I guess you are singing. Are you singing?
I'm always singing, bro. Hey, welcome to The Homeowner's Show. Whether you're DIY or looking to hire, we're here to bring you the best options and information for you and your home. You might be asking yourself, why am I doing the intro? 'Cause Kevin ain't here. Turn my monitor down just a little bit. I think it's this one, whatever that one is right there. Number 4, I think. Yeah, thank you. Awesome. Glad you guys could join us. Let me bring up the video here. We are live here at— what is this place? Moonshine? Moonshine Deck? Yeah, Moonshine Deck. Let's make sure we get that right before we start. Moonshine Deck. We're here live at Moonshine Deck.
I see a sign that says saloon. Yeah, well, they're definitely there.
They haven't been real generous with the Wi-Fi password, so— well, I'm not gonna remember their name. Um, fair enough. We're kicking things off for a fun night. I think I need to bring this light in a little bit here. I'm trying to see What this says, because you guys are kind of sitting in the shadows.
All right, I've got Moonshine Deck Ice House.
Moonshine Deck Ice House. Well, there's 2 of them. I think there's one downtown sometimes, because if you don't say specifically Moonshine Deck in Magnolia, people might go to the downtown location looking for us, and—
and then we'll get like 1-star reviews on the podcast, and that's no good. Um, anyway, not that we wouldn't get them anyway. All right, but we got, we got some guests sitting down. We got my buddy Dick from over— what, what radio station are you at, dude? Lone Star Commune Radio.
Conroe's FM 104.5, 106.1, and worldwide at irlonestar.com.
Yeah, and thank you from all the people in Homeowner Show Nation for like being kind to us, because I was telling you earlier we got a little side-eye from some radio people the last, uh, the last event we got to. So I don't know what that's all about. I feel, I feel like we have a, uh, a news anchor like street brawl coming.
It, it— people get a little weird when there's competition around.
Yeah, so I'm here for it.
I mean, it's not even a competition for it. We're a nonprofit community radio station, so we're just here to serve the community.
And I love y'all's stuff, by the way.
not just because you've had me on.
Yes. And anyone can— it's— we don't charge for on-air appearances. We— anyone can start a show with us as long as it follows the FCC guidelines and it's community-driven, right? So if anyone wants to start a show out there, reach out, irlonestar.com. We operate through sponsorship and donations.
So we do need those, but it's not like a requirement to start a show. We just want anybody Yeah.
So, I mean, like, what kind of, what kind of shows do you guys typically run right now?
Right now? I mean, I would say, I mean, we have business shows, we have event shows, we have variety shows. I have a morning show that anyone could be part of and talk about whatever.
Yeah, that's a fun one too.
Because that's the one I've been on, right? Yeah.
Because we can just, we literally can talk for 5 minutes about killing bugs and then we can talk about the Astros.
And I'm like, okay, cool.
Yeah, I don't care. Let's do it.
And then we have more, I would say, serious shows. We have a history show that, uh, locally got local guys in The Woodlands put together. And, uh, yeah, we're here. We're located at the first floor of basically City Hall. Yeah, Conroe. So that's what, 300 West Davis? So again, irlonestar.com.
Sweet, man. Yeah, just go across the street, get you a cup of coffee.
Have you been there yet? The Paulette Coffee Nham Pang?
Oh yeah, actually I was there yesterday.
Yeah, yeah, dude, I like— they have a, uh, Vietnamese coffee there.
Yeah, they have the drip.
I never had the drip. You know what I'm talking about?
So apparently it's called the drip or something, right? And it takes 15 minutes to make.
Because I'm a black coffee drinker.
It's black because like they do like the espressos and stuff like that. I was like, no, I just want black coffee. Like, oh, you have to wait 15 minutes.
I'm like, what does that even mean? Like, is it, is it Dunkin's?
Like, who waits 15 minutes? It's community coffee. It's fine.
And we got Corbin Vine sitting here with us. Vinco Insurance, right?
Awesome. And what kind of insurance you guys do?
Um, we do a little bit of everything. We definitely target kind of the personal lines market, home and auto. Um, definitely do commercial as well. It's not something we really spend our money marketing just because it's not what I learned to do first, I guess. Um, we'll, we'll get there eventually. Um, but like— Do you do body parts? Body parts?
I've heard people like insuring their body parts.
You talking about like actors and actresses, like insuring like sports athletes?
Oh yeah, yeah, we might be qualified to do that, but I'm gonna try to find somewhere to send this one.
That's not what you want to deal with, dude. I saw, I saw a really good, uh, insurance meme today, and because I'm sure you've heard about like all the stuff going on with like insurance roofing and stuff's happening there. Oh yeah, and I think, I think it was actually, um, Connor posted it today. It was, um, State Farm went from being a really good neighbor to that crazy ex-girlfriend.
That's a, that's a good one. State Farm's catching a little, little flak.
Little flak. Yeah. I mean, well, I mean, like, from what I hear, man, they're, you know, they're declining on so many claims right now, especially on roofs.
Yeah. So, I mean, believe it or not, I started my, my career working for State Farm.
Fine, fine company, I guess. I mean, I certainly wouldn't say I regret my decision. I wouldn't be where I am today Yeah, I mean, learned a ton from the guy that I worked for as far as the business and that sort of stuff. But as far as claims go and things like that, we fought a lot of them. So, okay, we tried to fight for the policyholder, but there wasn't many, many real smooth ones. Yeah, I'm probably not really supposed to say that, but that's, that's how it is.
That's, that's my opinion, at least.
Yeah. Well, so what is, what is your kind of your target market that you're looking for right now?
I would say homeowners because of exactly what you just said. It's definitely a challenge. It's not something where we can just help everybody that walks in the door because there's a ton that goes into it. But with the way that Texas is and the way that last year was for insurance companies, there's a ton of people pulling out.
There's a ton of limitations on what new— what you can do with new business. And I mean, we've helped a ton of people. It certainly takes, you know, some, some sifting through. There's people that should absolutely stay where they're at. Yeah, that's something I believe in, is not trying to, you know, sales the first guy that walks into the door, right? But with homeowners, there's a lot of opportunity out there, and there's a lot of people that you can help.
And is it— I mean, like, from your perspective, is it easier for someone to bundle kind of everything through like one provider than trying to like piecemeal it out to like a bunch of different, you know what I mean, like the home, auto, life, all that kind of stuff?
Yeah, so I kind of have a different perspective on that now. When I started out with With State Farm, right? They gave these huge discounts for bundling insurance, which is, which is good. But that doesn't necessarily mean that just because you bundle, it's always a better— whether it's a better product, whether it's a better price. I absolutely think it's a good idea to have it all with the same guy. Sure. Because, right, you build a relationship with that person. That person's going to fight for you, right? I tell everybody that we, right, we don't represent the insurance company to you. We represent you to the insurance company, right? Yes, on the front end, we're selling you the product. But when something comes up, if you're doing business online with
somebody and you talk to 20 different people every time you call in, it's different to be able to call the same guy and him have a little skin in the game to make sure that you're, yeah, you know, getting what you paid for.
Yeah, because I mean, you're, you're essentially advocating for them. That's right.
So that's, that's awesome, man. So I was getting the signal here from the, uh, from the, the people mover shoving people out.
Oh yeah, there's— she's, she's moving our guests in and out tonight. So I mean, if people are looking for like a good— I mean, like, do you do just Texas?
Do you do He doesn't do body parts.
Doesn't do body parts. No body parts. So I was really looking to insure my legs. You probably haven't seen them, but let me tell you, something special.
We can insure guns. That's a, that's a way better question than the last one.
That's such a compliment, right? Such a compliment.
You tricked me. But yeah, we're licensed in Texas and Louisiana. Louisiana is a tough market.
I have a business partner, actually. We both worked for State Farm. We went out on our own and opened our own thing to kind of—
create our own opportunity, if you will. Um, and he's from Louisiana, so we are licensed in Louisiana as well.
Okay, cool. Well, if people are looking to get in touch with you, how do they get a hold of you, bud?
Um, yeah, you can call my office. That's the easiest way, 936-286-3303. Okay. Um, and my email address is my first name, Corbin, C-O-R-B-I-N, @vincoinsurance.com.
If I want to Google you, what do I look up?
Uh, auto insurance in Magnolia will come up Do you really? You can Google Corbin Vines. Okay, uh, see, that's what I'm talking about. Insurance probably won't be the first thing that comes up, but is that, is that a bad thing?
So what you know right there is the brother spent some money on some SEO.
Not really, I've just, I've done it. Well, I've done it, me and Seth have done it all ourselves. Um, and I guess, I guess we're doing a good job at it.
I've, I've— if you show up on page 1, man, you're doing something right.
If you see me in handcuffs, I don't know, it's a joke.
I don't quite understand. We show up when you, when you look on the, the map, right, of the That's cool, man. Yeah, good enough, I guess. We're staying busy, so that's what counts. Well, dude, we don't want to—
we don't want to keep you. I know you got a lot of people you want to meet, but thank you for sitting down with us, man. I mean, like, you're the first one out of the chute. It's brave.
I didn't really plan on doing this when I got here, so, um, but it went well. I appreciate you guys having me.
Thank you for sitting down. All right, cool. We'll see you later. Yes, sir. Hey, what'd you think, man? Did you— you learn that your, uh, your guns were uninsurable?
Well, I was, you know, I'm still trying to try to find somebody here that, that will insure my guns.
That, that really makes it sound like you're looking for a woman.
No, it's just I know what I got and they have value.
I think you have a lot going on.
Now he's got me thinking about policies. Now I gotta look at everything. Dude, I don't like that.
My So like my life insurance guy was reaching out to me today asking me if I wanted more coverage. Like, hey, do you want another policy? Because he had— he was like, hey, I've got some that are way cheaper if you're willing to go through a medical exam. Yeah, I don't care. I mean, like, you know, but like, I was like, look, I'm already getting suspicious as to the amount of life insurance that my wife has on me. I mean, because I think we're like at policy number 5.
Okay, I don't know what that means. Like they call you, they called you 5 times to re-up?
No, no, no. I have 5 separate policies that she has on me. If I die, she's setting in 5 separate payouts.
She's just playing the spread, dude.
It's like, I feel like I'm in reverse. Like I'm doing every bad decision as I get older. And I'm like, okay, yeah, I like smoking cigars now. Okay, I can't, she can't tell anybody that.
Yeah, I don't run every day.
So, all right, we got it. We got another guest sitting down. It's gonna be intense.
I would be totally scared right now.
have you ever seen the movie The Kindergarten Cop? Old Arnold Schwarzenegger? I don't think it's called like Kindergarten Cop, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, like anytime we have somebody new on the show, that's what I always feel like. It's, it's, it's like, who's your daddy and what does he do?
So it's like, keep it clean though.
I've got it clean. I'm just gonna hold the kids up by their feet.
It's okay. So, well, if you haven't met, this is Dick. Hi, I'm Hope. Hope, tell everybody what you do.
I work for Stewart Title here in Montgomery County. Okay, so I work out of the Magnolia and Conroe offices. So I hold the marketing position, so I'm out and about all day long.
Just out there wrestling and bustling.
So I gotta ask, I mean, because like I would imagine title company is one of the more difficult things to market.
It is. Yeah, it is. It's very difficult because you have people that are loyal and it's not messed up.
Well, okay, let me ask you this, because is it people, or like individuals are loyal, or real estate agents are loyal?
