Not near as easy to become an appraiser in most markets. Also much more demand as almost every transaction has an appraisal. I believe our job is much harder and just as valuable but supply and demand is keeping a lid on prices. I wonder how many appraisers have to bring donuts to the banks to try and get business? 
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$150+ to fill my truck up now with $5/gal gas. 1-2 tanks per week. Ridiculous.
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July 1st my prices are going up. Most of my calls on average are almost 100 km round trip with some a lot longer. Diesel fuel here is $2.21 per litre ( $8.90 per US gallon for info). Costs are going up so fast that even adding a fuel surcharge isn’t cutting it.
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Of all the things being talked about in this thread I think this gets to the root problem. It’s too damn easy to become an inspector in most areas. Lots of states don’t even have licensing yet. In states that do it’s still pretty easy. Appraisers in Oregon need to apprentice under another appraiser and need a four-year college degree.
Fwiw, being an appraiser is no cake walk these days. The refi end of their business is completely gone and, as we all know, new purchases aren’t exactly booming.
I just ran into an agent I know with her appraiser husband and he told me he’s probably going to start driving Uber!
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This is intentional. Realtors love bad inspectors and bad inspectors who look the other way are often very successful. You don’t actually have to know much of anything. There are many of them and they are often also the low ballers on price because they don’t actually do anything. They just get the easy low hanging fruit and recommend further evaluation for everything else. It’s how many people play this game.
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Yup exactly. This conincides with my reply as well.
I know each area is different. But, it costs me plenty to keep up with all my licenses, equipment calibration, certifications, registrations and CE to legally work in a Tri-state area. It takes time to keep up with code updates, even though we are not code inspectors. The real problem is most people don’t even know that they got a bad inspection because you don’t know what you don’t know. As we know, it can take time for some things missed to manifest itself. By then, the quick, cheap, subpar inspector is gone.
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True Robert.
I just raised my prices for home inspections by $100 back on July 1st of this year. I’m at $600 now. I also raised my prices for radon, mold testing, chimney inspections by $100 each. It has cost me maybe one low baller client since. No one else has even said a word about the increase. Not a single word. Wishing I had done this sooner. This small change will add $35-50K in income for me annually. Every one of us should do this.
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The biggest problem for this industry is if we don’t stop the W3F GL0Bl$T from taking over our economy we all loose.
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The answer to 1984 is 1776.
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Would it work for you to lease a smaller road trip vehicle, keeping the truck for the occasional Dempster Highway trip?
Leases in Canada are VERY expensive and it would end up that I would be paying more for the lease than I make. Also the inspections I do are in mostly rural areas so 30 miles of gravel roads would play havoc on any small vehicle. Of course right now with our market so dead (nothing since beginning of October) it is really not a problem either way.
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Could not agree more!
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I disagree. I don’t think it’s the school’s fault at all. They aren’t responsible for how a CPI goes out into the field and acts. In my personal experience of buying a home 15 years ago, the CPI was useless, to be nice. He didn’t explain what he was checking for - or why. He just showed up, complained about the electrical system, said the garage needed torn down, said the house was not worth buying, etc. So, in my personal experience at that time, I thought the home inspector was a rip off. But the problem is that the CPI at the time was one of those “I know everything and I’ve been doing it for 20 years” types of people that have knowledge but can’t interact with people at all.
Most companies separate their engineers & techs from the customer, with a customer service dept/sales dept in between to handle the customer’s questions. As a CPI, we are the experts, but we also need to master the customer service and sales part too. It’s hard when Real Estate agents talk-down the home inspection value, but it’s something we need to overcome by “selling” ourselves to each and every client.
InterNACHI spends a lot of time focusing on how to communicate with clients, but it’s not their fault if someone gets the license and goes out to the field acting like a “good old boy”. It’s not the world we live in anymore. No one gets to just show up and expect respect.
I totally get what you’re saying, and I agree with many points, but I can’t say it’s a school’s fault. That would be like blaming schools for bad doctors and lawyers. Some are experts but can’t communicate in a user-friendly way, but the best ones figure it out.
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I 100% agree. It doesn’t matter what anyone else is charging. I am priced well over the competition in my area and have not had any issues. I am busy enough that I am hiring. I never understood why a. Inspectors undervalue themselves or b. Think they have to stay in the low competitive pricing market. I do a lot of ancillary work, stay overly busy and don’t care what others are charging.
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That’s great Jennifer! I wish you the best of luck!
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Well said & worth repeating.
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