Lansing, Michigan
Looking for a Lansing home inspector? We do certified home, commercial, mold and radon inspections in Lansing, 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 Lansing 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 Lansing and across Ingham 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 Lansing 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 reportLansing housing stock
Lansing has roughly 55,082 housing units and about 63% of them are single-family detached. Housing that went up mostly in one era has mostly one era’s problems — which is genuinely useful to know before you buy, because it tells you what to look at first.
Most of it went up in the years before 1940 — 13,548 homes, around 25% of the town.
The median owner-occupied home here is valued at $112,200. Only 53% 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. There are around 848 manufactured and mobile homes in Lansing. Those are a different inspection — the questions are about the frame, the anchoring and the skirting rather than a basement. Around 4,310 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.
None of this is a prediction about a particular house. It is where a Lansing home inspector starts looking in a home of this age, and what we photograph and write up either way.
Housing figures: US Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2022 five-year estimates.
When Lansing was built
79% of homes here run on utility gas, and 86 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 1,002 use bottled or LP gas.
Local knowledge
Lansing has more prewar housing than any city we cover except Detroit — about 13,548 units built before 1940, roughly a quarter of the city.
That is not a warning. A house that has stood for ninety years has demonstrated something a twenty-year-old house has not. What it means is that no assumption survives the front door: over that span the roof, heating, wiring, plumbing and windows have each been replaced, altered or partly renewed by different people to different standards, and the only way to know which is to look.
The rest of the stock is postwar and substantial: 9,170 units from the 1950s, 8,521 from the 1970s, 8,131 from the 1960s and 5,048 from the 1940s, out of about 55,082 in total. Around 63% is single-family detached.
And there is one Lansing-specific thing that catches people planning work after closing, buried on the Building Safety page where nobody thinks to look. It is about tax, not construction, and it is below.
Before you buy
The one nobody warns you about
Most cities put fee schedules on the building department page. Lansing puts a tax warning there, and it is worth reading before you plan work on a house you have just bought.
The Building Safety Office states that the City has adopted a local income tax requiring residents to pay 1% and non-residents performing work in the City to pay 0.5%, that any employees or contractors paid for labor performed in connection with a permit are earning taxable income, and that failure to withhold or pay that tax is a criminal misdemeanor.
In practice that is a question to put to your contractor before the work starts rather than a problem to discover afterwards. It is not a reason to skip the permit — unpermitted work is a far more expensive habit, and it turns up in every one of these reports eventually — but it is a real consideration in a city where a quarter of the housing is old enough that most buyers arrive with a renovation list.
The Building Safety Office describes its own job as certifying the safe occupancy of buildings by verifying construction compliance with state-regulated building, electrical, fire, mechanical and plumbing codes. That is code compliance for new and altered work. It is not a condition report on an existing house, and a buyer’s inspection is the thing that tells you what you are actually taking on.
Money, after the closing
This one is Michigan law rather than a Lansing invention, but the City Assessor explains it more clearly than most and it catches buyers everywhere.
Under Proposal A, a property’s taxable value is capped during a single ownership, rising by inflation or 5%, whichever is lower. The Assessor’s office states the consequence plainly: when you purchase a property the cap that was in place during the previous ownership is removed for the following year, which can result in a large increase in taxable value. The cap then restarts under your ownership.
Two deadlines come with it. A Property Transfer Affidavit must be filed within 45 days of the transfer, with a fine of up to $200 for residential property if it is not, and if the property will be your primary residence the Principal Residence Exemption request exempts you from the school operating millage. The City notes that all forms need a physical signature on a current State of Michigan form — typed signatures and expired forms are not accepted — and that land contract sales must be reported too.
None of that is inspection work. It is on this page because the number people budget from is usually the seller’s tax bill, and in Michigan that is the wrong number.
A quarter of the city is prewar
With 13,548 units built before 1940, Lansing has the deepest prewar housing stock of any city on this site apart from Detroit — and prewar houses are inspected differently, not more pessimistically.
The building itself is often the sound part. What changes is the number of layers: a house that age has been re-roofed several times, re-heated at least twice, rewired in patches, replumbed in sections and altered by owners whose work ranges from excellent to invisible. Additions, enclosed porches, finished basements and converted attics all carry their own questions about how they were tied into the original structure.
