Getting to the bottom of plumbing: An interview with Paul the Plumber

This is episode number 191 of The Homeowner Show. Whether you're DIY or looking to hire, we're here to help you find the best information and options for you and your home. My name is Kevin Hackett. Here with me is Craig Williams.

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to The Homeowner Show. We're so glad you could join us for another episode here in The Homeowner Show studios. How you doing, Kev?

Oh man, I am feeling like everything is, uh, just not in slow-mo. What's the opposite of slow-mo? Super fast mode.

The flash mode.

The flash mode. Yeah, that's what I feel like. Unless you're a perv.

Well, okay.

Yeah, so I, I don't know, man. Like, I'm— we're— so we've closed on our house and that's done.

Heard you've been getting lots of cool goodies along with that.

Yeah. So what's really kind of unique, I would say, is that the— so the seller is, is an older lady. And she is, is moving in with some family. She didn't need some of the stuff that she has, right? They would have double things like— so they've given us like a washer and a dryer. They've given us a riding lawnmower. They've given us some like power tools. They've given us, uh, let's see what else. Oh, some, some, some pig statues.

Pig statues?

Pig statues.

Are these like in the yard or something?

They're in the yard. And, uh, what's really the most interesting thing about that is that we found out the other day— so we spent an hour and a half there the other day just meeting her and talking to her and like hanging out with her for a little bit, right? Which is actually really, really great because I wouldn't have wanted to be near, uh, the buyer of my house. Um, but this lady was phenomenal. She was amazing. And I think we're best friends now. And anyway, but she told us that those— that the pig statues were there from a previous owner, and they've owned this home since '07. So I actually think that's kind of cool.

So do they have wings on them? I want to know.

No, not yet.

Okay.

Well, no, because there's like pigs and there's pigs with wings.

Yeah.

My mom collects pigs with wings. Yeah, they're like all over. They've been all over my house since I was a little kid.

Yeah, they're a thing.

And apparently I was like a nickname for her in college. I was like, Pigfly was like, ah, yeah, it was kind of weird. I don't know what it was.

I need— that's, that's valuable information.

I don't know what you're gonna do with it either.

Not yet. I gotta think about it. Uh, but yeah, she gave us a— oh, she gave us a bumper pool table. And yeah, bumper pool table with like a—

Is that like the— like, is it like 6-sided?

Yeah, exactly.

Okay, yeah.

And so, um, it's actually, it's actually a lot of fun.

Do you know how to play that?

I do. Uh, the one of the very first places that I worked had a bumper pool table.

Okay.

Um, it's been a long time. I'll have to refresh myself. But yeah, I, I do know how to play. Um, but then there's a, there's like a tabletop on it, so it'll be a great place for like game night.

Oh.

So yeah, that'd be, that'd be a lot of fun. Let's see what else did she give us. But it was all like the time that we spent with her, she was like, here, let me, let me take you out and show you the septic and like show you what I do to it. No, here's the well and here's these other things. I want to show you this stuff. And, um, anyway, pretty, pretty awesome. Very, very cool experience. And, um, I don't know. So we, we actually take possession a week from today, probably. So, um, oh, and, uh, Aaron, uh, our, our painter friend from— man, that was a long time ago that we had him. Uh, he's gonna, he's

gonna paint our kitchen cabinets for us and Uh, we got a guy coming on.

I gotta be honest, like, I know exactly who you're talking about and I have the hardest time pronouncing his last name.

Oh yeah, it's Bernazzle, I think.

Is that how you—

I don't know. That's what I go with. Bernazzle, Bernazzle.

It's one of those or none of them.

Bernie.

I don't know.

The Burns. The Burns.

Um, but anyway, I'm pretty excited about that. We're gonna, we're gonna replace the cabinet doors and the drawer fronts with like a shaker style. Um, so that'd be fun. And, um, we got a guy coming on next week that's gonna wind up doing some built-ins for us, actually.

Who's next week?

Uh, well, his name is Chuck.

Oh, the furniture guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

He's coming on next week and, uh, he's gonna do some built-ins for us. And I don't know, who knows what else. But it's been kind of fun. Like, my kids, they've been like— we've been jazzing them up a little bit because the house is configured differently. You know how you like have a certain amount of furniture and This house is set up differently, so we don't need some of the furniture. We actually bought a new Lovesac Sactional. Oh, you know what I'm talking about?

You jumped on the train with Jared there.

Well, yeah, yeah, Jared. Yeah, our friend Jared, who, who helped work on this room a little bit.

He's been on the show.

Yeah. Yeah, man, they're amazing. They're really, really cool.

So don't they have like their own store?

They do. There's one in the Woodlands Mall over here.

Okay.

But Lovesac is like, they've been around for a long, long time. They've done you know, big beanbags but filled with, uh, synthetic fill. Um, so anyway, pretty excited about that. It's just one of those fun times where you get to kind of reimagine the space that you're going to be in. And we know that we're going to be there for a very long time at this point, so, um, we're trying to make some smart changes as we go in, things that we, that we want to, you know, keep for a long time. So anyway, it's fun and we're looking forward to kind of getting in and And doing our thing. So, what are you doing next week?

My trailer has a flat.

Oh, dang it! A permanent flat.

Permanent flat. Well, tires were stolen.

I'll buy you a new tire. So, anyway, so yeah, gonna be moving. So, we'll see what happens.

So, we got it. We had a cool episode tonight.

Yeah.

Someone that has been in the studio but not. physically been here.

Right. Then we've, we've talked about this person a lot.

Yeah. And so we're, we're gonna tease it a little bit further because before we do that, we need to pay the bills.

Oh, we do. Alright. I'll go first.

Yeah. Go.

Alright. The tonight's episode, today's episode, wherever you're listening to this.

Or tomorrow's.

Or tomorrow's, whatever.

Yeah.

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None of this, uh, what is it? We're not gonna—

We've done that plenty.

Yeah. We've dogged on some of those other ones where like, it's, it's a, You know, it's a cockfight to jump in there and grab one of those leads.

It is.

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Oh yeah.

I mean, like when like you're trying to sell your house and like an inspector comes through and says, well, the whole home needs to be treated. You know, well, instead of having to pay, you know, $3,000, $4,000, $5,000, that, that system's already in place because you've been paying your $35 warranty.

Man, that's a— that's like a— there— here's the thing. There's not another termite Insurance warranty type company out there. No, this is the only one.

It's the only one.

So if you want to be protected, just like insurance, it's it's a warranty. It's like insurance, whatever. Like there's no, but there's no copay or no not copay deductible.

No deductible.

Yeah. There you go. So it's easy.

Yeah. That's that. I mean, that's I don't think we've ever mentioned that before. But there is no deductible on it. That was a big question we had to ask. So anyway, tease the guest.

Yeah.

We got Deborah and Paul. In the house.

That's right.

Finally, Paul the plumber.

That's right.

How you guys doing?

We're doing good.

You're doing good. She she she doesn't like the microphone, y'all. She likes talking. She just didn't like the microphone.

She's the she's what I would call the voice behind the phone. Yeah, right.

She's the one that answers the phones, and you got you got to just get friendly with that thing like you would your cell phone.

That's right.

It's fine.

Yeah, no big deal.

Tell her, Paul.

Yeah, you just be natural.

Act cool. Act cool.

It's okay.

Be cool, man.

Be cool, man. Well, here's the deal, guys. It has been— it's been way too long because the crazy thing is Paul sponsored our show back—

the first sponsor.

Yeah, the first sponsor way back when helped kind of get us started, which Thank you, by the way. Um, pretty awesome. Um, but let's do this. One of the things we just kind of kick things off with, with most of the time is tell us a little about you and how you got into the plumbing business.

Oh, wow. Okay, well, I met Deborah. We, we worked together at our first job when she was 15 and I was 16.

Oh, wow.

It's a love story.

This is good. I'm intrigued already.

And we were, you know, a couple, and things led— one thing led to another, um, and she got pregnant.

Okay.

And I knew that during her pregnancy, she stayed with her mom. Yeah, stayed with my parents, and my parents didn't know nothing. And, uh, when the baby was born, Steven, our oldest one, and About 2 weeks in, she called me, told me about it. I saw him. I wanted to be part of his life. Sure. I didn't know if we were gonna be together, but I want to definitely be a part of his life. And one thing led to another. 5 months later, we got married.

Nice.

Her mother had to sign for her. Oh, she was underage. Wow. I just myself just turned 18.

Okay.

And So it's with July, 34 years.

Wow.

Coming up.

So congratulations.

Yeah, that's awesome.

That's been the, uh, the biggest adventure of my life. Uh, plumbing ain't got nothing.

