Think You Know What’s Wrong With These Homes? Test Your Inspection Know-How

Every week, the detail-oriented folks at Green Scene Home Inspections will give CandysDirt.com readers an education in inspection. Want to see what they see? Tune in for “Upon Closer Inspection.”

It’s our fourth edition of “What’s Wrong With This Picture” in our weekly home inspection column. For the first three episodes, go here, here, and here to brush up on your skills. It takes a trained eye to pick up on all the things a home inspector is looking for, and some problems in a home stand out more than others. Can you tell what’s wrong in these pictures?

Sprinklers are running, but water is collecting on the patio.

If you guessed that there’s an underground leak in the sprinkler line, you’re right! The water is leaking through the seam in the slab, indicating a break in the line. The owner will have to dig up the concrete to repair the line.

Temperature is 201 degrees coming out of the register.

Yeah, that’s way too hot.

Your home inspector will run the heat and air conditioning in the house and check the temperature coming out to the vents to see how well the HVAC is heating and cooling.  A normal range for the heating system would be about 90-130 degrees. This reading shows there’s a big problem in the system — possibly the air is cut off and heat is running all to one vent.

Can you tell why this is bad?

These are crawl space vents, and the dirt is restricting air flow in the crawl space. You need that air flow to prevent moisture and heat from building up under there, which would be conducive for insects, mold, and wood rot. 

Do you know what happened here?

Poor bird.

You may have experienced that strange phenomenon where birds fly directly into your window, sometimes over and over. Sometimes birds see their own reflection and attack it, thinking it’s another bird. Or they see the reflection of vegetation or the landscape and it confuses them. There are a number of ways you can prevent this if it happens at your home, from tape or decals on the windows to screens or adhesive shields that also reduce your cooling costs in the summer.