The answer is YES!
It amazes me how many home buyers ask that question. Or when I have a buyer call to inquire, and they tell me that their agent said that they did not need an inspection, because the new home was already inspected by the local building department. .....What?
Fortunately there are many experienced agents that are fully aware that waving the home inspection on new construction is risky. All of us who have spent years in this business have seen the resale homes that were never inspected when new, to find construction defects that are revealed during the home inspection process. Buyers and Sellers are left to negotiate who is paying to fix what, and meanwhile the builder got away with shoddy workmanship.
Here is just one of many examples. Earlier this year I received a call from a nice couple in Marysville, WA. They had bought their new construction home approximately 9 months prior and wanted to hire me to perform an inspection, before their one year warranty expired. During the inspection I found several deficiencies that the couple was unaware of. Most were common and simple to repair.
However even I was surprised when I entered the crawl space to see the havoc the heating contractor created. It was another Sawzall in the wrong hands situation. The heating contractor had to install a main heating system trunk line to the furnace. Well..... some framing guy put his structural support beam right in the way. The heating contractor reached for the Sawzall and proceeded to sever the support beam completely in half, taking about a 2 1/2 foot chunk of of it.
While wondering what this guy was thinking, It occurred to me that he must have missed that day in school when the subject of gravity was discussed.
The good news in this story is that the couple who own this home were informed that this defect existed before their warranty with the builder expired. They were able to have it repaired at no cost to them. Unfortunately I find these type of defects on homes that are several years old, when it is way to late to go back to the builder. And these incidents are not that uncommon.
Don't let the fact the the city or county building inspector has signed off on all the required inspections lead you to believe that all is well.
Improper installation of decks, missing roof flashings, missing sub floor and HVAC system insulation, insufficient vapor barriers, and unsatisfactory drainage conditions in crawl space are way too common.
In fact I have a running tally of how many new homes were signed off and a Certificate of Occupancy was obtained, in which during the inspection I found absolutely no attic insulation. ........NONE....zero....zip....nada...
...Five homes.....The effects of the absence of this insulation would have not been discovered until winter, and the heating bill with the extra zeros shocked the new home owners. If I have seen five, then there are alot more that I haven't seen.
If your on the fence about new construction inspections, then here is a good article by Consumer Reports titled "Housewrecked" http://millerhomeinspect.com/newhomes.aspx Just follow the link on my site.
Comments(3)