Do you cover neighborhood environmental hazards in your report?
I don’t even cover property environmental hazards in my inspections, much less neighborhood or city.
I wouldn’t either. Best just to refer your clients to Neighborhood Environmental. That was the reason we set it up.
Nick,
Law suits, disclosure firms changing names, lack of completeness and accuracy on the part of the disclosing firm, lack of E & O insurance by the disclosing firm, etc…
We wouldn’t want to end up in a lawsuit involving maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars over a $12 referral fee.
Will… What is a “disclosing firm” ? I’m not following.
I’m not Will, but a disclosing firm is the company that creates, prints, and distributes all the dislosing forms to the realty brokerages so that their agents can disclose knowing absolutely nothing about the houses they help buy and sell.
Just a guess. 
:mrgreen:
I don’t know what he means either.
Anyway, we have 2 inspectors who are being threatened with lawsuits by their clients for not telling the client something pertinent about the *neighborhood. *In one case, the buyer was from out of town. Anyway, the problem for the inspectors is that in each case, the inspectors admitted to knowing about the issues in the area but didn’t think they had a duty to report it to their clients.
It would have been nice if they could tell the Judge that they told their clients that they don’t do neighborhood environmental reports, that they recommended to their clients to consider getting one, that they gave their clients a link to a firm that offers them, that they even got their clients a discount… but the client declined to take the inspectors advice and declined to order a neighborhood environmental report.
REMEMBER: Avoid libility by always recommending that your client acquire any service that you don’t offer. Mold taught us that.
I think I agree with everything in your post. Have we ever agreed on everything before? 
I’m referring to the Natural Hazards Disclosure reporting firms, “The disclosing firm or company” The company which is generating the natural hazards report. The company which is being referred via an independent inspection company website, (mine for example). I reside and operate my company here in California. If something goes wrong with a report from a company referred by me, what’s my downside liability? I’d like to exercise one of my NACHI membership benefits by having Joe Ferry weigh in on the subject of referral liability regarding “Natural Hazards Disclosure Reports” and their associated companies.
“In 2005, some of the largest California hazard disclosure firms were sold within months of being sued in a class action lawsuit that exposed them to enormous liability for research errors. Some of those same companies are now operating under different names.”
Good natural hazards disclosure providers will:
- Base their research on the most up-to-date and detailed local and state information
- Base their research on your unique property boundaries—not some random computer icon (i.e. a caricature of a house, star or dot) that does not accurately reflect your property
- Clearly outline whether the subject property is in a hazard zone
- Give details of the source of information contained in the report
- Guarantee the completeness and accuracy of its reports
- Carry sufficient “errors and omissions” (E&O) insurance coverage
It appears the 2005 class action lawsuit in California involved “Natural Hazards Disclosure Reporting Companies” not operating with the above referenced protocols and or standards in mind.
My question of Joe Ferry is:
Can I be held liable for the errors, omissons and or unethical business practices of a “Natural Hazards Disclosure Reporting Firm/Company” which was referred through my website and or for which I received a referral fee?
That may work if you make a “point to” URL, with “NE” as a shortcut.
Considering that it will rarely fit on one line, and I want to put it in my brochure, also, I guess I’ll stick with:
NEW! Let www.NeighborhoodEnvironmental.com](http://www.neighborhoodenvironmental.com/) research your city** and send you a report which includes everything from the status of local hazardous waste sites to heath risks specific to your neighborhood. Enter my NACHID number (NACHI0**3060502) in the Referral Code box for $10 off. P.S. - I am awarded a $12 referral fee if you enter my NACHI ID# in the Referral Code box - Thanks!
Sounds interesting but I’ll wait until I see the sample report.
You’re right. The method was meant for people linking to the site from your home page. For that, I’d use the following code:
<a href="http://www.neighborhoodenvironmental.com/index.php?ref=YOUR_NACHI_ID">
http://www.neighborhoodenvironmental.com/
</a>
Which will produce a link that looks like:
http://www.neighborhoodenvironmental.com/
But points to your special referral code.
Sorry, Chris, you’re over my head.
I’d need a specific (whatever) emailed to me. It’s too deep for this backwoodsman!
Here’s what your custom HTML would look like:
<p><em><strong>NEW! Let <a href="http://www.neighborhoodenvironmental.com/index.php?ref=NACHI03060502">www.NeighborhoodEnvironmental.com</a> research your city</strong> and send you a report which includes everything from the status of local hazardous waste sites to heath risks specific to your neighborhood. Use the link above for $10 off. P.S. - I am awarded a $12 referral fee if you use my link - Thanks!</em></p>
That would produce the following:
When you click on the link, your NACHI ID is automatically entered into the referral field. Try it out.
Hope that helps,
I think it is pretty obvious what Will is saying.
He is asking who is going to assume the liability if the reports that NE produces for the client as a result of the inspector referral are less than complete, or worse, inaccurate.
Am I correct Will?
There would seem to be different levels of liability between making a generic recommendation that a client seek out an environmental report and recommending a particular firm that you receive compensation from. If that firm screws up, it opens the inspector to being included in the resulting lawsuit.
This is the reason that (smart) real estate agents don’t refer one inspector but provide a list for clients to choose from or just point them at the internet. It’s the reason that some inspector E&O insurance companies offer coverage to include the real estate agents under referral coverage in an attempt to make a safe harbor for agents to refer inspectors.
Does Neighboorhood Environmental have E&O insurance that covers inspectors that refer clients?
Good to see your stil out there jim. See you at one of the meetings sometime…Larry
Wendy and Ronald,
Yes and exactly. The article I’ve posted earlier in this thread seems to be outlining the abuses listed in a massive class action lawsuit against most of the major “Natural Hazards Disclosure Reporting Firms” doing business in California. Other aspects of the suit involved real estate agents receiving kick backs or referral fees from these services and companies. Could we as inspectors be drawn into a future lawsuit as a result of the referral gone wrong and or acceptance of the referral fee?
Where’s Joe Ferry?
Does the Neighborhood Environmental report match up with any of these reports from LGS? LGS and PropertyID appear to be the two major players for “NHDR” in California.
Here’s the article from Pillar to Post about Neighorhood Environmental and their parent firm EDR:
http://www.rismedia.com/index.php/article/articleview/14584/1/1/