What you don’t know can hurt you. Houses degrade
from the day they are completed. And with human
nature the way it is, some people won’t fix their home
unless they are forced to. Until the home inspection
service came into being, houses were typically
bought in ‘as is’ condition.
Occasionally, houses are fixed up before they are
sold, but these are the exceptions and not the rule.
Owners who decide to sell a house sometimes do not
want to invest much time and money in it because
they're concerned they won’t get their money back.
When they do decide the problem must be fixed, they
often do it themselves (although they may not quite
understand the problem or how to fix it) or hire a not-
quite-qualified-unprofessional to do the repairs, which
can create additional problems. This process isn’t
new. The Latin saying caveat emptor or ‘let the buyer
beware’ is just as appropriate now as it was when the
Romans coined it.
Prior to the introduction of professional home
inspection, rather than fix problems and be out many
thousands of dollars, typical homeowners would
rather keep quiet, sell the house and let the new
owners take care of it. With the advent of the
professional home inspection trade, many houses
now get repaired before they are placed on the
market, because the seller knows the house will be
inspected and doesn't want repair or maintenance
problems to hold up a sale. This gives the inspected
house a longer life expectancy and the new buyers a
safer house. All in all, the home inspection profession
has increased the quality of homes nationwide and
made them safer for us all.
from the day they are completed. And with human
nature the way it is, some people won’t fix their home
unless they are forced to. Until the home inspection
service came into being, houses were typically
bought in ‘as is’ condition.
Occasionally, houses are fixed up before they are
sold, but these are the exceptions and not the rule.
Owners who decide to sell a house sometimes do not
want to invest much time and money in it because
they're concerned they won’t get their money back.
When they do decide the problem must be fixed, they
often do it themselves (although they may not quite
understand the problem or how to fix it) or hire a not-
quite-qualified-unprofessional to do the repairs, which
can create additional problems. This process isn’t
new. The Latin saying caveat emptor or ‘let the buyer
beware’ is just as appropriate now as it was when the
Romans coined it.
Prior to the introduction of professional home
inspection, rather than fix problems and be out many
thousands of dollars, typical homeowners would
rather keep quiet, sell the house and let the new
owners take care of it. With the advent of the
professional home inspection trade, many houses
now get repaired before they are placed on the
market, because the seller knows the house will be
inspected and doesn't want repair or maintenance
problems to hold up a sale. This gives the inspected
house a longer life expectancy and the new buyers a
safer house. All in all, the home inspection profession
has increased the quality of homes nationwide and
made them safer for us all.
| The Home Inspection Process |
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Covenant Home Inspection
A Home inspector has a working knowledge of construction, trades, as well as professional
trades, in addition to professional certification in the home inspection field and can give an
‘overview’ of the condition of the home. An overview means that the inspector will list areas
of concern. If these areas are significant, the owner or buyer will be advised to contact a
specialist in that area for expert evaluation. Home inspectors are like general practitioners.
Anyone who wants a home inspected has two choices, spend a lot of money and bring in
experts in all the trades or spend significantly less money and bring in one person who has a
general working knowledge of all of the systems in a home. Most homeowners can ill afford
to bring in each individual professional service. Hiring a certified structural engineer
master electrician, master plumber, and so on to inspect each separate component of a
house would cost the homeowner well over $1,000 (a typical inspection costs $350-500). And
think of the headaches of trying to get that many people to a house in a short period of time.
It was from this need to have a single person with a general knowledge of all the trades that
the home inspection profession was born.
Why Inspect?