That's what I thought, yeah.
You know, if it's not broken—
Yeah, if they've done it for you before.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's hard. Yeah, it's really hard, and especially going after the people who are really top producers. I mean, you want to work with the people— I mean, you want to work with everybody, right? But the top producers are, are already kind of stuck to a title company, so to speak. So it is hard to pull those people away and say, hey, give me a shot.
And so it's, it's rough. It's building relationships all day long.
And I hate to even use it this way, but how do you lure them away? I mean, you got to have some strategies.
It all boils down to trust.
Does that come through like consistency, or like, what is that?
I think it's consistency and just being able to call on you. I mean, even though they're not sending you the deal and even though you're not getting their business, but if they can call you and say, hey, I need you, I need your help, and you step up, right? I think that speaks for something.
So, well, and real quick for people listening to the show, because one of our biggest like market audiences for us is like first-time homebuyers.
You know, and so like a lot— I think a lot of people who have never bought a home before don't even know what a title company does.
I didn't know what a title company was until I started working there.
Can you, can you break that down for everybody real quick?
I mean, a title company— so you have, you have health insurance that pays for what may happen, right?
You have car insurance that pays for what may happen. Title insurance pays for past. It pays for what happened in the past, what happened yesterday, what happened 10 years ago, right? So it's securing that you own the property free and clear. Yeah, with no extra things coming up to haunt you.
So you have a big family, make sure you get a title company.
Oh my gosh, yes, it could get super scary.
It could get super scary, but title insurance covers the past.
So yeah, well, and, and so like, what are, what are some, what are some hiccups that can happen that would get you involved all of a sudden? We're like, hey, this is going to be problematic if you decide to buy this property. Like, what are some things that can pop up on your radar that would go, hold up, big family, big family?
Maybe family members that didn't know that the other family members existed.
Or your name— has that come up?
Yeah. Oh yeah, John Smith. The name John Smith is trouble.
Yes, you have, you know, you have heirs that no one knew about. That, that's big. That's big stuff right there. And you have to clear it. You have to reach out to them. You have to make a mess. sometimes to make it right. Like, it has to be right because you don't want to buy a house that's got— that's problematic. You just don't.
So are then some of like your vendors like DNA testing and like things like— I mean, like, I mean, how do you contend with that?
Do you hire PIs? Yeah, that's what I was gonna ask.
I mean, we have examiners, so we have—
That was a fancy word for PI.
Right. So you pull property records and you pull divorce records and you pull, you pull records that kind of give you a trail of what you need to know to make it all right. Yeah, there could be mechanics liens, there could be taxes that haven't been paid.
I mean, we're just talking about the worst of the worst, but it could be that you didn't pay taxes for 2 years. Well, I as a new homeowner Definitely don't want to pay for someone else's taxes.
Or a lien that's been placed on the property.
Those are the ones I know about, are liens that can happen on property.
Which is the most popular.
So it's like construction liens and mechanically. Yeah, all that kind of stuff.
You don't carry around a baseball bat?
Well, I mean, like, you're—
I mean, the examiners do.
Well, I mean, so I'm wondering if you're like, you're kind of like the ultimate Facebook stalker.
Like, she's good at her job.
My examiners and my processors probably are. I just go out and, you know, just speak the word of Stewart Title, you know, like we're the best. Did you know that we've been open for 130 years?
I mean, that's debatable.
I have a company, I have a title company that's going to research that. They're going to make sure they got—
Yeah, I have a couple examiners looking into that. 130 years? I don't believe that.
Our original office is still open. Do you know where it's at?
Oh, let me guess, El Paso?
Okay, it's gotta be northeast, right? It's gotta be northeast. No, Atlanta.
Texas. Here in your own backyard.
you didn't know Stewart's?
It's national. It's a national brand.
But born and raised here in Texas.
How long ago was the Galveston, like, hurricane that just devastated 1900. 1900. So that's—
So it's like 10 years after that happened.
Yeah, they took advantage of everybody.
That's what I was going through in my head.
I mean, have you heard of like Stewart Beach?
You're welcome, Stewart Road.
It's parallel to the seawall.
Stewart Mansion. I could keep going.
Is that like— is that next to like the, the religious one?
is that the Bishop's? The Bishop's Mansion? I mean, is it one of the ones like on the main drag that you—
yeah, yeah, it's a little further down, I think.
There's a lot of Catholics down there. But there's a lot of Catholics.
Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's kind of weird. You gotta stay away at certain times of the year.
That's the best time to go.
No one's going out. Business comes to a halt.
I've been in this position for 10 years.
Awesome. Like here in Magnolia, or—
Yeah, here in Montgomery County.
So I have 5 escrow officers. I think combined between all 5 of them, I would say like 180 years combined experience.
So yeah, work with the best. And forget the rest.
Forget the rest. So what should people expect? Because like with a title company, you have a very brief interaction with the actual homeowner. So what is that interaction that people should expect? So like if they're getting the best, what does that look like for them on the receiving end when they're buying a home?
I mean, I think first and foremost, it's about communication and customer service. service. All of our fees are Texas regulated, so none of those things vary too much from other title companies. But you want to work with somebody that's knowledgeable, who has been at the closing table, that's done all the many different transactions.
Because every transaction is different, obviously. There's different avenues that you have to— or different roads you have to go down to kind of get people to the closing table. But working with people who have been in the business for a long time is definitely something that I would say do.
It's super important. It brings value to the table all day long. And with Stewart being 130 years old, that also brings value because you're working with a company that's not going to close their doors tomorrow because the market's bad.
But first and foremost, it's about knowledge and it's about communication, just making sure that everybody knows what's going on at all times.
So it's about customer service all day long.
Well, and like, I would imagine one of the problems with working— and like, not to like say that someone can't, you know, get started in the title business or anything like that, but like, you want somebody that's not going to miss something. Absolutely. You know, and that could cause a hot mess, right? And it's like, like, and it's not like that doesn't happen. Oh, people miss stuff all the time, right? Absolutely. And but like, you want— like you're talking about, you have a staff that has combined, you know, 180 years worth of experience. There's a lot less chance that they're going to miss something on that title that's compromised.
You know, and, and like, so if they— but if they do miss something, what— where, where do you go from there if something I'm not saying that you guys would, but like what happens, you know, if all of a sudden I find, you know, cousin Barry from Minnesota all of a sudden has rights to this property that I just inherited or bought? Like what happens at that point?
Several things could potentially happen.
I mean, is that something you guys get involved with?
Yeah, we have to. Okay. I mean, it's part of that examination process. It's part of making sure that when we're pulling the When we're examining the property, all that's done upfront. The very beginning of the transaction, all that's done. So you get a title commitment that says, okay, we have, we have to clear ABCD.
We have to clear, you know, Cousin Harry. We have to make sure that there's no liens. We have to get these taxes paid. Like, all that's done before you get to the closing table. But if something is missed, By any chance, right? You have to, you have to make it right before you close. So potentially 2 things could happen. It prolongs the closing, which could, if it's a lender, it could cause a mess. If it's, you know, it could trickle down into potential mess, right? Or it doesn't close because you have somebody saying, no, I want rights to that property and I'm not signing that paper, right?
So it could get, it could get bad.
So when you, when you, when you say mess, does that mean court? Does that mean mediator? Does that mean— could it mean any of those things? I mean—
Uh, not necessarily. I haven't seen that happen.
10 years. Yeah. I mean, yes.
Um, it just boils down to the point of you're not closing. The buyers don't get it.
The sellers don't I thought you were going to say those evaluators.
Is that what they're called?
I thought it was like, oh, we're going to be dealing with those guys. It really, it really sounds like a Denzel Washington movie. The Evaluator.
Yes, it's— I mean, we do it all day, every day. People buy houses all day long. I mean, obviously some, some transactions are harder than others, but most, most of them, I mean, They go flawlessly.
Yeah. So yeah, well, and I would imagine if something does show up, like, most people just walk away.
Not necessarily. I mean, we try to fix it.
I mean, like, if it was something—
if it got complicated real quick, I mean, if they're old, just wait it out, right? I mean, there's got to be— you got to have a strategy.
Just take the Mick Jagger approach. You're talking about something that's important. If it's important to you, you want to make it work, right?
And Stewart Title makes it work.
Stewart Title makes it work. That's right.
carcinogens are on my side. We'll make this happen.
Yes, I think Stewart Title is a great company to work for. I think it's a great company to buy a house with. I mean, hands down. And I'm not just saying that because I work there. I'm saying it because I think Stewart brings a lot to the table when it comes to value, profitability, longevity, all the things. Like, all those things add up to being a great company.
Just need to tell people we don't mess up.
And then they'll be fine.
Here's the one I didn't realize, and they're about to make me kick you off, by the way. I didn't realize that the purchaser has the ability to tell the real estate agent, no, I don't want to go with that title agency. I want to go with that title agency. Yeah, and the real estate agent has to do it.
Yeah, so like everything is negotiable. Everything is negotiable, very negotiable. But the buyer and seller do have a say. If there's a preference, then they need to voice that.
Yeah, and so like, you know, like if you're— if what happened here? Sorry if that happened. Sorry, there was like a weird overlay on the screen.
Oh, you think you're in trouble? I'm watching the Astros.
I watched. I was like, Yainer almost had a home run.
I was like, okay, okay. He's tuned out for a minute.
Yeah, I was def— I've been tuned out for a lot of minutes.
I'm like, I'm so rude right now, but it's on the screen and I'm like, all right, it happened, it happened.
So if there's any real estate agents out there or potential homebuyers looking for a good title company to work with, how do they get a hold of you?
Call my cell. My cell is 346-224-1908. Again, my cell is 346-224-1908. Again, my name is Hope Moy. All right, Stewart Title. Call me.
Everyone out there in the homeowner show land, be kind to Hope who just sent you her cell phone. Don't send her any inappropriate pictures. Yes, please don't do that.
But if you need a title company, please, please call me.
I'm here for you. Just good old leads.
Thank you so much for sitting down with us. It was good to meet you.
I had a good time. Thank you so much.
We'll get the next one coming up. Uh, and, and while we're bringing the next person up, let me go ahead and give a shout out to our sponsor, Lone Star Appliance Repair, the best appliance repair company that you will ever find. Uh, you can reach them at 936-647-2364. They will get your appliances fixed and repaired, and it'll be cheaper than buying a brand new appliance. And will it? Absolutely, 100%.
Depends how old it is, right?
No, no, not always. Yeah, not always. I mean, especially with the price.
I feel like you open a bank account, you get a toaster.
Look, you can get into a fight with Darlene later about the definition of an appliance, um, because she and I fight about that all the time.
Which actually, I'll get you— I'll get your opinion on that here in just a second. I was wondering if I could take a break. You can absolutely take a break.
But before you go, you have to answer one important question.
And I'm gonna keep the Lone Star Appliance logo up. Is a sink an appliance?
A faucet is, but that's attached to the sink.
Yeah, sink is just a bowl.
Faucet would be a plumbing thing.
See, this is where it gets tricky, right?
I've seen faucets that have like literally computer chips in it. So that's an appliance to me. But like a sink is literally where we put the bowl back in the day, right? The bowl, that's where you wash your hands. All right, so wash your hands in the sink.
All right, I'm with you. I'm with you.
I get— that's where I feel like that's where I get the impulse.
Here's what I'm gonna do.
