bellingham home inspection: Whatcom County Home Inspection (King of the House): Detecting A Multi-layer Roof
- 11/24/07 01:24 PM
Actually, this title is a bit like the old question: "Who is buried in Grant's tomb?" The way you detect a multi-layer roof is by looking. That can, however, be harder than you would expect. The photo below is the simple way, just tweak the shingles a bit and you see another color below. The best place to look is at the eaves or at the gable ends. Sometimes there will be a metal drip edge flashing put over an old roof and that can make it harder to be sure what is below. On the other hand, I did an … (0 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Real Estate Professionals: Great New Inspection Blogger
- 11/19/07 12:57 AM
I know that many of the real estate professionals here at active rain, along with members of the public who find us through search engines, are very interested in obtaining information about homes, problems found at homes. I am aware of this because dozens of people have, for nearly a year now, subscribed to and commented on my home inspection blogs. Those of you in that category know that I try to make salient points and provide an easy to understand but informative approach with detailed photos.
I peruse through AR too and, in the past month or so, there is a new … (0 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Re-inspection Complications
- 11/18/07 10:33 AM
Frequently a home inspector is asked to go back and re-inspect repairs at a house where that inspector had previously done an inspection. This is typically done at a fraction of the cost of the original inspection.
On the surface, this sounds simple enough. But, for the record, most of those companies that insure home inspectors try to discourage us from doing re-inspects at all, in any fashion. The force of the marketplace is such that, realistically, most of us cannot refuse to do these inspections. But I think that here at Active Rain would be a good place to explain the reasons for … (0 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Bellingham Home Inspection (King of the House Inc): Downspout Drainage
- 09/08/07 05:33 PM
While it is a common practice, a home inspector does not like to see the downspouts of the home up tight to the siding and draining down the roofing materials. When that is the case, and the rain is really coming down in our climate here in Washington, it leads to uncontrolled runoff and the water leaves a lasting effect on the roofing. It is probably more apparent here than it would usually be because of the wood shingles and their tendency towards algae and fungus. In this case, it would be good if the one piece of siding near the … (1 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Connecting those dots!
- 09/08/07 10:57 AM
I was doing an inspection at a nice condo. Checked the dryer vent outside, or what I thought was the dryer vent, just to see if it had lint inside of it. Prior to looking, I had turned on the dryer. I was surprised to find that no warm, or cold, air was coming out the vent. I have seen this before, so looked down behind the dryer. Expected to find it was disconnected. It looked to be okay so I made a note to look carefully in the crawl space. Sure enough, I get in the crawl space and see … (0 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Just To Prove I'm Not A Model A!
- 09/08/07 08:23 AM
I recently wrote a blog explaining why I think there is limited validity to attempting to train serious home inspectors merely by supplying them with videos and Online courses. Now, I did not say that I do not think there is a place for modern technology in the training of inspectors. Much of our class at Bellingham Technical College relies on custom power point presentations. Also, for fun, I put together some time back a few simple Online tests that students take in class the first few days, or when they are considering taking the class, just to see what they know. If … (0 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Bellingham WA Home Inspection (King of the House): Strange Things People Do
- 09/05/07 10:35 AM
The crawl space photos below show, at least, a couple obvious concerns as far as the longterm well being of this home. The first issue, and I will cite it first as it is mandated as a concern by Washington State law, is that the so-called piers under the posts are wood. The one at the left looks like firewood, round side down. The posts at the right photo are on an assortment of wood pieces, the idea being to get them to fit, sort of. State law says wood to earth has to be called because the pier wood will rot, … (4 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Municipalities Do It Best
- 09/01/07 09:22 AM
I thought I should share this. I have made a number of posts lately regarding unsafe wiring. This is NOT home owner wiring. I was digging through some photos and, again, this is a photo I took near Cancun, Mexico. This is wiring in a public park. Seriously, this is a panel in a municipal park. And, to make it sillier, I did not have to open the cover to get the shot -- it has no cover. Is it dead? Is it vacated? I think not, as a few wires came out the top and seemed to be routed to … (3 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Bellingham Home Inspection (King of the House Inc): Off With Their Pointy Little Tips
- 09/01/07 07:54 AM
Okay, you are probably wondering what type of politically incorrect statement I am about to make here. In fact, I was wondering if I ought to post this or not. So, I decided that to backup my opinion, and to clarify the matter, I would supply a photograph of their little pointy tips and, from that, give a full explanation of my opinion and disgust.
