Every home inspector does the job a little differently, so I won’t speak for everyone, but at Green Scene Home Inspections, our inspectors have a specific pattern in which they perform their inspections that allows them to pick up on the way the different systems of the house interact with each other, enabling them to inspect not only the item they’re checking at the moment but the way it’s responding to the other parts of the whole. It’s called a three-pass inspection.
To get a clear idea of the things home inspectors look for, think about a home inspection as a way to test all the systems of the house to ensure they’re functioning properly. There are tests we perform to check for problems, and tests we perform when we see signs of problems. Today’s Upon Closer Inspection shows some examples of these tests.
The Ball Test
If you’re ever thinking to yourself, do I have foundation problems? This is one very simple way to check. If your floors are starting to slope, your foundation is moving. If you meet a home inspector that doesn’t have a golf ball or something similar in their toolbox, you’re either not in Texas, or you picked the wrong inspector.
The Water Test
We do an 11-month warranty inspection on a new home just before the one-year builder’s warranty runs out. In this case, the things home inspectors look for are any problems that have occurred over the first year in the house, so that the owner can take full advantage of that policy. In the video, the owner had noticed a water stain in the ceiling of the garage, and the inspector did a water test to imitate rain to try to determine what might be causing the damage.
Thermal Imaging
Thermal Imaging is a great tool to check for things like missing insulation; unsealed vents, doors, and windows; or the presence of moisture in walls or floors. In these pictures, you can see clearly where the inspector noticed a water stain on the ceiling. This could have been an old stain, but he checked with his FLIR camera and found a clear temperature differential in both the ceiling and the floor directly underneath, indicating a current issue. The buyers should check the seller’s disclosure for this damage, and investigate further under the floor and ceiling, and for the presence of mold.
Water Pressure Test
This is a perfect example of what I’m talking about, and why you want a home inspection. One of the first things home inspectors look for upon arriving at a home is to test the water pressure. First, we turn off all the water in the home, and then we run a water pressure test on an outside faucet like this one. TREC requires this, and the code for houses in Texas is between 40-80psi. If it’s too low, you likely have an obstruction somewhere. If it’s too high, you run the risk of damaging pipes and appliances.
In the video, you can clearly see the pressure is reduced at the faucet because some of the water is going into the wall. We can’t see exactly what the problem is without removing the bibb and getting into the wall, but this could end up being a big problem or a small problem. It’s likely an easy fix at the bibb itself, but it may be a difficult total repair depending on how long it’s been going on and how much damage has occurred inside the wall.
These are just a few of the many tests we run to investigate the different parts of a house. If you have questions, you can always #askahomeinspector.
