Report time

[Jeffrey R. Jonas]

My approx. breakdown of homes inspected (2009):

5% <10 years old
10% >10 years & <25 years
45% >25 years & <50 years
30% >50 years & <100 years
10% >100 years

0% Slab on grade
10% Raised foundation/crawlspaces
90% Basements, including... full unfinished, full finished, full partial finished, partial unfinished, partial finished, partial partial unfinished, and any other weird combination you can dream up.

Yes, age does matter, as well as the basement configuration. Many basements have multiple (extra) (divided) rooms, still have the old coal shutes and storage rooms, cisterns, "Dorothy" doors with steps, sealed off sections that you can barely shine a flashlight into, and all kinds of things you have probably never seen. Don't begin to tell anyone that inspects basements that it does not add to the report time, because if you have not spent years inspecting them, you are only talking out your rear end.

[Jeffrey R. Jonas]

Originally Posted by bkelly2

More than 1 hour for data entry is a loooooong time.

You will never get an arguement from me on this.

That is why I am caving in to Dominics demands!!!

[Dominic J. Maricic]

Originally Posted by bkelly2

Dom, you can continue on with all of the imaginary reasons on why houses are soooooo much different you want.

50 year old homes here do not take any time at all as they are pretty much all the same, and much smaller than newer homes.

It is BASIC DATA ENTRY Dom.

Some people type fast, some do not, some have software that easily helps with adding and annotating photos, some do not.

Some realize the value of TEMPLATES and not DUPLICATING work and some may think that there is something special about starting form scratch each time.

It is all apples an oranges Dom.

More than 1 hour for data entry is a loooooong time.

I agree on the time issue.

Yes, it's basic data entry. And the more data you have to enter, the longer it will take. I agree with you 100%.

The reason that people take longer often has to do with the software's photo handling, the number of photos (there's a big difference between 10 photos and 80 photos annotated) and their personal typing speed (if you type slow, seriously consider getting a program like Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing, I used to teach HS students with it and they'd go from 15 words per minute to 40 words per minute in 3 months at 15 minutes a day).

[Brian E. Kelly]

Originally Posted by jjonas

You will never get an arguement from me on this.

That is why I am caving in to Dominics demands!!!

Good for you Jeffery. Then if there are typical houses you inspect you may consider templates.

[Jeffrey R. Jonas]

Originally Posted by bkelly2

Good for you Jeffery. Then if there are typical houses you inspect you may consider templates.

If there is one thing I have learned over the years, there is no such thing as typical (at least in my area). We're talking (example) a standard farmhouse, 100-115 years old, that kept getting added onto as more and more children were born, and the room was needed. Some of these homes are a history lesson, as you go room to room.

Anyway, yes, templates will definately be utilized.

Thanks for the discussion.

[Brian E. Kelly]

An old added onto house falls into the Winchester Mystery House category

[Mark A. Timpani, CMI]

About 1 hour.

[Blaine Wiley]

Averages:

House here is a slab on grade, 1800 sq. ft., CBS construction, 2 car garage, 11 years old, with a pool and in ground lawn sprinkler system. (Oh, how I love this area!!)

HomeGauge, 25 to 35 photos, templates are well set up, 30 to 45 minutes.

[rmaday]

Originally Posted by bwiley

25 to 35 photos, templates are well set up,

To me, these are the keys, # of pics to annotate and include and # of pics to go through to decide what;s in the report or not. If you take 100 pics and 50 go in the report, you still have to go through 100 pics.

Templates being set up is huge! The less you have to type (rather than simply clicking) the faster you will go.

IMO,
Also depends on the house and how much is wrong with it. More defects = more data to enter.

Did a 1,500 sq ft (50 year old home) with all kinds of issues, report took 3 hours (150 something pics).

Did a 3,500 sq ft (2 year old home) report took an hour (40 pics).

[Mathew Hawley]

2 - 2.5 Hrs here

[Michael J. Merino]

I would like to get to about an hour. What I do now is I edit all my pictures, adding text and arrows , renaming the pic and stuff. Then I do the report, I have some canned text, but usually end up editing that. I am hoping that as I save text, it will speed up my report. I am 5 -7 hours as of now.

Bob, I am going to try and be there, so I will be interested in your reports.

[kpierce]

Originally Posted by mmerino

I would like to get to about an hour. What I do now is I edit all my pictures, adding text and arrows , renaming the pic and stuff. Then I do the report, I have some canned text, but usually end up editing that. I am hoping that as I save text, it will speed up my report. I am 5 -7 hours as of now.

Bob, I am going to try and be there, so I will be interested in your reports.

I'm curious how one can spend 6 hours writing a report. Is most of the time on picture annotation/inclusion?

[Michael J. Merino]

Originally Posted by kpierce

I'm curious how one can spend 6 hours writing a report. Is most of the time on picture annotation/inclusion?

Yes a lot of picture editing for me. This house was 1251 sq ft. not including the the finished basement. Main floor 3 BR 2 Bath living dining and kitchen. Basement had 6 rooms total-2 BR 1 bath, laundry, main room, HVAC room.

I took 196 pics and included 64 in the report. I like to annotate and do arrows so the client can match the text to the image and see what I am talking about. I even include educational pictures, like data plates, how to start and shutdown HVAC WH and such.

I also, keep going back over the report several times making sure that I did not miss something.

I think part of the problem is that I can't use the report software to edit the pics. I think HIP lets you do that. I am going to mess with HIP trial a bit more to make sure. I am just so new to the software out there, that I have not seen all the advantages and disadvantages between all of them

[rmaday]

Originally Posted by kpierce

I'm curious how one can spend 6 hours writing a report. Is most of the time on picture annotation/inclusion?

My guess is it's a lot with the pictures (no need to rename them, Mike)
and adding comments (narrative library not built up yet).

[Michael J. Merino]

Originally Posted by rmaday

My guess is it's a lot with the pictures (no need to rename them, Mike)
and adding comments (narrative library not built up yet).

I tried not renaming them, but found that not naming them makes it hard for me to find them. I put the pics in a folder named for the client, then as I pick the pictures I want and put them in a folder for the report, then I take the pics from the report folder and put them in the report.