I could be Wrong, but you know what? I don't care.
You don't. That's also fair. That is also fair. Hang on, hang on. Let's do this definition.
I think it's just a bowl of appliance water that's supposed to be designated for clean water.
Okay, so read number one.
Oh, a device or piece of equipment designed to perform a specific of a task, typically a domestic one. That's weird. Why'd you type in woman?
Is that according to Webster?
That was a good one. So, okay, so based, based off the definition—
I don't really care about definitions.
You don't care about definitions? Words have no meaning to you?
Well, I mean, it depends on where you're born.
I really want to make you watch a Matt Walsh documentary.
The sink could be different, you know, up in the— in Canada than it can be in Mexico. I don't know, I'm just making stuff up. I just need to use the restroom. That's why I want to take a break.
You can go use the restroom. I'll talk to— I'll talk to David. Get out of here. You're always welcome back.
Thank you so much for having me.
Dude, thanks for sitting down. I'm gonna get out of here without making too much noise. No, you're fine. Make all the noise you want. David, my friend, how you doing?
Oh yeah, I always have fun at this event. Yeah?
Oh yeah. You met anybody cool?
Well, you know, Tillman was here. He's a cool guy. Um, I actually had some friends from Tomball that I've been—
A little bit closer. I mean, there's so much ambient noise.
Oh yeah, well, I've actually— I've got some friends from Tomball that actually showed up, which I was happy about. They're with Digify Local. Yeah, they're clients of mine, and you know, I've been pressing them to come to one of these events, see what it's about, so that, you know, maybe we can expand and grow out in that, that direction. And yeah, yeah.
So what's new with you, man? Just busy, man. Yeah, busy. Got to know, I was onboarding a lot of people.
I'm onboarding a lot of people. I just wish people would spend more money. Not, not my, you know, not my clients, but my, you know, my clients' customers.
We're gonna cut the client's cost but have more people coming through the door to spend money for them.
Yeah, you know, it's, you know, the economy is, you know, it's affected everybody, right? You know, it's trickle-down effect. So if they're not spending money, I'm not making money. Yeah, you know, and my clients aren't making money.
So, you know. Well, so like last time we talked, there was a lot of, uh, shenanigans going on with people getting dropped. With payment plans, right? You remember that?
Oh yeah, they're, you know, that's, uh, people get dropped with their payment processors, and there's a number of reasons why that can happen. You know, it's, you know, some of it may be that they didn't, they weren't forthcoming with their processor, or, you know, they're using an aggregator like Square or Stripe or PayPal, and, you know, they go way over their high-ticket limit. You know, raise red flags, you know, that sort of thing. You know, it could be, you know, number of chargebacks.
Hmm. You know, talking about where people deny charges?
Well, like they go into a store, yeah, they charge it on— they charge it on their card, and then they, they don't remember it or something like that. And then, oh, I don't remember this charge, what's this charge from? When they get their statement, so they, they fight the charge. And that's a chargeback. And so merchants have to fight that, and if they don't have the proper documentation, they can lose that. And if they have a number of them, you know, they become a bigger risk, and, you know, eventually they can either, you know, be dropped by their process or worse, put on a match list.
Match list is like the blacklist. Oh, okay. It was originally started by MasterCard, and all the, all the card brands kind of report report to it. You know, just numerous chargebacks. It could be identity theft. It could be fraud, money laundering. There's a number of reasons why a business could be put on a match list.
And once you get on it, it's 5 years to get off. Oh, dang. Does that spill over into other— like, so like, if someone like that got put on a match list would that show up for you if you tried to bring them on? That would show up?
Oh yeah, I had one just last week. Really?
Flooring wholesaler, at least he claims he was. You know, we filled out the app, you know, he sent all his information in, had no problems giving all the information. We got the application done, he got bumped up to high risk. We redid the application for high risk. And then, you know, our underwriting departments usually are pretty good about researching and making sure you're a legitimate business. And once they get bumped to high risk, I'll start doing a little bit more due diligence on my own too. And there were just some things with this particular client that just didn't add up. And yeah, when you start seeing You start walking away.
Yeah, it's just not worth it.
It's not worth it. It's not worth the trouble. It's not worth the time, you know. And then if they do end up getting approved, you know, what happens in, you know, 15 days or 30 days when, you know, the risk department says, yo, these guys are fraud? And then, you know, I get a chargeback on me because I get paid, you know, not, not much, but I get, you know, I get a small little upfront fee for boarding them, and it's, you know, then that gets, you know, taken away from me, and it's just like, you know, I'd just rather avoid that altogether.
Yeah, no, I mean, like, I know on our end, in our, in our business, I mean, like, sometimes we get charged like $10 if someone denies a claim or denies a charge, and it's like, well, you know, for you guys to just fight the chargeback for the merchant It's a $25 fee just to fight it, usually with most processors.
You know, it can go up to $30, just, you know, it depends on what your agent and what the processor sets it at. Yeah, I've, you know, industry standard is usually $25. That's what I set it at, you know, keep it at industry standard.
That way there's no shenanigans. Yeah. All right, well, I'm getting the eye from from my handler over here. So if— dude, if people, if people are looking for somebody to handle all their payment processing, how do they get a hold of you, bud?
Well, they can reach me, uh, davidmcguffin@spacecitypayments.com. Actually, it's david@spacecitypayments.com. Or they can reach me at 737-932-2160.
You can also catch me on all sorts of social media platforms. I'm all over it.
So Look us up. Yeah, what's, what's the new, the new video series you've been doing? I've, I've seen what it's like. Of course I'm, uh, I'm from Space City Payments.
Of course I know payments.
Those— yeah, that's been the trend on social media lately, for real. So why not jump on it?
Jump on it, man. It's been good. I, I saw it.
Do your thing, man. All right, well, good to see you, bud.
Awesome. All right, guys. We are plowing through the evening. It's been a good night. Hey, we got Cassie coming on. Grab whichever mic you want.
All right, I'm gonna adjust this. Actually, there we go. Bring that up and bring you in right there.
How you doing, my friend? Very good. Let's see if I can do this. Hang on. Oh yeah! Sorry, I'm very proud of myself right now. They can't hear you. Is that not up?
Yeah, she's not. Talk like this. There it is.
Again, the little wins in life that get you through.
Yeah, I think if you pull it down just a little bit, talk into the top of it.
What's going on with you?
Um, actually, I think I can safely say that Lila Taylor and I Just talked about me and her doing a partnership.
Me doing in-home laundry service for the clients that call her that want that service. So I'm super excited.
We are in the process of getting all that underway.
And for people that don't know what she's talking about, she's talking about Lila Taylor, the Laundry Fairy.
Yes. Yeah, so make all that laundry disappear in a good way.
Yes, because I don't want to do it.
Yeah, so just come pick it up, wash it, fold it, and bring it back. And now you're talking about you're gonna do it in the house.
Yes, and a part of that would be me cleaning your laundry room while I'm in there so that it's nice and clean and sparkly.
Which is the dirtiest room in my house.
I wouldn't doubt that with kids.
Yeah, scratch the kids, man, the dogs and the horses.
Oh yeah, for sure. But your dogs are so sweet.
They are, they are, they're the best. They're the best. We have good dogs. So what's, what's new in cleaning? Um, and organizing?
Um, it's definitely on Facebook Reels. I think there's like 20 different ones that I'm following right now, and I'm just like, oh, that's a nice hack. Um, I found I found a wet dust sponge.
What's a wet dust sponge?
It's like, it's like a half-moon shape and it's got ridges and you get it damp a little bit and then you go across your surface and it just picks everything up like a magnet.
Yes, and then you take it and you rinse it and it comes right off.
Like magic. I'm just like, oh, this is amazing.
Real quick, hey Riz, can you turn, can you turn my monitor down? It's number 4, I think. Thank you. That's, that's way better. It's like I'm getting like ear fatigue.
Um, I saw one the other day. It was, you know how like if you use, and I, I know this is not true of like a lot of people that don't cook in their homes. I cook pretty much every day.
But like if you get the bottom of like a, uh, stainless steel pan, it gets like those char marks.
Makes your pan look real ugly.
And I saw this hack for it. It was you put salt and baking soda and then like damp paper towels over the top of that.
And then pour white distilled vinegar over that and then let it sit. And then once you pull the paper towels off, it just cleans.
That's crazy. I don't know why that works. I mean, like, isn't it like vinegar and baking soda makes the volcano?
Yes, and the salt acts as a scrub. So the salt is your, is your scrubber. Yeah. So it just—
Well, I know about the, the salt and the ice in the coffee pot.
It's— I, I learned that from like gals working in like, um, diners. Like, I saw a gal doing it one time and she had like a, um, coffee carafe full of ice and she was doing this number with it. I was like, what are you doing? She goes, I'm cleaning the coffee pot. I was like, what does that do? And she goes, well, I put salt in there with the ice and just move it around.
And it cleans the entire coffee pot.
I was like, that's crazy.
And then you can go back with a vinegar.
Yeah, well, that's like— vinegar is like the only way to clean a coffee pot.
But some people don't touch it because there's people who want that coffee flavor in their coffee pots, and they're like, you're either— you really want it clean or it's really dirty because you're like, don't touch that.
Well, yeah, but it's like, it's one of those weird things. Like, it'll— you get that coffee flavor in there, and— but, and I get what they're saying because you have that vinegar taste if you don't rinse it.
Correct. You have to run a couple of cycles.
Yeah, it's like 3 cycles after you wash it with vinegar.
To get the vinegar taste out of it, because that's what they're— that's what they— that's what they mean, is like, I don't want the vinegar taste in my coffee.
Either you're committed to it being really clean or you're not.
Yeah. Well, like, the thing for me has always been like, over time it builds up and your coffee pot gets slower making the coffee.
Yeah, because you haven't descaled it. Right. Because that's just—
And the only way to do that's with vinegar.
And sorry, you're gonna have that smell in there and all that kind of stuff. So, but anyway, yeah. So what about like organizing? I mean, like, I mean, like, is— are you finding people are wanting to have more like bare spaces out in the open, or, you know what I mean?
Like, like they want a simplified look.
Simplify things big time.
That's getting harder and harder to do, it seems like.
Either you're fully committed to do the decluttering and getting rid of the stuff you really don't use, or you're committed to having a storage unit and paying that monthly fee, right?
I mean, you just, you've got to pick your win, you know?
So what are you, what are you finding that people absolutely have to have out? Like, you know, maybe like in their kitchen, maybe on their nightstand, because like as I walk through people's houses, I'm seeing like, okay, you got like, obviously they're gonna have like an Alexa sitting on the countertop. They're gonna have maybe like a book that they're reading, maybe, you know, something like that. But like, what are, what are people's like new must-haves that they've got to have out and not put away?
I mean, it's whatever that book is. for sure. Um, and some people really want to see those remotes. I mean—
Yeah, some of them are, especially if there's kids in the house.
Um, I work with a lot of families, so they're like, this needs to stay out. Um, but for the most part, like, they— everybody's kind of honing in on not really wanting much of anything. Yeah. Um, you know, if they're gonna look at something, they want, you know, fresh flowers Or, you know, just whatever that book is. Like, they don't want a whole lot. It's overwhelming. They've got enough overwhelm on their phones, right? You know, sitting in traffic and whatever their work is. They really just don't want to see anything if they possibly can. For sure.
Yeah, that makes sense. No, I know with mine, like, we have a smart outlet on the TV now that I control from my phone.
