Your home is typically your largest financial investment. Yet most homeowners would not know who designed the structure of their home. They might know the architect and/or their builder’s name. In most cases, the homeowner assumes that the architect or builder has hired a competent structural engineer to design the structure of their home.
So, how can an engineer add value to your home? Simply by doing their job.
What do I mean by “Simply doing their job”? Let me explain by two typical examples that we have seen many times.
The first example of issues that we have seen… homes designed by an architect without the input or oversight by an experienced licensed professional engineer. In most cases where there hasn’t been an engineer involved or an engineer without experience in designing residential homes has been brought in. The contractor constructing the home would be forced to contact a professional engineer like our firm and ask for our assistance solving issues that arise during construction that not only add cost to the homeowner in materials but also cause schedule delays. If a qualified professional engineer was involved in the initial design of these homes, then these expensive cost overages and schedule issues could have been avoided – simply by doing their job.
Another typical example is…Most real estate transactions create a need for a home inspection. Many times during the home inspection, the home inspector finds a structural issue. The home inspector will issue a report with these structural concerns listed and typically request that a licensed professional engineer review the issues. Most of the time these issues require some type of repair or strengthening; requiring the current homeowner to spend additional monies to facilitate the sale of their home. From our experience solving these issues; most could have been avoided if the construction was in compliance with the building codes. If the engineer that designed the structure was engaged to observe the construction of the home; he or she could ensure that the construction is in compliance with their design and the building codes – simply by doing their job.