Standale sits just west of Grand Rapids along the Lake Michigan Drive corridor, and its housing is largely post-war: ranches, split-levels and bungalows built through the middle decades of the last century, with later infill around them.
Houses of that generation are typically well framed and comfortably liveable, and by now essentially nothing mechanical in them is original. That is where the inspection concentrates. A furnace replaced fifteen or twenty years ago into a house built decades earlier raises questions about sizing, ducting and combustion venting that nobody asked at the time. Electrical panels have often been extended to serve finished basements and added circuits rather than genuinely upgraded. Original galvanized supply piping restricts flow long before it leaks, and it is easy to miss if only the visible copper runs are considered.
Below grade, we look at the ordinary Michigan story: grading that has shifted as landscaping matured, downspouts discharging too close to the wall, sump pumps of unknown age, and the physical evidence on foundation walls of how much water has actually been in the space.
Standale is in Kent County, EPA Radon Zone 2, predicted average indoor level between 2 and 4 pCi/L, so radon testing belongs on the list.
