Interesting and a great idea to give inspectors a goal to achieve and learn about inspecting as well.
After the program has been initiated, I wonder which one Nick will consider to be a more prestigious achievement.
Associates Degree or CMI?
IMO the associate Degree program will make one a better inspector but the CMI designation will carry more weight in the eyes of the home buying public.
This is great! When do you expect the details to be available?
(Credit hour requirements, applicable courses, etc.)
Thanks!
Indeed, it really wouldn’t make a great deal of sense if you already have a secondary degree in something else. C M I would make more sense.
Click the link in the 1st post of this thread.
So I had a question about the curriculum. Will we have to complete the same course over and over again to achieve the individual certificates that count towards the degree? Say take the Code of Ethics course 20 times for each program or is once enough for all of the certificates?
Once. There are no “certificates.” It’s a real college degree.
I can’t say I agree.
Most of the buying public has no idea what CMI stands for.
Most everyone has heard of a degree.
Nick,
Question for you:
Let’s say this is approved this year, and an inspector earns their AA at the start of next year, but said inspector has been inspecting for 1/2/5/10 years.
How does one present that they now have an AA dated earned in 2016 without unintentionally presenting the false notion that they are newbie who just started inspecting in 2016?
Or that prior to 2016 they somehow didn’t know what they were doing?
Just curious.
Let me rephrase that then.
IMO the associate Degree program will make one a better inspector but the CMI (Certified Master Inspector) designation will carry more weight in the eyes of the home buying public.
I used CMI because in the inspection industry most everyone has heard of it and knows what it means and certainly everyone here knows what it stands for.
But my point is 99.9% of the home buying public is not in the inspection industry. Most agents I talk to don’t even know what all the industry acronyms stand for. CPI/ASHI/CREAI/NAHI/CMI, it’s just a bunch of letters to most people.
TRID becomes law in August, and yet, a majority of people in real estate have no clue what that stands for.
Correct.*
Certified Master Inspector* is just one of those things that every consumer knows and understands the split second they see it for the first time.
I’d have to take an hour to explain to a consumer what InterNACHI is, or what I’m licensed to inspect, or what my insurance covers, or what my Standards of Practice requires of me. Maybe 2 hours. Maybe even 3 hours. Every inspector has some license or insurance or standards or is a members of this or that trade organization. Nobody cares about that crap. Even the guy who washes my windows is a member of some window washing association. I’m not joking.
But *Certified Master Inspector *is immediately understood by every consumer in about 2 seconds. All they have to do is read those three words and they instantly know (or think they know) that they found the right inspector.
Having a college degree in home inspections is going to be awesome… but from a marketing standpoint, it will never compare to Certified Master Inspector. Those three little words are magic.
If the degree is going to require around 1000 hours of study will that not qualify us for membership into the CMI as long as we have been in the industry for 3 years?
It will require a bit more than 1,000 hours. I don’t have the exact number yet, but Ben tells me it is more than 1,000 hours of online courses.
I should note that you don’t need 1,000 hours of continuing education to become a CMI. You need 1,000 inspections and/or continuing education hours combined. In other words the number of inspections you performed plus the number of continuing education hours you’ve completed have to add up to 1,000 or more. See: www.certifiedmasterinspector.org for more information about CMI. I don’t want this to turn into a CMI thread please.
How about both? 
I’m chompin’ at the bit here, I can’t wait…
Will online test scores be made public? Should the public have the right to know whether the inspector averages 98% on their tests? Or 77%?
That would up the game in differentiating between graduates, and a good motive to strive for perfection.
This goes back to CMI (I’m trying to not turn this into a CMI thread). When a member of the public needs a home inspector, they only spend 5 seconds researching. That’s it. I’ve been at this for 23 years and I handle all the incoming consumer emails. Not once in those 23 years did a consumer ask about exam scores. Not once. Again, you have 5 seconds to convince a consumer who is holding your brochure or has landed on your website that they have found the right inspector. 5…4…3…2…1. That’s it. Certified Master Inspector does the job for you with 2 seconds to spare. I suspect our college degree in home inspections will be similarly efficient and causing consumers to choose you.
They might have not known they exist in the first place.
Your point is well taken of what really matters. I guess it is similar to the prestige of the university, not necessarily their grades, that is important.
I wish every consumer did 5 hours of research before they chose an inspector. They don’t. They do 5 seconds.
It’s like a boxing match that is scheduled to go one 5-second round. When that bell rings, you’d better throw your very best punches.
Like this guy!
LOL! Exactly.