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How Will AI and Technology Change the Inspector’s Role?

by Isaac Peck, Publisher

There has been no shortage of predictions about how rapidly evolving technology and artificial intelligence (AI) is going to be changing the landscape of our economy and our world. Which jobs are going to be “extinct” because of AI? How much will it drive productivity? And on and on.

Less analysis has been given, at least so far, on how AI and tech will change this profession; how will AI and tech change the home inspector’s day-to-day?

And more specifically, what kinds of changes can inspectors expect over the next three-to-five years?

Working RE Home Inspector sat down with Jason Petry, a licensed home inspector in Oklahoma and Product Analyst at Cotality (formerly CoreLogic), which has just introduced a new Home Inspector form software called PropertyVision Pro to the market, to help us imagine where AI and technology will be taking inspectors in the near future.

Report Writing, Commentary
To really think about how technology will propel the profession forward, Petry says we can look at how tools and tech have already made inspectors way more efficient. “In the early days of the profession, inspectors were doing reports on a pen and paper, and then after that using a dot matrix printer. Take pictures, then get Polaroids printed, go to One-Hour Photo, etc. It used to take four-to-six hours for a home inspector to generate a report and it was nowhere near as detailed as the reports that inspectors are producing today. Now, with one device in your hand, you can take photos, make notes, call up prepared commentary, and more. You have a tiny computer in your hand,” says Petry.

Petry also points out the ways different technologies can be put together in the same application, saving time and reducing confusion. “Inspectors used to have to carry a pen and paper, a camera, and use a ton of different tools to produce a report. Today, you don’t need a separate camera or even a laptop. You can do everything from a phone or tablet with a single app: inspection, reporting, billing, etc. You can do it all in one place, and also have interchange between devices and between applications,” Petry observes.

The bottom line is that inspectors can produce higher quality reports, and thus more value, to their customers in less time. AI will take this a step further, Petry argues. “The internet and mobile technology has massively reduced friction for home inspectors. AI and AI Chatbots will take this further. An AI assistant might help you put your report together, analyze photos, do some of the backend processing, make prepared commentary more accessible (faster), and more. This will all lead to better reporting that will take less time for inspectors to complete. Over time, the costs of these features will come down. Inspectors will be able to do more in less time,” Petry says.

As existing tech has helped inspectors write their reports faster, with more detail, photos, and in some cases even video, advances in AI promise to accelerate that process.

Some potential ways AI and tech may revolutionize home inspection include:

1. AI as Home Inspector’s Personal Assistant; Helping Write the Report
One obvious way that AI will likely support home inspectors is in the writing of the report. Petry sees ways that AI can make the report writing process easier. “Today, preparing an inspection report can take a home inspector a few hours. At the inspection, you’re constantly looking down at your device to find the right comment, making sure you annotate the report correctly, and so on. With technology, I can see AI helping to identify what the camera is looking at, helping the home inspector scan stuff, and making the report writing process faster by suggesting commentary and automatically transitioning the inspector to different parts of the report,” Petry says.

This automation could also extend to the placement of photos within the report as well. “Imagine taking pictures as you go through the inspection and AI is able to move those pictures into the report and put them in the right spot in the report. Inspectors will still need to review and finalize their reports, but they’ll essentially have an assistant in preparing and writing their reports. AI will also be able to tell you how to write a better report, tell you where your language could be better or suggest how to organize the information better for your readers. Why pay a consultant if AI can help?” Petry asks.

2. AI Chatbot to Explain Report to Clients
Another potential tech advancement that may help clients better understand their reports (and save inspectors time), is an AI Chatbot or even an AI-back information “pop-up” that gives clients additional information about certain aspects of their home such as plumbing, electrical, roof, and so on. “There could definitely be a place for an AI Chatbot that can answer basic questions or provide basic information to a client about certain home systems. Think of the old ‘Clippy’ from Microsoft Word. It could help the client reference certain parts of the report or explain the photos. Imagine if the inspector’s client could get most of their questions answered and get more education without having to speak to the inspector for 15-20 minutes. This will save inspectors time,” Petry predicts.

3. AI Chatbot for Scheduling
Scheduling and basic customer service is another area where AI is expected to make significant advancements in home inspectors’ businesses—and across service businesses broadly. AI “personas” are currently being trained and tested as customer service professionals and are even being used to make outbound sales calls! The capabilities of AI for these phone service functions appear to be advancing incredibly rapidly and many of the AI voices now sound nearly human and can be indistinguishable at times (visit WorkingRE.com/AIvoices to view some Instagram/TikTok clips demonstrating AI on the phone).

Petry sees a world where AI might help home inspectors answer the phone and also chat with customers via their websites. “An AI Chatbot can easily integrate with your calendar and help you schedule inspections,” Petry says.

4. Augmented Reality (AR) Glasses
AR glasses are another potential tech advancement that may come to home inspectors in the coming years. Apple, Meta, and several other huge tech companies have been working on AR tools for the last few years. “We may end up seeing AR glasses that can easily measure items and also photograph them. Imagine looking at a ceiling joist and being able to say ‘yep, that’s a six-inch joist that’s spaced 12 inches apart,’ just from looking at it. Imagine being able to look at different home systems and identify important characteristics in an augmented reality. Or to capture video and photographs automatically with the AR glasses,” Petry suggests.

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Over-Reliance on Tech?
Of course a common cautionary refrain from home inspectors, and from people generally, about AI is that it may leave the professional open to errors, omissions, and embarrassing (and costly) mistakes. For example, several lawyers have made national news (and gotten sanctioned) for including fictitious, AI-generated court citations in their official court filings.

Home inspectors who integrate AI into their businesses are putting themselves at risk of the AI being wrong and making a mistake, the argument goes.

