[15thandwhatever]

To nitpick on something...

You say:

> I agree it should be optional to just live in an uninsured and unsellable shed if you want. The buyer or insurance company can make the inspection, should they want to.

But then go on to say:

> Should a publicly funded fire department put out the recurring fires in your house due to your homebuilt fireplace and diy electric wiring?

You can't have your cake and eat it too: allow reckless behavior, disregard neighbors' lives and property, and have a reasonable life and property loss prevention policy?

The purpose of your publicly funded fire department is to extinguish fires before they spread to nearby properties and cause even more loss.

The efficiency at which your city/town/village/county/etc's fire department performs this, is something everyone's insurance company pays very, very close attention to when building the elements and costs of policies that'll serve your neighborhood.

Your choices (albeit simplifying it a bit), are:

a) staff up on building inspectors and fire inspectors and spend on office space

-or-

b) staff up on fire fighters and spend on real estate acquiring parcels of land, building firehouses upon said parcels, acquiring more fire-fighting apparatus, and contribute additional funds to the state's firefighting training academy and your fire fighter's pensions and life insurance policies

To me, this (inspections vs. emergency response) is the very definition of proactive vs. reactive.