That Time We Talked About Home Inspections

This is episode number 80 of The Homeowner Show. Whether you're DIY or looking to hire, we're here to help you find the best information and options for you and your home. My name is Kevin Hackett, and here with me is Craig Williams.

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to The Homeowner Show. We're glad that you could join us on the podcast of podcasts of Today.

Yes, we are glad you are here. Thank you for—

Not another one like it.

Well, not really. Yeah, no, we're, we're one of a kind.

That's right, the big 8-0. Yeah, hey, show turns 80 today.

Yeah, we're getting close to that triple digit.

It's— it— we're creeping into like Joe Biden territory.

Oh my goodness, we're almost as old as Joe Biden. Is that what you're going with?

That's funny.

I don't care who you are, that's funny right there. That's good.

So we got, we got, we got a bunch of old white men running for the, the presidency while we get corona-ing the— by the time this episode comes out, it'll be interesting to see what's going on with the, uh, the, the spread of the virus.

Yeah, it'll be interesting. Like, one of the things I was talking to, to Haley, our friend Haley.

Yes.

I was talking to her, uh, just yesterday actually.

She's your friend now?

Yeah, she is. We've talked on the phone.

One time.

That's all it took. She's awesome. Mortgage rates are the lowest they've ever been.

Dude.

Ever.

Right now. Who knows what's going to happen?

It could go lower. It's possible. We've talked on this show before that There are other countries that pay you to get a mortgage. Negative interest.

I don't know if it's that way right now. It was Japan. Japan had negative interest rates.

I don't expect it to get there, but I read an article just today that it's possible.

Absolutely, it's possible. They've already done it.

Exactly. It's possible in the U.S., I'll say that.

You know the issue over there was, Which I don't think is the issue. The government decided to do that over there. One of the big issues was people were saving too much money.

Yeah, they wanted them to spend it.

Yeah, they wanted to de-incentivize the saving of money, and so they started charging bank accounts in order to keep money in it. If you do that, people are more likely to borrow money and spend the money.

Right. The weird thing right now is that the coronavirus is just scaring everybody.

Right.

That's one of the reasons the The recession, so to speak. It's not a full-on recession yet, but it could be.

Could be. Who knows? Yeah.

But I, I got something else to tell you, man.

What you got?

So we, we were kind of cursed in our neighborhood with horrible, um, ISP, an internet service provider.

Got it. Um, would you guys get a new one?

What we did.

Okay.

And so which one is it? It's TACUS.

Okay. I've seen their trucks.

So, so TACUS is, um, it's a, it's a local company. Uh, we are the only place out currently out there Actually, Walden is also getting it, but, uh, there's another place, uh, kind of towards The Woodlands in Shenandoah that has it. Um, but, um, they're new and we had to get this— we had to get, uh, basically neighborhood-wide buy-in.

Oh, okay.

For them to come install it. And so we had to have enough people say, yes, I will switch over, in order to have them come install it. Well, it's pretty easy because what we had was horrible. Um, and it's interesting though because—

Was it difficult to get buy-in?

Basically, the buy-in was not difficult. What's weird is that where we live, we did not have horrible service, but on the other side of the main road, um, it's horrible service. And people talking about that just in the middle of the day, their internet would go down for hours and hours, sometimes days.

Oh my gosh.

And, and, you know, for someone like my wife who works from home, it's a huge, huge problem.

Yeah.

You know, so, um, Anyway, we, we decided it, it was, it was really one of those deals where dollar for dollar it's about the same. Um, and, and we've had fine internet, but, uh, for, for a little bit more money we could go from 200 megabyte download speeds to 500.

Okay.

Um, it, it made sense dollar-wise. to, to make the jump. The other thing is instead of 20 megabyte upload, we're getting 500 megabyte upload. So we're getting equal download and upload speeds right now, and they're really, really fast. Um, so we— the way we stream, uh, video content is probably different than a lot of people do. Um, and so I— when, when we installed the new internet service, we couldn't watch TV anymore. It was like this complete lag, and it was just— it was, it was buffering all the time, and we could not watch any type of, of TV. And I'm, I'm sitting here going, this is ridiculous. We more than doubled our speed, right? And we're not able to watch anything. This

makes no sense. So I go through and I turn— I, I I just reset everything back to the old ISP because we hadn't turned it off yet.

Right.

And everything worked fine. So I call their customer service and I say, hey, something's going on. This, this doesn't make any sense. Um, can you give me any insight into what I need to do? So basically they said, well, everything's coming in on our end the way it should. It's probably your router. I said, well, we have a really, really good router. We, we have the Eero Pro system, which, um, it is a good system. Yeah, it's a great system. It's the best wire— it's, in my opinion, I've done a lot of research on this, it's the best wireless mesh system there is. Um, so, uh, I, I'm, I'm going, this— all I did was plug it in

differently. I mean, it's the same equipment. There's no reason that this shouldn't be working. And so I called my router company called Eero's customer service, and they said, um, well, everything is working the way it should be. I mean, our, our product is doing what it should be. They, they were able to see everything on my system, right, remotely. And so I'm sitting here going, okay, both people are— neither one of them are blaming the other one necessarily. They're just saying our our stuff is working the way it should, right? And I'm going, okay, well, I know for a fact that, that my equipment is working, and I know for a fact that their equipment is working. This doesn't work at my house for some reason, right? There's something going on.

So I called them and I said, hey, um, I, I wanna— I want you to just come take it out, like just uninstall it.

Mm-hmm.

Do whatever you got to do, come get your equipment. and I want to be done. And obviously they didn't want to do that, right? So, um, they— so they put me in, in contact with someone who said, let me come back out. It's like a senior person. Let me come back out and look at it. I'd rather just look at it. Most of the time they're going to charge people to uninstall this, right? Um, because I didn't pay the install. because I was an early adopter, so I didn't have to pay any install. But to uninstall at this point, they gotta— I mean, they gotta gain their money back.

Sure.

Right? Uh, and I said, listen, I, I've done everything I think I know what to do, and I'm, I'm not an idiot when it comes to internet service providers. I'm not an idiot whenever it comes to routers. I'm not an idiot whenever it comes to the internet stuff. I, I know what I'm doing, and I'm— this isn't working. He said, okay, well, let us come out and check it. I said, fine. That's totally fine. Do whatever you got to do, but just take it whenever you're done, you know. As long as it's gone. As long as it's gone. Uh, I don't want to pay for this. And so interestingly enough, the next morning I got a call from somebody else

within the TACA's company. He is their infrastructure specialist. He's the one that creates all and, and, and does everything with their infrastructure. And he said, I can tell that you're not connected right now to your modem, is that correct? And I said, yes, I'm, I'm not connected to your modem, I'm connected to the other ISP modem. He said, okay, I want to try something. Um, have you ever heard of bridge mode? I said, yes, I don't know much about it, but I, I do know that sometimes that changes someone's ability to to stream things differently. Um, because here's the crazy thing, most people don't understand this. Most people think, oh, the higher speed I've got, the better things are going to run, right? That's not true. Um,

something only runs at the capacity that it needs to. So one, one of the things that is a misnomer out there, and, and this I think something's really good for people to know, is that— what, what do you think? I'm just curious. Do you have any idea how many, how many, um, megabytes it takes to run, to watch a video or movie at 1080p?

I have zero clue.

If you were to take a guess, what would you guess?

Well, any guess I would have would just be embarrassing. I don't even like— I have zero concept as to like how big a megabyte even is.

Okay, well, so what I'm telling you is we've got We've got 500 down with this new company. We had 200 before.

So probably like what, 10, 15?

Yeah, 7.

7?

Okay. 7.

I wasn't far off.

No, you weren't. But most people think it's like tons and tons and tons, right? You know, you, you could get away with streaming video at 20 megs.

Okay.

But most people are like, oh, I gotta have 1,000. No, you don't. You really don't. Don't pay— don't go pay for that unless you're doing crazy stuff at your house that your job requires.

You got like 20 people streaming movies at the same time.

Okay.

Yeah.

problem is bandwidth. Okay, so anyway, um, he puts my modem into bridge mode. I get home, I turn it on, boom, it works.

Ah.

So I say all that to say, and, and I've done a little more research to understand what bridge mode is, uh, basically what it does is it allocates all of the, the bandwidth and the speed to one port, and it takes out all the settings. all the settings that are, that are in their system. It basically gives you full control over those things.

Oh.

Um, it's good and it's bad, right?

It leaves you exposed, I would imagine.

Well, it, it— a lot of people want to use their modem with multiple inputs in the back. They want to put this in this one and this in that one. You only have one slot available Okay. There's only one port available at this point. From there, you have to infrastructure it yourself.

Like with a mesh system or—

Exactly, with something else. So I— one of the things that I, I want our listeners to hear through all this, and the reason I wanted to bring this up today, is if you get to a situation where you think that you should be getting a certain speed and you're not, um, think about alternatives. it may be something as easy as putting your modem into bridge mode will change things. Now, conversely, it could have some negative effects, and it may be that you want to make sure your modem isn't in bridge mode. Maybe it is and it shouldn't be.

Right.

So anyway, it's, it's a bunch of lingo mumbo jumbo for people out there who may not have any idea what I'm talking about. Um, but if you do know what I'm talking about, then maybe that, maybe that's helpful to you. And there's probably some people out there that are listening and going, gosh, Kevin's such an idiot, and he just proved it. But anyway, there you go.

