TOPIC: Update - Chinese Drywall - The Lawyers Have Landed

John, that is a very good point. I think at this point guys keep things in their contract are likely to be litigious issues. The Chinese Drywall issue is becoming a hot potato and could get worse.

You are right about that!!!

There is a large home inspection company here which franchises to home inspectors.  You buy their way of doing things, their book, and their contract.  The agreement they have clients sign is 6 pages, very small type and protects everything from the franchiser to franchisee to what they do to what the clients would have to pay for in court.  Too much, in my opinion.

My hazardous stuff clause includes everything from radon, to pesticides, to molds and now Chinese drywall.  It has to ("haz" to) for the reasons Dom says above.  So many things are becoming hot potatoes.  But, like my son says, you may want to keep things vague in the agreement, because if you have so many specifics listed it might be construed in court that you omitted something and therefore are liable... 

For example, I have never seen a meth house, that I know about.  I wanted to put something about that in my agreement, but my son told me that my hazardous stuff paragraph says, "and all other similar or potentially harmful substances," so that would cover it.  His point is that to mention meth might open me up to having to mention a thousand other things.  So, Adrian, that might be where you would want to "draw the line"...

He put together a really great agreement for me.  You can contact him at  This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. 

well I am going to put that Disclaimer right in my contract better to safe than sorry..

Hey guys, remember that disclaimer I posted was directly from FREA my insurance company. If they say put it in...I put it in. Period. Last thing I want is for something to happen and my insurance company blows me off because of an ...I told you to ...

For me that was a no brainer.

Now FREA is surely not the only company insuring inspectors, but they are one of the top I think. So it would not be a bad thing for guys to do something that they think is important.

John,

Sounds pretty good but I don't know that I would change my contract for that.  I might consider putting it in the report someplace.  I have a place up front where I put notices.  That might be a good location for something like that.

You mentioned that you have a place up front in your report that mentions notices. Do you have your clients sign that page? That would make them acknowledge that they have read and are aware of those notices before to the inspection. That might help you out somewhere down the line. Hopefully never though.

My agreement mentions "notices" and "recall notices" as well.  All on the advice of my son.  The verbiage makes it the client's responsibility to learn of and react to any recall notices.