Good Morning,
Wanted to figure out pricing on a multi-family home inspection. Do I just price it like another home inspection?
My base price for homes under 1500 is $350.
For every 500 sq ft I tack on $50.
Another question how do you all do inspections in rain?
Any tips on order of inspection? I’m assuming you don’t get on roofs? What about crawls? Exterior El panels?
Ps. I’m in SoCal.
How many units are you inspecting? It’s generally considered commercial over four units. CCPIA has some resources for this type of inspection: Multi-Family Dwelling Inspection Fee Matrix - CCPIA
Pricing is normally determined by your local market and more importantly, by what you feel your level of expertise is worth.
I inspect in the rain the same as I do on a dry sunny day, except I get wet. 
I don’t climb roofs in the rain or if there’s a T-storm in the vicinity.
I always try to get in as many places as I physically and safely can.
Not a good idea to remove dead fronts outside in the rain, here again I also won’t inspect the panels, inside or out if there are T-storms in the vicinity.
Thank you.
So I’m working on pricing for online scheduling,
I’m not ccpia member. Working on my commercial cert. So I’m not doing more than 4 units right now.
Thanks
Pricing multi-family home? Please describe.
A: Duplex. I charge &750.00 to 800.00. $50.00 to $100.00 more per unit. B: Triplex. C: Fourplex. D: Five plex. E: Simplex. Apartment building. Starting 1000.00 Investment property. I have to see the property.
Hope that helps.
If you have your commercial prerequisite course completed and insured for GL, everything 5 units and up is consider residential/commercial and is inspected as if commercial.
For multi-family my basic strategy is to take total SF/age like I would for a house and add extra $75 for each unit for the extra kitchen, panel, etc. I’ll have my office schedule these up to four units as that system works fairly well. Over four and I research it online and do a custom bid.
So that is fine for single family. But pretty low for multi-unit in my opinion.
Example 8,000 sq. foot quadraplex. Your formula results in a $1000 fee. I do not know your market, but that is a bit underpriced in my opinion. Age and foundation type is also a factor.
Also keep in mind, with Multi Family inspections, you will more than likely have multiple water heaters, multiple HVAC units, multiple electrical/sub panels. I wouldn’t go off your base price + additional square footage formula.
Our friend and veteran inspector @rlewis5 has a good formula. “Soak 'em! Yep” 
I typically use by sq ft formula (similar to yours) and add $150 per additional unit. Sometimes more if I need to make it worth it. But I also add more$ based on age.
But most of the ones I’ve done are only about 1k sf per unit.
My Canadian brother is knocking it out!!
Thanks Brian I’ll definitely work on that. I just have a problem calling up other inspectors getting prices like that. 
Can you give me an example how you do sq ft/ age.
Say on 1500 sq ft house 40 year old house.
Maybe with a 900 sq ft granny flat. Or guest house.
Thanks, Paul.
Remember, Canadian-American currency exchange, and what the home inspection market fee rate is in my neck of the woods. I wrote a blog article, many years ago called, [Cost of a home inspection] I change the year yearly…(BUYING A HOME - Montreal Home Inspector | Montreal Home Inspections). Tell me what you think.
Amen! In addition to what you mentioned…my first and only (so far) multiple dwelling was a Tri-Plex and it had two separate crawlspaces which I didn’t realize until I was on-site. That added some additional time to the inspection.
My fee was $895. It was a 1959 build, 3500 Sq Ft, 5 Bed/3 Bath, 3 Unit complex. This was in Menlo Park, CA (San Francisco Bay Area). My area is much more expensive than many parts of the country so don’t use my pricing to determine yours. I determined this price from feedback on this forum and reviewing pricing from my competitors in this area.
EDIT: I priced my fee at about 75% of what my competition charges. While being a newer inspection company, as an InterNACHI inspector, I feel I have many add-ons/perks that my competition doesn’t such as Move-In Certified Inspections and I participate in the Buy-Back Guarantee.
Good read,A lot of good information to take in. Thank you!
I bought my first house when I was 25 years old and you know that saying, “if I knew then what I know now”
It’s true.
I probably would have gotten an inspection and may have saved a-couple extra bucks. But in the end I came out a little ahead. I still own it and it’s probably worth 6 times what I paid for.
Yes! That is true for me.
The last time I check on recurring clients was less that 1 %.
I know my services with the experience I have, will save my clients much more than that.
I don’t and never have came cheep!
However, Any and all of our inspections have and had stood upright in any legal capacities .
And the reasons for this. Is just simple client inspector intergetry.
We (I) will never give in to anything that disrupts me telling my clients the absolute truth on our findings.
Do what you want, but after over 40 years it has worked for me.
Soak 'em and they will like it.
I price by unit, plus a show up fee.
I always want to go to a vacant unit first, if there is one, to get the feng shui of the building without visual clutter or… all the things tenants do in an apartment.
I also speak to tenants just casual like, and learn a lot. Last week I learned about a carbon monoxide poisoning from the week prior, not fully resolved.