When is a House No Longer a House?
Posted by manorhome on June 28, 2008
In addition to being your friendly neighbourhood home inspector, I also perform Property Condition Assessments on commercial properties. Due to the nature of the property as well as the nature of the transaction, PCAs are quite a bit different from home inspections. Unfortunately, sometimes it can be bit confusing to the client. I consider a property to be a commercial property if it is more than 4 residential units (a four-plex is still a house in my books) or if any part of the building is used for purposes other than residential - store, office, warehouse, factory etc.
The process for PCAs is also quite different. With a home inspection you would call me or email me some vague details about a house (size, age, etc) and I would give you a price over the phone. With a PCA you give me some specifics about the property and I then generate a written proposal that outlines what will be done and the related costs. Also with a PCA you are given a menu of services to choose from (Phase 1 Environmental Site Assessment, Elevator Inspection, Measurement of Building, etc) and these will all add to the cost of the inspection.
With home inspections, I aim for 24 hour turnaround. By that I mean that I do my best to get the report to you within 24 hours of completion of the onsite inspection. Since PCAs involve so much more “inspecting” and much of it will be carried out by myself as well as a team of experts (structural engineers, elevator specialists, HVAC specialists, etc as needed) I aim for 10 day turnaround. This is a commonly held time frime and universally acceptable to commercial clients. It would, however, be unacceptable to residential clients.
In order for my commercial inspection reports to be widely accepted, I follow ASTM E2018-01. This is the protocol for Property Condition Reports set forth by the American Society for Testing and Materials. The reason I don’t use a Canadian standard is simple: none exists as yet. The ASTM standard is a good standard, it outlines what should be contained in a PCA. By following this standard, the parties involved know what to expect in the report regardless of where the building is or who inspects it.
For these reasons, naturally, a PCA costs substantially more to have completed than does a home inspection. The reason I mentions this is that I have recently had the pleasure of being hung up on by a potential client that wanted me to inspect a multi use building for less money than a cheap home inspection would cost. If you have questions regarding commercial inspections, please give me a call to discuss what is involved, I can be reached at 519.818.9701 or 1.877.376.2667. This way I will be able to tell you what is involved and how the costs are broken down. If at that point you still feel compelled to hang up on me, I will know it is not because you didn’t have all the necessary information. 
I look forward to hearing from you soon!
-Brad
