My real estate agent (Redfin- Valerie Bond) listed a couple of options for home inspectors, and Ian's reviews immediately stood out to me as something when I looked up reviews on the internet. I decided to give him a try and see if his service was in line with the (unreal) caliber of reviews.
I am a very detailed-oriented person with a background in engineering, and Ian did not disappoint. I scheduled online without making a call, got a confirmation beforehand (love it! so easy) and he was on time.
He poured over every detail of the house, spending close to 4 hours on the home because it had foundation repairs that, while a normal inspection would not spend much time caring about, Ian spent extra effort seeing how they may have impacted the structure and other systems. Have you ever met those professionals that care only about doing things the right way--being utterly thorough and careful--and seem to not consider the extra time and cost it will take them to do it that way? Ian falls into that category. I honestly felt he would have spent 12 hours on the inspection if he though he needed it to cover everything.
He took pictures of everything, and let me walk around asking questions to which he gave clear, straightforward answers and also suggested potential fixes both of a get-it-done for cheaply and a do-it-the-right-way option. implications--and also often suggested repairs or other considerations. If you are not asking questions about the issues he is turning up, then you are losing a lot of the value in the service he provides; being able to ask and understand potential fixes was alone worth the cost of the visit.
After the visit he emailed me very late at night to apologize that he couldn't get the inspection document to me same day. Huh? I wasn't even expecting it same day given how long it took and how many things he pointed out! He sent it early the next morning.. and it was 105 pages long with 150 items and pictures clearly detailing every single issue with arrows pointing to the specifics in the report! Crazy. He must have an incredibly efficient workflow for that kind of turnaround. The report was invaluable in showing the sellers a variety of issues that could be repaired, and narrowing down the must-fix repairs to request in the contract. Believe me, you want a home inspector that shows you every potential issue.
I think I am even more qualified than many other reviewers to comment on his work because I hired him again! Ian offers a flat-fee re-inspection service to check on repairs and other work. This, again, was well worth the money because he let me know how they screwed up some of the negotiated repairs (and more importantly, is the partial repair something I can live with, fix myself, or something I should bring up in negotiations). I hired him through the walk-through inspection a few days before closing.
Overall, had I paid double his fee I would have still felt like I got a great deal. I rarely write reviews on service providers but felt it was the least I could do. If you are reading this, I hope you are lucky enough to be able to hire him.