Advice for New Home Inspections in Alpharetta

One huge myth is that a new home doesn’t need a detailed home inspection.

I run across new home buyers all the time that did not get their home inspected because they thought “new” meant “all good”, and most of the time they regretted it within the first year. Often, I end up doing an 11-mouth Builder’s warranty inspection for them.

Although new home’s do not have wear type problems, they certainly have all sorts of other problems including code violations and poor workmanship issues, regardless of who the builder is. I sometimes hear from buyers that the builder told them “not to waste their money by hiring a 3rd party private inspector because the county/city inspectors have been looking at the home in different stages of construction, plus they have a great quality control system that will catches any issues”. I assure you that most municipal inspectors are not inspecting the home but about 15 mins, 30 mins tops, so really they do not have time to do a detailed inspection. I rarely hear of a municipal inspector that walks a roof or all the way across an attic. Most of the builders’ QC teams that I have seen and reviewed their punch-lists are pretty good, but they still miss items because often they have so many houses to review or the house is up against a time crunch closing date. People are human and there are a lot of subcontractor, so mistakes are made quite often that do not get caught by the builder. The photos below show all types of issues I have found with new homes I recently inspected. And these builders are reputable and well-known in the Alpharetta area.

Just because the home is new does not mean that all components were installed correctly or don’t have manufacture defects.

The types of problems and issues I find in new homes while usually different than what I usually find in older homes, still can be quite serious and even structural related. But, more often than not they are improper installations and building methods. These types of issues are not easy to identify for the lay person. Most issues are not so obvious such as a crack in the foundation or a leak. Since most people don’t have detailed knowledge of building, electrical, plumbing, and mechanical codes or even manufacturers installation instructions it’s very difficult to identify installation defects. While a home inspection is not technically a full code compliance inspection, a good home inspector uses code all the time to point out and identify improper installations.

Below are pictures of just a few issues I have observed at new construction homes this year.