A Northern Virginia Home Inspector's Perspective

Do you have mice in the house?These folks do.  And they don't know why.It's a bit of an unusual request to get me to try to determine why there are mice in the house.  Usually that would be left to some pest company, and responding to some ad coupon received in the mail.So I asked why they called...

A very important thing is what home inspectors call Whirlpool Access.This is the case of Whirlpool Access - when access is not access.Every whirlpool tub has a motor and wiring.  All that needs access.That is in case there is a need to get to the motor to repair or replace it.Inspectors also like...

This photo might say something about less-than-professional work.Like they say, pictures say lots, perhaps a thousand words!These bottles were seen all over the house.  One might think that the supervisor would have the place cleaned up a bit before his buyers (and their home inspector) walk thro...

Sometimes a photo isn't descriptive enough.It happens.  What you want to show up on the photo doesn't show up.  What more could a home inspector do?For instance, in new construction I always spray the shower water onto the sides of the shower surround to see if it leaks anywhere. It is surprising...

Would you want to see labels on your new house features?This is a brand new house, not lived in, and my client and I were conducting the final inspection prior to the final walk through.When facing the house one interesting feature is a thin, horizontal trellis over the garage door.It is beautifu...

Where's the HVAC floor register in the closet?This is new construction!  Walking into the spacious master bedroom closet (almost 300 square feet) which had a wall on the exterior of the house, I looked for and did not see the floor register.There has to be at least one.So how can we find out if o...

Did my thermal camera catch a ghost outside?Well, did it?  Is that possible? *Thermal cameras can do a lot of things.  Images can be manipulated, or can indicate things that may seem to be something else.As I walk around with Mighty Mo doing a thermal image sweep of a house I sometimes click the ...

You have to see everything because a thermal image alone can fool you.It wasn't a cold day out, about 45F.  And it was cloudy.Breaking out Mighty Mo to do the thermal image sweep of the insulation in the house, this is what the ceilings looked like on the upper level.The roof rafter joists are vi...

"The code has changed since we installed that."  Um, not...Stopping by a house I had inspected a couple of days prior, the seller met me to let me in to retrieve a radon device.This seller thought I was there to look at and repair the furnace gas line.  Surprised I was not the HVAC contractor, bu...

"It's too cold to paint..."Paint has a particular chemistry - indoor and outdoor paint.  It has temperature and humidity parameters that must be met or it will not adhere or last.I arrived at a home inspection early, as I am wont to do, to see a work truck in the driveway, the garage doors open, ...