The One-Inspection Scam: How Texas Builders Keep You from Seeing What’s Really Behind the Walls

You get one inspection. One shot. One chance to find every hidden defect in your new home before closing.
That’s what many DFW builders now tell buyers. “Sure, you can have an inspection — but just one, right before you close.”
Sounds like a fair deal until you realize that’s the equivalent of being told you can’t open the hood on your brand-new car until after you’ve signed the paperwork and driven it off the lot.

This practice isn’t about efficiency, liability, or “safety.” It’s about control — and keeping you from discovering what they covered up before you take possession.

The Dirty Little Secret
When a builder limits you to one inspection, it’s not because they’re organized. It’s because they know what you’d find if you had access sooner.
By the time that final walk-through rolls around, drywall is up, trim is installed, and the paint is dry. What’s hiding behind it all?
• Foundation cables that were never tensioned.
• Flashing that never made it behind the siding.
• Crushed ductwork.
• Electrical boxes buried in insulation.
• Drain lines running uphill.
But hey — those countertops look great, right?

Why Builders Love the “One-Inspection-Only” Rule
Because once the house is finished, you can’t prove what’s wrong.
Limiting inspections keeps the builder’s shortcuts invisible. It prevents a qualified, independent inspector from catching framing errors, waterproofing failures, or missing structural hardware when those things are still accessible — and cheap to correct.
Then, when you finally find problems after you move in, the builder smiles and points you to the “warranty department.” Translation: good luck.

“It’s Our Policy.”
Builders love to dress this up with phrases like “insurance restrictions,” “liability reasons,” or “company policy.”
Let’s call that what it is: b-u-l-l-s-h-i-t.
Those same builders have no problem letting cable installers, pest-control techs, or painters wander through the jobsite. But a state-licensed inspector with a camera and a codebook? Absolutely not.
Because that inspector might document something that can’t be explained away later.

You’re the Customer — Act Like It
You’re about to spend more money than most people make in a decade. You have every right to inspect that house as many times as necessary to know what you’re buying.
If a builder refuses, that tells you everything you need to know about the quality of their product and their confidence in it.
Before you sign:
• Get inspection access written into the contract. Pre-pour, framing, and final should be the bare minimum.
• Hire your own inspector, not the builder’s “recommended” one.
• Walk away from any builder who tells you when and how you can protect your own investment.

Bottom Line
A builder who limits inspections isn’t protecting you — they’re protecting themselves.
If their work meets code, passes muster, and stands up to industry standards, they shouldn’t care who looks at it or when.
So when a builder says you can only have one inspection, tell them:
“Then you only get one chance to sell me a house — because I’m walking.”
Good builders welcome oversight. Bad ones hide behind drywall and contract clauses. Know which kind you’re dealing with before you hand over the check.

Ready to See What’s Really Behind the Walls?
Schedule your phased new-construction inspection today with Texas Inspector — the most trusted name in independent residential inspections across Dallas–Fort Worth.