We gotta let you see what this— she's like, oh my goodness, did he actually say that?

Wow. Yeah.

Hey, uh, Craig, do you have an extra room? Tonight, because he might— oh, you can sleep out here in the, in the studio. It'd be fine.

It's comfy.

Yeah, that's right.

I laugh at the word adventure. Yes, it's been more of a roller coaster. It's more of an adventure because the last 3 and a half years we've actually been working together every day. Yeah, it's great in one hand, and then the other hand it's like, oh Lord. Maybe we should have just stayed working somewhere, both of us. And it's been tough. That's been a tough thing.

Yeah, but it's tough not to bring work home.

That's right.

Right? I mean, because I mean, like, that's, that's what you've been doing all day. And so it's, it's natural because, because you, you were on the same topic. And so it just, it just carries home. And it's difficult not to bring it home and, and like let it continue to stress you out in some regards.

Be careful, you don't have anywhere to go.

Me?

You, you got to sleep here no matter what.

Yeah. When we, we first started, we were working at home. It was kind of hard. Now we have a shop. Okay. And, uh, our daughter made the comment when we first moved, she goes, great, you can separate home from business. And I laughed at her because, uh, when you're self-employed, there's no separation. You can try. But it's all about— I did an interview with somebody one day on another show, and they asked about how marriage and business go together. And I'm like, well, we have to remind ourselves that the business may be new, but our marriage is not.

Mm-hmm.

And, you know, are we willing to let our marriage go for the business? And if it means that, we'd shut it down in a heartbeat.

Yeah.

However, we're learning how, you know, they say to fight fair. So we, we've come up— many years ago, we came up with, uh, we don't argue and we don't fight. We have intense fellowship.

Oh, I like it.

So we, uh, there are many times that we go to blows and, uh, But it saves us because he works out in the field.

He has to leave, right? It's like, don't you have somewhere to be right now? I think you do. In fact, I made your schedule.

There, there is a built-in cool-off period.

That's right.

But you know, our customers— I'll be honest with you, our customers is what brings us together.

We—

one thing we have in common is the service of our customers. And what we believe in and how we do and conduct ourselves in front of the customer, how we treat our customers, how we show our vendors respect. You know, that we agree on.

Yeah.

I mean, some of the things we don't agree on, it's small pills in comparison to taking care of our customers. The first thing is customers. Without them, you don't have anything, right? And doesn't matter how good you are at what you do, you don't have the customers, you can't do nothing.

Yeah.

And then, you know, your, your people, your team, you know, the people that are with us, we, we— if it means I've got to stay in a truck and be one of those service guys, then that's what I'm, I'm, I'm ready to do. Right. Because that's where I'm needed right now. I like to work on the business, but right now I gotta continue to work in the business. Some days it's hard. Yeah, because the, the old muscles and the skeletal parts, they don't work like they used to. You know, when you're crawling across attics and, and changing out water heaters and getting on roofs. It's, it's rough work. Yeah.

So yeah, jungle gyms don't have anything on addicts. No, no, I, you know, so I, I actually, I have, I have kind of an odd question, but I, I think we can get some interesting answers out of you guys, uh, because I, I, because I do know that like one of the, one of the audiences that we, that we attract are, you know, entrepreneurs and business owners because they, they like to hear sort of the stories of you know, you know, because we're, we're catering to the homeowner here. Like, we want to inform them about, you know, tonight we're talking about plumbing, obviously. But like, we have a lot of people that, you know, sort of have that spirit. They want to have their own business.

Um, and I, I think a lot of times they go into it, and if they have a partner, uh, you know, like a husband or a wife that they can partner up with, I think it's natural to think, I want to, I want to bring that person along with me to do that. And so you guys, you guys have had the, I, I would say, the luxury of being married for, would you say, 30 years? 30 years.

Yeah.

And then in business for 3 now together. Like, what would you advise, you know, maybe, maybe like a young couple who's thinking about going into business together? Like, how, how could they prepare, um, their marriage to survive the business in y'all's, in y'all's opinion?

I think you should take that. She'll have some words of wisdom.

Well, yeah, no, we want to hear it. Yeah, it's not easy being married for 30 years.

It's— no, it's not. However, um, like Paul said, we started young, had our first child when, um, 16 and 17. We then— we got—

Scoot up, I want people to hear you.

We had our first child at 16 and 17, and then we got married at 17 and 18. And, um, it was, it was tough. But something Paul's always said over the years that he's told other people. He goes, I've married my best friend. And he's right. When we do stuff, we're the first people we want to tell. The first people, oh, did you hear about this? Guess what? You know, and we're texting each other. You have to be friends. Yeah. People may not understand that, as, you know, especially the younger generation. I don't know if they get it, that when you go into a relationship, you have to be friends. You can't just be a husband and wife because a husband and wife is— he's my sounding board sometimes. I come

to him and I'm venting because a customer just, just, you know, you just, you walk away and you're on the phone and you're just like as calm as you can be. But then when you get off the phone, you're just like, but then I come to him and I'm like, And I'm like, I don't need advice. I need you to listen. And you have to understand the differences between men and women. You know, you have to understand each other's love language. Does— I like acts of service. Let me start with that.

Sure.

I'm all about that. He likes words of affirmation. We have to work together with how we work together. It's no different than your marriage. But when you get your business and you put them together, You have to be each other's friends. You have to know that you are also partners in life, but you're business partners. And so you have to take each other into consideration. So it's that— it is that— it's that just consideration of each other, of what each other does. Now, there are many times I look at him and I'm like, stay in your lane, man. Stay in your lane. That's true. But, but I want to add, you are partners. I'm not the boss.

She's not the boss. We're partners.

Yeah.

We're in this 50/50. Okay, I don't know what she does. I don't think I could handle what she does, how she handles it. When I'm out in the field, customers are like, that lady that answered the phone, she is a Oh, an angel. I'm so thankful. Where did you find her? I said, I found her when I was 16. There you go. And I married her when I turned 18.

There you go.

Yeah, I think one of the things that I'm hearing, and I think this is so true, is y'all, you've figured out how to communicate with each other really, really well.

Oh, sometimes it's not pretty, but yes, we communicate real well.

Because here's the thing is like, you know what it is that you need.

Yes.

And you know what it is, what you need, and y'all have talked about that. And so if you— I mean, look, early on in my marriage, I realized that I needed recognition if I did something, which is ridiculous, right? But I needed the recognition that I did it. So, I mean, because I would do something that I thought would genuinely be thoughtful. So I would like come home and I would clean the dishwasher out. And I thought that that'd be very helpful and very kind, right? And but if I didn't get recognition for it, I would feel like, oh, she doesn't appreciate me, right? And so I actually wound up having a conversation with my wife early on. I was like, look, this is ridiculous.

I need you to tell me thank you for cleaning out the dishwasher, right? This is stupid. This is— but this is, this is true. I said, I realize it, it's unrealistic. Because nobody should have to walk into a home and go, okay, what did he do this time? Like, and he needs me to tell him thank you, but I don't know what it is, right? So I just told her, I was like, look, so what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna tell you when I've done something so that you can say thank you and it'll be fine. So it went something like this. Hey babe, it was great to see you. How was your day at work? You know, I came home a little bit early. I went ahead and

cleaned out the dishwasher. And she'd say, thank you. I'd say, thank you, it was great. No big deal. And that was it.

And I was happy.

But see, it like, I know that that sounds crazy, but it was something that I realized I needed. And so here's the deal. I mean, y'all are communicating, whether it's always perfect or not, right? But learning how to communicate with each other, I heard, was huge for y'all. So that's good.

It is. And so we pass that communication on to our customers. So we, the things that we do is we make sure we talk to them and explain to them. When I say I can be a little wordy, I'm a little wordy. If my son hears this, he's going to be like, Mom. But my son is— he couldn't understand at first why, when he came into the office, why are you— do you spend all this time? But sometimes you have to, because when they call you, they call you and ask, okay, do I get the ones that go, well, I've got this really little thing. Do y'all take care of something that small? Well, of course we do. Yeah. Yes, we do.

But then they'll ask, um, they'll ask this question and this question and then this question. There are a lot of times they call in and what's happening in their home, because they don't understand it, it is, it is the most important thing, the biggest thing. It is, it's a tragedy at that moment for them.

Yeah.

And I have learned to understand that for them This is massive for me. I can look at them, I can tell them on the phone, it's okay, this is what's happening. Because in 3 and a half years we've been married, all this time Paul's been— he's been in plumbing since our youngest was a year old.

Okay.

Okay, she will be 32 this year. So our— so since she's been a year old, he's been in plumbing. I'll be honest with you, I didn't know much about plumbing until we started our business. Because he would talk and my eyes would glaze over.

