Inspectorjoe

The exterior detailing wasn't much of a step up from a big box store garden shed. And the fun didn't end with the work done at the factory: Click to Enlarge 66.41 KB Click to Enlarge 48.36 KB Click to Enlarge 49.4 KB

The OSB was actually OK in the few areas I looked. It was a different story around the windows, but I didn't delve too deeply there, for fear of being blamed for causing damage. Click to Enlarge 38.63 KB Regardless of what codes were in effect when the house was delivered, I have to think the siding manufacturer would have recommended a WRB. It doesn't really matter, though, because it's a mess now.

Yesterday I had a 23 year old modular that had the vinyl siding installed directly over the OSB. There was no house wrap and I'm sure no flashing around the windows and doors. The last modular I did was the same as this one. I thought the other one was a fluke, but the buyer of this one said that he had been looking at new modulars, and was told house wrap was an option. I don't see many modulars. For those who do, is this typical? I'm pretty incredulous.

You don't have a problem with the water being trapped, Tom? That's the most idiotic roofing detail (both design and installation) I've seen in a long time.

This isn't a weekend warrior installation. Unbelievably, it's new construction. I swear this is not Photoshopped. Click to Enlarge 26.47 KB

Thanks guys. I've always been fascinated by WWII. The sheer enormousness, how America immediately shifted its industrial production to wartime needs, the logistics of moving men and materials around the globe and how Germany continued it's arms production while withstanding catastrophic bombing. I try not to think of the horror. Here are a few more pictures. There are no names on the back of these, just the location written in my dad's handwriting. There are no historic moments, like the raising of the first American flag in North Africa - just scared young guys ripped away from life as they had known it, doing what they had to do. I can't imagine going through what they were enduring at the time. Looking at their faces, I find the pictures haunting. Which of them didn't make it through the war - or even the next week? Castel Volturno, Italy 1/3/44 Click to Enlarge 107.12 KB Cassino, Italy Click to Enlarge 65.35 KB Click to Enlarge 96.09 KB Click to Enlarge 74.33 KB

Horizons by Carson Dunlop does what you want, but I don't know if you can use your own documents. You may be limited to what they have available. You might be over thinking this. Any report program that I know of will allow you to insert a JPG, GIF or PDF. You just need to keep them in a file on your computer, and take them from there when you insert them. For more complex documents, you can store them at a file hosting site such as box.com and insert the file link into the report.

Bizarre comes to mind. I've never seen anything remotely similar. I think LSD was invented in the 40's. I wonder if there's a connection.

My dad died in 1973. He was one year older than I am now. I was just going though the 70 year old army pictures of his. He served during World War II. I've gone through the pictures a half dozen times before, but never really noticed the captions written on the back of these two. I never knew about this. I wish I had been able to learn the story. It's not the same as raising the flag over the Reichstag, but I still think it's pretty cool. I thought I'd share it. My dad is second from the left. Click to Enlarge 33.59 KB Click to Enlarge 25.65 KB I don't recognize my dad in this one. I think he's the one holding the end of the flag. Click to Enlarge 46.46 KB Click to Enlarge 23.11 KB

Pretty Cool! I'd find that to be a real distraction while trying to concentrate on my work. That's a nicely maintained piece of property.

"20 poles maximum" is printed on the label. It's too bad all panelboards don't contain that info.

What's the container on the guy's back? It looks like thin stainless steel wire is being rapidly pulled out of it.

....... and the rake boards on the lower roof are even a little short because they don't completely conceal the ends of the gutters, which is the way they are usually cut here. I don't think I've ever seen it done that way. What's the reason for it? I'd think it would allow at least a little water running off the roof to miss the gutter and at the same time, set up conditions conducive to rot between the end of the gutter and the inside of the rake board extension. Around here, the gutter typically extends past the rake board a bit, or at the very least is flush with it. Click to Enlarge 74.9 KB

Why do the rake boards extend past the fascia?

Absolutely. It's a shed dormer.

