January 6, 2025 • 25 mins
Real estate transactions hinge on the quality of home inspections, as illustrated by a recent emergency case where critical issues were uncovered just in time. Agents must prioritize ethical recommendations and transparent communication to safeguard their clients’ interests and ensure long-term success in their careers.
• Highlighting the urgency of thorough home inspections
• Story of a frantic client facing hidden issues
• The impact of poor recommendations on client trust
• The necessity of comprehensive and clear inspection reports
• Ethical responsibility tied to referrals and client care
• Associations between agent practices and reputation building
• Emphasizing the fundamental role of home inspectors in client advocacy
To learn more about Habitation Investigation, the Two-time Winner of the Best Home Inspection Company in the Midwest Plus the Winner of Consumer Choice Award for Columbus Ohio visit Home Inspection Columbus Ohio - Habitation Investigation (homeinspectionsinohio.com)
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to the Standing Out in Ohio podcast,
where we discuss topics,upcoming events, news and
predictions with real estateprofessionals and entrepreneurs.
Listen and learn what makestheir companies and themselves
stand out and gain advantagesover the competition and gain
market share.
Subscribe for the latest newsand discussion on what it takes
(00:23):
to stand out from the crowd.
Now here's your host, jim.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Hey everybody, Welcome to the Standing Out and
how podcast.
This is Jim Troth and of courseI have Laura Troth, the office
goddess, here.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Hello everyone.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
So all right, it is.
What is this?
January 5th?
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Is it the 5th already ?
Is the 5th?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
wow, we're doing this .
Um, as you know, not allcompanies are the same in
quality experience.
Give a shitness right seriouslyyou're right yeah and then, and
nor are all agents, but it'ssomething you need to be aware
(01:08):
of, because who you recommend isa huge reflection on who you
are.
And so we have a story todaywhere somebody called in
emergency inspection becausetoday's our last day.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
Okay, but first let's listen to this Habitation
investigation is the way to gofor a home inspection in Ohio.
Trusted licensed homeinspectors for your needs.
From radon to mold towarranties For a great home
(01:42):
inspection, you really can't gowrong.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Visit home inspections in ohiocom all right
, laura so I get a call, yeahyeah, go go to the store and go
ahead so I get a call today.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
Gentleman is panicking because he has been
asking questions and askingquestions and asking questions
and has been blown offapparently for two weeks because
his inspection period was twoweeks.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
So when did he have his first inspection done?
Speaker 3 (02:19):
The first inspection was done December 27th,
according to the report that I'mlooking at from the first
company.
Okay, which we will not givetheir name, which we will not
give their name.
So what ended up happening ishe had specific questions about
specific items.
His agent had contacted aroofing company, writing that he
(02:41):
needed specific things lookedat, that he was concerned about
the ventilation in the atticbeing blocked off, and so on and
so forth.
So, needless to say, one of ourinspectors said you know what
I've got a few minutes before myinspection today.
If I can hit it on the way out,I'll stop, I'll do the mold
(03:03):
testing and I'll look at thosecouple of things he wanted.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Because the client, the buyer, is concerned about
moisture issues in the atticspace right and mold.
Speaker 3 (03:14):
And mold.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
And then, after we got all scheduled, he goes hey,
can they take a look in thecrawl space also?
Because X, y, z and Drewawesome as he is, he's like yeah
.
Yeah, he'll do that he'ssqueezing in.
He got things done.
Luckily there's nobodycurrently there in the way.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
So he got things done .
He was able to.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
But wait, so there's, a.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Go ahead.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
What did Drew find in that brief amount of time he
was there?
Speaker 3 (03:39):
So in the brief amount of time we were there,
drew found.
So let brief amount of time wewere there, drew found.
So let me backtrack.
So this agent had a homeinspection company come out, a
separate termite company comeout and a roofing company come
out that he had to take care of.
So he had the report for thetermite in the home inspection,
(04:03):
didn't get a report for theroofing company oh, okay, but
nothing arrived but at thispoint was told that everything
looked great, there were noproblems.
Drew goes out, he gets into theattic.
He finds two leaks.
He finds ice.
He finds that the bathroom isventing directly into the attic
(04:24):
space and he found areas of moldbecause he did a swab in the
attic.
He gets into the crawl spaceand he finds termite tubes.