I'm so sorry.

I would also add how good she is with a customer. I mean, she's on the phone and she'll cry with a customer. And some of the things she tells me, it's moving how much a customer trusts. That is so important in our business and our line of work. And I think over the last 10, 15 years, plumbing has turned into more of a sales-type business than a skilled trade. Instead of repairing something, they would rather sell you a brand new system. You know, water heaters are real bad where, you know, 6, 7 years old, instead of trying to repair it, let's, let's just swap it out.

Yeah.

And, you know, I think in a way that's not good for our trade. Back in the old days before I was even around, that was a long time ago, but the plumber could fix anything.

Yeah.

Now mind you, today's parts, uh, like faucets and stuff, they're really not worth fixing, right? The old style with brass stuff in the insides that actually had metal in there, metal in there.

Yeah.

They're worth fixing. But like a water heater, I mean, one valve, one pilot, one thermocouple would fit any heater universal. Now it's not like that, right? So, so it's a little different. You had to find the right valve, you find the right pilot. Some of them go on backwards threads, you don't want to pilot, so you can't keep standard parts on your truck anymore.

Okay, I got you.

So that's, that's the thing that's a little tougher now. But we'll get on the phone with the warranty company, not the warranty company, but the, like Rheem water heaters or Bradford White, and we'll sit on the phone with them. If it's under warranty, we're gonna get you your parts. They're gonna usually send them right back to you, and then you'll call us back out and we'll put it in for you and repair it.

Do you think, do you think that's a strategy among some of these, uh, manufacturers to make it more difficult for guys like you to be able to repair these things? Because I, I can imagine like a stressed-out homeowner going, okay, like, yeah, it's under warranty and yes, they're going to send me the part, the part's going to take 5 days to get here, but you can put the new water heater in tomorrow?

Yeah, you know, we've got some customers who are like that and that's okay, but—

I don't blame the customer.

No, no, no, it did— I think you're, you're right, just the manufacturers.

I mean, it makes sense for them because they want to produce more and You know, and same with the big companies.

Big companies, it's about big ticket items.

Yeah.

And, and we want the big ticket item, but we were discussing before the show started.

Yep.

We'll do these little jobs. We'll do the small job. No, it's not— never too small.

Well, I think, I think one of the things that, that is in probably more so than most industries, maybe, you know, air conditioning in the summer. But plumbing is one of those things that typically whenever you need a plumber, you need them yesterday. Like, something happened and I've got to get it done today. There's water in my house or the bathroom, you know, the toilet stopped up or, you know, the sink is clogged or something has catastrophically happened. We actually talked about that before the show too, a little bit that there's, you know, ongoing maintenance probably needs to happen. But at the same time, it's like, People wait until something breaks and they don't notice it until something breaks a lot of times. And it's like, well, now I gotta, I

can't use this until it's fixed and they need it now. And so, you know, even if it's a small job, it's still important to the customer, you know, right then. So I do remember that, are y'all still doing the video chats? Are y'all still doing that?

'Cause I know early on whenever we were, whenever that was kind of like in COVID.

That was during COVID Okay, so y'all don't do that as much anymore.

Now I'll be honest with you, We've done it a few times with with a customer because we can't get to them. So we will. I will get them to send me pictures. I will get them to send me stuff. And if it's something that even if it's a toilet that's making some odd noise, I'm like, okay, send me a video.

Yeah.

Send me a video. Let me let me listen to this.

Yeah.

And this is where this is where I need him. at this point where I'll sit him down. I'm like, okay, we need to take a breath, take a minute. Now let's go through this, this, this, and this. I had this customer do this, and this customer sent me this, and they're asking this. And so we have to— so that's when we talked about how we can't just always leave it at the office.

Right.

It comes home sometimes. So I have a home office. I got a phone that rings in my house, and I have to shut the door. Because at certain times you've got to shut it off. However, um, we do— we'll go down the list and I'll just tell the customer, okay, please send me this because I can't get to you for the next 5 days or whatever, and let me see if it's even something we need to come out for. Yeah. And, um, it just depends on what it is. But because I pick his brain so much, because I want to know So I can communicate with the customer and help them over the phone.

Yeah.

And then determine, okay, yes, we do need to come out. This is what we need to do. And we're one of the few companies around this area that'll give over-the-phone estimates. You know, now we leave, we leave it open, you know, sight unseen.

Right.

But usually I can, you can tell me the scenario and I can tell you right about a ballpark figure where you're at.

Yeah.

And sometimes the customer asks me, is that labor and material? That's everything.

Yeah.

Nothing these days especially is, I don't want to say cheap, but nothing is economical. Parts have gone up so much.

Yeah.

It's been absolutely crazy.

Yeah.

And of course gas.

I was also going to say, have you guys had to adjust because of gas? I know we have.

Yeah, yeah, we haven't adjusted, but we're working on our prices again. Yeah, it's just crazy. Yeah, it hurts us. It, it, you know, I, I stress to people, we're homeowners too. Yeah, we understand, because see, we may understand plumbing, I don't understand electrical or AC, or— so I still got to call those trades, right, from my own home. Yeah, there's a locksmith coming out tomorrow. Yes, yes, I have a locksmith coming. He's one of our customers.

What'd y'all do?

Oh, the front door, the entry with the keypad. It finally died. It finally died. And we don't have a key to it.

There you go.

So I was— we got— I got home today and he's going through the garage and I looked at him and he goes, it finally died. It just died. And I went, what is the timing? I've got them coming tomorrow.

Yeah.

You know, so yeah.

Can I, can I tell you guys a crazy lock story real quick? It's not real long, but like when, when my wife and I had our first child, we had a small group of people that would come over to our house every Sunday night. And, and one of these times we had it, and typically what would happen is we'd come and we'd hang out, and then a bunch of us would, you know, pick up and go get a bunch of takeout and then bring it back to our house so that we could all, you know, fellowship and have a good time together. So this particular time, a bunch of us left, and my, my first daughter had just been born, and my wife was like, I'll just stay here And I think she was there with like one other friend. And I

should also back this up by saying one of the guys that was in our group was HPD at the time. And so we, uh, we're gone for like maybe 7 minutes and my wife calls me and she goes, come back to the house right now, come back right now. And I was like, what's going on? She goes, I think somebody's trying to break into the front door.

Oh my God.

And when we left, we hadn't locked the front door. And I was— so I was freaking out. I was like, oh my gosh, you know, somebody could be in the house. And so we get home and, you know, I throw open the front door and my buddy who's HPD, we're going through and we're clearing every room. Like we're looking under the beds for like, you know, something was going on. My wife had gone out the back door with the dog and the baby and had gone over to the neighbor's house because she just heard somebody shuffling around the front door. So we clear the house and we come back out and we're like, what's going on with this door? Like, and we look at it and when I had stuck my key into it,

the lock had literally crumbled.

Oh.

And what had happened is somebody had, uh, what do they, what do they use? It's like, uh, what do you use like when you freeze flowers? Liquid nitrogen. They had sprayed liquid—

is that what it is?

Yeah, liquid nitrogen. They had sprayed liquid nitrogen into the lock in order to break it, but when they did, they locked themselves out because they thought they were freezing it to unlock the door, to freeze the lock mechanism. And when they did, they froze it and locked themselves out.

Wow.

So when I got there, I stuck my key in, it worked, I unlocked it, but when it did, it just crumbled the lock mechanism.

Interesting.

It was the craziest thing.

So someone was actually there?

Yeah, someone had actually been there. Yeah, for sure.

That's crazy.

And I think it was like, it was like 2 weeks later my truck got broken into and we— there was like a trail of blood down the driveway.

What?

He'd like— I had a really old pickup truck and he was trying to get my stereo out.

Look, this, this is like the worst robber ever. Because look, if I'm— if you're dumb enough to to rob someone, wouldn't you think the first thing you would do is try the handle first? Yeah.

Turn the knob first. He clearly knew our routine.

Yeah.

Because it was like, let's hang out on Sunday. We leave around 7 to go pick up dinner. We're gone for an hour and a half, and then we come back. He was like, I got an hour and a half to clean this house out. My wife just happened to be there.

Wow. That's a scary story, but It's amazing too.

So it is, but like, you know, have a good lock.

There you go. You know, that's right. You need to have a good locksmith.

Good locksmith as well. Good backup system for your lock.

That's right.

Yeah, well, the locksmith that I called, he says, okay, we're not going to use this brand. This is the brand I suggest. This is what I would never do this to you. And he went through it with me. And we've done this with them because again, that's how we met. They called us, they're customers of ours.

Yeah.

