A Northern Virginia Home Inspector's Perspective

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Home Inspector - Jay Markanich Real Estate Inspections, LLC - 3380-000723
RECENT BLOG POSTS
This kitchen cabinet front is a "repair" in new construction.Imagine buying a house for over 7 figures.  What would you expect?The best?  Good but not the best?LESS THAN THE BEST?During the great reveal is this what you, as the buyer, would want to encounter?Obviously the kitchen "professionals" ...
02/09/2018
This is step one of roof flashing.  Counter flashing is step two.So, on this new house, where's step two?This is step one.It is called step flashing.A piece of metal is bent at a 90 degree angle and placed under each shingle in a step fashion all the way up a roof.It abuts the side of the house, ...
02/07/2018
How can you see extreme door inefficiency? You can feel it.You can understand it.But how can you see it?With a thermal camera, of course!And who better but Mighty Mo?This is a panorama of two thermal images stitched together to show an exterior door front on.It was so poorly fitted into the frami...
01/31/2018
Is this a kitchen cabinet or a slow cooker?Chris Ann Cleland actually came up with that title.While doing my typical thermal image sweep of this house I wondered why there was no HVAC register in the bathroom.Well, there was one!  And thermal imaging is the perfect way to find it!It was there, bu...
01/25/2018
When homeowner repairs are uninformed and go awry.Homeowners often go ahead with "repairs" that are improper or simply uninformed.Concrete driveways can spall.  Spalling means that the exterior layer, the final layer sometimes called the cream, cracks, flakes, or chips off.That thin, top surface ...
01/24/2018
A pin-hole leak can do a lot of damage.A pin-hole leak is exactly that, a very small leak at a joint or other corrosive deterioration in copper tubing.  It is sometimes called a progressive leak.This pin-hole leak looks to have begun where the yellow arrow points.That is a soldered joint.It must ...
01/17/2018
Improper storage of building materials - do unto others...The temperature during this morning pre-drywall inspection was 10F.  During the night before the temperature had dropped to 5F.The drywall had already been loaded into the house.Along with all the materials.They had been in the house for a...
01/11/2018
Welcome to our new house!This is a new home.  Nobody has lived there yet.When the buyers are invited by the builder to finally see it and have their final walk through, how would you like to walk up to your new front door and see this?To top it off, when that "final" coat of paint was put on the ...
12/28/2017
Reflections of the Christmas Tree.We buy and decorate Christmas trees.  Why?  When did this start?Apparently in the 1400s and 1500s in Europe.  White pine trees have been used for millennia to celebrate various things, Christians began using the pine tree as a sign of the Everlasting God.My Chris...
12/20/2017
What kind of Christmas tree ornament does a home inspector use?Well, only the best!And what did you expect?I love doing home inspections - old homes, new homes - you name it.If I could afford to live independently I would do home inspections for free!My recommendation:  one could say that the Chr...
12/16/2017
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Jay Markanich

Home Inspector - servicing all Northern Virginia
local_phone(703) 330-6388
smartphone(703) 585-7560
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An experienced home inspector's look at current home inspection events and conditions along with his useful recommendations.