Carole,
Wow...I can honestly say that I was not expecting to see you reply (especially since I had purposely tried to give you and your company the benefit of the doubt by not including your name in any of my previous posts. Unlike all of the other posts on this board that have publicly criticized your company, I was trying to take the high road in the hope that things may have improved since we last spoke a few years ago).
However, since you're here and seem to be interested in dragging your own name through the mud, I might as well give my side of the story since your notes seem to be a bit fuzzy...
Yes, you did our PDI inspection back in July 2007.
No, we were not happy with your work and even my non-technical wife had concerns about some of your comments and items that we discovered afterwards that we felt you should have noticed as a “professional home inspector”.
Yes, we hired you again for our 30-day inspection.
No, this was not because we were "happy enough to engage your services for the follow up 30 day inspection". Unfortunately, my wife was hospitalized shortly after we moved in and we simply ran out of time to find someone else. On the premise that something had to be better than nothing, we contacted you at the last minute to perform our 30-day but subsequently cancelled because we weren't comfortable having you come back inside our home again. I forget what excuse we came up with at the time but we were simply trying to be polite while secretly hoping that you would just go away.
Yes, your list of exterior items was quite long.
No, I was not going to type all of that into my earlier message as the focus was specifically on the concept of looking at "every brick".
Yes, some of the items that you reported were valid and we included the important ones on the list that we submitted to Tarion.
No, everything on your list was not accurate and in many cases, the items you included were simply not important in the grand scheme of things. As anyone that has gone through the new home warranty process can tell you, it's important to pick and choose your battles. It's hard enough getting Tarion and the builders out to fix legitimate complaints and building code defects let alone trying to chase after them to power wash our bricks, chip off some mortar splashes or come out and lift up a little gravel to see that there really is a weeping tile connection in our window well despite what some inspector might have reported incorrectly.
Yes, the shower floor in our en suite bathroom is sloped toward the drain.
No, it's not "wavy" with "defective" floor tiles as it's actually quite smooth and drains perfectly.
Yes, you should have recognized what a dishwasher RI wire was when you saw it hanging in the ceiling.
No, you did not seem to recognize what it was. You also failed to recognize the fact that it was hanging above our laundry tub (safety hazard #1) and that the tub had been installed beside our electrical panel where water could easily splash on to the panel and breakers (safety hazard #2) and directly underneath the panel’s utility outlet which did not have a GFI receptacle (safety hazard #3).
Yes, you may have noticed the large hole in the wall of our basement (but I doubt it).
No, the hole was not for future use as our HRV had been installed at least 3 weeks prior to our PDI. Since it was obviously a mistake that someone had tried to cover-up (they had taped over it with painters tape for some reason, possibly during the blower door test as one of the Mattamy guys eventually admitted), I'm quite positive that one of us would have caused a stink with the Mattamy rep that was on-site for our PDI while we were walking through the house had you have mentioned this.
Long story, short - We were not happy with your service during either of your visits, we would not recommend your services to anyone on this board and yes, we did go with someone else for our 1-year inspection. That inspector was certified and came with a number of excellent recommendations. As such, they were quickly able to notice several critical issues including safety hazards, some OBC problems and structural issues that Mattamy was subsequently able to repair before they became a problem.
With that said and to try and get this thread back on topic…
Checking electrical outlets – Good.
Checking bricks instead of electrical outlets – Not so good.
