Rick Jenkins and his BIS team have been the best home inspectors that we have ever used over our 25 + military moves around the country. Having over 13 years of real estate experience, and numerous experiences with many name brand inspection companies, this company was far and away the most thorough and helpful with our latest personal home purchase, than any other inspection company.

The reports provided helped us to obtain the best possible insurance coverage, because they were clearly written and extremely detailed. If there were findings, the report allowed us to understand what we needed to correct (or request the seller to fix) and why. Rick was frequently available by phone to answer several follow up questions we kept thinking of!! We had a contract on one house, BIS found hidden faults within the structure of the home and we were able to withdraw from that purchase. Thank Goodness!!

The second home we found and purchased in Coconut Grove, we asked BIS to do all of our inspections, the general for us and the 4 point one for our insurance company. If you are buying a house I would 100% recommend Rick and his BIS team to do all of your inspections. If you are selling, I would also recommend an inspection so you can correct anything and nullify any findings a prospective buyer may find, so you can defend your selling price (especially in this market). It is the best fee to pay to protect your investment. Well worth it!

Janet K.
September 22, 2011

When buying a house, one of the newest and most serious problems your new house may have is hazardous imported Chinese Drywall.  You may have heard about it on the news, on the internet, or even from your real estate agent.  However, most people don’t realize how bad the problem really is.  The truth is that hazardous Chinese drywall has been found in over 4,000 properties, most of them located right here in South Florida.
In 2004 and 2005, because of hurricanes and other factors, construction material was in short supply.  So builders began importing materials (including drywall) from other countries.  Surprisingly, the hazardous drywall wasn’t even from China.  The most notorious exporter of the hazardous drywall was a company called Knauf out of Germany.  Knauf obtained the raw materials from a gypsum mine located in China.  Although we haven’t been able to trace the exact cause of the contamination in the gypsum, it is believed that poor pollution controls in China allowed the raw gypsum to be contaminated within the mine.  Since then, millions of sheets of this hazardous drywall have been imported and installed into homes and business across America.

Although the hazardous Chinese drywall is mostly found in homes constructed around the years 2004 and 2005, it has been found in homes as early as 2001 and as late as 2009.  It is recommended that any house constructed or renovated between the years 2001 and 2009 be fully inspected by a qualified home inspection professional.  In addition to having your home professionally inspected, you can review a self assessment guide at Florida’s Department of Health’s website: (http://www.doh.state.fl.us/environment/community/indoor-air/inspections.html).

Although the chances of your home having Chinese Drywall are minimal, the cost of remediation can be astronomical.  Building Inspection Services, a home inspection company specializing in Chinese Drywall, recommends Chinese drywall remediation to include the complete replacement of the following:  all drywall, all electrical wiring, the air conditioning system, all metal plumbing components, all appliances with major metallic components, all carpeting, all wall insulation, all wood flooring, all wood baseboards or crown molding and all metallic bathroom fixtures or components.  As you can imagine, the cost of this work can easily skyrocket to $50,000 to $100,000 depending on the home.

With that being said, most people will want to avoid buying a home with Chinese Drywall.  However, some people with an entrepreneurial spirit have made a great profit on these homes.  I spoke with an investor who purchased a townhouse in the Orchid Grove community in Pompano Beach a few months ago.  He purchased a townhouse for $35,000, remediated the entire place in 2 months, costing him $60,000, then sold it for over $130,000.

Written by: Mike Jenkins, Home Inspector
Building Inspection Services / www.BIS-Inspections.com
954-564-5227

