Items missed during home buying inspection

[Mel Smith]

Hi, I had a home inspection done on a property I bought last July.  On Thanksgiving Day, the tile floor suddenly cracked in the living room.  The contractor found a broken joist and others that were in need of repair in the living room area.  When the flooring to replace all of the cracked tile was done, the flooring company found more weak spots in the bedroom. The flooring company knew nothing about the joist issues. I'm wondering does the inspector have any liability here since this was not noted on the inspection and therefore, I was not given a chance to negotiate repairs of the joists in the purchase price or walk away from the deal?  Thanks.

[Randy Gutierrez]

Apart from opening the door to an electrical panel and opening cabinet doors, the home inspection is purely visual. Unless the joist was visible from the basement it most likely would not have been seen and put in the report. Buried in the terms of a home inspection report you will see something along the lines of that they are not held liable for anything arising from the report and that there are no guarantees and warranties of their findings, something you most likely signed or agreed to.

[Russell Brazil]

No.

[Andrew Syrios]

Probably not unless it was something that could be seen in a visual inspection. A single broken floor joist is probably not something they could have seen unless it's visible from the basement. 

[Mel Smith]

Quote from @Randy Gutierrez:

Apart from opening the door to an electrical panel and opening cabinet doors, the home inspection is purely visual. Unless the joist was visible from the basement it most likely would not have been seen and put in the report. Buried in the terms of a home inspection report you will see something along the lines of that they are not held liable for anything arising from the report and that there are no guarantees and warranties of their findings, something you most likely signed or agreed to.

 Thanks for the reply.  The broken joists and the others that had to be replaced were all easily visible when in the basement.  There were other items (not connected to the joists issue) noted about other possible issues in the basement.  Even with them being easily visible, I probably have no chance of getting some type of compensation from the inspection company?  

[Jon Kelly]

@Mel Smith how do you know when it happened? Inspection occurs in July and you find a broker joist 5 months later? You can always try to call the inspection company, but there's less than 1% chance they would admit responsibility. 

Unfortunately, it's the cost of doing business with real estate. There are humans involved and it's not perfect. 

Don't be afraid to overpay for a good inspector. They can save you thousands. 

[Bruce Woodruff]

If it is clearly visible from the basement then it should have been caught and noted in the report. But do you have any chance for redress? Most likely not. It's been too long for one thing.

The fix should be pretty easy though, right?

[Sergey A. Petrov]

Second what everybody else said. In addition, buried in that fine print you will likely see that even if, in the unlikely event, you are able to prove some very high level of negligence on behalf of the inspector your claim for damages is limited, at the very most, to the amount of money you paid them to conduct the inspection.

Trying to get to any point in proving their negligence will exceed the cost of the inspection after your first call with your attorney 

[Chris Seveney]

@Mel Smith

As others mentioned no but also since you have occupied the property they could

Claim the damage was done after closing. Unfortunately this is the cost of homeownership

[Randy Gutierrez]

Quote from @Mel Smith:

Quote from @Randy Gutierrez:

Apart from opening the door to an electrical panel and opening cabinet doors, the home inspection is purely visual. Unless the joist was visible from the basement it most likely would not have been seen and put in the report. Buried in the terms of a home inspection report you will see something along the lines of that they are not held liable for anything arising from the report and that there are no guarantees and warranties of their findings, something you most likely signed or agreed to.

 Thanks for the reply.  The broken joists and the others that had to be replaced were all easily visible when in the basement.  There were other items (not connected to the joists issue) noted about other possible issues in the basement.  Even with them being easily visible, I probably have no chance of getting some type of compensation from the inspection company?  

 I would say that is correct, there will be no chance. The company can just claim it occurred during your ownership considering a decent amount of time has elapsed.