Columbiaville, Michigan
Looking for a Columbiaville home inspector? We do certified home, commercial, mold and radon inspections in Columbiaville, seven days a week. Home inspection reports come back in 24 hours.
Schedule your inspectionCall 734-331-3269
Services
For buyers, sellers, and homeowners keeping an eye on the place they already own. On new construction we also do pre-drywall inspections and 11-month builder’s warranty inspections. Our certified inspectors walk every major system in your Columbiaville home and tell you plainly what they found — then put it in a photo-rich digital report within 24 hours.
Following the InterNACHI Standards of Practice:
Included free with every home buyer inspection— and none of them require us to sell your information.
SatisfactionIf you are unhappy with your inspector on the day of the inspection, before you have seen your report, tell us and we will make it right — or you owe us nothing.
30-Day WarrantyA free 30-day Guard home warranty trial, negotiated for you with no obligation. Activate it whenever you are ready.
$100 OffThe buyer’s protection guarantee: if the first home we inspect for you does not make it to the closing table, for any reason, we take $100 off any further home buyer inspection within 30 days of the original.
Optional services at an additional cost — not part of a standard inspection. Tap one to see what it covers.
A camera down the main sewer line, watching its condition from the inside — roots, breaks, bellies and blockages no visual inspection can find. More about sewer scope inspections
The wood-destroying organism report VA buyers are typically asked to provide, on the federal NPMA-33 form. Carried out during the same visit. More about Veterans WDO inspections
Up to five air samples sent to an accredited laboratory, added to the same appointment rather than booked as a second visit. More about mold inspection and testing
View a sample report
Offices, retail, multifamily and warehouses in Columbiaville and across Lapeer County. Know what condition a building is in before you sign — or stay ahead of problems in the one you already own. Reports in 24 to 72 hours depending on size.
Following the CCPIA commercial standards:
Commonly added to a commercial inspection at additional cost.
Commercial laterals are longer, older and carry more. A camera is the only way to see the condition of the one you are buying. More about sewer scope inspections
Air samples to an accredited laboratory, which matters most in buildings that have sat empty or had a roof or plumbing leak. More about mold inspection and testing
View a sample report
Add either to a Columbiaville home or commercial inspection, or book it on its own. We test and we never remediate, so there is nothing to sell you on the back of a result — the number you get is just the number.
Radon measured in house on a professional continuous monitor; mold samples to an accredited laboratory:
The other things worth testing while somebody is already there.
Carried out after remediation on the treated area and the areas next to it, to confirm what was found. More about mold inspection and testing
A damp basement can have several causes, and the buried sewer line is the one a visual inspection cannot check. A scope rules it in or out. More about sewer scope inspections
View a sample reportColumbiaville housing stock
Columbiaville has roughly 354 housing units and about 84% of them are single-family detached. The year a house went up decides more about what an inspection turns up than almost anything else about it, which is why it is where we start rather than where we finish.
More of it dates from the years before 1940 than from any other decade — 134 homes, roughly 38% of the town.
The median owner-occupied home here is valued at $110,900.
This is not a forecast for any one address. It is where a Columbiaville home inspector starts in a home of this age — and whatever we actually find, it goes in the report with photographs.
Housing figures: US Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2022 five-year estimates.
When Columbiaville was built
88% of homes here run on utility gas.
Local knowledge
Columbiaville does something almost no municipality in this area does: it tells you exactly what the utilities will cost before you own the house.
Its published rate schedule for 2026/2027 sets out every charge line by line, with last year’s figure, the increase, the new figure and the percentage change beside it. Water, sewer, trash, curbside collection, and a separate monthly sewer loan charge, adding up to a stated minimum bill.
For that year the minimum total came to $124.88 a month, of which $22.00 is the sewer loan charge. Consumption above the minimum is billed on top, per thousand gallons for both water and sewer.
That is a genuinely useful number to have during a purchase, because monthly running costs are one of the things buyers routinely underestimate. Do check the current schedule with the village rather than relying on ours — those figures were approved in February 2026 and they change.
The other thing worth knowing is how few phone calls it takes to get an answer here. The village’s own guide for new residents lists water, sewer, trash collection, the zoning department and village ordinances all on the same village number.
The housing is old: about 134 of roughly 354 units predate 1940, with 77 from the 1970s and 65 from the 1950s, and only around 34 units built across the whole period since 1980.
Before you buy
Running costs
The village’s published utility rate schedule is a model of clarity. Rather than a bare list of charges, it shows the previous year’s rate, the increase applied, the new rate and the percentage, for every line on the bill.
