Montrose, Michigan
Looking for a Montrose home inspector? We do certified home, commercial, mold and radon inspections in Montrose, 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 Montrose 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 Montrose and across Genesee 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 Montrose 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 reportMontrose housing stock
Montrose has roughly 865 housing units and about 68% 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 1950s — 184 homes, around 21% of the town.
The median owner-occupied home here is valued at $96,900. Only 55% 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.
None of this is a prediction about a particular house. It is where a Montrose 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 Montrose was built
79% of homes here run on utility gas. Another 7 use bottled or LP gas.
Local knowledge
Start with the thing that will actually affect you. In a notice dated 22 August 2026, the City published that it does not currently have a building inspector, and that all permits must be processed with the State of Michigan until further notice.
If you are buying here and intend to do work, that changes who you deal with entirely. It also means you should check the position before relying on it — the City’s own wording is "until further notice", so this is a situation that will change, and anything we write here is a snapshot rather than a permanent feature of the city.
We are not going to speculate about why the post is vacant. What we would say is that if permits matter to your plans, make the phone call before you commit to the purchase rather than after, and ask the City where things currently stand.
The rest of Montrose is easier to deal with than most places we cover. The city office opens Monday to Thursday from eight in the morning until six in the evening — a four-day, ten-hour week. A six o’clock close means someone with a job can actually get there, which is not something we can say about many of the communities on this site.
The housing is mid-century: about 184 units from the 1950s and 148 from the 1960s, with roughly 103 predating 1940 and a later cluster of 99 in the 2000s. Around a third of the stock is not a detached house.
Before you buy
Permits
The City’s building department page describes what the department normally does: regulating design, construction, quality of materials, use and occupancy, location and maintenance of properties and structures under the City’s code of ordinances. It also states a service standard that is rare enough to be worth noting — that the City will attempt to conduct inspections within forty-eight hours of being notified.
On top of that page sits the current notice: as of 22 August 2026 there is no City building inspector, and permits must go through the State of Michigan until further notice.
Two practical consequences. First, the forty-eight hour aim belongs to the City’s normal arrangement, so do not assume it applies to a State-processed permit — ask about timescales directly. Second, if you are buying a property where recent work has been done, ask where the paperwork for it sits, because records from either route are what a future buyer will ask you for.
The City is also explicit about something many people get wrong: permits and plans may be required whether you are hiring a building, electrical, plumbing or mechanical contractor or doing the work yourself as the owner of a single-family home. Doing it yourself is not an exemption.
A home inspection is not a permit search and we do not present it as one. What we do is establish what is physically present and in what condition, and flag work that appears to have been done without the benefit of a permit — which on sixty-year-old housing is a common finding and a fair thing to raise. A buyer’s inspection is the usual starting point, and commercial building inspections to the CCPIA standard are available where a building is commercial.
The guides
Montrose publishes, through its city departments, a set of plain-English building guides, and the titles alone are instructive: residential additions, basement finishing, decks and porches, and residential doors, siding and windows, alongside a commercial plan submittal guide and the 2021 International Property Maintenance Code.
Those are not arbitrary. They are the jobs homeowners most often take on, and — not coincidentally — three of them are where we most often find work that was never inspected.
Basement finishing is the classic. Finishing a lower level covers up the foundation walls, the sill, the framing and often the electrical, which means it conceals exactly the evidence an inspection wants to read. We look carefully at finished basements here: for signs of past water behind newer finishes, for whether egress and headroom look right, and for junction boxes and connections buried behind board.
Decks and porches are the second. Deck failures are among the few structural failures that injure people, and they almost always begin at the ledger where the deck meets the house. We examine ledger connections, flashing, fasteners and post bases rather than glancing at the surface.
Doors, siding and windows are the third, and on 1950s and 1960s housing they are usually a patchwork of original and replacement. We record what is original, what has been replaced, and where the flashing and seals around openings have been compromised — because that is where water gets into a wall.
We have not read the guides themselves and we are not summarizing them. We are pointing out that the City has published guidance on precisely the jobs a buyer here should be asking about.
The housing
With around 184 units from the 1950s and 148 from the 1960s, the typical Montrose house is sixty to seventy years old and has been through several complete replacement cycles in everything mechanical.