You’re a real estate professional and a new couple has contacted you regarding one of your listings. These prospective buyers are absolutely in love with this house. So you set up an appointment and take them in, showing them all the wonderful features of the house. It almost seems like this house was built for this couple. It’s absolutely perfect. As the couple looks around for a bit, the wife looks up and notices some paint peeling on the bedroom ceiling near the air conditioning vent. The husband reaches up and touches the peeling paint and it’s wet. There was a rainstorm last night so the husband immediately believes it’s a roof leak. The couple informs you that they don’t have money for a new roof, and they would rather just keep looking then to waste time and money on continuing with this house.
I’m sure many real estate agents have seen similar situations to this more than once. But a bit of knowledge could mean the difference between this couple walking away immediately, or at least waiting until Miami home inspectors can fully evaluate the situation.
Finding moisture around air conditioning vents is extremely common in South Florida, especially in older homes. While the cause of the moisture could be anything from a roof leak, plumbing leak, or some other deficiency; it is more commonly caused by condensation of the vent or the ceiling box (also known as the boot, or ductwork boot).
Condensation occurs on a surface that is below the dew point of the air. The temperature of the cold air in the ductwork could range from 50 to 65 degrees (depending on many different factors). During our summer months the temperatures can reach upwards of 100+ degrees which dramatically raises the dew point of the air. The temperature is even higher in your attic which raises the dew point of the air even more. When the cold metal on the ceiling box or the vent register gets below that dew point, condensation will occur.

Repairing this is often very easy. All that needs to be done is to prevent the hot air of the attic from touching the cold metal surfaces of the ceiling box or vent register. There is a wide variety of insulation or ductwork sealants that can be used for this. The problem is usually an inadequate seal between the ceiling box and the vent register due to improperly cut drywall. Hiring a contractor for this repair could cost anywhere from $75 to $150 per location. This is a huge difference from a roof repair that could cost $500 or worse, a roof replacement which could cost tens of thousands of dollars! If you need someone to check out your roof, use our Miami roof inspection services.

Recommending a low-cost or under qualified inspector could have dire consequences for yourself and your company’s reputation.  The following article in Sunday’s Miami Herald shows exactly what can happen when under qualified inspectors are used.  Don’t let your name appear in the next newspaper article like this one!  Recommend only one Miami home inspection company and make sure they have the knowledge and experience to not miss a major structural problem like this.  See the qualifications of a BIS inspector at www.bis-inspections.com

An elderly woman and her daughter were hospitalized Sunday night after a floor collapsed under them in the subterranean mall of the Marco Polo Beach Resort in Sunny Isles Beach.The 15-foot-wide hole, seven feet deep, opened into an empty area under the hotel structure.The resort at 19201 Collins Ave. passed a building inspection recently, according to the property manager Victor Sala. Read More…

Chinese drywall was imported between 2001 and 2006, however most of the problems are with houses built between 2004 and 2006. You might need a home inspector in Broward to come check it out.

Problems with Chinese Drywall

1. Foul Odor (could smell like rotten eggs or ammonia)
2. Corrodes metal surfaces, especially copper
3. Potentially causes adverse health effects.
4. Not yet proven, but the potential exists that the sulfur gases can penetrate and corrode wood and concrete, which can potentially cause structural failures.
5. All of the above conditions can still exist after the drywall has been removed if it’s not remediated correctly

Chinese Drywall Inspection

1. Smell for foul odor when you first walk in. Be aware that the chemicals temporarily cause your sense of smell to diminish so you won’t smell it for long.
2. Look at all metal surfaces including plumbing fixture handles and faucets, kitchen appliances, etc.
3. Remove all panel covers from the air handler unit and check the coils and wiring for corrosion or blackness.
4. Remove electrical receptacle cover plates and check for corrosion or blackness.
5. Remove the distribution panel cover and check for corrosion or blackness of the panel box, cover breaker and wires. Pay close attention to copper wires.
6. In the attic, look at the back of drywall. Look for the following writing:
   -Made in China
   -Knauf
   -Knauf Tianjin
   -KPT(which stands for Knauf Plasterboard Tianjin)No official protocols exist for remediation of drywall yet but contractors are having success with removing and replacing the following components:
   1. Drywall
   2. Insulation
   3. All electrical wiring
   4. Distribution panels including all breakers
   5. Appliances and similar equipment including alarm systems and intercoms
   6. Air handler units

   Chinese Drywall

   For Real Estate Professionals: For more information, a knowledgeable inspector from Building Inspection Services can come to your next office meeting to discuss the Hazardous Chinese Drywall Inspections as well as the impacts it is having on our real estate market free of charge. Call (800) 255-3317 and ask for Mike Jenkins for more information.