Most charges rose by three percent that year; the trash charge did not rise at all. The minimum bill went from $100.19 to $102.88, and with the sewer loan charge of $22.00 added the total minimum moved from $122.19 to $124.88 a month. Above the minimum, water and sewer are each charged per thousand gallons.
We are quoting it because it is the sort of thing a buyer should have and rarely does. It is also worth understanding what a minimum bill means: it is what you pay even if you use very little, so a small household does not escape it.
The sewer loan line is a fixed monthly charge separate from usage. We have not read anything about its term or purpose and are not going to speculate — ask the village how long it runs, because on a long ownership that is a real number.
These figures were presented to and approved by the council in February 2026 for a billing cycle beginning that March. They will have moved since, so treat them as an illustration of what the village charges and confirm the current schedule before you rely on it.
None of this is inspection business. It is included because it is free to establish in advance and it changes the arithmetic of an offer.
Setting up
The village publishes a guide for new residents that is, in practice, a utility setup checklist — who supplies what, with numbers.
Electricity comes from DTE Energy and natural gas from Consumers Energy. Several providers are listed for telephone, cable and internet, including a satellite option, which is a reasonable indication that connectivity is worth checking for a specific address rather than assumed.
Water, sewer and trash collection all sit with the village, on the village number, and trash is collected on Friday mornings. Recycling goes through a named private hauler. Street light outages are reported directly to the electricity supplier rather than to the village.
The detail we like is that the same village number is given for the zoning department and for village ordinances. So a question about what you may do to a property and a question about your water bill land in the same place. In a village of 354 homes that is efficient rather than a shortcoming.
The page also lists Marathon Township separately with its own number, which is a useful reminder that the village and the surrounding township are different governments. Confirm which one an address actually sits in before relying on anything you are told.
One thing the village does not publish is who issues building permits or performs the inspections. There is no building department page and no named inspector. We are not going to guess, so make that a call before you plan work.
Public works
The public works department runs weekdays from seven in the morning until half past three, and it is two people: a superintendent and one other employee.
Between them they maintain the village parks, the cemeteries, the streets and the water and sewer systems, along with whatever state and federal law requires. That is a wide brief for two people, and it is worth bearing in mind when judging how quickly a non-urgent request will move.
The village also publishes a consumer confidence report on water quality, as state law requires of community water suppliers, and notes that paper copies are available at the village office. The copy on the website did not yield readable text when we looked, so we cannot tell you what is in it — we are naming it rather than paraphrasing, and if water quality matters to your decision, collect a paper copy from the office.
On the drainage an inspection does cover, we record where the downspouts terminate and whether they carry water clear of the walls or drop it at the foundation, where any sump pump discharges and whether there is a backup arrangement, and how the ground falls away from the building on every elevation.
Inside, we look for what past water has left behind: staining and tide lines on foundation walls, efflorescence and mineral deposits, replaced lower wall finishes, and corrosion at the base of mechanical equipment. On a house eighty years old the original arrangement has usually been altered more than once, and grading that was right at the start has had decades of landscaping and settlement since.
The housing
With about 134 units predating 1940, 65 from the 1950s and 77 from the 1970s — and only around 34 built in the four and a half decades since 1980 — almost every inspection here is an older-house inspection.
Electrical systems have usually been rebuilt in stages by different hands. We look for mixed wiring types meeting in the same box, ungrounded receptacles, undersized or overfilled panels, overfused circuits, and connections made in places that were never intended to be permanent. On the 1970s stock, aluminum branch wiring is a live question and we report it wherever we find it.
Original electrical service capacity is frequently the practical limit on what a modern household wants to run, and on housing of this age that is often the single largest item a buyer faces.
Plumbing tends to have been renewed in part rather than in whole, so material transitions where old meets new are where problems concentrate. Original galvanized supply, where it survives, corrodes from the inside and shows as reduced flow and discolored water long before anything leaks.
Roof coverings will be several generations deep. Heating equipment is typically several replacements from the original, and how well each was fitted and vented matters more than how new the current one looks. Water heaters are usually on their third or fourth.
Foundations from before 1940 are usually stone or early block, and their condition depends far more on how water has been managed around the building than on how they were built. Radon testing and mold inspection and testing can be added to any visit, and a buyer’s inspection is the usual starting point.
The buried line
The village bills a monthly sewer loan charge, which pays for the public system. It does nothing for the length of pipe between that system and your house, which belongs to the owner and which no visual inspection reaches inside.
