Certified Home Inspector

[Roy D. Cooke, Sr]

Originally Posted by dduffy

Roy,

It sounds like you guys have a real mess up there regarding licensing, certification, etc.

It is far from good we also have many inspectors who belong to nothing doing inspection for $200:00 or less.
The agents love them we also Have OAHI and its BOD and CAHPI and its Directors and many colleges turning out Thousands ? of new inspectors every year.
Many do not even try to start inspecting when they find the truth . This is so unfortunate that it continues to happen . Of those who do try to make a living I am led to believe about 90% do not last three years .
In my small are there are over 20+ HIs and only4 have been at it over 3 years.
I have had 5 phone me in the last few weeks who wish to become home Inspectors . They do not want to hear the truth . Last night the guy told me I am not with out some talent you know.
I wish them all the best but the pie is not big enough to feed all.

Roy Cooke sr
Roy Cooke Sr..

[rwand1]

Strange, most all of the newbies coming into the field have been taught by OAHI members running home inspection mills, aka puppy mills. Not to mention two colleges that rely on OAHI inspectors to teach their courses and indoctrinate the pupils into their report writing systems.

[csteele]

A lot of people are saying there isn't much work (in HI) so I'm currious,.. can you guys state where you guys are located. I'm in the Ottawa valley area and there is plenty of work but tons of HI's in the area. It is hard to get realtors to promote you when your new but I feel I'm starting to make a significant break through.

Everything you guys said about OAHI is true. I still can not get over how they justify spending 10 grand on writing a HI agreement form. In the end it looked just like all the others,.. I could have wrote the damm thing. Actually a lot of members don't even like it! It's nuts! Anyway I'm out of there!

[rwand1]

Chris

I am in the Orangeville area. I charge more than my competition and work by referral, repeat biz, reputation. I do not advertise and have been in biz since 1991. I deal with approximately 8-12 agents only most of whom are the high earners.

Here is a good read for ya Chris I like to post this from time to time to show how things are run in OAHI. The strange thing is OAHI pulled out all the stops with Mr. Cooke, yet the two principal players mentioned in this appeal remain undisciplined even though there are outstanding complaints filed and they admitted acting outside the confines of the by-law. The DPPC new this at the time, and I even I was powerless to stop the abuse, and ended up being canned myself along with the committee for trying to stop the abuses. You see certain people and certain acts are condoned in OAHI for reasons never fully understood. The major problem being they are a self regulating body with no outside oversite or review, they answer to themselves the same way CAHPI answers to itself with no outside accountability.

Who says NACHI is inferior when you have this crap going on? Only those folks with the most to hide, thats who!

[cbarrows]

Chris

What is this $10 000 agreement form?

[cbarrows]

Please ignore my last message. Now I see what you mean.
CB

[csteele]

But isn't that crazy?? 10 grand for some lawyer to write some agreement using common terms that have been around for years. It's nuts, I mean how can they justify that. Anyway that isn't the only reason I left,... why would I pay hundreds of dollars to be at a marketing disavantage? Plus everytime I turn around they want 400 bucks for this or that and even 30 or 40 bucks for a breakfast one time. So I asked why so much? It's just bacon and eggs,.. someone belittled me for asking and claimed it was well worth it. i said good luck with that.

The other kicker is, at the time I was a student member,... so not allow to practice until you meet their requirements, and you need money to meet their requirements - its a catch 22. How can I get ahead,.. so I go back to work at a full time job,.. the monthly meetings are 9:00am to 11:00am during the week,.. well I'm at WORK! Basically I was not able to benefit from being a member so good bye!

[csteele]

Hi Raymond,

Interesting read but I'm really not surprised. I have a few interesting experience of my own, which all led me to make the decision to leave.

Cheers,
CS

[rwand1]

Chris,

From what I am hearing OAHI has been imposting mandatory fines without any form of hearing.

Even though the by-laws state you are not suppose to be inspecting as a Student that portion of the by-law has no weight. OAHI cannot stop you from earning a livelihood, particularly if you are inspecting and not even mentioning any affliation with OAHI. It not only runs contrary to the Constitutional guarantees, it is down right ignorant for management and committees to be thinking they can enforce it. This is why they don't want students and Applicants having the vote. Just as they did not want the Associates to have the right to vote til I made it an issue and finally they succumb to permitting the vote, but Terry Carson who for years has and his clique have been putting their personal stamp on everything and was adamant that Associates had no right to vote because to allow such would allow Associates to vote on their entry requirement! This is so myopic and downright misleading, but people saw through it. It is the Students who keep OAHI in the black.

OAHI is nothing but a clique, extorting money to ensure the BOD and others on certain Committees are able to power trip and act like the zealots they are.

The word is getting out and more people should be speaking up because this is what will eventually turn the tide from incompetence.

Again how can anyone be assured of anything with the National when you have so much corruption within and when its actively promoted?

ONTARIO ASSOCIATION OF HOME INSPECTORS ACT, 1994
http://www.ontla.on.ca/hansard/commi...htm#P256_32987

Seems Mr. Carson and Mr. Segal have not lived up to what they promised the Ontario Legislature.

