We do not inspect anything and cannot assess your property
We do not inspect anything and cannot assess your property. Nobody connected with this site has seen your house, your condominium unit, your rental or the building you are about to buy. We have no access to your report, your photographs, your contract, your disclosure documents or your correspondence, and we have no way to obtain them. Every page here describes how inspections work in general — who commissions them, what they cover, how findings are written up, what deadlines attach — and a general description is not an assessment of a specific building.
We do not tell you whether a finding is serious
We do not tell you whether a finding is serious. That requires somebody who has been there. The same five words in a report — evidence of past moisture intrusion — can describe a stain from a fixed leak a decade ago or an active failure behind a wall, and the difference is visible only to a person standing in the room with a moisture meter. Severity depends on what the inspector saw, what they could not see, the age and construction of the building, what the trade-level follow-up turns up, and often on what the contract you signed says about it. No page on this site can supply any of that, and no email to this site can either. The person who wrote your report is the right first call; the specialist they refer you to is the second.
No prices
No prices. This site publishes no inspection fees — not a range, not an average, not a per-square-foot rate, not a figure attributed to a survey. Cost is described structurally instead: what drives it, why it varies by region, square footage, age and foundation type, which ancillary services are bundled into a base fee in some markets and billed separately in others, and what a reader should expect to ask about when comparing two scopes of work. A figure goes stale silently. The page around it stays correct and the number quietly stops being true, and a reader has no way to tell which is which. Structure is slower to read and stays right.
No figure without a source
No figure without a source. Every number on this site is traced to a named document — a state administrative code, a statute, a standard of practice, a federal form, an agency publication — with a URL that resolves. Where a commonly quoted number turns out to have no reliable primary source behind it, the pages say so rather than repeating it.
Two live examples, both of which appear everywhere else on this subject. There is no primary source for the claim that a home inspection takes two to three hours. No standard of practice sets a duration, no state licensing rule prescribes one, and the figure circulates because it has been copied from site to site. And there is no primary source for a typical report page count; report length is a function of the software, the number of photographs, the inspector's reporting habits and the condition of the building, and nobody authoritative publishes a figure for it. Readers sometimes find that unsatisfying, and we understand why — the number they were looking for is the one they came for. It is still better than the alternative, which is to repeat a figure because everyone repeats it.
State variation is the norm
State variation is the norm. Home inspection regulation is state law, and it varies more than almost any reader expects. Standards of practice differ in what they require an inspector to operate, describe or merely observe. Licensing requirements differ in education hours, examination, supervision and insurance. Report-delivery deadlines differ. The legal definitions of defect and material defect differ, and in some states they are not defined in law at all. Several states do not license home inspectors at all, which means the floor in those places is set by the contract the inspector asks you to sign rather than by a regulator. Where a page here describes a rule, check it against the current official source for the state where the property is.
We name no inspector and assess none
We name no individual inspector, firm or franchise, and assess none. There are no rankings here, no ratings, no scores, no "best of" lists and no directory. Comparison content in this field is overwhelmingly funded by the companies being compared, and the ordering usually reflects what a placement is worth rather than how the work is done. Rather than publish a worse version of that, this site describes the things a reader can check for themselves: what a license verifies and what it does not, what a standard of practice commits an inspector to, what a pre-inspection agreement typically limits, and which questions separate a scope that fits the occasion from one that does not.
Not professional advice
Nothing here is legal, real estate, engineering, insurance or financial advice, and reading it creates no professional relationship. Inspection standards, licensing rules, disclosure obligations, contract deadlines and consumer protection law all vary by state and change over time. Consult a licensed professional in the state where the property is before acting on anything you read here.
Standards of practice are summarized, not reproduced
Where this site describes what an inspection includes or excludes, it is summarizing a published standard of practice and saying which one. An individual inspector's pre-inspection agreement, scope of work and state licensing obligations may differ from the standard summarized, and the agreement you sign governs your inspection. A home inspection is a limited, visual, largely non-invasive assessment of readily accessible components on the day it is performed. It is not a warranty, not a guarantee, not a code compliance inspection, and not a prediction of how long anything will last.
The verdict on each occasion page is a summary
Each occasion page opens with a short verdict — a standard inspection, a standard inspection plus specific additions, or a genuinely different inspection. That label summarizes how the occasion is usually handled across the standards and state rules cited on the page. It is not a determination about your transaction, it does not bind any inspector, and it carries no weight in a dispute. An occasion described here as taking the ordinary scope can still call for additions in your particular case, and the person to decide that is the inspector you engage.
Timeliness
Pages are written from sources current at the time of writing and are not updated automatically when the underlying material changes. A page's modified date moves only when its content is actually revised, which means an older date is honest rather than neglectful — but it also means you should treat everything here as a starting point for your own verification rather than as a current legal authority.
Illustrations are abstract
The artwork on this site is abstract and decorative. No image here is a technical diagram, an installation detail or a depiction of any specific product or building, and nothing should be inferred from a graphic about how anything is built, installed, inspected or repaired.
Accuracy and corrections
We assume no responsibility for errors or omissions, or for any outcome resulting from the use of information on this site. If you find an error, please tell us — ideally with the primary source that supports the correction — and we will fix it.