The Chairman and Board of the National Association of Registered Home Inspectors (NARHI) has confirmed that from October 31 2008 it ceased operations.
This, claims the organisation, is due in the main to the failure of Government policy to make Home Condition Reports (HCR) a compulsory element of the Home Information Pack.
NARHI was originally formed by individuals drawn from the residential surveying and property world who back in 2005 saw the potential for a new dedicated trade body to represent the interest of Home Inspectors who were to be responsible for producing the HCR.
The Board elected Hugh Dunsmore-Hardy formerly CEO of the NAEA and an industry consultant as the Chairman following which NARHI was launched in January 2006.
NARHI’s original objectives were to support the role of the Home Inspector in the delivery of HCRs. The body says supporters of HIPs perceived this as the most useful component of the new packs.
Recent qualitative research published at the beginning of November by the Communities and Local Government Department contained the statement: ‘Most buyers and sellers said that the inclusion of the HCR would vastly improve perceptions of the HIP overall.’
However the historical events of 2006 and the ‘about turn’ on the part of the Government in reducing the HCR to a voluntary document within the HIP has seen the demise in both the awareness and the inclusion of the HCR.
Those who had undertaken the training to become registered home inspectors have either moved on or pursued careers as energy assessors.
Former members of the NARHI Board remain convinced that at some point in the future a single condition report will become mandatory but time has run its course as far as NARHI is concerned.
At their Board meeting in October it was resolved that current paid up members of NARHI would receive a part refund of subscriptions to be advised to the membership over the coming weeks.
