The WDI Inspection With Old Damage and No Live Termites

Why this matters

The hardest wood destroying insect (WDI) report to write is not the one with a live swarm in the garage. It is the one with real damage, signs of an old treatment, and not a single live termite anywhere you can see. Every party to the sale wants you to say the damage is old and the problem is gone, and that is the one sentence the inspection cannot support. This case follows one crawlspace house from the probe to the issued report, including the questions the buyer's agent asked and the exact lines that went on the form.

The house and the visit

A ranch house built in the 1960s, brick veneer over a wood frame, sitting on a vented crawlspace with block foundation walls. Across the front is a concrete porch with three steps, poured against the house. The buyer's lender required a WDI report on the form the lender specifies, and the buyer's agent ordered it. The seller had owned the house for eleven years and the listing disclosure said nothing about termites.

The inspector, Dana, started outside as usual: a lap of the foundation looking for tubes, wood touching soil, and anything at grade that had been drilled or trenched. On the front porch slab and down the face of the steps she found a row of small round patches, each about half an inch across, set roughly a foot apart along the line where the porch met the house. Two more patches sat on the top step near the door. The patch material was weathered to almost the color of the slab.

That pattern is the signature of a past subterranean termite treatment: the slab is drilled so liquid termiticide can be injected into the soil beneath it, then the holes are patched. Its age is not readable from the patch. It tells you someone treated, roughly where, and nothing about whether it worked or when.

Under the house

In the crawlspace, Dana worked the foundation wall clockwise from the access door with a bright light and a screwdriver. The north wall, directly behind the front porch, is where she found it.

The sill plate. For about 6 feet behind the porch, the sill plate sounded hollow when tapped with the screwdriver handle, and the blade went into the side of the board with light pressure. Where she opened a small area, the wood was eaten along the grain in layered galleries, the soft spring wood gone and the harder late wood left standing in thin sheets, with the cavities lined in a soil-colored crust. That is subterranean termite damage, not rot and not carpenter ant work, which leaves clean, sanded-looking galleries with no soil in them. See related: How to Probe and Sound Wood for Hidden Termite Damage.

The rim joist. The rim joist above that stretch of sill sounded solid along most of it, with one soft section about 18 inches long at the east end of the damaged run.

The tubes. Three mud tubes ran up the inside face of the block wall to the sill in that same area. All three were dry and pale. She broke a section out of each: the inside was hollow, crumbled at a touch, and held no termites. Two other tube remnants were only a scar of dried soil on the block.

Everything else. The rest of the crawl had no tubes, no damage she could find by probing, no swarmer wings on the vapor barrier, and no live insects. One section along the west wall, behind a run of supply duct hung low between the joists, could not be reached or seen.

The reasoning that went into the report

Three findings, and each one had to be reported for what it was and no further.

Visible damage: yes. The sill and the rim joist section are damaged by subterranean termites. That is an observation, and it goes on the form.

Evidence of previous treatment: yes. The drill pattern on the porch and steps is visible evidence that someone treated. The form asks for what the inspector observed, so Dana reported the drill holes and where they were. She did not write "the house was treated in" any year, because nothing she saw told her the year.

Live infestation: not observed, which is different from absent. The tubes were dry and empty when broken, and nothing live turned up anywhere she could reach. That supports writing that no live insects were observed. It does not support "inactive", "old", or "no infestation", because:

• A broken tube tells you about that tube on that day. The test that means something is coming back later to see whether the break has been repaired, and a sale inspection does not stay on site for weeks.
• Termite activity follows soil moisture and season. A dry crawl on a dry visit can look quiet over a colony that is still feeding somewhere else.
• The filled porch slab sits against the sill exactly where the damage is. Termites can work up through the fill and into wood behind the porch without leaving a tube anyone can see from the crawl. See related: Foundation Types and Where Termites Get In.
• One section of the crawl was not inspected at all.

A WDI inspection is a visual inspection of accessible areas on the day. The report says what was seen. Age, completeness of the old treatment and what is hidden behind the porch are outside what it can say.