And like, I, I know for a fact that our guest today was just like completely lost in the conversation.

She—

I mean, like, she spent like a good 10 minutes before the show telling us how much she hates technology.

Exactly. Yeah, yeah, she, she was lost.

But I rely on it.

So, but we, we do have a really cool episode for you guys today.

If you have ever thought about Buying a home, building a home, or really anything to do with a home, one of the things that you're going to need is an inspector. And we have a really good one in the studio today. My good friend Ricky Neal is in the house.

Hi.

How you doing, Ricky?

Doing okay.

I'm so glad you're here.

I'm a little numb after that last 11, 12 minutes.

You were gone for like the last 8 minutes.

I know what you're talking about.

She's over there like playing tic-tac-toe with herself in her head.

I'm inspecting the room. You got a drywall crack over there.

Oh yeah, there's, there's plenty of—

there's plenty of things. An outlet cover.

Well, most, most—

and outlet cover.

And hey, from where I can see, yeah, that's what's visible to me at the time of inspection.

You should be, you should be impressed because this was a chicken coop.

Nice.

So, and, uh, I will— I'll tell you the story about that later on.

It's—

that was a fun one.

Yeah.

Yeah. So, uh, Tell us, tell us who you are, Ricky.

My name is Ricky Neal. I actually work as a home inspector. Currently, I'm working for a company called Golden Soap Inspections. I have a Facebook page called Get 'Em Inspected. That came about kind of ironically. I was doing little videos on my own personal Facebook page and I just kept saying, get 'em inspected. And one of my inspector buddies is like, hey, you might want to do something with that because you say it a lot. So a few months later, here we are.

Yeah. Yeah. And that's actually one of the reasons I wanted to have you on the show. I love the videos that you put up.

Oh, I'm so glad.

I crack up every time. I was actually on the phone with my dad earlier today and I was telling him, I think it was one, it was a kitchen sink and there was a—

The disposal.

The disposal with the vegetable sprayer.

That was a good one. It was like pulling a pull-start weed eater. Every time you lift the vegetable sprayer, the disposal would come on. It was really funny because I'd spent like 20 minutes trying to figure out why it wasn't working and I'd push the button, the I'd gone to the electrical panel, like I had done all these different things and I decided just the heck with it. I was gonna write it up as inoperative at the time of inspection and move on to my next item cuz I was wasting too much time. And so my next item was actually the kitchen sink. And when I pulled up on the vegetable sprayer, it came on. I was like,

Lord love a duck, what just happened? I don't know what just happened.

So, uh, why you didn't start there? I don't know.

I, I don't know either. Like who would've thought? But every time I would lift up on the vegetable sprayer, it would come on. would like kick it on and then it would go off and kick it on and go off. And I was like, okay, what's happening? Well, come to find out, the homeowner was like apparently uber protective of their appliances.

Mm-hmm.

And even though their home was built when they had the AFCI/GFCI resets in the panel, they decided they needed surge protectors as well. Well, when he unplugged the disposal to put the surge protector in, he didn't pay attention to where the loop of the water line was for the vegetable sprayer, and it was wrapped around that surge protector. So every time he would pull up on the vegetable sprayer, Kicking the—

hitting the switch on it.

It was kicking out that surge protector, so it was making contact in the receptacle.

Oh my goodness. Wow.

But that was a funny one. Every time I would pull up, it would, it would come on and then it would turn off and come on, it would turn off. I was like, what is happening?

Okay, I have to ask a question here. How many, how many homes have you come across that there's a surge protector under the sink?

More than I care to admit.

Wow.

I don't understand why. Why do individuals feel like their garbage disposal needs a surge protector, especially if it's built after a certain year and you've got all the protection in the panel that you need? But they do. It makes them feel warm and fuzzy. And there are 3 things that trump code, and one is the authority having jurisdiction, your city, your state. The other is the homeowner, because you can do whatever you want to with your house. And the other's the manufacturer. But the homeowner usually wins. In fact, Connor Mack and I, he's your friendly neighborhood roofer. We have a saying, it's Chuck in a truck. Here comes Chuck in a truck. You can just tell the

construction is not up to par.

Oh man.

Wow.

That's like when they say my brother-in-law's an electrician or my brother-in-law's a general contractor.

Yeah. That brother-in-laws in general are, can be fun.

And they have some interesting ideas on how to do construction sometimes too.

My brother-in-law literally is an electrician.

Sorry, brother-in-law to Kevin. Some brother-in-laws actually do know what they're doing, but most of them don't.

He definitely knows what he's doing.

Most of them are not licensed and qualified at the jobs that they have actually participated in at these properties.

Shocker!

Shocking! It's absolutely shocking. In fact, sometimes it actually is shocking!

I'm sure it is, literally. I want to take a step back before we get too far down any rabbit trails. We talked about this on an episode earlier, but, um, walk us through why someone would get a home inspection. We mentioned just a few minutes ago, if you've ever bought a house, uh, so walk us through why someone would call you to begin with.

Well, there's several different prospects when you're looking at doing an inspection. Are you building a new build and are you starting from dirt? Um, we can do the pre-pour foundation inspection to make sure that number one, they haven't filled it full of a bunch of garbage because they like to do that sometimes.

Yes.

on job site garbage, that they've put down the proper layment, that they've installed the piers correctly. Many, many, many different things that happen before they actually pour the concrete. Then you have what they call a pre-drywall inspection, which is where they've put up the studs and they've gone ahead and wired it and they've plumbed it, but nothing's actually working. But you can see all of the actual physical construction of the building between the rafters, the sill plates, the top plates. You can check and make sure that they've got the proper strike bars and things for when you've drilled within an inch of an edge of a stud and you've put in electrical, we're going to want to put a strike plate there so that the homeowner doesn't hang a picture when they get moved in and

electrocute themselves.

Yeah.

Same thing with plumbing and stuff like that. So you can see all of those things. You can make sure they've done a lot of the grounding and see how the electrical panel is going to be put together before it's put together. Just make sure everybody's doing their, their jobs on the front end of this construction. And then we have what they call the final inspection, which is basically right before they go in to do their final walkthrough, we come And when all of the sheetrock's been put up, all the fixtures are in place, all of the appliances are there. Texas has some of the most strict requirements on home inspection, and things like appliances and stuff are included in Texas's inspections, save a couple like a refrigerator.

So we go in and we make sure that they've installed all the appliances correctly, all the safety features that go along with it. Say like a range, for example, needs an anti-tip device so it doesn't get knocked over. Say a little one wants to climb up on the door of the oven and get a cookie off the counter. So we just make sure that all those kinds of things have been put in place. My company, we actually carry around blue tape and even cosmetic things that may not be in our report. If we know that that's going to be a walkthrough item for the client, we'll go ahead and mark it.

Mm-hmm.

It kind of saves the client and the builder time when they do their final walkthrough. It kind of gives them an idea of where they're at in repairs as well. So there's that kind of inspection where you've got your 3 phases. And then you have just a new build, you just, you're buying a build that's already together, but nobody's ever lived in it before. There's a lot of things that go into that. Sometimes contractors are not all scheduled when they should be. So things like air conditioning, the air handler will go ahead and get put into the attic space, but the roofing company doesn't get there to put the sheathing on before it rains.

Mm-hmm.

So all that equipment's been sitting out in the rain and it has a lot of times it'll have rusted and things. And this is a brand new house. You know, you don't want that to happen. I've seen it with water heaters too. The plumber's there and the GC just didn't get the roofing roofer in in time and stuff sits out in the weather and it happens. It does happen. Or where the roofer's gotten there before those other guys, the plumber and the HVAC tech, and they have to go in and basically hack up part of the Oh, cool. Hack up part of the support system, the purlins in the attic, to put in their equipment. Or equipment gets

damaged because they're having to put it in after the fact. So there's, you know, those kinds of things. It's a brand new house. You wouldn't expect to have to have a new water heater. I was in a brand new house over in New Caney the other day, and it was like a splash pad in one of the water heaters' safety pans. I mean, it just, it was already leaking and the other one was rusted. Brand new house. Nobody's ever lived in it. Most expensive house in that neighborhood, actually, floor plans. So they were paying a pretty penny for this house. And then you have just a pre-purchased home, just like, you know, it's— I hate to say used home, but a used home.

Yeah.

And you just want to make sure that things have been done. Things like dryer vents being cleaned out. You don't think about it, but if you're moving into a home that's already been lived in, you need to have that dryer vent cleaned and make sure it's clean because it's like the number 3 reason houses burn down. And then just other things, you know, is everything working like it's supposed to? Has the foundation moved? Is the roof in insurable condition? If you've got a VA loan, then there's going to be certain things that I'm going to need to tell you upfront, like galvanized plumbing or aluminum wiring are automatically going to disqualify you for your loan. So it's just kind of knowing, you know, what

you're getting into. And that's basically what we tell you. The house tells the story, we just write it down.

Okay.

And the state of Texas has a very specific format. Every inspector in the state has to use the exact same form. We are required to report on the exact same items. A lot of inspectors like myself and our company go way above what that standard of practice says. I mean, you can find the standard of practice on TREC's website. It's trec.org. And, you know, so you'll know what that inspector is supposed to do. And it also tells you what they're not required to do.

