Highland Park, Michigan
Looking for a Highland Park home inspector? We do certified home, commercial, mold and radon inspections in Highland Park, 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 Highland Park 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 Highland Park 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 a Highland Park 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 reportHighland Park housing stock
Highland Park has roughly 5,800 housing units and about 55% 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 — 2,060 homes, roughly 36% of the town. It is also less detached-house territory than most of the area at 55%, so condominiums, duplexes and small multi-family buildings are a bigger share of what we inspect here — and those bring their own questions about what is yours to maintain and what belongs to the association.
The median owner-occupied home here is valued at $59,400. Only 45% 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 668 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.
This is not a forecast for any one address. It is where a Highland Park 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 Highland Park was built
82% of homes here run on utility gas, and 23 still heat with oil. If yours is one of them, the tank is the thing to ask about — where it is, and whether it was ever buried. Another 69 use bottled or LP gas.
Local knowledge
Highland Park publishes something no other city we write about does: a proper definition of where an ordinary repair stops and permitted work begins.
That question sits underneath almost every conversation about undocumented work on an older house. Somebody finished a basement, moved a wall, replaced a drain line, changed a service panel — and the seller says it was just a repair. Most cities publish a list of things that need permits and leave the edge undefined. This one draws the line explicitly, and the line is drawn where a buyer would want it drawn.
That matters more here than in most places because the housing is old. Of about 5,800 units, roughly 2,060 — some 36% — predate 1940, and around 55% is single-family detached. A century-old house has accumulated a great deal of work, and knowing which of it should have been permitted is a genuinely useful thing to be able to check.
The City is also strict about process in a way worth planning around: incomplete applications are returned unprocessed, and plans have to be submitted electronically.
Before you buy
The line between repair and permit
Here it is, from the City’s own building department pages, and it is worth reading slowly.
A permit is not required for ordinary repairs. But ordinary repairs do not include cutting away any wall, partition or portion of one; removing or cutting any structural beam or bearing support; removing or changing any required means of egress; or rearranging parts of a structure in a way that affects exit requirements. Nor do they include adding to, altering, replacing or relocating any standpipe, water supply, sewer, drainage, drain leader, gas, soil, waste, vent or similar piping, electrical wiring, or mechanical or other work affecting public health or general safety.
Read that against a typical older house and you can see how much of what gets called "maintenance" is not. Opening a wall between a kitchen and a dining room is not an ordinary repair. Moving a drain line for a new bathroom is not. Relocating a vent, changing the wiring for a finished basement, or altering egress from a bedroom is not.
The City adds a second trigger in the same place: a permit is required when the use or occupancy of a structure, or a portion of it, is changed. That covers a single-family house used as two units, or a ground floor that used to be a shop.
None of that tells you whether the work in front of us was done well. That is a buyer’s inspection: the roof, structure, foundation, drainage, electrical, heating and cooling, plumbing and the accessible interior, reported as found, with what is failing, what is near the end of its service life and what to plan for — and what could not be seen said plainly. On an altered older house, that last category is often where the important questions sit.
How the department works
If you are planning work after closing, the process here is specific and it rewards getting it right first time.
Incomplete applications are returned and will not be processed, so plans, supporting documents, contractor information and any applicable registrations need to go in together. All plans and supporting documents must be submitted electronically — by email, flash drive, drop box or another approved digital format — and paper submissions are not accepted unless otherwise approved.
Plans are required for all residential new builds, additions and alterations, although the Building Official may waive that where code compliance can be clearly determined from the description in the application. Stamped architectural or engineering plans are not required for one- and two-family dwellings under 3,500 square feet of calculated floor area, or public works projects under $15,000 in construction cost; above those thresholds they may be. All commercial new builds, additions and alterations require sealed and signed plans.
The City publishes the codes in force: the 2021 Michigan Building Code, effective 9 April 2025, alongside the 2021 Michigan Residential, Plumbing and Mechanical Codes, the 2023 National Electrical Code, the 2021 International Fire Code and the 2021 International Energy Conservation Code.
A person constructing a residential structure, or a combined residential and commercial one, must be licensed as a Residential Builder with the State, subject to exceptions in the licensing law.
What the City tracks
The City’s published forms are a fair guide to what it pays attention to, and several are directly relevant to a buyer.
Among the building documents are a furnace inspection form, a deck construction guide, a vinyl siding manual, a generator permits and inspections document, a homeowner permit affidavit, a hold harmless agreement, a permit extension request, a rental application, a tenant and landlord complaint form, a vacant property registration and a commercial certificate of occupancy. There is also a document simply headed hiring a contractor.
Two of those are worth flagging. A separate furnace inspection form tells you heating gets its own attention, which on housing with this much prewar stock is sensible — older systems, older flues, and chimneys that were built for a different fuel. And a vacant property registration means an empty house carries an obligation, which is worth establishing before you buy one.
