Home scans for moisture, mold

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Posted on Sun, Dec. 03, 2006

'Home scans' give residences a high-tech structural

checkup

Find problems before catastrophe strikes

By Alan J. Heavens

PHILADELPHIA - The men stood on the lawn in front of

Dick and -Helen Boothby's house in the Chestnut

Hill neighborhood of Philadelphia, aimed their

infrared cameras at the fieldstone facade, and fired.

" No major problems with heat loss that I can see, "

insurance appraiser Rick Albers told his colleague

J. Carroll.

Carroll agreed readily with that observation as they

looked at the thermographic images of the exterior

wall their cameras produced.

The men, who work for Chubb Insurance Group, were

using state-of-the-art technology to perform what

company vice president Mark L. Schussel calls a " home

scan service. " The company is starting with " customers

like the Boothbys who have more significant homes,

and, therefore, greater exposure to costly damage. "

Chubb has been using the technology for commercial

clients, but added high-end homes to the program in

early October.

Also in early October, AIG's Private Client Group

announced its complimentary " Residential Engineering

Services " program, designed for owners of " large,

complex homes, with a replacement value of $10 million

plus, " and intended to detect causes of property

damage before they can escalate into a catastrophic

loss.

In addition to using thermography, an engineer

examines major mechanical systems, including

electrical, air conditioning, backup electrical

generators, heating, fire protection, home

electronics, and alarm systems.

" When you're dealing with residences valued in the

tens of millions, this expertise is indispensable, "

said Poux, AIG's vice president of loss

prevention.

An insurance appraiser typically looks for the " kinds

of materials used in the construction of a house, as

well as the quality of that construction, " said

Chubb's Schussel. Chubb will likely be returning to

properties with the " home scan, " and will use it as

part of the appraisal process for new customers too.

Led by Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma, the

disasters of 2005 resulted in $56 billion in claims

paid by insurance companies, twice the previous

record, according to industry experts. Payouts would

have been larger, but flooding was the primary cause

of damage, and that is covered by the National Flood

Insurance Program.

Chubb's home-scan program focuses less on these kinds

of catastrophes than on the everyday sources of

insurance claims -- electrical fires, or moisture

intrusion that could lead to mold issues, for example.

At the Boothbys' house, there were no electrical " hot

spots " behind the walls, Albers said. The only

evidence of moisture he could find was between the

chair rail and the baseboard in the living room, below

one of the windows.

" It's a blocked downspout, " Albers said. " It is really

minor, so small, in fact, that there was no evidence

of it in the basement, which would be an obvious place

for the water to go.

" We went below all the bathrooms and looked for

evidence of leaks, " he said. " If there was moisture,

we'd see an anomaly on the screen. We didn't. "

What he and Carroll did find in their thermographic

scans were spots that were not properly insulated.

Thermography is used with blower doors as part of

energy audits; the technology has long been a part of

Chubb's commercial appraisals, but was deemed too

expensive for residential ones, Schussel said.

Advances in technology have lowered that expense, he

said, and " finding major problems and dealing with

them in advance would warrant such use. "

On an unusually chilly Friday in late October, the

Boothbys had to raise the heat inside their house to

75 degrees to help Albers and Carroll find places in

the walls where the insulation was inadequate.

" It's about 45 outdoors, " Albers said. " The difference

between the two is great enough to give us accurate

readings. This is a test that would never work in the

spring or early fall, because with windows open, for

example, you couldn't get that kind of indoor-outdoor

contrast. So winter or late fall and in the heat of

summer, when you can cool down the interior, are the

best times. "

The " heat loss " spots appeared as surrealistic-looking

black bits on the screen of Albers' infrared camera.

" It gives us a temperature-change reading on the

surface we just pointed to with the camera's laser, "

he said. " You can even see the heat leaving the vents

and rising, and the warmth generated by the lights. "

One cold spot was in the family room, beside an arch,

" where a worker might have just forgotten to add

(insulation) when a renovation added this room 20 or

so years ago, " Albers said.

Otherwise, for an older house, " this one is

well-insulated, " he said. " Unlike other stone houses

of this period, which have plaster right on the stone,

this one has plasterboard on studs, which accommodates

insulation. "

Except for that one moist spot in the living room,

Albers pronounced the Boothbys' house " really tight. "

" The fact that we found just a couple of tiny things

in this whole house testifies to the need for regular

maintenance, and how well the Boothbys have done it, "

Albers said.

The camera can be held 100 feet from a surface and

still produce an accurate reading. And it's so

sensitive to heat that it could register Carroll's

handprint on a wall (it remained for a couple of

minutes) and footprints across the floor.

" As long as heat radiates from it, you can see it, "

Albers said.

Proper construction and maintenance make all the

difference, Carroll said.

" Last week, we were at a condo unit that was evidently

cheaply constructed, " he said. " We took the camera

outside, and when we focused on adjacent houses with

new windows, we could see that the windows on the unit

we were appraising were not as good, because a lot of

heat was being lost. "

But simply installing new windows won't necessarily

make your house energy-efficient, the men said.

" You need to take a whole-house approach, " Albers

said. " The benefit of new construction over old is

that builders today look at the entire house as a

system, and that includes insulation in the walls as

well as double-pane, energy-efficient windows. "

Yet mold issues arise in a lot of newer construction

because the builders made the houses " too tight, not

allowing for proper ventilation, " Albers said. " Houses

have to breathe. "

Chubb and many other insurance companies return to

houses periodically for reappraisals, especially after

extensive renovations.

Insurers handle reviews of insurance coverage in

different ways. Some leave it up to the homeowners to

notify them of changes, or send standard forms to be

filled out and returned for review.

A growing number are now doing on-site appraisals,

using these " loss evaluations " to determine actual

replacement value, as well as making recommendations

to the homeowners about security or fire protection.

" We always recommend a reappraisal, " Schussel said.

© 2006 Belleville News-Democrat and wire service

sources. .

http://www.belleville.com

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