I was thinking of you when I walked this roof. I kept telling myself if Charley can do it I can too.
Nice car Greg for a home inspector. 
Now you’re going to have to get yourself a red hat with the number 2 on it of course. ;)
Just to be The Devils Advocate, why walk that roof?
What can you see up there while you’re shaking in your boots that you can’t see from the ground?
You will never know unless you have been there.
Nice gig Greg be safe out there
A non answer and deferred answer.
Can’t do much with that.
To see the chimney cap, dormers and see the roof from another view.
Ya don’t see squat from the ground:( If you call yourself a HI you put two feet on the roof and walk it
You’re right.
Should of finished the caulking of the crown and flue while you were up there. ;)
All of which could be seen with binoculars and/or a pole camera.
I just don’t like to see inspectors putting themselves at risk
unnecessarily.
That is BS and you should know it
You have a right to your opinion.
Can’t check the bonding by looking at the shingles.
The defects that you can’t see from the ground…
You can from the roof edge or from a window.
I would simply like to see inspectors value their own safety first.
I’ve inspected both ways. From the ground, from a pole, from a ladder, from a drone, you can only see a fraction of what you can see from the rooftop. If you walked them, you wouldn’t need to have it explained to you, because you don’t know what you don’t see from the ground, unless you get up there and walk them. If I can inspect from the rooftop, I will. Doing less is performing an inferior inspection.
If you feel safer on the ground, that’s fine, you’re not required to climb and that is a personal decision for you to make, but don’t try to palm a ground inspection off as being just as effective as a walkover inspection, because it isn’t even close.
You’re misunderstanding the point here Chuck.
It’s not about whether I walk roofs or don’t.
Greg started this thread convincing himself that he could walk a roof because of another inspectors well known bravado about doing so.
I am arguing that should never be in consideration when deciding to walk a roof or not.
Safety should always come first.
Your other posts in this thread are at odds with this statement. I’m responding to your assertion that a ground inspection is as effective as a walkover inspection.
Every inspector needs to make a personal safety decision about whether or not they walk roofs. That is their decision to make and they should never yield to peer pressure in making the call. However, no inspector should claim that a ground inspection is equivalent to a walkover inspection. It simply is not.
I make that decision daily. I don’t walk every roof, but when I can reach it and do it safely, I do, because I know how much more effective it is.
You didn’t walk that roof, you viewed it from a lower sloped roof just as Charlie does…
I walk every roof in the summer. In the winter it is another story.