He finds that the dryer wasvented into the crawl space.
That's a huge no-no which is ahuge no-no vented into the crawl
space.
(04:44):
That's a huge no-no, which is ahuge no-no, and apparently the
client's parents had had thatdone to their house and it
totally damaged their foundation, which you know.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
It would ravage the floor, joists.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
The floor, joists.
So that's just a quick brief.
What all Drew found in the halfhour he was looking in there
and you talked to the client.
Brief what all Drew found inthe half hour.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
He was looking in there and you talked to the
client he was not happy.
I can't think of how thequestions came about.
What order?
But the client was not giventhree inspection companies to
shoot from.
No, he was not the agent justscheduled.
I'll schedule an inspectioncompany.
I'll just schedule aninspection company with one from
(05:25):
.
No, he was not the agent justscheduled here.
I'll schedule an inspectioncompany, I'll just schedule it
all with one that I know, onethat I work with or I like
working with you, do that.
He's got a roofer, he's got atermite.
So, first of all, that's you'renot supposed to do that, and
here it gets even better.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
So the client is not sure that he paid for the roof
inspection.
He doesn't know that he did,which means literally that the
agent had a roofing company comeout and go oh hey, everything's
fine.
When we go in, and we're noteven on the roof, we're just in
the attic, and we find two leaks, and you know what I mean.
(06:06):
So, and when the agent calledme to see if, you know, we were
like contractors and could getin, like he made it seem as if
this client had waited, just youknow, lollygagging about for
two weeks until now, when he waslike, oh I, I need all this
(06:27):
stuff done, not, you know, notrealizing that the client had
already told us listen, I'vebeen trying to get answers for
two weeks yeah, well, thespecial only like a week or so
ago well, a week and a half, somaybe who knows.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
But anyway, it's very suspicious when the agent
doesn't give him a choice to whoto pick.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
Right.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
And there's no good quality customer service because
they're not getting theirquestions answered.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
No, the inspection company didn't get back company
didn't get back.
The um roofing company didn'tlook at what he wanted and he
had it in writing that he wantedspecific things looked at and
actually those were a problem,those.
There was something that wasn'tbig enough, there was stuff
that was blocked, so he had ajustifiable concern with those
(07:18):
vents in the attic yeah, some ofthem were not open as much as
they should so but we looked atthe well the client our client
now sent us the report becausehe had moisture concerns.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
We I think, instead of a report, we'll look at the
location, an idea of where to dothe mold testing yeah, and see
what the moisture issues are,but man, I can't there weren't
any in it that report.
I'm not going to tell you thename of the company, but, man,
it was not an easy report toread.
There's lots of pictures.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
That was all.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
There wasn't any explanations?
Yeah, there's no explanationfor the pictures, they're just
like here's 15 pictures of thisarea, but nothing telling you
what this picture is showing.
Speaker 3 (08:06):
Did you see the part where your exterior is in good
working order?
Speaker 2 (08:11):
I, yeah, I did, I did , I did okay that that's
interesting.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
I'm just kind of funny, that's kind of I gotta
get the.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
The siding isn't the shape, but there's things that
just don't make.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
There was another one I forgot because drew saw
sunlight through the chimney andsaw issues with the chimney.
Oh, the chimney flashing.
I don't know if it was theflashing or the chimney itself,
but this guy had no problemswith the chimney, said it was in
good shape and continued tomonitor.
And please understand, repairsmay be required in the future.
(08:43):
Well duh, it's a chimney.
Of course there's going to berepairs in the future.
You always need to upkeep stuff.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Yeah, it's just not a good.
I mean, if what you're used tomaybe and we're very used to our
report, but our report At leastyou explain stuff.
Our report has hyperlinks, soif you want to jump down to the
attic, you click a button thattakes you down to the attic
section.
This thing has no easilyrecognizable organization that I
can see.
There's no at the top.
I don't think there's even alist of here's the sections.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
Yeah, there was.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
There was a table of contents.
Okay, but no links, but nolinks.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
Like you, literally just have to scroll through this
whole report.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Yeah, not great.
But an issue is the agent isnow Didn't give him a choice.
Yeah, did not give the buyerchoice and so the client is not
Happy.
Yeah, I'm sure he's not happywith that agent.
That agent will never getreferrals from this client,
(09:46):
which is why some agents neverget busier.
