Bay Area Home Inspection

Today's pre-fabricated fireplaces have a metal covering at the top of the chimney chase to prevent water from entering the flue. The chase top is usually made of cheap galvanized sheet metal. Over, the years the metal coating is eroded by the sun's UV rays, rain, expansion and contraction.

A proper installation has the sheet metal sloping to the sides of the chase. Sometimes the flue collar underneath the cover isn't installed high enough or the weight of the flue moves downward creating a depression in the cover.

The next time that it rains, standing water accumulates around the flue as shown in the photo. Many times you'll see rust streaks on the sides of the chimney chase... This is your first clue that a chimney specialist should take a look.

During a recent home inspection in San Jose, a mystery was identified. For two years, the homeowners thought that they smelled sewer gas.

When the wind blew, there was no smell as the air circulation under the house dissipated the strong odor.  On calm days, the odor was strongest under the hall bathroom... like from a giant litter box.

The photo shows a crack in a Wye fitting (whitish area), not the waste line pipe. The material is ABS pipe a black rigid, non-pressurized plastic pipe used to drain sinks, bathtubs, showers, and toilets.  It's a tough material that will last a long time if properly installed.

Whether you're buying a house in Santa Cruz or Danville, you may have walked into a room and noticed that one or more dual pane windows are cloudy. The home inspector tells you that these windows have failed seals.

You walk up to the window and wipe the inside pane... The cloudiness remains. You wipe the outside glass with the same results. Then you have a revelation:  the cloudiness is between the two panes of glass.

Picture a house built on a steep hillside with an elevated deck 18 feet above the ground with the bottoms of the support posts rotted away.

This is what the inspector reported at a recent home inspection in the Oakland hills.

Dry rot refers to the decay of timber in buildings and other wooden structures caused by a certain fungi. However, fungi requires a high moisture content (25-30%) to initiate an attack on timber. Once established, the decay can cause instability and collapse in houses, decks, and other structures.

We live in earthquake country and the deck probably wouldn't take much shaking. The other scary thing is that a live load (people walking on a deck) could cause the deck to collapse. Our recommendation was not to use the deck until a structural engineer could review the situation prior to the close of the contingency period.