Tom,

Thanks again

THIS IS A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT!

Home Safe, Smart Home Buyer Seminars
Presented by Tom Corbett of Tomacor Incorporated

What: A free, fast paced seminar with (pending) ASHI continuing education credit that is jam packed with information for anyone interested in buying residential, commercial, or industrial properties. Get all of the information you need to negotiate prices and reap financial rewards! 27 year veteran building inspector, Tom Corbett is renowned for his no nonsense, straight forward style and you won’t believe how much you can learn in just one hour! Tom will cover topics such as “Choosing a Team of Advocates” and “Negotiating Strategies”. If you’ve ever thought about purchasing property, this is a seminar you don’t want to miss!

When/Where:
Buying Foreclosed Property Without the Pitfalls
Saturday, October 22, 2011 12:00pm-1:30pm
Chicago Public Library – Logan Square Branch
3030 W. Fullerton Avenue
Chicago, Illinois, 60647

Thursday, November 10, 2011 6:00pm-7:30pm
Chicago Public Library – Roden Branch
6083 N. Northwest Highway
Chicago, Illinois 60631

Become a Home Detective: Ten Distinctions to Avoid When Buying a Property
Thursday, December 1, 2011 6:00pm-7:30pm
Chicago Public Library – Roden Branch
6083 N. Northwest Highway
Chicago, Illinois 60631

Space is Limited! Please email coco@tomacor.com to RSVP today!

Why: The market is down but YOU should be up! Tom Corbett is committed to educating the public about the myriad of issues which can arise when buying, living in, owning, or selling a home. This education, in turn, empowers people to make educated decisions regarding their property.

During this economic crisis the housing market is suffering, and many are pessimistic about buying and selling properties. After 27 years Tom Corbett has learned all that you need to know to get quality property at affordable prices. He would like to share this wealth of information with the public, empowering them to purchase property and, in turn, stimulate the market.

How: Tom Corbett of Tomacor, Inc. will speak at a one-hour seminars on topics relating to buying properties. His goal is to empower the consumer by giving them the education and the tools needed to make informed decisions about purchasing within the real estate market.

2. You get a couple of weeks to make sure your financials are all in order and you take your net lease to Tomacor after you’ve received permission to “bring your friend” or “inspect” the property.

3. Tomacor inspects the property with you present and puts budget figures next to all of the deficiencies needing immediate repair. For instance, a furnace may be spewing carbon monoxide and in need of repair.

4. You take Tomacor’s report which includes budget figures for repair and give it to the landlord followed by the phrase “fix these things”.

With the downturn in the economy, anybody with any money is king. That holds true for the rental as well as the purchase market. Last month Tomacor inspected a 60,000 plus square foot manufacturing facility that was leased. The lease was ending and the manufacturer moving but he didn’t want to get stuck with the lessor claiming hundreds of thousands of dollars in repairs. What did he do? He hired Tomacor who discovered that all of the cooling equipment was at the end of it statistical life and that the roof would need to be replaced within the next two years. When this report was given back to the landlord showing that the building was in good shape, but aged, the tenant breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that the building’s condition had been pegged.

Recently, near Fullerton and Clark in Chicago, while completing a lease hold inspection, I opened the roof to find a heating and air conditioning unit (RTU). I discovered a neatly folded manila envelope with the phrase “the heat exchanger is compromised”. It was dated a month before I inspected the place. I reported to my client after some tests that carbon monoxide was present everywhere and that he would have to replace the equipment. He walked away from the lease based on this $10,000 repair

Can we help your clients in this way? Our inspection services include everything from a 14 story building, where we assemble a team, to the little 600 square foot condo on Fullerton avenue. Cost? Almost always less than $1,000.00. We know it’s cheap and we tend to save our clients tens of thousands of dollars or more in their contract to the landlord.

Dear Mr. Smith,
I appreciate you taking the time to review my blog and follow up with your comments. My comments and opinions are not based in my real estate sales or brokerage degree, but simply on my 27 years of experience in the field watching how this game is played out. As a managing broker, I understand how your interests are to represent one side or another of a deal, yet they are also best served by “making the deal happen”. It is this dynamic I am witnessing today more than ever. I readily admit I am not familiar with “Cap Rates” or “ROI” Illinois brokerage licensing laws, yet I am deeply steeped in the sales tactics so commonly used in the real estate profession.

