GFCI outlets are required if the outlet is closer than six feet to a water source i.e. a sink, water faucet, toilet, shower, etc.

If your house was built before the local building codes were instituted and it has not been significantly remodeled as in replumbed and rewired then you are not required to have GFCI’s.

If you live in a pre 1960’s house where your electric outlets are two prong, non-grounded outlets then you cannot just install three-prong GFCI outlets. There has to three wires in your outlet box.  The third wire is the ground wire. If you install GFCI outlets they will only look like they are grounded.

There are literally thousands of homes like this so don’t panic.

In order to ground all of the outlets in a non-grounded home you would need to run a ground wire to each and every outlet in the house and unless you are undergoing a big remodel, the cost of this would probably be more than you are prepared to spend. Half of the cost of this re-wiring would be drywall repair when you bust out the walls to run the wires. The only way to avoid this is if you have a one-story house with a crawl space and/or a basement where you can come up with the wires from under the sill plate but his method is not easy.

The Orange County Home Inspector, Michael Sedillo Property Inspections owner has lived in a 1956 non-grounded house for may years.