Business Networking with Jojo Trumbly & Solar Power with Alan Blair LIVE

We're actually live on the Net page right now on Facebook. I had the video messed up for a little bit, but now everyone can see your lovely self.

Hey y'all, how we doing?

Roland, just a minute ago, was explaining a little bit about what The Net is, but if you could let everybody know what this, what this group is, what it's about, why we're here, all those, all those things.

Absolutely.

You put this thing right— if you can't hear you, they can't hear you.

Gotcha.

There you go.

It's falling on me.

Just hold it up. There you go.

So The Net is a net for all other businesses, all other business chapters to get together get to know one another. We are building ourselves, we are building our community, we're growing, we're serving our community as well as each other. It's just a great time to get to know people that you might not otherwise ever meet. You can only do so many different, like, social media marketing, print marketing, but there is a real magic about being in person, having experiences with one another, genuine connections. That's what it's all about at The Net.

Yeah, and it's— I mean, we couldn't pick a better spot to have it. I mean, one, we have the foot traffic walking by. I can't tell you the number of people that walk by and just kind of give me the side-eye, like, what is— what is going on? And it's because they're reading all the names on the billboard here.

Oh yeah, did you— if Craig hasn't told you yet, I'm sure he has, every logo back here is a founding member of The Net. We started as a different network group back in 2020, and with the pandemic happening and everything, it kind of phased out for everyone else. But we believe in each other, we believe in ourselves, and we stay together. And now we've created our own thing, and here we are 2 years later.

No, we, we had a great turnout. And who, who— I was telling Roland, we just gave away the, uh, the cruise.

Yes.

Who, who won the cruise?

Okay, this is the best story. So this man, literally, he told me that he, this afternoon, he Googled what to do in The Woodlands tonight and Level Up Networking popped up. So he came and he was telling everyone all night, he was joking, I'm gonna win the cruise, I'm gonna win. Then we're like, yeah, sure, I'll be your plus one. We were pimping him out, the whole thing.

Yeah, yeah.

Marianne chooses the card, not looking. She picks him. This guy, this guy, his jaw drops to the floor.

He was excited.

He was so excited. That alone made this whole night special to me, just to see his face. It was so sweet.

Was he a veteran?

I'm not sure.

I mean, he was wearing like a special forces— Yeah, he was.

Okay, okay.

So I thought so. I was like, man, I'm excited for that guy to get it. Looks like—

Me too.

That guy deserves a cruise.

Yes, he does.

Absolutely.

100%.

And so, so Tell us about your businesses then, because I know one, you've been on the show.

How much time do you have?

I got plenty of time. The internet is always live.

Honey, honey, where do we start? Okay, so we just talked about The Nut. That is the baby business, so we'll go backwards. The one I opened before The Nut is called The Corner Cravings. We are a vendor market in Conroe, Texas. We have amazing local artists, chefs, entrepreneurs, anyone who sells products or services that is local to our community in the North Houston area is welcome to be a vendor or a sponsor. We've had quite a few NET members. I've got to say my favorite is Kathy O'Hare with KO Creations. She's sitting right there. Yeah, she's amazing. It's basically the same concept as this except it's more for— you're going to reach the demographic of just

the local community. You're going to get a lot of moms and families families, and it's just a really fun thing to do in Conroe that is safe for children, safe for parents. It's free to attend, and you're supporting local business, so it's also good for you too.

No, and one of the reasons I love that you started that is because I, I find it so difficult because, like, because we're both in the service industry, right? You know, like, and it's difficult for us to refer out those businesses that don't fall into that category.

Correct.

You know, and so like you've kind of created this venue where you can do that now.

Yes.

You know, like you can, you can highlight those businesses that do things like what Kathy does and, and some of these other creators and, and people that, you know, just make things that I can't make.

Exactly.

Same. Yeah, like it's totally, you know, it— for us it's like, like, well, no one really asks us about that kind of stuff sometimes. And so, but like we love those people, we want to promote them. And so like you've created just like this incredible venue where people can come in and sell the things that they make.