Your comments appear to assume that the real estate market is complete but static, simply waiting for banks to loosen their criteria for lending for the market to be active. I could not more completely disagree. There has been a fundamental loss of faith and serious breach of trust in the market which is causing a new paradigm to emerge. Here it is:

1. Real Estate agents often work very hard to “outlast” their buyers. When a committed, qualified buyer comes to the market and I get a chance to meet them, they usually complain of their agent’s failure to listen to what they want, and being pushed into a transaction. A significant percentage of my buyers simply drop out of the market due to real estate buyer’s exhaustion (REBE). The new real estate paradigm will listen to and serve buyer’s needs, not frustrate them.

2. It is common knowledge that real estate attorneys in the Chicago marketplace who serve the industry are referred by real estate agents and they are stuck to a flat fee. Have you heard their complaints? After long conversations with these attorneys, and at least one presentation for the Chicago BAR association Real Property Committee, I have learned that the attorneys are frustrated. They want out of the market and far away from taking instructions given by agents who refer them work. These attorneys feel obligated to help their referring agents and obligated to help their clients. They are left in dual agency. Attorneys will begin to charge hourly rates for their services.

3. The 11,000 or so clients I’ve met are not concerned with whether the house has two or four bedrooms. They want a good location, a good school district and a house free of major structural, electrical, mechanical and plumbing problems. The market is shifting from location, location, location to condition, condition, condition. Buyers deserve this.

4. Home buyers don’t know their rights, and this is changing. All you’ve got to do is look at what’s happened in the real estate market in the last six years to understand that. We recommend that you and all professionals in the field teach buyers their rights. Ninety percent of the condominiums that I’ve inspected are represented either on the buyer or seller side by real estate agents who refuse to provide access to the common areas or roof. These are areas that belong to the homeowners and must be inspected. Tomacor says teach your buyers about how important the common areas are. Will you take that on?

5. Buyers are rethinking their notion of what a “good experienced agent” is. Of course their agent should know the market and the value that an inspector brings. Professional inspectors always include budget figures for repairs. We know this kind of information will be helpful to buyers. After 27 years in the inspection business and 10 years in the construction business, I know, and certainly you do too, that contractors’ proposals are all over the market, and buyers don’t have time to get bids. Repair budgets are available from any home inspector that is interested. Simply look up R.S. Means or Neighborhood Housing for budgets. Tradesmen do not provide accurate budgets or contract figures for homeowners and they shouldn’t. They don’t know what’s behind the walls. That’s why R.S. Means is helpful. Home inspectors are licensed and follow a code of ethics. Our opinions are professional. Buyers will demand budget figures.

6. You mention my desire to stereotype agents. They stereotype themselves. Restoring faith and integrity in real estate includes “raising the bar”. This means going to work for home buyers and sellers to provide the best possible service with the clearest information to help them make a choice, without sending them an inspector, a mortgage broker, or telling them they can’t go on the roof. This cannot be done when we hide behind the notion, as you have, that “numerous others have helped cause the real estate meltdown.” What are you going to do? Responsibility needs to be taken. Buyers want commitment from their agents. They’re looking for a commitment that exceeds the law because they demand it. Buyers are looking for agents who can spot problems that are major and suggest that they look at another property. At Tomacor we are committed to working with buyers who are treated fairly and humanely in the business marketplace, not just another check.

Of course there are good real estate agents out there; of course there are good inspectors. We do respect agents as human beings that work hard. Given what we’ve been through as a country it’s time to raise the bar and hold real estate agents accountable on both the buyer’s side and the seller’s side for their honesty, their ethics and their integrity to provide a high quality, informed, practical service for their clients.

Here’s Mr. Smith’s original comment:

Just like all professions there are good and bad agents as well as inspectors. I only hope that you find a way to respect those agents that are hard-working, honest, knowledgeable and provide a valued service to their clients.

According to everyone on the planet, the primary reason for the economic recession in the U.S. is mortgage failure and foreclosure throughout the country. Even my small independent company has developed a new income model as a result. Somewhere around 20% of our home and commercial property inspections involve foreclosed and short sale property. The vast majority of these have major flooding, sewage, electrical and/or structural problems caused by some overly zealous rehab-types who watched too many “flip this house” shows in attempts to get rich quick in this land of plenty.

