» 2010 Tuesday » October 8 » 2002 That Crack? What crack? The nicest people can turn nasty when a house inspector points out flaws in the house they're selling. But nasty won't make Steve Balshin, H.I., go away Norman Doidge National Post Tuesday, October 08, 2002 Chris Bolin, National Post Steve Balshin, president of Majestic Home Inspection, is used to hearing homeowners ask: "What do you mean you have to climb up there?" Chris Bolin, National Post SELLER BEWARE: Steve Balshin Vendors and agents hate him. Buyers love him. To be so important either way -- can there be anything better for the ego? Being a house inspector, it turns out, is like being a private eye. The scene of the crime? Your beloved domicile. The one you are now trying to unload on that naive young couple who look like you did 20 years ago. The enemy? House inspector Steve Balshin, who is forever finding himself in the rooms and lives of those who would normally not admit him -- and in places, if it weren't for his job, he might not care to go. Steve Balshin, H.I., age 50, has found himself inspecting on behalf of, or the homes of, major political movers, prostitutes, rabbis, nuns, prima ballerinas and old friends (awkward). Once, real estate agents loved him. That is because, before his profession existed, they were getting nailed with lawsuits for undisclosed defects in the homes they sold. But with people like Balshin in the business, there were now professionals who could vouch for the house, or at least warn the buyer to beware. The real estate agents celebrated the H.I., reasoning that all those lawsuits would suddenly be deflected his way. But after a while, they started noticing that sales that looked as if they were in the bag were falling through because of that no-good Balshin, H.I. He could delay things. Impulsive buying gave way to second thoughts. Many a real estate agent began to wish his spoiling occupation had never been created at all. It seems the nicest people have criminal tendencies when it comes to selling a house. It's partly for money reasons that the dissembling occurs: a little teensy-weensy leak in a roof, if it becomes the vendor's responsibility to fix before the sale, could end up costing $10,000. An itty-bitty toxic-waste dump in the backyard caused by an oil tank that was left in place after the home was converted to gas, and that is now about to leach, might cost up to $200,000 to remove, and it must be removed according to new regulations. But it seems these flaws are also hidden out of a vanity for which there is no known name, and which we thus designate as "housepride." The bourgeois like to use their homes to impress, and see them as extensions of themselves. Having the flaws in one's home systematically exposed by a professional starts to feel personal. Twenty-five years ago there were no home inspectors. Any unmentioned leaks were yours to discover with the first storm. And the first storm would occur only after you had moved your precious antique pool table into the basement which, you would learn, was the de facto community runoff reservoir. Steve was a builder then, and friends and family started asking him to look over houses they were thinking of buying to see if the roof was OK, or if there were any other problems. He became Toronto's first full-time house inspector. Then the practice caught on. Sometimes, it seems, people think the home inspector is not too bright. As in the time Steve went into an old acquaintance's house, and saw all the furniture moved to one end of the basement. "That's where we like to keep it," said the vendor. "That's OK, but I have to look behind it," said Steve. Shocked vendor. "Funny coincidence, but just behind the furniture, I think I just found a pool of water big enough to nurture a school of salmon through college." Each time he suspects there's something fishy, the drill is the same. "What do you mean you might have to climb up there?" "There might be a leaky roof." "I've lived here for 15 years. There's no leaky roof. Are you saying I am a liar? I am a doctor [or respected dental hygienist, cleric, lawyer, teacher with 25 years' elementary-school experience] ... why would you intimate such a thing?" Next the agent (seeing a lost sale) is outraged, and gets all supportive of the vendor. Hence: "But Mrs. A. is a respected member of the board of a not-for-profit non-governmental organization! I've never heard such an outrageous allegation!" Sometimes people have to sell because they are getting divorced and the family is breaking up, or someone has died. People in these situations get touchy when you find a geological fault line running through what was once their happy family home. Thus it's best, whenever possible, to let the defects suddenly reveal themselves. Steve's business card has developed the habit of falling from his hand and landing half under the edge of a rug covering a cracked concrete floor: Cost of repair, $3,000. "Oh, could you pick that up for me...? Well, would you look at that. There's a crack in the concrete ... just under the rug." Going through a house one day, Steve finds a bathroom with two sinks. He slips in before the vendor can catch up with him. A flower pot is in one of the sinks. "Please. Don't touch that flower pot in the sink in the bathroom!" yells the vendor, a nice lady still down the hall, huffing and puffing to keep up with Steve. "It's just been watered. It's in the sink to catch the runoff." "OK, for sure not, plants can be so sensitive," yells Steve. But he lifts it up and discovers a major crack in the sink. $700 to repair. He makes no comment and moves the flower pot to the uncracked sink. Then he goes through the rest of the house with the purchaser, and then down to the basement. He hears a man's voice upstairs. He's screaming, seemingly at the huffing and puffing woman: "You idiot! You put the pot in the wrong sink!" "Oh, dear," says Steve to the