Yes, so I, I especially cater to like the side hustlers, the moms in the garage, the people working out of their office with a, with a baby on their arm who might never need a storefront, never want a storefront, but they want to reach those people that they will not reach with social media.

Yeah, absolutely.

So that's where I come in.

So, and then people probably recognize you because you've been on a couple times with Affordable air repair.

Yes, yes, totally. And that's my AC business as well. If you listen to Homeowner Show, I think it was episode like 80-something.

That's probably right.

Just listen to all of them. Listen to all of them.

You'll be wiser and smarter.

And you'll find me on there eventually.

It comes through. So we're kind of getting to the—

Lots of really good episodes.

We're coming to the point now where like people are wanting us to like put more episodes out. And so like we've been like, we just did like a replay today of like an older episode. that people have— people really liked. And so we're like, hey, we're gonna put this one out again. Make sure you listen to it if you haven't. And because we have so many people that come on, you know, it's like, well, you haven't listened to this one. This one was like 2 years ago, but it's a great interview. Listen to this one again. And just reintroduce those people because like some of them we just don't have a chance to talk to again because like they live in California

or Michigan or whatever it is.

Mm-hmm.

And I don't want to mess with that kind of stuff anyway because it's More difficult. I like being in person.

Yes, see, let's circle back, land the plane. The magic of being in person. If you can't make it tonight, I encourage you to try your best to make it to our next one. I'm talking to the venue tonight and we will announce it very soon, so stay tuned. Make sure if you're seeing this on the net, make sure you like and follow us. Go to our directory. Every single person in that directory I've used Most of them, they're amazing businesses.

Yeah, so we— I mean, like, we get together once a month, but how often are we going to do things like this?

I want to say, um, maybe every 6 to 8 weeks. It's gonna be a little further in between because they're gonna be bigger events. Sponsorship opportunities will be available for anyone. The only, um, stipulation that I kind of do is I limit the number of sponsors.

Because we only had 4 tonight, right?

Correct.

Okay, do you remember who they are? Off the top of your head?

Yes, I do.

Okay, I don't mean to put you on the spot. I just want to—

Trying me. We had, um, oh my gosh, now I'm—

I know Paul.

Yes, Corey and Ashley Reeves with Reeves Realty. We had Laundry Fairy with Lila Taylor. She's amazing.

Okay, so we just talked to her. We're actually gonna do a whole episode with just her.

You need to. I was just about to say that. She's magical.

So like, it's what it is. Literally, it's what it is. I mean, the The name is the business. That's the laundry. She does your laundry.

Yeah.

But we're gonna talk to her. We're gonna find out how it works. We're gonna get, we're gonna get all the information because if there's one thing my wife will sign up for, it is that.

Yes, 100%.

Have you used their services?

Not yet.

Not yet.

I'm one of those weird people that likes to do laundry.

You like to do the laundry?

I've like had a toxic relationship for a long time and then I like, we got— and now it's finally, we got it.

Uh-huh.

Yeah.

So like, are you, are you from beginning to end?

I mean, like, Oh yeah, I love it. The whole thing.

Ironing and everything. Yeah. What? What?

Okay, so don't fact check my husband. He might tell you.

So are you? Are you like? Are you meticulous in the sorting and the you like all that?

Yeah, I fold my husband's underwear. Yeah.

Okay.

100%.

So my wife is like it's underwear. It just goes in the drawer.

No, no.

Yeah, see, I'm not. I'm not. I'm like I want to fold everything.

Yeah, same.

Yeah, I don't want to do the laundry, so I don't really get a choice.

And then my daughter's clothes. Y'all, y'all will probably relate, my parents out here, them little baby clothes that look like little Barbie clothes. Mm-hmm.

You fold those?

No, no, I hang those up.

Hang those up?

Yeah.

See, okay, so that's—

I know y'all are wondering.

So let me ask you this, because this is, this is something that's bizarre to me. My wife hates folding clothes, and I don't blame her. Like, I enjoy it, she doesn't like it. So her answer to that is, I'm just gonna hang everything Oh, okay, I, I see where she's going with that.

I just don't have enough room in my closet. That's like— I actually don't. Oh, sorry.

