MARCH JLC 2000
BUILDER
These oversights, omissions, and bad
design details can lead to early failures
After working as a builder for almost 20 years, I changed gears and set up shop as a home
inspector. Most of the houses I inspected were only five to ten years old. I was surprised
to learn how quickly some building components can deteriorate. In house after house, I found it
frustrating to see certain poor building details, all leading to similar types of early failures.
In most cases, these details were built wrong not so much because of an intentional
trade-off between cost and longevity, but because the builder didn't realize