Writing Your First Home Inspection Report

INSPECTEXPRESS™ is installed with all settings pre-configured to create a report right out of the box. There are also additional templates installed with the program or you can customize your own. For the first time user we suggest adding your own inspector information then following the easy steps below to create your own sample report.

Starting a New Inspection:

  1. Select Start Inspection Wizard from the main menu/toolbar to start the report wizard.

  2. Enter the inspection address.

  3. The checked sections are the ones that will appear in the new report. Check or uncheck any section you wish to include/exclude on this report. If you want to include a summary, make sure it is selected.

  4. If you want to add a image to the report cover you can do that now also.

  5. Click the 'Write' button. You will see INSPECTEXPRESS™ write the template for this inspection on the open Word document behind the form.

  6. Save the report when prompted. The program will then auto-save the document as you complete each report section.

  7. Click 'Next' to proceed to the General Information form.

Filling in the General Information:

  1. Complete the details about the inspection (city, state, date etc).

  2. Type in the contact information you wish to have included on the inspection report. If you have Microsoft Office Outlook installed you can also save or retrieve your contact information for the buyer, seller, realtors etc.

  3. Click the 'Write' button to add all the completed or selected information to the report.

  4. Click 'Next' to proceed to the first system to be inspected.

Completing a System:

  1. Describe the system by selecting from the list boxes and drop-down boxes. Only the selections you make will be included in the report.

  2. Make any observations needed by selecting the appropriate 'check box'. The comment that will be added to the report appears in the white box at the bottom of the form. If you would like to add an image to the comment you can do that now also using the two image buttons beside the box. If you want to edit the text you can type the changes into the box and click the 'Save' button to the right of the box.

  3. Once you have completed all the comments for the section, click the 'Write' button to add the selected information to the report.

  4. Click 'Next' to proceed to the next system to be inspected.

  5. If you want to skip forward to another section before writing the current one, you can click the 'Skip' button, but you must come back to the form later to Write' the information to the report.

  6. Continue through the wizard to complete all components included in this inspection.

Finishing the Report:

  1. Review the report and add any images or observations you may have forgotten.

  2. Add photos to the report by clicking in the paragraph on the report document where you want a photo to appear.

  3. Select 'Insert Wrapped' or 'Insert Inline' from the 'Insert Images' group menu.

  4. Browse to an image on your computer or camera and click 'Insert' .

  5. Annotate the image by selecting the image first and then choosing an arrow or circle etc from the 'Annotate Highlight Image' menu selection on the 'Annotate Image' group menu.

  6. Review the report. If you want to make any changes you can edit the report just as you would any other Word document.

  7. If you have manually edited the report you may want to ensure the page numbers and Table of Contents are updated by selecting 'Update TOC' from the 'Edit Report' group menu.

You should now have a complete and properly formatted inspection report. Now that you understand the steps to creating a report using INSPECTEXPRESS™ you can begin to explore the many ways to customize both the program and the report to match your own unique reporting style.

Related Topics:

Setting Company Information
Using Report Templates
Main Program Settings
Font and Styles Settings
Using the Summary Report
Inserting Observations