Like, for me, it's like, give me some drawers and I can do this. But like, so she has like 80% of the closet space now because it's like everything's hung up. Everything. Everything's hung up.

It happens.

So, but okay, what about ironing? Do you do any ironing?

Only if I need to.

Only if you need to?

Only if I need to.

Okay, okay. That's the one thing I'm good at.

Really?

Oh yeah, I can put a crease in a pair of pants like nobody's business.

Y'all heard it here first, Craig just volunteered to do my ironing for the rest of 2023.

You bring it over and I will knock it out. It is, it is—

I've got witnesses you can't see, but there are a bunch of people behind us and they are Shaking their heads.

So we're good. So I, I can kind of see some people in here.

Have you talked to Robert?

I've— well, I've talked to Robert many times, but isn't this the guy that just won the cruise?

Yes! Do you want to come talk? Oh my gosh, y'all, if you have not tuned in, tag your friends right now. I'm about to show you the, the salt of the earth, my favorite human being. I met him 2 hours ago. 2 hours ago, and he just won a cruise.

Let's get him out. Let's see if I can fix this thing so it's not like wobbling around on everybody. Come on in here, sir. You can grab those right there. All right, put that right up next to your mouth. All right, so we, we have never met. I'm Craig.

Alan Blair.

Alan Blair, good to meet you, man. So we were so we were just asking. It's like you won. You just won the cruise.

Yep.

That may not help. I think it's going to be that one right there. You may have to. You may have to kind of hold it up. Are you? Are you trying to get out of here?

There we go.

In a minute. Let me. Can I give you a card? Thank you so much. All right, so JoJo was telling me a little bit about this. Tell us how you even ended up here tonight, because I think it was kind of a random—

Well, uh, Toni Bradley, who's my old girlfriend from 40 years ago, she called me up and she said, I've been looking at some networking events, and we literally did a search on networking in The Woodlands, and this popped up. And she said we should go to that, and I'm like, okay. So we went. Here we are.

Is she here?

She just left. She just walked off.

Okay, so what did she do?

She's a real estate investor.

Oh, real estate investor. Okay, fantastic. Well, this is the homeowner show in case you didn't know.

Oh, okay. Wow. So do I get a plug too?

Absolutely. Yeah, what do you do?

I own a company called Texas Energy Saver. I'm a division of Power, which is the 43rd fastest-growing company in America, and we do solar.

You do solar?

Yeah, we do solar.

Fantastic.

Yeah, and I'm excited about it. I went to school for it and everything.

And so do you guys Do you guys just work with one brand, or you guys kind of like, look, let's look at the spectrum and see what's gonna work for you?

That's what I like about the company I got with. They train us, they've got more, they offer more different products than anyone else. They're, they're just a really super good company, and I'm excited about working with them.

Well, I'm actually really excited that you're here. I have lots of questions about solar, if you don't mind.

No, lay it on me, man.

All right, so what are some things happening in Texas right now that maybe a lot of people don't realize are happening with solar?

Well, one thing is the credit just went up. The federal tax credit is now 30%, dollar per dollar.

Okay.

You can write off 30% of your system if you buy a solar system.

So right off the top?

Right off the top.

Is that in the first year, or?

You can do it over— you can amortize it over a few years.

Okay.

So yeah. Also, the great thing about it is we say you don't rent your car and you don't rent your home. So why rent your power? And you know it's gonna keep going up. So when you get into a solar deal, you have a set price, it never goes up. And once you've paid the loan off, you own the panels, so you're not paying a power bill anymore.

Okay.

But you start right out paying less money than what you do for your power. I literally had a friend call me today that said no just a month ago, and he got a bill today because his power rate went up, and he got a $593 bill, if I remember correctly. And he called me and goes, my bill's $593. Can we talk about that solar now? Yeah, because I can cut that in half.

Yeah, well, I mean, just, I think it was 2 months ago, I had a $900 power bill.

Oh man.

Yeah, it was, it was brutal. It was brutal.

Yeah.

