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Part of Purchases and sales records: a deed, a roll and a permit compared
Purchases and sales architecture: a home inspection, step by step
Purchases and sales architecture: the order a home inspector works through, who orders and pays, what the report cannot cover, and the steps that follow.
A building inspection is a systematic look at a structure by an inspector who has seen many fail, and its value is not a defect list.
A competent inspector reads the building as a system. A ceiling stain becomes a question about a roof, flashing, pipe, or vent, and the inspection narrows down which.
This page covers what an inspection can see, what it cannot see, and how to read the report. It also shows where the inspection sits inside the purchases and sales architecture of a transaction.
What governs an inspection, and who pays for it
Inspectors work from a published standard of practice. The two most widely used in the United States are the ASHI Standard of Practice, from the American Society of Home Inspectors, and the InterNACHI Standards of Practice, from the International Association of Certified Home Inspectors. Each sets out what has to be inspected, what is reported as a limitation, and what is excluded.
Licensing sits on top of that. Most states license or regulate home inspectors through their own board or consumer affairs agency — Texas through the Texas Real Estate Commission, New Jersey through the Home Inspection Advisory Committee in the Division of Consumer Affairs — each with its own scope rules, continuing education requirements and complaint process. Checking that an inspector holds a current license in that state, on the board's public register, is the practical first step.
Reports are written on site in reporting software such as HomeGauge or Spectora, and asking for a sample report shows what you will actually receive.
In a purchase, the buyer orders and pays for the inspection, and the inspector quotes the work for that particular building. A seller may order one before listing, and the two sides sometimes split the cost by agreement. Ask what the quote covers and whether specialist inspections are billed separately.
What to take away
- An inspection is a visual assessment of accessible parts on one day, and every limitation in that sentence is doing work.
- The most valuable findings are the ones about water, structure and safety; almost everything else is maintenance.
- What the report excludes is as informative as what it includes.
The order an inspector works in
The sequence follows water and load, because those are what destroy buildings.
Inspection order follows water and load
- Sitewhere water goes when it lands
- Roof and envelopebuilding meets weather
- Structurefoundation, framing, movement evidence
- Systemsheating, cooling, ventilation, plumbing, electrical
- Interiorsurfaces read as symptoms
The site. Where does water go when it lands. Grade sloping toward the building, blocked drainage, or a downspout discharging at a foundation explains more interior damage than any other single cause.
The roof and envelope. Covering condition, flashings, penetrations, gutters, cladding, openings. This is where the building meets the weather and where nearly all water entry begins.
The structure. Foundation, framing where visible, evidence of movement. Cracks are read for pattern and direction rather than for width alone, because the pattern says whether something is settling, rotating or shrinking. Reading those patterns across a whole house is the method set out in mansions architecture, where roof seams date each campaign of work.
The systems. Heating, cooling, ventilation, plumbing, electrical. Inspectors test what can be operated safely and report what they could not.
The interior. Surfaces are read as symptoms. Sloping floors, doors that will not close square, and stains are all indications pointing back at one of the categories above.
What the report cannot tell you
| Limitation | Why it exists |
|---|---|
| Visual and accessible only | Nothing is opened up; what is behind a finished surface is unknown |
| One day, one set of conditions | A leak that appears in driving rain may not appear at all |
| Not a code compliance review | Existing buildings are lawfully nonconforming in many respects |
| Not a valuation | Condition and value are different questions entirely |
| Specialist areas excluded | Structural engineering, environmental testing and geotechnical work are separate disciplines |
The exclusions section of a report deserves as much attention as the findings. An inspector who could not access a roof space, a crawl space or an electrical panel has told you where the unknowns are, and the unknowns are where the expensive surprises live.
What the report cannot tell you
- Visual and accessible only
- One day, one set of conditions
- Not a code compliance review
- Not a valuation
- Specialist areas excluded
Reading findings by consequence
The useful way to sort findings is by what happens if nothing is done.
Sort findings by consequence
Is there active water entry?
stop it first, damage compounds
check if structural movement is progressive
An inspection on an older building needs an extra layer, since a repair routine on a modern house can destroy historic fabric.
The published reasoning on what constitutes appropriate treatment is in the Secretary of the Interior's Standards for Rehabilitation. The specific case of additions is in Preservation Brief 14 on new exterior additions.
What to do with the report
Read it twice, once for the findings and once for the limitations. Then put it beside the documentary record, because an inspection describes the building today and the permit file describes how it got here.
Where the two disagree, chase that disagreement: work that appears in the fabric but not in the file, or a permit with no physical trace.
How to read that documentary record is set out in what a permit file shows, and the physical evidence of past campaigns is in reading interior phases and the anatomy of a large house. Why public records exist at all and what they can support is in how property records work.
The records themselves are specific: the building department's permit file, which shows what work was permitted and inspected, and the county recorder's land records, which show who owned the property and when it changed hands.
How the inspection sits inside the purchase or sale
The inspection happens inside an inspection contingency written into the purchase agreement. That is a set, negotiated number of days after the contract is signed during which the buyer can have the building inspected, receive the report, and ask the seller for something. Nothing else in the contract waits on it, but the deadline does.
None of this changes with the size or the price of the building. A mansion sale and a mid-range house run the same sequence, at different scale.
Specialist inspections sit outside the general scope and are ordered separately, usually within the same window: radon, mold, wood-destroying insects and other pests, a sewer scope, well and water quality, septic systems, asbestos and lead-based paint. Each is arranged, paid for and reported on its own.
On the sale side the federal rule is specific: a seller of housing built before 1978 must disclose known lead-based paint and lead-based paint hazards and give the buyer the EPA pamphlet and an opportunity to test, under the Residential Lead-Based Paint Hazard Reduction Act. Most states then layer on their own seller's property condition disclosure statement, which covers known defects.
After the report the buyer has three realistic routes: ask the seller to make repairs, ask for a credit or a price reduction instead, or accept the condition and proceed. The seller can agree, refuse or negotiate, and if the two sides cannot settle, the contingency usually lets the buyer withdraw and recover the earnest money.
The ask is not a conversation. It is written into the contract paperwork, usually as a repair addendum or an amendment to the purchase agreement, and once both sides sign it, it forms part of the contract.
Whatever is agreed gets confirmed at the final walk-through shortly before closing, when the buyer checks that the work was done and that the building is in the condition the contract describes.
Common questions
Is an inspection a guarantee?
No. It is a professional opinion about accessible conditions observed on a date. Reports say this plainly and the sentence is not boilerplate.
Should I be present for it?
If you can. An hour walking a building with someone explaining what they are looking at teaches more than the report does, and it lets you ask about the things that are hard to write down.
How many cracks are too many?
The wrong question. Pattern, location, direction and whether movement is continuing are what matter. A single crack in the wrong place is more serious than many in the right ones.
Does an old building need a different inspector?
Often yes. Someone used to modern construction may read a historic detail as a defect, and may recommend a repair that damages the building. Experience with the construction type is the qualification that matters.