So that they can't turn the TV on. So that way I can cut all power to all electronics. And that way if they're not listening to me and they're in the middle of something, that disrespect is immediately turned into power outage.
Which I love. It's the ultimate revenge. So, well, listen, I'm getting, I'm getting the eye from, from my handler over here. If people are looking for organizer, cleaner, Now laundry.
Yeah, how do they get a hold of you?
Website, Facebook, Instagram, phone number is 936-207-9287.
Website, tailoredtousolutions.com.
There you go, awesome. Thanks for sitting down.
All right guys, hope you're hanging in there with us. I'm gonna change out my, my listening device here because I'm getting some nasty ear fatigue going on. on over here. Let's see what we got here. Find out who we got coming up next. All right, that's much better. You can turn— what, I don't know what channel this one is. What is this? Turn that one down for sure. Yeah, that's way better. Come on, man.
Grab that Wait, right there. This is left side.
I mean, you'll get sound either way, but—
Okay, hold on, let me sit like this real quick. Let me get my boss moves on.
We'll get y'all, we'll get y'all situated.
We got the old school iPhone right here, got the camera going.
You got your camera going, I got my camera. You got headphones, I got headphones. This mic sounds amazing. We're just making sure the audio right, you know what I mean? Yeah, I might start rapping on this bad boy.
Dude, if you do it, I can, I can lay a beat down.
Let me know. Hey, it's Taco Tuesday out here, you know what I'm saying?
Like, get crazy. Well, dude, we've never met, so tell me, tell me who you are and what you do, man.
Yeah, my name is Tillman Givens III. What?
How do you say the first name?
Yeah, like Tillman Fertitta, but better because I have 2 L's, he has one.
Yeah, yeah, so you gotta double his money.
Well, listen, he's just playing the restaurant game, man. You can do better than him.
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. I, I, I use restaurants to get through college, but now I have a digital marketing agency.
Yeah, so I'm trying to build my digital marketing agency. So last year I have a theme like football teams.
Right, so last year was 2023, We Not Me. Okay, this is 2024, which is the Kobe year. You see what I'm saying? It's also a leap year. It's also the Year of the Dragon as well.
So it's all about system scaling and simplicity this year.
How long you been doing this?
4 years. Okay, awesome. So where do you typically start with a new client?
So really, like, the first thing I do is I just lead with value, you know, like from the prospecting side. I just do like a free audit for them for the most part and kind of let them know like where their digital footprint looks like, how their customers view them online.
And then from there, if they see value in it, I'll lay out some solutions from there.
Um, and then after they decide, hey, I want to need a website, I might need some automation, or some people are both at the website and automation, they might want to beef up their LinkedIn or their Facebook, or they just want to incorporate AI. Uh, we do all those things. So, okay. It's just really, really wherever those holes are, then I kind of want to fill those out and be like an all-in-one solution to help businesses grow. It gives me a lot of fulfillment.
So, dude, so like when you, when you, I mean, like if you've been doing this for 4 years, you've probably onboarded quite a, quite a few people. Like what is the most common shortcoming that you see most businesses have in, in their marketing strategy?
I think that the biggest shortcoming in their marketing strategy really is just identifying who they really want to target and that ideal avatar and also where they're at. Just because you like Facebook doesn't mean that the people you're trying to find like Facebook.
So in getting that across to business owners sometimes is tough because they have this idea in their mind that this is the only way to do it. Dude, the world is changing really fast.
You know what I mean? Like, my next venture really is like voice. Like when you have like a Google Home.
Oh, okay. I see what you're saying.
That's the next Siri. You know what I mean? In the, in the car now, you know, like my fiancée just got like an electric vehicle and you can talk to it in the car. Like, hey, look this up. Hey, look that up. And like having that voice, that's my next thing. Like I've been obsessed with AI for like a couple years now. So I'm like, oh, okay. Everybody's waking up to to it. But with the voice thing, that's, that's next level.
But listen, like, on the, on the drive over here, Rizzler over here was telling me, like, he's, he's a little tech, little tech demon over here. He was telling me about how to jailbreak ChatGPT. Have you heard about this?
Not the jailbreak version, dude.
So he was telling me that he jailbroke ChatGPT and, and like made it evil.
Like, and got it to to where like, like all those things that it will tell you that it can't do, like, I can't do that, that goes against our protocols or against our— it'll do it. And like, it's a, it's a, it's a series of prompts that you convince the AI that now it has no morals or now it has— and like all of a sudden it starts behaving like that avatar.
And, and doing the— and so like he was, he was telling me, he's like, what was it? What was it? Uh, uh, fire alarms that—
Say what? You wanna go over there? No, no, no, it's fine. I mean, like, if you want to, you can, but like, I, I'm just—
I want to see his reaction. He was telling me that like— oh, here, he can tell you. He can tell you.
Okay, so I can't hear myself, and also sorry for the sound effects. Um, the sparkles were not intentional. Oh, you hit the— is that what— that was you? Yes, that was me.
Um, so I jailbroke it, um, and I asked it what would happen if I used 1,000 smoke detectors, and it like came up with like how to make it into a bomb, how to use like the atomic material on the inside of it, or how to rig it up around a building, um, for it to set off like random alarms to distract people. And then like I, I did the smoke alarm combined with cologne. And so then it was like also create like a bomb with the cologne, so it like creates chaos. Whoa. Which is totally against the protocols. It was like smoke detectors and Axe, isn't that what you told me?
I just want to be specific, but yeah, because Axe is potent, you know?
Yeah, I just wanted to be able to pull information that's like not from just being.
Yeah, you know what I mean? Well, and like he was, he was saying like it's It's fine. He was saying like how like the one that we use only has like information up to like 2014. You jailbreak it, it's like up to like 20—
Yeah, it's crazy. It's crazy, crazy stuff. So like it's interesting and like all that kind of weird stuff, but like it's cool that you're using that for your clients.
How does that get integrated for what your clients need?
Yeah, so that's a great question. Like, I think that on— like, remember I was telling you most people don't know what their ideal avatar is?
So I use it a lot on like the front, the front end, like, you know, like helping people really get clear, like helping them find clarity. Like, you know, if I have somebody who, let's say they're trying to target like software as a service companies, you know, but they don't necessarily know, even if they're on the front end, like what age range should they target or What would, who would be looking for this type of product, you know?
And where would they be looking for it? That's one side of it. After they become a client, then there's automations that you could set up where it has like an AI chatbot on their website, or maybe they have like certain responses that they want people to have, like for an email automation campaign or SMS messaging campaign or both of those campaigns.
Or being able to set up something to where they say like, if you go to Instagram and you can go, hey, what services do you offer? Like, it'll automatically just say, I offer these 10 different services.
So you set up prompts that are like pretty much your FAQs that you have, and then like it provides those automated responses to the questions that it usually gets.
I even have sometimes where like it might be a little bit difficult to get information on like certain companies and certain industries. So what I'll do is I'll have like a certain section of my ChatGPT that's specifically built for what I need it for. Like that section is only for that. I have one of 'em that's like just a basic ChatGPT and I can go in there and be like, do kids' homework or be like, hey, what are the top 10 things to do at Disneyland?
Whatever the case may be. But then the section that I use for my clients and for digital marketing, I'll be like, give me a competitive analysis on you know, this place versus the next place. And within this competitive analysis, like, what would be the best marketing strategy moving forward? Like, give me an outline of that, you know what I mean?
So I'll get a lot of detail from that. Or like revenue within like a certain market. Like, they might go into a market and say, oh well, I don't really know what, what percentage of market share is even available, you know what I mean? So I could say, what are the trends that you see over the next 10 years within this particular industry. And then just like, I mean, I just have fun with it really.
Like, once you get into that part.
And then by the time I get a chance to meet with them, I'm just like, oh yeah, this is your market. This is the percentage that's able to capture. And then I can go in on my end and say, all right, we're going to target these particular keywords, which is totally off ChatGPT. I do that on my own.
And I can say, but based on these amount of keywords, based on this amount of traffic, we're going to build this amount, this particular website based on the amount of traffic, if you were able to close at only 15%, that would be an extra $34,000 of revenue minimum, conservative numbers. I can really give you an ROI on what the marketing would do for you. That's mostly what I use it for.
Yeah, it's fun stuff, man.
All right, so I'm getting the eye from the handler.
I know, she was right there.
No, she's good. If people want to get a hold of you, man, how do they do it?
Yeah, you can go to TNT Superior Marketing. Um, my nonprofit is phenomenalfatherhood.com. Be sure to look that up.
So basically, uh, it's a community of fathers that I want to get together and like, you know, build a community where dads can share other dads— and I mean, they can share other tips and tricks on how we could be better dads.
Yeah, yeah, it's really, really cool. And it's like tips, tricks, like I bring on people on a podcast similar to this and be like, hey, you know, what's one proud dad moment?
What's one thing that you would share back to another young father? I was just telling a father the other day, like, super simple stuff, man. Like, I was telling this guy, like, hey, I know you have a baby on the way right now. One thing I would recommend that nobody will probably tell you is go learn how to put the car seat in correctly. Yeah, before the baby gets here. Nobody ever tells you that.
No, it's like figure it out at the hospital.
And then you got nurse— and I was like, the reason why it's such a high-stress situation, you got nurses coming in, families coming in, people asking you questions. Your wife is out of it because she just had a freaking baby. Yeah, you know what I mean? It's so much going on. But if something was to happen on the way home, guess who's gonna be responsible?
So just little gems, man. Like, just like with Kobe Bryant, you know, everybody had this ideology of the mama mentality. Now that he's no longer here, like, when I'm no longer here, I want people to have that same mentality of like, Phenomenal Fatherhood and also to highlight fathers that are doing well out there. I mean, we really only hear about it one time a year, but I mean, just to say like, hey, there's this guy here that's, you know, doing great as a dad. Let's highlight him, you know.
Dude, that's awesome. Sorry, I didn't, I didn't let you finish.
Go ahead. No, so just 10% of everything I, I make goes to Phenomenal Fatherhood.
With my marketing agency.
Did you, did you get all your numbers and website and everything in there?
Oh, my phone number is, uh, 281- 790-5262. Uh, the digital marketing, tntsuperiormarketing.com, and then Phenomenal Fatherhood.
Dude, thanks for sitting down.
Yes, sir, likewise. All right, this is where we wrap. Get— I grab back, about to get a snack. It's a snack attack and I got the stack. We put it with the packs. What you know about that? I did it like that on the MIC.
She shut you down. I'll put it right here. Except you're taking an intermission and you have to go get headshots. I gotta go get headshots? Who's gonna fill in for me? I can fill in for you.
I mean, if I can't, I don't know what to do, but I'll fake it till I make it.
Okay, do you know, uh, is Dick still here?
Dick. Don't laugh at that.
I'm going to put you on camera because you're fussing at me.
I can't. I have to have somebody come sit for me. You want to come fill in for me? No.
Are you filling in for me?
Two minutes. Can I get makeup? Powder?
Gotta get the sweat down with the powder.
Hang on. Hey, can you cover for me for? Yeah, I won't be long.
Less than five minutes. I'll be right back.
You can edit, it doesn't matter.
Yeah, we're live. All right, this is Dick Schisler with Lone Star Community Radio, IRlonestar.com worldwide, The Homeowner's Show. I'm filling in for Craig Williams. And I have in front of me a gentleman who's got an excellent shirt on and it's buttoned, which is always nice. I, I—
I have headphones on. Like, I— can you hear me now?
