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[Dave my comments are in brackets. Some you may wish to work into the text, others should at least be part of discussions about this document and process. Sorry it’s so wordy. Like a teen-aged boy I sometimes think too much with my fingers. Dan 2016/09/27]Home Inspectors[Change to “Home Inspections & Reports”] The purpose of a home inspection is to protect the buyer from unknowingly purchasing a house that has serious defects.? Vassar’s leasehold policy states that the College will hire a home inspector before buyback of a leasehold property. The purpose of this inspection should be to identify for the College any serious problems with the? property.? In effect the College should be using inspection information to decide at what price a buyback should happen. ?[Note: “Serious problems” means either Costly repairs necessary to keep the home habitable, safe, and / or to stop rapid, costly deteriorationorUnsafe conditions observed by the inspector regardless of cost.Both of these categories need attention. I would say: The purpose of a home inspection is to identify costly problems or immediate life-safety hazards at a property.?These need prompt attention. Some home inspectors may also recommend other repairs or improvements but those categories should be kept separate.The inspection report should make clear distinctions between necessary repairs (stop deterioration, make something work, correct an unsafe condition) and “improvements” such as better insulation or a bigger electrical panel or better windows. Note also that a home inspection does not normally include repair cost estimates. It identifies work that’s needed; The College or leaseholder will still have to come up with repair cost estimates. Some inspectors may also offer repair services – those are people to avoid as there is an innate conflict of interest. ]Once a home inspection report is obtained [by the College] it should first be shared with the leaseholder.? This would allow the leaseholder the option of making corrections or repairs prior to buyback, a process that should impact the sales price.[Note: delete “first” ? – to whom else are they giving the report? When?][Note: Inspection standards/ethics require that the inspection report be provided by the inspector only to his/her client unless instructed by the client to do otherwise. Once the client has the report they can share it with others. This creates an unavoidable third-party-risk that worries some home inspectors. ] [Note: The report will also improve safety for the occupants of the home, and should responsibility for home maintenance and repairs later fall to the College it will be better able to know about and thus perform those tasks.] The faculty handbook states that the College will make available the inspection report to potential buyers and this is nobel of the College but it further states that the buyer should arrange for their own home inspection, which is sound advice.[Change nobel to noble].[Note: … which is sound advice as it both avoids liability for the College and it permits the buyer to hear from their own, un-biased source who was paid-by and is working for them.] [Or a shorter version of that]. A home inspection report should not be shared with a home appraiser unless it is agreed upon beforehand that the report is to be shared with both the College’s appraiser and the leaseholder’s appraiser.?Since the College normally obtains an appraisal prior to the leaseholder sharing of an inspection report would normally occur only under rare circumstances.[Clear up the sentence above.][Note that because appraisers are not normally privy to the sort of information in a home inspection report, providing one may result in inconsistent appraised values: the appraiser may de-value a property for items found by the home inspector but will fail to similarly de-value properties used for comparables since the appraiser won’t have an inspection report for the comps.] The home inspector should be instructed to inspect for serious defects in the home including heating systems, plumbing, electric, exterior and interior conditions.? Minor details should not be part of an inspection by the College.? It is unreasonable or think a house would be free of all minor problems and so things that are obvious should not be included in an inspection. Again the purpose of an inspection is to identify major defects or safety issues.[Note: I addressed this earlier – above so all of this elaboration might be cut from the document including the paragraph above. Or replace it with a request to identify separately required repairs from improvements. “What’s a minor detail” is very arguable. “Instructing” a home inspector to leave out items is risky in part because there are judgments and will be disagreements about what is substantial and what is not. For example it may cost just a few dollars to replace a leaky TPR valve on a boiler but failure to do so could blow up the boiler and kill people in the house. Even bad lighting or missing lighting over a step, viewed as unimportant by an owner, can result in costly injury. Worst, a professional on the scene knows she is going to be held liable for failure to report even a “small detail” if later it hurts someone. An inspector doesn’t want a homeowner nor the College telling her to eschew what they, less expert, tell me what they don’t want in the report. Rather it’s fair to insist on separation between essential tasks and others. Most inspectors are willing to make that distinction. ]Inspections should include radon, wood destroying insects, asbestos, and mold. If a property is deemed asbestos-free this need not be repeated in future inspections. ?