On stock of that era the electrical system deserves the closest look. Original service capacity is very often the practical limit on what a modern household wants to run, panels are frequently overfilled with circuits added by different hands over the decades, and we look for double-tapped breakers, mixed wiring types meeting in the same box, ungrounded receptacles and overfused circuits.
Plumbing has usually been renewed in part rather than in whole, so the material transitions where old meets new are where problems concentrate. Original galvanized supply, where it survives, corrodes internally and shows as reduced flow and discolored water long before anything leaks.
Roof coverings will be two or three generations deep. Heating equipment is 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 on their third or fourth.
The 99 units from the 2000s are a different conversation entirely — twenty to twenty-five years old and arriving at their first full round of replacements, with original roof coverings and failed double-glazing seals the common findings.
About a third of the stock is not a detached house, which in a small city usually means small multi-unit buildings and converted upper floors. Shared roofs, walls and services raise questions a single-family inspection does not, so tell us what the building actually is and we will scope it properly. Radon testing and mold inspection and testing can be added to any visit.
Drainage
On housing this age the drainage findings are consistent, and they are usually the cheapest useful thing an owner can put right.
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. Grading that was correct in 1958 has had almost seventy years of landscaping, added patios and settlement since.
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. Equipment raised up on blocks is nearly always a story about something that happened once, and it is always worth asking the seller about.
This connects directly to the basement finishing point above. A finished lower level in a sixty-year-old house is the single most common place for water history to be hidden, and it deserves a careful look rather than a quick one.
Fixing a downspout that discharges at the wall costs very little. Discovering after closing that it has been doing so for twenty years costs a great deal more.
The buried line
The line running out from the building belongs to the owner, and no visual inspection reaches inside it. On a house from the 1950s or 1960s that pipe is sixty to seventy years old, and it is often the oldest untouched component on the whole property.
We will not name a material from a build year. Nothing published establishes what lines here 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 inside: roots, cracks, displaced joints, bellies or blockages where they exist, and a clear run where they do not. In an established city with mature street trees, roots are the common finding, and they give no warning until the day the drains back up.
It is the one part of a purchase where an unknown can be turned into a known for a fixed and modest amount of effort on the day, and on housing this age that is a straightforward decision.
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 Montrose.
Local information from City of Montrose — Building Department, current permit notice and guides · City of Montrose — departments · City of Montrose — city website · City of Montrose — contact the city office. Municipal requirements change — verify current details with the municipality.
Radon in Genesee 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 · Genesee County radon and inspection coverage
Zone from the EPA Map of Radon Zones.
Why choose us
Five reasons people here pick us as their Montrose 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
Outstanding precision and attention to detail! Helps being able to make a truly informed decision about a home! Also, they are very veteran-friendly! No complaints here!
Desmond SheppardFlint, MINoah Scott was very thorough and explaining things to us, especially in regard to a possible mold problem.
Claudette GranvilleFlint, MII 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, MIWhat happens
Questions
In a notice dated 22 August 2026 the City stated it does not have a building inspector and that all permits must be processed with the State of Michigan until further notice. Check the current position with the City, because that wording means it will change.
It affects what happens after one. If your plans involve work needing a permit, find out now who processes it and how long it takes, rather than discovering it once you own the property.
Possibly. The City is explicit that permits and plans may be required whether you hire a building, electrical, plumbing or mechanical contractor or do the work yourself as the owner of a single-family home.
Monday to Thursday, eight in the morning until six in the evening. A four-day week with a late close, which is unusually workable if you have a day job.
A set of building guides covering residential additions, basement finishing, decks and porches, and residential doors, siding and windows, alongside a commercial plan submittal guide and the 2021 International Property Maintenance Code.
Because finishing a lower level covers the foundation walls, the sill, the framing and often the electrical — which is exactly the evidence an inspection wants to read. On a sixty-year-old house it is the commonest place for water history to be hidden.
Sixty to seventy years. About 184 units date from the 1950s and 148 from the 1960s, with around 103 predating 1940 and a later group of 99 built in the 2000s.
On a house from the 1950s or 1960s, yes. The drain line is sixty years old or more, no visual inspection reaches inside it, and mature street trees make roots the common finding. A camera inspection goes on the same visit.
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
February 24, 2026
Your local Montrose home inspector, seven days a week. Home inspection reports in 24 hours.
