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whatcom county home inspection: Whatcom County WA -- Rare Snowy Owl Migration - 01/12/12 04:01 PM
My friend Curtis Brown, of Curtis C Home Inspections, is not only a competent and an excellent home inspector, whom I often recommend to others, but he is, also, a wonderful photographer. Curtis loves to shoot (with his camera of course) birds. I have, with his permission, used his excellent bald eagle photos in past blogs and online videos. That shot above, taken locally by Curtis, is one of my favorite eagle photos. Well, here is something new and interesting. About a week ago, Curtis had a long awaited and an exciting opportunity. He received a call from a past client, who said … (10 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Bellingham Home Inspector (King of the House) It's Cold Outside - 12/22/11 01:25 PM
Recently, as the weather has gotten colder, I did an inspection on a cold day -- at least it was cold based on our wimpy Pacific Northwest standards. It was 28 degrees F.
At first, I thought that someone had left the garage door to the outside ajar or open. On closer examination, the fit of the door was something less than ideal.
Since it was cold outside, and my little knees were knocking together, it made me think of an appropriate song for the season and the weather.
… (7 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Whatcom County Home Inspection (King of the House) Knob and Tube Wiring Systems - 11/20/11 10:29 PM
In the last week, half of the home inspections that I performed in Bellingham were at houses with knob and tube wiring systems. The minute I say that, the inspectors know that the houses I inspected were at least 50 years of age.
Knob and tube wiring, the first wiring system to be used on a widespread basis (after Thomas Edison figured out the light bulb) is a relic, an antique. However, that does not mean it is not commonly found. I own five residences, one a duplex and one house I inherited, and three of the five houses still have … (8 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Whatcom County Home Inspections (King of the House) Crawl Space Water - 11/18/11 03:40 PM
In the wet Pacific Northwest, an ongoing problem is trying to inspect crawl spaces that have an abundance of crawl space water or flooding. The concern is, at the least, three-fold. First, the water should not be down there and it is conducive to creating all sorts of problems -- wood decay, attracting wood destroying insects and high humidity levels that can cause microbial activity. Second, at times it is hard to determine if the issue is the result of runoff water or if it is caused by plumbing leaks. And, third, sometimes you cannot figure out the source of the water at all, … (5 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Outdoor Ponds -- Flying Under the Radar - 04/06/11 11:12 AM
You probably know that swimming pools have any number of requirements as to barriers and various means of keeping children from accidentally drowning. The barrier requirements, depending on the design, may include four foot high, non-climbable, fences that need latches. In some cases, safety requirements include an alarm that will sound if someone goes through a door into the area with the pool.
On a number of home inspections, here in the northwest, it has come to my attention that even small outdoor ponds, very popular, are fraught with drowning dangers. And, of course, since people want to see them in the natural, there are … (7 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Seamless Aluminum Gutter Leaks - 04/02/11 09:59 AM
In life nothing is perfect, I think we know that. But, in a wet climate such as we have here in the Pacific Northwest, aluminum seamless gutters are typically what the home inspector will suggest for a home that has no gutters or one that requires new gutters.
The term seamless sounds good. Instead of those plastic or old metal gutters where sections are spliced one to another, the gutters are "seamless". No seams, no leaks. That is kind of true, but not in real life. There will be ends on the gutters and they have a mastic applied, at that … (4 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Manufactured Home Inspection -- Oriented Strand Board (OSB) - 04/01/11 11:58 PM
Here in the Pacific Northwest, at least 85% of the time, I find that the siding on manufactured homes is oriented stand board, either lap siding, panels or a combination of both. With real old manufactured homes, I find some metal siding but, most of the time, the cladding is OSB.
OSB has had much written about it and the most famous of the various class action lawsuits, at least in our region, involved Louisiana Pacific or L-P siding. Despite claims that the product known as OSB is better now than that product of 15 to 25 years back, I still … (7 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Seller: You Can Cover It Up, But You Can't Hide It - 11/26/10 04:08 PM
It probably has less to due with deception, and more to do with ignorance, but many sellers paint right over the top of the rot. Anytime there is an older house on the market, if the home inspector has experience in the field, he or she will be on the lookout for fresh exterior paint that is in place to hide problems under the paint.
I have written articles on this topic before, but the photo below is a wonderful example of someone having painted right over the top of the rot at a rafter tail. The problem area is the … (6 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Risk of the Draw (Inspection) - 11/13/10 03:37 PM
Certainly you have heard of the "luck of the draw". That is an often used poker term. I intend to tell you about the "risk of the draw". Many inspectors and agents have written about safety hazards when inspecting older homes -- falling through rotten decking immediately comes to mind.
There are substantial risks in inspecting a very new home as well, one that is not quite finished. I do almost exclusively inspections of completed homes, some old some new, but they have their final occupancy permits.
There is an exception: Banks hire inspectors, at a work in progress, to perform … (7 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Whatcom County Home Inspector (King of the House) Wide Handrails - 10/10/10 06:45 PM
It is not a problem at guardrails, but when a handrail at stairs is supposed to be graspable then it needs to be something other than a 2x4 or a 2x6 on its side. Codes have all kinds of specifications that define the term "graspable." With outdoor building, at least around here, we see mainly flat handrails at outside decks and stairs.
More often than not the handrail is a 2x4, but I have seen 2x6's and 2x8's. None of those rails are graspable. A guidelines is that flat material needs to be no wider than 2 5/8". The rail below … (4 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Knob and Tube Wiring: Bellingham Home Inspector (King of the House) - 09/26/10 04:53 PM
One of the things that buyers often wonder about, assuming they have heard the term, is whether or not an older home they are buying might have knob and tube wiring. Any old house, up through the late 1950's approximately, might have some knob and tube wiring. And if they are really old they are pretty much bound to have had it at one point or another. The house I grew up in as a kid had knob and tube and that was an upgrade -- it had been gas lights.
