Thanks Dale, I've been busy, just not making a lot of money. I haven't posted here at AR or visited many of the trade association message boards recently. You'll notice that there are many controversial topics in the Commentary so feel free to critique it as needed. I'll try to filter any good input back to the committee that is writing the Commentary.

New home 1Q'09 starts are down 47% from last year. Existing home sales are down 33%. The central Texas area was slow to feel the downturn but it hit hard after the 1st of the year here. I don't do phase inspections but I do new home finals for buyers and I haven't done one so far this year. What little work there has been is existing home sales.

Another Inspectors Advisory Committee sub-committee teleconference was held on Monday, April 27th to continue work on the Commentary. The 3 sub-committee members, one public member, one TREC staff attorney and 3 inspectors participated. That's 3 inspectors out of over 3,000 in the state! Hmmm...rank & file inspectors in Texas don't seem to care too much about the laws that govern them it would seem. Now, on the other hand, I do have to admit that the Inspectors Advisory Committee doesn't promote or publish the fact that these teleconferences even occur much less widely share the log-in information. In any case, several more commentaries on SOP topics were discussed. One, that got my attention and disagreement was on crawl space access. The TREC SOP, like most others, states that an inspector is not required to enter a space with less than 18 x 24 access. Well, the commentary being considered discusses the notion that inspectors should enter all crawl spaces they are capable of regardless of the 18 x 24 rule. Well, they can't have it both ways in my opinion...we are either required to enter only if access is 18 x 24 or we're not. The Commentary must not contradict the SOP!

OK, here's a link to the Draft Commentary work that was completed yesterday. Remember, all is still open for discussion if anyone has any ideas. Post them here or I can provide e-mail links to the sub-committee members who are writing the Commentary.

You can preview the documents or even download them at: http://www.divshare.com/folder/538043-723 

Also...here's a link to some of the recordings from Monday's Commentary teleconference.