Home inspection tools
- The kit as entered, in total
- $430
- The eight core items, without the thermal camera
- $430
- Inspections a year the kit will work
- 144
- Kit cost spread over the first year of inspections
- $2.99
Every figure here comes from the figures you enter and the method stated beside it: what your instruments cost, how many inspections you do, how many inspectors you have. Where a worksheet borrows a public figure, a vendor's listed monthly price for instance, the page names the pricing page it was read from and the date it was read, and the claim is on record in the estate's claims ledger.
The figures above are one firm worked as an example ($430). Put your own kit, volume and inspectors in and the answer follows as you type.
Download the Home inspection tools worked example (CSV)
The home inspection tools worksheet costs the kit a home inspector carries from the figures the inspector already knows: what the flashlight, the moisture meter, the receptacle and GFCI tester, the non-contact voltage tester, the infrared thermometer, the ladder, the mirror and probe and the protective gear cost, plus the thermal camera if there is one, and how many inspections the firm does a month. It returns the kit in total, the eight core items without the camera, the inspections a year the kit will work, the kit cost spread over that first year, the readings the core kit takes on every house, and the share of the whole that the camera is, so the question of whether to buy the camera is answered in dollars per inspection rather than in envy of another inspector's truck.
Why the core kit is eight items and not eighteen
The standards of practice say what the inspector shall inspect and, by implication, what has to be read: moisture where staining shows, receptacle wiring and GFCI protection, the presence of voltage before a panel cover comes off, supply and register temperatures at the heating and cooling equipment, and everything else by eye with enough light to see it. Eight items do all of that. The rest of the catalogue is convenience, and the worksheet lets you add it as the ninth line if you carry it.
The camera is a business decision, worked as one
A thermal imaging camera finds moisture and missing insulation the eye cannot, and it is the single most expensive thing most inspectors are asked to buy. The worksheet shows the share of the kit it represents and the cost per inspection once the whole kit is spread over a year, so an inspector doing forty houses a month sees a different answer from one doing eight. Neither answer is wrong; the point is to see yours.
What Intakez keeps from this list
The kit list becomes the instrument register in Pro: which meter took the moisture reading on that wall, which tester tripped that GFCI, and when each instrument was bought. When a finding is questioned later, the record says what it was read with. The worksheet is free and computes on the page; the register is what the subscription keeps.
Intakez Pro
Keeping the inspection on record after the report goes out
Upgrading turns the worksheet into the record. The checklist you walked becomes an inspection with its defects and safety items counted; the report you wrote becomes a document filed against the property and the client with the date it went out; the kit you costed becomes the list of instruments your readings came from. Nothing is retyped: what the worksheet computed is what the record keeps.
- Download the report summary or the checklist as a file to send to the client
- Your reports and checklists without our name on them
- Save a walked checklist and open it again when the re-inspection is booked
- Your firm name, logo and licence number on every printed document
- Take every inspection, finding and report out at once
- Send the report to the client and the agent from inside the record
$99per month, whole team
Start Intakez Pro PricingIntakez Pro is $99 per month for the whole firm, billed monthly, and renews each month at that price until you cancel. The price and the renewal date are shown before you check out and on every receipt.
What the inspector asks before using the Home inspection tools
Which figures do I need before using the home inspection tools worksheet? What you paid, or would pay, for each of the eight core items, the price of a thermal camera if you carry or are considering one, and roughly how many inspections the firm does a month. Every one is your own figure; the defaults are placeholders to show the arithmetic.
Does the worksheet recommend a brand of moisture meter or camera? No. It costs what you enter and names no product. What the kit has to be able to read comes from the standards of practice the page cites; which instrument reads it is your choice and your money.
Why spread the kit over a year of inspections? Because a kit that costs four hundred dollars is not expensive or cheap on its own; it is expensive at three inspections a month and trivial at thirty. Cost per inspection over the first year is the figure that tells an inspector whether the camera pays for itself.
Where the constants in this tool come from
InterNACHI, Home Inspection Standards of Practice: the systems and components the inspector shall inspect, which decide what the kit has to read. The standard names what is inspected (roof, exterior, structure, heating, cooling, plumbing, electrical, fireplace, attic and insulation, doors, windows and interior) and what is operated or tested; the worksheet's eight core items are the instruments those observations need. The standard does not price instruments; every dollar figure is the inspector's own.
ASHI, Standard of Practice: the systems and components to be inspected and the report contents. Read alongside the InterNACHI standard for the readings an inspection implies. No figure in the worksheet is taken from it.