And like, there's nothing I can do about it. So, and we, and so like, we've looked, we've looked into solar before. The, the issue I've run into, and maybe you can help me with this, is I'm, I'm with a company that doesn't, uh, doesn't sell back to the to the grid. I get credit, but I don't— yeah, they won't buy back.

Most companies don't. Now they give you a credit. But yeah, but that's good because if your system— if the company you work with puts together the correct system, you have what's called 100% offset. And that means that during the day, your system creates more power than you use, and that goes back to the grid and you get a credit. So at night, when those panels are not making power, right, you're running off the grid on credits that you have.

Okay. Yeah, because I mean, you still get like a grid charge every month, right? I mean, like, that's— I mean, that's just standard.

Well, it depends. Yeah, some, some people say, well, I got a $20 a month, and then I see people's bills that are negative because they still— the companies—

because the credit rolls.

Yeah, the power company still owes them. So yeah, um, so it's, it's just, it's a really, really good thing. And what got me in it was that last summer, um, I was living up in Fort Worth, and they were warning us of power rationing and brownouts, which means they're going to cut your power off in the middle of the day when it's 100 degrees.

Right.

And my girlfriend and I started panicking and buying window air conditioning units and generators and stuff. And of course, winter before last, if you remember, right here in, in the Houston area, um, there was a freeze that lasted like a week.

Yep.

Power outage and a freeze that lasted like a week. And so I guess realized they're not reliable. The power companies are not reliable. And then they built these big wind farms up in North Texas and West Texas. Drove by one just a week ago. There wasn't a single blade turning. And they're saying that's the reason for the power rationing this summer.

If they're not generating—

Because they're not generating any power.

Yeah. So, well, that's— I mean, like, obviously wind's not going to be as reliable as solar.

I mean, yeah, the sun, you know, come up every morning for at least the last 6,000 And you know, everything has a carbon footprint, and, and creating these solar panels also has a carbon footprint. But the company that I'm with, the, the company I was mentioning, Power, they give back. They plant trees. They do a lot of things to offset the carbon footprint of manufacturing solar panels.

Sure.

So it's a very good thing.

Yeah, I mean, because I mean, it's expensive to manufacture those things for sure.

Yeah, yeah. And it's blowing up right now. Everyone's like, wow. I can't, I can't believe all the people that I'm meeting and they say, what do you do? I'm in solar. It's like, what? Give me your business card. I've been looking into that, but I don't know who to go with.

And well, that, I think that's, I think that's the big problem with, with solar in general is like, I think most people want to know somebody, but, you know, rather than just have like a stranger coming to their home and like, let me see your power bill and let me, yeah. You know, you know, and, and so it's, it's just weird. It's a, it's a weird sort of relationship when you're like, I'm gonna spend, you know, $80,000 Right. On a solar system and I don't know you.

Yeah.

That's, that's a big chunk of change.

And you know what, honestly, I get a lot of traction from being a veteran and being a former Special Forces.

I was gonna ask you because I see the hat.

Yeah, people, people see that and they're like, yeah, man, I'll do business with you. I'm just like, oh cool. But I'm, I'm very big on ethics and honesty, and that's why I wanted to go with this company. They give us a lot of great training. I want to make sure I know what I'm doing when I go see somebody. I don't even want to accidentally lie to them. them. I want them to get the best deal they can get and save money, and that's gratification at the end of the day.

Yeah. Well, if I can ask you, where have you been stationed?

Oh my God, where hadn't I been stationed? Well, I've been all over the world, but mostly on the West Coast.

West Coast?

Yeah.

So I have a, I have a good buddy, he was underwater demolitions down in Key West.

Yeah, and that's what they used to call SEAL before they called it the SEAL Team. It was called UDT, and in 1967, if I remember directly is when they changed the name to SEAL.

Yeah, so he actually— so like most people don't realize that Key West is sort of divided into 2 islands. Yeah, you know, because there's the naval base and then there's actually like, you know, where everybody else hangs out. So he took me over to the naval base and I didn't realize that like underwater demo actually trained actual seals and dolphins to do a lot of their underwater demo stuff. And so he kind of took me through and showed me all that kind of stuff.

