All Forum Posts by: Jeffrey Bradbury

I wanted to update this post now that I've settled on this issue. I can't give much detail, but I can say that everything worked out great in the end. I also wanted to give a little advice for anyone in this type of situation.

1. Bring in a second inspector, contractor, engineer, etc. and document everything (get quotes).

2. Open a claim with the insurance company and stay on top of it.

3. Don't give up. It took almost two years and a lot of emails, phone calls, etc. get me to this point. I almost gave up a few times because I couldn't find any good advice and I ran into a lot of negativity.

4. If you know you're in the right, fight for yourself and don't be afraid to push back if it's not going the way you want it to.

I know this is vague, but there isn't much more to it than that. It's my opinion that mistakes are made and this is why people carry insurance.

Thank you for all for your responses to my post.

Wow, this question took a turn for the worse... to answer the question that keeps getting asked.  Yes, I was concerned and did ask him to look into it further.  He looked at what I was concerned with and I trusted his professional opinion.   I made a mistake in trusting him and he made a mistakes in his inspection.  My hope in coming here was that someone would have some useful advice for dealing with the situation that I'm dealing with now.   ...it's pretty clear that things should have been handled differently. 

@Mike McCarthy

Yeah, you and I are on the same page. It’s definitely worth perusing… now I just need to find an attorney. 

@Wayne Brooks

I'm talking about his liability insurance. 

@James Mc Ree

Many of the problems were visible enough for my wife and I to notice (with our new home buyer blinders on) and ask about. Anyone who I’ve bought out to look at them claims that there are obvious. It was negligence on his part. And in hindsight stupidity on mine.

This was not an investment property and my wife and I had our new home buyer goggles on. We relied on the home inspector to do a good job. 

@Wayne Brooks

It didn’t take a year and a half to find them. I have been running in circles with the process and insurance company for that long. They were clear problems very early on.

There are a number of issues and some of the most visible and obvious in hindsight were:

Sagging floors and ceilings.

Cracking on joists and beams.

Sagging in a large double door entrance with cracking on the drywall above it.

The main floor clearly arching over the pain beam that supports the house with clear separation between the hardwood. 

@Carl Fischer

What issues were missed? I’ve had a few contractors come in and without prompting them they were able to quickly point out all the issues that I noticed and then some.

There are a number of issues and some of the most visible and obvious to me in hindsight were:

Sagging floors and ceilings.

Cracking on joists and beams.

Sagging in a large double door entrance with cracking on the drywall above it.

The main floor clearly arching over the pain beam that supports the house with clear separation between the hardwood.

It didn’t take people who knew what they were doing long to tell me how much work I had ahead of me. I also brought out and architect to determine how to best tackle the problem.

Were they visible? Very, some were event pointed out to him during the inspection and we were told they were nothing to worry about and they never made it into his report. Unfortunately, they ended up being part of a much bigger problem.

How did you find the structural problems? I started looking into fixing the items that I was told were minor only to be told that they were in no way minor.

Why did it take a year and a half? I reached out to the inspector and got the run around there. I then reached out to the insurance company and there were a lot of unreturned phone calls, emails, etc. I started reaching out early, but I didn’t rush the process because I wasn’t sure what the process was. I foolishly assumed that the insurance company was going to work with me and hoped I could avoid getting a lawyer involved. They pointed me to their internal lawyer and once he found out it was a big fix he then pointed me to an external law firm that handles these claims for them.

I could write a book about my foolishness in trusting people here…

Were the problems hidden? Many of them were visible.

Was the inspector an engineer? Did his contract limit his liability to the cost of the inspection? Did you checkout the inspector credentials? Did you just take the inspector the realtor gave you? Etc?

I took the inspector that the real estate agent recommended. From what I can have seen he is a legitimate home inspector with liability insurance. I have almost all of the paperwork together and there isn’t anything that I’ve seen that limits his liability. I know he was not happy because he has a $5k deductible.

Ask another engineer inspector to give you an opinion on what was done and what should have been done then make your decision as what to do.

I’ve spoken with other inspectors, contractors, and had a structural engineer on site and they all claim that the problems were visible and should have been caught. I’m already roughly $2000 deep in fees and will be taking this to court. I’m struggling to find someone who works in this area of law and/or has any confidence that these types of cases can be won.

My problem is that the insurance company is not responding to me anymore and I can’t find an attorney.

Hello All,

I picked up a property about a year and a half ago. I had a home inspection that missed some big structural issues. Repairs estimates are between 60k-100k. I’ve reached out to his liability insurance very early on and they ran me in circles for over a year and now they have just stopped responding. The last message they sent me was one claiming that they were going to send out someone to look at things, but that was a few months ago.

I’m struggling to find anyone in the Southborough, MA area who is willing to even look at the case. The few that I’ve spoken with tell me that it’s unlikely that they could win this type of suit – this is without even looking at anything. If this was a few grand I wouldn’t bother, but this is a lot of money for me.

Have you ever had to go after a home inspector? Any advice at all? Do you have an attorney you have used or could recommend?

Thanks In advance! 

I recently purchased a property that needs some structural work. I've had a structural engineer look it over and it looks like the main beam may need to be replaced as well as a large number of joists. I've had a few people out to look at it but I can't seem to get anyone to quote the job. I get the “I’ll have it next week” until I stop calling.

Thanks,

Jeff

@Robert Leonard Thanks for the comments.  My thoughts were to pay market on the first and make it up on the second, so that he gets more of his money up front and assuming that I can get a lower price on the second and good financing, I make it up for things on that side.  

I guess I'm wanting it to work, and maybe that's clouding my judgement.  

That said, it looked like the numbers were going to be tight, but still be positive.  My (rough) assumption was one month empty, 10% for repairs, 10% for misc -- and it still left me putting a few dollars in my pocket each month.  Any info on where I'm messing up on this would be greatly appreciated!  (I'm not doubting you, just trying to refine my "process")

Thanks again!