Knob and tube is outdated, and insulation might be brittle, … (7 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Video Blogging: Temperature Pressure Relief Valves - 09/17/10 09:32 AM
Keeping with my recent theme of producing short videos that better describe a problem to a client than can easily be done with words alone, I have produced a short video on water heater temperature pressure relief valve and drain line installation.
Just yesterday I did a re-inspect at a new house here in Whatcom County. The first time around the builder had made a drain line out of PVC tubing. I cited that as wrong so he has now "fixed" it by using CPVC tubing that is routed up hill. It went from bad to worse. So far the videos … (10 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Bellingham Home Inspection (King of the House) -- Wood to Soil with Rot - 09/10/10 10:23 PM
Working as a Bellingham Home Inspector, at my firm King of the House, I often see wood to soil contact on premises when doing the job. Some wood is pressure-treated and is designed for some contact with soil. However, more often than not, the specific wood that is in contact with soil is not pressure treated. When that is the case, at least half of the time, the wood will be decayed as a result of the earth contact.
At the photo above, just below the bolts at the post, the wood is decayed. Again, this was a common case of … (4 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Loaded For Bare, Nutsy Vents From Up North - 09/06/10 10:52 AM
I have had such a good time at Active Rain. For now I am away. Many of you have written to say that you have noticed that Nutsy is scarce and that this is a problem for you. People all over the Active Rain hemisphere have benefited from the Nutsy wisdom that I have freely handed out.
To those of you who have written to me, have no fear, I am still around and I do check in periodically. People ask what I am doing and why. Well, Mr Charles Buell seriously offended me about one month ago and I just … (13 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Whatcom County Home Inspector (King of the House) -- Anobiid Beetles - 09/05/10 12:22 PM
In the northwest corner of Washington state we have an insidious pest that, fortunately for other areas, tends to be found in only a few locations in the country. In the maritime northwest, lucky for us, we get stuck with this bug.
The anobiid beetle is a tiny insect, you can barely see one, even if you look at a specimen, but you see their exit holes in lumber. They get inside lumber that has a moisture content of 13% and higher. In our climate it can be difficult to get ANY crawl space below 13% moisture, regardless of vapor barriers … (5 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Whatcom County Home Inspector (King of the House) -- Gutter Problems - 09/03/10 07:03 PM
Gutters and downspouts come in many materials -- plastic, steel, aluminum. While plastic does not rust, it generally is a poor gutter material. Plastic gutters are usually assembled by homeowners from a variety of parts they find at home stores. The gutters tend to come apart, break and be low capacity.
Then there are steel gutters and downspouts. When these are new they might not be bad. In fact, they might be okay for many years. But, eventually, since steel rusts, the gutters and downspouts will start going the way of the gutter in the photo below.
In my … (11 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Whatcom County Home Inspection (King of the House) -- Inaccessible Crawl Spaces - 09/03/10 11:29 AM
A general guideline, reinforced by the Washington State Department of Agriculture, is that substructure lumber must have minimum clearances from soil. The clearances are defined as 12" from grade to the bottom of beams and 18" from grade to the bottom of joists (they rest on top of the beams.)
These clearances were not dreamed up to be mean, or to give inspectors an easy excuse to duck going in the crawl space. The fact of the matter is that, if wood is much lower than that, it is extremely difficult for workers to do any jobs in the crawl space … (12 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Whatcom County Home Inspection (King of the House) -- Wood Destroying Organisms - 09/02/10 09:53 AM
I see this often while working as a Bellingham home inspector who serves all of Whatcom County and the outlying areas. Many builders, often dating back from eons ago, choose to leave old scrap lumber and debris in the crawl space. You know the story: It does not hurt anyone if they cannot see it.
That may not be true in the case of leaving cellulose scraps in the crawl space. Wood destroying organisms, often first rot and then wood destroying insects, tend to be attracted to such materials.
Below are examples of problems:
The bottom photo … (4 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Whatcom County Home Inspection (King of the House) -- Frost-free Hose Bibbs - 08/31/10 09:14 PM
In a climate where it freezes in winter, like here in Bellingham and Whatcom County, WA, it makes sense to have the new frost-free hose bibbs. When I do home inspections and find that the faucets, or worse yet, the pipes to the faucets are exposed to the weather then I know that one of two things will happen in winter. (1) The homeowner is going to have to find a shutoff and drain the pipes or (2) they will end up frozen.
The best tip I can give is for the purchaser to install frost-free hose bibbs or frost-free … (7 comments)
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whatcom county home inspection: Bellingham Home Inspection (King of the House) -- No Flashing, Decay Present - 06/20/10 03:26 PM
Often homeowners build decks based on tips from neighbors or some how-to-do-it guide that they purchase or are handed at a building center. The information that they glean, and what they understand, can lead to problems. Some of the common issues include decks not properly secured to the house, unsafe steps, handrails and guardrails.
One of the more subtle ones, is the deck that is secured right up against the wood siding and there is not a proper metal flashing in place. Below is an example.
Water pools on the flat surface and that leads to moisture accumulating against the … (1 comments)
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Steven L. Smith, Bellingham, Wa. Home Inspector
Bellingham,
WA
More about me…
King of the House Home Inspection, Inc
Address: Bellingham, Ferndale, Lynden, Blaine, Sumas, Nooksack, Lake Whatcom, Lake Samish, Anacortes, Mount Vernon, Whatcom County, Bellingham, WA, 98225
Office Phone: (360) 676-6908
Cell Phone: (360) 319-0038
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