How a $3,500 CASp Inspection Prevents a $30,000 Problem

Most business owners do not find out their building has ADA issues until they receive a demand letter.

By then, the cost — legal fees, settlements, and rushed construction — is almost always higher than it would have been to address the issues proactively. Often significantly higher.

What a CASp Inspection Actually Does

A Certified Access Specialist evaluates your property against California Building Code accessibility requirements and the Americans with Disabilities Act. You receive a written report identifying barriers, prioritized by risk level and cost to remediate.

That report does several things at once:

It gives you a clear picture of where you stand before anyone else finds out.

It gives you a prioritized action plan — not a list of everything wrong, but a roadmap organized by what matters most and what to fix first.

It gives you legal protections under California law, including the ability to request a stay of legal proceedings while you work through a remediation plan — a protection that is only available to properties that have been CASp-inspected before a claim is filed.

The Math

We have seen firsthand how a $3,500 inspection prevents a $30,000 problem.

A single ADA demand letter in California typically comes with $4,000 in statutory damages per violation — before attorney fees on both sides. A property with five violations is looking at $20,000 in statutory damages alone, plus legal costs that regularly double that number.

A CASp inspection with a remediation plan costs a fraction of one demand letter. And if violations are corrected within 60 days of a CASp inspection, statutory damages can be reduced to $1,000 per violation under Civil Code 55.56. For a property with multiple barriers, that reduction is the difference between a manageable problem and a business-threatening one.

If you own or lease commercial property in California, ask yourself: when was the last time your building had a CASp inspection?

We are here to help.

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