House Inspectors

[SS MAYFLOAT]

Bought this house 3 years ago. Had a certified inspector go through the house. His findings on the electrical wiring was this. "Wiring is fabric coated non-grounded, typical of wiring of the era." Now that my grown kids of moved out, I can get onto the re-wiring of the house. Once I started pulling down the ceiling tiles, I found that all junctions are not contained within a junction box. The wires are twisted together and taped! BIG FIRE HAZARD! Then further inspection, several small double pole breaker boxes with 30 amp breakers are wired with #12 wire! To me the inpsector should have discovered this during his inpection. Also the electric hot water heater was wired with #12 also. The wires shows evidence of being hot.<br /><br />I wonder if it be worth the hassel of going to the business that inspected the house. Then place a complaint that the inspector had failed on his ability to spot these problems. What would the odds be in getting them to pay for their negligence? Thanks

 

[snapperbait]

Re: House Inspectors

Not sure about Ohio, but in Florida, I believe home inspectors are liscenced and certified by the state... So you might be better off filing a complaint with the state?...<br /><br />At the very least, I'd contact the Better Buisnuss Bureau....<br /><br />As for getting then to pay.. Good luck.. Probably is'nt worth the hassle... But then again who knows?.....

 

[Scoop]

Re: House Inspectors

SS, the inspector should have caught the 30 Amp with 12 gauge wire. I am surprised. I am not sure what is code but I thought 20 amp was the largest for 12 Gauge wire. As far as fabric coated non-grounded wire. How old is your house? Are you describing what they call knob and tube wiring?<br />That is the two wires that go to each outlet are run in the walls and ceilings about 3 inches apart? These are fabric covered and there are only 2 wires going to the outlets/lights? If this is so, I have never seen 12 gauge wire in this configuration. Usually it is 14 maybe 16. What they do in knob and tube is to make a "home run" and then solder circuits off that. They then tape the connections. The wires are usually held to the stubs, by ceramic "knobs" and run through the studs/joists inside ceramic "Tubes". If this is the case, then what the inspector said is totally correct and it is not as big a danger as most people would suppose.<br />Now if the connections are just twisted together, not soldered and are on the outside of the ceiling where you can see them when you "remove the ceiling tiles", then you do have a problem. A non-soldered joint that is twisted together with no wire nut is a big fire hazard. There will be resistance between the wires and this will cause heat at the joint. <br />There are very few home inspectors I would trust. I have seen a investative report where some show like 20/20 showed that the inpector would never make a finding that would stop a house sale. The inspectors are usually referred by the realtors and if they do something to stop the sale, then they will not be referred again. Get an inspector that referred by the bank. They do not want to be stuck with a house that has problems. Then they have the chance of the loan going south and losing money by being stuck with a problem house. I accompanied my house inspector and pointed out things he missed as he was doing the inpection. The bank also made the owners get a separate electrical sinpection which passed. 3 years later when I was replacing a circuit, I found that I did not have an earth ground on the service. The service was fairly new and no one installed an earth ground. That was bad and both inspectors and I missed it. If you do have knob and tube, don't worry. Just watch for overloaded circuits. They did not think about high power things then because they did not have them.

 

[SS MAYFLOAT]

Re: House Inspectors

Its not a Knob-n-post, I have rewired several of those in the past. My neighbor told me that the house was built by a hillbilly. It looks like it was a kit since most of the studs have different numbers on them. It was built in 1958, and of course it still has fuses. And your right about the #12 wire, According to the NEC (National Electric Code) 12 is 20 amps, 10 is 30. I always wire my water heater, dryer and stove 1 guage higher than what is required.<br /><br />I have done quiet a few miles worth of wiring, but for a house of this age, I wouldn't have expected this. My old house was built in 54 and had the fabric romex, but it had its junctions in boxes.<br /><br />I'm gonna take pictures just for the record, and probably do nothing about it. Can use that time to get the rewire job done faster. Thanks

 

[Jack Shellac]

Re: House Inspectors

Unfortunately, in many states all it takes to be a home inspector is just to say that you are one. I don't know what the law is in your state but have served as an arbitrator, including for the BBB, for many years. You would be doing your community a service if you reported the guy, even though it may not help you. Find out if he belongs to any professional society of home appraisers and report it to them, too. You may get some help here. Good luck.

 

[Scoop]

Re: House Inspectors

Sorry to hear that SS. Sounds like you have a lot of work ahead of you. I still would contact the home inspector and make a complaint.

 

[Bart Sr.]

Re: House Inspectors

Good winter endeavor SS.Wi're all pulling for you!!THANKFULLY AND RESPECTFULLY>>BART SR.

