The Razor’s Edge

If you’re a fan of the television show “The Big Bang Theory”, then it’s quite likely that you’ve heard Dr. Sheldon Cooper utter the phrase “Ockham’s razor” before. If you’re like most people, that phrase simply joins the rest of the scientific jargon that theoretical physicist Sheldon spouts on the show. Most of it goes right over our heads, but …

Wicked Problems

(L)earning is a lifelong process of keeping abreast of change. Peter Drucker In this life, the only thing that anyone can really promise us is that things are going to change. For home inspectors, this fact means that our client’s HVAC system is eventually going to change from functional to non-functional. Good maintenance (and good luck) may be able to …

Do I Want Fewer Agents?

We all want to be the most successful inspector out there. We all want to be on the short list of inspectors for all the agents. We all want to be everything to everyone. But that’s not really possible, is it? We couldn’t work for every real estate agent. It’s physically impossible. There are simply not enough hours in the …

The Most Important Thing

It’s not too difficult to start a business. Most people are able to get a basic business off the ground in short order. Growing that “basic” business into something that makes us happy, well, that’s a whole different story. In most states, in order to call ourselves a home inspector, we need to do some basic schooling and pass a …

Remarkably Average

We all want to be as successful as we can be. We don’t have to be too smart to figure that out. We do, however, need to have some common sense to be able to realize that level of success: the most successful that we can be. It takes a certain level of commitment on our part, an ability and …

Crazy People

Working in an industry like real estate, it’s inevitable that we are going to run across problem clients. There’s no way around it; it’s just part of the deal. But it doesn’t need to be. We’re going to run across all kinds of different personalities while we’re working, and it’s imperative that we learn that some clients’ money is worth …

Similarities

It never ceases to amaze me, how many of life’s experiences seem to overlap with our job as a home inspector. Just recently, I was speaking with someone about the way that I try to operate when training new inspectors, and once I had a chance to reflect our conversation, I was struck by the similarity between my approaches to …

A Dream Job…

To many people, being able to do home inspections seems like a dream job (at least, that’s what I keep telling myself..) The reality of working as an inspector is that we’re faced with an almost impossible task. We’re not like an HVAC technician, that’s simply looking at the AC to see what needs to be repaired. We’re not like …