Tiff
Moisture meter
and combustion analizer
all in good shape and working order
and who said mandatory E$O wouldn’t effect the HI industry :roll:
Sorry to hear that George, Good luck in your future endeavors.
George,
Really am sorry to hear our industry and the consumers are loosing you.
Our loss will be some other industry’s gain.
Best wishes for you and your family.
Always gave me a sense of pride when I saw your posts and logo.
I’m sad to hear the bad news. We need good inspectors like yourself.
I noted on your web site a comment that TREC is going to start
taking disciplinary action now, even without complaints. Can you,
or anyone reading this post, provide more information about this
new TREC positron. Thanks much.
Gentlemen, all signs that after thirty-plus years our industry has come of age, hence the incursion by ASTM, which will have the support of rich lobbying groups. Money talks, and no doubt we’ll soon be paying a $75.00 registration fee to ASTM and a $1.00 per report fee to use their standards.
John, SB914, that included the infamous E&O provision also includes a myriad of other provisions such as:
What does this mean, in the real world?
I don’t like the words that the “staff” can file a complaint.
Is this going to be the TREC “Gestapo” clause? :roll:
Some think it is. I take it to mean that if one of the staff attorney’s is told of an issue of any kind with an HI then they can instigate an investigation on their own and not have to wait for a private citizen to complain formally and officially. My guess is that this will open the flood gates for inspectors to start tattling, via e-mails and phone calls, on their competition hoping that TREC will get involved.
Do you also know that SB914 removed most of the caps on fees that TREC may charge? The cost of keeping our licenses will surely increase dramatically over the next couple of years. Do you know that this also will allow TREC to more easily migrate to the NHIE? The cost to administer and take the NHIE is much more than the current proprietary proctored exam and the fee that could be charged an applicant was one of the reasons that was keeping TREC from going to the NHIE. Personally, I don’t really care which one is given but several Inspector Committee members favored the NHIE.
Is there a law in place that enables the TREC “staff” to arbitrarily go
after real estate agents? appraisers? or just home inspectors?
TREC is the state’s regulatory agency for the following:
- Real Estate Brokers and Salespersons
- Real Estate Inspectors
- Education Providers for Real Estate and Inspection Courses
- Residential Service Companies
- Timeshare Developers
*]Easement Or Right-of-Way (ERW) agents
Appraisers are licensed and governed by a separate board: http://www.talcb.state.tx.us/AgencyInfo/default.asp
Thanks guys –
Here is a little update-
I am now in Illinois, my birth state and am currently an apprentice Electrician,
So all my study and involvement in the HI industry was not a total waste and has already been of use in my new occupation (hopefully my last occupation change).
I will really miss the North Texas NACHI meetings; the guys there were great.
Best of luck
Good Luck George! Stay in touch with us.
George, give me a call.
Licensing solves nothing.
This is the conclusion made by the Ohio Real Estate Commission after having reviewed the work of the Texas Real Estate Commission (and others) who tried to improve the quality of inspections and inspectors through legislative efforts, and failed.
Real estate salesmen need to limit themselves to real estate sales and stay out of the inspection business. Texas, a state whose inspectors have been under the control of the commissioned real estate salesmen longer than any other, is proof.
You folks should begin to organize a counter effort, in my opinion, and show your public the need to separate you from TREC by repeal.
JB, we will get right on that. But, before we do, I think it prudent to point out that we have debated the merits of that Ohio study here on the board at least once before. I personally can’t get too worked up over the ASHI-fied, junior college white paper. Also, it’s funny how different folks can read the same thing and come to different conclusions isn’t it? The last paragraph of the paper’s conclusion statement says:
I’m confused, how does that statement not support licensing?
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We all believe that the SoP is a benefit and a good guideline for home inspectors
and a help to the consumer.
Licensing is basically putting in place an enforcement to the SoP.
To agree with he SoP and disagree with the enforcement is an oxymoron.
The SoP will never create a new heart or a perfect integrity in the inspector,
but the enforcement puts a little fear in place to disobey it. It will never be
perfect, but it has some benefits.
Not all laws are evil. The enforcement of the SoP is licensing. I don’t like
drivers licenses or mandatory insurance either, but I can see it’s benefits
everyday.
For every example of enforcement against abuse, it can be show how the
laws did their job to mandate the desired standard. In the end, order and
law will bring better results than arbitrary chaos pretending to police
itself.
To give an opinion on the huge expense of a home is an important
responsibility. I think in the end, the public is better served
by enforcing the SoP and holding inspectors accountable, than just
allowing random opinions to become the norm, with no enforcement
in place to check the abuser of this responsibility.
Does the threat of enforcement make me do a better job? Yes.
But just because some will seek to abuse this power, does not make
the power evil of itself.
Some states have no law in place to prosecute the inspector and
therefore have very low complaints on file. When there is no law
then there appears to be no violations. But this is not sound
reasoning.
When the HI associations came along and told the public that
membership in their group would help assure that approved
inspectors now follow a strict SoP, it looked like a good thing.
When the states come along and enforce these same SoP,
we call it licensing. Nothing has basically changed, except
for the enforcement.