10 Easy Ways to Save Money & Energy in Your Home

Have you ever woken up in the middle of a winter night, shivering under the blankets and able to see your breath? Or have you ever watched the thermostat creep into the upper 80s during a record-setting heat wave, realizing you haven't heard the air conditioner kick on? If so, your heating or cooling system was on the fritz—and (of course), it happened at the worst possible time. www.HomeBossInspection.com These systems not only fail when you need them the most, but also during the hardest time of the year to get a heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) contractor to come by for repairs. Naturally, technicians are at their busiest when these systems are busiest. So, unless you have a relative in the business, the best way to ensure your heating and cooling systems keep working is to maintain them properly. To guard against a future breakdown, have a professional perform periodic maintenance on the systems before the peak seasons begin. Have the heating system ser...

The Federal Housing Administration (FHA), which is part of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), administers various single-family mortgage insurance programs. These programs operate through FHA-approved lending institutions which submit applications to have the property appraised and have the buyer's credit approved. These lenders fund the mortgage loans which the Department insures. HUD does not make direct loans to help people buy homes. The Section 203(k) Program is  HUD's primary program for the rehabilitation and repair of single- family properties. As such, it is an important tool for community and neighborhood revitalization and for expanding homeownership opportunities. Since these are the primary goals of HUD, it believes that Section 203(k) is an important program and intends to continue to strongly support the program and the lenders that participate in it. www.HomeBossInspection.com Many lenders have successfully used the Section 203(k) Prog...

Some sellers – often, those working without an agent – want to sell their home “as is” so they don’t have to invest money fixing it up or take on any potential liability for defects.  There is nothing wrong with buying a home “as is,” particularly if you can buy it at a favorable price, but if you are considering buying an “as is” home, you should still hire a competent home inspector to perform an inspection.  There are several reasons for this. First, you don’t know what “as is” is. Sure, you can walk through the home and get an idea of its general condition.  You may even spot some defects or items in obvious need of repair.  But you won’t obtain the same detailed information you will receive if you hire a home inspector.  Home inspectors are trained to look for things you are not likely to notice.  InterNACHI inspectors, for example, must follow InterNACHI’s Residential Standards of Practice and check the roof, exterior, interior, foundation, basemen...

The Home Inspection Defined A general home inspection is a visual inspection for system and major accessible component defects and safety issues. The inspection is not technically exhaustive. A "general home inspection" and a "home inspection" are the same thing. A home inspection is designed to reflect, as accurately as possible, the visible condition of the home at the time of the inspection. Conditions at a home for sale can change radically in only a day or two, so a home inspection is not meant to guarantee what condition a home will be in when the transaction closes. It’s not uncommon for conditions to change between the time of the inspection and the closing date. Above:  an overloaded outlet with no cover It’s a Visual Inspection A “visual” inspection means that a home inspection report is limited to describing conditions in those parts of a home that an inspector can see during the inspection. Obviously, parts of the home that are perma...

Before the year 1800, the existence of the infrared portion of the electromagnetic spectrum wasn't even suspected. The original significance of the infrared spectrum (or simply “infrared,” as it’s often called) as a form of heat radiation is perhaps less obvious today than it was at the time of its discovery in 1800 by Sir William Herschel during his search for a new optical material. www.HomeBossInspection.com   Sir William Herschel (1738-1822), Royal Astronomer to King George III of England – and already famous for his discovery of the planet Uranus – was searching for an optical filter material to reduce the brightness of the Sun’s image in telescopes during solar observations.   While testing different samples of colored glass that gave similar reductions in brightness, he was intrigued to find that some of the samples passed very little of the Sun’s heat, while others passed so much heat that he risked eye damage after only a few seconds’ observation. Her...