I remember back a few winters ago when my wife and I were going through the inspection process for our first home purchase. I remember that time well mostly because I was leading my Fantasy Football League with my first (and still only) undefeated season. The inspector for our soon to be home, come to find out, was playing fantasy football too. (He now plays in my current league)
Oh well… needless to say we were excited that we had finally found the perfect home. It had a little A-Frame with a side porch that I could literally picture myself grilling burgers for the family when the weather got warmer. If you can picture the old school Brady Bunch house, minus the 50 kids, that’s what I’m talking about. Everything was perfect…this is until we got back the Inspectors report.
The conversation went something like this:
The inspector pulled me to the side. My proud grin slowly faded to a look of concern.
The inspector said “Well…it looks like your chimney’s sick.”
My obvious response was “Sick? What do you mean it’s sick?”
“It aint been cleaned…ever”, was his casual response.
He anticipated my next question before it even came out of my mouth.
He jumped in with “No you can’t clean this one yourself, the build up is too much for a newby.”
I immediately started thinking back to the houses and chimneys that I’ve been in over the years and I never remember cleaning the chimney. I mean how do you even go about cleaning a chimney? The inspector was worth his wieght in gold that day because he went on to tell me that the chimney hadn’t been cleaned in probably 5 or so years. The problems that had mounted up over the years weren’t catastrophic but after talking to my realtor we decided to get the current owners to include a thorough chimney sweep & clean before we moved in.
My smile returned and the peace of mind that my wife and I had at the start of the inspection was priceless. I learned a lot about chimneys and the importance of keeping them in good shape. Since that eye opening experience I’ve continued to have all our chimneys cleaned each year…no matter what. I’ll forever be grateful to the inspector, my realtor and my chimney sweep for making sure I was investing in a home that was in tip-top shape.