What should a property inspection report include?

Cover with address and date, property summary, a short overview, a room-by-room section with dimensions and photographs, external condition, services, any guidance against published minimums with sources, a due diligence checklist, and a disclaimer stating that it is not a survey or valuation.

Is a property inspection report the same as a survey?

No. An inspection report records what was observed on a visit. A survey is carried out by a qualified surveyor, usually RICS Level 2 or 3, and carries professional liability. An inspection report should say plainly that it is not a survey.

How should photographs be organised in an inspection report?

Attached to the room they were taken in, not collected at the back. A block of unlabelled photographs becomes unusable within days because nobody can tell which room is which.

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What goes in a property inspection report

Nine sections, and the reasoning behind each. Written for reports that get read by a lender, a partner, or you in four months.

Digital Property Inspector · Updated August 2026

A property inspection report has one job: let somebody who was not there make a decision. A lender, a partner, a client, or you in four months when three properties have blurred into one.

That job sets the structure. Everything below earns its place because leaving it out costs somebody a question, and every question is a phone call.

The structure

Section	What goes in it	Why
1. Cover	Address, postcode, date and time of the inspection, who carried it out, who it is for	Without a date and a name it is not evidence of anything
2. Property summary	Type, tenure, basis (purchase or letting), asking price or rent, intended use, council tax band, EPC	The facts a decision is priced against
3. Overview	Two or three sentences: what it is, what state it is in, what stands out	Most readers read this and the room table, nothing else
4. Room by room	Dimensions, floor area, ceiling height where it matters, condition, fire provision, photographs	The body of the work, and the part that gets referred back to
5. External	Roof, gutters, pointing, windows, boundaries, parking, outbuildings	Where the expensive faults live
6. Services	Boiler make and age, consumer unit type, detection, certificate dates	Straight answers to the questions a lender asks
7. Guidance	Measurements checked against published minimums, with the source and its date	Advisory. Never a compliance claim
8. Due diligence	Title, EPC, gas, electrical, searches: requested, received, outstanding	Stops things being discovered late
9. Disclaimer	What the report is and is not	Below

Photographs belong to rooms

The single biggest difference between a report that gets used and one that gets skimmed is whether the photographs sit with the room they were taken in.

A camera roll of forty images at the back is worthless within a day, because nobody can tell which bedroom is which. Three photographs under the heading "Bedroom 1, 11.52 m²" are still useful in six months.

Say what you did not inspect

The bit that protects you

If you could not get into the loft, say so. If a room was locked, say so. If two rooms were not inspected, the report should say that at the foot rather than quietly omit them.

A shorter report is a choice. It should never look like a thinner inspection, and it should never let a reader assume something was checked when it was not.

The disclaimer, and why it matters

Wording along these lines belongs at the end of every report:

This report is a record of a personal inspection visit on the date shown. It is not a survey, a valuation, an EPC, a fire risk assessment, or legal, planning or licensing advice. Guidance observations compare recorded measurements against published national minimums with their sources and dates shown; local requirements may differ and may be stricter.

That sentence is the difference between a useful record and something a reader could treat as a survey you are not qualified to give.

What good looks like in practice

Time-stamped. Date and time of the visit, not the date it was typed up.
Consistent. The same sections every time, so two properties can be compared side by side.
Measured, not estimated. "Approximately 12 m²" is an opinion. 3.60 m × 3.20 m is a measurement.
Branded. Your logo and business name, because it goes to your client.
Finished on site. A report written from memory in the evening is a different, worse document than one recorded in the room.

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