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1. Reports that are too long

With rare exceptions, home inspection reports should not exceed 20 pages (not counting photos).   People do not want to read long reports.  Show respect for your client’s time by keeping the report as short, straight forward, and as easy to read as you can make it.  We are not writing reports to impress our clients, and certainly should not be writing to impress ourselves!   Clients will appreciate reports that communicate efficiently.

2. Too many disclaimers

You are a professional.  Accept responsibility for what you are doing.  People will respect you.  You cannot be a home inspector and live inside a protective bubble.  Keep your disclaimers to a minimum and move them to your pre-inspection agreement. 

3. Inconsistency

Establish standards for your inspections and do all your inspections according to those standards.  If you are a member of a trade association, you may adopt the association’s standards exactly as they are written or you may go beyond the association’s standards.  Whatever you do, be consistent.

4. Fluff and filler

Either leave out the fluff and filler altogether or at least keep it separate from the main report.  Home maintenance tips and explanations of how things work are fine additions to a report but they need to be separate from the inspection report.  Your client should not have to wade through filler information to find the meat of the report.  If you use a presentation binder, put your report at the front of the book.

5.  Ill defined scope

It is imperative that your client understands the scope of the inspection.  Do not assume that the client is simply going to accept what you do.  You need to review your standard procedures and your pre-inspection agreement with your client so there are no misunderstandings later.  The information in your report needs to be consistent with your standards.

6. Pompous language

We all want to feel important.  One way in which we sometimes try to make ourselves feel important is to use pompous language.  Don’t do it!  Use natural language when you talk to your clients and when you write your reports.  When you write something read it back to yourself and ask yourself, “Is this the way people really talk?”

7. Summaries that are not summaries

A summary should be just that – a summary!  If your summary is more than one page, it is not really a summary.  You are merely rewriting your report in different form.  The reason that so many real estate agents and lenders ask for a summary in the first place is that too many inspectors write reports that are too long and cumbersome.  Keep it short and to the point.

8. Verbose narratives

The more you write, the less likely you are to be understood.  Most of us have not done enough writing since our school days to be skilled writers.  Long narratives often lead to confusion.  The goal of the inspection report is to communicate clearly and efficiently.  If something is broken, say it is broken.  Don’t write a paragraph or two saying that it is broken.

9.  Spelling errors

There is just no excuse for spelling errors.  Spelling errors send a powerfully negative message about you to the readers of your reports.

10.  Grammar errors

Most of us do not think about grammar much in our daily lives.  How can we expect to know good grammar when every day we see serious errors of grammar in newspapers or hear bad grammar on radio and television?  Almost daily we hear or see constructions such as: “I seen”, “He done that”, “I should have went there”, “The house was inspected by John and myself” …

Make a small investment.  Buy a good book of common mistakes in grammar and usage.  It may very well be one of the best investments you can make.

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