There's no law in the land that requires you to get a home inspection, but 75 percent of residential real estate transactions come with one.

Why?

Because before they plunk down the largest wad of cash they are likely to ever spend on a single item, most home buyers want to know what they'll get for all that dough. And many sellers want to show buyers what they've really got for sale.

A brand new home is, unfortunately, too often far from perfect. A home that's 100 years old? Well, it's 100 years old. Homes age.

A home inspection will tell you just how far from perfect that one day old home is and how much aging went on in that 100 year home.

A home inspection is like an insurance policy guaranteeing you the condition of most components in a home. A home inspection is like a bloodhound that sniffs out potentially hazardous conditions. A home inspection is like an evaluator that helps you decide on the bottom line.

"Most purchase contracts have a contingency written in that says to make the offer good it's contingent on having a home inspection," says Rob Paterkiewicz, executive director of the American Society of Home Inspectors (ASHI) in Des Plaines, IL.

For years the society has been telling you what a home inspection is -- an objective visual examination of the physical structure and systems of a house, from the roof to the foundation (without tearing into walls or opening floors) -- along with all the whys.

Now it's showing you, online, with voice over.

ASHI's "Virtual Home Inspection Tour" shows you what components of a home a professional inspector gives the once over, what areas he or she can't see and what that inspector is likely to find, based on a host of inspections over many years.

The visual tour inspection areas include the structure, exteriors, roofing, plumbing, electrical, heating, air conditioning, interiors, ventilation and fireplaces.

Click around the house to get inside the inspectors head. Click the little blue dots to poke into the components inspected, learn common problems found in each area and read the standards of practice employed in each area.

A tour of the virtual tour turned up these problems inspectors commonly find from one component to the next.

• Structure -- Earth movement under the foundation causing structural cracks. Engineered lumber incorrectly installed to carry framing loads. Moisture damaged and weakened rim joists.

• Roofing -- Missing, brittle or worn shingles and rusted and leaking gutters and downspouts.

• Electrical -- Incorrect wiring in the electrical panel; defective circuit breakers; loose connections; insufficient capacity for modern electrical needs.

• Heating -- Flue pipes that run downhill before entering the chimney; disconnected flue pipes; leaking and rusty boiler pipes.

• Fireplace -- Stains above fireplace indicating misdirected smoke; improperly screened flue tops and chimney's pulled away from the house.

Published: October 31, 2006

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Broderick Perkins parlayed a career in old-school journalism into a contemporary digital news service that really hits home. The award-winning consumer journalist, originally from Wilmington, DE, is founder, publisher and executive editor of the bootstrap DeadlineNews Group, a Silicon Valley-based editorial content and consulting service specializing in residential real estate, consumer news and related editorial consulting services. The DeadlineNews Group includes the Web site, DeadlineNews.Com, offering real estate editorial content and consulting services, and its back shop, the Deadline Newsroom, an open house on news that really hits home. Perkins obtained his formal journalism education from University of Delaware and a journalism boot camp, the Institute of Journalism Education at the University of California-Berkeley. He went on to 20 years of service as a daily newspaper journalist at the Wilmington, DE News Journal and San Jose, CA Mercury News. Perkins covered housing on the San Jose Mercury News reporting team which earned a General News Reporting Pulitzer Prize in 1989 for coverage of the Loma Prieta earthquake. He has also produced real estate, consumer and small business content for the Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, RealtyTimes.com, Nolo.com, Better Homes and Gardens, the National Association of Realtors, Homestore/Move and Intuit/Quicken among more than three dozen publications. In addition to managing the DeadlineNews Group, Perkins most recently served as chief editorial consultant for "Nolo's Essential Guide To Buying Your First Home" (Nolo $24.99) and writes real estate television scripts for RealtyTimes.com.