I personally wouldn't buy a house without an inspection, but I can understand the pressure to do so in a hot market. Unfortunately, most inspections aren't worth the paper they're written on, and most inspection companies don't seem to have any accountability in the case of missing major defects.
Hubby and I bought our last house after having a thorough 4 hour long inspection by someone I knew was extremely experienced and qualified in addition to three of our own visits/reviews. However, once we bought and started a major renovation, there were about $15,000 in extra costs for roof and window replacement that were triggered by a 100-year rainstorm. We were a bit stressed about the costs, but decided to mentally reframe it as 'the house is telling us what we need to do'. That, plus having a healthy contingency in our budget and having 'vultched' the house for $150,000 less than appraised value meant that we accepted these costs.
In short, it's a risk management exercise. You have to decide what level of risk you're comfortable with, keeping in mind your experience with construction/building codes/local issues, and act accordingly.