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Unpopular opinion: I thought drone scans were overkill for small remodels, then a $75,000 mistake changed my mind
I do books for a guy who flips houses around Columbus, and for a while I rolled my eyes at the drone talk. He kept pushing it on a 1950s ranch last fall, and the scan caught a 14 inch sag in the roof line that no one saw from the ground. That one catch saved him around $75,000 in change orders after the buyers had their own inspection. Now I tell every client to scan first, even on a tiny job. Anyone here skip the scan on a small project and get burned later?
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the_jason10d ago
That sag number is what gets me. 14 inches over what span? Was it a full run across the ridge or just one section between the rafters? The reason I ask is because on a 1950s ranch the roof framing is usually pretty simple, so if something moved that much there had to be a cause, like a wall settling or somebody cutting a joist for a furnace duct years ago. Did the scan show the why behind it or just the shape of the dip? And once he saw that, what did it actually cost to fix before listing versus the change orders he dodged?
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