potential purchaser in a loud voice that will be heard on the second floor by all as he is now racing upstairs, "IS THERE SOMETHING WE SHOULD ATTEND TO IN THE BATHROOM?" You can't blame people for want-ing to hide things in the bathroom. Once, Steve inspected an entire house except for the bathroom, because each time he passed by, it was locked. Finally, when he was ready to leave, he knocked on the bathroom door. The vendor said, "I am sorry, but you can't go in there." "Why?" "There is a naked lady in there. In the bathtub. I'm awfully sorry, you just can't go in." "But I have to inspect the whole house, and tubs are important." The vendor's censuring eyes met those of the agent: "What a perv!" Even holy people take liberties. Inspections are supposed to be billed by the home. Once he went to a holy order, inspected the place, and had only the basement left when he was told to go down a long underground passageway and up a stairway into an adjacent building. "This too?" "Yes." He inspected it as well, but it too had an underground passage, leading to yet another structure: All for the price of one. Another time, Steve had to inspect the house of a rabbi. He started going through the house. He arrived early afternoon on Friday, knowing the Sabbath begins at sundown. After 20 minutes of searching, the rabbi came in and said, "Are you done yet? It's Shabbos today, you know." "Rabbi, I know, but it's five hours till sundown." Off the rabbi went, but he was back in half an hour. "You will have to be leaving now, it's almost Shabbos." "Rabbi, there are over four hours left." Steve, on his hands and knees, kept finding things until an outstretched hand with a watch on it and a finger tapping the watch face appeared before him. "I have my preparations for Shabbos," said the rabbi. "You must leave now." "I'm staying till the sun goes down." "What are you doing to me?" said the rabbi. Then the agent: "What, what are you doing! To a rabbi yet?" It's predator and prey. Vendors know the house inspector's job is to inspect the home in its entirety, and their job is to prevent it. And the hapless home inspector knows if he misses something that has been cunningly camouflaged, an angry purchaser might sue his pants off rather than going after the sleazy vendor. But Steve's a pro: He does his job every day, and vendors sell only once in a blue moon. Not a fair contest. Each minute they let Steve inspect could cause them to forfeit thousands. Which is why they suddenly take to changing the rules midstream, or introducing a higher moral plane to the contest. Thus, the same vendor who greeted him with a warm "We have nothing to hide" welcome and a pasted-on grin is now screaming at him, "THIS IS MY HOME!" and "You have no right to snoop around!" Just as he was warming to the foibles that made the place so endearing. One day, Steve was sent to a remarkable home in an exquisite part of Toronto. He was met at the door by a gentleman in a silk smoking jacket, with an ascot, and a cup of brandy in his hand, Mr. X, in a muffled, affected voice, invited him in to the living room. The living room stretched the length of a bowling alley and had no furniture in it except for a chair at one end and a small television at the other. Mr. X sat down in the chair and started watching the TV at the other end, saying nothing. As Steve went through the house, he found that each of the rooms had no furniture except for a chair. Gloomy silence lurked everywhere. Then the man's male partner appeared and, in an equally affected accent, said only, "Mr. X would like you to leave now." "That's it? But there can be no sale without an inspection." "Yes, that's it." No explanation, no inspection, no sale. Then there's the plain-looking Toronto house in which Steve was greeted by a vendor in black leather. She's a dominatrix. "I've been expecting you. But be quiet, the girls are all upstairs sleeping." In the basement, just off the furnace room, are the whips, chains, table, and dildos. "Everything looks in order," he says. On the wall is a large board with the names and phone numbers of every major downtown Toronto hotel concierge. The bizarre part of the job is the flipflop. A vendor accuses him of being a liar, a cheat, shamelessly in cahoots with the purchaser, and swears he'll sue him for maliciously ruining a sale. Then, a few days later, that same vendor gives him a call. "I'd like you to inspect the home I'm looking at." Recently, Steve had the misfortune of discovering another oil tank in a backyard. That always adds several hours to an inspection, and is the cause of endless fights with agents and see-no-evil vendors. This time, the agent started screaming at him that he was an impostor, inventing things to make trouble, that it wasn't really an oil tank, that Steve didn't know what he was talking about, and that she was bringing in "real house inspectors" to prove he was wrong. He happened to be on the local news that day, talking about home inspections, in one of those broadcasts that keep getting rerun all day long. He asked the vendor to turn on the TV. "What for?" "Just do it." After a bit, he heard his own voice come on the TV, and heard the vendor's kids jumping up and down. "It's the guy in our house, he's on TV!" The agent and the vendor came in to see what the fuss was about. Steve arrived in the room. "Oh, that's just me, giving expert testimony on house inspection." He turned to the agent and pulled out his Daytimer and a pen, as if he wanted to write something down. He asked the agent, "When's the next time you're going to be on TV giving the public advice about the market? I'd like to catch it." Then he left. A card tumbled from his pocket. Onto a crack in the floor. © Copyright 2002 National Post Copyright © 2002 CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest Global Communications Corp. All rights reserved. Optimized for browser versions 4.0 and higher.