New Homes Aren’t Always Perfect

Never do I pay for myself more than on a new construction home. Even on the nicest home built by the best builder, it doesn’t take much to justify my inspection fee once everything is said and done.

Modern homes are often built on tight timelines, and when dozens of trades are working on a house in a short period of time, small things sometimes get overlooked. Most of the time these issues are minor, but occasionally they can turn into expensive problems if they aren’t caught early.

Last week I did a home built by one of the bigger builders in Edmonton that was completely missing insulation in the attic, and had damaged floor joists in the basement! The site supervisor was furious (and clearly embarrassed) that these didn’t get caught sooner. Everything got put on the builders to-do list right away.

2 years ago I did an inspection in Belgravia where they had forgoten to use the tie-down straps to attach the home to the foundation… The house ended up having so many severe issues that it ended up getting torn down a couple of months later (Yes, literally torn down back to the foundation…)

While the majority of deficiencies I find in new homes are minor, none of them are things buyers expect to see in a brand new home, but they are more common than people realize—especially with smaller builders working on tight timelines.

Most of the time they are easy fixes. The important part is simply catching them early while warranty coverage is still in place.