NOT interested in a “which software is best” debate. I’m going to fill-in at my old company while the new owner is out with a new baby. Since I sold, he’s gone to Spectora and I’m wondering if it’s reasonable and worth it to learn the new system for +/- a month of inspections. The alternative is using our old MS Word/PDF template but I don’t think the new owner it too excited for that. Fwiw, I watched a couple YouTube videos and it looks pretty straightforward.
Can he walk you through it over Facetime?
Thanks Jeff… my former employee… now my boss I guess 
is going to get me all set I’m sure. I’m just doing the preliminary research. I’ll let you know if I need anything.
Learning the mechanics of writing a report in the software is easy. The learning curve is knowing where all your narratives are organized.
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Yeah, the search function looks pretty useful. Especially, since I know all the keywords since his narratives are essentially the ones I left him that I developed over the years.
One thing I’m still a bit curious about is the software seems very aimed towards individual problems. I do a lot of writing up a whole system… for example, the entire outside of a house is trashed. My current method is to make a general comment and put in 5 or 6 supporting pictures. I’m hoping there’s a way to do that with Spectora. Or, even a less than trashed system but one you’d like to give a couple pictures of. Maybe two caulk joints at tubs in two bathrooms… I always HATE reports that don’t group things like that. It’s just such a waste of time/effort writing it and reading the same problem replicated in more than one area.
That’s an interesting take but I can understand that anyone unfamiliar with a new system may feel that way.
No. The software is easily adaptable to any problem or narrative “on the fly” and this includes any “major” or “general” system, sub-system, or any component…per Inspection
I do this often. New “Whole System” comments are easy to add as well on an individual Inspection. I know you would probably want to use Bert as a quick walk-through since He’s The Best!, but I’m available to help out as well, like a Zoom or FaceTime call.
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Thanks for the reply… I guess the root of my question is, can I list a given problem and give more than one photo?
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As far as I know, the amount of photos with Spectora is unlimited but I’ve never “pushed the boundaries”. The feedback from you pros is to include around 4 photos on average for any given problem…on average I do around 4 to 6 but I’ve never felt limited by the amount of photos that I can add in Spectora. I’ve never tried more than 8-ish but maybe @ruecker can chime in on the most photos he’s ever been able to include on a given narrative.
Edit: I don’t know why I didn’t include @bhull1 as a reference…long day 
Thanks… I’m probably jumping the gun. I just see all the comments in Spectora as a single clickable block with a number, 2.1 etc., and a single picture. I’d hope I could have “2.1” with 4 or 6 pictures. Maybe once I click the block there are more pictures?
At first glance it just seems very, “Here is a single, specific problem, here is the picture.” I like to inspect/report a bit more generally at times, when it’s necessary.
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I get what you’re saying. Spectora can definitely do the general reporting that you’re looking for. Although, what you stated is what makes Spectora so fantastic for on-site reporting with 60 to 90% of the report completed on site and the “canned” narratives are so easily modified on-site and at home to easily turn the canned narratives into custom-made narratives per Inspection or being able to create custom narratives on-the-fly. It’s late and I’m hoping Ryan and Bert can back me up tomorrow and better articulate what I’m trying to say
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Yes, you can have at many pictures as you want.
From yesterday. Some mook just beat the hell out of the Vinyl in this home. There were probably 30 holes in this home.
This isn’t a very good narrative, I added it while I was standing there, the guy was there too, he just said make a note. So note he got. I have some more specific string trimmer one, but this had to be a mower running over stones.
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Your narrative can be for anything and you can attach as many pictures or videos to it as you want. I have several “whole system” narratives like you describe. The most common one for me is when a deck is a complete tear down/rebuild. No use listing every single issue as a separate call out and clogging up the report. I make a list of the issues inside the narrative and then attach a few pictures.
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