With the high cost and multiple expenses of buying a home, buyers sometimes look to avoid certain out of pocket costs such as a home inspection. Unfortunately, this is an invaluable tool that should home be eliminated.

A home inspection will give you a visual analysis of all the systems in the home as well as the home’s structure. The goal of a home inspection is to see if there is anything in the home that is not performing as it should and is unsafe or beyond its useful life. An inspection will cover the interior and exterior of the home.

A home inspection is not a warranty but it gives the buyer some sort of recourse including asking the seller to make repairs or cancelling the purchase contract.

But why do I need a home inspection? The main reason is that it will buy you some piece of mind and coverage. Without a home inspection, if something goes wrong with one of the major systems in your home after closing, you have no way of recourse for the seller to fix the problem. Knowing the home has a certain issue ahead of time allows you to be more prepared and also gives you more options.

When searching for a home inspector, verify the amount of experience they have in the industry first. Inspectors with affiliations or professional memberships tend to not only be more informed but also more serious about their jobs. It is important to make sure your inspector carries professional liability insurance.

When getting a thorough home inspection, it should cover the condition of the home’s electrical system, heating system, plumbing, central air conditioning system, the roof, visible insulation, attic, walls, floors, ceilings, foundation, doors, windows, landscaping, basement and visible structure.

A professional, thorough home inspection will help you to understand any potential problems in the home and is certainly well worth the cost. An inspector that charges significantly less than others in the area may not provide you with a full report. Remember, you get what you pay for. It will be much more expensive to repair problems that were left out of an inspection report that was not thorough.

If you are buying a newly constructed home, one may wonder if a home inspection is needed.  We believe it is important to have ANY home inspected no matter how new or old it is.

Many people mistakenly believe that they don’t need a home inspection on a new house. The misconception is understandable because as consumers we have been conditioned to believe that consumer products of all types will be delivered without defects. Unfortunately this is not true, especially in the new construction market.

Quality control programs in new construction vary widely in the field and many contractors do it by the seat of their pants if at all. They usually get away with this because they have learned from experience what kind of mistakes are going to show up as a problem during the warranty period, if a home inspection is not performed. As a result there are likely to be hidden defects that will show up later in the life of the house, after the builder warranty has expired.

Homeowners often encounter these problems after the first year or two not knowing they are related to construction error if they do not initially have a home inspection performed. For instance, brick veneer is installed on about 90% of the new houses built in this area. Most people do not realize that brick is not waterproof. To compensate for this, construction standards, including the building codes, require a drainage plane behind the brick along with flashing and weep holes that will guide any water that penetrates the brick, back to the outside.

It is not uncommon nowadays to see brick veneer installed without all the required flashing.  As a result water may enter the interior wall and ceiling space and cause all kinds of problems including damage to walls, ceilings and floors and issues with mold, mildew and fungus.

Again, most homeowners don’t realize that the problems they see even 5 or 6 years after they move in are the result of code violations. If you are looking to purchase a newly constructed home, please make sure a home inspection is performed.