[csteele]

I'm not surprised about any of this.

Currently there are more Students in OAHI than any other members status. So I assume they are a big cash flow for the organization. But unless you have a lot of money it is hard to follow their rules and make it to RHI. And as I said you are at a marketing disadvantage when you are an associate member and the guy beside you is RHI. In addition the organization does more promoting of RHI than anything else. How are you suppose to get business this way?

In addition I found the organization terrible unorganized. The only person that you can actually contact for information is Wendy. I was told when I had to appeal a decision for education exemption that the BOD does not respond to email or phone calls that they only address them in their meetings. I told them that was unacceptable and should be more personal. They shouldn't deny people exemption without explaining why they made that decision. In the same email they advised me I could take the challenge exam for $160 bucks! Ya right.

[Roy D. Cooke, Sr]

Originally Posted by csteele

I'm not surprised about any of this.

Currently there are more Students in OAHI than any other members status. So I assume they are a big cash flow for the organization. But unless you have a lot of money it is hard to follow their rules and make it to RHI. And as I said you are at a marketing disadvantage when you are an associate member and the guy beside you is RHI. In addition the organization does more promoting of RHI than anything else. How are you suppose to get business this way?

In addition I found the organization terrible unorganized. The only person that you can actually contact for information is Wendy. I was told when I had to appeal a decision for education exemption that the BOD does not respond to email or phone calls that they only address them in their meetings. I told them that was unacceptable and should be more personal. They shouldn't deny people exemption without explaining why they made that decision. In the same email they advised me I could take the challenge exam for $160 bucks! Ya right.

They tried that with me an they spent ±$35,000:00 trying to prove my wrong .
I then started a law suit in small claims to get some of my out of pocket expenses.
They settled the day before court after advising me they would have my claim transfered to a higher court .
I guess intimidation worked for them and I settled for $1,000:00 again this information has never been
given to the membership or what the true cost was to the OAHI funds.
Typical of OAHI never give out much information to the membership .
Can you say old boys club.
I feel the BOD does not have much say in how the association is run it is still the past pres club who tell the BOD how to do things .
To bad it could have been great for all Ontario Home Inspectors.

Roy Cooke sr ... RHI... CAHPI-ON...


The more I hear,
the more I see!
NACHI is the one for me !
Roy Cooke R.H.I. Royshomeinspection.com
A HAPPY NACHI MEMBER,... More find this out ever day!

Remember Whistler http://www.nachi.org/forum/f48/lets-not-forget-whistler-4935/

[rwand1]

Roy they settled because they new you would succeed in your claim, given that the two players admitted breaking and acting outside the by-laws and that it was animosity that drove the process. What did not come out and is a well known fact is that there was also a conspiracy to do you in at the most highest levels. I should know, I sat in on one BOD meeting and was flabbergasted at the negative derogatory remarks made by people in a position of power. Apprehension of bias? You bet ya.

Its great to see people in position of power negligently spending the members money.

[rwand1]

OAHI MEMBERSHIP TOTALS
as of January 31, 2006

RHI (Registered Home Inspector) 222
Associate 98
Applicant 6
Applicant without logo privileges 155
Students 275

Retired 24
Friends of the OAHI 6

TOTAL MEMBERSHIP 786

Strange that Friends of OAHI are being counted as members, even though they don't pay any money. Got to keep those membership numbers up eh!

With the exception of the membership category “Friends of the OAHI”, the Association shall grant membership only to
individuals and not to firms, corporations, unincorporated associations, partnerships or proprietorships.
(f) “Friends of the OAHI” are individuals or organizations wishing to participate in the activities of the Association.
They shall have the right to receive mailings, participate in OAHI meetings and events at rates charged to members, but
have no voting rights. They shall not themselves or through their corporate bodies perform inspections, directly or
indirectly. Friends of the OAHI shall not hold themselves as nor make reference to any affiliation with the OAHI.

[rwand1]

Mario.

Harry is there at Humber along with his affiliates to push their inspection report software. Just as one member of this biz is a member of Nachi to ensure their inspection reporting software and other wares are marketed to Nachi. His membership number in Oahi is #4.
I know Harry was not happy with the way things in OAHI were going a number of years ago, because he told me so. Maybe he tells different stories to different people. But in the end he does have product to push, just as others on the BOD do either on CAHPI or the OAHI board.

BTW my membership number in OAHI is 00029.

[csteele]

I was once advised by a BOD member that if I complain too much that the organization can make things difficult for me. I don't take threats very well so I started paying more attention to how the organization operated. A lot of things puzzled me about OAHI so once I discovered NACHI I decided that it was best for me to switch.

However, NACHI does not appear to be without its problems. It needs to improve it's visibility in Canada. I had to spoon feed a bunch of realtors and educate them about NACHI since they didn't know about them.

Also, for someone like me it is easy to to pass all the exams (i.e. electrical, ethics etc). They probably should make the entrance a little hard in order to dismiss any negative claims. But then again what the hell do I know about these things.