Sewer Scopin'

I am always looking for ways to further advance my goal of providing the best value in town and accordingly recently added another service to our repertoire. After months of training and testing I launched our sewer scope services in October of this year.

What motivated me to finally launch this service? I was driving down a street just off the Halifax Peninsula and saw a home’s front yard being torn up, after noticing how the street nearby had more patches than actual pavement from recent sewer work. I have also seen the results of sewage backup in a commercial building and thank my lucky stars I have never experienced it at home. I also remember that, as a high school student in the 90s, I lived in a neighbourhood that had constant issues with what I now know were Orangeburg sewer pipes, it was a running joke about trying to predict how long until the next lawn was going to get dug up as it seemed literally every week (often during the winter) the excavators would be out in full force. Of course, sewer backups don’t wait until a convenient time to appear, and you won’t have time to carefully vet contractors or price shop for the best deals.

There is a common misconception that a sewer failure will be paid for by insurance or by the local utility (in our case Halifax Water). Unfortunately, standard home insurance usually does NOT cover sewage system failures. Of course, contact a licensed broker since we are home inspectors not insurance representatives for information specific to your home.

It has also been claimed that only older homes need a sewer inspection. While it is certainly less likely to see problems in more recent homes, I have known from other home inspectors that even brand-new homes can have sewer problems such as poor installation (in one case the sewer line just randomly ended before reaching the street!) and tree root infiltration. While I always suggest a sewer scope just for peace of mind alone, if you have any of the following:

• Any property over 50 years old
• Homes with large tree(s) on the front lawn
• A system with suspected Orangeburg or Cast-Iron waste pipes
• Unusual healthy patches on grass

it is HIGHLY recommended by professional home inspectors that a sewer scope be performed both at the time of inspection AND at regular intervals. While sewer failures seem sudden, they almost always develop slowly over a long period of time and can usually be detected with a quick sewer scan. Here are a few samples of what a sewer line looks like: don't worry about being grossed out: the lump is just a hairball, and the yellow streak is simply ABS cement that holds two pieces of waste pipe together: the installer likely used a little too much and it dripped down, but this is not a defect or an issue whatsoever.

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