Last year at this time, I was getting not only price shoppers, but people who had already booked would shop around, find a much lower price and then cancel. That seems to be a thing of the past. Last December was more than double the previous December, January was down a bit, February was more than double and at this point in March, I'm nearly triple over the entire month of March '11. One thing that's been consistent is the erraticness. After tomorrow's inspection, my schedule is empty. I did have one scheduled next week that was cancelled, but not because of price. I had done two others for the buyer within the past six months. The seller of the house had a pre listing inspection done two months ago and shared the report with the buyer. The buyer saw the report and then cancelled the inspection with me. The reason he cancelled is that I had done the pre listing inspection and that made him comfortable with it. Damn! The ironic thing is the odds of that happening - I don't do more than one or two pre listing inspections a year.

Phillip: Yes, that's the drain under the pile of pine needles. The roof surface can handle deep standing water, but I'm not so sure about the framing. Kevin: Not depression, but recession - the big one we supposedly climbed out of in 2009 (could have fooled me). The copper roof was installed a year ago, and about about two decades ago, an addition was put on the rear of the house. It's probably the most unobtrusive, well integrated addition I've ever seen. The addition is on the left side: Click to Enlarge 72.62 KB Click to Enlarge 57.36 KB

Today was a good day. I had a meticulously maintained 1920 Tudor Revival. Check out the year-old copper roof. I can't begin to imagine what that baby cost. Apparently, the great recession hasn't adversely affected everyone. Click to Enlarge 43.83 KB Click to Enlarge 44.93 KB I thought of Mike Bryan when I saw this doorway detail. I know he'd appreciate it. Click to Enlarge 154.74 KB

That's doubtful. It's a small bathroom on the second floor and the house had central air.

On my first walk around the exterior, I spotted this PVC pipe exiting the master bathroom wall. I figured I'd find out what it was when I got inside. It turned out that I was wrong. It's capped of at the wall. The seller (deceased) put in an extensive jerry-rigged irrigation system. This obviously isn't part of it, but seems to be made of leftover pipe and fittings from that project. Does anybody have any guesses as to what it was used for? All I could come up with, is to save water, he used to take a wiz in something that was connected to it, letting it drain into the gutter (then out on the ground). I hope I'm wrong! Click to Enlarge 30.25 KB Click to Enlarge 19.7 KB

Mike: I didn't read Dante's installation instructions. I said only that they "may not" approve of wall mounting. I based that on their description of it as a floor plate, assuming that if it could be mounted elsewhere, they would simply call it a mounting plate.

It's a floor plate for a gas valve. It shouldn't be installed in a wall unless the valve is accessible, and even then, the manufacturer may not approve of wall mounting.

Here's the wrap up. As I mentioned, I switched my wife to straight talk first. That went well. She needed to talk to tech support once and the person who answered was competent. I took the leap and switched. I wanted to wait to activate the phone at a time I wasn't busy in case there was a glitch, so when it arrived I played around with it using my home Wi-Fi, but didn't activate the cellular service. When I did try to activate it, It wouldn't do it. I spent about two hours with foreign based tech support, going through several people before finally resolving the issue. A master reset, which wiped the system clean did the job. I deducted that my messing around with it before activating it was the cause. I'd bet more experienced tech support people who weren't just working through a troubleshooting list would have figured it out early on and asked me "were you f****** around with the phone before you activated it?" So my leap of faith wasn't a death leap. I'm quite happy with the service and I'm saving about $75 per month. Now I just have to work on learning the phone. It's my first smart phone. I hate it, but that's mostly my fault for not spending the time to learn it. I can't see me ever using it for web browsing. The email part is pretty cool. Syncing it with my Gmail account was totally intuitive and it works perfectly. That was the main reason I went with an Android device. I give Straight Talk a thumbs-up.

I'd probably be around $1,600-$1,800, but would lose out to a lower bidder. I almost always do. Right now I have 4 quotes for big/unusual/multi unit properties on my desk dating back to last summer that I ought to throw out, but I'm holding onto 'just in case'. Before I give a quote on something out of the ordinary, I go on line to get more info. Trulia usually is a great resource and Bing maps gives me an overhead look at the property from 4 angles. Unless business is humming along just fine at the time, I usually price it out lower than I should, just to get it. Even doing that, after I call back with the bid, I rarely hear from the person again. No big deal. I figure I'm probably being done a favor.

That's not always the case. For years I've been buying their store branded lithium ion batteries for my cameras from http://www.accessorypower.com/ . They are dirt cheap and last for up to two years of heavy use, through hundreds of recharges.