5 Traits Of Bad Home Inspectors
If you are reading this, you are probably planning to or have already taken a leap of faith and hired a home inspector, even though you have heard and read about the horror stories associated with bad home inspectors in Canada.
Hiring someone to work for you and simply hoping that they know what they are doing, might not be the wisest of choices, especially when those who won’t be able to deliver what you expect are distinctly identifiable. Knowing these characteristics will better guide you towards making the right selection of home inspector. Here’s what to look out for:
#1. Recommendations
Bad home inspectors usually have no good recommendations, or have bad recommendations from people they have worked for in the past. If the home inspector you have hired is not recommended by your real estate agent or by people who say they have worked for them in the past, it is mostly likely a sign that you should not waste resources on that home inspector.
#2. Quick work
Home inspections usually last at least three hours. Make sure to find an estimation of the amount of time any given home inspector averagely spends on inspections. If it is significantly less than three hours, that is enough reason to suspect that they are most likely skimping on some aspects of the inspection. Skimping is a major trait of many bad home inspectors and you definitely do not want any skimping practiced on your home.
#3. Absent sample report
When a home inspector is unable to provide a sample report or provides one that is incomplete or badly written, you probably should realize that it’s a representation of what your report would look like.
Many bad home inspectors do not know what should be included in a report and others still, don’t care to get a sample in the first place. Thus, an absent or badly written sample report is most likely a sign that your current home inspector is unreliable.
#4. Recommending contractors
Home inspectors usually get their money from inspecting your home and telling you what is wrong structurally, and sometimes telling you what could be done to make it better.
They gain no benefits from the repairs you might decide to make on your house and therefore, they won’t usually go out of their way to make suggestions as to who should make the repairs, or offer to make those repairs themselves.
Bad home inspectors are usually greedy and try to benefit from everything including repairs that might not even be necessary.
#5. Not part of any association
Although some very good home inspectors are not part of any association such as the Canadian association of home and property inspectors or Ontario association of home inspectors, all bad home inspectors aren’t a part of any legit associations of home inspectors.
Conclusion
If the home inspector you hope to hire has no good recommendations, bad or no sample reports, is trying to benefit from work that might be done on the house, does their work in a period of time shorter than recommended and is not part of any association, they are likely to be bad home inspectors and not worth the allocation of your resources.
