Home Inspections and What We Discover

An electrical panel with its interior cover removed, showing the breakers and wiring behind it

There is a step in every inspection that explains most of what an inspection is for: the interior cover comes off the electrical panel.

Why the cover comes off

With the deadfront in place you can see the breaker handles and nothing else. Everything that matters for safety - how conductors are landed, whether a breaker is properly seated on the bus, whether anything is making contact that should not be - sits behind that cover.

An inspector who does not remove it has looked at a panel door. That is the difference between checking the electrical system and confirming it exists.

Close-up of circuit breakers seated on the bus bar inside an open panel — Behind the cover: how each breaker sits on the bus is only visible from here.

On one house, taking the cover off turned up a breaker that had come off its track and was grounding out against the inside of the box - not visible in any way from the front, and not something that announces itself until it does.

What the rest of the inspection looks like

The panel is one instance of the general rule. A home inspection is a visual examination of what can be seen and safely reached, and the value is in going to the places where problems actually live rather than the places that are easy to look at. The full scope runs grounds, exterior, utilities, interior, kitchen and bathrooms.

Findings are written up with what was observed and what should happen next, including where something needs a specialist to take it further.

The exterior of a stucco home showing the chimney, roofline and foundation edge — The same rule outside: chimney cap, flashing, and where the wall meets the ground.

Ingraffia Home Inspections has been inspecting across Orange County since 2003. Call (714) 371-8422 or request an inspection.