We do not name components from a build year. We report what is installed, what condition it is in, what is at or past the end of its service life, and what could not be seen — and on an older house the last of those matters as much as the first.
Water is the recurring theme in older stock, so grading and drainage get particular attention: how the ground slopes at the foundation, where the gutters and downspouts discharge, the condition of the foundation and basement or crawlspace, floor drains and any sump equipment. Permit history for an address can be looked up through the City’s online permit system, with the usual caution: a permit on file does not establish that work is sound today, and nothing on file does not establish that it was done badly.
The buried line
On a prewar house the buried lateral running from the building to the public main is the oldest thing you are buying that nobody has ever seen.
It has had ninety years for tree 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 Lansing laterals are generally made of, and guessing from an era is how people end up buying the wrong repair.
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 — which in Lansing includes any building of three or more dwelling units — and radon testing or mold inspection and testing can be added to a residential or commercial visit.
Local information from City of Lansing — Building Safety Office · City of Lansing — City Assessor, transfers of ownership · City of Lansing — residential permits and plan review. Municipal requirements change — verify current details with the municipality.
Radon in Ingham County
Zone 2 is the middle EPA category — the predicted average indoor level across the county sits between 2 and 4 pCi/L.
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 · Ingham County radon and inspection coverage
Zone from the EPA Map of Radon Zones.
Why choose us
Five reasons people here pick us as their Lansing 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
Older than most of the region. About 13,548 of roughly 55,082 housing units predate 1940 — around a quarter of the city, and the largest prewar stock of any city on this site apart from Detroit. There is plenty of postwar housing too: 9,170 units from the 1950s, 8,521 from the 1970s, 8,131 from the 1960s and 5,048 from the 1940s. Around 63% is single-family detached. Age on its own tells you very little; what it does mean is that every major system has been replaced or altered at least once by someone.
The City raises it on its own Building Safety page. Lansing has a local income tax — 1% for residents and 0.5% for non-residents performing work in the City — and the City states that any employees or contractors paid for labor performed in connection with a permit are earning taxable income, and that failure to withhold or pay is a criminal misdemeanor. It is a question for your contractor before the work starts. It is not a reason to skip the permit.
Because the taxable value uncapped. Under Michigan’s Proposal A a property’s taxable value is capped during one ownership, and the City Assessor states that when you purchase a property that cap is removed for the following year, which can produce a large increase before the cap restarts under your ownership. It is why the seller’s current tax bill is the wrong figure to budget from. Ask for an estimate on the uncapped value instead.
A Property Transfer Affidavit within 45 days of the transfer — the City notes a fine of up to $200 for residential property if it is not filed. If the property will be your primary residence, the Principal Residence Exemption request exempts you from the school operating millage. Forms need a physical signature on a current State of Michigan form; typed signatures and expired forms are not accepted. Land contract sales must be reported as well.
For the City’s permit and plan review process, yes. Lansing treats multi-family buildings of three or more dwelling units as commercial buildings, so work on one goes through commercial plan review rather than the residential route. On the inspection side, a commercial building inspection to the CCPIA standard is usually the right fit for a building of that size — and the mechanical count alone changes the arithmetic before anything else does.
Nothing we could verify says so. Several cities in the region do run point-of-sale or certificate programs, and we are not going to import one that we could not read on the City’s own pages. Lansing’s code enforcement pages were largely empty at the time of writing, so confirm the current position with the City rather than relying on any web page, this one included.
Water, and the evidence of it. We record how the ground slopes at the foundation, where gutters and downspouts discharge, foundation conditions, the basement or crawlspace, floor drains and any sump equipment, along with staining, efflorescence and past repairs. On a house that has stood since the 1930s the foundation has usually seen several attempts at managing water, and reading which of them are working is most of the job.
On older housing especially. The buried lateral running from the house to the public main is the one component no visual inspection reaches, and on a prewar house it has been in the ground ninety years. We will not guess a material from a build year — no authoritative source establishes what Lansing 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.
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Permits, assessing and property records for Lansing are handled by Lansing, Michigan, not by us.
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