on me if I say something negative about agents. One of the arguments I made for the MA law that prohibits selling agents from referring inspectors was the point you stated, "We always say time or the marketplace will take care of weeding out the bad apples." In the home inspection field, however, we have "middlemen" who interfer with the natural selection process that would weed out "bad" inspectors or help "good" inspectors. We all know of inspection companies who get sued on a regular basis, yet, these same companies are on the short list given out by the real estate agents. The end user of our service (the home buying client) has little to do with helping good inspectors expand their business or helping to get rid of the bad inspectors. In most areas of the country the marketing effort and the "pleasing" effort are directed to the people who are responsible for suppling inspectors with the majority of their client leads. I get several e-mails each week from inspectors in the US and Canada who have been "blackballed" by the agents because the inspectors were "too thorough", or "took too long" or "delayed the sale". I got my share of hate mail from inspectors and agents when I was pushing to have agents removed from the inspector selection process. It really scared some inspectors that they would have to let the end users of their services decide the fate of their business, rather then the agents referring them. Licensing for home inspectors will not change the status quo. Changing the real estate licensing laws to remove agents from the inspector selection process will and has changed the status quo. BTW, Brian G., I like your favorite quote. I can relate to it.

Scott, On a similar kind of situation. About 12 years ago I show up for an inspection at the appointed time. As I walk up to the house the agent comes towards me and says; "what are you doing here?" I said I was there to inspect the house. "Oh didn't your client tell you that he got someone else to do the inspection?" (The other inspector was there when I arrived.) As it turns out, it was the agent who got the other inspector and my client who was in the house was too embarrassed to come out. I told the agent my lawyer would be contacting him for interferring with my business practice and that I expected my inspection fee to be paid. A couple of days later I got a check from the agent (a real estate company check.) I showed that check during one of the state house hearings back in the mid 90's when the first attempts were made to keep agents out of the inspector selection process. So I actually got paid by the agent not to do the inspection. Dennis []

The condos were in the same building. Around here all the systems have the circulator pump on the return side.

I found the remnants of an old oil line near the boiler. So I was figuring that this boiler was installed at the last "energy crisis", which was 1978. That's when a lot of people were "scared" into dumping their oil systems for clean, cheap, abundant natural gas systems. I have an oil system myself and pay $1.19 per gallon, which is cheaper that the equivalent amount of natural gas. I think someone figured out that oil would have to be $1.70 per gallon to be the same current energy cost as natural gas.

George, The pipes from both boilers connected into the pipe that ran to the tank. It was the older metal non-diaphram type tank. It sounded around half full. Didn't take a photo of the tank, but I took one of the boiler. Care to take a guess at the approx. age? Dennis Download Attachment: boiler.jpg 38.55 KB

Chris, Sometimes it takes a good law suit to wake up inspectors to the huge responsibility they take on. Over the past 21 years I have gotten a few suits thrown at me. I have one of those "mold" cases now pending for the tune of $91,000. As soon as I got the notice for that suit I raised my fees another $100. My goal before semi retirement (3 1/2 years away) is to average around $900 per inspection. In my neck of the woods the average home is around $500,000 and agents are making around $25,000 per sale. I don't hear buyers complaining about these huge commissions. Last week after finishing up a condo inspection of a 3,000 s.f unit selling for around $500,000, the client wrote out my check and asked "$715 is the correct total, right"? The agent was in ear shot of that question and starting questioning me about how I base my fees. It appeared she was trying to imply that I was ripping off my client. Boy did she ever bark up the wrong tree. My client was the father of an attorney who I had done numerous inspections for as well as several of the attorneys in her office. My client was well aware of the huge commission check that was going to be cut to this agent for basically showing the place a few times and tagging along for the inspection. My client shot back to the agent that he had agreed a week earlier to the inspection fee, but was just double checking because the inspection took about 1/2 hour longer than planned.

Did a condo today. Two units in one building. Each had a forced hot water by gas heating system. The odd thing was that they shared the same expansion tank. Never seen it done that way before. Any potential issues? It apparently has been like this for around 15 years.

I received this e-mail today. If anyome has a suggestion let me know. Hello, We are in the process to sell a "little" Property with a Travel Trailer (set up as a mobil home). After many problems with the realtor Devon Garberick ( Venture Out of Mesa 5001 Main Street Mesa AZ 85205) with all the tricks to get here a fee for cutting trees and so on, he came up with the Termite Inspection by law. If we would have Termites we have to pay $ 400.- + for the Treatment. We did Treatments every Year and never had Termites. I did ask the Realtor for the report from the Inspector after he told me that we have Termites. He declined to make the report available to me. I was asked to remove constriction wood from underneath the trailer, otherwise it would cost an aditional $ 50.-. When I removed the wood I had a Termite Treatment Guy with me who just did Treatment on our New house. He could not find any Termite Investation. We both inspected every piece of wood from under the Trailer. There was not a single sign for Termites. I called Mr. Gasrberick to ask for the report. He said he had called the Inspector and he stays by his Report. What can I do. We got only about $ 23.000 for the property and we are low income seniors. I would appreciate your advice. Wolfgang Berger

Brian, I have found the file upload does not work with Netscape. I use Explorer to upload stuff. Dennis

Is fiberglass ductboard the thick black stuff I sometimes find lining the ducts?