This is not true.
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Not sure how that is not true? I send the report to lots of people; real estate agents, insurance agents, contractors but not without the permission of the client as it is a product that they paid for.
It is written in my inspection agreement that the home inspection report is my property for the use of my client. They are paying me for my time to perform an inspection and write a report. The report is my property for them to use. If they share my property with somebody who has not paid for it we got a problem.
Now the floodgates are open.
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The first thing to understand is what an inspection report is, which is only a written record of an inspector’s observations of a home and its systems at the moment he observed them. The observations, and not the document, is what the client paid for.
Your observations are yours and remain yours, otherwise you would need the buyer’s permission to use them to defend yourself in court if you provided incorrect information and he decided to sue you. Your observations never leave your custody or control.
The written record of your observations remains yours after it is sold, in the sense that the “purchaser” has no right to change the language in the report, replace photos in the report, or otherwise modify the report … which he could do if it actually was his property … without your permission.
Home inspectors complain that they are treated as a commodity rather than a professional, and this is one of the reasons for that. You do not sell a product. You sell a record of your professional observations. YOUR observations.
The difference in price for the observations of an old pro should be greater than the part-time newby, even though they are using the same digital checklist to record them.
The observations are yours. You own them. You are accountable for them. All you did was share them for a price.
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Ok. Sounds good. I will rephrase in that case. I choose not to share or resell my intellectual property that someone else has commissioned me for and paid for unless the person that paid me requests it or unless I am in court which should hopefully due to my level of scrutiny and professionalism shall hence forth never become prudent hitherto? Just playing…but yeah.
Justin Kirch
Pro-spection Home Inspections
Somewhat quick question ( I really should be working) is there any recourse for agents to be passing around my report to other perspective buyers without consent or payment as was stated earlier and I’m sure we have all experienced? Getting calls asking questions about the report because they are about to purchase the home instead. I’m like " Who are you?". In that case, if you do answer questions about it are you now opening yourself up to liability even though you dont know how they got it in the first place? And yes…all agreements, opening and closing paragraphs state that the reports are not transferable. Still happens though.
For me, nope.
I will answer a question from a skilled tradesmen working on behalf of my client or my clients realtor. And even then, only to clarify a comment in my report. I might get two calls a year.
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Just a quick tip. Fill out your profile in your settings and your business info will automatically be part of your posts. It is great for your SEO. But more importantly, it allows us to easily snoop on your website so we can give you advice you didn’t know you needed. 
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I have only had this happen one time, I inspected the same house about 15 days apart. I told the buyer and realtor, just in case they found out later, and gave about a 20% discount.
But then conducted another full inspection
Every inspection is unique. Things change with time. Same inspector, same house, different weather. Guess what. The heater that worked under 80 degrees doesn’t work the same on a day with a temperature of 30 degrees. The roof that didn’t look to have issues starts leaking during the second inspection when it starts raining. Morale of the story: same inspector, same house, same client = BRAND NEW inspection from scratch with a new fee (can be lowered for the same client). Also, the devil is in the details: Always use a well written inspection agreement that doesn’t leave room for interpretation. Last but not least: be consistent, be professional, be courteous and above all be knowledgeable and stand behind your findings. Knowledge is power.
P.S: sorry I don’t participate as much as I would like to.
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