Recently, one of my listings was inspected by a home inspector I had not met before. This guy is a highly-qualified licensed contractor and really knows his stuff.
We had an interesting conversation. He told me that, in addition to performing home inspections, he also works for insurance companies such as State Farm and All State. When a house has been destroyed by fire, they hire him to investigate and determine whether the property had defects that void the insurance coverage.
Building codes require that houses be built with a firewall between the garage and the living area of the house. Since many house fires begin in the garage, the firewall in engineered to inhibit a fire in the garage from spreading to the living area for two hours.
However, many homeowners breach the firewall, making it much less effective in slowing the spread of a fire.
Some owners install a pet door in the door leading from the house to the garage. This door is an integral part of the firewall and cutting a passageway to let pets out also allows fire in.
Also, the door to the garage must be equipped with an autoclosure device. This is to insure that the door is always closed. Obviously, if the door is open, it is easy for a garage fire to spread into the house. However, some owners remove or disable the autoclosure device so they can leave the door open.
Other owners install pull-down ladders to the attic portion of the garage. This can be a problem because the ceiling of the garage may be part of the firewall.
Bottom line: If an inspector discovers that the fire started in the garage and there was a breach in the firewall, the insurance company will not honor the claim! So keep your firewall intact.
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