Mysterious Emotion

[Les]

The emotion is:  I kinda miss the banter and education I used to get from this forum.  Well mostly I miss interacting with a group that is not whiny, stupid, careless, or arrogant!  I do realize absence dulls the after-thoughts from the arguments I used to have with Kurt and Mike O.  

I try to read and interact with the facebook pages but mostly find myself screaming that these folks are not qualified to inspect.  They (most) think a frickin' loose screw is the end of the world and but for their superior knowledge most home buyers would perish after closing the deal. 

well if you got a good story or even a tall tale why not just post it to keep me quiet for another few weeks! 

 

[Jerry Simon]

I miss the humor during inspections; necessary IMHO to keep the tensions in check.  For example, my text tone is a doorbell.  Always thought it was a hoot to see the realtor scurry for the front door (multiple times if I didn't tell them).

I used to tell some folks it was the pizza I ordered - but saw many were disappointed when they found I was kidding.

Hope that fills a small space of your void.  (I'm having similar feelings since my retirement a few months ago.)

[hausdok]

I've missed it too, but most of the time all I did was needlessly blather anyway. The weather here is warming up, so soon I'll be spending most of my time out in the garage. I've been checking the site whenever I fire up the box, and when I see that someone has posted, I read what's been posted and sometimes respond. I'm nearly totally recovered now. I know that because I'm able to use my right little finger while typing again (something I hadn't been able to do for about 7 months) plus the fact my older sister no longer says my voice is all mush-mouthed. When I've gotten back as far as I can, I'll probably begin spending more time here.

[Jim Katen]

On 3/15/2024 at 1:52 PM, hausdok said:

I know that because I'm able to use my right little finger while typing again (something I hadn't been able to do for about 7 months)

Well, that should help with your "colon" as well, eh? 

[Jim Baird]

On 3/15/2024 at 12:13 PM, Jerry Simon said:

I miss the humor during inspections; necessary IMHO to keep the tensions in check.  For example, my text tone is a doorbell.  Always thought it was a hoot to see the realtor scurry for the front door (multiple times if I didn't tell them).

I used to tell some folks it was the pizza I ordered - but saw many were disappointed when they found I was kidding.

Hope that fills a small space of your void.  (I'm having similar feelings since my retirement a few months ago.)

I was a part time inspector/trainer for two full timers at a local AHJ during the wild Y2K decade.  Neither full timer could read the newspaper, much less the codebook.  One of them failed a builder's final inspection for a doorbell not working. Builder threw up his hands and sold the house anyway.  Cited then by AHJ for occupying a home without a CO, I was sent to signoff, commiserate, and issue the CO to get builder off hook.  I made sure not to try that errant doorbell.

[Jerry Simon]

30 minutes ago, Jim Baird said:

I was a part time inspector/trainer for two full timers at a local AHJ during the wild Y2K decade.  Neither full timer could read the newspaper, much less the codebook.  One of them failed a builder's final inspection for a doorbell not working. Builder threw up his hands and sold the house anyway.  Cited then by AHJ for occupying a home without a CO, I was sent to signoff, commiserate, and issue the CO to get builder off hook.  I made sure not to try that errant doorbell.

Leaving a completed inspection on new construction when the client asked me if the doorbell worked.  Said I don't check low-voltage stuff, but tried it anyway and it didn't work.   Nice folk, so I went in the basement and tapped on the doorbell transformer which was mounted up at the pull-chain basement light fixture.  Yelled upstairs for them to try the doorbell, and it worked.

Leaving again, and client tried the doorbell again and it didn't work.  I went back in the basement, tightened-up the transformer wires, yelled upstairs to try it again, and it worked.  Just to make sure, when I got to the top of the basement stairs, I again asked my client, who was standing at the nearby front doorway, to try it again.  It worked.

Sure enough, when we got outside to finally leave, client tried the doorbell one more time and it didn't work.  Took me another few minutes to figure it out.   

[Les]

most of my weird inspections involved either drugs, sex and/or porn.  

I was having one of the guys that had been with me 10+years try to transition into construction litigation support and opened up the largest (and profitable) can of worms in my entire career! 

