Reinspections / Inspecting Repair Items

[Nick Ostrowski]

For those of you who do reinspections / inspections of repair items from your home inspections, are there any repair items you will not reinspect? Also, what type of documentation do you ask for or require in order to perform the reinspection? For example, do you require receipts and invoices from the professionals who did the repairs? If the sellers do not provide paperwork or have none to provide, do you still do the reinspect?

[Raymond Wand]

Nick

The only caveat I would throw back at ya... if you are not there to see first hand how the repairs were completed and materials and quality of workmanship regardless of receipts, you cannot ascertain with certainty if it was done correctly.

Having said that however, if the client was astute enough to keep notes and photos of the work, that would assist greatly in your quantifying if things were on the up and up.

[BridgeMan]

Certain types of repairs that are concealed as part of the completed repair work are very difficult to inspect. Plumbing items embedded in walls/ceilings come to mind, and there are lots of others. As long as everyone is aware of the limitations of one's re-inspection (and having same spelled out before going back, and charging for, the re-inspection), there shouldn't be any major problems.

A few years ago, I had occasion to spend a lot of time doing re-inspection at an assisted living facility that had been extensively remodeled to make things more accessible for the 6 or 7 residents. I had not been brought into the picture until after all of the initial work had been completed, and my first walk-through resulted in a full page list of obvious things that had been done improperly (having an ADA bathroom sink knocked off the wall by a motorized wheel chair is always a good clue that short-cuts were taken). After seeing my list, the State HSD project manager decided she wanted me there on a close-to-full-time basis for the remainder of the repair work (had I been allowed to open up walls, I suspect it would have been at least a 2-page list). When people know their work will be closely monitored, there's a tendency for them to perform more carefully (but not in all cases, unfortunately).