I decided to become a home inspector after my near miss with a deadly house. I was shopping for a new home and finally found one with character in a socially active neighborhood. Since my background is in architecture, I couldn’t bring myself to own a “house with 10 gables” that is commonly found in developer subdivisions. Instead, I found a neighborhood full of mid-century moderns with low roof slopes, roof decks, exposed brick on the interior, tongue and groove ceilings, and craftsmanship that is hard to come by these days.
Even though my husband and I are architects, I decided to hire a home inspector. It just seemed prudent to have a third set of eyes look at the house before buying. I had been over the house myself with a fine tooth comb and had found a couple of issues to address. It was nothing out of the ordinary for a 45 year old house. The remedies were simple and I could save money by doing it myself. The inspector said this house had good bones, was structurally sound and found the same issues I had discovered. Then he threw a kink in the plan. He was getting a tremendous headache during this inspection – something that happens when he is exposed to mold. He suggested I pay the extra money for a mold test. I agreed and waited a few days for the results.
I was shocked to learn the house was consumed with toxic mold. The specific type of mold was gaseous, invisible to the naked eye and was covering every surface in the house. I sought the advice of a mold remediator who told me for $20,000 they could clean the house but there was no guarantee they would remove all of the mold. If I bought the house and chose to skip mold remediation, my family’s health would decline within 3 weeks. Some symptoms were mild and some life threatening. With no guarantee the remediation would be 100% successful, I continued my home search.
While all of this information is useful, my true motivation to become an inspector came when I informed the seller of the house what we had uncovered. He didn’t believe me. He said a little bit of mold was no big deal. He thought the inspector and remediator were conspiring so they could make more money. He was going to keep the house on the market. Because he thought all of this was a hoax, I feared he wouldn’t disclose our findings to a potential buyer. The new homeowners would unknowingly risk their lives.
I started researching what it would take to become a home inspector. In Georgia, anyone can call themselves an inspector with no training or certification. Some inspectors take initiative by joining ASHI (American Society of Home Inspectors, www.ashi.org and www.ashigeorgia.com ) and become certified by passing the National Home Inspectors Exam. There are additional credentials an inspector may acquire in specialty areas to expand the scope of their inspections – mold testing, new residential construction, new commercial construction, stucco inspections, radon testing, etc.
I’ve been a working architect for 15 years designing buildings for residential and commercial properties in the southeast. Much of my time is spent on the job site during construction conducting progress inspections to make sure the contractor is following the design and the work is code compliant. My architecture experience has made my expansion to home inspection very easy. Although not required, I am pursuing inspector certification and additional credentials to broaden my inspection services. My goal is to uncover hazards that might go unnoticed and provide new homeowners peace of mind.
Please contact me for more information about B Environmental Studio’s Home Inspection Services.
Shelley Belknap
Principal
B Environmental Studio, LLC
sbelknap@enviro-studio.com
phone 770.402.6827
fax 404.420.2486
