Turning a competitor's bad home inspection into an education

Last Thursday I got a call inquiring about whether I could do a home inspection on Friday.

Since Friday was my first anniversary, and I told the caller so, I suggested doing it on Saturday, but he really wanted it done on Friday, so I passed.

Monday I got a call from him asking me to do a TECH inspection for him, since he wasn't happy with the inspection that he had received on Friday.

On the size home he was buying, my TECH inspection would be $1,999. Since home inspectors are not licensed in the State of California, what I do on a TECH inspection is take various licensed professionals with me as part of my team:

1. licensed plumber
2. licensed electrician
3. licensed roofing contractor
4. licensed heating and cooling technician
5. licensed chimney sweep

Additionally, if I detect any problems with the foundation or structure, I will take the lead on getting a structural engineer or foundation professional to inspect the building.

Unfortunately, to get all those professionals together at the same time requires a little coordination, so I require seven days advance notice, which often doesn't fit into the home inspection contingency period.

The caller told me what he was unhappy with, and I endeavo(u)red to explain to him why that inspector did what he did, said what he said, and wrote what he wrote. When I was a home inspector by name, I did the exact same thing, and I wasn't totally happy with what I had to do.

The problem here in California, in addition to there being no licensing for home inspectors, is that our attorneys keep us informed about what's going on in the courts, and our insurance advisors tell us what we can and cannot say if we want to carry errors and omissions insurance through their companies.

As a property consultant, I can take a little more risk in saying and doing things, risk that I am willing to take, so many of the things that the caller was complaining about would be things that I now take the risk for doing, saying, not doing, or not saying, as the case may be.

I suggested that I sit down with him as a $100/hour consultant and go over the other home inspector's report line by line so I could explain what the other inspector was or was not doing, answer any questions he might have, and look at anything in the house that was still of a concern to him. Then I could provide him with my own recommendations of how to proceed.

We had a tentative date set for this morning at 10:00 a.m., but since I haven't heard from him, I hope that I helped him gain confidence in the other inspector. Of course, he could just be really upset with me because I couldn't meet his timeline for doing a TECH inspection. Nonetheless, I did what I could, and I hope I helped.