And the training is pretty Amazing. It's, it's tough too. I met an Army—

It's not as tough as the stuff you went through, I would imagine, but it's, it's very similar.

Yeah, I met an Army Ranger recently and he goes, hey man, you know, we did all the same training that you guys did. I said, really? And he said, yeah. And I said, how many times did you swim through fire? And he looked at me and he said, what? Swim through fire? We didn't swim through fire. I said, that's right. So be careful when you're trying to compare notes with a SEAL because we had to swim through fire.

Yeah, absolutely. And like, they, they drown you guys.

Literally.

Yeah, I mean, like multiple times, don't they?

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, that's crazy.

Yeah, if you're a good enough swimmer, you know how to handle that.

Yeah, there was a, um, I mean, not, not to get off topic, but I was listening to— are you familiar with, uh, uh, Steve Rinella, uh, Meat Eater? It's a show on Netflix. Oh, it's a hunting— it's a hunting—

okay, okay.

So he's, he's recently got into like spearfishing. And they've, they've started this whole other podcast telling like really scary stories of things that happen. Oh, thank you. Uh, out in the wild. And one of them was a spearfisherman and these, these guys who do these deep dives. And like, it's like these guys are going down like over 100 feet free diving.

Oh yeah.

And he was this—

We did a lot of that.

Oh yeah, I would imagine you did. And He was, he was talking about the— this one guy was telling a story about how he ended up having to like spear his friend through the leg in order to get him back to the surface because he was too far away from him and he had blacked out in the water.

Yeah.

And he was— so he was too far away to swim to him and actually survive the, the resurface. So he speared him in the leg and then resurfaced and then dragged him up. And I didn't realize that like the human body had this like reaction where it actually like shuts down breathing at a certain point and won't— and like, it's like a survival mechanism that the body knows it's underwater and won't breathe until it can't. Yeah, can't do it without oxygen anymore, and that's when you drown.

Yeah, and I went through a similar event. Um, my equipment failed. Oh, and I was about 120 feet and my equipment failed, and so I, I literally drowned and swallowed a bunch of water, but the guy I was with was, was just a good enough frogman that he pulled me into the boat, and they did— they pumped the water out of me and did CPR and got me back on. And then he broke it to me, uh, we got to get you a new tank and we have to go back down again.

Because like, as soon as they revived you, we got to get you a new tank.

You have to come up slowly and you have to come up distances at a time because nitrogen will gather in your blood and you'll get what's called the bends.

Okay, yeah, I've heard of that.

Yeah, yeah, the bends can kill you, and it can strike you right at that moment, or it can strike you 2 days later. Oh, but it didn't hit me. So when he revived me and got all the water out, and I got through throwing up all the water, um, he took— he put a tank on me, and we went back down and decompressed properly coming up so that I made sure that I wasn't going to get the bends.

Oh, and that— and correct me if I'm wrong, the bends is what, what you get when you come up too fast?

That's right. Okay, that's right. Yeah.

And that's what you're just describing, the nitrogen in your blood and all this? Okay. That's crazy.

Yeah, that was in the Philippines actually when that happened. I was pleasure diving.

Oh, just for fun?

Yeah, but the equipment failed. Yeah.

Dang. So how long have you been out now?

Um, I've been out for 40, about 40 years.

Have you really?

Yeah, yeah.

Well, you don't look a day over 20.

I still do the gym 5 days a week.

There you go.

I take care of myself.

And so, well, most guys that I meet that, that come out of systems like that, it just doesn't leave their system. I mean, like, they— yeah, it's just part of who they are for the rest of their life.

Very disciplined, and it's— I've never lost that. Yeah, I still, like I said, go to the gym 5 days a week, and even people I know are just like, dang, dude, how do you do it? I push myself.

It's—

and, and I believe that a truly successful person strives for success in every aspect of their life— their health, their business, their mindset, everything, their love life, everything.

Well, do you mind if I circle back around to solar real quick? No, go right ahead. Oh yeah, excuse me. One of the, one of the things I was going to ask you is how important is it for people nowadays to look at a secondary system for their solar, meaning like a battery backup or a generator backup? How important is that for you when you're talking to new customers?