Hmm.

So we're not required to do a lot of things people think we're required to do. So, you know, you— if it's been less than 60 degrees outside for 24 hours before we do an inspection, I'm not running your air conditioner.

Oh.

Because it can damage that unit. And so those kinds of things are put out in the SOP, the standard of practice, to kind of give a guideline. And so real estate agents, even homeowners, can go and see what inspectors are actually required to do and what they're not required to do. But an inspection is just a good idea. I mean, if you're— it's generally the largest purchase a person makes in their lifetime is to buy their home. Whether they buy 1 or 5, they're still going to be the largest purchases that they buy. It's just kind of astounding what a home can go through and survive. It's also very astounding at what a home cannot handle.

That's right.

I still am amazed that more people do not die in their homes daily. And it's usually because of just simple accidents, like they got a new roof and the flue vent got knocked loose from the heater and they're running the heater. So carbon monoxide is coming into the attic. They don't even know it. The roofer doesn't know that they did it. The roofer is not required to go in that attic and look and see if he knocked anything loose. So things like that, if you have a roof replaced, it's a good idea to have an inspector come out and just inspect the attic space and make sure, you know, all your appliances are still connected properly and you're not making your family sick without even knowing

it.

Yeah.

So there's, so there's reasons you might need an inspection other than just buying a home.

There is. Anytime you have a piece of equipment installed, it's always a good idea to have a third party come in and look at it because just because they say they know what they're doing doesn't mean they know what they're doing. A good example is roofing. In the state of Texas, roofers are not required to be licensed. So, okay. Craig can take his truck over to Home Depot and buy bundles of shingles and pick up a couple of day workers, and he is now a roofer.

Congratulations.

Congratulations.

You started another business.

So, you know, they're not required to be licensed. And that is one of the largest parts of your home. And the most protective parts of your home is your roof, right? It's also one of the most expensive parts of your home. So you want to make sure it was installed correctly. And I continually go out on brand new houses that the roofs are not installed correctly. And if flashings aren't installed correctly, If they put the roof on when it was too cold outside, it's not going to adhere properly. So the shingles are going to lift from each other, they're not going to actually stick down. And they may or may not when it gets warmer outside, but the chances of them not are pretty high because they were installed when it

was too cold. So there's certain things that you just don't even know.

How would you tell that though?

If you can access the roof and don't Don't do this yourself, Mr. Homeowner. Not a good idea. Your insurance policy doesn't cover it, I promise. We just gently lift on the edges of them, and if they come up freely—

Okay.

You can't really tug on them because, yes, you can pull them loose if you're, you know, manhandling them, but you just give it a little gentle lift. And I mean, if they're not adhered, you'll see it really easy. In fact, there's one of my videos where you can actually see me say goodbye to a shingle as it goes skidding down the roof. Oh gosh. And it was a brand new house. So, you know, it's things like that, that if you're moving into a brand new house, you really don't expect there to be roof issues.

Yeah, and those are the ones that actually surprised me the most, that when people are buying brand new homes, that they— one, the bank doesn't necessarily require them to get it inspected.

No.

Right. And so, but, and so a lot of people, because it is a brand new home, think that they don't need to get it inspected.

Well, another thing that people don't realize is Because like roofers, builders don't have to have a license to build a house either. So Kevin could decide he wants to be a general contractor tomorrow and go build houses. Congratulations, you now have a career path too.

Nice.

So it's one of those things all over the place. It cracks me up because Texas has the most strict requirements on licensing a home inspector. We're over 430-something hours. And to get your professional license, it's like 200-hour code class of just sitting and reading codes. And that'll make you want to lose your mind. But some of us have. But they require me to have all this extra knowledge and all these certificates. And because I think it's like 16 full certificates before you can apply to get your license and take your test. And you have to take this It's like 4— I think it's 4 hours and 45 minutes for the state and the national test. And

it's a pretty grueling little test. You go down and you basically have to tell them where your birthmarks are to get into the room to take the test. And once you get in there, it's absolutely nerve-wracking. And so we take this test and everything, you get your licenses, you pay your insurance. And you go out and you tell this builder, I did it wrong. And he's like, so? I've been doing it that way for 25 years. Well, that's great, because I just earned a license to tell you you did it wrong for the last 25 years. So congratulations. But they make us have this license. It's pretty extensive comparative to the rest of the country. In some states, you don't even

have to have a license to be a home inspector. Really? Even more terrifying.

Are those states Kevin went? Kevin and I could go.

Yeah, I'm gonna Georgia. Take this show on the road. You can go be in All right. Perfect. She's out in Georgia. She can hook you up.

Megan, hit me up.

Megan, I'll hit you up. So they have these crazy requirements to get these inspection licenses, but yet half the trades that they want us to inspect aren't required to be licensed to do their jobs to begin with. And some that are still don't do them right.

Right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think that's, that's one of the crazy things is, is how often those types of things happen, which is one of the things that we say over and over and over on this show. is make sure you vet the person that comes into your house to do anything. Make sure that you ask for their licenses. Make sure that you make sure, uh, make sure that they are insured, that they're bonded, whatever they have, you know. Do your due diligence and don't just bring in Joe Schmo.

When I write a report, if I refer you out to somebody, let's say like Craig does pest control, it's gonna say, because pest control in Texas does have to have a license, yep, so it's gonna say to consult a qualified, verified, licensed pest control specialist. If it's a roofer, I'm going to say qualified, verified roofer. And I've had inspectors tell me that's overkill. Well, is it? Is it really overkill to tell them that they need to not only find a qualified person but to verify that that person is qualified? I don't think so, given some of the stuff I've seen over the last few years.

Yeah, you know, and like the, the people who are in industries where you, you do have to be licensed, you do have to be, you know, verified by the state and all those kinds of— most of those guys are happy for you to go and find their credentials.

Oh yeah, if they're good at their jobs and they actually are honest business people, they really are totally okay giving you any information that you need. Here, here's some references, feel free to call them.

Well, because they understand the value of those, but they also, you know, they want you to look for those because they don't want you hiring the person that doesn't have those kinds of things. Not just because they want their business to succeed, because they want to protect you the consumer against, you know, shoddy work.

So, and that's the thing about a home inspector. When you hire us as a buyer, we don't work for anybody but you. You're the boss. We don't work for your agent. We don't work for the seller. We don't work for the builder. We don't work for the county. We don't work for anyone but the person that is paying for the inspection, right? That's it. That's my sole interest in this deal is to make sure the person that has hired me is taken care of, and that they know exactly what they're getting into, good, bad, or indifferent. Because, you know, a lot of investors that come in and they buy pieces of property that I'm thinking, what are you doing? Are you sure

you want to do that? And they seem to be totally fine with it. And I'm like, oh, there's no way I would do that. But that's not my job. My job is to give them the information and let them make the decision. And some of them back out and some of them buy, you know, it's just what it is. But that's the thing I love about my job is I just tell the truth.

Yeah.

Hmm.

Well, I think a good example of that is, I mean, I think it was, I think it was actually earlier this week, I came across something in somebody's attic. I didn't know what was going on. So I sent you a picture of it. And it was really valuable information to that homeowner. It was basically a, I don't know if you remember or not, it was a ventilation pipe.

Yeah, it was their vent hood for their stove. And it was going at a negative angle and airflow doesn't work that way.

When it was going into an attic.

Yeah, it was Just like, hello, we're just gonna put all of the smell that you just got out of your kitchen straight into your attic. So all the grease, all the moisture straight into the attic.

Yeah. And like on top of insulation.

And it seems like a great idea.

And it was a brand new home.

Yeah, brand new. They hadn't even hooked it up. Yeah, that's why you need a new home inspection right there. Yeah, there's an example of an I need a new home inspection right there.

When they were, they were baffled. Like legitimately baffled. Like, how could this happen? Like, we hired this custom home builder to build us— and it is a gorgeous home.

Gorgeous homes kill people too. They have some potential. I'm just telling you.

Well, like, you know, but like, if you were to look at it from the outside, you would kind of go, oh, there's nothing wrong with that. Because it's, you know, it's a beautiful new home. And so like, your brain immediately goes, oh, that's brand new. Like, it's like looking at a new car. Like, if you roll that new car off the lot, you expect everything on it to function properly.

That's what we call living la vie en rose. You're living in the pink. You've got those rose-colored goggles on of, oh, the kitchen's so pretty.

Right.

Yes, but does it work? Is it growing mold underneath there? I'm just like, are biological substances peeking out? What have we got under there? Yeah.

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All right guys, it's hard to forget a name like Paul the Plumber. Give him a call. And now back to the show. So, so you mentioned something earlier, Craig, that, uh, the banks don't necessarily require an inspection, but, um, What, what are the cases? Are there cases? Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about at all where it is required. Is it required at all? I mean, when the, the last 2 homes that I bought, the mortgage lender required it.

It depends on the mortgage lender, right?

Okay.

It depends on the lending financial institution, or if it's a VA. VA has to have an inspection, and depending on how it's set up and which inspection you're doing depends on which party pays for it. It's, it can get very confusing when you start getting into the different loan types. And I'm just really starting to learn those too, as I've got more into inspection, because I'm not a real estate agent. So I don't deal with the loan process as much. But I've started getting in with a couple of loan officers and kind of learning that part of it. So I can, of course, better help my clients as well. But it's like I was telling you earlier, if I

know it's a VA loan, the first thing I do is go look at the plumbing if it's an older home, because if it's galvanized, I already know they're not going to get financed for it. Yeah.

issue with like galvanized pipe then?

