Inkster, Michigan
Looking for an Inkster home inspector? We do certified home, commercial, mold and radon inspections in Inkster, 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 Inkster 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 Inkster and across Wayne 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 an Inkster 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 reportInkster housing stock
Inkster has roughly 11,081 housing units and about 74% of them are single-family detached. Age is the most useful single fact about a house before anyone has seen it. It narrows down what is worth checking first, and it is why two places of much the same size can need quite different inspections.
If the town has a defining decade it is the 1950s, which accounts for 4,835 homes, around 44% of the housing stock.
The median owner-occupied home here is valued at $69,000. Only 44% of occupied homes are owner-occupied, so a good share of what we inspect here is bought as a rental or sold with tenants in place — which changes what access on the day looks like. Around 592 homes sit in two-to-four unit buildings, where a shared roof, a shared wall and sometimes a shared furnace mean the report has to be clear about where one unit stops.
Treat this as a starting list, not a diagnosis. An Inkster home inspector checks these things early in a home of this age and then records what is genuinely there, which is often not what the era would suggest.
Housing figures: US Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2022 five-year estimates.
When Inkster was built
81% of homes here run on utility gas. Another 65 use bottled or LP gas.
Local knowledge
Inkster puts something on the front of the building that most cities keep in a filing cabinet: an orange sticker.
The City requires a Certificate of Occupancy on the sale of residential and commercial property, and it says that requirement covers all transfer of ownership transactions, including land contract purchases. An orange Certificate of Occupancy sticker posted on a property means it is unlawful to occupy it without a certificate from the Building Department. The seller is responsible for obtaining it before the closing.
What is unusual is the second half. Most cities frame this as a seller obligation and stop. Inkster warns buyers directly that they are subject to a citation, or to a business being shut down, if they occupy the property without the certificate in hand. It is worth knowing whose problem that becomes on moving day.
The housing behind all this is postwar and concentrated: of about 11,081 units, roughly 4,835 — some 44% — were built in the 1950s, with 1,508 more from the 1940s and 1,308 from the 1960s. Around 74% is single-family detached.
Before you buy
Two inspections, two purposes
Nine of the cities we write about require some form of municipal inspection before a house changes hands, and every one of them produces the same confusion. Inkster is no exception.
The City’s Certificate of Occupancy requirement exists so that a dwelling or building may lawfully be occupied. It is enforced through the Code Enforcement Division, it results in a certificate rather than a report, and the seller arranges it. The City’s own forms page lists what sits alongside it — a residential Certificate of Re-Occupancy application, a rental registration, a sale of rental inspection checklist, a vacant property registration, and a roof inspection affidavit, which is a form we have not seen another city on this list publish.
None of that is written for you. A buyer’s inspection is independent, commissioned and paid for by you, and it reports condition: the roof, structure, foundation, drainage, electrical, heating and cooling, plumbing and the accessible interior, with what is failing, what is close to the end of its service life, and what to plan for. On a house built in the 1950s that is a seventy-year-old building, and the difference between compliant and sound is most of the cost of owning it.
Both happen before the same closing. Neither does the other’s job.
If you are buying a rental
Inkster’s rental program has a feature worth understanding before you buy income property here.
The City requires all rental properties to be inspected on a three-year cycle, and qualifying properties must be registered with the Building Department as a rental. On inspection and compliance a Certificate of Compliance is issued, valid for three years, with a fee of $150 for each rental one and two family home.
The clause that matters is the next one: the City states the certificate may be rescinded if blight and property maintenance issues arise during that cycle. A three-year certificate is not three years of certainty — it is three years of continuing to meet the standard. Most towns on this list issue a certificate and let it run to expiry.
For a buyer, that turns the exterior condition of a rental from a cosmetic question into a compliance one. We document what is there — roof covering, siding, porches and stairs, garages and outbuildings, grading and drainage, and the condition of walks and drives — and on multi-unit property the mechanical count changes the arithmetic before anything else does.
Where the code and the inspection overlap
Inkster’s property maintenance code reads, in places, like a list of things an inspector looks at — which makes it a useful thing for a buyer to have read.
The City requires that premises be graded and maintained to prevent the erosion of soil and the accumulation of stagnant water. It requires siding and masonry joints to be kept weather resistant and water tight, and it requires garages, sheds, fences and walls to be structurally sound and in good repair, along with sidewalks, walkways, stairs, porches and driveways kept free from hazards. Peeling, flaking and chipped paint has to be eliminated and the surface repainted.
The City is looking at those things to enforce a standard. We look at the same things to tell you what they will cost and when. Grading that sheds water away from a foundation is the cheapest drainage improvement there is, and grading that does not is one of the most common reasons a basement is damp — so we record the slope, the gutters and downspouts and where they discharge, the condition of the foundation, and what the basement or crawlspace shows, as found.
We are not going to tell you Inkster has a flooding problem, because nothing authoritative says that. What we will tell you is what the particular property in front of us does with the water that lands on it.
The buried line
Everything the City checks and everything we check is visible. The buried lateral running from the house to the public main is not.
On a house from the 1950s that line has been in the ground about seventy years — long enough for roots to find a joint, for ground movement to displace a section, or for a repair to have been made that nobody now remembers. We will not name a material from a build year, because no authoritative source establishes what Inkster laterals are generally made of, and a construction boom is not evidence about pipe.