Unfortunately, the streets are not paved with gold and the real estate market sucks. Everyone that I know has either been hurt by the real estate market, knows someone who is in the process of losing their home or has already lost their home. It makes complete sense to this inspector that people flock to the relative safety of the rental market.

If the real estate market will ever recover in this country, several things must take place:

1. The real estate agents will stop trying to sell people homes they can’t afford and homes even THEY know are defective. Any agent that has sold more than 25 homes knows more about home inspection than the green kid who just graduated from a home inspecting school. The problem is the agents don’t tell their clients about the deficiencies.

2. The quality of housing needs to improve, and we need to stop pretending that it already is. Dig deep and grab your boot straps, we all need to go to work to improve the quality of our home, the infrastructure and the fire safety components or the market will never fully recover.

3. Home sellers need to get that they’re not going to get rich by selling their home. Retirement is not going to be quite as glorious as it looked 10 years ago. As the real estate market gulps for breath, nobody knows where the final prices of homes are going to stabilize. I think home prices could stabilize at the 1980 or 1990 levels. A lot of people are going to be unhappy and stuck in their buildings.

4. People interested in the real estate market have got to get educated. Frankly it’s like the stock market, not everybody wins. Educated buyers will demand independence from their service providers including their real estate agents (if they feel they need to pay for one), their home inspectors, the appraiser and the mortgage broker. All the players in the market must be tough minded and independent herein lies the value for you. *NOTE: If your home inspector embraces the real estate agent when you drive up for your home inspection, it’s simply not a good sign.*

Until we’re ready to take on this challenge, apartments will continue to be the best bet for people over the long term.

Today I received a complaint about Tomacor’s service. “Oh my god,” I thought—Then, I read further into the complaint. Okay, now I get it. Another unhappy home seller who chooses to cover asbestos piping with tape and then explain to the home inspector that the brown water mark throughout the basement did not represent a flood line but “the remnants of her Irish Wolf hound’s shaking after a bath.”

Although we are sympathetic to every building owner and have rarely seen any community work as hard for its money as real estate agents do, confusing the facts, belittling the information and hiding the evidence are not good ways to sell property. In fact, they are tactics which lead us into this real estate recession in the first place. Frankly, I think it is time to restore the integrity of the marketplace.

“Location, location, location” usurped by “condition, condition, condition.”

The problem in the real estate business is its basic lack of integrity. The problem in the real estate industry is too many people have been sold poor quality overpriced homes. The industry has left hundreds of thousands of people in bankruptcy or foreclosure based upon ignorant and short sided sales practices for quick profits in a short term economy.

Qualified professional home inspectors intent on full disclosure will bring the real estate economy back full circle to the vitality it once enjoyed. Now is the time for home inspectors to work their hardest to represent their buyer’s interests. People are buying homes for their families. They aren’t simply investing. Buyers everywhere are at risk for the possibility of a further declining market especially if significant repairs are missed during the inspection. Every home needs repairs and if those repairs are misdiagnosed or not seen, the result will be to encourage the downward economic spiral which we are already in. Homebuyers deserve a good deal.

If you are in the market to buy a home or income property, spend the money to get a professional property inspector who quotes budgets for repairs. Hire someone your real estate agent doesn’t know or is upset about. Check his/her credentials thoroughly. All Illinois home inspections are visual in nature. Better inspectors are more experienced, the best inspectors include budget figures for repairs. Make sure you can afford to repair the property before purchasing it. The property’s condition can be more important than its location. At Tomacor, we have 27+ years of experience and include pricing for all of the repairs needed.

There are no lawyers on the staff at Tomacor yet we believe every home buyer deserves a full and complete inspection including all common areas. We believe every home buyer deserves a sense of what a reasonable budget for repair is regarding all of the problems and deficiencies associated with their purchase. Finally, we believe that critical information regarding housing stock should be available to all home buyers. This information should include how long the property has really been on the market, the specific insurance claims made against the property, the official architectural drawings and permits due to build or rehab the building, and the names, addresses, and phone numbers of the contractors architects and subcontractors used to build or renovate the property including those hired to repair it after major flooding or fire events. This information is routinely withheld, obscured, or not delivered to consumers until after their options to negotiate or walk away from the property have expired!

