A local home inspector answers questions about home insulation in Tomball and Magnolia. Mark Roach Home inspector, HTown Home Inspections Mark Roach
Home inspector, HTown Home Inspections[/caption] Why is insulation important to a home? The biggest [reason] is going to be for energy efficiency of the house and the comfort of the home. If you have an area of the house that is warmer than the other sides, it’s going to indicate that there is missing insulation. When may more insulation need to be installed? If you’re seeing excessive heat coming into the house during the summertime or cool during the wintertime, [more insulation is needed]. How does home insulation differ in a humid climate like the Greater Houston area? [In the Houston area], we want to put down a [vapor] barrier that’s going to stop the air from flowing through the insulation. If the air flows through, that’s what’s carrying all of our moisture. It flows into the insulation, and [that is when you get] moisture buildup, condensation [and] things of that nature. How does insulation type differ by the age of a home? As the building codes have evolved, [they have] required more and more insulation over the years. In the older homes, there’s a variety of different ways that [people] insulated a house—some of them even included [shredded] paper, which is not allowed anymore because it’s highly flammable. The most typical [insulation] you’re going to see [in newer homes] is going to be blown-in cellulose insulation, and in some rare cases, you’ll see the spray insulation—the foam that is sprayed into the walls and ceilings. During what stage of a home inspection is insulation evaluated? We do the inspection [during the] pre-Sheetrock stage in new construction [homes] before they put the Sheetrock up [so] we can verify that everything is exactly where it needs to be. [Home inspectors assess insulation] also in the final stage to make sure that all the blown-in insulation is blown in correctly on the areas that the Sheetrock was installed. Plus, we can use our thermal camera to verify at the final stage [of the inspection] if the insulation is still inside the walls after the Sheetrock was installed.