How to Write an Effective Building Inspection Report + Free Template Samples

A building inspection report helps check structural integrity, ensure compliance, support maintenance, and guide informed decisions. However, a single inspection involves multiple stakeholders, depending on the purpose of the inspection and the building type. Therefore, it is important to have a robust workflow to automate reporting and keep everyone updated.

In this article, we’ll explore the importance of building inspection reports, the challenges to manual reporting, and how a digital inspection software streamlines reporting and facilitates faster decision-making.

What are Building Inspection Reports?

Building inspection reports are comprehensive documents that detail the condition of a property’s structural elements, systems, and components. These are based on evaluations conducted by qualified professionals who assess everything from the foundation to the roof, including electrical systems, plumbing, HVAC, and other critical building elements.

These reports are essential tools for various stakeholders in real estate:

• Property buyers rely on these reports to make informed purchasing decisions.
• Property sellers use them to address issues before listing or to substantiate asking prices.
• Building owners utilize them for maintenance planning and budgeting.
• Property managers depend on them for ongoing facility management.
• Insurance companies reference them for risk assessment and policy underwriting.
• Lenders often require them before approving financing.
• Regulatory authorities may mandate them for compliance verification.

Importance of Building Assessment Reports

Building inspection reports are a critical tool, providing far more than simple documentation of a property’s condition. These comprehensive evaluation documents allow you to identify potential problems before they become hazardous.

They act as proof of compliance, confirming whether a building meets applicable building codes, accessibility requirements, and other regulatory standards. Furthermore, these building reports help uncover hidden defects or necessary repairs before they escalate into costlier problems.

Beyond immediate concerns, they help with preventive maintenance by setting a baseline for property conditions, allowing managers to catch and fix issues early. Over time, these reports create a historical record required for insurance claims, legal matters, and future property transactions.

Most importantly, comprehensive building assessments function as risk management tools, helping property owners and managers identify and mitigate potential liabilities before they result in accidents, injuries, or property damage.

Types of Building Inspection Reports

Different property types and inspection purposes necessitate specialized reports:

• Commercial Building Inspection Report: These comprehensive assessments evaluate commercial properties such as office buildings, retail spaces, warehouses, and industrial facilities. They inspect commercial spaces for structural integrity, safety systems, and compliance with building codes.
• Pre-purchase Inspection Report: Conducted before property acquisition, these reports help potential buyers understand the condition of their investment. They highlight existing problems, potential future issues, and estimated repair costs. They are particularly valuable for negotiating purchase terms or planning for future renovations and maintenance.
• Residential Building Inspection Report: These building reports assess living spaces for safety, functionality, and potential defects and typically cover foundations, framing, roofing, electrical systems, plumbing, HVAC, insulation, windows, doors, and interior finishes.
• Structural Inspection Report: These reports include evaluations of foundations, load-bearing walls, beams, columns, roof structures, and other critical structural components. Structural inspections are often commissioned after natural disasters, when visible structural problems appear, or for older buildings requiring condition assessment.
• Building Safety Inspection Report: These reports evaluate fire protection systems, emergency exits, structural safety, electrical hazards, and other safety-critical elements.

How to Write a Building Inspection Report

Start by introducing the property—its location, age, and purpose. Then, during your on-site visit, examine all critical components: structure, electrical systems, plumbing, roofing, and safety features. Document your observations meticulously, noting both strengths and areas needing attention, and support these with clear photographs.

Conclude with actionable recommendations, prioritizing them based on urgency and potential impact. The goal is to communicate your findings clearly and concisely, ensuring everyone can easily understand the property’s condition.

Building Inspection Report Templates

Building inspection report templates incorporate logically organized sections that guide readers systematically through each component. The most effective templates include inspection scores that allow stakeholders to compare across different properties or over time.

Well-crafted building inspection report templates have customizable fields to accommodate unique property features while maintaining overall assessment standards. Moreover, they establish clear documentation guidelines for both observations and recommendations, helping inspectors articulate findings clearly.

Building inspection report templates also offer space to attach photos, allowing you to showcase visual evidence and help the client better understand the property’s condition. Moreover, professional formatting makes the reports more readable and accessible for stakeholders, some of whom may lack technical expertise.

Consistent implementation of templates can transform what could be a subjective, variable process into a methodical, standardized assessment that generates actionable insights for property owners, buyers, and managers.

Building Inspection Sample Report Template PDF

Here’s an example of a commercial building inspection report sample for an office generated with GoAudits.

Why Checklist-Based Building Inspection Report Templates Are Effective

Using checklists to perform building inspections and write reports ensures thoroughness, consistency, and efficiency. They are a reliable memory aid, helping inspectors systematically assess all aspects of the building. They prevent oversight by prompting the evaluation of both targeted concerns and general conditions.

Building inspection checklists standardize reporting across multiple visits and inspectors, making it easier to track trends, identify recurring issues, and compare data over time.

They also improve efficiency by streamlining the inspection process, allowing inspectors to focus on assessments rather than remembering what to check. Checklists can be modified to include building codes, which ensures the final building reports contain relevant information related to compliance and reduces the risk of penalties.

To improve accuracy and reduce paperwork, use a digital property inspection app like GoAudits that allows users to access checklists, complete inspections, generate instant reports, and share them with the stakeholders.

These inspection software also offer a library of free customizable digital building inspection checklists. Here are a few examples of GoAudits building inspection checklists:

• Commercial Building Inspection Checklist 
• Residential Building Inspection Checklist 
• Building Exterior Maintenance Checklist
• Building & Facility Maintenance Checklists
• Structural Audit Checklist

Eliminate Manual Work in Building Inspection Report Writing

Let’s explore some common obstacles faced while drafting an inspection report manually before diving into software solutions.

• Time-Consuming Reports: Writing building inspection reports manually requires inspectors to return to their desks and spend hours transcribing notes, organizing photographs, and compiling findings. This process is not only tedious and time-consuming but also leads to inconsistencies.
• Managing Large Data Volumes: A comprehensive building inspection generates extensive data, requiring a high level of organization. Handling hundreds of observations, measurements, and photos using Excel sheets can pose logistical challenges.
• Difficulty Retrieving Past Data: Locating specific information from previous inspections can be a challenge for managers and owners. Manual reports require inspection services to search through paper files or multiple digital folders, turning simple information requests into frustrating tasks.
• Limited Preventive Insights: Manual reports hinder trend analysis, making it difficult to plan preventive maintenance and long-term building strategies.

A property inspection and reporting software like GoAudits allows you to perform inspections using property checklists, take photos of the defects, add notes, and assign urgent corrective measures.

Once the inspections are complete, you can generate instant, professional, well-formatted reports and share them with all the stakeholders in just a few clicks, saving you hours that you would otherwise spend on organizing the inspection data and writing/typing reports.

These reports not only reflect the findings but also include inspection ratings and historical data. This allows managers and owners to identify trends and get the gist of the property’s condition over time. Users can use the analytics dashboard to access the detailed historical data and identify recurring issues.

These reporting software leverage cloud technology to store all the data, making it easy for stakeholders to retrieve past data whenever required. Moreover, with inspection software like GoAudits, you can schedule inspections, assign corrective actions and track their completion, set inspection workflows, and more.

GoAudits provides us with trend reports that assist us in our annual budgeting processes. In addition to the trends throughout our entire portfolio, we now know the top 5 issues for each property and can reserve funds to correct them.

Kristin Ingram, Regional Director of Resort Operations, LaTour Hotels & Resorts