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Retaliatory Building Inspector? How to handle this situation.

7.5K views 57 replies 21 participants last post by  G&Co.  
#1 ·
Owner/Builder and Contractor [California]

Purchased and did major rennovations to a turn of the century home. Added a 2/1 unit (attached) underneath existing home. New foundation, plumbing, electrical, mechanical. City was between building inspectors and hired a third party inspection outfit who conducted the final inspection and the city issued a certificate of habilitability, which was in 2019.

Fast forward to 2023.

I needed to replace the A/C units (window units) upstairs and pulled a permit to replace them with a 2-zone mini split. The permit included a demo permit to pull out 100 square feet of sheetrock in the front bedroom to insulate that wall (original part of the house is now the upstairs and it still has missing insulation in some walls).

The city still has no building inspector and uses the third party inspection outfit. I scheduled an inspection after removing the 100 sq feet of sheetrock.

The inspector no-showed. I re-scheduled but could not be onsite that day and left the unit accessible for the inspector. He showed up but said he couldn't get in. We rescheduled a third time. He no showed.

I went down to the city building department and they wanted a $66 re-inspection fee. I told the manager the inspector no showed so "no I'm not paying a re-inspection fee."

Inspector writes a ****ty email to the city manager and the community development director calling me a liar.

4th inspection date: The inspector shows up with a police escort (I cant make this **** up), and proceeds to tell me "you shouldn't have called me a liar."

This is the part I need help with:

He proceeds to make two pages of violations unrelated to the sheetrock demo to force a re-inspection of the ENTIRE property from the 2019 permit and the final. The caveat: HE IS THE SAME INSPECTOR WHO SIGNED OF ON THE FINAL IN 2019.

What should I do at this point?
 
#45 ·
That may be BUT for $66 and a little humble pie, it all likely could have been avoided WITHOUT having to expend the time, resources, power and control... now, resources and time will be needed to exercise that power and control... and at the end, you have an adversary going forward on other projects no matter the outcome on this one...

But who knows... maybe not...
 
#46 ·
That what I meant, the horse is out of the barn.
I agree it never should have gotten here. Do what they want or have a respectful conversation with the supervisor but never start a fight with an underpaid government worker with more power than their paycheck. That's just dumb.
 
#57 ·
All homes get inspected before sale, supposed to be a life safety inspection, carbon monoxide and smoke detctors
But towns see it as a way to get more money in if they find other things. Most of the time its illegal basements, bedrooms etc. Some dig up lots of stuff

In NJ if inspector has a "reasonable suspicion" of unpermitted work they can just walk in. I only had it happen once and surprised the crap out of me. I was replacing cabinets and no permit was needed but he thought I was doing much more.
 
#58 ·
Ok, that's a different issue. I once had the city of Detroit flag a cracked garage slab on an inspection for a sale. Detroit is the only city with a sale inspection here. No suburb has it.
But that has nothing to do with what we're talking about here. Whether something passed an inspection before has no bearing on a sale inspection. The OP is not having a sale inspection, he claims they are reopening a closed permit.

As to inspector walking in, we have just the opposite. I cannot get an inspector to go inspect a house I just leave unlocked. They are instructed not to go in without somebody on the premises actually escorting them in. Apparently there is some kind of legal precedent. Lots of regional differences.

That's pretty dumb actually. If I were an inspector I sure wouldn't walk into somebody's house unannounced. What if the HO mistakes me for a burglar? :oops: