When Jeanne and Joseph Gallagher called in a home inspector to check out the newly renovated house they were buying on Chicago’s North Side, they thought everything looked fine. But the inspector, Ronald Gan, of the Home Star Group in Chicago, discovered several areas where the contractor had made serious mistakes, including installing the wrong size gutters. “At that point, the deal could have fallen through,” says Jennifer Ames, a real estate agent with Coldwell Banker/Kahn, who represented the seller. “But Ron agreed to return to the house with the seller, to point out his areas of concern. After the repairs had been made, Ron, the Gallaghers and the seller went through the house together, so that everyone felt comfortable that the house was now in good order.”
“The home inspector’s help was invaluable,” says Jeanne Gallagher. “He pointed out things we never would have noticed, and saw that they were fixed before we moved in.”
Margaret Stone’s (not her real name) experiences with home inspectors were decidedly less comfortable. “I’d spent months talking my husband, Harry, into buying a house in Hinsdale he thought was too expensive,” says Stone. “When it was time for the inspection, my Realtor, the home inspector she’d recommended, and I got there early. The first thing the inspector said was, `You paid too much for this house.’ That’s all my husband (would have) needed to hear. I dismissed him before Harry even arrived.
“The next inspector had obviously been tipped off not to find any fault, because he cruised through, giving everything his blessing. I was the one who spotted two cracked boards in the balcony and a bathroom tile so loose that the whole wall could have fallen down. If I hadn’t wanted the house so badly, I would have just walked away.”
Pre-contract checkouts by people calling themselves home inspectors have become standard in the Chicago-area residential real estate market, and most buyers pay an average of $300 for a two- to three-hour inspection of the house they have selected before turning over their earnest money. But, as the Stones and Gallaghers discovered, there is nothing standard about who conducts those inspections.
Illinois, like all states except Texas, does not require licensing of such practitioners, and the only body trying to impose ethics on the industry, the American Society of Home Inspectors Inc. (ASHI), in Arlington Heights, has standards so high that most inspectors never try to join.
Vera Wadler, the New Jersey-based spokeswoman for ASHI, says that organization, which requires that inspectors take two three-hour technical exams and perform 250 verified inspections before joining, has 1,819 members and 2,875 candidates out of a national universe of more than 10,000 people in the field.
Because most home buyers have had no previous experience with home inspectors, they usually rely on recommendations from their real estate agents to hire one. And agents, who like to let buyers choose from a list of two or three inspectors, find competent ones through trial and error.
Despite these odds, most home inspectors are pretty good, says Andee Hausman, a Realtor with Re/Max Experts in Buffalo Grove, who has had inspections of all the 120 homes she has sold this year. The purpose of a home inspection, she says, is for someone to go through a house and look for major flaws, like something wrong with a furnace or a roof, and to be sure the appliances and plumbing are in working order.
Most of the inspectors she has used get those technical details right, says Hausman. “But I did have one inspector who turned off a furnace and forgot to turn it back on. There was a bird in that house, and I had to baby-sit it in my office until the house warmed up again. I don’t need to mention that I never recommended him again.”
Barbara Byrne, a real estate agent with Prudential-Burnet Realty in Northbrook, agrees that most home inspectors perform a valuable service. “I recently had a young couple who’d signed a contract for a cottage which looked wonderful, until the home inspector went up into the attic and found that the wood under the roof was rotting away,” she recalls. “The seller reduced his price by $4,000 on the spot.”
Byrne and other real estate agents say home inspectors are more likely to kill deals when they step beyond the boundaries of their check lists and overdramatize minor problems.
“Some home inspectors want to make a major issue out of everything,” Byrne says. “I recently lost a deal because a home inspector noticed that a room addition was pulling away from the main house by a fraction of an inch, and he told the buyers it would cost $30,000 to get it fixed. The next week another Realtor, with another home inspector, sold the same house to new buyers for $8,000 more than my clients had bid. The second inspector said that the room addition had been that way for 30 years, and that it would last another 30 without repair.”
“I had one inspector who killed a deal because he spent 4 1/2 hours in a house, picking everything apart,” recalls Alise Anders, a real estate agent with Prudential-Burnet in Buffalo Grove. “He made the buyers so nervous that they rescinded their offer.” The best inspectors are those who approach their task in a non-threatening manner and who can help negotiate problems between the buyer and seller, she says.
David Blair, of Pro-home Inspections Inc. in Buffalo Grove, says the inspector must be sensitive to the emotionally charged atmosphere. “When a couple is going through a home inspection, they’re at the peak of their anxiety level,” Blair says. “They’re totally committed to the house, but are afraid they’ve paid too much for it. This is their last chance to get out of the contract and any problems you point out will set off emotional bells.”
Blair says that the ASHI, which forbids its members from making any repairs themselves, would cringe at his approach to the inspection process. “I carry a screwdriver with me,” he says, “and make minor repairs, like loose cabinet handles, on the spot. Instead of just checking out the furnace, I show the buyers how it works and how to change the filters. If the check valve on a water heater is leaking, I tell them where they can buy a new one for $15. I try to make buyers, especially first-time buyers, feel confident that they can maintain this house,” Blair says.
Ronald Gan, the home inspector who held together the deal for the Gallagher house, says he sees his role as a problem-solver. “I keep broker’s hours,” he says, “and I’m always available to answer questions on the phone and to return to a house to check out repairs. I try to be unbiased, but if there’s an egregious problem, like a poor quality roof, I want the buyer to make an informed decision. Usually, the problems are less serious and can easily be resolved. I believe it is our job to help people feel happy about making the biggest economic decision of their lives.”
How can you find a home inspector who’s a problem solver instead of a deal killer?
– Don’t rely just on your own real estate agent for recommendations, says Stone. Despite what they say to the contrary, agents have a vested interest in a house passing inspection. “If I ever have to do this again,” Stone says, “I’d contact a realty company that was not involved in the deal and ask for its recommendations.” Friends and business associates who have recently purchased homes are also good sources of referrals.
– Contact ASHI at 800-743-2744. The organization will give you a list of members in your area and will tell you if an inspector who claims to be a member really is.
– Don’t hire the cheapest inspector. Getting an inspection for only $99 when the going rate is $300 can mean expensive repair bills later.
– When you have the names of several inspectors, interview each on the phone. Ask if each has errors and omissions insurance. Although the home-inspection contract states that an inspector is not liable for any undetected defect, competent inspectors carry insurance just in case, Gan says.
– Be there during the inspection. If an inspector’s conduct seems questionable–if he offers to come back and fix things at a good price, for example–dismiss him and hire another one.
– Finally, if your dream home flunks its inspection because of lots of minor flaws, stop and question whether the fault could be with the inspector instead of the process. Older houses go through a lot of normal wear and tear, says Anders. If an inspector is nitpicking a long list of items, hire a second inspector to go through the house before you cancel the deal.