Below, are the offending members. I removed these from a circuit breaker main panel at a home in Point Roberts. You might think that three of the four look like regular sheet metal screws. Well, that is the … (7 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Bellingham Washington Home Inspector (King of the House): Termites In Our Midst
- 09/01/07 07:38 AM
If you think you have a termite problem, well look at the kind of problem you might have. I took this photo in Mexico at a small island off Cancun. When I went into the city park I could not believe my eyes. This makes a caterpillar infestation look like the fun of attending the Ringling Brother Circus. There was tree after tree after tree that looked just like this. These particular termites, and I have the name somewhere, are a type of subterranean termite. That means they live in the ground. However, in this case they obviously kind of like … (1 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Bellingham WA Property Inspector (King of the House): Electric Panel Safety
- 08/31/07 07:08 PM
This is the photo of the inside of an electric panel. Granted, the big bent nail off to the side is not so impressive, but at least it is staying in one place. The thing that you need to see is in the lower left hand corner. That is oh so simple, but a problem. There should be no non-essential things floating around in the electric panel. And, when that non-essential is metal, double the warning. An inspector, or an electrician, does not want to see low voltage transformers, speaker wires, or screws inside the panel. Think about it. If something … (7 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Bellingham WA Home Inspector (King of the House): Open Ended Gutters
- 08/29/07 02:45 AM
In the Pacific Northwest, where we have so much rain, gutters are a pretty important part of a home. They control the rain and runoff water. Around here, when you see a house without gutters and downspouts there is almost always a big pile of mud under the eaves, caused by the falling water. Missing gutters is what we call a conducive condition. One construction method that has become common is to install gutters on dormers but to install gutters that have open ends. The gutters have a slight slope back and from there they drain onto the roof below. From a home … (2 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Home Inspections Bellingham WA (King of the House): Fallen Insulation
- 08/25/07 03:40 AM
When a home inspector sees crawl space insulation that has fallen, such as this, it usually means one of a couple things. In this case, the crawl space is wet and the moisture has evaporated up into the insulation and it is heavy and no longer supported. The little metal rods that hold it in place cannot support the weight. Another time one might see insulation that looks like this is when rodents have been working it. In that case, often you will also see straw, sunflower seeds and things like that worked up into it. Obvious remedies are drying the … (5 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: When In Rome
- 08/20/07 03:20 PM
As I said in a previous post, in about a month, I will be visiting Italy again. Even though the construction is so different over there, I can still pick up on some things. They are not very useful tips in the Pacific Northwest, but interesting anyway. Most of the roofs over there are tile. We have very few like that here. I have watched them re-roof in many Italian cities over the years. They very carefully remove the old tiles -- and I have no clue how many hundreds of years old some of those might be. They discard the … (6 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Bellingham Wa. Washington Home Inspector (King of the House): Unsafe Wiring Practices
- 08/16/07 03:08 AM
Here is another one I see frequently on inspections. This is the case of running the live electric wires over, inside, or through the gutters or downspouts. The gutters and downspouts are obviously not designed for this purpose and the wires usually move around and wear the insulation off the conductors. Often the wires seem to find a sharp metal edge on the gutters. Maybe all the rubbing makes one. I had an inspection one time where a bare conductor, insulation had rubbed off, was in contact with the metal of the gutters. Depending on which wire was in contact that could … (0 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Bellingham Property Inspection (King of the House, Inc): Electric Heater Safety
- 08/13/07 08:36 AM
Sometimes I am amazed at how casually people treat the areas around their electric heaters. The heater might be in a bathroom and a towel rack is mounted over it, towel hanging down. Or maybe the curtains hang down over the baseboard heater in the living room. In the photos below, someone had actually installed a hardwood floor that went well up over the bottom edge of the heater. When the heater ran, the wood got very hot. While the temperature it achieved was not hot enough to cause immediate combustion, this reduces the moisture in and dries the wood. If the temperature reaches … (4 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Bellingham Wa. Home Inspection (King of the House): Not Such A Spiffy Biffy
- 08/06/07 02:55 PM
One of the most common problems with toilets is the loose toilet. People have heard that if they tighten a toilet too tight to the floor, they can crack the porcelain. That is true, but the usual problem is that they overcompensate the other way. They leave the toilet loose to the floor -- the bolts doing nothing. Then there are those who do not understand that the true seal is the wax ring under the toilet. They think they should caulk it down. Some people find a leaking toilet and caulk around it at the floor. If that goes on … (5 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: Bellingham WA Real Estate Inspection (King of the House): Asbestos Cement Siding
- 08/05/07 03:29 PM
Probably the biggest problem with asbestos cement siding, that is still in place today, has to do with areas that have been cracked or damaged. This was the early cement-based siding, with asbestos fibers. Everyone hears the word "asbestos" and gets nervous, however asbestos siding itself is not airborne or friable unless one starts mechanically tearing into it or sanding on it. Here is the real problem: The material, from day one, was brittle so it is unusual to find it in pristine condition. It was a good long-lived product, but as installations of the siding go back more than 30 years, mechanical damage … (7 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: King of the House Inc: Telltale Signs -- Underground Storage Tanks, Pt 2
- 07/31/07 06:46 AM
The photos below are more examples of telltale signs. These are all from inspections that I performed. I will show the clues and describe the outcome. As to realtors, since you are not going to be down in the crawl space (where the clues are seen probably 60% of the time) you should look for outside vents and fill tubes and small diameter copper tubing near furnaces and in basement walls. Thurston County has a link that you might find helpful. http://www.co.thurston.wa.us/health/ehhw/pdf/fact_sheets/heating_oil_tanks.pdf
Also, check out the very last photo. That was a real weird scenario and a related matter. To read part one … (4 comments)
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bellingham home inspection: A King size sigh of relief: The meme is done
- 07/29/07 05:18 PM
Well, it took me more than a week to mull it over but, as of this weekend, I did my meme. On top of that, tonight I selected my three victims -- Michael Eisenberg who is at Fairhaven Realty and quite the AR competitor in this market, also Eric Badgley and Angela Gardner, a married team at Prudential Kelstrup and Anna Biondolillo, who works at Keller Williams and knows lots about Lynden. I will be interested to see what these folks have to say about themselves. With the exception of Michael, whom I have corresponded with but yet to meet, I … (4 comments)
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Actually, this title is a bit like the old question: "Who is buried in Grant's tomb?" The way you detect a multi-layer roof is by looking. That can, however, be harder than you would expect. The photo below is the simple way, just tweak the shingles a bit and you see another color below. The best place to look is at the eaves or at the gable ends. Sometimes there will be a metal drip edge flashing put over an old roof and that can make it harder to be sure what is below. On the other hand, I did an … (0 comments)
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