For Whom do You Write Your Reports?

For Whom Do You Write Your Reports?

Do you write your reports for the customer, the customer’s Realtor, the home owner, the listing agent, the repair contractor, the closing attorney, the insurance agent or the mortgage banker?

There are three answers:
As hard as we try, there always seems to be someone else who
wants or says that they need a copy of the report. If we give a copy of the report to anyone except our customer, is that because that’s what is expected or is that what the customer wants?

How do we not give a copy to the owner of the home? After all, that’s their home we are inspecting.

How do we not give a copy to the listing Realtor? They can’t get anything done from our list if we don’t give them a copy.
The primary purpose of the home inspection is to inspect. We then write out the areas of concern, minor problems, major problems, items that would require some repair or items that would cost thousands of dollars to repair, and we make a recommendation.

1. Okay, the first person we need to give a copy of the report is our customer. He or she is the one that who us, and no one else gets the report unless the customer gives us permission to make the information available to anyone else. It’s the customer’s information, and if he or she doesn’t want anyone to see the report, then that’s the customer’s decision.

2. The next person that we should write our reports for is—Guess who?—the customer’s lawyer. So when you are writing and describing your items in the report, write like this would go to a lawyer. But make sure you are following the Standards of Practice in the state in which you live.

3. The last person you would write your report for is—Guess who?—the judge. If something goes wrong, then that’s where the report will end up on the judge’s desk.

So the first person is your customer, the second is the customer’s lawyer and the third is the judge.

Good luck writing your reports.