Home Inspector in Romeo, MI

Romeo is ten minutes from my house and it's one of the more interesting places in the county to inspect. The village holds a National Register historic district — Greek Revival, Italianate, and Victorian homes, many close to two centuries old — and the surrounding countryside is farmhouses, orchards, and newer custom builds on acreage. Almost nothing here is a standard suburban tract house.

The single biggest difference from the rest of my service area is that a large share of these properties are on private well and septic. That is two major systems a suburban buyer has never had to think about, and they are expensive to get wrong. On well, I want flow, pressure tank operation, and visible condition of the equipment. On septic, I want tank and drainfield location, evidence of surfacing or ponding, and an honest conversation about what a county evaluation and pump-out will tell you that a visual inspection cannot.

In the historic village, the findings are what any two-hundred-year-old house produces: stone and rubble foundations, framing that predates dimensional lumber standards, knob-and-tube and cloth wiring, plaster, and roof systems layered over generations. These are wonderful houses. They are also a maintenance commitment, and you deserve to see the real number before you sign.

Pre-1940: the Greek Revival, Italianate, Gothic Revival, and Queen Anne houses

The Romeo Historic District holds about a hundred 19th-century structures, mostly frame, with the earliest dating to 1822. Along Main, St. Clair, Gates, Tillson, Benjamin, Bradley, and Prospect the houses range from Gothic Revival cottages to full Queen Anne mansions. Homes from this era commonly have slate or standing-seam metal roofs that outlast asphalt but fail at the fasteners and flashings, multiple chimney flues that were never lined, porches whose columns have rotted at the base, sills buried by 150 years of grade creep, and layers of wiring from every decade since electrification. I get the drone over a slate roof (airspace and weather permitting) rather than walking it, probe the sill and porch framing, run the thermal camera over plaster ceilings below the roof, and open the panel to sort live knob-and-tube from abandoned. Exterior changes go through the Historic District Commission, which changes what a repair costs.

1940s–1960s ranches and Cape Cods on the village grid

Nearly 3 homes in 10 in Romeo were built between 1940 and 1969, filling the blocks between the Victorians and the village edge, and 1965 is the median build year for the whole village. Homes from this era commonly have a 60-amp fuse panel or an early breaker panel, galvanized supply that has narrowed to a pencil, block foundations, clay laterals, and returns sized for a furnace half the size of the current one. In Romeo these houses also show the fingerprint of municipal well water: iron staining in tubs and toilets, a softener that may or may not be maintained, and sediment in aerators. I check the softener, the pressure at the farthest fixture, and the galvanized runs above the basement ceiling, and I read the block for the efflorescence line.

1970s houses and the 1990s subdivisions on the village edges

The 1970s account for about 17 percent of Romeo and the 1990s for another 19 percent, with almost nothing in between and very little since. Homes from the early 1970s can still carry aluminum branch wiring and Federal Pacific or Zinsco panels, along with single-pane aluminum windows and early central air. The 1990s subdivisions fall inside the tail of the polybutylene window, which closed in 1995, and they are now on their first roof replacement, their second furnace, and builder-grade windows with failed seals. I identify the supply piping at the water heater and under the sinks, pull the panel cover, fly the roof, and check the sump and its discharge, because the ground on the edge of the village drains toward East Pond Creek and the North Branch of the Clinton.

Macomb County is EPA Radon Zone 3, the lowest-potential category. The county health department estimates 5 to 10 percent of homes test above the EPA action level of 4.0 pCi/L, and EGLE’s test-result map puts Macomb at about 11 percent. Romeo’s stone and rubble foundations with dirt or thin-slab floors give soil gas more paths in than a poured basement does, and a Victorian with a partially finished lower level deserves the same test as a 2005 colonial. A 48-hour continuous-monitor test placed in the lowest livable level costs $175 and runs alongside the inspection. It is the one number on the report that no amount of looking can produce.