Jeff Barnes publicly responds to Jim Bushart, Dan Bowers and others regarding Kansas.

[Bill C. Merrell, CMI]

I am just writing this to discuss the Law of Agency as it applies to NYS.

If the seller is paying a commission to the listing broker and to the selling broker, the seller is the client in NYS. The buyer is not.

Commissions out of seller proceeds is a perfect example of the seller paying the commission. Although many are unaware of this, but the seller is the client for both the listing and selling broker in NYS. If the buyer wants their own broker they are responsible to pay the fee to the buyer broker directly, as per NYS, Dept. of State guidelines.

New York State is very specific as to who is the client for a transaction.

Just wanted to set the record straight. I tried to post this earlier and it did not post. This is to affirm what Joe F. stated earlier. Again, I am addressing the licening law as it relates to NYS, which may or may not be similar on other states.

[Paul Sabados]

Originally Posted by gromicko

No one hold their breath. Paul can't do it.

We hear rumor after rumor about sellers suing inspectors and winning for the way the report was written for the buyer (the inspector's client), but no one can ever point to a real case. An inspector has no duty to the seller if he is working for the buyer. Duty is one of the 4 elements needed to win a negligence suit.

Paul can't reveal the case because it doesn't exist. Stay up all night and watch this thread... you'll see... he can't.

You can start breathing can folks. Sorry for the delay, but I really have more important things to do than search the legal files. A case in point was presented at the ASHI conference in 88, I dont remember the legal eagle's name that was heading the program. It was my first convention and legal cases were discussed and documents on transparencies were viewed from an overhead projector on a screen. (State of the Art at the time). Seller's sued the inspector for false claims and other damages was awarded a sum of approximately 20K, case occurred around 1986 in the central area of Florida. Over 20 years ago, sellers have were suing inspectors, it happened back in the stone age and its still happening today. Only difference is that it doesn't make the major news channels. An inspector did the old senior citizen or single mother of four wrong will be headlines, a disgruntled seller suit, maybe in the back pages.. If you want to waste time researching, go right ahead, I was just starting out at the time and I thought it was interesting that sellers could be a potential liability. It was an eye opener and I wish I had saved the handout info for the class.

Now, sellers can sue. Insurance companies will bail. ANYWAY THAT YOU SPIN IT, THE INSPECTOR LOOSES. An inspector can loose in arbitration, by a judge, by a jury or settle. A loss, is a loss, is a loss plain and simple.

Thats my story and I'm sticking by it. You can spin it anyway you want.

[Paul Sabados]

According to Nick, this new law will bring in 300 new NACHI members from Kansas (who now has less than 50).

Thats going to be really interesting, since with all of the searching that KARCI did we found only around 225 inspectors in Kansas last year. So, that means we all can expect a nice bump in the amount of inspectors that will be invading the State.

BTW, has anybody received the OFFICIAL list of board members yet? It October and the selections were to be announced in Sept. typical huh? Hey, Nick why don't you ask the President of the Board when the announcement is coming?

[Keith Swift, PhD.]

A CREIA inspector, actually a father and son team, was sued by a seller fas a result of a mold survey they had conducted, which the seller alleged prevented the sale of his house. What scared me about the case was that their "credentials" as mold specialists, or lack thereof, was the "issue." The father of the team told me about this at a CREIA conference shorty after one of my articles was published in their magazine "The Inspector," but I don't have any official information. Undoubtedly, this was a unusual case, but many are in La-la-land.

[Nick Gromicko]

Paul writes:

Thats going to be really interesting, since with all of the searching that KARCI did we found only around 225 inspectors in Kansas last year. So, that means we all can expect a nice bump in the amount of inspectors that will be invading the State.

They are already in your state, they just aren't inspectors yet as breaking into the profession in unlicensed states is difficult. Once licensing is adopted, the number ofo inspectors in that state nearly triples. So you should end up with about 700 when all said and done.

Licensing keeps out almost no one, lets in almost everyone, and makes them all as equally licensed as the existing veterans.

Tripling the number of competitors accounts for inspection fees dropping (on average) once a state adopts licensing.

Licensing also causes home inspector schools to open up which keeps a steady flow of fully licensed newbies pouring into your market and also causes inspection fees to stay low once licensing is adopted.

And finally, the worse the economy, the more new inspectors enter the profession. You never want to adopt licensing while your state is losing jobs.

[Gary Farnsworth]

We cannot wait to prove you wrong on all points that you, Nick, just mentioned. You are way out in left field. Equality will not bring about more inspectors, unless ASHI diploma mill and school churns them out. You are hoping for more members. I just do not see that happening. Everyone knows that the ecomomy is suffering, and home sales are down over 50%. Why would anyone, during this period, want to be a home inspector, or even stay in the business? You have said in the past for us to raise our prices, now you say that fees will decrease. You are confusing your members.

[Dan Bowers, CMI]

Nick, wow what a fun thread. I thought I would take a moment to respond to some of the posts and I'm sure you will post this so I have written it to your members as well. I will start with Dan Bowers' post number #242 because this will cover a lot of other ground. Dan starts out the post listing the key players in the KC area for InterNACHI, NAHI, and KARCI, which is great because it helps tell the whole story, by the way KARCI was not active when this process started. Lets start at the beginning.

