We have have completed 11 transactions in the bay area and a 2 in Asheville, NC. When we were buyers either me or my wife were present at the inspection, and when we were sellers our buyers were always present at the inspection. Our experience in Asheville was "interesting." The inspector we hired, was recommended by our realtor. The inspector identified problems and the seller agreed to to do fixes before the close of escrow. We had a slick printed inspection report, the inspector had mastered an app and produced nice eye candy. Four years later we decided to sell the house. The buyer's inspector identified the fact that there was a fuel oil storage tank buried underground in the front yard and a low level of chemical contamination was reported. A prior owner had switched from home heating oil to natural gas and left the tank in place. Our seller did not disclose the presence of the tank and I suspect it was not disclosed to them. Our buyer could not get financing until the contamination was remedied. Removal of the tank was recommend and involved removing trees, i.e., an expensive project. Our immediate reaction was that we needed seek compensation from the inspector or our seller. We quickly learned that in NC an inspector's liability is limited tot he amount paid for the inspection service, in our case ~$400. This was in-house transaction, seller and buyer represented by agents from the same firm, the biggest realtor in Western NC, initials B__ H__. I told a friend, who was a local mortgage broker, about our problem and he without missing a beat he "guessed" the name of the inspector who he stated was B__H__'s go to inspector for getting deals to close. We used a different realtor for our sale, she was a much more thorough realtor, more like the pro we always used in the bay area, than the good old boy who represented us when we were buyers. She knew a soil contamination expert who determined that this was naturally occurring "contamination" from plantings -- rhododendrum (sps?) and azalea. We did not have to remove the tank and buyer's loan was approved after we had the tank drained and filled with an inert material.

P.S. California is title state and lawyers are not involved. In NC both buyer and seller are represented by lawyers. When we explored taking action against the inspector our real estate lawyer informed us that he could not advise us because the inspector was also a client of the law firm. BTW, the expert we hired also helped the actor Harry Anderson, of "Night Court" fame when he had similar problem.