When Michael Rowan was growing up, his home was between the Irish cities of Shannon and Dublin. That put him in the path of the airplane traffic and his eyes always were to the west.
“America. The United States,” he said. “I loved Ireland, but I told myself that someday I would live in America.”
But where? It turned out to be Jacksonville and today the 35-year-old has built a home inspection company and school that would be the envy of a lot of older people who had lived here all their lives.
Rowan, a tall, slim always-on-the-go type with offices near The Avenues Mall, got his home inspection start in his native land and moved to London, where he studied to be a professional “building surveyor,” as the trade is known there.
“You learn what keeps a building standing for 400 years,” he said. “There aren’t many new buildings in London.”
He also saw the other side, the buildings which “were just thrown up after the war” and which still stand. “The maintenance has been lousy,” he said. “You learn a lot looking at places like that.”
He followed his parents to America and started his business in 1994. He says he’s done thousands of inspections through his AmeriPro company and has put that to further benefit by starting a school. It’s also in his Southside office and goes by the name of Inspection Depot.
Having the two entities is readily apparent during a tour of his building. People are handling calls for inspections in one area and students are learning the trade in another.
The school is impressive. There’s a main classroom with exhibits lining the walls, and there’s also other rooms with boilers, furnaces and other equipment for hands-on training.
“I tell my students that there’s only one way to do an inspection — everything you do has to be 110 percent,” said Rowan. “When we start class, I tell them that it’s the first day in kindergarten. Home inspection is not an easy profession; you can’t learn it in one week.
“If their image of their future is taking an ad in the Yellow Pages saying ‘home inspection’ and doing business, they’re in the wrong business,” said Rowan in his clipped accent. “When you leave this class, I tell them, you will have the knowledge and information to help your career.”
The students are greeted with a giant looseleaf binder which Rowan wrote. It appears to have almost everything relevant to the profession — a bible, if you will. It’s looseleaf “because I continually add to it,” he said. “Homes change and so does our business.”
Students come from all over the nation to his class, he says, and his mantra is always the same: get qualified and do it right. He equips with everything they need. He even has a catalog where you can buy everything from marketing tools to sell yourself to CDs to show how things are done to flashlights.
As for Rowan, he’s a member of the American Society of Home Inspectors and the state association. He has a general contractor’s license, is a certified 203K and maintains his membership in the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors.
He’s set his roots here; he, wife Lorraine and the two kids live less than a quarter-mile from his office.
“This is a great area for living and business,” he said. “The real estate market is excellent. We have a good real estate community; I talk with Realtors daily and I know what’s going on with them.”
He’s also out front with his company. Most of his printed materials use him as a model, often with a tool belt.
His school is an intense three days of classroom and field work. The course outline goes over every major facet of the trade and students are told upfront: it’s going to be a long three days.
They start at 8 each morning and finish somewhere around 6. The first day, for instance, takes the student through five chapters of the textbooks and includes sessions on site conditions, concrete, masonry and metals.
“They get what they want,” said Rowan. “We give them the information; a person who applies himself and studies hard has all the resources needed to become a qualified home inspector.”