Here, Petry agrees that concerns about AI’s imperfections are well-placed. “These concerns are valid. AI is not infallible. At this point in time, AI is learning from a book of knowledge. It can’t reason. It’s not going to replace a human being anytime soon. It is a tool. I’ve had inspectors tell me: ‘I wish I had someone to help me write the report so I can do more inspections.’ AI is that person. AI is your assistant. If you were to have a personal assistant help you prepare or write a report, you would still need to check its work. The same is true for AI. You will be able to train it and it will get more and more proficient, but you’ll still want to train it and check it,” Petry says.

It all comes down to efficiency, according to Petry. “AI will be used by people to be more efficient at what they do. Those inspectors that don’t embrace these tools will have to work harder and take longer than those that do. It’s ultimately going to be a competitive advantage for someone long-term to learn how to use AI. At the same time, AI is not the licensed expert. It still takes prompting and engineering. It is not the expert on the house. But it might be able to help you find the answers,” Petry advises.

PrepertyVision Pro
As a product analyst at Cotality, Petry and his team are excited to be working on the cutting edge of AI tools and home inspector tech. Cotality has recently released a new home inspector form software called PropertyVision Pro with a goal of delivering both superior design and more automated report-writing enhancements to help home inspectors save time as they write their reports.

Here are a few of the features that Petry is most proud of with PropertyVision Pro:

1. Auto-Detection and Report Navigation:
Petry points out that most home inspectors have an established routine to their inspections, tending to do things pretty much the same way every time. This process normally gets interrupted when inspectors must periodically return to their software to enter the information and data they’ve gathered, then get back to where they were before.

In contrast, PropertyVision Pro uses machine learning to analyze that data—such as photos—on the spot. “Take a photo from anywhere in the report, analyze it, based on machine learning, and tell you with a degree of certainty, this is a main breaker box. Comments about a main breaker box are in this part of the report, but maybe you’re in the garage. The application will navigate you to that so you can make your comments, instead of having to take time out and navigate up the tree. Take a picture and the technology navigates you to where you need to go, Petry says.

Voice dictation is another function of this data management. The inspector’s voice note will be translated into text, processed by the AI, then sent to the part of the report database it needs to go.

This kind of versatility is significant. “I inspect a lot of homes from the 1950s, see a lot of things you wouldn’t see in a 1970s-and-up home. Sometimes you’ll be reporting on one thing, then stop in your tracks and see something from a completely different system. The old way was to stop and have to navigate through to a different section of the report. Now, you can just take a picture of it. You can say ‘take me to the heating section.’ Then you’re in there making your comments, then you get back to the living room for the previous item,” Petry says.

2. Pre-Population of Data:
One exciting feature Petry talks about is that PropertyVision Pro’s software, Cotality, pre-populates available data about the home being inspected. Petry says this will save at least 30 minutes of time on inspection day.

“As a home inspector, when I get an order for a house, my next move is to go out to Zillow or Redfin and get as many photos and data points from my research as I can, so I can get some things pre-filled out. If you wait until you get out to the house to get all that information, you’re at least adding 30 minutes to your time. Instead, sit in the comfort of your home while our software, Cotality, pre-populates that data. Details about the house—square footage—the weather, images, cover image from the report, from the MLS, with our MLS integration feature. That’s a time savings for you as well,” Petry explains.

3. Sync Between Users:
For multi-home inspector teams where two (or more) home inspectors work together to inspect a property, PropertyVision Pro is designed to seamlessly sync between the two users, allowing them to work on the report together in real-time. “We have a process in our application where if two inspectors are inspecting the same property, they can be on different devices, just as long as they have an internet connection,” Petry explains.

This means that instead of the two inspectors needing to manually synchronize the details they collect in the inspection, the application will do it for them with no manual intervention required, Petry says.

“Even if you go offline, the process still works when you’re back online. We have eliminated the concept of having to do a manual syncing process. The application is seamless, allowing you to just focus on the inspection, not worry about trying to synchronize all the of the details gathered by different individuals on site,” explains Petry.

Looking Ahead
Petry believes we will look back on the significance of artificial intelligence the same way we view the significance of the internet in the 1990s. “The internet got popular in the late 1990s, and everything you could do in person you could do online. The internet is transformative. Without it we’d be doing this [Zoom interview] on a telephone call. We wouldn’t be able to record it. A lot of people couldn’t have worked during COVID. The internet eventually fulfilled its potential. AI is just as big as the internet. It’s going to be a monumental shift,” Petry says.

When asked about inspectors who fear AI, Petry points out: “Inspectors that embrace AI and new technology will get to spend more time growing their business because they won’t be on the inspections as long. If you’re using the old tools and old ways of reporting, your competitors are already back at the house, have already turned in the report. It leaves more time for talking to Realtors and building relationships.”

“There’s an arms race to implement AI features within products,” Petry says, explaining that technology for home inspectors is no exception. Ideally, new technology should free up the inspector to do the more important work of focusing on the home being inspected. “Technology helps you translate what you’re experiencing into something that can be used and understood by the lay person in an easy manner. As an inspector, you don’t have to be an expert in technology; you need to be an expert in home inspections. Technology’s job is to not be in the way,” he explains.

About the Author
Isaac Peck is the Publisher of Working RE magazine and the Senior Broker and President of OREP.org, a leading provider of E&O insurance for savvy professionals in 50 states and DC. Over 14,000 professionals trust OREP for their E&O and liability insurance. Isaac received his master’s degree in accounting from San Diego State University. Reach Isaac at isaac@orep.org or (888) 347-5273. CA License #4116465.

Published by OREP Insurance Services, LLC. Calif. License #0K99465

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