 

[Capt. Bob]

Re: House Inspectors

My experience in the residential/commercial building and restoration business for 30 years in Atlanta, is that most (read all) home inspection authorization forms effectively limit the liability of the inspector or inspections company to a refund of the fee to the homeowner....when fault is admitted.<br /><br />I was called by a regular customer that had just bought a $375,000. home about 2 years old. The inspection list included "Caulk brick to window sills where wood is shrinking." I inspected the house and immediately noticed that the brick was pulling away from the house wall. The footing for the brick veneer (3 stories) was poured separately from the building foundation and after only 2 years the footing was rotating and causing the brick to begin pulling away from the house. Left alone it would eventually fall away from the house. Originally brick ties were installed but the weight of the brick was too much for them. We used over 3000-7 1/2" bolts to secure the brick. We also undermined the fireplace foundation and poured additional footings with vertical piers to support the fireplace. Upon research we found out that the builder was going to stucco the house and the original buyer wanted brick instead. The brick is still stable, now 4 years later.<br /><br />Total cost to the new homeowner...$8,500....but the inspection company returned the $475. fee they charged him. <br /><br />(The bolts and washers were counter sunk into the brick joints and brick..then mortared over.) <br /><br />I know it doesn't matter and don't slam me too hard...but the inspector was a woman. <br /><br />Good luck!

 

[bobber head]

Re: House Inspectors

It's really a no win situation for the inspectors.<br /><br />With the moronic, crooked, and new hires aside, the "good" inspector still has too many things on his list and too little time in which to look the place over, to do anything close to a complete assesment. <br /><br />The concept of "pronouncing a place fit to live" by one or two people, in the course of a few hours, is flawed.<br /><br />The new colour coded romax, ie: green for 20 amps, no wait maybe it's orange, is a step in the (see what I mean) right direction.<br /><br />Selling my girlfriends house last summer, we had to deal with hoardes of inspectors. Mostly good guys, but everyone seemed to zero in on something different. One guy was just served divorce papers. I jokingly told him I'd cover for him if he wanted to sneak off the bar on the corner and he took me up on it. Later, he actually did a good job and knew his stuff. I digress...<br /><br />/paste

 

[bobber head]

Re: House Inspectors

somehow the end of the above post ended up on a different forum post.<br /> http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=1528506#post1528506 <br /><br /> <br /><br />The thing is it can take years for even something obvious to catch our eye. <br />Walk by it everday, and for one reason or another, we don't notice that somethings amiss. <br /><br />Granted, these guys are paid to notice, that's their job...but we all have off days and just like doctors, second opinons are sometimes very wise. <br /><br />First Doc: "Sorry, it's a brain tumor. You have maybe 4 days left. Better put your affairs in order." <br />Second Doc: "No big deal, it's wart, sit down and I'll freeze it off, you'll be home for lunch". <br /><br />Bobber head.<br /><br />PS. Capt Bob is a sexest pig.

 

[Capt. Bob]

Re: House Inspectors

bobber head - How did you find out??????

 

[ob]

Re: House Inspectors

Hey bobberhead,Do you know RD Mercer?

 

[SS MAYFLOAT]

Re: House Inspectors

When I sold my old house, the woman that bought it had an inspector check it out. I wasn't allowed to follow him through the house, but got to see the results. I was curious to see what they were since I had just spent the last 3 years completely remodeling it. New Roof, Furnace with Air Condition, Bath, Kitchen, Wiring, and even dug out cracked mortar joints and remortared them. So I felt like this was a test on how well of a job I did. He spent 3 hours going over this little 30x25 house. He found only two things. A super small gas leak that it took forever for my soaptype leak detector to find. The second was a setting on the thermostat that didn't allow the burner on the furnace to stay on until the rooms heat was satisfied. I had the two problems fixed in about an hour. He came back and checked them out and then signed off.<br /><br />Since I felt that he did an outstanding job on that house, I hired him to do this one. I must admit, that some of the stuff he pointed out helped me get this house for way less than the asking price. This house is about 4 times bigger than my old one, so I can't blame him for not catching everything.<br /><br />I am going to contact his business and suggest that he should look at the electric system closer. Thanks for your replies.....

 

[bobber head]

Re: House Inspectors

ob - I heard a broadcast once of a radio show personality: where he called an unsuspecting person, created a tremdous amount of grief for this person to spontaneously deal with, which escalated to threats of physical violence, and everyone was expected to laugh at the negitive abuse he dished out. I heard of rd mecer, once. I didn't find it funny though.<br /><br />Now the guy made the set up call, pretending to be a representive of a marital aid company, calling about possible medical issues attributed to the product, finally getting her to blurtingly confess to MUCH use, of said product: now that was funny to me. However she too was mortified at the end of the call...so maybe I am sexest pig here? <br /><br />Did I miss an actual humorus rdm episode?

 

[ob]

Re: House Inspectors

I don't know.I guess you guys in Tulsa get plenty of him.Some guy down here in corpus that did some welding work for me about 5 years ago gave me a cassette tape of about 15 or so different calls RDM and his sidekick made.Not all were a riot but some were entertaining.Just wondering.

 

[flashback]

Re: House Inspectors

"typical wiring of the era" is the key here. the inspector covered himself. shoot, I don't know what code was back then but i have seen plenty of those old houses wired up without junction boxes. anyway good luck................

 

[ebbtide176]

Re: House Inspectors

next time put "Attention: Crabbait" as the heading<br />-that might get you all the 115v wiring info you could ever want for