All right, so what's your name, sir?
Carrie Johnson, pleasure to meet you. Uh, what do you do?
So digital marketing basically tells me nothing print. Yeah, you don't touch—
You don't touch billboards, you don't touch that filth that goes on poles.
No, we stay away from that.
Like, you're safe away from all that. You might design it, but you're not gonna—
you're not gonna send the file over to the printer.
So recently I went to South by Southwest.
With my best friend, and it was a great little— I took a vacation, but I never realized how serious they are about the poles there.
And I, I kind of had a laugh 'Cause I thought it was like Philadelphia where they like reset the polls and everything.
I was like, why are they wrapped?
Like they're Saran wrapping everything in the city. And it's because the digital marketing people create signs like you. Yep.
So yeah, South by Southwest is huge, right? Big, big marketing area.
Yeah. You ever been there?
Just once. It was, it was my first time too. It was a wonderful time, uh, especially to spend time with my friend. And we just— I was there for 2 weeks just having fun.
Catch the downtown scene, the music, good food.
Okay, so what's the company you work for?
I own it. It's called Firefly Digital.
Firefly Digital. All right, cool.
All right, now, now I know what it is.
And, uh, you guys just do digital? which basically means now in what world, or in this world we're living in now? Because that could be like social media, that could be like you said, you can make a poster with it, but you don't print it.
What we do is, um, the clients that we work with, it's like going to the doctor. We kind of sit down with them and assess what their, what their needs and goals are. So some clients we may just do social media content Some of them we build everything from the brand.
Strategy, website, everything. SEO, the whole, the whole kit and caboodle. All right. So it just depends.
I have one more question. With social media like TikTok and YouTube Shorts and Instagram, are y'all able to create things that day for your clients?
Because I feel like that's the kind of crap we're going towards.
Right. I should have called my business Last Minute Marketing.
No, honestly, am I wrong? Am I wrong?
Yeah, it's like, hey, we need this yesterday.
Yeah, because like with the radio station, I— we, we film all day and record all day, and there are so many moments, and I go, well, I now I need to create another room that's literally getting this feed. So they're creating feeds for the social media feed that like literally within an hour, not to sound cliché, but it is literally just time.
Yeah, it all comes down to time. Wonderful.
All right, so you're done. You look good. You got your thing. Oh, look, I mean, I look— I look great. Oh, that's, that's okay with me. My name is Dick Schisler, Lone Star Community Radio. IRLonestar.com worldwide, Conroe's FM 104.5. We are a nonprofit radio station. television station. Anyone wants to come on, visit irlonestar.com. We don't charge for anything. We just want you to be a part of the community and the community radio television.
Good chatting with you. Good stuff. We're not done.
Oh, it's a pleasure, sir.
I'm gonna give you my card because that's what you do over here at these events.
All right, I'm back with my hat. Fix her up good, Sarah.
Yeah, Sarah, listen, fix it.
Stop messing with it. Leave it alone.
Good. I had to go get my picture taken.
Yeah? She made you? Uh-huh.
It is. When you suddenly become the face of the company, that's what happens. Oh.
So what's going on with the company? I mean, other than getting the massive support from this show.
Right, I'm gonna bring up your logo at the bottom while you're talking. Go ahead.
Okay. Thank you. We are really busy. Yeah? Yeah, we're having a special right now. As a matter of fact, um, 3— we'll come out and check 3, um, general maintenance.
Talking on the top of that thing, people need to hear you.
Oh, sorry. Um, we're having a sale right now, if you want to call it that. Um, it's 3 general maintenance for $175, just to come out and look at it, make sure it's running right.
And if we find an issue when we're looking at something that's actually wrong with it, right, then you get a percentage off of the price of fixing it. Okay. Instant discount then.
Because you're looking at all 3?
What does it cost to have all 3 looked at?
Uh-uh. It's not bad at all.
And I imagine you guys are kind of taking a deep dive into each one that you're looking at, right?
Yeah. I mean, it's— we're not taking the washers apart. Just because that's 3 hours easy. But general maintenance, of course. Yeah, come out, just make sure, you know, you're not going to burn your house down with the grease in the bottom of your oven.
Yeah, yeah. What are your top 3 that you guys are getting calls on?
Uh, refrigerators right now, and I'll tell you why. It's the summertime. A lot of people don't understand that you have that beer fridge in the garage and all of a sudden it's not cooling like it's supposed to. Well, It's in the hot garage.
If you'd crack the garage door, it would help the efficiency of the unit.
All right, so we got refrigerator.
Washing machines for some weird reason. Okay.
People are over— I mean, last month it was, my oven's broke, how am I gonna cook Easter?
Right, yeah. What is it that they're complaining about with the washing machines though?
A lot of them, the mold smell.
And a lot of that is because of the gray thing that goes around, especially on front loaders. You really can't get those clean.
Really? What, why is it that you can't get those clean? What's the issue there?
Because you can't get into all the crevices with a rag and bleach and all that. You just can't.
I mean, do you like literally, I mean, in order to clean it properly, you just have to take it out and take the whole thing apart?
Okay, no one's gonna do that.
Yeah, no, I mean, like, you guys don't even want to do that.
I mean, I know you do, but like, it's gross. But like you said, it's a 3-hour process, right?
But we can just replace what it's called— a door boot is what it's called. Okay, the gray thing around it, it's called a door boot.
But those, those only— those are only on the front-end loaders?
So like, you, you do not have that mildewy smell kind of issue that you do with the top loaders?
You do, especially— I have one, as a matter of fact, that doesn't have an agitator.
And it's so weird. And I mean, I've had my techs out several times, and it's just the luck of the draw. I have really hard water, so it's just— I have them out there at my house All the time.
I'm gonna make you laugh. Come on. I run an appliance company. Uh-huh. I have 3 refrigerators in my home.
3. Why do you— why do you have 3?
Okay, so I have one in the kitchen, one in the garage, and one in my office upstairs.
Ask me where the ice machine is. The only working ice machine. Where's the ice machine? On the kitchen counter.
On the kitchen— you have a separate ice maker? Uh-huh.
I have an LG refrigerator that has the ice in the, in the door of the refrigerator and below. Both are broke. Why? It's LG.
I was— you're calling out the brand?
I didn't mean to do that live and on in person.
Didn't mean to do that. Well, it happened. It happened.
Let's see what happened was. So, okay, so Kevin and I are now enchanted by these new fridges that make the craft ice?
What's wrong with the filters?
If you have really hard water, if you don't have a water filtration system on your home, your little craft balls of ice are not going to be balls.
What are they going to do?
They just come out flat like half circles. Really?
You're messing with my world right now. I need, I need my craft ice.
Well, I'm sorry, but I don't know how to tell you, and I think it's still not an appliance.
We're changing minds over here. I changed somebody's mind earlier.
We've had this whole thing going on for a year now. Yeah.
Have you ever read the definition?
You've read it to me. Okay.
As long as it's been read.
Oh, okay. So we've got— we, we had fridge, washing machine. What's the third one?
The bane of my existence. I hate microwaves. I hate microwaves. Do you know why?
No, the radio. I mean, look, I mean, yes, they produce radiation, but like, no, it— like, if, if I walk into a kitchen and someone asks me to inspect it for a cockroach infestation, you know where I'm going first?
Every time. Every time. Every time. Because it's the thing people clean the least. It's got the most electronics in it. It's warm all the time. I mean, like, and now the way that they're installing them, most of the time they're putting them in over the stove, which is just a giant grease trap. So anyway, that's— I have other reasons why I don't like microwaves, but that's at the top of the list.
Well, I'm rather old, let me say. And whenever I was young, we didn't have such things. Right. You had a plate that you put in the oven with aluminum foil over it.
Thank you. And warmed it up that way. Or like, people are always like, well, how do you heat your coffee up? And I was like, it's called a kettle.
Like— You know, used to, you could set it on the stove and it actually percolated up. Right.
That's how you made the coffee. Good coffee. That's how you make good coffee. All right, so she's giving me the stink eye. All right, real quick, I've got your number up on the screen, but you can tell everybody how to get a hold of you. How do people get a hold of you?
You can call us at 936-647-2364.
You passed. It's exactly what it is on the screen. Way to go. Okay, you're done.
Thank you so much. Good to see you. All right, guys, we are plugging along. It's good to visit with our good friends over at Lone Star Appliance Repair. Again, you can reach them at 936-647-2364 because they are amazing and we love having them as a sponsor on the show. Um, yeah, you guys go ahead, grab a— there's those, there's these. These don't sound that great, but you'll be able to hear.
Um, so anyway, man, this has been a fun night. I'm glad that the sun went down so that our lights could actually finally go to work. Yeah, thank you, thank you, Riz. Um, how are you guys doing? Good, how are you? Good. Okay, so you guys got to talk into the top of that. Bring it— you can probably bring that one down just a little bit. There you go. Awesome. So tell me your names and tell me what you do.
So I'm Heather Riesch, this is Tyler Riesch, and Neil—
My better half. Uh, yeah, I would say that you're my better half.
All right, good. So we have You have mutual agreement on that?
So, Reach Plumbing, did I say that right?
Okay, good. Um, how long you guys been doing this?
Yeah, but Tyler's been plumbing for how long?
16. 16? Bring that just a little bit closer, man. If you can't hear you, they can't hear you. All right, there you go.
Awesome. So 16 years, and you—
So I have a background in healthcare.
I came on in November full-time. And so it's definitely family-owned and operated.
Awesome. Yeah, so I gotta tell you, I saw the, I saw the picture of your office the other day. Oh yeah, and like the comment stream was like, can you help me organize my office? Like, like honestly, like if nothing else, that tells me a lot about your business. Just, I mean, like how, how clean you keep things.
Well, that's mostly her, but you just, you just get to live there.
Oh yeah, it used to be his office and then I kind of I overtook it when I started full-time. And so yes, we do try to keep it organized so we can find everything. And also when our employees come in, they know where the timesheets are, and it helps everything run a lot smoother.
Yeah, well, I mean, so what are some issues— I mean, I'm sorry, I'm gonna jump right into it because she's gonna come and take you guys away here in just a minute. What are some of the big issues you guys are seeing right now in homes?
We get a lot of stoppages, you know, due to—
Stoppages, you mean like clogs or like—
Yeah, like kitchen sinks. stopped up or, or, or something like that. Or even in these older homes, they'll, they'll have, uh, like leaks in the ceiling or AC blockages that come through their sheetrock. That's like 90% of our business, maybe 85%.
I've been taking calls, a lot of calls for the, uh, people who have galvanized or copper pipes, um, especially for galvanized in the older homes. They'll call us and say, hey, you know, I have a leak. And, uh, sometimes they're really severe and it destroys a lot of things in their home.
we'll come out and we'll give them an estimate, you know, we do free estimates and tell them, uh, we can repipe your house with PEX. And so the nice thing about that, it expands and contracts with the changing weather conditions, which in Texas you never really know.
Yeah, well, and like, I'm, I'm always surprised at how fast you're able to repipe a house. I mean, like, I, I— from what I've seen, most, most companies can knock it out in kind of like a day.
Yeah, what— how How is that?
