Limit on filing a claim against inspector

BTW, if you could bookmark this post and give us a follow-up it would be appreciated. I think many inspectors will benefit from your experience. Best of luck!

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“Cover it” as in write a policy or cover some damage that has occurred or cover a repair to the house?

The whole roof/insurance thing seems to be making quite a comeback into our industry. I say “comeback” because 20+ years ago when I started “roof certifications” were a huge thing. Then, everyone realized they aren’t worth the paper they are written on so the went away. But I’m hearing of a lot of new cases of people being denied coverage unless they get a roof cert. We’ve actually started working this into or reports on roofs over 10 years old. As HIs we just can’t protect ourselves against every speculative roofing contractor out there.

As for your immediate situation, I often differ from my colleagues on this but I’d hold off at least a bit before calling my E/O carrier. Talk to your client, get on site and see what’s going on, do some fact finding. They won’t deny a claim if you do a bit of investigation on your own. Just be measured/careful in your communication. Don’t admit any wrongdoing or fault, of course. The vast majority of complaints can be eliminated with little or no money from you. Certainly, nothing even close to your E/O deductible.

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Dear [customer name],

I received your complaint letter regarding the roof of the home at [address] which was inspected by A&E Home Inspection on June 2nd 2021. You hint that you intend to assert a claim against A & E Home inspection in connection with this inspection and the report you received.

I have a copy of the pre inspection agreement (contract) that you signed that states that a home inspection is a snapshot in time, a limited, non-invasive, visual inspection that is conducted under the InterNACHI standards of Practice (“SOP”) which may be found at nachi.org/sop.htm.

Under the SOP, home inspectors are not required to report on the “Life expectancy of any component or system” or “the cause(s) of the need of repair” or “Predict the future condition, including but not limited to failure of components”. Therefore a failure to identify damaged decking (not visible) or future shingle failure would not be negligent, as a matter of law.

I note that the inspection was one year ago and produced a detailed report that showed the roof to be in good condition at the time of the inspection.

Even if A&E Home Inspection had been negligent, which the facts conclusively establish that it was not, you would not be owed anything near the $15,000 you seek. Under the Law of Damages, the most you could hope for would be the cost of having the leak repaired, not a whole new roof. In other words, next to nothing. I should also note that in the past year Piedmont OK was pounded by several hailstorms, wind-storm events and over 40 inches of rain with no complaints from you. Your current issues were not observable during the inspection last year.

Finally, the pre-inspection agreement that you signed limits any recovery to the amount of the fee paid for the home inspection, $550.

While it is unfortunate that you have had issues this past week, A&E Home inspection will not voluntarily make any monetary contribution to your roof repair project.

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Our Inspection Agreement says 1 year to file, California says it also but actually it is 7 years now (used to be 4). The limit for damages is not recognized in California, Oh and by the way, California holds those damn Realtors responsible for only 1 year. We need a lobbyist,

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Check with a reputable roofer or your home owners insurance company. They have access to storm and hail history that may identify if your client has been in any hail storms in the last year.

That’s what I was thinking, David.

This is one of the sites we use to see if an area has had hail storms when we are doing litigation work.

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Nice mapping, Scott! :+1:

So do you. This is what I use.