A sewer camera inspection records what is actually inside — roots, cracks, displaced joints, bellies or blockages where they exist, and a clear run where they do not — and it is added to the same visit rather than booked separately.
Alongside it, commercial building inspections follow the CCPIA standard for offices, retail, multifamily and warehouse property, and radon testing or mold inspection and testing can be added to a residential or commercial visit.
Local information from City of Inkster — Certificate of Occupancy · City of Inkster — rental property program · City of Inkster — property maintenance code · City of Inkster — forms, permits and applications. Municipal requirements change — verify current details with the municipality.
Radon in Wayne County
Zone 3 is the lowest of the three EPA categories — the predicted average indoor level across the county is below 2 pCi/L. So on the state’s map Inkster sits well away from the worst of it, and we are not going to dress that up into something it is not. What a zone cannot tell you is anything about one house: 17% of tests actually run in Wayne County still came back at or above the EPA’s 4 pCi/L action level, which is about one in six. Zones are drawn around counties, not around addresses, which is why the only number that settles the question is the one from the house itself.
We place a continuous monitor for 48 hours and read the result on site — no mail-in kit, no lab wait. How radon testing works · Wayne County radon and inspection coverage
Zone from the EPA Map of Radon Zones. Elevated-result share from the Michigan Indoor Radon Program.
Why choose us
Five reasons people here pick us as their Inkster 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
Justin, our inspector, was very personable and knowledgeable, and did a thorough job with our WDO inspection.
Tekid The BlackInkster, MIOra from Trademark did an incredible job with the inspection and sewer scope of the home I am in the process of buying. He was very thorough, explained everything to me from the start, and made it all super easy to understand which definitely helped to put me at ease a bit more. Highly recommend this company!
Mariah HartmanWestland, MIJim was prompt and thorough during the mold testing. Clearly gave us an explanation about mold and testing process he was going to conduct. Testing was followed by a written report. I would recommend everyone use a third party to test mold, independent from the company conducting remediation work. I would hire Trademark again and strongly recommend them.
Alberto PicconeNorthville, MIWhat happens
Questions
It is the City’s Certificate of Occupancy notice. An orange Certificate of Occupancy sticker posted on a property indicates that it is unlawful to occupy, or cause to be occupied, that dwelling or building without a certificate obtained from the City’s Building Department. The seller is responsible for obtaining the certificate before the purchase closes.
Yes. The City states that an owner who intends to sell residential or commercial property is required to obtain a Certificate of Occupancy, and that it is required on all transfer of ownership transactions including land contract purchases. It is arranged by the seller before closing. Build it into the timeline early rather than in the final two weeks.
The City warns buyers about exactly this. It states that buyers are subject to receiving a citation, and to a business being shut down, should they occupy a dwelling or building without first obtaining the certificate. Most cities put the whole obligation on the seller and say nothing to the buyer; Inkster does not. Confirm where the certificate stands before you take possession.
No. The certificate exists so a dwelling or building may lawfully be occupied, it is enforced by the City’s Code Enforcement Division, and it produces a certificate rather than a report. A buyer’s inspection is independent, paid for by you, and reports the condition of the roof, structure, foundation, drainage, electrical, heating and cooling, plumbing and the accessible interior — what is failing, what is near the end of its life and what to budget for. Neither does the other’s job.
Two things. Rental properties must be registered with the Building Department and are inspected on a three-year cycle, with a Certificate of Compliance issued on compliance and a fee of $150 for each rental one and two family home. And the certificate is conditional — the City states it may be rescinded if blight and property maintenance issues arise during that three-year period. A current certificate is not the same as three years of certainty.
Overwhelmingly postwar. Of about 11,081 housing units, roughly 4,835 — some 44% — were built in the 1950s, with 1,508 from the 1940s, 1,308 from the 1960s and 1,431 from the 1970s. Around 74% is single-family detached. That means most houses here are seventy years old or close to it, so an original roof covering, furnace, air conditioning condenser and water heater are all long past their expected service life. Which have been renewed, and how well, is what an inspection establishes.
Some of it overlaps, for different reasons. The code requires premises to be graded and maintained to prevent soil erosion and standing water, siding and masonry joints to stay weather resistant and water tight, and garages, sheds, fences, sidewalks, stairs, porches and driveways to be structurally sound and free from hazards. The City is enforcing a standard. We are telling you what those same components will cost you and when — which is a different question with a different answer.
It is worth considering. Whatever the City looks at for its certificate, no visual inspection of any kind sees inside the buried lateral running from the house to the public main. On a house from the 1950s that pipe has been in the ground around seventy years. We will not guess a material from a build year — no authoritative source establishes what Inkster laterals are generally made of. Putting a camera down the line documents roots, cracks, displaced joints, bellies or blockages where they exist, and is added to the same appointment.
More on cost, timing and what is included on the FAQ page.
Police, fire, rescue, military and educators — our way of saying thank you for your service. Enter code HERO at checkout.
Claim the Hero DiscountNeed an Inkster home inspector and not sure we reach you? Call 734-331-3269 and we will tell you.
Permits, assessing and property records for Inkster are handled by Inkster, Michigan, not by us.
From the blog
October 22, 2017
May 18, 2024
February 18, 2025
April 5, 2024
July 2, 2020
Your local Inkster home inspector, seven days a week. Home inspection reports in 24 hours.
