Who am I and why
“The Best Home Inspection”?
My name is Lance Hudson, son of the famous Joy Hudson and brother of the infamous Craig Hudson, both Realtors in the Beverly Hills and Westwood areas for too many years now, and I better add that Craig works on Large International Commercial deals also, Casinos, Hotels etc.. My lovely wife Day used to own a Dry Cleaners in West Hollywood “Merry Go Round Cleaners” but we closed that years ago. Now she handles the phones and email and works on the larger inspections so that we can finish them more quickly.
I have been a California Licensed General Building Contractor for nearly 20 years, specializing in repairs and remodels. This includes both installations and repairs of virtually all aspects of construction, including; framing, drywall, plaster, stucco, rough and finish carpentry, rewiring, re-piping, cabinets, roofing, concrete, concrete block, brick, tile, all types of flooring and wall coverings, paint, refinishing of floors, furniture and cabinets, all facets of plumbing and electrical repairs and modifications, decking, fencing, irrigation, waterproofing, earthquake retrofitting and more. For a variety of reasons, I decided a while ago to scale way back on my construction business and focus on the inspection business. I am currently not accepting any new construction clients but I would be more happy to refer you to some very good contractors that I have worked with if you would like. To be especially clear for the lawyers and per State law: I do no construction work of any kind on houses which I inspect, including but not limited to; repairs, installations, demolition or asbestos removal or abatement.
What originally got me interested in Home Inspection is that of course I often ended up doing the work on homes after they had been inspected. I was constantly disappointed in the reports that I saw and often had to work with. I usually had to re-inspect in order to find out what the inspector was referring to when he said something like ‘door won’t operate properly’, does the door need planing, the lock oiling or replacing or what? I was also often called upon to interpret or expand upon a home inspection report which someone had received, often these reports were simple check off sheets that said little more than, “Faucet Leaks”. No; when, where, how or why about the leak, much less the repair which was required! After a while it seemed to me that it was silly that myself or another person like me should have to go around explaining someone else’s work, for free, as was often the case. Finally I told my dear Mother and a few other brokers whom I know well that I wanted to do their next inspections, “If I’m going to have to go interpret it, I might as well get paid to do it, and then it won’t need interpreting”.
The inspection itself was rather simple to figure out and I made a checklist to help me do a thorough and orderly inspection, based upon my own experience and what I had seen done by others. It took a LONG time to process and produce the report I wanted however, which quickly showed me why generic check off lists and similar short cuts are so popular among inspectors. Well, I am at times a stubborn individual and I knew that through the efficient and extensive use of modern technology, I could do a heck of a lot better report and not spend an unreasonable amount of time in the process. I quickly added simple graphics to help identify things in the report and then soon changed to inserting actual pictures of the items in question. Eventually Matt, my old business partner and I ended up developing our own software, using Filemaker, so that we could do everything we wanted and do it as quickly as possible. As we went along we learned a few things from our clients about what would help them and in some cases what is most and least important to them, feedback has been extremely helpful, thank you to all whom have commented. Anyway, one thing led to another and here I am today, the self proclaimed “Best Home Inspector”! Well, I have never been terribly shy, and I do take pride in my work.