Thread: How long do you keep your reports?

How long do you keep your reports?

I've always heard this magical, mystical number of 4 yrs.

Is that urban myth or is there something to it?

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State law for Termite inspection is 2 years. But if your smart you will keep stuff for a long time. you just never known.

Best

Ron

Personally, I have a copy of every inspection I've done. No hard copies but I keep them on a CD's. I burn them onto discs or storage devices every month and then at on Dec. 31st.

You want a wake up call, go back and look at some of your first inspection you did.

rick

Originally Posted by Rick Hurst

Personally, I have a copy of every inspection I've done. No hard copies but I keep them on a CD's. I burn them onto discs or storage devices every month and then at on Dec. 31st.

You want a wake up call, go back and look at some of your first inspection you did.

rick

Done that, embarrassing to say the least.

The cleaner-outer, thrower-awayer in me wants to get rid of stuff (even on hard drives or discs).

Rick is the 4 yr thing a TX thing or am I just making that up?

I've got em' all, along with every picture I've ever taken at an inspection - backed up locally, and to the net.

A local inspector I know has lost all his reports and templates twice in the last few years due to computer crashes - totally freaks me out that he could let that happen.

I still have everything since I started in '95 but I think the magic number most CPA's endorse is 7 years for non-critical stuff but lifetime for loans, property, etc. I doubt there is much need for anything past 2 years but you never know, especially when folks start listening to their remodelers telling them "your inspector should have caught this" along with watching Holmes tear stuff apart on HGTV.
If I had a house fire, the reports would not be something I would save, but everything since I quit printing paper copies in on the computer and backed up on Mozy. Too cheap and easy to keep it. Most of the time I throw stuff out I could have used it within the next 30 days, seems to never fail. Reports will stay archived for me at least for 7 years.

Up until a little while ago, I had every report I have ever done, back to 1989. However, after going thru my Mother's paperwork after she passed, and my Mother in law's, I never want to do the same thing to my children.

Up until, maybe 7 years ago, I did paper reports. That means I had between 4 - 6 file boxes for every year. I moved to TN from CA in 1994. I just felt that I had a very low chance of getting called on a report I did 2000 miles away, 16 years ago. I decided to start dumping them.

Since I switched to computer reporting system around 7 years ago (or so), I have numerous back ups on c/d's, external hard drives, and "in the clouds" back up. Any photos I take during an inspection, gets deleted from the camera as soon as the report is finished. I only keep photos from legal cases.

Last week I took 15 file boxes and two 32 gallon trash bags of shredded stuff to recycling. I still have a ways to go.

I'm gaining more room in my basement. I'm working on a new router table, now I will have a place to put it.

I just keep everything. I write off the portion of my house that is my office. So the more files I accumulate, the more space my office takes, the less income tax I pay.
I burn pics and data from an external drive to DVD's. They are all filed by date.
All inspections are entered, eventually, into a database in MS Access. Give me a date, I can tell you where I was. Give me a street, I can tell you the dates and the clients. From the date, I can find pictures of the house. A pic of the house can usually jog my memory if it was a unique place. So my brain has them all filed as well.

I have them all.... Not that I really think I need them but I just don't see a reason to toss any. They really don't take up much space. I've always figured if I didn't have one and somebody was trying come after me for something I allegedly didn't do, they'd be happy to furnish me with a copy

Speaking of backing up and such.... I just finally got my system down and am pretty pleased with it. My laptop (which I do all my reports on) automatically backs up to my desktop every night via a little free program called "Syncback" - I do a "synchronize" and dump any files on the backup that aren't on the laptop (this stops the accumulation of stuff I've moved over the desktop manually). I also backup my wife's computer and one other desktop to my desktop, then use Carbonite for the one desktop.

Moving everything to one computer means only one Carbonite subscritption. I've messed around with CDs/DVDs, external hard drives, media sticks and all kinds of other methods but the problem is I have to actually do something... FINALLY, my system doesn't need me to function.... I suppose a lot of you have mastered this years ago but if not, check out that Syncback program. It's pretty cool.... and the price is right.

I plan on keeping every report I ever do. They are all computer generated and they average 2mb.

It takes 500 reports to equal 1 gig. You can get a 1 TB storage drive for about $100. That would hold 500,000 reports.

For me, theres no reason to not keep every report indefinitely.

Here in California we have 4 years of direct liability and another 1½ years of discovery liability, so it would be prudent to keep reports for at least 5½ years. However, if someone files a lawsuit on the last day of that 5½-year period but you don't get served the papers for another 30 days or so, you could be sunk if you already threw stuff away.

I'm with John Dirks. I have five 500-GB external drives for home inspection stuff, and another five 1-TB externa drives for photography and music.

Virginia Certified Home Inspections - required to keep agreements and reports for 3 years. The reports are digital. I was scanning the agreements but said what the heck, the signature page is just one page. The main agreement legalese is digital.

Office Depot - 250 GB external HD, $49.95 out the door.
In California the statute of limitations is 4 years from the date of inspection, however, with the on-line back-up services like Carbonite and cheap external HDs why throw them away?

Bruce,

7+ years ago I actually kept about 8-months of hard copy reports in folders. Stopped that real quick. I have soft-copy of all my reports since day one.

Move on regular basis from active HDD on notebook to external HDD and then to disc.

Have had some questions come up from interested clients asking clarification, but that is about it over the years.

I also keep all my inspection reports, contracts and photos on a Network Back up drive and at the end of the year burn them to a DVD. I scan the contracts to a .pdf and include them with the inspection report so there is only one file. I use MACs exclusively so I don't have problems with viruses or bugs but I did once have a hard drive failure, so I always back-up.

Colorado Springs Home Inspector
FHA 203(k) Consultant