Home Inspection Course?

[Jamie Blair]

Hi All, I'm considering taking a couple online classes from the St. Lawrence College Home Inspection course, perhaps the Structural Inspection & Electrical Inspections classes to start. 

I have 2 objectives I would like to achieve:

1. Become more knowledgeable on the "important stuff" when walking through a building for this first time. I always hear "look at foundation, electrical, floor joists etc." but when I get there are look, I feel like it still doesn't tell me anything lol

2. Have the option of submitting a more competitive bid if a deal seems worth it (by leaving out the inspection condition). I know the landscape is changing and multiple bids on every property are declining, and maybe home inspection conditions are coming back, but for SFH, I feel like it will still be a while yet, so I would like to have this option in my pocket.

I'm a chemical engineer and my partner is a software developer, so although we're in technical fields, I feel like we don't have any useful transferrable skills that help us determine the quality of a building. What are your thoughts on this plan? Or home inspection courses in general? Has anyone taken other courses and felt more empowered?