Jim Katen

I rarely ever see those issues in newly constructed homes. But then we generally have very well trained electricians and very good municipal inspectors. By far, the most common electrical issue I find on new construction is failure to protect electrical cables near attic entrances. It's as if the rules for this didn't even exist.

At Kingdom Inspections, LLC, we make useless comments on message boards to boost our search rankings.

<but that does mean that a house built in 2007 has to follow 2020 rules?> No. But the inspector didn't say that it had to. He said that he recommends improving it to make the house safer, which seems reasonable. <He also mentioned that "Tamper resistant outlets are not installed. New construction practices adopted in 2008, require the use of tamper resistant outlets on all outlets/plugs. Recommend improving for enhanced safety." I purchased another home in 2023 in the same area (Greater Houston) and it does NOT have tamper resistant outlets.> Seems like a problem with your 2023 house.

Until you put up a sample report that isn't embarrassingly bad, I won't be going near it.

I can't speak for Texas, but in 2007, the NEC did not require GFCI protection in those locations. It does require it now (I believe since 2020.) When I decipher the inspector's horribly written comment, he seems to be saying that "current" rules require it, which is true of the NEC (In Texas, it depends on how far behind they are in adopting the most recent version of the NEC.)

And the gel coat is stable in UV light?

Oil furnace flames always flicker, don't they? Or is this flickering somehow unusual? When was the last time it was serviced. With oil furnace's you really have to service them every year. Get a new filter and nozzle in there.

What Bill said. I see the rather often. As I understand it, their variable speed compressors and variable or multi speed blowers will not always provide the traditional temperature differential.

I'm having a hard time understanding the set up. Do you have a picture? It sounds like you have a 200-amp meter/main and a 200-amp sub panel immediatly after it. That's a very common set up for manufactured homes. If I'm describing it correctly, then it's just a 200-amp service - nothing needs to be sized for 400 amps.

Regarding what you're saying: I'm never in favor of recommending "further evaluation" when I know full well that the thing should be replaced. I figure I'm being hired for my opinion, not to defer to others for their opinion. Regarding how you say it: First sentence. You really don't need "in the condo." Isn't everything in your report in the condo? You could say: "The electric panel is a Zinsco type which has a bad history of circuit breaker failure." But then there's that missing comma after "type". Do you really need "which"? Is it important that the failures have to do with circuit breakers, or are there other failures at work? Also, is it a bad history of failures or a history of bad failures? Maybe tighten it up some more and make it more emphatic: "Zinsco electric panels have a notorious history of failure." The next two sentences could be merged and greatly shortened. They also don't make a lot of sense. What's an electrician going to see that you didn't see? Do you really want to say that you looked inside the panel and saw no problems, but if an electrician looks in it, he might see problems? Maybe just avoid contrasting your evaluation with an electrician's evaluation: "While I saw no signs of active failure inside the panel today, that might change tomorrow. Hire an electrician to replace it."

Are you looking for opinions about what your said or how you said it?

It looks like Celotex, a soft compressed fiber product. You can break off pieces with your hand. Firtex and Homasote are similar products but they have different textures and colors.

Yes, that's my experience too. But a heat pump water heater in one of those basements will work like an air conditioner. The 67-degree basement won't be 67 degrees after one hour, let alone one day.

Those basement's must be freezing cold. Where was the 67-degree air supposed to come from? I can see having them in the southern states, but they just don't seem to make any sense up here.

Is it just me, or are these things really stupid? Today's new-construction house had an AO Smith heat pump water heater in the garage. When I arrived on site, it was 42 degrees outside and about 39 degrees in the garage. The water heater was set to 120 degrees in the "hybrid" mode and its heat pump compressor was running non-stop while its indicator showed that it was also running one of the resistance heating elements. Even so, the hottest temperature that I could get *at the water heater's outlet pipe* was 110 degrees. By the time it got to the fixtures it was about 102 degrees. Even when I switched it over to pure resistance heating and checked back a few hours later, the best it could do was 114 degrees at the outlet pipe. Most of the ones that I see are set to 130 or 135 in order to get 120-degree water at the fixtures. In our climate, these are always installed in a garage because otherwise they'd be fighting with the heating system in the house. In the winter, the garage is always going to be close to 40 degrees and the heat pumps generally stop working and switch to resistance heat at 37 degrees. So are these just really stupid or am I missing something?