So the old stuff isn't flexible and the new stuff is. So we just drill new holes, and a lot of times, um, if it, if it requires like breaking extra sheetrock, then, uh, we probably will leave the old stuff in there. But you know, it'll be dry and all that, right? And we'll drill new holes and, um, you know, just kind of curl it to wherever we need it and it'll be solid.
So it's just, it's just easier to get there because you can maneuver around stuff, whereas before, like, you're like It's a straight line and then we need a 90 and then we need a tee and then we need like all that kind of stuff.
So like, what are the— I've only seen PEX in homes a few times now because most of the time now you put it in, it's, you know, sitting underneath insulation. And so does it have like compression fittings for like the tees and the 90s and stuff like that? Or is it mostly just trying to keep it one solid piece from connection to connection?
So there's actually 2 types. of PEX. There's Type A and Type B. The older style, which I mean, I would say older style, the more used style in these newer houses is the crimp style. So you'll shove a fitting inside of it and then crimp a ring over it. We like to use Type A where we'll actually expand the pipe, push the fitting in it, and then it'll contract over it.
But yeah, you still use fittings and all that. You still don't have problems with them. Yeah, maybe it's too early to tell, but I mean, they've been using it up north for a while. And yeah, it's something—
We never get callbacks on PEX. Like, it's very rare. Even in new build homes, it's few and far between where someone's like, hey, I have a leak and I have PEX. It's that good.
When I've seen it leak, the only time I've seen it leak is when something's chewed through it.
I was fixing to say that. Yeah, in your, in your line of work.
Exactly. Yeah, that's about the only time I see it.
Yeah, yeah, it's good stuff.
Yeah, and even then, like, it takes a while. Like, it's sometimes it's not like an immediate leak. It's like they chewed on it, it kind of got to that membrane, and then like pressure builds over time. And then it's not even like a big leak. Sometimes it's like a slow leak.
Yeah, and it can be there for a long time before anyone realizes it's there.
Kind of get that fun little sheetrock bubble. Yeah, yeah.
I usually start getting pictures about that point, and Homer's like, how fast can you get here?
I think that gal just walked behind me to wave to the camera while I was— I think she did. I don't know if the camera was on or not, but she— like, I saw her in the—
She thinks I'm way more famous than I actually am. Well, so what else is it? I mean, like, I know, I know that one of the big things right now is the tankless water heaters. I know that— sorry? Okay, got a couple minutes here. I'll skip the tankless water heaters.
One, getting a house repiped in a day, incredible, especially if you can get PEX in there. If people want to get a hold of you, they're looking at their pipes going, man, I've got like old copper, I've got old, you know, God forbid, like cast iron. Whoa, easy there. If they need to get a hold of you, how do they find you guys?
So you can find us on Facebook, you can look up our, our email, you can also contact us on Facebook. You know, social media is really big right now, so Facebook's an easy way to get a hold of us, and they can talk to me, get the free estimate. Usually I can do an estimate same day or next day just based on the number of bedrooms and bathrooms and, you know, different fixtures they have in their home.
Yeah, no, I mean, I've reached out to you guys before. It's— I mean, you guys have been very responsive and pricing is very fair. So I mean, like, you guys, some— if you need something, people should definitely reach out to you guys.
Super important to us is to be, you know, affordable. Not cheap, but affordable so that people can get, you know, good quality work in their homes.
And communication is big with us too, so we like to talk to our customers. We want to make sure that they're happy in all aspects.
And that they're making an informed decision about what they're doing to their home, because if you're spending several thousand dollars to make an upgrade to your home, you want to know what you're getting. How long is it going to last? How long is it going to take for— how long is my water going to be turned off?
So I mean, and so like, just real quick, you guys can, I mean, fix leaks, clogs, general plumbing.
General repair, water heaters.
What about water softeners? Absolutely.
Yeah, like filtration systems, all that, all that.
That's been big here lately. A lot of people calling, you know, it's spring cleaning, you know, the wives are like in there like, hey, you know, I'd really like to get this water softener in. Yeah, RO system, we can handle all of that.
Awesome. Tankless water heaters are real big as well.
Oh yeah, I, I wish my house was piped where I could have one. I would have one right now. Yeah, so it just wasn't in the cards. All right, thank you guys so much for sitting down. I don't know who we got next, but we get— we're going to move on to the next one. So, but always good to visit with you guys.
Appreciate it. Yeah. Good to see you. All right, guys. I don't know what it—
You make it look so easy.
It's my job. I don't know what's going on with your life, man.
I keep wanting to fall over.
Yeah, you have interference. Rodent.
Yeah, we'll call it. We'll throw the flag on that. That's it. All right, who we got? Roberto. Hey dude, did you, did you see the post that we put up about you? I think it was yesterday. You put a post about me?
Yeah. Was it a good post?
We got the infamous Robert Green.
Greenlight Movers. So yesterday it was exactly 2 years from when we recorded Uh, our first interview with you.
And so I found like the picture showed up in my feed and I was like, I gotta share it. I gotta share it.
I think that was like the last time I did a podcast.
I was saying it's like a year ago, but I didn't know it was 2 years ago.
Yeah, I was like, no way. So anyway, so we didn't cover it all then.
So we gotta, we gotta get into it now.
What's, what's happening, man?
Not much. Just enjoying this night.
Is it all scratchy in your ears?
Because one of them's kind of off. That's why I was asking.
Yeah. So, dude, where— so right off the bat, so it's been 2 years. What's— where's the furthest you've gone since last time we talked?
Furthest that we've gone? Uh, we just went to Maine.
Yeah, we just went to Maine last month, actually.
So, okay, was it somebody moving from here to Maine?
where do we move her from?
I think she was like in Rosenberg on top of that. So I was like—
Dude, look at this thing.
Oh, see that? What is that?
That is a longhorn beetle, my friend. Just hanging out with us right there. Sorry, go ahead.
Glad for the education. I never knew what that was. But, um, yeah, we went to Maine and she moved from Rosenberg, so it was like, of course she couldn't just move from Spring, right? Run right down the street. Yeah, you know, she's an hour away. And then moving her all the way from there to Maine, golly, it was a, I think, 3, 4 days of driving.
My— and like, my first question is why? Like, why Maine?
I like— I'm sorry, like, honestly, I don't know why.
I know with that customer, actually I never met the customer, so I only met the realtor. So I work with a home organizer, and she had told the realtor about us, and the realtor told the homeowner about us, right? And so the homeowner actually had lost her husband, and so she had decided just to go to Maine.
Well, maybe that was it. But she has no— let's just make a big change. I mean, like, yeah, no family at all in Maine.
So I guess she decided just to make a big change like you're saying and get up there and take her daughter with her and Enjoying the beach life.
And then, you know, once they got the home situated, they got the home sold, and we came in, loaded it all up, and took it over there to Maine for her.
That's crazy. Yeah, yeah, 3 days. So like, it's like at least 7 days you gotta book. Oh yeah, for you guys minimum. Yeah, because you got, you got to have at least 1 day to unload, right?
Yeah, exactly. Yes, it's 3 days of driving, 1 day to unload, 3 days to drive back. And my guys are crazy enough to where They will try to drive back on the day that they unload.
Like the, like the whole way?
Not the whole way. They've tried it.
Oh, they'll leave after they get done unloading?
They'll unload and they'll head straight out. Like, I've had them go to Florida and I'll like, oh, Florida, like they're going by the beach. Let me give them an extra day just so they can enjoy the beach and really enjoy it. And I give them an extra day. I'm like, hey, we can go and head back now, right? Like, you don't enjoy the beach? No, we just want to go home.
I don't blame them. I don't blame them. I want to, I want to get— then anytime, like, anytime I'm— that it's done with whatever I need to do from being away from home. Yeah, I want to go back home. Yeah, I'm just done.
I want to be on my bed. I want to be on my couch. I want to be around my kids. I'm just done with being gone. Yeah, I get it. I get it.
Like, whenever something comes up and I have to, like, go out of town, I don't even expect it. I just have to go out there. Um, I start acting like a big baby. I'm like, man, I miss my kids. I could be sleeping in bed with my kids right now. I want to kiss my kids on the forehead. So I'm sure they're the same way. So I wouldn't want to go to Maine. No. I wouldn't want to go to really anywhere more than half a day.
Well, like, look, I mean, people, people can say that we're arrogant and that it's Texas, but like, listen, it's just better here. Like, I, I can't— I, I really can't wrap my brain around wanting to go live in Maine. Yeah, I just can't. I mean, I'm sure that people are lovely there. I'm sure it's pretty. I'm sure the beach is pristine. I'm sure everything is great about Maine. I'm sorry, it can't be better than here. Yeah, it can't be.
No, I mean, I don't have a problem against Maine. Like, I'll go to Maine. I just— for work purposes, I'd much rather stay here with my kids and my family. Yeah, sleep in my bed.
Absolutely. Let everybody else go. Yeah.
If anything, we need less people. here.
Very true. We are at capacity.
And somehow the capacity— it's like we're, we're at the—
I mean, it's good for you.
We're a full bottle right now, but somehow we're still finding more space to fill up.
Well, dude, I mean, you've been out to my house, right?
So like around, around my neighborhood, man, they're building 3 new neighborhoods that are at least 1,500 homes.
And I'm like, why? Why? I mean, like, I know that we're short on housing, but like, let's Let's leave something. Yeah, let's leave something for us to enjoy, you know, for the people that have actually been here for a while. Like, let's leave something for the squirrels and the birds.
That's what makes Texas Texas.
I don't know if this is still the same, but I know when I looked before, I think 74% of Texans live on 4% of the land. Yeah, which is crazy.
It makes sense, man. I mean, you have so many, like, just people jam-packed in, like, a downtown area. Any metropolitan area, man, it's just gonna be like people on top of people. So yeah, it makes, it makes sense.
But it's just crazy. I'm sure that's not the same for a lot of other states. I could be wrong. I know New York, I heard New York has some countryside to it.
Yeah, you know what, you're probably right, but that's probably part of that is because like Texas and California are just so big.
So, all right, I'm getting, I'm getting the, the wave to move you along. Already?
That was quick. All right, so if people, if people are looking to move to Maine, how do they get a hold of you?
If you want to move to Maine, you want to move right, be well taken care of, customer service and all the, all the 9 yards, um, give Robert Green a call. Greenlight Movers. Give us a call at 832-929-6683. Email me at robertgreen@glmovers.com and also reach out to us at www.glmovers.com. greenlightmovers.com. And of course, hit us up on Facebook or Instagram, All Greenlight Movers. Uh, thank you again, my friend.
We'll have to do a longer one.
All right, man, thank you for sitting down.
Good to see you. Hey, uh, Angels. Yeah, please. Big Rock. Well, you kicked him off. Who you got? Oh, come on.
Whichever one you want. Not— well, I mean, whichever one sounds good, because one of them is kind of crackly.
I don't like the crackly one.
So choose wisely. This is like Indiana Jones. Hello?
Yeah, this one's kind of dead on this side though, but it's not crackly.
As long as it's not crackly, man. Yeah, that's, that's what you got to watch out for.
I don't like the crackles.
Big night. Hell yeah, it's great. I can't say that, can I?
It's after, after kid time.
Well, I mean, I mean, kids can be watching.
parents let kids do all kinds of crazy stuff on the internet now.
Tell me about it. Keyboard warriors and the whole 9 yards, man.
Like, look, it— I don't— I really don't understand parents giving kids just completely unfettered access to the internet.
