Blog > Home Inspections in Eastern Ontario: What They Cover, What They Miss, and How to Read the Report
Home Inspections in Eastern Ontario: What They Cover, What They Miss, and How to Read the Report
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The short answer: a home inspection is a non-invasive visual review of the main systems of a house, done on one day, by someone who in Ontario is not licensed by anybody. The Home Inspection Act, 2017 was passed and has never been proclaimed into force. That means the quality of your inspection depends entirely on who you hire, and that a general inspection deliberately stops short of several things an older or rural Eastern Ontario property needs checked separately.
Most buyers book an inspection because their agent told them to, sit through it, get a long PDF two days later, and are not sure what to do with it. That is a shame, because the inspection is one of the few points in a purchase where you can still change your mind cheaply. What follows is what the inspection actually is, what it is not, and how to get value out of the report instead of filing it.
What an inspection is, and where it stops
A standard inspection looks at the main systems and components of the house: the site, the structure, the building envelope, the roof, plumbing, heating and cooling, electrical, and life safety items. The federal Office of Consumer Affairs describes it as a non-invasive, visual evaluation, and that phrase is doing a lot of work. The inspector is not opening walls, lifting carpet, moving your seller's storage or dismantling equipment.
The consequence is simple and it is the single most useful thing to understand before you book. As the same federal guidance puts it, if an inspector is unable to see a portion of the home, a snow covered roof or a locked furnace room, it will not be possible to report on its condition. An inspection tells you about what could be seen on that day. It is not a warranty, it is not a code review, and a good inspector will not give you repair cost estimates.
Ontario's own unproclaimed legislation defines a home inspection the same way: an opinion as to the condition of a dwelling based on a non-invasive evaluation. An opinion, from one person, on one morning.
Nobody licenses home inspectors in Ontario
This surprises people, so it is worth being precise. Ontario passed the Home Inspection Act, 2017. It would have created licensing, a regulator and mandatory qualifications. As of the current e-Laws consolidation it carries the note that the Act is not yet in force and comes into force on a day to be named by proclamation of the Lieutenant Governor. Nine years on, that day has not come. The Canadian Association of Home and Property Inspectors puts it plainly: anyone in Ontario can currently call themselves a home inspector. British Columbia and Alberta license theirs.
So the screening the province would have done is screening you have to do. In practice that means association membership, insurance and a sample report, because those are the three things a weak operator cannot fake in a two minute phone call. Voluntary designations exist and mean something: the Registered Home Inspector designation through the Ontario Association of Home Inspectors, CAHPI membership, and InterNACHI certification all carry standards of practice and continuing education behind them.
Ask these before you book, not after:
- Which association do you belong to, and are you in good standing
- Do you carry errors and omissions insurance, and can I see proof
- How many inspections have you done, and how many on houses of roughly this age and type
- Can you send me a full sample report from a comparable house
- How long will you be at the property, and may I walk it with you at the end
- What is specifically excluded from your inspection, and what will you recommend I bring in separately
- What is the total price, in writing, before you start
The sample report is the one people skip and the one that tells you the most. A report that is mostly stock photographs and boilerplate is what you will receive on your own house.
Read the inspection agreement, not just the report
Nearly every Ontario home inspection contract contains a clause limiting the inspector's liability, often to the fee you paid. Toronto real estate lawyer Bob Aaron has written about this at length, noting that courts have refused to enforce such a clause where the wording was ambiguous and was not clearly brought to the buyer's attention, and that British Columbia, Alberta and Quebec have required those limitations to be removed. Ontario has not. You are usually handed this agreement minutes before the inspection starts, standing in the driveway. Ask for it by email the day before and read it then.
What a general inspection will not cover around here
This is where Eastern Ontario differs from a suburban Toronto purchase. Between Ottawa, the 416 corridor and Brockville, a large share of the housing stock is older, rural, or both, and four things routinely fall outside a general inspection while mattering enormously to what you are buying.
Wood burning appliances. If there is a wood stove, insert or fireplace, your insurer will very likely want an inspection by a WETT certified professional. Worth knowing: WETT Inc. is a national training and education association that certifies people, not appliances. There is no such thing as a WETT certified stove. What you are buying is an inspection by someone who holds the credential, and your general home inspector may or may not.
Well water. Bacterial testing of a private well is free in Ontario. Public Health Ontario laboratories test for E. coli and total coliforms, using a bottle you pick up from your local health unit or a designated drop off point. Ottawa Public Health runs pickup and drop off at Ben Franklin Place and the lab on St. Laurent Boulevard, plus rural sites on set days, and recommends testing every spring, summer and fall. What the free test does not cover is chemistry. Nitrates, sodium, arsenic and the rest need a licensed private lab, and PHO is explicit that a clean bacterial result does not by itself mean the water is safe to drink.
Septic. A general inspection does not open a septic tank. That is a separate inspection with its own scope, permits and record searches, and we have covered it in detail in wells and septic systems in Eastern Ontario.
Radon. Home inspectors do not test for it. The Leeds, Grenville and Lanark District Health Unit notes radon is found at high levels in buildings across Ontario, including Lanark County and the United Counties of Leeds and Grenville. Health Canada's action level is 200 becquerels per cubic metre, and a meaningful test means a kit on the lowest lived in level of the house for at least three months during fall or winter, when the windows are closed. That is longer than any condition period, so this is a test you do after you move in, and budget to act on if it comes back high.
Insurability sits on top of all of this. Knob and tube wiring, aluminum wiring, an aging oil tank and an unapproved wood stove are inspection findings that quickly become insurance problems, which is a separate conversation we have gone through in what insurers ask about older and rural homes. Get your broker looking at the same report you are.
How to actually use the report
Sort every finding into one of three buckets. Safety and structure, meaning anything that could hurt someone or is holding the house up. Systems near the end of their life, meaning the furnace, the roof, the panel, the water heater, where the question is when and how much rather than whether. And maintenance, meaning the long tail of caulking, grading and worn hardware that fills out the page count and should not change your decision about the house.
Then get numbers, from trades, not from the inspector. A roof flagged as near end of life is a quote from a roofer, and a quote is what you negotiate with or walk away from. If a finding needs a specialist, say an electrician or a structural engineer, that is not a failure of the inspection. That is the inspection doing its job and telling you where to look next.
And be clear about what an inspection condition entitles you to. It is a condition in your favour, drafted a particular way, with a deadline. What you can do with an unsatisfactory report depends on the wording you signed, which is worth understanding before you write the offer rather than after. We walk through that in how offer conditions work in Ontario.
One last thing for sellers. A pre-listing inspection is not for everybody, but on an older rural property it lets you find the surprise before a buyer's inspector does, and decide on your own timeline whether to fix it, price it in or disclose it. Surprises discovered on day six of a five day condition are always more expensive than surprises discovered in advance.
If you are looking at a specific property and are not sure which of these apply, send me the address. I will tell you what I would want inspected on that house, what a general inspection is likely to miss on it, and roughly what order to do things in so you are not paying for tests you do not need. No obligation, and no pressure if you are still months out.
Dan Jutai, Salesperson, Dan J Realty at eXp Realty Brokerage. Call or text 613-818-6227, email dan@danjrealty.ca, or use the contact page.