The house was masquerading as a single family home but in fact was a porn studio/playpen/drug distribution center! 

We had to make several trips to close this file and sometimes we had to stay all day to be sure we didn't miss anything! 

Notable was the bath faucet on a wall 10+- feet away from a concave rock that was the sink.  The water came out of an adjacent wall and ran across and down a rock wall and then ran like a babbling brook eight foot or so horizontally over to the concave rock that served as a sink.  By the time the water got to the sink you had to pee again because of the noise make from falling water! (credit to Frank Lloyd Wright).  The whole process took a full minute or more.

it also had both european and american electrical circuits and devices.  

There is more - but I'm too old and frail to vividly remember the details! 

[Jim Baird]

On 3/19/2024 at 12:09 PM, Les said:

most of my weird inspections involved either drugs, sex and/or porn.  

I was having one of the guys that had been with me 10+years try to transition into construction litigation support and opened up the largest (and profitable) can of worms in my entire career! 

The house was masquerading as a single family home but in fact was a porn studio/playpen/drug distribution center! 

We had to make several trips to close this file and sometimes we had to stay all day to be sure we didn't miss anything! 

Notable was the bath faucet on a wall 10+- feet away from a concave rock that was the sink.  The water came out of an adjacent wall and ran across and down a rock wall and then ran like a babbling brook eight foot or so horizontally over to the concave rock that served as a sink.  By the time the water got to the sink you had to pee again because of the noise make from falling water! (credit to Frank Lloyd Wright).  The whole process took a full minute or more.

it also had both european and american electrical circuits and devices.  

There is more - but I'm too old and frail to vividly remember the details! 

I hope you were deputized for those visits.  My brushes with legal issues were all on the bottom side of occupancy.  I had to verify squalid conditions at dwellings were homes had been condemned by AHJ. My visits were final steps in delivery of due process before evacuation orders. One such case was of an occupant born and raised in a dwelling that was in extreme decline.  His parents' portraits hung on the walls but he mainly hung out on the street.  His birthplace home was scheduled for demolition, and he refused to accept homeless sheltering options.  My visit was accompanied by a social worker and a sheriff deputy.

 

[Les]

Well I seem to have taken control of my emotions now that many of my social media posts have been deleted, censored or mysteriously disappeared.  Even ashi has put the kibosh on me.  

I really do realize that in many ways I have become a Gadfly thereby fulfilling my life goal!  I really really am coming to believe most home inspectors are fools.  They fool themselves, they fool their client and likely their association.  I can't believe the stupid questions, the rancor in the responses and the blessings from on-high that I see on most sites.  My wife keeps telling me to just stay off the sites and ignore it.  I suppose I will have to or have a conniption fit!

What happened?  Who put these people in charge of our profession?  Will it change or are we destined to become ridiculed? 

[Mike Lamb]

On 3/15/2024 at 10:33 AM, Les said:

well if you got a good story or even a tall tale why not just post it to keep me quiet for another few weeks! 

 

Here's a story from 2 weeks ago but it's not funny. I was inspecting a 20 unit building on the S. side in a distressed area for an out-of-town investor. When I do these I try to get into every unit. It was the property manager with keys, a real estate agent, and me. We were trying to get into a third story apartment when the owner burst out screaming and he had a gun. The agent and I ran away down the stairs And when I heard the, "pop, pop, pop." I tried running down 5 stairs at a time and slid down half a flight of stairs on ass. 

I called 911. The property manager did not run out with us so I thought maybe he had been shot. Then the crazy man came running outside screaming chasing us, so the realtor and I ran a block away and jumped inside another apartment building that had a front door partially open. Locked it.  We hid in the basement while the crazy man was pounding on the glass outside screaming I don't no what.

Police came. The nut bag choked the property manager but he was okay. The police then berated us for trying to get into an apartment without the tenant being notified which was BS. The tenant thought we were breaking in, which again was BS. The dude was cracked up. And they said the gun he had was a pellet gun which did not make me feel much better.

Unfortunately, I never finished the job so I didn't get paid. So I came back a week later with a small army of property managers and realtors, and the goofball was there apologizing to us that his behavior was wrong. My pepper spray was ready for any additional crack head behavior. I finished the job and got paid.

