We Broke What?

Here is one you might have heard before: A home inspector walks into a home and they broke my ….

A home inspector has a certain routine and organization to their motion through a home. Most like to perform their inspection in a top down routine. This allows them to follow the plumbing as well as to stay organized. We are very much creatures of habit.

After a few hundred inspections most inspectors move through the home like instinctual animals. They have a choreography like a ballet dancer. Because of this an inspector will just grab for that tub faucet knob or sink handle like they have done hundreds of time before.

Our challenge is, this time the knob was not connected to the plumbing and it falls off in the inspector’s hand. The inspector will write in their report that the faucet handle is failed and will recommend attention. The inspector did nothing different than they have done countless times before. The inspector did not exert any additional pressure or force then they have done before but yet we are about to be blamed for breaking the faucet.

Now I do not know if it is a seller trying to ready the blame on someone else or if they are just ambivalent over the entire condition buy yet the inspector is still going to be blamed.

As a professional inspector we would love to have the sellers of the home leave us a note letting us know if there are any conditions we should know about. This could include loose handles, trick drawers or cabinet doors, maybe the special instructions to turning on the spa tub or anything else that might raise a question.

Things are going break. Inspectors are human and if we break something we will take ownership and responsibility but if we did not break it we will hold our grown.