The Holmes inspection : everything you need to know before you buy or sell your home

Mike Holmes is on a mission. Now that he's helped Canadian home renovators with his mega-selling Make It Right, Canada's most trusted contractor offers his expertise and passion for excellence to anyone with plans to sell or buy a home. In The Holmes Inspection, Mike shows us how to sell smart and buy smart so there'll be no surprises when it comes to the single largest investment most of us will ever make.
Homebuyers today are in a bind. Before signing on the dotted line and handing over their hard-earned cash, they need advice about the product itself: the house they've got their eye on. But to get that good advice, says Holmes, it often takes more than a single call to a "professional" home inspector. He tells readers what a home inspector can and can't do, and what options are open to prospective homebuyers who need to know what they're getting. Holmes deconstructs the often mystifying and downright scary process of buying and selling a house, walking readers through, into and around the average house so they can see past the tasteful, neutral decorating scheme.
Using real case studies, "red flag" sidebars and hundreds of photographs, The Holmes Inspection shows readers how to spot problems that could be expensive or even catastrophic, giving them the information they need to judge a house wisely. From the mechanicals (furnace, electrical and plumbing) to the "envelope" (floors, walls, doors and windows) to issues of location and siting, this book alerts readers to the ugly realities behind the "lipstick and mascara" that many vendors use to cover up problems when selling their homes.