And, uh, and this is how we've, we've met. And we've, the wife and I have kind of gotten along where we have a lot of similarities in our families. And her and I just start laughing about all the similarities. And then, so I'm like, you know what, I gotta call them. This lock is about to go out and, and I'm not letting anyone touch it. I know what's gonna happen. He's a plumber. That's all I have to say. And, uh, so he called. And he gave me my estimate, and I, I get so busy that I forgot. So last night I'm texting and I'm emailing them back. I'm going, oh my God, I forgot I'm gonna miss my appointment. And I said, I called this morning, I went, did y'all get that? I need to know, am I still on the schedule? And

they're like, oh yeah, you're still. Just to come home to find out that the lock died.

And I'm like, what timing.

Wow.

So again, that leads to we're homeowners too. Yeah. So we understand I don't like surprises, so we don't want to give our customers surprises. So I try to give disclaimers over the phone and be honest with them as much as we can, be as open. Transparent. That's just the best we can. And, you know, I will tell you this, I'm better over the phone. I can make you laugh. I get in front of people and I freeze up. He's the opposite.

Get you on the phone.

On the phone, I'm just like, don't you ever answer my phones again. Just go away. Don't you ever answer my phones again. That's a true story. But he gets in front of somebody and he's just like, I'm like, who is this person? Who are you? But that's, that's kind of how we work together. It's, we've, we've learned a lot about each other since being in business. And You would think being married, it was almost 31 years because we'll be 34, 34 this July, but we'll be going on 4 years in business by November.

Okay, so that's awesome. Well, one of the things, so, so you, you came out to my house, I don't know, it was probably 3 years ago at this point. And one of the things I appreciated is we had a couple of issues that were, that were going on and I didn't know what I needed, but at the same time, you took the time to explain, look, if you don't do this, then this is going to be a problem. So one of the things that I'm always very cognizant about, especially one of the reasons, like, whenever we're talking to our listeners on this show, is I want to help them figure out how do I not get scammed by a tradesperson, like by a contractor? How do I not—

uh, because I don't know what I'm doing. Like, all I know is that there's an issue here, and, and how do I know that they're not selling me a water heater when they could have just replaced the pilot for, you know, a fraction of the price or whatever? Um, so I'm curious for you, you've, you've done plumbing for a long time. I don't know who your previous employer was and what his expectation was of you as far as, uh, You know, sell them this versus sell them that. Uh, 'cause I know that happens all the time. Um, what would you say, how do you find a plumber, for example, that, that is going to take care of you and not just sell you something you don't actually need?

Ooh, that's, that's a, uh, that's a tough one because I think in the residential game, I came from the commercial background.

Okay.

So all our jobs were like customer call, you go out and do it, you go out and do it, T&M. Or even if you flat price, you flat price. We already had pre-approvals. The thing I've learned about residential is most of your companies, it's more about sales.

Yeah.

I hate to say that word and I say it like it's a dirty word and it's not. The only thing you have to truly sell to your customer is yourself. You know, we like to take the part as being a trusted advisor to our customers. Our customers are, I mean, I really mean this, they're our friends. We've got a lot of friendships with our customers and I treat them better than I treat my own family. You know what I'm saying?

Yeah.

When I hear the stories of what somebody paid for something, it's— I don't know what the other company's overhead is. Their prices are gonna be higher, they have more overhead. I understand that. But some of the stuff I've heard, it's like, man, they could have done it like this and not, you know, had to pay that.

Right.

You know, tunnel under a house when all you had to do was cap the line off and reroute it through a cabinet. outside to a cleanout or something, right? You know, um, or reroute a drain or reroute a water line. Some of it's really, really easy stuff. Some of it's just service the line.

Mm-hmm.

I mean, like, 2 weeks ago in Conroe, I went out. One of the bigger companies said that they need to, uh, tunnel under the house. and replace cast iron pipe. I went out there and tried to run it from the vent up on the roof. It was too much cable going in, so it wouldn't make the P-trap. It— P-trap was under the slab. I didn't know till I went inside. Cut the vent, went through the vent, ran it out, unstopped it for a fraction of— she goes, they were going to charge me 10 grand. She goes, I didn't have that kind of money. Geez. And I said, let me try, because I don't know the skill level of that technician that was there,

or was he a sales-minded technician, you know, trying to separate money from people's bank account. And it took me about an hour, but I stopped it. She was very, very happy with us. Sure, you know, I've done that several times. You know, I always try to say, let me do it myself, 'cause she wanted me to just go by the scope of work and go, how much would you charge to do this?

Wow.

Well, I was trying to reroute it outside, under sidewalk, around the back to a house, to the cleanout in the back. And, you know, let's see the best price I can get you. And I said, you know what? We're gonna run this thing. And once we ran it, we got it unstopped. Wow. So there's a, there's a right way to do it, taking the high road. I always tell my customers, I still sleep at night.

Yeah.

You know, hey, Deborah knows this, we'll lose money before our customers waste money. And, you know, I'm almost to a fault where if it's questionable, Yeah, I could probably charge for that, but let's just take care of it.

So in that particular situation, what is it that— and I don't want to get into who that company was, but what is it that they were going to do that was going to cost $10,000?

It was the routing of the underneath.

They were going to tunnel underneath.

They were just going to bypass the problem, right?

Well, no, they were going to fix the problem. They were going to tunnel underneath. Make an access hole outside, tunnel underneath.

Right.

It's like underneath the foundation.

Underneath foundation to replace that pipe.

Okay.

When that absolutely has to be done, it has to be done. Yeah.

So I know you and I talked the other day about that weird one that I came across where the supply lines were coming up through the foundation in the middle of that bedroom. Is that a situation like where I might need to go in if something were to happen with those pipes? You can either redirect them up above or you can go tunnel underneath.

Well, with that kind of work, we, we would have to find out where the lines came from and where they're going to, then put a test on it, find out which one's leaking, find out where it goes to, then take it up and over. Unless it's like a sleeve, like in an island sink. Right. In Wood Forest, I've had houses like 4 years old. I've had to go out there and have it tunneled 15 feet. And I've had to replace that pipe that was in there. It was 4 years old. It wasn't gonna fix just one line. I fixed both lines because we got it done. We opened up.

As long as you're there, right?

I gotta do both.

Yeah.

It's gonna cost you the same amount of money both ways. Trust me, most of the money's in the excavation and the backfill.

I would imagine.

It's not in the plumbing. It's about a 2-hour plumbing job to route that. And I found out what was funny is this customer, she was home, husband was in Louisiana, they were about to move. She went into the attic, followed the 2 water lines down the exterior of the house, and she goes, they come in behind this cabinet and I cut Under the cabinet. They're right there.

Wow.

I said, you know more than most plumbers know.

That's amazing.

For a diagnosis, she diagnosed everything.

Oh, wow.

And then I went under the sink in the island and I could see where the pipe, it was a sleeve. It's a PVC sleeve that has both lines in it.

Yeah.

They took regular hard rigid CPVC pipe and forced it down that. And—

Was that the one you were telling me about where they—

They curved it.

Curved it, yeah.

They make a soft, CPVC, which would probably have been better in that application. PEX would have been the best.

Sure.

But use the soft rolled CPVC. I've seen it done before. They used hard pipe and then they put 90s in there. You couldn't hardly make the turns. So it was, it was a pain. But the most, the biggest part of the job was excavation.

Yeah. So do, do builders, I mean, like you said that that home was only 4 years old. Do builders not warranty the plumbing?

The, the most times on built homes, it's a 1-year warranty.

But is that like from completion or—

From completion, when they, when they, when, you know, 1 year from the date, I guess, you buy the house. Okay. Um, and then that seems, you know, I do construction.

That's so—

that's, that's completely normal.

I know it's normal, but it just— I mean, like, you know.

Well, the one thing I can tell you This is from the state board. If you do it sketchy as a plumber, a licensed plumber in the state of Texas, and say, I'm retired in 20 years or something.

Right.

And the company's still going and something we did that wasn't like the way it should have been done.

Sure.

It's a lifetime warranty.

What?

It's the plumber's responsibility and obligation to make that job right.

Wow.

Huh. That's if it's done wrong or, you know, in certain way that's like—

You mean if somebody comes in and goes, well, what the heck was this guy doing?

Yeah.

Okay. So, but like if you do it right—

Yeah, you, you just give your standard warranty.

Okay, that makes more sense. I gotcha.

