Originally Posted by shakran

But those aren't the kind of things you're looking for. Yes, leave the construction requirements to the building inspector. You're looking for stuff like the flooring installer saying "oops, cut that vinyl floor in the wrong place. Aww fuckit, run the seam across the middle of the floor in the traffic pattern even though that means in 2 years it'll be peeling up." You're looking for crooked outlets, crooked moulding, bad paint jobs, creaky floors, off-centered fixtures, fixtures that you ordered but that have been replaced by something cheaper, the wrong color/style of material being used, etc. The building inspector isn't gonna know that you ordered fancy Kohler faucets but the plumber got a deal on Deltas and pocketed the extra money.


And if you fail to catch this stuff before closing, you're pretty much out of luck.

As for the builder being your neighbor. . .that really doesn't have a whole lot of bearing on the quality of the build. If he's a good builder who uses good subs, it's gonna be a good house no matter where he lives. If he's a crappy builder who uses bad subs, he's not generally gonna be able to suddenly turn out award-winning construction just because you're his neighbor.