I don't get it. Like, my 15-year-old daughter just got her first phone. Now, she had a device before where she could text us and message us. Thank you so much. And all that kind of stuff. But like, she never had anything where she had access to the internet where we couldn't see what was going on at all times. I don't— and like, I watch parents at restaurants with kids just hand them devices and just, do whatever you want.
And we're gonna be over here having dinner.
Yeah. Well, we've tried to have this, you know, at our house to at least plan set-down dinner where it's no device time, right? Because they're on devices all the time, all day, computers at school. I mean, they're— even my 7-year-old, it's— that's how they learn. on computers. Yeah. So it's unfortunately, it's the age, right? Yeah. It's the new age of learning.
Yeah. So, well, his math I can't do. I mean, I'm college educated in calculus and physics and everything, and I can't do first grade math anymore.
Is it like the Common Core math kind of stuff?
It's like, I don't know, bubbles and showing work and all kinds of stuff, but 2 and 2 doesn't equal 4 anymore. I mean, it's It's some crazy stuff, man, you know. So calling the teacher going, you know what, I don't know how to do this.
Yeah, yeah, no, it's like, this is not for me.
No, yeah, me and Ashley are both pretty good with math. They'll learn real estate, right? We deal with numbers all the time. His numbers don't add up.
I don't know what business you're going to go into, son. It's not ours.
If you come get to that listing on that price, I want to see how you're going to do it, and it ain't going to be bubbles.
Well, dude, so what, what is— I mean, you've been on the show before, people probably know, but let everybody know who you are.
Hey, Corey Reeves with Three's Realty Group. We're a husband and wife team out of Montgomery specializing in renting, buying, selling lots, land, and commercial. We're here to help y'all, so anybody looking for anything as far as real estate, needs. We're very good, very diversified. We got 16 years of experience between the two of us, 35 years of sales on my part, and my wife Ashley has been a director of commercial and buyer's agent, seller's agent, and run, run her own group. So we pretty much are a one-stop shop. Just went through a solar panel, solar panel class today. Huh? you know, new as far as real estate goes and can be very tricky. Yeah. Because people are actually— and this is a good topic we could talk about
as far as kind of going down that road. Yeah. The guys that are selling— I learned this today— the guys that are selling solar panels to people in their neighborhoods, and they'll be like, oh, I talked to Mrs. Jones down the street. They're like, oh yeah, I know Mrs. Jones. Yeah, she's buying some solar panels from us. It's like, oh, they warm up, right?
And then before you know it, they just bought $100,000 worth of solar panels, right? All right, so what they don't take into account is you're putting solar panels on a roof that's 10 years old.
All right, so the roof's halfway through its life expectancy, then you got solar panels on it, so you're gonna have to remove the solar panels to replace the roof on. Yep. Right. So unless they're done at the same time, Because solar panels and roofs all have about a 25-year lifespan. But if you don't do them at the same time, the roof's not going to live as long as the solar panel is going to. Yep. Right? So then you run into a problem where who do you find the company that's going to come do it? Because the guys that are selling it to you are using burner phones. Learned this today. Ooh. So they're— and they're going from state to state and
neighborhood to neighborhood, and they get you sold, they get it installed, They move on, then they switch phones. They don't want people calling them back. A lot of times you can't get service after the sale, and that company's not around anymore.
Or it doesn't— it never existed.
It never existed to start with, and they're hiring it out or subbing out, right? So it's a deregulated market. It's not regulated.
So we're trying to figure out how to sell houses with solar panels when the buyer bought them, thought he was gonna stay there 30 years, and And then all and behold, 5 years later, he's got a job transfer, or, or they got a reason, family matter, that they've got to move to a different state or what have you. So we are educated now on how to handle that transaction.
How to get that loan paid off, how to keep that buyer out of hot water, because if they don't pay them off, that loan is going to get transferred to the seller. Mm-hmm. So we try to pay it off at closing if there's enough equity in the house to do that. Actually dealing with one right now. The guy owes $46,000 on the loan left on his solar panels in his house.
Wasn't that like one of the big issues is like, you know, like the solar guys are telling you how much value it's going to add to the home, but then you go to sell the home and you're not actually getting that equity on the sale.
There's zero equity. Zero. Right. Okay. It doesn't add any equity to the home. The only person that adds equity to the home is the appraisal district. The appraisal district that raises your taxes values that into the home. Nobody else does.
Okay? The only person that's going to look at that as an asset is going to be a buyer that gets them paid off for free. Right? They're not going to want to assume—
They don't want another loan.
Here's the problem with the loan situation with that, that we are now educated on. is most of the loans are only transferable one time. Uh-huh. Once.
So the buyer buys it, moves 5 years, sells it to this guy. The guy buys it, decides he wants to move. He's got to pay it off. Can't transfer it again. Hmm. So that loan has to come to—
We're about to get in trouble with Darlene.
Look at her. I'm not sure what that's all about.
She's telling me I've gone too long.
We didn't even go long enough. I can go a lot longer. Woo! It's Reed's Realty Group in the house, baby.
Who do you got? You got Connor? Cocktails with Brad? Come sit down, dude.
Yeah, come on, dude. You're a roofer. We're talking about you. No, actually, you're going to fit right into this conversation. I teed this one up real good. So yeah, let's have a group chat.
So bring it— bring you up to speed. Okay. Is that one crackling in your ears a little bit?
No, not necessarily. Okay, good.
So he was— he went to a class on solar today and he was talking about how these guys will sell solar but not replace the roof. How'd you get tableside service? Look at that. Cocktails with Craig.
Yeah, yeah, she knows who the star is.
And then, but like, they're not replacing the roof. Oh yeah, before they— even though the roof might be 10 years old.
So the solar panels are gonna last longer than the roof, so you're gonna pull the solar panels off in order to replace the roof, and then you're kind of upside down on both of them.
So, well, I can tell you how many— I can't tell you how many times I've seen solar panels on 3-tab roofs.
They're single-dimensional. They look like your brickwork, you know, and their usual typical life expectancy Expectancy is about 10 to 12 years on a perfect day.
Um, and my son's up in Livingston. I can't tell you how many times that I've actually driven out there and seen solar panels on a 15-year-old 3-tab, knowing dang well that they're having some leaks, you know, and they don't care. Solar guys got their cut. I'm not against solar, but as a roofer, I'm more on the side of give me field panels. Versus putting something on the roof that's gonna void a warranty and that's also gonna be susceptible to more leaks.
This is— so this is something I've run up against many times, is like anytime I've looked at solar, people say, well, let's just put them on risers out in your pasture.
Oh, that'd be perfect. No, that's great.
That's perfect. Which my response to that has always been like, look, is my kid gonna get decapitated when they're riding a horse in the field?
Yeah, it's like, look, I need— I need like— we gotta—
we gotta think through them all.
Yeah, you build, you build a solar farm.
Which is my hang-up, right? It's like, look, you're telling me I'm gonna lose so much of my pasture.
That you're like, I like, I know. And then, and then they're like, well, let's just cut down trees. I'm like, no, I don't want to cut down trees. Yeah, well, you don't want— you're telling me all the stuff I don't want to hear.
Not as bad as you think. It only takes 4 panels to equal 1,000 watts. So it's not catastrophic to run your house. So you wouldn't need that big of a farm.
Yeah. So it all depends on what you want to power. Now, if you're wanting to power 5 houses and, you know, a shop with 220, you might need, you might need some acreage. Yeah, right.
So, well, listen, I've, I've seen, I've seen the solar farms out in Vegas.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, like, they're insane. Oh yeah, yeah. Drive out West Texas, I see them all the time going to my ranch. Go look at Dell in Austin. Oh yeah, they got acres and acres and acres of solar. Yeah, yeah.
So, well, let me run this by I was listening to a guy the other day talk about wind farms.
And I'd never— like, I've, I've known guys that have gotten into wind and like, like the stuff that you see where it's out in the plains just makes no sense to me. Makes zero sense to me. I heard this guy talking about taking over old oil derricks out in the ocean and putting wind farms out there. And I'm like, that makes sense to me.
There's constant wind out there, you know? And like, you're going to get— you're going to get a lot more power generation, a lot more constant power generation. And I just never heard anybody explain it. It's like, well, let's just put them offshore. And like, there's people pushing back on it for different reasons. A lot of it is like fishing and different things like that because like they're now like federally protected things out there that you can't touch.
Yes, but reefs grow on them. And, and so they're like, they're having— they're running up against some stuff. But I'm like, all right, so this— that wind power actually makes sense to me. Like when we can— we're going to start getting into areas where like it makes logical sense. You're not taking up anybody's land. You're actually putting it where there's more wind. You can actually get more efficiency out of them because that's the big problem with them is they're not efficient enough on the land in order to generate the kind of electricity that you need for them to generate for what you're spending on them because they're fantastic.
And now you got to think of maintenance out there. Well, you want to hear the number one problem?
Where do you dispose them? So you can't burn them. They don't disintegrate, so you have to bury them.
So now we're putting cad metal, lithium, all that, all of it in the earth, which is contamination. So we're trying to get out of killing our atmosphere.
But we're going to contaminate our soil in the process.
So the whole thing with solar is it's great, but the problem is we don't have a solution to where it's going to go when it hits the end of its life? Yeah. So you got to buy new ones, you're going to build new ones, you got to get rid of the old ones. What, what's that look like?
Yeah. Um, and you're not, you're not talking about like a little piece of land either. No, I mean, like, it takes like 6 semi-trucks just to drive the blades down the highway.
Sure. It's a lot of real estate to manage. And here's what's really another, another fun fact. I'll ask both of y'all this trivia question. Let's go. I don't have an exact date because I forgot the exact day, but I've got the century and the decade. When did solar actually become a thing?
What do you mean became like solar?
When did they figure out that they could harness solar energy to power?
If I had to guess, I would say somewhere between the 1940s and 1960s.
That's a good guess. I said 1970s. What do you think? I would have said the '80s.
Yeah, because that's when you started seeing them, right? Yeah. 1820.
But solar was actually— and it came from France, and a guy from, uh, the United States actually took credit for it because he was the one that patented it over in the US, but actually it was a French design.
I know, isn't that nuts? Little Tuesday nugget. Yep. So, but it didn't really start becoming available and readily seen in America until 2008, is why we always say. So it's like a newer generation type thing. So the problem is we haven't seen life expectancy long enough on those to know exactly what they are going to do because it's new. Yeah, and can agree. And while I was telling Craig earlier, the guys that are selling the solar or running around neighborhoods going, oh, I talked to Mrs. Jones down the street, she's gonna buy from me. Oh, I know Miss Jones, yeah, we worked a great deal. Well, what kind of deal did she get? Well, hey, guess what? Hook 'em, hook 'em, right? Or they, they change light bulbs. Say, I got a whole package of light bulbs, I'm gonna give you some free
light bulbs that are gonna work with your new solar power.
So they bait you that way, then you feel bad, then you gotta buy 'em, right?
So then they go and then they change their phone 6 months later, and then they have a burner phone and you can't get a hold of them. Anymore. And a lot of them go out of business quick too. Well, there's no service after the sale, right? Yeah. So, and then the problem is there's only one company that we know of that is, that is fairly legal as far as regulation go that can take them off and put them back on. And it's a company out of Austin, okay, that can actually do that, and they cover this area. So, and I got that info if y'all want it later. Oh, but I know you might. Yeah, no, that's definitely—
Hey, Corey, real quick, Darlene wants me to bring somebody else on here.
