Kindly note that it is an exceedingly rare thing for me to endorse anything or anyone on this blog. I am generally loathe to fall into the promotional and I am especially chary of recommending folks until I feel I have logical, verifiable reasons for doing so.
This said, I am quite pleased to be able to toss all the above aside for a moment to recommend to anyone in the Puget Sound area a home inspector who not only made the stressful process of understanding a potential purchase from the status and maintenance perspective simple, but who put more time and effort into going over the place with a fine toothed comb than I could ever have hoped for or expected.
I will diverge from this recommendation but briefly to share with you that in 2010 (aka ‘the first attempt at house shopping’), I had an inspector for a house in Kitsap county who spent a grand total of two hours onsite; of that time, almost nothing was fully explained, and the resulting report was generic to the point of BEING pointless. For this “service” I (over)paid and, in blissful ignorance, remained unaware of what I had missed until I met with Mr. Paul Neis of Harbor Home Inspections (ASHI member number 201816; take a moment to review what this means here).
Not only did Paul arrive ON THE MARK of our appointment, he arrived and got to work as if my time and interests were actually important to him (as opposed to “just the next job I have to do today”). He spent a total of almost five hours at the house; exploring (quite literally) every nook and cranny with me in tow. No question from me was unnecessary or unimportant; the man stopped whatever he was looking at or doing to think upon and then, answer me. Not only did he answer me, he educated me; explanation of “code at the time this was built” layered upon “code as it stands today”, and topped with recommendations on (a) level of severity, (b) best recommendation of timeframe in which to address an particular item (or, conversely, that it likely was not in need of address except as time allowed), and (c) whether or not the item under discussion might be worth taking to the seller’s agent/seller for redress.
To say I was impressed with his professionalism and service would be a profound understatement. But not nearly as much of one as when I say this:
Mr. Neis treated this inspection and this house as if it were something HE were reviewing for HIS OWN purchase.
This perspective threaded through every moment of our running, four-nearly-five hour conversation and it was utterly apparent that his primary focus was to ensure MY understanding as well as MY level of information on the house so that I could make a truly educated and informed decision about its purchase.
As a female buyer, it was refreshing to have someone involved with construction and inspections (Mr. Neis was a general contractor for 22 years and has been the owner/operator/inspector behind Harbor Home Inspections for 14 years, since 1997) look beyond my chromosome combination and just give me solid, insightful, and timely information. Add to this, his fee was surprisingly low in relation to the mountain of information and general service he provided; I almost felt guilty to write the check out to him as I compared and contrasted my previous experience with this one…. I truly felt I was underpaying him for what he had done for me.
I know this is but one person’s anecdotal experience, but I have to tell you, I never expected to learn so much in so short a period of time and I certainly never expected to have such genuine commitment to ensuring my understanding as I experienced working with Mr. Paul Neis.
I am pleased to showcase this experience and to recommend him without reservation. As a buyer, he has “done me a solid” and I see from his card that he offers services to both sellers (pre-listing) and buyers. I cannot possibly recommend him highly enough; in my opinion, if you want a truly focused and experienced eye and mind set to your home, be it to sell or to consider purchase, you would have to travel a very long road indeed to find someone of higher caliber or professionalism, someone who gives such exemplary service, or someone who so fully demonstrates a dedication to service quality as Mr. Paul Neis of Harbor Home Inspections.