Okay, I think it's important to me, but a lot of customers will just get the panels. What people don't know, or what most people don't know, if you buy just the panels and you don't have backup batteries or you don't have a generator, then if the grid goes down, so does your house. Even though you've got the panels, because you're connected to the grid, they shut you down.

Because it's not point-to-point. Yeah, right.

So if you have a battery system and the power goes out, your house is still running and it's running off those batteries. And it can run off those batteries for 20, 24 hours, which is enough because when the sun comes back up, panels are charging those batteries again, right? You know, so yeah, most people don't realize that, but currently the battery technology, though it's good technology, it's very expensive. So for most people, it makes more sense to buy a generator, a Generac, uh-huh, or something to that effect.

Like a natural gas kind of a deal if you have access?

That's the best way to go, the natural gas, because then if you have gas in your home, you can literally route it to your generator, right? And you never run out no matter what the outage is. You're not Carrying around a bunch of gas cans or keeping those stored in your garage, which can be dangerous.

Absolutely.

Yeah, yeah.

So, dude, so the, the guy that, that co-hosts the show with me, he recently sold his house, and before they closed on the house, the, the lady that was buying his house, um, moved in a bunch of lawn equipment to the interior of the home, like gas cans, lawn mowers, and all this kind of stuff. And so like he was, he was going back to pick up a couple of things. He shows up and there's all these gas cans like inside his house that they haven't closed on. And he's like, what, what the hell is this? Like there's combustibles inside my home that I still own.

Yeah, yeah.

And this lady's just moving this stuff in here. People don't realize like it's, it's just not a good idea.

Wow. And you know, another thing people don't know about solar, I get questions about it was like, wait a minute, if I buy this solar, what happens when I sell my home? Well, solar adds 4 to 6% on the value of your home.

Okay.

And since it's a fixed price, anybody who, who does a little bit of research realizes it's better to have that solar. So your house will sell 20% faster on average than a home that doesn't have it.

Oh, really?

Yeah, because it— you get a fixed payment. You're, you're not, you know, you're not paying a super high electricity bill and the payment never goes up.

Well, because the— I mean, like, I, I assume most people that sell their home pay off The solar before they— with the, with the note?

No, they roll the loan right over to the new buyer.

Oh, you can do that?

Yeah, you can do that.

Okay.

Yeah, yeah.

Are most buyers willing to do that?

Um, that's a good question.

Don't know.

I'm gonna guess that most do. And if they look at it, we, we call this a no-brainer because, you know, I did a friend of mine's just today, quoted him on one because his light bill came in, it was so high, but You know, if you're paying $420 on the loan for your panels, but your monthly bill is between $400 and $800, right? You're paying $600, $700 average. Then why wouldn't you want to do it? It never goes up.

Yeah.

And they say that power companies go up about 4% per year on their rates. Right now the average is about 16%, and we have a little slider on our presentations and you roll it up 5 years and 10 years and you see how fast those bills go up. So it just, solar just makes sense.

For sure. Was, is there anything else that, that people need to be aware of? I mean, I know you said it's 30% right off the top, right?

30% tax credit.

Tax credit.

Yeah.

Yeah. Is that, so is that on, is that state? Is that federal?

It's federal.

Federal. Okay.

Yeah. Yeah.

So is there anything Texas is doing to incentivize people right now?

Depending on the county you live in, some may have an extra incentive.

Okay, do you know of any? Like, is Montgomery County doing anything, or—

I don't think they are.

What about Harris County?

I don't think Harris is either, actually. But with a 30% tax credit, if you pay $100,000 for your system, you can literally get a tax credit of $30,000. It's dollar per dollar. It's not a write-off, it's a tax credit.

Yeah, which is— I mean, like with what you said earlier, that if you can amortize that over several years, I mean, that could be really valuable.

Yeah, because then you're never paying taxes, at least for several years or whatever, right? And I've literally had customers come to me and go, wow, I need this because I've got a lot of business taxes.

Yeah.

So a gentleman in here that's got the air conditioning company, he owns this building, he saw my card and he was like, yeah, we're gonna talk. I'm like, okay.