Real estate professionals including appraisers, brokers, inspectors, and attorneys are expected to plead ignorance regarding commonly known deficiencies and practices which expose fires and their investments into 30 year mortgages at significant risk. In less than a decade we have experienced significant country wide failures leading to multiple collapses in the commercial and residential real estate industry regarding inflated real estate investment appraisals, unregulated and unprofessional mortgage lending practices, and real estate sales techniques that hide the real risk, financial and personal, for consumers who are investing their life savings in real estate.

Upton Sinclair wrote “The Jungle” a little over 100 years ago. It completely transformed the meat packing and meat preparation business located in Chicago and sold throughout the world. Similar practices are waiting to be revealed on a large scale within the boundaries of the real estate sales community. As the details of covered over, sloppy work, hidden environmental hazards, inflated appraisals, and insincere relationships emerge within the contexts of residential and commercial real estate there may or may not be discipline or fines for those involved on a day by day basis in confusing and misrepresenting consumer interests. What will happen is the quality of the construction work will improve. This fact and a strong intention on the part of the real estate community and all of its aspects to improve on their obligation to consumers will once again raise the quality of housing and life across the United States.

• If your inspector is a butt kicker, the agents envision the hours of negotiation and lost money from their own commission to hold the deal together. They simply don’t want to do the work. Some agents become impossible to reach for a showing or unavailable for any possible inspection time other than after the sun goes down or before the sun comes up. Some agents pull the inspector aside and tell them there is no roof access. This practice leaves the naive inspector without access to the roof, which usually has some leaks, which then become his liability or obligation. With condominium purchases, inspectors are almost never granted access to roof and other common areas without a fight. The Illinois home inspector licensing law states that we must find all significant deficiencies, not just those in the condominium. Good inspectors will fight for you, and they will win!

• It is routine for some agents to challenge the inspectors opinion during the inspection or to down play the significant deficiencies disclosed in front of the inspector while they routinely expect the inspector to go climb in a hole and withdraw their disclosure. National statistics illustrate that some place between 60 and 80 of all home inspections come out of the roll-a-dex or contact sheets prepared by the broker, owners, or agents in each real estate office. After reviewing more than 100 competitor’s inspection reports while Chair of the Ethical Practices Committee of a national home inspection trade association, I realized that many of my remodeling/ contractor friends suddenly became deaf, dumb, and blind when asked for a simple budget to repair or replace a furnace or an air conditioner that was broken. Remember the inspector gets his work from the agent and glib experienced inspectors loose all of their real estate agent referrals when they become too verbal.

• Confused and naive buyers are the bread and butter of some unscrupulous agents. During one home inspection, I met with a polite single mom buying a house in Chicago. I could see the buyer becoming confused and disoriented as the four (yes four) real estate agents were sent over to the inspection to keep her focused on them and not the disclosure. I had to literally, take her hand, then her arm, and pull her away from the group of hounds who were committed to keep her confused. The Post and Beam foundation with major termite infestation did not kill the deal, but probably should have.

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Coming out of the recession will be slow yet we won’t loose work because we are focusing on opportunities to build on what is emerging rather than focusing on the past.

Tomacor is looking for a few good inspectors to help us with commercial work, residential work and expert witness work. This is a challenge that requires significant amounts of study. You will learn how to recreate what you have been doing into something new. New areas of expertise can help you stay busy over next winter.

You must be licensed by the state and fully capable of taking full responsibility for all of your inspection decisions. We can create the future of the inspection business together!

Interested? call our office at 312.475.0835 or send an email to inspection@tomacor.com

Tomacor sees this as a huge opportunity for inspectors, attorneys, property managers, and building owners to work together to complete the repairs that are needed in order to prevent water infiltration and mold/mildew in new or rehabbed living spaces throughout the city. Call us should you desire to get involved in the network of building owners and condominium associations that are demanding high quality standards and repairs for their properties. It’s time for the developers to take responsibly for what has been poorly built. Our expert witness team has been helping home and condominium owners for 26 years. Can we be of service to you to solve your problems? Please send your inquiries to inspection@tomacor.com