Documentation that the retrofit was done correctly is absolutely essential. You will need this information when you sell your home. Unfortunately, as discussed in the video above, building permits do not provide this assurance because there is no building code for the building departments to follow. Because there is no code to follow, building departments will let a contractor do anything he wants, regardless of whether or not it resists earthquakes. Nor is there any special licensing for retrofit contractors. It is therefore possible for a contractor who has absolutely no idea what he is doing, get a permit which has no definition of what a retrofit looks like. charge you several thousands dollars for a retrofit that will not do anything at all. Given there is no code to follow, building inspectors must do 15-20 inspections a day excluding travel time, and crawling under houses is a dirty job that takes special clothing and safety equipment, building inspectors rarely bother to look at the work.
When You Sell Your House
When someone buys a house they will want to know if the retrofit was done properly. Many buyers hire a pre-purchase private home inspector to see if the retrofit was done properly. The inspector knows a permit means nothing for the reasons mentioned. The inspector, and the buyers, only want to know if it was done correctly. One service we offer in lieu of a permit is a letter that documents what we did, photographs of the work, and the engineering basis of our retrofit. The drawing that is part of your proposal describes the retrofit components we used and their location. This drawing, photographs of the work we performed, the engineering basis of your retrofit, and a letter from one of the leading experts in the field, will for many people hold much more weight with home buyers than a permit. Not only does this provide better documentation, it will also save on permit costs which are usually between $1000 and $2000. This money might be better spent on the retrofit itself.
