I’m building a double-story house in QLD with a reputable volume builder and considering hiring a private building inspector. I received a quote of $3,000 for a staged inspection (five stages).
Is this a typical price?
New House Building Inspections - Is $3000 a Typical Price?
Meercat on 05/12/2024 - 10:27
Last edited 05/12/2024 - 11:14 by 1 other user
Last edited 05/12/2024 - 11:14 by 1 other user
Comments
5 stages implies they're coming to the site 5 times, right?
So travel from their base of ops or home 5 times = $600 per inspection. you're paying a supposed expert $600 pre tax and expenses.
seems completely reasonable if they are spending an hour or two each time they go there.
Sometimes you are just paying for someone else's cock up.
I was in a cert 4 building & construction course and everyone was commenting how they are just quoting more to make up for the busted builders they worked for.
You are correct. Each stage is quoted $600 per visit.
Yeah I paid $600 for a pre purchase inspection in QLD recently
$600 for an hour or two. How do you become a building inspector?
Don't waste your time studying to be a neurosurgeon.
https://www.fairtrading.nsw.gov.au/trades-and-businesses/bus…I can tell you're a salaried worker.
2 hours of work on-site doesn't account for travel time either side. associated costs, tax and everything else.
And admin time writing up the reports
The key is to start a successful building inspector company.
Doing it alone sucks. Drumming up enough business through marketing, the travel and downtime between jobs, the insurance costs, the admin and invoicing and all that, doing it yourself that $300-600 an hour quickly shrinks to not much. $600 for one job sounds great. Getting 5-10 jobs a week, every week, becomes very hard to keep up.
If you can run a company with enough work to keep all your building inspectors busy, that's where you make money.
Why not just talk to OPs own certifier????
Thats why they are there
Can't comment about Qld but in WA I am paying $2500 which includes 5 inspections for single storied house itself.
Any refund clause for if the builder goes bust and only half completes the house?
Not sure at this stage as I am yet to receive the full signed contract, scheduled for next week. I will engage a solicitor to look over the contract before I actually commit.
But: "Home warranty insurance pays up to a maximum of $200,000 on claims" — bit useless on most builds! Too little too late if there are major issues.
The value of a good inspector is picking up defects before the potential claim value gets anywhere near that high.
@pinchies: Oh, definitely. I'm all for hiring a building inspector. I was just addressing the part about a refund clause. If the builder goes bust, there's almost certainly going to be a long line of creditors that will be paid out long before the person building would get a cent, so HWI is just more relevant.
think of it as insurance. obviously get more quotes but I paid around that price and I sometimes got more than 1 inspection per stage.
If you are building on average a 500-600k house which is the going average these days. whats $3000.
Now its not a matter of if the builder subbies mess up its only a matter of if they get caught out or not.
I also see this as the earlier you have photographic proof of the stuff up , its alot easier to get the builder to fix it early days then towards the end. As it is cheaper for all involved.
I recently finished building and I can saw the defect I picked up/inspector outweighs the cost of the inspector by far. (By the way there is no such thing as a house without defects its just a matter of minor/major)
*also all my defects were considered minor.
Thanks mate. That’s really helpful.
So, go cheaper. It's only a home. What could possibly go wrong?
Seriously. Get the BEST inspector you can. Houses will get more and more shit from 2 years ago, onward. Good luck.
Houses will get more and more shit from 2 years ago
Huh? Try 20 mate.
How about, the rate of decline in quality likely increased markedly two years ago?
Sums it up.
It won't improve .Inspectors will soon have to take short cuts to keep up with the workload.Insurance premiums can only go up every year as the faults pile up.
Up until 2 years ago baristas and flower growers weren't imported in to be converted on paper to qualified builders & tradies. Building half OK was a coin toss, at least. But post covid, even the 3 little pigs have contracts, and they aint using bricks.
Yep, its a fairly normal price. We went with Darbecca and it cost us close to $4k. Expensive but worth it for peace of mind.
Were many issues found?
Yeah there were a few, nothing very major though. I took the reports back to the builders and got them to fix each issue and then provide me with proof that they were fixed.
Just another note when getting an inspector.
While contractually they builders have no obligation to fix defects, they do have a obligation to have the house to QBCC standards.
Now with that being said from personal experience I picked up a few things that the inspector did not. This is me being paranoid and also I've had experience building.
Ie. I had anti-con insulation placed in my spec. It was specced for R1.8 . They put in R1.3 . This is almost impossible to tell by eye, I caught them out because I take pictures of supply being delivered and also for construction rubbish. Anyway when I notified the builders. This became a conversation between me and the supplier , long story short I got a few upgrades (R 4.1 insulation+ free ground level wall insulation) as they were very reluctant to pull the roof off understandable.
I also had a storm-water pipe that was punctured during piering for slab piers. This was picked up by inspector and he also mentioned it was fixed. Had photos for both pre and post fix. I was not satisfied due to my paranoia so I hired separately CCTV plumber and guess what still a small crack. I paid out of pocked for my CCTV but for me this was necessary cost as the area was going to be concreted by me. Which means I aint pulling up any concrete due to prior mistakes.
You can guess the builders love me =)
I've seen lots of shortcuts over the years. Thinner grade roof sheeting than specced.Dodgy steel frames.Imported plasterboard faking as genuine Gyprock. It's a seriously feral industry.
fwiw i paid 3.3k for mine in NSW.
as mentioned above, go with one with a good rep rather than focus on the cost. in the end you're counting cents when comparing this to the money you've dropped on the house
No worries thanks heps.
Is $3000 a Typical Price?
Is it for that youtube property inspector?
If not, it might be non compliant…
Zeher Khalil
Hahaha, I have seen this guy. Didn't know he was Australian!
But some of the stuff he finds is mind blowing…. I'd want him on my side.
It's funny when the builders lock him out of the properties, but he enters anyway…
2 questions: why do they need 5 visits? And how do I become a building inspector?
even easier being a pool fence inspector!
1.5m pools in Australia need 4-yearly fence inspections due to SPASA (or some other lobby monkeys) berating government over all the kids drowning. Government feel they need to do something but not actually think about anything - how to make noise go away easiest? Pass a law! So, to get on this gravy train…pay $1,500 to do a 4-day pool fence certification course - kerching!
pay a membership fee to SPASA - kerching!
pay for a builders registration fee - kerching!
pay for professional indemnity insurance - kerching! (because nobody else is now taking any accountability up the chain…they just take money).and pool owners get to fork out an average of $300 to get an inspection performed + the $80 registration in the first place fee + $35-ish fee to register the inspection with the council because the inspector doesn't have to…or they probably did, but hey, council dreams up an additional revenue stream so why not?
have the number of kids drowning in australia dropped? NO! Because pools are harder to access these days so nobody sees the importance of getting swimming lessons any more….and beaches are not fenced
Please get Khalil from Site Inspections to do the job and post the youtube links here! Let's go!
Always ask for quote from multiple companies