Written from the job, not from a desk.

A Firefighter’s perspective to Inspecting a Safe, Habitable Home.

Preface

This book isn’t about fear. It’s about awareness. A question I asked at Public Fire Education Events was, how much is your family life worth? Your answer should be priceless. So why would you put a $10,000 deck on a $700,000 home, or a $10,000 roof over a $75,000 kitchen remodel? Stop and think first. If it sounds too good to be true, it is. These companies that say they can change a bathroom or kitchen in 1 to 3 days are cutting corners and putting your family at risk. We will dive deeper into these vital points of a home inspection in this book.

Annual toll and how often a home fire kills someone

The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) estimates an annual average of about 2,600 civilian deaths from home structure fires for the five-year period 2019–2023.

The U.S. Fire Administration publishes annual counts that can differ by reporting method and year; a preliminary figure shown for 2025 lists 362 home fire fatalities (single-year count), illustrating how year-to-year totals and counting methods vary.

Translating that into time between deaths

Using the NFPA five-year average (2,600 deaths per year) gives a clear, communicable rate:

So, on average over 2019–2023 a civilian died in a U.S. home structure fire roughly every 3 hours and 22 minutes.

Important context and caveats

• Different sources, different scopes. NFPA’s 2,600 figure is an estimated annual average across multiple years and includes civilian deaths from all home structure fires.

A sample — not the whole book.

This book exists for the following reasons:

• Family Safety
• Structure of the home is not compromised
• Structural stability of the wooden deck

Introduction — Where Decks Go Wrong

Badly built decks fail quietly. They rot behind the ledger, pull away from the house, collapse under a birthday party, or burn fast because no one ever checked the underside. As a fire service veteran and home inspector, I have seen the same pattern: shortcuts, missing hardware, and water intrusion that starts the clock ticking. I have investigated wood deck failures for the fire department.

The key compartments of wood decks that fail are:

• Wood rot from water intrusion through improper flashing.
• Nails that back out and allow microscopic openings for water to enter and start wood rot and decay.
• Nails used to attach the ledger board to the home.
• No blueprint plans approved by the building department.
• No permits.
• No structural engineer approval.
• Improper footings.
• Concrete mix (bag mix) that does not have the proper mix as needed for the square feet the deck will be.
• Concrete mix not matched for the PSI needed for the area where the deck was built; for the soil structure.
• No soil engineer report.

And this list will go on and on. We will cover much of the deck failure in each chapter.

Badly built decks fail without warning.

They deteriorate quietly from the inside to the outside, by the time you see it on the exterior it is too late. The home has received major destruction, rot, mold, mildew, and wet insulation.

A sample — not the whole book.

The Spirit of Appalachia and Washington’s Stand

The Whiskey Rebellion did not begin with muskets, liberty poles, or the burning of a tax collector’s home. It began in the mountains.

Long before the federal government sent troops west, the Appalachian frontier had already formed its own identity — isolated, self-reliant, and hardened by the daily grind of survival. These were families who carved farms out of rock and timber, who lived miles from their nearest neighbor, and who trusted their own hands far more than any distant politician. In this world, whiskey wasn’t a luxury. It was currency, livelihood, and the only reliable way to turn fragile grain into something that could survive a journey over the mountains.

So when the federal government imposed a tax on distilled spirits in 1791, the people of Appalachia didn’t see a revenue measure. They saw a threat.

Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton had pushed Congress to enact the excise tax as part of his plan to pay off the enormous debt left from the Revolutionary War. To eastern lawmakers, it was a practical solution. To the frontier, it was a direct attack on the only economic system that worked west of the mountains.

The Appalachian Spirit Meets Federal Power

The Whiskey Rebellion was more than a tax dispute. It was the collision of two visions of America:

• A frontier society built on autonomy, barter, and survival, where whiskey was the backbone of the economy.
• A new federal government asserting its authority.

A sample — not the whole book.