North Shore & Sunshine Coast Home Inspection Blog

In my area we have a number of coastal islands that can only be reached by ferry or water taxi. Many a time, a newbie to island travel can waste a lot of time and money to reach their island destination. For example, reading ferry schedules is an artform, especially if you have to use a couple to...

Here's a typical request I get... "Can you help me, do you know a good contractor to renovate my condo?" Certainly I have a short list of preferred suppliers. These are companies that I have worked with before and I know the quality of construction I can expect from them. Notice I said 'quality' ...

As a professional engineer, a significant amount of my work is as the Owner's Representative (or OR for short) on new home construction or on major building renovations. So let's discuss what an OR does for a client. The OR knows the local designers, contractors, sub-contractors, engineers and te...

Property Disclosure Statements are used throughout metro-Vancouver in British Columbia. But attention to completeness is too often ignored. Here's why it's important to have the form accurate.A Property Disclosure Statement (PDS) lists potential issues such as: underground oil storage tanks asbes...

Consider the alternative to a pre-owned home: If you must have new... If you can wait for the right house... If you really want something special... If you want selection control over most features... If you want your personality embedded in the house... If you are prepared for the challenge of d...

As a home inspector I like to go above and beyond my responsibilities to the profession. Given the opportunity I provide opinions after the inspection on how best to make a dated house more comfortable for the new owners and how to overcome issues that would otherwise drive the cost of living hig...

Our region is a hub for high tech companies in games, entertainment, VR and social media apps. The other day I had a client ask if I accepted bitcoin. Unfortunately, I had to reply that we did not...yet. I went back to the office that day and did my homework. Crypto-currencies are certainly well ...

I took no photos to protect the guilty.It's well known in these parts that if you are going to build on an island, with minimum services, then first, you have money and second, everything is going to cost you 30% to 50% or more.Yesterday I was at a major marina watching a barge load-up with concr...

Here's an example where a seller has maximized their deck space and forgotten all about safety. In this case, we have a deck on the upper floor which is almost at the height of the overhead electrical service wires. When it gets wet (and believe me that on the west wet coast, in our rainforest en...

I recently completed another new home warranty inspection in West Vancouver, BC. In this case, it was the 2 year anniversary inspection. BTW there still remain the 5 year building envelope and the 10 year structural warranties.The warranty anniversary date was expiring in less than 10 days and so...