What we look for in Eglinton, and why it differs from the suburb next door. 44.4 km from the CBD, on the coast, postcode 6034.
Eglinton is mostly still banksia woodland, scrubland and heath, with new estates being cut into it as part of the planned Alkimos to Eglinton satellite city. It takes its name from a barque wrecked on the rocks nearby.
Its most useful distinguishing feature is that one of its estates, Allara, is one of only two in Western Australia to achieve a six star energy rating. That sounds like marketing. It has practical consequences, because an energy rating is earned on paper at design stage and only delivered if the building work matches.
So there are things worth verifying. Whether insulation went in to the specified level, and without gaps. Whether glazing performs and is oriented as designed. How well the building is sealed against draughts. Whether any solar or efficiency system was properly commissioned. A house that under performs its rating is a common and quietly expensive disappointment, and the difference shows up in bills rather than in anything you can see.
This is also an actively building suburb, so handover and defect liability inspections matter and a dilapidation record is sensible where a home adjoins live construction. On young slabs the priorities are site classification and imported fill, then drainage. Sitting on the coast, Eglinton's homes take salt from day one, so confirm that coastal grade fixings and flashings were actually specified. Inland grade hardware fails fast in this air.
Estates here are carved from native banksia woodland, and the retained vegetation is the thing that raises risk above what a new slab built house would otherwise carry.
Lots backing onto retained bush face continuous habitat and steady foraging pressure. Clearing conditions imposed at subdivision may limit what can be removed. The vegetation stays. Every house should have a durable notice recording the termite management system installed at construction, either a physical barrier or a chemical treatment. Find it first.
Then look at what has happened since. In a young estate where everyone is landscaping at once, soil, mulch and paving get built up over the slab edge constantly, and that bridges a barrier completely. Timber in ground contact around fencing, decking and retaining gives colonies somewhere to establish.
There is a specific reason to combine them in Eglinton. Verifying an energy rating means looking at insulation, sealing and junctions in the roof space and around the building envelope, and those are the same places a pest inspector needs to reach. Sending one person to do both means the roof is opened once and the perimeter walked once. Reported under AS 4349.1 and AS 4349.3.
Most work here is on new houses. Handover inspections dominate. On an energy rated build there is an argument for looking earlier as well, because insulation and sealing are covered up at lock up and cannot be verified afterwards without opening things again.
We also do the inspection before the defect liability period runs out, which owners routinely forget. Dilapidation reports apply where a finished home now sits beside a block about to be built on, which in a suburb at this stage is most of them. Pre-settlement inspections and strata work round it out as the town centre develops.
Eglinton is home to a six-star energy-rated estate, and that means construction details a buyer should actually verify rather than take on trust: insulation levels and continuity, glazing performance and orientation, sealing and draught-proofing, and solar or efficiency systems. Energy ratings are earned on paper at the design stage; whether they were built and commissioned properly is an inspection question, and it is one worth asking specifically here. The estates were carved from native banksia woodland and heath, so the retained-vegetation interfaces bring bushfire (BAL) exposure and termite pressure, and clearing conditions on lots adjoining bush are worth checking.
Eglinton is an actively building fringe suburb, so the work here is handover and defect-liability inspections, plus dilapidation records where a home adjoins live construction, and the young slabs mean site classification, fill and drainage are the priorities. Being coastal, there is salt loading on roofs and external metal from the outset, so even new homes need correctly specified coastal-grade fixings and flashings, and that specification is worth confirming was actually built. An Eglinton inspection reads the energy-rating claims against what was built, the bush-interface fire and termite exposure, and the young-slab and coastal-specification issues of a fringe suburb still under construction.
On an Eglinton home the inspection is a build-quality and compliance read. The energy-rating claims are worth verifying rather than assuming: insulation levels and continuity, glazing and sealing are checked against what was actually built, since a rating earned on paper is not the same as one delivered. The young slab drives checks on site classification, fill and drainage. On bush-interface blocks the BAL exposure and clearing conditions are noted and the perimeter read for termite pressure. The coastal position means the fixings and flashings should be coastal-grade from the outset, a common shortfall worth confirming, and where the home adjoins live construction a dilapidation record is the sensible protection.
None of it is guesswork. Reading the stock above into an inspection, these are the checks the Eglinton pattern pushes to the top of the list:
Eglinton sits on the Quindalup dune system — young calcareous sand, still mobile in places, and thin over the water table near the front. Sand this young has low bearing capacity but very little reactivity, so footing movement is uncommon and drainage problems are not. What the ground gives you here it takes back in the air.
What that means in practice, on a house in Eglinton:
Landform is assigned from the suburb's position on the Swan Coastal Plain rather than from a site soil test. It tells you what to expect, not what you have. A site classification to AS 2870 is a different exercise and a different report.
Alkimos, Butler, Jindalee, Yanchep and Quinns Rocks sit on the same ground as Eglinton, so the footing behaviour and the drainage problems tend to repeat across all of them. If you are comparing houses across those suburbs, you are largely comparing the same site conditions.
Ridgewood is 9.4 km away but sits on the Spearwood dune system. That is the useful thing about this part of Perth: the ground can change inside a few kilometres, and with it what an inspection is looking for.
On site classification: any soil zone quoted for a suburb is indicative, inferred from geography rather than surveyed. A real AS 2870 classification comes from geotechnical work on your actual block and can differ from the one next door. We report what we observe; we do not read your soil class off a map.
The inspection is visual and non-invasive, over the readily accessible areas, reported to AS 4349.1. Our inspectors physically enter the roof space, as long as there is sufficient access. Report within 24 hours of the inspection.
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Flat fee, the same in Eglinton as anywhere: $440 inc. GST for a pre-purchase building inspection, or $616 inc. GST with the timber pest scope added in the same visit. Full price list →
Right on the coast in Wanneroo, and salt does the damage this close to the water. The flat fee buys a hard look at the tile battens for delignification, at the wall ties and metal fixings for corrosion, and at the rust bleed through render that looks cosmetic and is not. The tiled-roof void is the priority.
Pre-purchase building inspection in Eglinton →
Building and pest inspection in Eglinton →
Yes. Our inspectors physically enter and inspect the roof space, as long as there is sufficient access to do so safely. Where access is restricted, the report says so plainly rather than implying we saw more than we did.
Eglinton is on the coast, inside the band where delignification should be expected in tile battens. On a tiled roof more than about ten years old it is one of the first things we look at.
Within 24 hours of the inspection itself, not 24 hours from booking. On a pre-purchase or pre-settlement job that timing is the whole point, because your leverage disappears once you are committed.
We would rather you checked than took our word for it. These are the bodies that actually hold the records and set the rules:
Tell us about the property and what you need. We'll come back to you with a firm quote and a time.
PERTH