Back when my husband and I first got married, we did what many newlywed couples did- we made purchases to enhance our brand new condominium unit. One of these was a large 50 gallon fishtank complete with a wooden cabinet stand. We spent a great deal of time picking out accessories for our fishtank and setting it up. My husband filled it with water and set up the pumps. Then, we followed the instructions that said we should let it sit for a few days before adding any fish. The following day, my husband I went off to work.

We returned home that evening to find a DISASTER! The Condominium Association had broken into our apartment because of complaints from the unit below that water was pouring down from their ceiling. The fishtank glass had somehow burst and our unit was flooded with shattered glass and water. Our furniture and carpeting was ruined! Not only that, but water had seeped through the wall behind the fishtank and had destroyed clothing, books and other items! The wall had significant amounts of water damage, not to mention the damage on the flooring and to the roof and wall of the unit below us. We were devastated. We contacted the manufacturer of the tank and they sent out a public adjuster to assess the amount of damages. The numbers that he claimed were extremely low and not enough to even come close to repairing the damage to our unit and the unit below us. At the time, my husband and I weren’t aware that we were entitled to have our own public insurance adjuster represent us. We didn’t realize that the insurance adjuster that had come out to our home was representing the best interests of the fishtank manufacturer, not us.

By: Jamie Yonan

Are you one of those people who wonder what a building inspector sees when he disappears into the tiny dark space under a house?  Wonder no more! Here are some photos from a home inspection in Broward.

The cracking concrete in the following photos are floor joists, very important structural member which prevents the floor you walk on from collapsing. They are cracking because the steel inside the joists are corroded (a condition known as spalling).

So the contractor’s response to correct this problem is to provide additional support to the floor.  Well if you ever played the game Jenga, it’s a bit like that. (everyone hold their breath!)

Or my personal favorite. How much many pounds do you think your house weighs? How much weight do you think a 2×4 can support?

I was at a commercial inspection the other day in Boca Raton and I found something very interesting. Frightening, but interesting. The property was consisted of a class A office building that was just over 100,000 square feet. The building was originally constructed in 1985 but was completely renovated in 2007. The electrical system for the entire 100,000 square foot building was fed through one main service meter. When I was performing my commercial inspection on the service meter, it looked like there was an explosion in the meter can. One of the reasons this is such a big deal is because, without getting to technical, it takes some serious electrical components to power 100,000 square feet of office and it is all feeding right through three wires inside this box.

Luckily, the buyer of the property hired a building inspector in Palm Beach because the owners and the property manager had no idea about this problem.

Do you know the difference between roof trusses and rafters?  Rafters, or conventionally framed roofs, are historically how roofs were built.  It’s usually 2″x6″ or 2″x8″ lumber put together on the job site by a general contractor to form the roof.  In Florida they cannot consist of any structural member smaller than 2″x6″.

Nowadays, we have really moved away from conventionally framed roofs and moved towards trusses. Trusses are engineered systems manufactured in a factory and then shipped out to the job site and then assembled on site. Trusses usually consist of 2″x4″ lumber. Because they are designed by an engineer, and manufactured under the supervision of an engineer, we can actually get more strength over conventionally framed roofs while using less lumber, which actually lowers the cost of construction.

A few other Miami home inspectors from Building Inspection Services and I inspected this building last year. It really looked like a castle, inside and out. Some of the cool features of this house I remember were the stucco on the house was done by an artist drew pictures in the exterior walls in some areas and made it look like the stones of a castle wall in other areas.
It had towers, four bedrooms and even had a salt water moat stocked with fish and a drawbridge.The fireplace was a huge hand carved masterpiece. The interior walls were decorated like a castle with full suits of armor, tapestries and such.
There was a giant pool which was pretty much the equivalent of three normal pools. The pool had a Pirates of the Caribbean theme complete with barrels of gunpowder and cannons. The best part of the pool was that you could swim under the exterior wall and come up out of the water in the middle of the living room.
This was one of the most unique buildings in South Florida and it’s a real shame that it was destroyed. See the full story about the fire from NBC: http://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local-beat/Miami-Beach-Castle-Mansion-Torched-by-Fire.html