The findings lines as written

VISIBLE EVIDENCE OBSERVED
- Live insects: none observed.
- Dead insects, parts or wings: none observed.
- Visible damage: subterranean termite damage to
  sill plate, approx. 6 ft, crawlspace north wall
  behind front porch; rim joist above, approx.
  18 in at east end of that run.
- Other evidence: dry, empty mud tubes (3) on
  north foundation wall at same location.
- Previous treatment: patched drill holes in front
  porch slab and steps at house line. Date and
  scope of treatment unknown.
INACCESSIBLE OR OBSTRUCTED
- Crawlspace west wall behind low supply duct.
- Soil and framing under filled front porch slab.
COMMENTS
- Inspector cannot determine whether damage is
  from a past or present infestation.
- Recommend evaluation of damaged members by a
  qualified contractor to determine extent and
  repair. Request seller's treatment records.

The structure of the form, which box each of these lines lands in, and how the lender reads them belong to a sibling card: see related: The WDI Report Form, Section by Section. What this case adds is the wording inside the boxes. Note what the lines do not contain: no age, no "inactive", no "previously treated, no further action needed", and no estimate of what the repair involves.

What the buyer's agent asked

The agent called the office the afternoon the report went out, and the questions were the ones every agent asks on this kind of report.

"Can you note that it's old damage?" No. Dana could write that she could not determine whether the damage came from a past or present infestation, and she already had. Weathered patches and dry tubes are consistent with an old problem and they are also consistent with an old problem plus a current one behind the porch. A report that calls damage old is the report that gets pulled out when the new owner finds swarmers the following spring.

"Does the seller have to treat?" That is a contract question between buyer and seller, and the lender's conditions, not the inspector's. Where the form asks for a treatment recommendation, the answer depends on what was observed, whether documentation of a prior treatment exists, and your state's rules and company policy on when a recommendation is required; check your state lead agency. Dana's office told the agent the fastest way to settle it: get the seller's records from whoever did the porch treatment. If a company treated and the house is under a renewable service agreement, that company may owe an inspection of its own and the agreement may transfer to the buyer.

"How bad is the sill? Does it need to be replaced?" The inspector reports where the damage is and how much of it she could see. Whether a 6-foot section of sill and an 18-inch section of rim joist can be reinforced, sistered or need replacing is a structural repair call, and a WDI inspection is not a structural inspection. Hence the line recommending evaluation by a qualified contractor. Dana also told the agent plainly that probing finds what is reachable, and damage can run further inside a board, or into framing behind the porch, than any probe from the crawl can show.

The office logged the call in the job notes with the time and what was said. The report did not change.

What would have moved the report

Each of these changes one input, and each would have changed the lines.

• One live worker in a broken tube. Live insects observed goes from "none" to a description and location, the comment about past or present comes out because the question is answered, and the report reflects an active infestation with whatever treatment recommendation your state and company require.
• No drill holes and no records. Previous treatment drops to "none observed", and the report shows visible damage with no visible sign that anyone ever treated. On many forms and under some state rules that combination is what triggers a treatment recommendation.
• Seller produces a treatment record with a current service agreement. The inspector still reports what she saw. The record goes in the file and the comments can reference it, but a record is not an observation and does not turn "cannot determine" into "inactive".
• The duct section is reachable. One fewer inaccessible line, and if that wall is clean the report is no stronger on the porch question, because the porch fill is still the blind spot.
• Fine, pellet-shaped droppings instead of soil-packed galleries. That points at drywood termites, a different insect with a different treatment and different form entries.

Where this report usually goes wrong

Writing the conclusion everyone wants. "Old damage, previously treated, no activity" reads as three observations and is really one inference. If termites show up after closing, that sentence is what the claim is built on.

Leaving out the drill holes. An inspector who sees no live termites and does not want to complicate the sale sometimes skips the previous treatment line. Evidence of previous treatment is an observation the form asks for, and the next inspector will see the same holes.

Sizing the repair. "Sill needs replacement" in a WDI comment commits the company to a structural opinion it is not licensed or paid to give. Report extent observed; refer the repair.

Thin inaccessible areas. "None" in the inaccessible box on a house with a filled porch slab is almost never true. Listing the porch fill tells the reader exactly where the inspection could not reach.

A record that cannot be rebuilt. The graph, photos of the sill, the tubes before and after breaking, the drill pattern and the duct obstruction all go in the job. See related: How to Draw the WDI Inspection Graph. If the report is questioned a year later, the photos and graph are what show the tubes were empty and the duct really was in the way.

References

• See related: The WDI Report Form, Section by Section
• See related: Wood Destroying Insect Report Inspection
• See related: How to Probe and Sound Wood for Hidden Termite Damage
• See related: Foundation Types and Where Termites Get In
• Your state lead agency's rules for wood destroying insect inspections and reports, and the lender's form instructions