Is it this guy right here? Jehu?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Yeah, Jehu, that's him. Yeah. He wears that ball cap well, doesn't he?

Yeah, he does.

Yeah, super, super nice fellow.

He does, he does all my AC work, man. He's fantastic. He's been, he's been on the show a couple of times.

Very nice.

Very, very good guy. So yeah, if he, if he wants to, if he wants to work with you, I encourage it.

Yeah, we give a $1,000 referral fee too.

Okay.

Yeah, yeah, anybody that, that refers a job and we sell it, then it's $1,000.

That's fantastic.

Yeah, I love it, man.

I love it. Well, so what else, what other things about solar should people aware of right now that maybe they don't know?

Um, it's growing really, really fast, and with the prices of power continuing to rise, you might as well do it now, you know, because it's— at some point you're going to want to get it. And yeah, the predictions are— and these are predictions, you know how that works— is that most of America will have solar panels at some point. Okay, most American homes will have them. Yeah, and we're right in the boom stages of solar right now. Yeah, yeah.

And so are you seeing prices across the board kind of remain steady? Are they going down, going up? What are you seeing with what's happening with the prices of the actual product?

The prices have been staying pretty steady. One of the things we're starting to see now is these rising interest rates.

Uh-huh.

You know, that's—

Oh, so that's affecting people's—

Yeah, except when you see that your bill is going to be this and it's a couple of hundred dollars a month less than what you're paying, right? That interest rate is not as big of a deal now, you know? Yeah.

But, but I, I do think that's something important for people to pay attention to. I, I saw something the other day. It was like somebody who bought like a $600,000 house back in like, I think it was like 2019, right before COVID hit, is paying the same mortgage rate as someone who bought a $335,000 house. house right now.

Whoa.

Just because of interest rates.

Interest rates.

Because it went from like 2% to like 6.5%.

Yeah.

And that just drastically changed the payments that you'd be making on a 30-year mortgage. And, and so, which, I mean, like, that's, that's insane.

It is insane. Absolutely. Yeah.

But like, but like, you know, like, I think it was Einstein that pointed out like compound interest is like one of the most powerful forces in the world.

Yeah. And on our, when we do an analysis and we do a great interactive presentation, it's very comprehensive thanks to technology and satellites and stuff. And we show on there what, what your loan, the total of your loan is going to be, but we also show what you pay if you pay cash. And some people will pay cash and just purchase the system. It's a big difference though. Oh yeah, big difference.

I mean, if you have the cash, it makes complete sense.

Sure, sure, if you've got that kind of money, sure.

Absolutely. So, okay, well, I've got your card here, but if people want to get a hold of you, how do they find you?

They can go to TX That's txenergysaver.com.

Okay.

Shoot us a note, we'll give you a call back.

All right. And if they want to get a hold of you, do they email you?

Do they— Um, they can, they can email me at alan@txenergysaver.com, and that's A-L-A-N.

Okay.

Yeah. Or they can call, uh, 682-243-0631.

Awesome. I appreciate you sitting down with us today, man.

I appreciate you having me.

And congratulations.

This has been a great networking event. I'm it's my first time here.

I'm glad you came.

I met lots of great people. You know, made some great connections and everything. And then I won the doggone trip. I won the cruise.

Do you know where you're going? Where you want to go?

Oh, she told me. But you know what? I was so in la la land at that point. All I was thinking about was which girl I'm gonna take.

No, I mean honestly, the choices are endless.

Yeah, yeah. I'm an old dude. I still do okay with the.

Muscle tough.

That's it, man.

Well, man, I appreciate you jumping on, and it's really, really good to meet you.

Thanks, great meeting you. Y'all have a great evening.

Thank you, and thank you for your service.

Okay.

All right, guys, uh, if, if you haven't had a chance yet, subscribe to Homeowner Show on YouTube, on Facebook, follow the net, uh, or any of these businesses that you see behind me. Or really any of the ones you can't see because you can't see all of them in the video shot. Thank you guys so much for joining us at this live event tonight, and we'll catch you next time.