All right, no, dude, thank you. Real quick, give everybody your, your, your contact info.
Uh, Corey Reeves, Reeves Realty Group. Um, 281-932-2423. Corey Reeves, Reeves Realty Group out of Montgomery, Texas. Husband and wife team. 281-932-2423. Website is reavesrg.com. Again, reavesrg.com. Appreciate you guys.
Thank you, Corey. Thanks for jumping on. Connor, feel free to hang on. I don't know who we got coming up next. Thank you for sitting down, Corey.
Thanks for the, uh, thanks for the time.
Thank you. No, dude, are you, uh, you can see, bud, are you, uh, are you geared up for hurricane season? Oh yeah, yeah.
No, it's, uh, it's gonna be an active year. Um, it's already been active with all the hailstorms and windstorms that we've had this year. Yeah, but insurance has changed There's a lot of rules and regulations that are changing.
There is. We talked about your— we talked about your post earlier in the show. Oh yeah, crazy ex-girlfriend.
Oh, we got Rudy joining the house. What's up, Rudy? What's up?
Yeah, no, insurance is definitely changing. And, uh, yeah, Big Red, uh, would rather spend their tax dollars or your policyholder money actually, you know, of that, uh Teaching Arnold Schwarzenegger how to say neighbors correctly versus paying their hard-earned policy members.
Well, listen, man, I've been singing this song for a long time that people need to be paying attention to their homeowners policies because, like, all— it's not just State Farm. Like, all these insurance agencies are fixing to start taking roofs away.
So, and I've been hearing that from the brokers for a long time.
They have been shutting up shop. Florida, it's going rampant right now. You know, With insurance holders pulling out. They've closed Lighthouse out here in Texas. There's a whole bunch nationwide. It's not official yet, but Nationwide isn't really reissuing policies going forward.
So yeah, insurance is definitely changing, and they're going to have their rules and regulations to how they see fit, you know.
Yeah, it's a different world, different market the last few years. We ran the story 3 or 4 weeks ago about how a lot of Florida residents are concerned about losing their homes.
Because they can't afford the premiums on their homeowners insurance anymore. And like, you're talking about like elderly people who are on fixed incomes.
That, I mean, like, they've had these policies for years and now they're looking at potential foreclosure. Well, because they're so strapped with the premiums on their homeowners insurance.
And they're also The ways are changing in a sense on that core too. I'm not a door-to-door solicitor or door knocker or anything, but roofers in Florida are not allowed to do that anymore. Right. So, be it however business that is on a door knocking scale, but still, you still are informing the public of damage that's around, you know, and things of that nature. And now you can't have that. So, homeowners are kind of left astray not knowing where to go, you know. Yeah, it's different.
Yeah, Rudy, jump in here, man. Oh, tell everybody who you are and what you do.
My name is Rudy. I'm RC Pressure Washing.
Dude, get up, get up on that thing so people can hear you.
My name is Rudy. I own RC Pressure Washing.
I do everything residential and commercial exterior cleaning.
Yeah, yeah, it requires water, you got it, huh?
If it requires cleaning and I can take care of it, I'll handle it.
So like, I mean, can— like, I know driveways are in the mix, right?
Oh man, yeah, that's the easiest thing you can do. Yeah, yeah, you can get it. My 12-year-old son can go out there and pressure wash. But it's the mixing the chemicals and getting sure— making sure that you get the right mixture of chemicals, or not mixture, to get the stains off, right?
What are the big stains that you guys end up dealing with?
Oh man, we get a lot of oil stains.
We just can't get off. Uh, there are ways to lighten it off, lighten the oil stains.
And is that with product or more pressure?
Yeah, the equipment you have as well.
Um, get up on that thing so people can hear you.
Equipment you have as well, right? If you don't have hot water, you're gonna have a harder time getting the oil stains out, right? Right. You know, you're not going to wash your dishes with cold water and a sponge that you've already dipped in oil, right?
You know, so, um, she's gonna be smearing stuff. That's what you're gonna wish you had Dawn.
You could try Dawn if you want, but, uh, that's what the 16-year-old kid is gonna do.
They're not gonna come out with professional equipment. They're not going to come out with one that— they might, you know. Sure, more power to them. And please, let me know so I can meet them. Yeah, 16-year-old kids out there with a hot water unit pulling a trailer, then he's doing things right, right?
Um, and I wish I would have had that mindset back when I was 16.
For sure. Yeah, I'd have been a millionaire. At that point, you're handing out respect.
But, um, it's definitely, you know, it's not rocket science, you know.
But, uh, it takes a little bit of chemistry know-how.
You've got to be knowledgeable on the accord, especially on high-pressure wash on a house, you know, not to mess up the grout work and the mortar lines and things of that nature. So of course I'm sure it all kind of comes into play.
Yeah, right. You know, putting the right amount of chemicals and not putting too much and making sure that you can rinse off and not damage not only the property, the structure, but your grass and your plants. Right?
You don't want to kill everybody's—
Yeah, you can spray all the chemicals, house is clean. But man, look at those roses.
Look at those azaleas. They responded.
So there's a way to protect that when you come up to a house to do a house wash.
You're going to dilute the— soak the water or the plants. You're going to soak the grass, cover the plants with a certain cover. You're not going to sit there and use a tarp because using a tarp is not going to get oxygen to the plants and it's actually going to cause more damage than the chemicals.
I learned that during the freeze.
Yeah, I ain't got no plants.
The wife over here is making good plants, you know, good flowers and garden little thing going on. And, uh, yeah, we tried to pressure wash and just kind of preserve that, left that there for like 6 hours. Puppies are fried.
Connor, Connor, I'm giving you your 2-minute warning, man. She's gonna kick you out here in just a second.
She can kick me out. Who's next?
But so, I mean, like, what about like, uh, like an industrial kind of stuff? Do you guys get called in for that kind of stuff as well?
Oh yeah, all the time. Um, that's, that's kind of what I'm going towards. Not just industrial, but more commercial.
Uh, my background is industrials. I worked in the oil field.
I was an instrumentation and automation technician, and I worked all over the world, right?
I used the pressure washer every once in a while to wash some sensors off that had too much oil-based mud, but that was the extent of my pressure washing, you know, experience on drilling rigs.
Yeah, but this is offshore?
Oh man, no, I didn't touch offshore.
I went a couple times, but, uh, not for you? Nah, them boats, not for me. The cool thing is they would send us out on helicopters you know, because it was a rush job. Send Rudy out there, he's, you know, he speaks Spanish and he knows everything about RigWatch, right? I don't know if I can say that, but he knows everything about the instrumentation software. So they would send me out there, rush helicopter jobs. But the boat back, there was one time I was like 24 hours on the boat and I'm sitting— I'm, I'm, uh, I've been on the boat. The first time I tried to stand up and then just— no, I was throwing up. I learned the best way—
you can get the Dramamine.
I tried it. The best way to handle boat rides is to lay down, man. I'm on a waterbed for 24 hours. Yeah, I was trying to just lean in, laying down. And, uh, anyway, but—
All right, real quick, Connor, we got it. We gotta kick you out, dude. I'm getting kicked out real quick. Let everybody know how to get a hold of you if you need a new roof.
Y'all can reach me at, uh, Facebook on Your Friendly Neighborhood Roofer with Core 4 Roofing. Number is 832-623-2115. Again, that's Your Friendly Neighborhood Roofer where I ensure quality protection of your most valuable investment, your home or your business. Currently definitely pursuing more commercial buildings, so if you have any commercial properties that need a quick inspection, you know, or a maintenance plan or a not-to-exceed, you know, clause, anything like that, It's not everything needs to entitle a roof replacement. We're happy to help for waterproofing needs. Again, give me a shout. Connor Mack, your friendly neighborhood roofer with 4Four Roofing. That's 832-623-2115. Thanks, guys.
Good to see you, bud. Good to see you, bud.
Dude, thank you for sitting down. So, on these industrial ones, are you— is it the same sort of equipment that you'd be using for like the heat and the chemical and all that kind of stuff, or is it different?
Yeah. So it's different equipment. I mean, for bulldozers, for heavy equipment, for some industrial equipment, a degreaser is just fine. Hot water, degreaser. But you also have to be careful for all the electronic equipment, right?
Which is a problem that we would have with the rig workers. They would come and pressure wash And it says that it's waterproof, but that doesn't mean you could sit there and spray a screen with 4,000 PSI.
So that's the things that I've been known to look for because I've been in that side of it to where I'm having to fix the electronic equipment.
Now when I go see any electronic equipment on industrial stuff, um, I cover it up, right? There's just certain ways to protect it. Obviously ensure it's not plugged up and energized, lockout tagout, right? And then that's things that, you know, most other pressure washers have never had that experience with.
Right. So being OSHA certified, having rig pass, which are 2 things that are required to be on rigs, but yet the same concept of safety and HSE, you know, health, safety, and environmental, right? That was drilled into us. So I see the same thing on my projects where I'm working with bulldozers and having to clean heavy equipment or industrial equipment. So yeah, that's where my—
Connor's kind of gone now, but like, what about like roofs? I mean, like, you guys clean those as well.
Yeah, yeah, it's definitely easier and cheaper to clean a roof using the soft wash method than it is to replace it.
I get calls from real estate agents that, or even some home inspectors, like, hey, let's just come clean this roof. It's a great roof, it's in great condition, but it's a little dingy looking. It's dingy. Yeah, faces the north side. Really the only thing the north side's the only one, can you just quote me on cleaning that one?
And I'm like, I, I can, but you don't realize how dirty the other side is, you know, until you clean the north side, basically.
See you, Robert. Robert, there you go, bud.
So, um, yeah, once you clean the one side and it's got the black streaks coming down, you're gonna have overspray on the other side either way. Yeah, you know, so you might as well clean it. I never will quote somebody half a roof wash.
Yeah, that doesn't make any sense.
Doesn't make any sense, you know. Same with half, uh, parts of your house wash. Yeah, I will, but it's price-wise, it's gonna be—
Dude, are we shut— are we shutting the place down? I think we're the only ones left. Yeah, we are, dude. Well, man, if people are needing pressure washing, how do they get a hold of you, bud?
1-877-754-WASH. Yeah, it's 9274 for those that don't know how to use T9.
So, and real quick, like basic driveway, how much we looking at?
That's, that's my minimum.
Awesome. Um, you got— do you have a website, Facebook, all that kind of stuff? What is, what is all that?
My website is wewashyourgrimeaway.com.
Dude, that's a great website.
Yeah, yeah. I'm not gonna sit here and tell you I'm gonna clean your mold, I'm gonna clean your mildew, because we're getting into all these legalities. Yeah, but I'm gonna make sure that it's as clean as it can be. It's gonna be clean.
Love it, man. Dude, thank you so much for sitting down with us, man. Thank you very much. Yeah, man, we're gonna, we're gonna, we're gonna wrap it up. Hit the, hit the cue. Yeah, go ahead, man. Uh, this has been a fun night out here with Annette. I'm glad you guys could come out and join us. It has been a fun night sitting down with everybody. So glad that you could join us for this live episode here out at Moonshine Deck. It's been a fun time sitting down with all of our guests. Uh, thank you guys. Be sure and reach out to our sponsor, Lone Star Appliance Repair, 936-647-2364. We look forward to seeing you guys next time.