A note on scope: the certificate of occupancy form the City publishes is a commercial one. We found no residential point-of-sale inspection requirement here, and we are not going to import one from a neighboring city that has one. Confirm the current position with the Building Department rather than relying on any web page, including this one.
Old housing and the buried line
With around 36% of the housing predating 1940, the typical inspection here is a building that has stood for eighty to a hundred years.
Nothing in it is original. The roof has been replaced several times, heating has turned over more than once, wiring has been extended and partly renewed, plumbing replaced in sections. Additions, enclosed porches, converted attics and finished basements have gone in at different times by different hands. The interesting findings are almost always at the joints between those layers, and behind the finishes installed over the top of them.
The same applies below ground. The buried lateral running from the house to the sewer main is the oldest thing changing hands and no visual inspection reaches inside it. A hundred years is long enough for roots to find a joint, for ground movement to displace a section, and for repairs to have been made and forgotten. We will not name a material from a build year, because no authoritative source establishes what Highland Park laterals are generally made of.
On the water side, the City runs its own water department, publishing water and sewer rates, a fee schedule and a bill dispute process. A home inspection does not test water — we do not take samples and we do not analyze them — but we do report the accessible plumbing as found, including visible materials and condition, the water heater, functional flow and drainage, and evidence of leaks or past repairs.
A sewer camera inspection records what is actually inside the lateral, and is added to the same visit rather than booked separately. Alongside it, commercial building inspections follow the CCPIA standard, and radon testing or mold inspection and testing can be added to a residential or commercial visit.
Local information from City of Highland Park — Building Department FAQ, including the ordinary repairs definition · City of Highland Park — forms, permits and applications · City of Highland Park — Water Department. 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. That puts Highland Park at the calmer end of Michigan’s radon picture, which is worth saying out loud rather than glossing over. 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. The zone describes a county. The only result that describes your basement is the one measured in it.
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 Highland Park 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
Ora 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, MICowboy “Jim” just did Mold Testing in my parents’ basement. He was Professional, explained the what, how and yet of everything to my Senior parents. Our results came back super quick. He even referred us to the resources on the Trademark website for me to use to fix the leaky basement. It’s 1 stop shopping with Trademark.
Becky JohnsonWayne, MIWhat happens
Questions
Highland Park publishes the definition, which is unusual and useful. A permit is not required for ordinary repairs — but ordinary repairs do not include cutting away any wall or partition, removing or cutting a structural beam or bearing support, removing or changing a required means of egress, or rearranging parts of a structure in a way that affects exit requirements. Nor do they include adding to, altering, replacing or relocating any standpipe, water supply, sewer, drainage, drain leader, gas, soil, waste, vent or similar piping, electrical wiring, or mechanical work affecting public health or general safety.
Because it is the answer to "it was just a repair". On an older house that has been altered over decades, the seller’s description of past work and the City’s definition of what needed a permit often do not match. Opening a wall, moving a drain line, relocating a vent or rewiring a finished basement are all outside the ordinary repair exemption. That tells you what should be on file, and what to look at hardest if it is not.
Yes. The City states a permit is required when the use or occupancy of a structure, or a portion of it, is changed. That is relevant on a single-family house that has been used as two units, or a building with a ground floor that was once commercial — both common on older stock, and both worth establishing before you buy.
Not usually. The City states that stamped architectural or engineering plans are not required for one- and two-family dwellings under 3,500 square feet of calculated floor area, or public works projects under $15,000 in construction cost. Above those thresholds they may be. All commercial new builds, additions and alterations do require sealed and signed plans.
Completely, and electronically. The City warns that incomplete applications are returned and will not be processed, so plans, supporting documents, contractor information and any applicable registrations should go in together. All plans and supporting documents must be submitted digitally — email, flash drive, drop box or another approved format — and paper submissions are not accepted unless otherwise approved.
Old. Of about 5,800 housing units, roughly 2,060 — some 36% — predate 1940, with 692 from the 1950s, 750 from the 1970s and 687 from the 1940s. Around 55% is single-family detached. On a house that has stood eighty to a hundred years, nothing is original, and the interesting findings are at the joints between the layers of work.
We did not find one. The certificate of occupancy form the City publishes is a commercial document, and no residential point-of-sale requirement appeared on the pages we read. Several cities nearby do run one, and we are not going to import theirs. Confirm the current position with the Building Department rather than relying on any web page, including this one.
On housing this age, seriously. The buried lateral running from the house to the sewer main is the oldest thing you are buying and no visual inspection reaches inside it — on a prewar house it has been in the ground a hundred years. We will not guess a material from a build year, because no authoritative source establishes what laterals here 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.
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From the blog
October 22, 2017
May 18, 2024
Your local Highland Park home inspector, seven days a week. Home inspection reports in 24 hours.