Galvanized pipe is, it's just old. And the problem with it is that it deteriorates from the inside. It's kind of like an artery in your heart with plaque buildup, and it gets smaller and smaller and smaller. So the blood flow in your heart gets less and less and less. Same thing with the galvanized plumbing. It gets smaller and smaller and smaller on the inside from rust. And so you end up with very little water pressure, or it does the other fun thing and it gets a pinhole leak in it. They get really small, small, tiny leaks. So they'll leak for a long time before you usually know it's even leaking. So it can create some havoc.

Yeah. Yeah.

I, uh, the, the home that I've sold, I've only sold one, uh, the buyer was a VA loan and I had like $900 worth of plumbing I had to get fixed. Yep.

So they also will not loan on aluminum wiring either. So if it's got aluminum branch wire, they're not going to loan on that. Service entrance, fine, but branch wiring, they're not going to loan on it. It's just known to have problems.

Well, so that's one of the things I actually kind of love about VA loans. I mean, I know that some people look at VA loans and go, oh my gosh, the buyer is a VA loan, this is gonna be a hassle, etc., etc. But I am so very thankful that there are people out there taking care of those veterans.

I was gonna say, I love VA loans. I mean, because I know it's— I already know that I'm I'm doing an inspection for a veteran as soon as I find out that it's a VA loan. And we do discounts for veterans anyway, but I don't mind VA loans. I know what they require of me. And I actually take pride in doing them because I know that this is somebody that served our country and that I get to do the things I get to do every single day because they did serve our country. Yeah.

And you know, without a doubt, that whenever you sell your home, that the person buying it is buying a home that's in good shape. And, you know, I think that there's something to be said about that. But the other thing that I think is really important through all this is it really puts you in the driver's seat as a buyer.

It does.

And also, you may be able to afford the monthly mortgage payment, but can you afford to live in the house?

You know immediately these are the things that have to be fixed.

Or are on their way to needing to be fixed.

Right. We actually, when we bought the first home that we bought, There were a number of things that came back on the, on the inspection. I remember looking through them at one point and going, none of those are life-threatening, horrible things.

That's why we get called deal killers. The dreaded, the dreaded term of a deal killer. I am not a deal killer. I am a truth teller. The house kills the deal, not me. Okay, I'm just writing down what the But somebody needs to, because—

but so what's the— what's really interesting is about year 7 into owning that home, I came across the inspection and I went—

But things seemed a little bit more important.

I wonder— well, I was like, I wonder what the inspection said. There was only one thing out of the entire inspection that I had not fixed, and it made me Very prideful in the moment, right? And go, maybe I do know how to own a home. And it wasn't because I had gone down the inspection list and gone, okay, all right, babe, now we gotta fix this. Next month we gotta fix that. It was just stuff that along the way I was like, listen, that's not working well, or that's not the way it should be. And, and I had gone down the list and that was a good thing.

But—

Well, and that's another option too, is for somebody that's selling their house. Like, let's say that you were ready to sell it, you can do what they call a pre-listing inspection. So I can come out and actually tell you what's going on with your house before you put it on the market, and that way you can decide, yes, I'm going to fix these items up front and I'm going to keep the price at this, or I'm going to reduce the price and tell them no, I'm not going to fix that, it's an as-is item. So you're a little bit more prepared when you're going into the transaction in that you already know what you're going to fix, you already know what you're not going to fix. You can go ahead and have the AC serviced, have that guy come out, you know,

simple things that you can do, change your air filters, you know, stuff that you know is going to be an issue on an inspection report, you can kind of combat it from the front end. And it's kind of a personal choice if you want to do that. I think Craig and I are actually going out to do one tomorrow together.

Yeah.

That's a, it's a pre-listing inspection. And that's what they want to do. They want to go ahead and find out upfront what's going on so they can decide now, yes, I'm going to fix that, or no, that's going to be an as-is item. And it kind of makes it easy when you go in. A lot of buyers will decide, well, it's already been pre-inspected, so they don't do an inspection which I don't necessarily advise either. I think you should always, as a buyer, get your own independent inspection. And but you already know a little bit more about the financial aspect of it and that, yes, I'm going to pay for that. No, I'm not. So then the buyer already knows, okay, well, they're not going to buy a new AC system and the AC system is 17 years old. So I'm going

to have to kind of consider that.

Yeah.

So it's one of those kinds of things too. Now, the flip side of a seller's inspection or pre-listing inspection is that now becomes a documented issue. So it has to go on your seller's disclosure. So that's where a lot of realtors kind of step back. But at the same time, if the buyer has it inspected, it's going to be noted anyway.

So it's going to come up.

Yeah, it's more than likely going to come up.

If you've got an issue with your house, there's an issue with your house.

There's an issue.

It doesn't just fix itself.

As much as we would all like for that to happen. And spray foam doesn't fix it either.

A little gap sealant. Although I will tell you, this is a crazy story.

I—

so my truck is old, and the other day a check engine light came on for the catalytic converter.

I was like, oh crap, just put a little electrical tape right over that.

Yeah, no, this is probably not gonna work. And about 3 weeks later, the check engine light went off. Whatever was there unclogged itself. And I'm like, okay, brilliant. I guess something, you know, dislodged. All I know is that life was in my favor in that moment.

Winning.

The likelihood of that happening though is like slim to none, right?

That's okay. I saw a really good one one time though. I was in an old insel brick house, which is like you could order— used to be able order kit houses from like Sears, and they would deliver them on site. Oh yeah, build them, right? Even the fence came with it, like the old cyclone fence with the little cocker spaniel dogs on the gate. Remember those?

You know, Amazon's actually doing some of this now too.

Why does that not surprise me?

No, they have like, they have those where you can like, they're not big.

Yeah, they're not, they were never very large homes. They, you know, they were small 3-bedroom homes. I was in this one and it was over off West Hardy and I kid you not. You know the Flex Seal stuff that you see the guy with the bottom of the boat as like a screen door that he put in it? He like sprayed— well, they have a tape version of that now that's, you know, on a roll. Yeah, they had a leak in one of the front bedrooms, so they just went around the baseboards with the Flex Seal.

Around the baseboards?

Yes, it was all Flex Sealed.

Oh my goodness. They didn't Flex Seal the The pipe. No, which might be important.

That's not why it was leaking. It was because they're over off West Hardy and it had flooded.

Oh my goodness.

And their grade on the outside of the house was too high. The dirt was too high against the slab, so it was just coming up over the edge of the slab.

So you need to Flex Seal the dirt to the house.

The Flex Seal would have been a little bit more ideal on the exterior, but that's not where they put it. You got to I gotta admit, that's pretty—

I think every guy listening to this show right now wants to know, did it work? Did the Flex Seal hold?

Unfortunately, no, because sheetrock is porous and it just wicks up the wall instead of coming in on the carpet.

It was like, is that wallpaper? No, we call that Flex Seal.

That's Flex Seal.

It's just layers and layers and layers of Flex Seal the higher it goes.

We're just gonna keep going.

I saw a— let's, how do we put this? Air quotes, decorative element in one house that they had used tongue depressors to make octagons on the wall to make it look like a beehive. They had glued tongue depressors on the wall.

Did they square them off or they leave the rounded edges? Oh, rounded edges.

Rounded edges.

Whoa.

Lazy crafters.

Lazy crafting. Lazy crafting.

You know, to each his own.

Sure. That is definitely a very true statement when you're walking into people's homes.

I bet, I bet you see all kinds of stuff.

I see all kinds of stuff. I think one of my favorites, and my mother actually ended up naming the photo for me, she calls it, she's got legs, but that ain't how you use them. Oh, so I was in a house and the dryer vent for some reason was venting inside the laundry room. So to keep the dust from going everywhere, they had taped a pair of ladies' pantyhose To the end of the dryer vent, and it had filled up so much with lint, it literally had legs.

Oh my goodness.

It literally had legs. I was like, I just can't do something.

Okay, so, so speaking of dryer lint, um, growing up I did a lot of camping.

Oh, it's great.

I did a lot of backpacking, and the absolute best fire starter in the world is dryer lint. I would ask my mom to save the dryer lint so that I I could—

do you want me to tell you how to improve on that? Broken crayons, a cardboard egg carton.

Mm-hmm.

You put your dryer lint in there and kind of get you a little wick twisted up. You put it in your little egg cartons and then you melt broken crayons and pour it down in the little egg carton, let it dry, and then you've got a little wick of lint and then you've got that wax that'll feed in and it'll— and the cardboard from the egg carton, you can cut them up into 12 little fire Nice. They work great too.

Wow.

It's kind of like its own little container and everything. That's awesome.

Yeah, that is awesome. But the, the problem—

I was a Cub Scout leader.

There you go. The problem is that that dryer lint is highly flammable.

It's like the number 3 reason houses burn down.

Do you know the number 1 and number 2? I'm curious.

Well, electrical is usually high up there.

Is it really?

