In most areas of the country, a fire door assembly is required between the garage and the living area, the premise being that many dangerous items are commonly located in the garage (gas dryer, gas water heater, gas furnace, gas car) or commonly stored in the garage (paint, fertilizers, gas lawnmower, gas leaf blower, etc.), so it's always been presumed, and maybe even fact at some point in time, that fires quite often start in the garage. Of course, if your garage looks like that in Figure 1, spontaneous combustion might even occur!

  Figure 1.

Figure 1 also also presents problems because there could be leaking chemicals or gas containers somewhere in all that mess, and if a child happens to be playing hide-and-seek, he could be overcome by fumes and pass out.

Fire door assemblies are usually either solid wood doors or metal doors, and they can easily be identified by the fire door rating attached to the door, usually on the edge of the door. See Figure 2 and Figure 3.

  Figure 2. Fire door rating plate

  Figure 3. Fire door rating plate.

Sometimes the door can't be readily identified because the original door was damaged and was replaced with a standard door. Even if the door is solid, it can't be verified as a fire door unless the rating plate is attached. Doors like that shown in Figure 4 are not acceptable.

  Figure 4. Window compromises fire door

Pet doors (see Figure 5) also generally are not approved because the opening is usually plastic or rubber which won't meet the minimum 20-minute fire resistance rating.

  Figure 5. Pet door compromises fire door

Check the door in your own home, and when you go to list a property, you can notify the owner that resolving this problem can eliminate at least one item from the buyer's home inspection report, making escrow go a little more smoothly.