Yeah, I think, I think, um, when it, when it comes to what I hear you're, you're talking about with, uh, with how you deal with your customers and everything, the hard part is a lot of people Um, they call a plumber, they go, hey, can you get out here in the next hour? Well, no, sorry. So they hang up and they call someone else. Can you get out here in the next hour? And whoever says yes is who they hire. And then they wind up getting these yahoos there who, first of all, don't know how to do plumbing, or if they do, they're just gonna try to sell you something. Um, or worse, this is to me worse, They bought a

home warranty company, uh, that they don't have any control over who comes to their house. And so they call the home warranty people and say, hey, I've got a plumbing problem. The home warranty company says, now you're gonna have to pay your deductible of $100.

Yep.

And we're gonna send a plumber out. That plumber gets there and they— like, I actually had a home warranty Plumber come to my house one time, and he told me, he said, "I just want." It was a it was a disposal problem, garbage disposal. And he told me, he said, "My boss reminds us every single day, you do not replace garbage disposals. You do not replace garbage disposals." And I'm like, "What are you talking about?" He was like, "We are we are instructed, do not." Yeah, I was like, you probably shouldn't be telling me this right now.

Like, but he said, he said that they just basically hit record on my phone. Say it loud one more time.

Exactly. Because he was like, he was like, we basically— my, my boss basically tells us that we're not going to pay for garbage disposal. So any garbage disposal claim that we get through home warranty, we're going to deny it. And you're going to have to pay for it. So I was like, okay, so I just paid $100 for a garbage disposal. technician to come out here. And I could have paid $150 and got a new garbage disposal from Lowe's or Home Depot, put it in myself. And he's like, yep. I'm like, well, now I gotta go pay $150 for this garbage disposal. I was trying to save $50. But that kind of stuff happens all the time. And so here's, here's one of the things that I think is probably really

important is just think ahead a little bit. I mean, you, you look at the, look at the age of your water heater, you know, kind of pay attention to weird sounds, pay attention to things that aren't draining very well. And try to search for someone that's actually going to do a really good job. I mean, if you live in this area, obviously call Paul the Plumber. But if you don't, then, then take your time and ask a lot of questions. You know, how do you, how do you do this? How do you do that? Right.

Yeah.

And how does that kind of thing work? Because, um, if you wind up calling the, you know, the emergency plumber line, it's, uh, you're, you're going to get who you're going to get. You know, that's what I think.

No, you're right. You're going to get a, you're going to get a guy and there's companies that are in business that from, from the evenings through the weekend and holidays, that's 50, 60% of their revenue.

Wow.

Because they know a lot of times when people call on those days, now there's some customers, they just gotta have it done. They don't, they get, you know, the only time they have off is on a weekend.

Right.

They have to, you know, but you, 'cause there's, plumbers out there that are ready to take, and I don't mean it in a bad way towards my trade.

Sure. Yeah.

And our business, but they want, they're going to make more money on the weekend.

For sure.

And on a holiday and at night.

People are willing to pay more for emergencies.

And there's a small group of people and customers. They don't even care how much it costs.

Right.

Just get here.

Just get here. Can you be here now? They don't have a choice. There are many that just don't have a choice. They're— it's, it's cold out and their water heater went out. So they're bathing their kids, their, their little ones, and there are times that their whole house is just stopped up. Mm-hmm. You can't— there are times a lot of people have 2 and 3 and 4 restrooms in their home, and if one is, well, we, we have others, we can use those. But when none of them are working, then you have a, you have a problem.

Yeah.

That you don't have a choice but to get it fixed. So there are times that they, they don't have an option to do this. They can't just go stay at a neighbor's house or go stay at a friend's house.

Right.

So we, we understand that. We just have, we just, we would hope that, that our, and I don't wanna call other plumbing companies our competitors. It is what it is. However, you know, there's enough work out there for everybody.

Yeah.

We have such a big community, it's such a big area we're in, and we're not in a tiny little town. So, but I would hope that they would be just as honest and open with their customers and, and just look at it. And yes, we will do— we like to do repair before replace. However, if it's safe.

Yeah.

It has to be cost-effective for them. Because if you're going to repair something and you're just going to drop money into it, and we know that from the beginning, we're going to tell you, look, we can do this now, but this is not a guarantee this is going to fix the problem. But I will suggest that if you go this route, it's going to be a little more expensive now, but down the road, this is where you're going to be. Um, and it has to be safe. If we see that it's not going to be safe, we're going to tell you.

Yeah.

Because your safety is our priority. I wouldn't want that in my house.

Yeah.

I don't want it in yours. And that's how we look at things. And no, I feel like we can all learn from each other. We have a— I guess I'm gonna throw that out there. I've got what I call plumbing sisters. Their companies, one in Katy, one out in Missouri City, and, uh, we don't go to Katy, you know, go to Missouri City. Yeah, so that's a kind of a drive.

Yes, it is.

So we partner with them.

Yeah, and I know like in, in our, in our industry, like there's, there's a lot of other like quote-unquote competitors, um, that I'm like you, I don't necessarily look at them as competitors because I'm like, you know, I can drive down the street and like all of us can have plenty of business You know, looking at, looking at the number of houses around here, I mean, like, we were the fastest growing cities 2 years in a row. There's, there's plenty of work. But one of the things I, I do is, especially if someone calls me and says that they've been unhappy with another company, I always ask who's the other company. Not because I want to know who the bad guy is, I want to know if it's a good

guy, because then, then I know, oh, you're going to be a problem.

You know what, we actually had a customer not too long ago that did that with a company that We've actually become pretty close with this owner and kind of gotten to know him. And, um, the customer gave us a story and kept telling me stuff. I told Paul, I said, you need to call so-and-so. And, and, and she's like, oh no, please don't do that. I told him, I said, because of that, you need to make that phone call.

Yep.

Yeah, because something's not right. Yeah. And sure enough, What came around, we're like, okay, we got both sides of the story. He did everything he was supposed to do, and and and took care of everything he was supposed to take care of. There was no issue on his part, right? But because she wanted me to go upstairs and look at stuff he did during the freeze, okay, a year later basically, and I looked up there and go, no, he did a great great. I didn't know who it was at the time. And I finally said, you got to tell me who it is now. And then when she did, we're close friends.

Yeah.

I mean, he refers us work in the area all the time.

Yeah.

And, um, I waited through the weekend, then I finally called him. Then he goes, I'm just glad she got it done. But I said, well, I want to let you know what she told me.

Yeah.

He goes, I didn't do that. My guy sat there the whole time. They were there to help, do whatever they want. And when the fire department told them to leave, that's when they left. Because there were, there were issues on that. And so, yeah, like you said, you— I want to know. And it's not, uh, there's another plumbing company in the area When we first started business, we would get the phone calls, oh my God, such and such, they're so expensive.

Right.

And I would tell them, I would tell the customer, I said, look, they have a lot more vehicles, they have a lot more overhead than we do. We're still a small company. However, my goal is to be where they are.

To be there, yeah.

That's, that's my goal. That's, that's what I want. I want to be able to see, and we're going to be there. And then one day you're gonna be calling somebody else saying, God, Paul the Plumber's so expensive. Well, we're not, we just, we're growing.

Yeah.

And I said, and that's what's happened to them. And I don't believe, we do not believe in bashing other companies by no means.

No, not at all.

But, but I do think it's important for regular homeowners to understand that they don't have a monopoly on reviews. You know what I mean? I mean, like, it's not, it's not as if tradespeople don't talk amongst themselves. And so like, if you're gonna be a bad actor, like it's eventually gonna come out and no one's gonna wanna work with you. I mean, like, no matter how much, how much money's in your bank account, eventually some, some people just aren't worth it. And so, like, I think it's good to know that, like, like, plumbers talk to other plumbers, electricians talk to other electricians, AC guys talk to AC guys. I mean, like, we, we all talk to one another. And so,

like, like, we know, we, and those of us that have been around long enough know who the bad actors are. And they're pretty good at smelling them out.

And so if you're having trouble getting service, it's probably not you, it's me type of thing. Just the way it goes.

Yeah. So it may take some time to clean your record up. That's all I'm saying.

No doubt.

One of the things I know we wanted to talk about with you guys because it's something I'm interested in is the hot water heater situation. I've, I've got a bugaboo about hot water heaters up in the attic, but I also want to talk about tankless stuff. So which, which, which direction you guys want to go?

You go either way. You want to talk about attic?

All right. Yeah, let's, let's start with the attic one because here's, here's why they bug me. I, I can— I've had several customers who have had to be out of their homes for months on end because of exploding hot water heaters in the attic.

Dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb.

And I can't, I can't for the life of me figure out why the builders do it this way. We're like, like, they have perfectly good, like, utility areas in, like, the garage. I don't know if it's, like, gravity that they're trying to take advantage of to move the water through. I don't, I don't understand. But, like, to me, it's just like, it's a ticking time bomb waiting to flood your entire home. And, like, I'll go up there and there'll be, like, 2 or 3 hot water heaters in an attic. And is there any— I mean, like, one, like, I mean, I don't know about y'all's home. Where's the hot water heater in y'all's house?