Yeah. Okay. It's usually somebody's done something stupid with the electrical. Or it's, you know, aluminum wiring or something like that. And I think number 2 was like lightning strikes or something.

Okay.

Because we do have a lot of lightning in the United States. You'd be amazed at the amount of lightning.

I've been hit twice.

I have an inspector buddy that's been hit twice. I call him Thor.

Yeah, we had—

That explains so much.

What's weirder is his family, like members of his family's been hit too.

Yeah.

I'm like, like, yeah. So I call him Thor. His name's Troy, but I call him Thor.

Yeah, it was, it ended up being a, uh, over a $15,000 claim on our insurance.

Wow.

When you got struck by lightning?

Yeah, because it didn't, it didn't catch anything on fire, but it, I mean, like, it cooked everything in the house.

Yeah, it will.

Yeah, like that.

Which is why it's so important for your home to be grounded, which a home inspector will tell you.

Yeah, and after the second time, the insurance company offered to put in a lightning rod.

Yeah, that, that's a grounding rod that's supposed to be installed on all homes.

Well, I think, I think we have a grounding rod, but they were offering to put like a full-blown lightning rod on top.

Yeah, I can see that.

We have a lot of those.

I can see that.

Yeah, we have a lot of those. We call them trees.

Yeah, you would think that we'd be fine with our, you know, 200-foot pine trees that we have.

Yeah, and they actually attract lightning, it seems.

So it's crazy.

Yeah. Yeah, it's— I don't like lightning.

No.

I like it over there.

I want to watch it.

I like watching it over there. That's true.

It can be very beautiful.

National Geographic has some beautiful lightning.

Yes, if I could watch it somewhere else.

Yeah, you can stream it on your bridged modem or whatever it was you were talking about. See, I caught some of it.

She picked up some lingo.

Yeah, there you go. I'll sound like a smart tech person tomorrow. So, so don't tell my home inspection software company that though.

Oh, they know.

They do. Unfortunately, customer service knows how bad it is. She actually asked me what machine I was on the other day. I'm like, I don't understand. She goes, what's your computer? I was like, a laptop.

It's got a keyboard.

She's like, they all know me. So they're all on my Facebook. So they're like, didn't you just buy this? I'm like, yeah. So you should know what it is, right? Because I posted it.

It's like, it's like you call in and everybody's like, hey, hurry, get on the line.

Switch over to—

Probably do too. I can hear them go, it's Ricky from Texas. They're like, what's up, unicorn? Hey, guys.

All right, so I'm curious, what's something about a home inspection that you wish other people knew that most people don't?

Hmm. I guess I just wish they knew exactly what we did. I think that people think that we just go and look at stuff, and that's not exactly what happens. We're climbing underneath sinks and we're in the attic and on the roof. And, you know, if you've got a crawl space, we're suiting up. And, you know, to go in an attic or in a crawl space, you have to put on full protection equipment. It's PPE. Craig knows about it doing pest control.

Yep.

So you have to have a certain type of breather, which I'm really, really upset with the coronavirus right now because I need new Cartridges for my mask to do my everyday job, and it's a 4-month lead time.

Not because of the coronavirus. Yes, because of the coronavirus.

No, because of crazy people who are fearful of the coronavirus. Who hasn't killed near as many people as the regular flu and has been around long enough that it's actually already on some cleaning products' labels. So how is this Is this new?

It's on it. I think it's actually on the label for Lysol and Clorox.

Yeah. Now, now there have been— okay, we're gonna get down a rabbit hole, but there have been other— this isn't the first time that something labeled the coronavirus— there's different strains, right?

Well, that's the same thing with the flu. Yeah, there's influenza, there's different strains, like there's thousands of strains of flu. Bird flu, swine flu, mad cow disease, who knows? We've survived all of those. So yes, I'm betting there's a lot more on our side than that side.

But just real— just because I'm curious, where do you get your respirator cartridges?

I actually use a Cool Flow, a 3M Cool Flow, and I usually just pick them up at Home Depot or Lowe's.

Okay.

Um, at this point I can't even buy a whole mask to get them because they don't have them. Um, which is really upsetting because honestly, people in our kinds of jobs, like you doing pest control, me doing home inspection, yeah, um, and people that like are immunocompromised, like cancer patients, they need this equipment, and people are hoarding this equipment for reasons that are not necessarily justified.

Yeah.

So it's—

oh, you mean like the person that I saw driving down the road the other day in his own vehicle with the respirator on?

Yeah.

Oh, that guy.

Or the lady that was in the Atlanta airport in full PPE and her high-heeled boots. I was dying. I did share that one. I had to.

So remind me after the show. I've got a couple places you can probably go to get some.

Yeah, I just think— well, my husband works for a supplier. I mean, he works for electrical supplier and they can't even get them and they order from 3M like every 3 days. Right. And they can't—

Craig has a backstock. Yeah.

Are you a hoarder, Craig? Are you hoarding them?

Not those.

I should have. You could make a lot of money.

But yeah, so, you know, doing crawl spaces and stuff, we see that we do a lot more than people actually think we do. And it's kind of amazing to me that I'll talk to agents and stuff. They're like, you go in the attic? I'm like, what kind of inspector have you been using? We're kind of required to do that, man. And if we've If you've got a certain sized opening, we're required to go in there.

So I think that, that part of that plays into the question that I'm sure you get often, which is like, wait, it's gonna cost me how much?

I don't do estimates. That is the greatest part about my job. The state of Texas says you can't do that. And you also can't work on a property that you've inspected for 12 months after you've inspected it. So it kind of gets me out of a little bit of those conversations. I can kind of give estimates. My estimates are ballparks, but I don't do really like, I don't do written estimates. The cool thing about my software is, and when we do get it online, we don't have it online right now, but when we do get it up and running from HomeGage, which is the software that I use, and we have the online side of the service, they actually can make their own request list

for repairs and it kind of does estimates for them. But I don't, I kind of stay out of it.

No, but not, not the estimates of what it costs to repair the things that you're telling them they need to repair, but just the cost of the inspection. inspection? Because I think a lot of people look at it and go, okay, what, $350? How much?

We start at $350 for 2,000 square feet or less, but we don't, we don't do pest control. We let that— I have this thing about ancillary services and inspectors. Unless you're super duper qualified to do it, just don't. Um, I prefer to refer professionals like Craig for pest control. Yes, I can go get a pest control license and I can do a pest control inspection, But I'm only limited to what that small amount of education was. I don't have in-the-field education, which in inspection of any kind is crucial, is being in the field and actually seeing it. Because there's a lot of different types of, let's say, termites, even though in an inspection world I cannot say that word.

Mm-hmm.

I have to say wood-destroying insect. But in just, you know, talking terms, there's at least 3 different kinds of termites that I know about in Texas. Texas. They have the— exactly. But that's just the ones I know about, the Formosa, the drywood, and the, the subterranean.

Subterranean.

And the subterranean are the most easily spotted. They're most common. And down in the Heights, they're having fits with them right now because they're going down and tearing all those old houses down and building what I call them alleyways. It's like a, just a straight shot, and they'll build like 4 townhomes on each side of this alleyway. They're like 3 stories high. Well, they're not treating the ground that they tore those old houses down on. So these brand new builds down in that area are having termites already.

Yep.

I had one the other day. The house isn't even 4 years old and was full of termites. Yeah, it was a wood-destroying insect on my report.

It doesn't help that they're like tearing down old houses that were full of termites already.

That's exactly what's happening is that the old houses were already full of them, but they're not treating the ground that they were sitting on.

But I think that the thing that is so good though, that I'm, I'm hoping people that are trying to learn more about home inspections listening to this episode understand is The amount of work that is put into this, it's massive. The fact that you're a professional coming in, you're not just, you know, unlicensed someone that, that, you know, brought a vehicle onto my property that says, you know, Joe's Inspection Service. You know, you know what you're doing. It, I mean, it takes you hours to do an inspection.

It does. We're looking at normally a 2,000 square foot house or less, you're 2.5 to 3 hours minimum. And people don't really realize is how much time you actually spend on site. And there are people that will complain about your inspection costs. But this is the thing, how much is your agent making? Because I'm not even making 1%, right? They're making 3%.

And then you gotta go back and put the report together.

The report. And most of the report, I luckily, the way I choose to do it, I write most of my report on site. I do not deliver on site unless you want to pay me a good amount of money to do it.

Mm-hmm.

I liked— because a lot of homes in Houston have a lot of different equipment, you're never going to know all the equipment, you're never going to know all of the specifications, and sometimes you got to go look stuff up. And so, and sometimes you just need to take your brain and sit and think about a condition for a minute, like what could possibly be causing this to do this? So I don't really do on-site reporting, but we do 24-hour reporting. But I have a companion device on my cell phone that I actually use an app and I write a good portion of my report on that app and it is very convenient. It still takes time. And what people don't understand is

I've put 1,000 or so hours into writing the template that is using on your inspection to write your inspection. So I've had to build that entire library of comments myself. And I've added, you know, different things from like CodeCheck has great diagrams to explain some conditions. And so I'll have a little picture that's in there. All that stuff has taken time. An inspector doesn't just go out and inspect houses. They have to get to where they can inspect houses and just the knowledge that goes into it. In fact, at Christmas time, I twisted my ankle pretty good coming off of a roof and had some downtime. And even though I'm a professionally certified inspector in the

state of Texas, and it's one of the hardest requirements or licenses to get, there's a company called NAACHI, and I've joined them, and it's the National Association Certified Home Inspectors. And once you join, you're an InterNACHI, and you actually can do their— what they call the Certified Professional Inspector. And so for states that don't have any licensing, you can use that as a certification.

