Hello All,

As of Jan. 1 NYS requires home inspectors to be licensed which I believe is good. This does not address the "requirements" for licensing, nor the "expertise" required - that can be another thread.

The law also provides that real estate agents bear additional responsibility: “Real estate licensees are obligated to know that home inspectors must be licensed. Accordingly, they will have an obligation to ensure that the names of home inspectors that are provided must be licensed (unless that person is an architect, engineer or code enforcement official pursuant to sec 444-d). Therefore, there are additional obligations of a real estate licensee when providing the names of home inspectors to customers, clients, sellers or purchasers.”

What concerns me is the State putting the responsibility on us to be sure HIs are licensed. We are not the policing entity to check up on this. Are we also going to be held responsibile to monitor attorneys? Mortgage Brokers? Perhaps even to ensure builders are licensed and insured???

Of course, it is in my best interest to recommend those HIs, or other disciplines that reflect well on my business, but I get concerned that government is going to hold one discipline responsible to check-up on another discipline.

Here is the State link:
http://www.dos.state.ny.us/lcns/homeinspector-law.htm

I think it's Pennsylvania that passed a licensing law but didn't provide a method for enforcement or financing enforcement. The law basically states that an inspector has to be a member of a national trade association, or some such. So it is up to the various home inspector trade associations to "license" their Pennsylvania-based home inspectors. Yet another example of politicians gone mad.