ThoroSpec

On Tuesday, September 16, 2014, our home was inspected by Hollis Brown on behalf of ThoroSpec, LLC. While we dispute some of his findings, this review is not a dispute of his findings. The conclusions reached by Mr. Brown are a matter of his own professional opinion, though we have specific professional opinions that dispute some of his findings.
The purpose of this review is to address the condition he left our home following the inspection. First, in our attic, he changed the
setting of the attic fan thermostat and screwed in the light bulb on the north end of the attic. Second, he removed insulation around and adjacent to the air plenum. Third, he broke a piece of wood off the back stairs and left it laying on the ground. Fourth, he disassembled the package of directions for the generator switch at the electrical panel, and left the package and the contents in different areas of the basement.
While none of these issues are worth pursuing a damage claim, they are indicative of a lack of respect for the homeowner’s property. We have never experienced an inspector that left a trail of disturbance in his wake – in all previous instances the inspectors have been extremely careful to leave the property as they found it. If something can’t be returned to its original condition, as in the case of the stairs, courtesy and professionalism call for notification of the homeowner: he should have left the broken piece inside the house with a courtesy note explaining how it came to be removed and could not be replaced.
As a result of this incident, we will never again be absent for a home inspection.
We sent an e-mail to Thorospec on September 22nd with this information, but received no response. 

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I can tell you Hollis Brown was thorough. I can also tell sellers to beware. Thanks to Hollis we now have an angieslist account. I don't think he has a building license but he told our buyer that he thought our back porch did not have a permit. I jokingly told Hollis that I would not give him a bad review, so I am not. Just going to state the facts. About 3/4 through the inspection he even told the buyer that he was having a hard time finding anything wrong with my home. Which I am sure made him look even harder. What he said prompted our buyers to call the county & request permits. & to my dismay she discovered that there were never any pulled for the back patio. Not our fault cause we purchased the house this way. Unfortunately our inspector didn't catch this. So I will say Seller beware. This is going to cost us an insane amount of money to remedy the situation. Angieslist can thank Holiis for our business, had it not been for him we wouldn't need to be checking reviews on every contractor in our county. I will say , in all fairness, that I wish Hollis had been OUR inspector 3.5 years ago.

Hollis Brown performed an inspection of our single family home for a buyer (the contract fell through, but he was the inspector they used while going through the process).  He made correct assessments about plenty of things in our home, however, he made quite a few misstatements and overstatements that made it seem like our house was falling to the ground.

Examples of his "dings" on our report included issues with hairline cracks in brick, damage to blocks and bricks, and furnace rust, all of which were incorrect or overstated and sounded like major structural and system defects.  The buyers of our home were young and their realtor was inexperienced, so they were spooked and really couldn't afford further investigation by licensed contractors to back up or refute Mr. Brown's report, so at that time, they voided the contract on our house. 

Prior to putting our house on the market, we had a licensed structural engineer come and inspect the property because we were aware of some block and brick damage.  His report recommended repairs, we completed all of them.  After we received the report from Mr. Brown indicating major structural damage, we were concerned that the appropriate work had not been done and asked the structural engineer to come BACK to the house to inspect the issues in the report.  He pointed out that hairline cracks are not structural concerns at all unless they are larger than 1/8 inch. He said that one of the places where the wood rot they mentioned was present had already been repaired by adding additional support beams with pressure treated wood.  He noted that one of the places of "extreme wood rot" was in the form for a cement pouring (which is typically removed but in our case wasn't and while it was rotted, it had nothing to do with the house or support and affected nothing).  He did find some water damage and rotting wood that was previously undetected underneath our front stoop, and indicated the repairs that should be done which are simple and not costly.  Hollis Brown also pointed out some chimney movement, which will happen in settling any house built in 1950 and recommend that we "remove and replace" the chimney.  The structural engineer, who is truly an expert on the solidness of a building, said that we needed to repair chimney flashing to prevent water damage and stop the crack from getting bigger.  Two very different recommendations, one by an expert, the other by a generalist.

We also had an HVAC contractor come out to look at our furnace because it is a high efficiency Amana gas furnace that was installed 5 years ago and is serviced regularly.  The expert said that any furnace in a crawlspace is going to have surface rust but it does not affect the operation of the machine and that our furnace in particular will last another 20 years.  (He actually said "this inspector is an idiot" but that's not really the kind of comment appropriate for Angie's List, I know).  Hollis Brown's report said the furnace should be replaced. 

Hollis Brown is an instructor for the certification courses that other home inspectors take.  While I respect that he is obviously trained and I'm sure he has done plenty of well-written and thorough inspections, I also believe he took a lot of liberties in his evaluation of our home that unfortunately adversely affected the outcome of our home sale to this buyer and potentially others, as we will now have to explain why the first contract fell through.  As I said earlier, he pointed out legitimate problems too, but they were all minor (things like "still have some 2 prong outlets in the home").  I think as a generalist, the job of the home inspector is to point out all issues.  But when the inspector makes statements like "persistent" and "replace" when he really isn't an expert in those particular areas is not the most ethical behavior.

I would not use him as a contractor when buying a house either, as in my experience, he dramatizes problems and I want a realistic view of property I am purchasing, not fear and doom unless there is really a reason to see that.  Hope this clarifies my opinion and helps someone considering him.

They are very flexible. I had to have them come back. The owner was out of town, but he arranged for his partner to come out the next day. They really went out of their way to support their customer. The office lady was extremely friendly and helpful. The inspector was very knowledgeable and did a great job.

Very thorough inspection, including getting up on the roof and into the attic. He almost missed a piece of plywood that was covering a hole to the crawl space under the addition, but when I pointed it out, he crawled into the crawl space to get pics and write up the problems. Unfortunately, he doesn't give even ballpark figures for how much repairs will cost.

Hollis was on time for the inspection. He's a good natured guy, dry sense of humor, to the point. Most importantly for an inspector, he's very exacting and demanding. He records very precisely what's wrong but he also gives a big picture summary so you know what to expect from the house in general terms. He has a fantastically responsive receptionist named Mish. We had a bunch of problems with a contractor and Hollis agreed to return on several occasions to inspect their work. He kept them honest by documenting (with digital photos and video) all the work that was missed or poorly done. His initial inspection uncovered damages that warranted approximately $7,500 in repairs.