Okay.

You can use it as certification in any state because it's pretty much accepted everywhere. Although Texas says no, you have to have an actual license from Texas. And some states do, they're like, no, that's not going to completely work. But it's about 70 hours. And so I just sat down and did it in about 12 days just sitting down, just learning, constantly learning. And even though I knew a lot of the information, there's stuff I didn't know. And a lot of things that I could pick up and I can alter my comments to make more sense to the person who's reading them, make it a little bit more of an understandable condition and also relate it to the trade that's going to be reading it too.

Mm-hmm.

So there's a lot of stuff that goes into doing our jobs that people just don't consider. But, and I'll have people go, oh my gosh, I didn't know that. I can't believe I didn't know that. Well, that's not your job to know that. That's my job to know it. I don't know how to do brain surgery.

Right.

I didn't go to school to be a brain surgeon. If I was standing in there, I wouldn't know what to do either. So you don't need to know how to do my job. Just allow me to do my job to help you out.

And it's probably worth $350.

It's easy money.

That's my point.

Yeah.

Minimum, minimum $350. But yeah, it is, it is worth it. And you know, there's just certain things that you just don't know. It's like being in Sugar Land. My favorite question is, is my foundation okay? okay? It is now. And they always, well, what do you mean? Well, you're in Sugar Land.

Yeah.

You're gonna have to monitor your home. You can't just live in it. You gotta watch it. And they always ask me, well, why? It's Sugar Land. They have Imperial Sugar here, right? They're like, yeah. I'm like, well, why do you think the sugar company chose here? Oh, you can grow sugarcane. Exactly. What does it take to grow sugarcane? A boatload of water. So it's a high water table there. And most of Houston, we're anywhere from 26 to 13 feet, I think, below sea level.

It's just a big old wet pile.

It is. I mean, we're not quite as bad as New Orleans. We're on a bowl, but we're not far from it.

Have you, have you seen these? And I'm asking because I'm curious whether or not it would come up in your inspections, the Aqua Lift systems for foundations. Have you seen these?

We— yes, and I've seen the hydro jacks, and there's a lot of different ways that they can do foundation repairs. And that's usually when I tell them they need a structural engineer. I would prefer you to go ahead and if you have questions about your foundation to get a structural engineer out because they're not there to sell you a repair.

Right.

They're there to tell you what's wrong with your foundation and how to fix it, but they're not there to tell you to sell you that repair. So you know that you're getting just exactly what I would do, which is an opinion about how it's performing.

Right.

And they're going to be able to tell you the actual specifics of it. Because if you hire a foundation company, yes, they may be able to tell you that, but they want to repair it.

Yeah.

So let us fix it for this amount of money.

Yes. And that can get really expensive. Yeah.

Foundation, really quickly. I know I asked because I mean, like, that's— I mean, I've seen that on a few houses over off 1990. And to me, it's like, okay, does that mean that it's had foundation issues? Or is this person just being, you know, proactive?

It means it's had foundation issues. And there's usually a really good way you can tell if they've got any exterior concrete, you'll see big hunks cut out and repaired. And that usually means that they've put a pier in there.

Yeah.

Sometimes you can't tell because they'll go in and they'll remove all the flooring in the house, they'll put the piers in the interior of the house, they put flooring back down and we don't know, right? See it. So unless it's been disclosed or they're, you know, just really super honest, we may not know. And that's one thing about an inspection that people need to realize too. We're not mind readers and we don't have crystal balls. We can't predict what's going to happen and we can't tell you what has happened. We can only tell you what we see that day.

Hmm.

So that's, that's a whole nother situation that, you know, we're, we try our best to do everything we can to tell you everything that we can. But it's still, you know, a human being in a house.

Yeah.

And some of those houses are more overwhelming than others. I have one on Avenue I. Avenue I almost broke me. Avenue I was— I was cursing my boss for— I'm still cursing him. And that was 2 years ago. Avenue I haunts me. It does. It was one of those old houses down on the third Ward that has been converted. And it was a single-family home with a carriage house at the back, a 2-story carriage house. Well, they took the carriage house, made it into 4, um, like little apartments, or call them apartments. And then they split the house down the middle and made basically a duplex out of it. And they're just— they're, they're almost 100 years old, you know.

They're just—

I have a new eye.

I have a new eye. If you ever get the chance and I'm sponsoring an event, come up and watch my screen with all the different defects that I show in a PowerPoint. And there's probably about 30 of those are from Avenue I.

Mm-hmm.

Avenue I was, it was a beast. And it was really funny as I ended up getting a call to go down off Sherman Avenue, which isn't far from there either. And the guy meets me that day. And a lot of times the clients don't meet me. A lot of times I'm there by myself. And so he meets me that day and I was like, your name looks familiar. He goes, yeah. He goes, you actually saved me from buying a house, I went, off Avenue I, at the same time he said it. And it was, it was the, it had been the buyer who originally was going to buy Avenue I and that house on Avenue I. And he's like, you said, you have no

idea how much money you saved me. I was like, yes, yes, I do. Because that's what I'll tell a real estate agent. If I say the term D9, you need a D9 Caterpillar in here and just doze it over. But that's my gentle way to tell the agent this is really bad without freaking the client out, you know. I'm like, this is, this is D9, you know. Just, just bring a dozer in, take it down at the slab, and let's start over. And there have been some that I wonder why people don't do it too.

Yeah.

Uh, I have— I do have a deal breaker though. If I find bed bugs, Ricky is done.

All right.

I am so terrified of bed bugs. People are like, oh, are you afraid of snakes and stuff underneath the house? No, you're not. Nope. I know the 4 venomous snakes in our area. I'm not worried about that. Um, spiders don't really bug me. I carry peppermint oil. They don't like it. Spray a little peppermint oil, they go running. Um, we carry snaps, you know, those little things you throw on the ground. They're like fireworks. You throw a couple of those in the house, stuff will go running. That doesn't bother me. Bedbugs terrify the ever-loving mess out of me.

They should.

They do.

They're nasty.

Well, and they're so hard to get rid of.

They're worse than—

that's why I say they're nasty.

Yeah, you get Yeah, it's like, oh, just, oh, I've been in one house and I saw the container and I'm like, and of course it's like Home Depot, what is it, Weed B Gone brand of bed bug spray. That's not gonna work. Um, you can't kill them with chemicals. Heat.

Yep. That's the— honestly, that's the only effective method is heat.

Just throw everything away too.

Well, I had a girlfriend that that happened to and their son was like 13 at the time it happened and they had to move everything out of the house, like all their pictures and all that stuff. And so they tent this house, they heat it up, was like 180 degrees or something crazy. Like, it's really hot.

I think, I think you have to heat it to a minimum of 160.

Yeah, it's like ridiculous. It has to stay there for a certain amount of time. She said when they got back in their house, they found so many melted crayons from when their kid was little that they hadn't even considered might be in the house. She's like, we had to replace the carpet in one room because we didn't didn't realize.

It just liquefies everything.

That piece of furniture, there had been all these broken pieces of crayon.

All the crayons left in the couch cushions.

Yeah, so there's like fallout from bed bugs that you don't expect.

So, but I mean, honestly, that's why these, these companies make so much money doing it, because it's such a pain.

I would make a lot of money doing that too. I don't want to go in there, just, oh, start it. It's like when you find out that a kid in your kid's class had lice, you know, your head starts itching.

You know, you're like, not mine. It's the beard.

The beard starts itching. I'll shave it.

That would be the worst right there, right? Yeah. Bugs on your face.

Oh my God. Yeah.

I'll shave this thing off, man.

Oh, my husband's is down like to his chest. I would die if he had to shave it off. That would just be— yeah.

I'd do it, man.

So, so we have I mean, people listening to this show, not just in Texas, I mean, like, we're pretty much in every state now.

Oh, that's awesome.

So like, a lot of people listen to this, I mean, they may not have access to you, like, or to get to Ricky to come out and get it inspected.

So what—

Oh, just call me. I know somebody in just about every state.

Well, I was gonna say, how do they find a good one?

In, you know, a lot of times you can go— we talked about InterNACHI. If they're certified through InterNACHI, you can go to NACHI's website, and they'll give you a list of qualified inspectors. I'm listed on there. your state requires licensing, you can go to the state website most often. Ours is actually the Texas Real Estate Commission. So it's trec.org or .gov, I'm sorry, .gov. And you can look up an inspector or you can look for an inspector in your area. A lot of people Google search, which sometimes that's gonna work for you.

Sure.

But a lot of times you can just get in touch with me and I will find you somebody. I mean, I pretty much know inspectors across the country at this point. If I don't know somebody, I know somebody that knows. I got a guy who's got a guy, um, or a girl. I got some girls that got some girls too.

So you were telling us before the show, I mean, you have these networks of inspectors.