Thought I'd drop a line out here to clarify some of Jeff Barnes incorrect information. Jeff Barnes, is 100% right in one of his statements. The part about KARCI not being around when the legislative process 1st started rearing its ugly head in Kansas. However neither was KAREI or Jeff Barnes. The Kansas Realtors tried getting this rolling and using a Kansas legislator back around 1993. Thats when EXPERIENCED Kansas home inspectors 1st started fighting off the subtle PUSH by the KAR. Barnes wasn't around at that time NOR was he a part of our resistance. Several of todays KARCI members were a part of that resistance.

[Dan Bowers, CMI]

In November of 2006 we had our third annual KAREI meeting. At this meeting Dan and Mike Greenwalt were present and I think John Kurtz was present as well. At this meeting we discussed where we were within the process and continued working on the language. By this time what was happening in the state house was well known across the state so why the room had so few inspectors who opposed the direction the association was moving in was beyond me. Again the association was moving in the direction of the majority rule association. It should be stated here that NONE of the inspectors at the meetings wanted to be regulated. But they understood that regulation was going to happen and they would rather be a part of it rather than just let it happen to them. Apparently those who did to show up did not care what happened. I had one guy call me to say that he would not show up because he did not like the direction we were heading. I explained that if he felt that way he needed to come and bring 20 of his buddies. This is how you effect change, you don’t take the weekend and go fishing. Guess what, he did not show up. By the way, Dan, Mike and John all contributed ideas and language to the bill. I will say, however that when the vote was taken on how to proceed Mike and John voted to fight only and drop working on bill language and Dan had left and did not return until the meeting was nearly over and the vote was taken.

[Dan Bowers, CMI]

One more comment on Jeff Barnes opening post ................

In November of 2006 we had our third annual KAREI meeting. At this meeting Dan and Mike Greenwalt were present and I think John Kurtz was present as well. At this meeting we discussed where we were within the process and continued working on the language. By this time what was happening in the state house was well known across the state so why the room had so few inspectors who opposed the direction the association was moving in was beyond me. Again the association was moving in the direction of the majority rule association. It should be stated here that NONE of the inspectors at the meetings wanted to be regulated. But they understood that regulation was going to happen and they would rather be a part of it rather than just let it happen to them. Apparently those who did to show up did not care what happened. I had one guy call me to say that he would not show up because he did not like the direction we were heading. I explained that if he felt that way he needed to come and bring 20 of his buddies. This is how you effect change, you don’t take the weekend and go fishing. Guess what, he did not show up. By the way, Dan, Mike and John all contributed ideas and language to the bill. I will say, however that when the vote was taken on how to proceed Mike and John voted to fight only and drop working on bill language and Dan had left and did not return until the meeting was nearly over and the vote was taken.

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From Dan: Again we counted and there were about 24-28 inspectors present at this meeting. Mike Greenwalt, John Kurtz, Myself and a few others were present. When we scanned the room again 18-20 present were KAREI / ASHI members. John, Mike and I each raised issues with the language they were promoting that we thought were foolish or irrelevant.

I left to take someone somewhere and got back after the vote was taken. Again just like earlier posts - let me fully clarify 1 POINT - KAREI's membership is 90%-95% ASHI. Less than 30 inspectors have ever been at Jeff's meetings AND this supposedly represents AND speaks for ALL home inspection associations in the state .... Not Hardly!

[Gary Farnsworth]

Kansas Home Inspector Board announced.

http://www.governor.ks.gov/news/News...r-08-1002a.htm

[Dan Bowers, CMI]

So The Kansas Board has been appointed - Its real cool. Good Balance.

1 Realtor from KC,
1 Trial Attorney from Wichita (specializing in RE, const, etc),
2 ASHI / KAREI home inspectors (from Wichita & west Kansas), and
1 guy from Topeka nobody knows that we're told mostly does environmental inspections and dabbles a little in home inspections (can't find him on any National Assoc Sites - NACHI, ASHI or NAHI).

I thought HI's were to belong to a national assoc??? Maybe I'm wrong

Well this will be GOOD for us with a Realtor & Attorney to track our progress and report back to their associations on what we do, discuss etc

Kinda humorous - All it would ever take to CARRY any vote is 3 votes - such as: 1 Realtor, 1 Attorney and 1 USER FRIENDLY home inspector

COOL ...............................

But we control our own destiny, RIGHT.

Over 15 years ago Ralph Nader spoke at an ANNUAL seminar for ASHI. Ralph made a very interesting point - that was on the lines like:

"Guys, theres a whole lot of special interests fighting you, especially the Realtors. They have more people, more money and more political influence. As soon as they get you INSIDE the corral, you're theirs for life.

You as home inspectors are the publics last defense - fight off regulation and control as long as you can possibly do so".

This was a moving speech to me. I took it to heart. Others in our ranks started the line of:

""Well we don't see a demonstrated need for licensure, but if you special interests / Non-Home Inspector groups think its inevitable we'd certainly like to work with youse realtors and trial attorneys, etc to make it more meaningful"

Thats when we started getting screwed BIG-TIME