Above my closet.

Above your closet.

Okay. Where my shoes are.

Does that make you feel comfortable?

No, no, it does not.

Me either.

So I tell people, my water heater is above my shoes and my purses. My clothes can be washed. It's above my shoes and my purses. Yeah, I'm not a happy camper about this.

So Paul, is there, is there any, is there any good reason why they might put them up other than space?

I think it's space, and I was talking to another plumber that's, you know, up north, and they have, they have basements, right? We don't have basements here, so that's our basement up in the attic. Uh, I've heard before from a realtor that I don't know for sure if this is true, but it takes away from the square footage in your house for the sale price. So anything that's up in the attic, that's not taking space up in the main part of the house, right? They could charge more for.

Well, what about the garage though?

I mean, like, garage, I'd love that.

Well, I mean, like, I see like older homes, I see them like in the corner of the garage, right?

That's where my new one is.

Yes.

Yes. Yes.

And like, to me, it's like, okay, that makes sense. It's easy to access. I don't have to be up in the attic. Like, it's not gonna flood anything. If it does, just goes out the driveway, right? I mean, would it make a difference if the garage was detached? I mean, is it just like a—

No, I think, like, if it goes up 2 stories through a garage, like, up through the other story, then through the attic, you'd have to have a flue vent on a gas water heater.

Oh, you're right.

Natural gas.

Yeah. I mean, I guess you could take it out the side of a of a, of a garage, right? Um, you know, we're actually going to be moving, taking that tank out of our attic above her shoes and clothes because—

Gotta preserve those.

Small area of clothes in that closet. Uh, don't listen to him. But we have a tankless we're going to put in the garage.

Okay.

So, uh, we just haven't had time to put it in. So I keep getting bumped off the schedule. Uh-oh.

Yeah, because again, we've said it, our customers come first.

first. And when I start getting jobs, I'm the one that goes, man, and I'm clicking the schedule on the dispatch screen going, fine, I'll just move my schedule. You know, but I will tell y'all, my water heater goes out, I don't care where these people are, people are getting up at 3 o'clock in the morning and changing water. So all I pray is that it does not do what I've heard stories from some of our customers where they've— somebody's come home with their water heater in their bed.

Yep. Yep.

So, and but yeah, we're with you when it comes to the attic. We— I don't like them in the attic, especially because during the summer it is so stinking hot.

Yeah, and you guys like— and Paul has to go up there and like be in the attic with that thing.

Yes. And so it just— I mean, you're up there 2 minutes and they're drenched.

Yeah.

So Um, I tried to do— try to schedule those for first thing in the morning. And during the winter, we could do one in the morning, one in the afternoon. We could do— right now, now we're starting to get to the place we can't. Yeah, but now we're— we are going to do the tankless and we're having it put in the garage.

So, okay. Well, let me ask you this, because I, I'm, I'm, I'm looking at the tankless. I want to move over to the tankless. I'm, you know, I'm happy with my my natural gas one right now, it's working. But, you know, if I, if I need to move on, I want to go tankless. One of the things that I'm seeing on— and it's not all the time, and so I'm asking you, like, does this work? I'm seeing it on the exterior of the home. So what's up with that?

That's a, that's a good place for it. Yeah, put it on the exterior home. They have a vent, a vent termination cap. So no water gets in it. Uh, the only thing that might be a detractor, if we have another winter like we had in 2021, there was a lot of parts that were—

Got seized up.

Especially when the power went out.

Okay.

Because they have, they have little things in there that keep them warm.

Okay.

Uh, but when the power went out and it, you know, for 12, 24, you know, some of them were 24 hours without power. They had like a 12-week backlog.

Oh my goodness.

On repair parts, actually.

Are those, are those the electric tankless?

Those are the gas.

The gas tankless.

I'm sure electric— I don't see a lot of electric unless it's for one fixture.

Okay.

I do see them like on a travel trailer, right, or something small space, but I don't see them a lot tankless like that'll do 3 bathrooms. Most of those are gas.

Okay.

So what, how, okay, so explain to me then, during the freeze, there's something about them that's electric then?

Well, there's electric components in it that run everything else, and that'll heat up the stuff in it that has the water in it.

Okay, I would imagine like the ignition system on the ride.

The ignition system, the blower motor, the computer board, all the solenoids that are in there.

Mm-hmm.

You know, those things have a solenoid valve that, you know, you gotta have so many gallons a minute, and if it's going too fast, it has to choke down the pressure so it'll get temperature instead of pressure. So the higher you set that temperature on that tankless inside your house, that, that water pressure will be reduced to like a trickle. I remember going out, helping another company out when I first got into business. And he goes, man, I've got this guy that owns this in River Oaks that owns this construction company. And we put 3 of these things in. And he said he can pee harder than what's coming out of the shower. And I said, the

first thing I said was, okay, what's the temperature set? Well, he wants hot, hot water. It's set at 160. I said, that's the problem.

Uh-huh.

It's gonna get temperature on that water over pressure.

Yeah.

So the lower you have that temperature, usually in a house it's 120.

Yeah, okay, okay, reasonable.

Yeah, and these things go 16 gallons a minute.

Cooking crawfish in your bathtub.

So, right?

Goodness gracious. So, um, let me ask this other question because, uh, at one point I was looking at putting a tankless water heater in and, uh, the plumber Said, well, um, a lot of, a lot of houses in your neighborhood, it's going to be very expensive because they got half-inch pipe coming to them. So are most tankless water heaters requiring 3/4-inch pipe?

Tell you the truth, all water heaters are requiring at least 3/4. You and your tank types have—

Because apparently in the neighborhood that I— now it was an old neighborhood, all right?

My—

the house that I had was built in '45, and it was—

You can say who it is. You don't live there anymore.

No, no, no, no, no, not that one. No, I've consistently, like, increased the, the year of the house that I purchased. Okay, newer homes. The first— this was the first one I ever bought. It was in Arkansas. Okay, 1945. And it was, it was 3/4-inch pipe. But he said, he said, for whatever reason, a lot of them in that neighborhood were 1/2-inch.

Wow.

Said so. So that was an issue that apparently you're not running into most of the time.

No, not around here. Good. Usually no. Good to know.

Yeah, it's good to know.

For you, it's really good to know.

Yes.

Because you want to put one in. I do now. So okay, so let's talk about tankless. But so obviously, in my opinion, the one of the biggest reasons to go tankless is you're not storing 50 gallons, 40, 50 gallons of water. Ruin your shoes. Having to— exactly. You're having to continually keep hot. So what are you—

Keep up in the attic. Exactly.

So what a leak That's ridiculous.

So let's say that you don't— like, for me, my— the new home that I'm— that I've purchased, the hot water heater is in the garage where it should be. Let's say it goes out. Would it be wise to put in a tankless water heater at all? What are the— when— at what points is it a good idea to put in tankless, I guess, is the question?

I think it's got to be It's got to be your preference. Uh, because I used to talk people out of it when I first went into business, and my customer finally said, no, I want a tankless and it's final. And so I, I put her tankless in and she had 3.5 bathrooms. And, and it's a lot. I just want to make sure she was going to have enough hot water everywhere. Sure. And, uh, I said, okay, let's— and it was 2 tanks up there, so it was 100 gallons of water.

Hmm.

To now, I think it was 16 gallons a minute, that particular tankless.

So she went from 2 hot water heaters to 1 tankless.

And actually, when they— when customers do that, I try to give them that option because it's only about $900 more for me to put a tankless in than to put 2 tanks in.

Oh, wow.

So it's not that much difference because that one little tankless can carry that load of that 100 gallons.

Okay.

Or 80 to 100 gallons, whatever you have up there. Um, and I can retro those. The heaters have come a long way. Before, you had to make sure the gas pipe was 3/4 all the way. You had to make sure everything was sized right. Now I pipe the lines together, in, out. Gas goes in. They do have a drain on them because they condense. We take those to an approved drain. Um, and the P— you know, the vents are PVC. The flue vent goes out with upside-down P-trap through the roof. And then we come— usually, as long as the square footage is right in the attic, we draw our fresh air from the attic space. And,

um, there's one more thing. Oh, they have to have an electrician to run a plug over to there.

Is it just a 120?

It's just a 120.

Yeah.

And then we build a wall, like a plywood wall from joists down the floor, and then we put a piece of plywood on there. We hang the heat We hang the heater and we re-pipe it, and they look pretty sharp.

Yeah.

You know, I like them. That's why I got one I hadn't put in yet. Yeah, I've just tired of, you know, 50 gallons in 8 years now.

