Healthy Homes

by Kurt Salomon August 1, 2011

I attended the National Healthy Homes Conference in Denver. This conference addressed a cross section of health, housing, energy and environmental issues, providing us an opportunity to assess where the United States is, where we are and to measure our progress.

The conference was hosted by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Office of Healthy Homes and Lead Hazard Control, in partnership with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. You should also know that ASHI was acknowledged as a planning partner. Another significant planning partner was AARST, the American Association of Radon Scientists and Technicians.

AARST.jpg
Photo: ASHI President Kurt Salomon attended the National Healthy Homes Conference. R to l: Carolyn Allen, AARST president; Kurt Salomon, ASHI president; Bill Angel, AARST past-president; and Peter Hendrix, AARST executive director.

As home inspectors, please consider the following: Our Standards of Practice direct us to identify those systems or components that are unsafe. There is clear and undisputed evidence that lead-based paint is a hazard to infants, young children and pregnant women. Radon is real. Radon is a Class A carcinogen. There are specific action levels for lead-based paint and radon. I am not stating that our standards call for us to do environmental testing; rather this can be entree to additional billable services beyond our Standards of Practice.

Radon

Doing a radon test is a valuable service for your clients. Is there any debate that elevated levels of radon are not a health hazard? Radon is real. Radon causes lung cancer. Radon kills. And, just as important, a house with elevated levels of radon can have a radon mitigation system installed to reduce the radon levels to below the EPA action level of 4.0 pCi/L.

If you are not doing radon testing, I encourage you to offer this valuable service. You need to determine if the state in which you test has its own radon licensing program and what its requirements are. I encourage you to refer to section 5.b of the Home Buyer’s and Seller’s Guide to Radon to ensure you are measuring at the proper location for a real estate transaction.

You may consider offering the additional service of inspecting the installation of a radon system in accordance with the “ASHI Radon Mitigation System Inspection Checklist.”  This checklist can be found in the Members- Only section of the ASHI website or also on the EPA website at www.epa.gov/radon/pdfs/ashicklst.pdf. Be sure to do your homework so you are proficient and competent to fill out the checklist correctly.

Lead Based Paint

Effective April 22, 2010, new federal rules came into effect for contractors disturbing more than 6 square feet of painted surface for buildings built before 1978. I realize that we are home inspectors. We can provide better service to our customers as we broaden our base of knowledge concerning buildings and associated items. I recommend we all become familiar with the EPA Lead-Safe Contractor Renovation and Repair Paint program and rules.

Indoor Air Quality

And then there is the category of indoor air quality, including elements, mold, dust mites, VOCs and others. Unfortunately, many of these have attributes of allergens and there are not action levels. It is my belief that the problem with mold is not mold; it is the water or moisture source that is causing mold to grow. It is mold in large quantities that poses a problem. From Page 11 of the EPA Pamphlet “A Brief Guide to Mold, Moisture and Your Home:” There is a question and answer: “Is sampling for mold needed? In most cases, if visible mold growth is present, sampling is unnecessary.”

Each and every one of us should strive to do the best inspection to the ASHI Standards of Practice. I encourage us to broaden our horizons as it comes to the environmental aspects of the home to generate additional optional services and generate additional revenue streams.


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