Under a pre-1940 house — nearly four properties in ten here — that pipe is often the oldest untouched component on the whole property. We will not name a material from a build year, because nothing published establishes what Columbiaville lines are generally made of, and a guess in a report is worse than no statement at all.
A sewer camera inspection records what is actually in there: roots, cracks, displaced joints, bellies or blockages where they exist, and a clear run where they do not. In an old platted village with mature street trees, roots are the common finding and they give no warning until the day the drains back up.
On a village with a two-person public works department, a problem that turns out to be on the private side is entirely yours to solve, on your own timetable and at your own cost. That is a further argument for knowing the condition of the line before you own it rather than after.
A camera inspection is added to the same appointment rather than booked separately, and we deliver a full written report with photographs, generally the same day. You can read what our clients say, browse answers to common questions, or get in touch about a specific address in Columbiaville. Commercial building inspections to the CCPIA standard are available where a building is commercial.
Local information from Village of Columbiaville — 2026/2027 public utility rates · Village of Columbiaville — new residents guide · Village of Columbiaville — Department of Public Works · Village of Columbiaville — property tax information. Municipal requirements change — verify current details with the municipality.
Why choose us
Five reasons people here pick us as their Columbiaville home inspector.
Family owned since 2009, more than 16,000 inspections completed and over 2,000 five-star reviews across Michigan. We also handle home buyer inspections, commercial building inspections, mold testing and radon testing.
We do not sell mold remediation or radon mitigation, so there is nothing to gain from a result that comes back bad. The number you get is just the number.
Radon, mold, sewer scope and wood-destroying organism inspections go on the same appointment as the home inspection rather than costing you a second morning.
Most people do, and it is the most useful hour of the whole purchase. Ask anything while we are standing in front of it.
InterNACHI and CCPIA certified, with four Certified Master Inspectors and National Home Inspector Examination passes on the team — none of which Michigan requires. The standards we inspect to are published and you can hold the work against them.
Including weekends, because inspection windows sit on closing dates and closing dates do not care what day it is.
Reviews
I recently hired Trademark for a full home inspection on a new purchase, including sewer scope and radon testing. It was a phenomenal experience from beginning to end. Our inspector, Mitch, did a fantastic job explaining all the findings, and the digital report with photos and videos was superb. Would definitely recommend without hesitation.
Salina HamiltonOak Park, MIWe had Mitch inspect our prospective house and he was amazing. He was thorough, patient to answer my questions and provide feedback on what areas he would recommend having a follow up expert and why. The office was responsive and I was able to book multiple services to be done in the same visit (inspection, radon test, sewer scope).
Chris PlaweckiOak Park, MIThis is one of the finest companies I have come across - that means serious customer service and professionalism. Justin was the inspector and he was very thorough yet very kind to answers all the questions that came in my mind during inspection. He took enough time, no rush, and a very detailed inspection was conducted. Extremely competitive pricing and timing from the company. 100% recommend to anyone looking for any kind of property inspection!!
Chirag R MiyaniMichiganWhat happens
Questions
The village publishes a full rate schedule. For 2026/2027 the stated minimum bill was $102.88 a month, and with the $22.00 sewer loan charge the total minimum came to $124.88. Usage above the minimum is charged per thousand gallons on top.
Treat them as an illustration. They were approved by the council in February 2026 for a billing cycle starting that March, and rates change — confirm the current schedule with the village.
A fixed monthly line on every account, separate from water and sewer usage. We have not read anything about its term and will not speculate — ask the village how long it runs, because over a long ownership it adds up.
The same village number as water, sewer and trash. The village’s new residents page lists the zoning department and village ordinances on the same line as the utilities.
We could not establish it from published sources — there is no building department page and no named inspector. Ask the village before planning work rather than assuming.
Yes. The village publishes a consumer confidence report as state law requires, and notes that paper copies are available at the village office. The online copy was not readable when we looked, so collect one if it matters to your decision.
Old. About 134 of roughly 354 units predate 1940, with 77 from the 1970s and 65 from the 1950s, and only around 34 units built in the whole period since 1980.
On a village where nearly four houses in ten predate 1940, yes. The line is often the oldest untouched component on the property, and anything on the private side is yours to deal with. A camera inspection goes on the same visit.
More on cost, timing and what is included on the FAQ page.
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Your local Columbiaville home inspector, seven days a week. Home inspection reports in 24 hours.