Yeah.

And one shower basically is what we go through on a, on a tank, right? And you know, and take so long to recover. And that's probably because of the sediment. Another thing with tankless, consider some kind of descaler, you know, uh, for hardness of water. Because like the Navien is the one we recommend. It's just, to me, it, for— it was made for this region. Okay. Um, they got a stainless steel heat exchanger. And you get a 15-year warranty on that thing.

Oh wow.

And if they know you're protecting the water or treating the water before it goes in there, then they'll honor it. They'll honor that. But understand, that's what he's about to say, and that's why I wanted to say this. I have to jump in. We, we like to inform our customers, take care of it, because you're putting a computer in your, your house to take care of your water, and it needs to be maintained. So you need to service it. You can get away with it with the tank type, but not with the tankless. You must service it. You must have it, have it flushed. You must have it just run through, take care of it. But also, as he

was saying about descaler, Navien provides one that you can purchase, or if you have a water softener in your home.

Okay.

Make sure that it's taking care of the water.

Before it gets to that.

Because there is a thing for Navien. We've read it, we looked for it. It will not warranty after, after a scale of 11 parts per million. They'll void the warranty. Oh, so we always do a free water test if someone wants a tankless, and most of them, it's not crazy high. Some well water might be 12, 15, but we've got a little small unit that we could put in before to go in.

Like a filter of some sort?

Like a filtration, but you got to change it every year.

Okay. So the maintenance on the Navien, is that something that you guys have to do? Is that something they can do on their own?

Well, here's what I tell people. Do it the first year. You can do it in 12 months. Um, I've been told by the local rep, if you do it and you see the— you see what's in there, if it's not cloudy and it looks clean, then go every 18 months.

Okay.

Okay, you can spread them out. Uh, the very first one, and she didn't have real hard water, she had a 6, so we didn't recommend putting any kind of filtration or anything in. But I went there the first year, 12 months on the dot, in November, ran it clean. Told her, let's wait 2 years. And this November will be 2 years.

Okay.

So I'll go back there, um, and I show the homeowner. I'll say, hey, come up here if you want me to show you. You invest $100 in a pump, and a bucket, get a lid for the bucket and, and some washing machine hoses, and I'll show you how to do this. There's all kinds of stuff on YouTube.

Yeah.

They show you this stuff, and it's very, very easy. And, and instead of buying a solution, just buy just, just regular vinegar. Put 3 gallons of vinegar in there, let it rip for about 45 minutes to cycle through there.

You just recirculating that vinegar?

Recircle it through there. And then if it looks like a— like, you know, you ever see copper pennies in a thing of water and it turns kind of green and cloudy? If it's like that, stay on top of it every year. If it's not, pretty clean, not real cloudy, you can go 2 years.

Wow, sounds like cleaning the coffee pot.

I've seen some people's Keurigs.

That's rough water.

Just buy a new one.

Get rid of that for so many reasons.

Yeah, that's true. Okay. Well, um, I got one more question.

Yeah.

Um, so let's talk about garbage disposals for a second.

Okay.

Um, how much— I'm just curious, how much do you hate garbage disposals?

I will tell you this about disposables. They were— it's a commercial invention for restaurants.

Mm-hmm.

I'll replace them. I'll do whatever I have to. But I always tell people, I know when people have cleaned their refrigerator out or had a big after Christmas meal or something where Christmas, where they threw everything away. The commercial units are much bigger in a restaurant, and the pipe that it's going into is bigger, is much bigger.

Yeah, right.

The one for a house, that line, when it gets in the wand down, that's a 2-inch line, right? And they usually 90s and then 90s again. It's designed for a home.

Uh huh.

But I think all it's good for is to keep me in business.

Yes.

To be honest, to be quite frank about it.

Well, so just just for everyone's own personal edification, I don't I don't have one, but like I used to. What shouldn't people be putting down the garbage disposal?

That's that's.

But like in one sense, you're like no, please put this down there because I'm gonna have to come out and clean.

No no no no no.

I Any kind of peels.

Peels? Like potato peels?

Carrot peels. Uh, I've seen onions, like husk, the, you know, the thing.

Oh, like onion skins.

Okay. Um, I've seen banana peels.

Oh my goodness. Uh, what?

Yep, banana peels. The worst I've ever seen was in Woodforest, and I think it was, uh, right after Christmas one year, the first year we were in business. And there's a lovely couple, retired couple in there. I love them to death. They're, they're really good. They moved back to Dallas.

Great customers.

The husband got a master class thing from a chef, a real world-renowned chef. Now, when I got there, the wife had to leave. She was gone. She— I— we talked to her and she said, I just had to leave. And when I went inside the house. It smelled wonderful in there. But in the sink, it was a big farm sink, giant, and it was on an island. Okay, so I wish I'd have took pictures. He had onion stuff and he had the Costco 36 eggs.

Uh-huh.

2 packages of them empty. And all the eggshells were in that drain.

Oh no.

And then he tried to run them down. When I opened it all up, I had to remove it. I had to take all the water out, drop the disposal. When I dropped the disposal, there was— the whole pipe was full of eggshells.

Oh my goodness.

Pulverized eggshells. And I tried to run my cable and it wouldn't go through. I had to go get a little mini vacuum out of my van. put it in there and suck those things out and finally was able to get my cable to go through.

Geez.

And then when, like I said, he was like right beside it with food and he would throw stuff in there and it would splash on his food. He goes, do you want something to eat?

And I'm like, no, I'm good.

I'm out.

Yeah. And I looked at the kitchen. He was, oh no, I know why she left at that moment. wonderful kitchen equipment in that house. We're talking this house is like $2 million, right? And she— her kitchen was tore up.

He ruined her kitchen.

Yeah.

And she had told me later, the next time I went out there for something, she goes, you got to understand why I couldn't be there. I said, I know, Miss Becky. Mr. Don, he destroyed the kitchen.

Called him out.

She goes, she goes, I wish I was this close to just getting rid of that equipment and buying new equipment.

Oh my goodness. Yeah.

Well, I actually remember one time my dad accidentally, wasn't on purpose, dumped some cooked rice down a commercial disposal and then tried to run the disposal and it was just a big old mess.

Yeah. Had that same problem at a Golden Corral in Humble, Texas about 12 years ago. Where somebody did that. Must have took a whole bag of it.

Yeah.

Oh my goodness.

I had a customer call and she goes, well, I was cleaning out the refrigerator. First keywords. And I'm like, oh, so taking a deep breath and waiting for the rest. And she goes, well, I had— we had made 4 boxes of macaroni salad. Oh, and apparently nobody ate, so she was dumping it down. And she goes, and so now And I'm like, yes ma'am, yes ma'am, yes ma'am.

Nowhere.

Just knew.

Yeah, I know.

Just knew it was not— it's not going nowhere.

Yeah, so here's, here's what we wound up doing, because we— I told you about the, the— we had an issue. It wasn't anything too, too major, but, um, they weren't gonna warranty the garbage disposal, and so Um, what we did is we just, we just put strainers on our, you know, in, in each side of the sink. And, you know, we dump everything we can into the trash can, everything. And if something gets down just because it's, you know, you're, you're rinsing off a dish or something, then we'll run the disposal for something like that. But it's very rare.

And it—

and the strainer catches almost everything. So, um, I wouldn't— I would encourage a lot of people to do that. What's going to be really interesting is this is this new house we bought. It's the first time we've ever been on a septic. And, um, it currently doesn't have a disposal, which is great. Fine with that. Except that, I mean, I've got kids. And I know that they're gonna throw something into the— into the sink and inevitably Something's gonna go down the sink. And so, um, I'm probably gonna put one in just to make sure that we're, you know, we're safe as far as that goes. But, um, I have been told that there are septic-specific

disposals that are like twice as heavy duty.

That's right. They also have a solution that is— every time it's used, it's Administered into the system.

Oh, okay.

So I don't know if it's enzymatic. I know it's not no acid, but it's some kind of enzyme maybe.

Okay.

Um, it's a cartridge. It mounts on the disposal.

Interesting.

Yeah. So you—

So I need to get a specific one.

It's a specific, a specific one.

Okay. Well, I'll— we'll talk later. But it's, it's— I mean, for us, it's not because we, we use it all the time, because We've heard the horror stories, you know, we don't want to be that, that person. The, the problem with the, with the disposal that we had is one of our kids, one of the straws out of their sippy cup had gotten stuck down in there and we couldn't get it dislodged. And it was down in the disposal and it wouldn't, it wouldn't come out. And so we wound up having to replace the disposal.

Oh, man.

