(Niel) writes:

I just bought a house and the inspector tagged four of six basement
outlets as hot/neutral reversed.
I open the first two, see the problem, and fix it (one of two blacks
was going to silver and one of two whites was going to brass).
However, the other two "bad" outlets are already wired correctly
(white to silver/black to brass).
Plus, these two outlets have one set of wires (white/black/ground)
instead of two sets, which may not be a problem, but could be a clue.
Supposedly, if I switch the wires, the plugs won't be reversed
anymore. But that would put white on brass and black on silver.
Maybe the electrician got the white and black wrong at the head end,
wherever that is. So switching the two at the plugs will be the right
thing to do.
If the inspector was right, what is wrong with the wiring and how do I
fix it?
If the inspector was wrong, how could that be, as he was right about
two other plugs in the same room?
Or do I need to spend a couple of bucks on a sensor to check for
myself whether the inspector was right?

Spend a couple bucks and get an outlet tester.

Then, when you confirm that they are still bad. It's possible that the outlet
you fixed was upstream of one or both of the other miswired ones and all is
not well.

If not, it's possible that the outlets that test reversed are fed from
upstream outlets whic are miswired for the wiring feeding those outlets.

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