Virginia Senate Bill 627, as proposed, will have an unfavorable outcome and be damaging to real estate transactions, future home buyers and the hard working professional home inspectors.  To open up liability for items that may arise after an inspection that were not visible the day of the inspection, and to require home inspectors to carry the liability for items that were either outside the scope of the state regulated home inspection or were undetectable, just doesn't make sense.  Limiting  liability as it stands currently is the best way to ensure no frivolous lawsuits or claims arise when a homebuyer decides that they aren't responsible for the costs that come with home ownership. 

For example, no homeowner wants to pay for a new HVAC unit that stops working properly 6 months after moving in but was working properly the day of the inspection.  They feel someone should pay other than them and this is exactly the reason why we need to keep the protections in place for the home inspector.  Unfortunately, systems break down, water entry occurs out of the blue from a storm, etc.. These are situations that come with home ownership.  If you eliminate the liability protection from the home inspection contract, there will be a dramatic increase in such frivolous claims, and the home inspectors' liability insurance will become too cost prohibitive to afford and prices will rise significantly for homebuyers to cover this expense.  There will be less home inspectors willing to conduct inspections when the opportunity for catastrophic liability and lawsuits will put them out of business.  As the industry sits now, if there is negligence in a home inspection, the home inspector will be held accountable – why are we trying to solve a problem that doesn’t exist?