Which is fine. It's not that big of a deal. But just put a strainer and throw your stuff away. Come on now. Banana peels? Really?

That seems bizarre to me.

That's ridiculous.

We've had somebody lose their ring in it and found a stone wedged in it. Oh. So it's— We got the stone out and it was working after I— and it wasn't that big of a stone.

Did you get to keep it though?

No.

Well, that was the first problem. He didn't get her a big enough stone. Lesson learned.

Oh man.

Well, we are— we're bumping up here on an hour and a half already, so we probably need to, uh, to, to move to the, to the most important segment, right?

Absolutely.

And let's go ahead and do it because it's time for the Final Four. That's right, the Final Four questions. We ask each and every one of our guests. So are y'all ready? Are you prepared?

I'm ready.

You knew this was coming?

I may not be prepared, but okay. Oh, I didn't know it was coming.

Oh, you didn't? Okay. Well, we're gonna ask both of you. You both get to answer separately. So, uh, we'll just start, uh, ladies first, right? So we'll let, we'll let her go first.

All right.

So here's, here's the very first question, right? What's the must-have tool you won't leave your house without?

My phone.

Your phone.

Yep, that is the number one answer.

It is. Ding, ding, ding. Definitely. All right, Paul, what about you? Uh, what I would must-have?

I'd have to say my phone too.

Yeah.

Yes, sir.

It's how business is done.

That's it. I mean, it's by far— it's not even close, the number of people that answer with a phone. I mean, it's not even close. In a far distance.

Second, I think, is pocket knife.

Yeah, yeah, way, way far distant.

Yeah.

All right, next question. What's a job you walked away from? So preface it, we always have to preface it. People that listen to this all the time are like, oh, here we go. So we really think of this in like a job at your house that, you know, a project at your house that happened that you were trying to fix. Something went wrong and you had to call the, you know, the professional in. What's a job you walked away from? However, it could also be a career or a job specifically. So we're just gonna leave it up to you. We're gonna ask the question: What's a job you walked away from?

Trying to think because. Yeah, if we're putting something together at home, we either get it done or it goes in the trash because we're done.

They finish everything, Greg. They finish everything.

We usually pay someone to finish it.

That's, that's, that's exactly what we're talking about here.

Somebody to start it. Yeah, we don't even bother to start. Um, I, I don't know. I don't think I can think of anything off the top of my head. I mean, aside from being in business, there are some jobs that you have to learn to walk away from on that, in that, on that perspective. Now us, I can't say, um, if there's anything that we've ever walked away from. I can say one. We moved into our shop in August of last year. I was trying to take her desk apart in her home office. Okay, and I'm like, nah, no, we're not gonna do this. And then we went down and bought a desk for the shop.

Good, good. Probably that— probably right there saved your marriage.

It probably did.

Probably was the thing. Congratulations on one of your better decisions in life.

And you like the new desk, right?

I love the desk. However, it's so big that it takes up so much space in the office, and our office is so tiny. Half the size of this, this area.

Okay.

Wow. And that may be big. Yeah. Yeah, the office space that we only got it because of the warehouse space.

You know what's funny is like a lot of times when people who have never been here before, like, we'll bring them into like the, the outer room and they're like, they think that that's where the podcast happens. And so they're just kind of like trying to like find a seat and looking around and like, no, no, you got to come through. And then they come through like, oh, exactly.

All right, next question. How do you wind down at the end of a long day?

Usually just sit and watch TV, get in our recliner. And, you know, um, usually I like to have a drink or two, but right now I'm on a diet, so I'm trying to be good. Yes, I am. Yes, I am. I, I promise I'm trying.

So what, what shows got your attention these days? Um, you have a go-to?

So if there's nothing else to watch We will rewatch Leverage.

Leverage, okay.

That one, man, that's a good one.

And Burn Notice. Those are the shows that we rewatch if there's just nothing else to watch. We've seen the episodes multiple times, right? But we love them.

Yeah, good stuff.

Leverage is good. It's one of my all-time favorites.

All right, Paul.

Yes, sometimes what we do is we've had such a hectic day, for us to wind down, to get home, we may not say nothing each other for 3 hours and just sit right next to each other, watch something, do something, and just take a deep breath. Take a deep breath. Yeah, try to cry a little bit, I guess.

They're, they're people after my own heart. That's what my wife and I do. We just sit and we'll watch a show or two just to kind of—

I can imagine your wife cries a lot.

Yeah, that's mostly my fault.

We've told people before that there are times we don't We don't— we just don't want to talk to people. We don't want to talk to each other.

Yeah.

So we look straight ahead at the TV and pretty much we— it just— if we're eating in front of the TV, we'll hand each other a napkin or something. And I mean, just, we're done.

So that's good. That's good. All right. Well, last question. Y'all are in the homestretch here. What's one of the best pieces of wisdom or advice you've ever received?

Been given a lot, not taken a lot.

That could, that could be it right there. Take good advice.

Yeah, sometimes you don't know it's good advice until you're older and you're like, man, now I know what they meant.

Yeah.

You know, um, I don't know. I guess I'm put on the spot. When I leave here, I'll go, that was it. That was it. That was the thought, you know?

Um, all right, well, let's do this. Paul, what's yours? We'll come back to you.

Well, there's a lot of things. It, it, the best wisdom that I think I've ever got is try to stay into a, some sort of a lifelong learning type process in your life.

Yeah.

To develop better skills and, and, and, you know, personal skills, um, trying to become a better person. Um, because this is me 10 years ago, right? Who I am today, who I've been the last 4 years or 3, 3 and a half years, that's not me.

Mm-hmm.

You know, some of the things people tell me, like, I can't believe you were quiet and timid and you would rather not talk and stay in a corner when we went somewhere by myself. You know, um, people find that hard to believe today.

Yeah.

It's like, you wouldn't like that. But I, I've been reading books for what, about 16 years, different types of books, you know. Um, had a mentor about 16, 18 years ago that kind of introduced me into it. And I mean, I'm in my mid-30s, so it's like you ain't gonna teach an old dog new tricks, but literally changed my life for the better. So, well, you know, good lifelong learning.

Who was that?

A gentleman named Raymond Brown.

Okay.

Him and his wife, Yolanda Brown, very important people in our lives. They're like spiritual parents. Very, very wonderful, beautiful people. We love them very much.

Is she still around?

Oh, they're both around. Yeah, they live in Sugar Land. They're the only people I go to Sugar Land for. Okay. Sorry, that's too long of a drive, but they warrant that drive.

So there you go. All right, your turn.

You know, um, you know, I try to think of the things that my mom would tell me growing up, you know, just one, you don't judge a book by its cover. And, you know, mom would always tell me so many things. And as I go through my life, oh yeah, She said that. Mm-hmm. And, um, it's— I feel like I'm, I'm lost. But I do know that you have to have a positive attitude. You change your mindset. And, um, I will tell you this, I guess, because I've— you know, we walk through our life and we learn things from the things we do. But I wish I would have come to know Jesus first a long time ago before we did. Because,

um, everyone has a different faith and a different walk in life, and I, and I respect, I respect that. But for us, a lot of our reason that we're still here is because of Jesus.

So amen.

That's probably one of the things I wished we would have done sooner and introduced to our family sooner, but We did what we did and, you know, I know God has a plan, so we're gonna, we're gonna walk with it the best we can.

There you go.

It's awesome.

I love it. Well, we got one final question. Sorry.

It's okay.

Can you count?

Yes.

That was 4. It was called the final 4, but Craig has to get his question in every single time.

I get one.

He gets one. So go ahead, Craig.

The final 4 and then the Craig That's right. All right, if people, if you want to get a hold of Paul the Plumber, how do they do it?

Best way to do it, uh, you can, um, see, I know I was going to get that question and I didn't bring that other number, but let me start with call our office, 832-521-3252.

That's the best way.

You can also reach us on our website. There's, there's a section that says Contact Us and you can send us a message. We have a, uh, um, you can, um, it goes to our operations email, so multiple people watch that. So not just one. So that's the best way. Go to our website, uh, paultheplumberllc.com. Send us a message. If you need to email us, go to operations@paultheplumberllc.com. Okay. So those are the best ways. To reach because multiple people keep up, not just one. Yeah, awesome.

Great. So fantastic. Well, thank you guys. It's man, it's been really, really good.

Thank you.

It's been it's been fantastic having you guys in here. So it's been too long. Well, that that's dumb. We should have had you on earlier.

Well, keep trying.

It is what it is.

We're all busy. But thank you for for being here, and thank you. For the listeners and the viewers out there, for downloading today's episode, we appreciate it. Go ahead and like us, share us, do all the things. We appreciate you very, very much. And until next time, we'll see you later.

See ya.