We actually do. We have a lot of Facebook pages that we're all a part of. Um, my favorite one happens to be mine and my, uh, my best friend, and she happens to be an inspector too, uh, Megan Riley Wilson out in Georgia. Uh, we have a page called the Unicorn Squad, and We keep it very limited. It's not just open to just anybody. It's limited to home inspectors and some professionals like pest control or air conditioning. And it's so that inspectors can actually go in and ask questions and get professional advice from other inspectors or perspective on how to handle a client in a certain situation. There's a lot of us that we're like, okay, we got a client doing this. Like, what do we do now?

Mm-hmm.

She's a little bit nuttier than I thought she was going to be. How do I do this without, you know, opening myself up to more liability?

Yeah.

So we have inspector networks like that and we've just kind of all become buddies. And the Unicorn Squad actually is, it's right at, I think about 198-ish, like not quite 200. And everybody in there, we just know we can all ask each other anything we need. A lot of us communicate in Messenger, you know, privately. about, you know, just, hey, how are your kids doing? And, you know, well, how was your inspection today? You know, we all check on each other and it's actually helped. We actually had an inspector that was suicidal at one point that we all were able to kind of, you know, talk to him and be like, it's going to be okay, buddy. We all got you. You know, we're

not all where you're at in the state you're in, but you got us. We're here. And Megan actually went through something pretty traumatic this past summer, and we were able to raise funds to get her through some pretty bad times. and get her safe. And so, you know, we just kind of become this little family of inspectors.

Yeah.

And we're literally, I've got inspectors from Canada, Australia. Um, I don't think there's a state, maybe Idaho, that I don't know an inspector in. Um, or know an inspector that knows an inspector in that place.

Right.

So I can pretty much get you to anybody that you need. Um, locally, uh, my inspector buddies and I, we have kind of a phrase that we don't compete, we complete. we can't get to you, if we're booked, or we don't do that service, we will refer you to another inspector that we know that is good. I would rather give the business to an inspector I know is a good inspector than have you out there just searching on your own. So if I can't do it, or I don't perform that service, for instance, I am certified in septic, but I don't do septic. I just don't do septic. Ricky has a thing with poo. I raised my babies. I don't do poo anymore. So, you know, there's certain things like swimming pool. I don't do swimming pools.

Pest control, don't do pest control. So I'd rather you ask me and let me get you a professional that can help you. And if it's not me as the actual inspector on the home, that's okay with me.

Yeah.

Like, if you'd rather hire somebody that does all those services together, I can still tell you that person. Yeah. And a person that you can trust to do all that stuff, that's okay with me. I would rather you have a good inspector than to just be out searching on your own. It's okay if you don't use me, but let me know and I'll find you the right person to get to. I mean, there's so many of us. I mean, there's so many of us in this area that are really good. Alan Cunningham and Michael Hamill and Brendan Cormier, Will Esmer and Matthew Mulvaney and Leslie Brush. And I mean, there's just a ton of— Al

Quiroz. I mean, there's a lot of talented inspectors that know what they're doing and that I would trust with my home. So if I can't either fit you into my schedule schedule, or I can't get to that service, you know, between me and the 3 guys that I have, um, V Tran and Tony Ngo, you know, the 3 of us, if we can't get to you, I would rather you call me and I will find you somebody. I would rather get you a qualified person than you just be out searching on your own and hope you get somebody that's qualified.

So like with, with like the septic system and the swimming pool, and I forget the other one that you mentioned.

Wells. I don't do wells.

So like, are those things that you can't Inspect, or you can, but you, you prefer to have somebody else that has more of like a specialty.

I'm qualified to do those.

That's what I wanted to know.

They're not in my comfort zone because they're not things I deal with on a regular basis.

Right.

I am qualified. I can inspect them. But let's say swimming pools, for instance. We just talked about water tables in Houston. In-ground swimming pool with a high water table and the types of soil that we have over time, it's going to have issues that you may just not see. A home inspector is more a visual, and we inspect the equipment. The equipment's more what we're there for, make sure it's grounded, it's wired properly, it's functioning properly, backflows, whatever. But that gunite in that ground, if it's been there since the '80s or the '90s even, it may be showing signs that a normal everyday home inspector doesn't really see because they're, they're a visual inspector, not a full-blown blown professional inspector of a swimming pool. Like, I have a guy I use, his name's Earl. Earl

does all my pools. I love Earl. Earl's great. But I've been at pools where I was like, eh, it doesn't look too bad. Little coping issues on the outside. That little thing that swims around in there has made a little mark on that side. It doesn't look that bad. Earl gets there and he's like, this pool needs to be re-gunited. And I'm like, oh, this is why I don't do pools. But when they actually got the water drained out of that pool, it had 4 huge cracks that you just could not see because the water was bouncing that day and the sun was reflecting off of it. And so that to me is something I'd rather refer to a professional, that that's

what they do all day, every day, kind of like pest control. We've talked about that too. I'd rather refer to somebody that that's what they do all day, every day. I'll inspect the home and let the professionals do the professional jobs.

Yeah, I was, I was trying to think of like weird things that I've seen in homes that would like probably need— like I was thinking like there's, there's several homes I've been in that have like Yeah. You know, have you ever, have you ever had to like—

Um, I haven't had an elevator house yet, but that's another system that I would refer out to a professional. But I refer all chimneys out to a professional. I don't like gas fireplaces anymore. I lost my eyebrows twice.

Oh gosh.

When I first started doing this, because 6 feet away is the requirement for your gas shut off, right? Well, you have to turn it on too. I'm sure short. Like, my whole body's not even 6 feet. So to go over 6 feet, turn it on, and then to get back to this gas burner that's pouring gas out of it within 6 feet— yeah, I just don't do that anymore. So I automatically tell you I don't like gas fireplaces, and I'm not starting a log fire either. So I do do visual inspections of them, but I almost always refer refer them out to a professional because that's another place that can easily be set on fire. And a lot of people

don't use fireplaces here. I've been in houses from the '90s, you can clearly tell it has never been turned on.

It's never gotten below 40 degrees here.

So not usually.

I'm just kidding, people.

But, and if it does, it usually swings it in one day. We're gonna go 40 degrees one direction or 40 degrees the other direction, which Makes inspecting fun because it's trying hard to explain to people it was 73 degrees ago for 3 days in a row, so I could test air conditioners that day. Well, that's not exactly what happened the night before your inspection.

But Texas.

But Texas. I say it's weather by Sybil. She's got to get her meds straight. She can't figure it out, bless her heart.

That's good. Well, um, what have we not talked that you would like to talk about? Anything, or have we just about covered it all?

I think we just about covered it. You know, I mean, it's really just knowing what you're getting into. I mean, like, if you're going to have surgery, you're going to ask the doctor his credentials and you're going to want to know that he's qualified to do it. So you definitely want to check your inspector out, make sure they're qualified to do their job and what you're asking them to do. But really just, it seems like such a small thing, thing. And it seems like an expense that you really just don't have when you're putting all this money out for your, you know, your option fees and your all of this other stuff. But really, in the grand scheme of things, it's a

very small portion of money to the information that you're going to be given about this house. And again, you may be able to afford the house, but can you afford to live in it?

Right. Yeah, exactly. Well, in that case, we just have one more thing we have to do before we let you go. Oh, the, the 4 horsemen. The final 4. The final 4. That's right. So we'll just jump into 'em. You already know what the questions are, so obviously. Yeah.

Y'all gave me a heads up.

Thank God.

Yeah.

So here we go. What's a must-have tool that you won't leave your house without?

Um, my cell phone. Hmm. I have to have my phone. It gets me to my inspections from my inspections. I can text the office and say, hey, um, the police may be showing up because you didn't give me an alarm code. So just know that that call may be coming And I write my reports on it. Most of my report is written on my cell phone. I mean, it really is. Flashlight, screwdriver, your typical, you know, to open electrical panels and stuff like that. But really and truly, it's that phone because I have that app that writes most of that report, and that's my lifeline.

Yeah.

And I drive about 40,000 miles a year, so Waze is genius. Yes.

And don't test her.

Don't test her. I don't think you can do it faster.

I've tried. Chalk it up to another check mark in the phone category on this question.

Yeah, technology.

Have you tried all the different voices on Waze?

I had it on Mr. T for a while.

Yes.

I have to admit that was my favorite one. But turn right, sucker. Turn right, sucker. Turn right, sucker. When you're going through a neighborhood kind of is a little nerving.

Um, does he ever tell you to treat your mama right?

Uh, I don't think he said that one, but it was, it was pretty awesome though. I do have to admit, I did— I, I tried the English lady and she got on my nerves. Um, so I just went back to the regular one. But yeah, the Mr. T one was probably my favorite. That was pretty sweet. But I'm a good fan.

Have you, have you seen it?

Yes. Okay. Have you seen it, Ricky?

Which one is it?

Treat Your Mama Right. His— I mean, like, he, he had a, a song that he came out with.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

Oh yeah.

And there's—

I love it. See, I used to eat Mr. T cereal for breakfast.

Yes.

Remember Mr. T cereal?

I do remember Mr. T cereal.

Remember C-3PO cereal?

Oh, I don't remember C-3PO cereal.

Yeah, that was good stuff.

But my cereal game was not strong when I was a kid.

Oh, I lived on that.

Kind of had a hippie mama that That, uh, made me eat weird stuff for breakfast.

Oh, did you have to have wheatgrass for breakfast?

Uh, a lot of chlorophyll.

