How many of you guys do combustion test on your home inspections? I am going to start incorporating them into my inspections this year, but I’d like to hear what your client responses are. It seems the more inspections I bring in the more push back I get from agents in particular, which to be honest I couldn’t give a flip what the agents think. 80% of clients my come from previous clients or builders. Any suggestions or advice?
I do not do combustion tests on my home inspections.
What would you include in your combustion test?
A combustion analysis and a CAZ test depending upon the location of the equipment. I’ve found two water heaters this year that were backdrafting. One was in a garage and the other was in a mechanical room. The garage was backdrafting because the homeowner put in a high flow exhaust fan to pull fumes out of his wood working shop, little did he know he was pulling combustion gasses through his water heater. The mechanical room was backdrafting when the air handler was turned on because the system was leaking excessively at the supplies, causing a big negative pressure in the home. I just don’t see how I can inspect a home with gas appliances without testing them and sleep well at night.
Looks like you have been doing inspection for over ten years and now you want to do some thing that is not part of an inspection .
Where will this end .
We do visual inspections only .
Then why do you need our permission?
The State Law says you can do it. But as you stated you may get Realtors riled.
You decide.
I do them whenever I see the need. I do them to document that the “issue” is actually a real “problem”. No one will differ about that.
I have had to answer to the licensing board about doing stuff outside home inspection, so just be prepared…
That’s more along the lines I was thinking about using the analysis. To confirm an issue I suspect is present. I’m probably going to just make several programs that go above the standard home inspection and let my clients choose what they want. I doubt I will get many clients that want the whole thing. But I have noticed a trend in some clients, especially my age group that want a full analysis of the home. I did do a Vanderbilt surgeons new home months ago that wanted everything tested. Blower door, duct leakage, thermal imaging, radon, ect… The home tested very well actually; the only thing we had to do was get the ERV balanced.
I am anticipating more of these types of clients in the future as word gets out to the client base.
If inspecting is supposed to be just visual, then I guess all you need is a flashlight. No moisture meter, no psychrometer, no GFCI/AFCI tester?