[Note: I do not recommend “mold inspections” – the sorts of tests that are performed are junk science and can significantly err in finding negative results. They are not worth their cost. DO NOT order “mold screening tests” for a property. Further, identifying mold genera/species will not change the required actions except in rare cases of cosmetic-only mold. However IF there is visible mold one can ask that it be reported. Note: most but not all home inspectors offer these ancillary tests and are especially reluctant to be held to having performed a survey for environmental hazards. These are not required by home inspection standards. It is most economical if radon and (Wood destroying insect) WDI tests can be performed by the same person performing the home inspection. A WDI inspection may indeed be appropriate to perform again at a property if a year or more has elapsed since last inspection since termites or carpenter ants move in when wood close to ground is wet – say from a gutter failure. ] ASHI or NACHI certified inspectorsInspectors?must be certified by either ASHI (American Society of Home Inspectors at? HYPERLINK "" \t "_blank" ) or by NACHI (InterNACHI -International Association of Certified Home Inspectors at HYPERLINK "" \t "_blank" ).? Furthermore inspectors must be licensed in New York State and have their center of operations in Duchess County.[I would not require center of operations in Dutchess County or you will find a too-small inspector pool, some of whom are rather light-weight. I would say “Hudson Valley” or “Southern New York State”. Puentes, e.g. whom some Vassar people liked, is from Kingston (Ulster County). Consumer SatisfactionASHI and NACHI only guarantee a level of training for a home inspector but do not evaluate consumer satisfaction with a business.? [underlined means what?] [Change “guarantee” to “require” – beware that these clubs have categories of membership with varying levels of both training and experience. ] [Here is a copy of the ASHI Standards of Practice & Code of Ethics: defining the minimum performance standard for home inspectors. ]This kind of information can be obtained from agencies like the Better Business Bureau or Angie's List and these should be consulted when choosing an inspector.? The College should maintain a list of home inspectors that have had grievances filed against them by leaseholders and these inspectors should be excluded from future inspections.[The BBB has proven nearly worthless for these purposes; Angie’s List may be useful but will absolutely be incomplete. These should not be required sources though they can be recommended.][If the college is going to maintain a gripe list – which is fair – there are, on reflection, some concerns: should the inspector be given opportunity to reply to a gripe and have it on file (similar to credit bureau reports)? Who evaluates the gripes for accuracy and fairness? Who has what recourse if an inspection is deemed unsatisfactory? We may need a review committee – a job I handled for ASHI for a time. Handling customer complaints was very educational. Do you think Angie’s List could do this function?]Inspector ListIt seems of little value for the College to maintain a list of certified inspectors since these inspectors can be identified using resources at the URL’s listed above.? [Note too that any independent list maintained by the college will become quickly obsolete as it may not reflect additional qualified inspectors new on the scene or not known to the college. Avoiding its own list of “approved” inspectors also avoids wasting energy bickering over just whom the inspector actually feels obligated to please. There has been a history of falling off of the approved list for not always the best reasons.] The only requirements for an inspector to be used by Vassar College are three:? Licensed to perform home inspections in the State of New York[Note that in New York licensed professional engineers or architects are also permitted to perform home inspections without having to have a separate “home inspector’s license but the RA or PE should be someone familiar with residential construction and home inspection standards.]Certified? by ASHI or NACHI [Note that there may be other home inspector associations doing business in New York and who may gripe at being excluded but these two remain my recommendations. Some of the others have very minimal acceptance standards, possibly simply paying a fee.]Doing business in Dutchess County. [Note that the inspector may reside outside of Ducthess county elsewhere in southern New York but be familiar with and doing business in Dutchess.] ? ................
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