Ah, it's different than chloroform. Different than chloroform.

Yeah, there's a difference between thankful for what she gave me and what I actually deserve.

Oh, I feel like I was a serial— I feel like you got what you deserved, buddy.

Parents. So I was a serial—

I know your mom All right.

My cereal.

Second question. What's a job you've walked away from?

Uh, personally or like as an inspection?

Um, yep.

Dealer's choice.

Okay.

So I was a floral designer for a while and, um, Pinterest came out and, uh, people didn't understand this one fundamental thing about Pinterest is it doesn't have price tags.

Yeah.

So they would come in and want these very much champagne caviar dreams, and they had a Moon Pie and RC Cola budget. So that, and I think my favorite was arguing over a shade of white. I'm like, it's a rose. She's like, yes, but it's not white enough. I'm like, I didn't make it, man. I just am putting it in a bouquet. Well, I need one that's whiter.

I'm like, You get to talk to God about that.

Yeah, I didn't— there's a creator, I'm sure, and, um, I'm not it. So, um, short of getting you silk flowers, this is what we're stuck with. Yeah, so I was pretty fed up with that industry just because it just kind of got a little crazy. Bridezilla is a real show for a reason. So a home inspection though, I've walked away from a couple. One recently, it sounded like someone was actually living in the attic and I wasn't willing to find out considering both of the back doors were open when I got there and I'm by myself on these inspections. So I wasn't willing to find out. So I kind of just stepped aside. I told them I'd finish it if they'd just let me know there was nobody in there and they didn't call back. So that works

for me. And then a grow house or what was a suspected suspected grow house. It was a very weird— you get up to the second floor and what was a closet, very obviously had been a closet, that wall had been hacked out and the attic had decking laid in it and then had ventilation put in it. And I'm like, yeah, stuff's not adding up. And then I went down and they had taken— and you can use copper line for gas piping, but it has to be Schedule K.

Uh-huh.

And there's no way for me to know if it's Schedule K. And they had tapped into the gas meter, run this copper line all the way around the house to the other side, and had it going up through— wait for it— the ventilation for the cooktop. So I was like, yeah, I'm pretty sure they're doing stuff in here that I don't want on my insurance.

Yeah.

So I had the agent there and I'm telling her and she's like, well, you can still inspect it. I'm like, okay, let me put it this way. I'm not going to inspect it.

And will or—

Very different issues. My insurance guy is definitely gonna question my sanity if I sent him— if this gets on, you know, my insurance, he's gonna be like, what were you thinking? You should have known better. So, you know, there's— there has been stuff I have walked away from. Um, sometimes it's just better to walk away than find out you'd be sorry later.

Well, that brings us to the next question, which is, how do you wind down at the end of a long day?

I have a penchant for single malt Highland Scotch. Actually, it's just hanging out with my family and my dogs. I like— I showed up to Craig's house and I was like, oh my God, dogs! I love my dogs. I have a big dog, medium dog, little dog, and I just pile up on the couch with my dogs and we watch Netflix or Hulu. I'm addicted to baking competition shows. I have no idea why, but they make me happy.

The British Baking Show, is that—

Yes.

You like that one?

I love that one. And like the Spring Baking Championship, and I love all those shows. I don't know if it's watching people fall on their faces flat or if it's actually watching people succeed with stuff that's like, how do you actually make that edible? You know, like, how do you make celery root into a dessert? Like, that takes some talent to do that. So it's kind of amazing that they can do some of those things.

So that's basically what strawberry rhubarb— and rhubarb is like a cousin to celery, isn't it?

Yeah.

I mean, I'm down for some rhubarb.

Don't know the answer to that.

They make stuff called chocolate.

Uh-huh.

That stuff's good.

Yeah, it is. And the darker the better in my book. I like me some dark chocolate.

You gonna dip some celery in the dark chocolate? Is that the—

I mean, if I have to.

If you have to. I mean, it needs—

if I've got to eat celery, it's going to be dipped in chocolate.

I know they had cheese cubes next to the chocolate fountain at my sister's wedding, so I'm just saying cheddar cheese dipped in chocolate's not so bad.

I bet it's not.

It's not.

The, the place I don't dip stuff in chocolate is Golden Corral. Corral though.

Oh yeah.

Well, first of all, I don't go to Golden Corral. I would—

okay, I was gonna say, I don't think I'd go there.

However, fine, Kevin, they'll never be a sponsor.

I'm fine with that.

Fantastic.

Fine with that. But, but, but at a buffet like that where there's a chocolate fountain?

Oh God, no. I'm out.

Do they have chocolate fountains at Golden Corral? Yes.

I tap out. If you don't go, how do you know these things? I'm intrigued.

I accidentally— I, I showed up outside with just your nose on the window, like the Mervyn's It's a long story. I don't want to talk about it.

All right.

She's starting to ask questions I don't want to answer. So let's go to the 4th one.

We're doing the interview here.

All right. What's one of the best pieces of wisdom or advice that you've ever received?

Well, um, when it comes to home inspection, actually the very first guy I ever worked for, and this is a lot of the reason why I do inspections the way I do. I was talking about getting a lot of the certifications that we've talked about that I don't have. And he goes, hey. And I went, what? Like, I was mid-conversation, just super excited, like, I'm going to get this certification. He's like, hey. And I went, what? He goes, how about you just be a good home inspector? And so, I've kind of kept that kind of in my back pocket. Just be a good home inspector. Like, know your role.

Yeah. Stay in your lane, right?

Yes, exactly. Stay in your lane. Do what you do. Do what you do the best you can do what you do. And then, if you get to where you want to do those other things, then figure that Yeah. But 567 inspections in, I'm okay just being a home inspector after all this stuff I've seen. Yeah, I've seen some wild stuff, man. I spend a lot of time in Chinatown, so down in the International District, dude, that's, that's crazy.

Is that before or after work?

Well, it depends on how long I'm down there, but I can tell you this. I carry my own set of chopsticks around because them, them people down there know how to cook, man.

I love—

that's the best part about going down there is I get some of the best food on the planet, man. You find one of those little dive hole-in-the-wall places and get your pho on, you know? Oh my God.

Yep.

My favorite's when they're like, are you sure you're gonna eat that? I'm like, yes, put the blood cake in the pho. I'm okay. All right.

I like that.

All right. So the, the 5th and secret question of the final 4.

Oh, dang it.

Yeah, I know. How do people get ahold of you if they want to contact you?

Uh, you can do it a couple of ways. Uh, you can call me on my phone, 281-217-2200. Um, I have a thing for Emmitt Smith, so when they told me I could have 22, I was in.

There you go.

Um, and then, uh, Get 'Em Inspected by Ricky Neal is my Facebook page. Um, it's literally spelled exactly how it sounds. G-E-T apostrophe E-M Inspected, um, by Ricky Neal. And you can message me through there. And then, you know, just email rickieneal333@yahoo. There's different ways, but really the first 2 are the easiest way. If you text me, I'll text back. If you message me, I'll message back. I'm usually pretty quick about that. The only time I'm not is if I'm in an attic or on a roof or in a crawl space.

With the respirator on.

With a respirator on. And I've actually hit the answer button and had to pull it off. Yes. Um, but yeah, you can get ahold of me that way. Um, and like I said, if you need— you guys said you're, you know, pretty much nationwide at this point. If anybody needs anything pretty much in any state, I pretty much can help you find somebody that can help you out, or I know somebody who can find somebody to help you out. So we can get you pretty much hooked up across the country, which is pretty sweet.

Are you just on Facebook or you gotta—

Uh, I have an Instagram, it's Ricky Inspects, and I can't— I think my LinkedIn is Ricky and Ricky Neal or Ricky Inspects as Okay. Um, Instagram is @rickyinspects. I know that for sure.

You put the videos up there as well?

Sometimes. I usually do, um, like little e-cards with, um, like photo collages that'll show you a condition and kind of, okay, you know, like this is the inside, this is the outside, how does that look to you kind of thing, you know? Or like she's got legs and the little thing taped to the end of the dryer vent, and I was like, yeah, that's nice. That's not how that's supposed to work.

No.

Well, I highly encourage folks to, if they can, jump on over to your Facebook page and follow that, because if nothing else, it's highly entertaining.

Yeah, if you get bored at work one day, but I highly encourage you to put your earphones on. It's not that I say anything inappropriate, I'm just loud. I've switched a couple of my key phrases to Lord love a duck and how in the halibut, so your kids can watch. It is child-friendly now. Um, in fact, I've actually had a fan make a meme for me of My Lord Love a Duck and put a rubber ducky in the safety pan of a water heater that was full of water. So, um, yeah, it was pretty funny. I was pretty, pretty excited about that. That was pretty cool. Um, but yeah, you can get a hold of me those ways. And I mean, like I said, if you get bored one day at work or you're at home, you can watch videos And

find out the crazy world of inspection, because it's just stuff you don't— you don't even inspect. You don't expect to need to be inspected, and it really is kind of strange, and it's wild what we come up with.

Hmm, that's awesome. Well guys, thank you so much for listening to the show today. Ricky, thank you so much for joining us.

Thank you so much for having me.

This has been a blast. Uh, Kev, what else we got, man?

I don't have anything. Thanks for downloading today's episode. And, uh, remember, we're here every Tuesday. And until next time, we'll see you later. See ya!