I had another encounter with a dangerous occupant about 5 yrs ago but that's another story.

[hausdok]

Yeah, My first year in business I got scheduled to inspect a POS house for an investor. The agent and I arrived on the day scheduled, knocked, because we'd been told the occupant slept during the day and worked nights. After about 15 minutes of pounding on the door with no response, the agent let me into the home, and I got started. It was like a pigsty in there. Eventually, I walked into the bedroom the occupant used and was checking the outlets when a big bundle of clothes on the bed suddenly moved to reveal the occupant rearing out of bed drunk as a skunk. He went for a bedstand drawer, withdrew a gun and began looking around for the magazine, calling us home invaders and promised to shoot us. The realtor and I quickly went outside and called the police from the far side of my van. The police eventually came and got the drunk under control and I finished the job, none too happy about the way the realtor and owner had scheduled things.

[Jim Baird]

Mike,

That is a job I never would have finished.

Flash to future, I inspected a pos mobile home a property owner had relocated across his own property to set up as an ADU, but before set up was complete, a neighbor begged him to offer shelter to a family that had suffered a house fire and had no insurance etc.  My client offered them shelter in his ongoing ADU setting, and before long they became a nuisance, would not leave and loaded the property with loads of junk.  Owner appeal to sheriff said he could not evict them without extended court action.

Took him six months to execute eviction.

[Les]

Jim I had a total stranger squat in one of my houses for 15months.  I was court ordered to pay utility, taxes and basic cable for that period.  I never even met him except for in court.  Liberal judge vs Landlord in Michigan. 

I was held hostage for six hours at gun point by an apartment tenant.  Jumped on by a naked woman during an inspection;  from behind the door jumped onto my back.  Good looking, weighed abt 100lbs, red hair, nice nails about 30yrs old

[hausdok]

Hey, do any of you guys remember this? That was a good seminar.

[Les]

sure do!  I stuck my finger in the pex extruder line and screwed up lots of newly extruded pex pipe!  Also I was impressed how well Watts treated us.  And Kurt and his damn knife he bought at some gas station in Kansas.  And  seven of us and my wife taking our car (Jeep Patriot) to dinner!   We were pioneers - the first and best class ever! 

This is the kind of stuff I miss now.  We were certainly all very different individuals, inspectors and "characters".  What is missing now is really quite simple - respect.  I knew that one of these guys would always have my back and freely share their knowledge and experience.  

[Jim Katen]

I totally agree with Les. For many years this site challenged and sharpened me. 

Interactions on Facebook and other modern internet sites dull my soul, so I avoid them. 

[Bill Kibbel]

On 3/28/2024 at 2:01 PM, Les said:

Well I seem to have taken control of my emotions now that many of my social media posts have been deleted, censored or mysteriously disappeared.  Even ashi has put the kibosh on me.  

I really do realize that in many ways I have become a Gadfly thereby fulfilling my life goal!  I really really am coming to believe most home inspectors are fools.  They fool themselves, they fool their client and likely their association.  I can't believe the stupid questions, the rancor in the responses and the blessings from on-high that I see on most sites.  My wife keeps telling me to just stay off the sites and ignore it.  I suppose I will have to or have a conniption fit!

What happened?  Who put these people in charge of our profession?  Will it change or are we destined to become ridiculed? 

I think you're always welcome at TIJ (we've built up a tolerance).  Might even be some respect here for your experience and insights.

I've visited other forums and very briefly joined the facebook groups.  I saw exactly what you described.  It produced thoughts of the ignominious demise of our profession.

[Jim Baird]

On 3/30/2024 at 8:21 AM, Les said:

Jim I had a total stranger squat in one of my houses for 15months.  I was court ordered to pay utility, taxes and basic cable for that period.  I never even met him except for in court.  Liberal judge vs Landlord in Michigan. 

I was held hostage for six hours at gun point by an apartment tenant.  Jumped on by a naked woman during an inspection;  from behind the door jumped onto my back.  Good looking, weighed abt 100lbs, red hair, nice nails about 30yrs old

Glad she did not weigh 200 lbs.