As the years go on, they don'tget busier.
You know, as the years go onthey don't get busier because
their referral sources aren'tthere.
There's no big chance to worklike that.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
I mean you'll occasionally get somebody just
because you've got somebodythat's in a hurry and they don't
read reviews or they don't seethings, and so you'll
occasionally get somebody justjust by virtue of the fact that
there's a crap ton of people inthe area.
But you're not going to grow.
And at this point this clienthas every right to file an
ethics violation with that agent.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Oh, yeah, yep.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
Like every right to do that and every like all three
reports that this guy got in ahalf an hour.
We found contradictory evidenceon all of them.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Correct yes, yes.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Because the termites Drew wasn't looking for termites
.
No, he didn't and found them.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
He's looking for moisture and he goes oh, there's
the tubes, here we go, go.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
So I mean it's not about whether an inspection
company does a thorough job ornot, because they all should.
There's a minimum standard thatthe state requires, but that's
not the point.
The point is that your clientsthis is the largest purchase of
(11:09):
their lives.
Let's be realistic at least upuntil this point and in all
probability, unless they buyanother house, this is going to
be it.
But when you do that and youdon't give them all the
information that they're sittinghere begging for, begging for
this because something doesn'tfeel right to them, and like
(11:31):
there's been comments aboutthings that, oh well, you know
we work with this agent all thetime and don't worry, you're
good and and you know just we,we work with this agent, you're
fine.
You know this guy doesn't feelfine, he's concerned, and that
threw red flags up to him.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
He's concerned and that threw red flags up to him.
Well, it's a sad fact thatagents only get paid if the
house sells.
Yeah, and we have seen socialmedia posts where somebody's
like some agent's like, hey,where can I get a quick sale or
I can't make my rent this month.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
My closing just got canceled.
How can I get into anotherclosing really quick to make my
rent?
Speaker 2 (12:12):
You just saw that like four days ago.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
And then, before that , somebody needed a sale in
order to make their mortgagepayment.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
It's been a rough year for a lot of real estate
agents.
It's been a hard year for homeinspectors as well.
But a home inspector here's abig difference.
A home inspector here's a bigdifference.
A home inspector their bestinterest is to protect the
client.
Speaker 3 (12:34):
And to give the client enough information to
make an informed choice.
Speaker 2 (12:38):
Correct, Because a home inspector will get paid
whether or not the home sells.
So the way a home inspectorstands out, trouble is to do a
good job.
do a good job, not miss thingsnot over exaggerate don't
misrepresent things, do notminimize things.
It is what it is.
(13:04):
Things are not like this.
But for a real estate agent,say there's an inspection, they
minimize issues found during theinspection.
They can minimize that and thenthey get paid.
And then and I had this happenone time I wrote something about
a chimney Leaks around thechimney.
It even had a tarp around it.
(13:26):
Okay, the tarp a little bit,but there's issues around here.
You need to get that looked at.
The disclosure said no leakscoming into the roof or the
ceiling.
That's what the client told melater on.
Because they move in, it rains,there's water coming in.
Speaker 3 (13:45):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
They call the agent and go we have an issue here.
And the agent goes oh well,your home inspector should have
caught that.
Of course I'm like yeah and Iyou did.
Yes, here it is.
But the agent does not want totake responsibility over
anything, even though they knowthat was hidden on the
(14:09):
disclosure.
Obviously it was, and here'spictures.
But a real estate agent, theycan minimize issues and still
get paid where they.
If somebody decides not to buya house because of the issues,
the agent doesn't get paid.
So there's a motivation foragents to let people buy things
that may not be in their bestinterest.
That's definitely not everyagent, no, and it isn't.
We're not saying that.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
But that's like any industry, any job, any whatever,
you're always going to havethat small percentage that
aren't looking out for aclient's best interest, and
those are the ones that justshould no longer be agents,
because you shouldn't be.
Speaker 2 (14:47):
I like to think it's.
Three to 5% of the populationis just Well, did I tell you?
Speaker 3 (14:51):
about the article I read the other day, I don't know
.
I saw it on LinkedIn.
A gentleman who was a brokerwrote it and the title was I
hate real estate agents.
And then you go in and he'slike not really, but here's
what's going on.
So he's saying thatstatistically, there's like
between 1 million and 2 millionreal estate agents in the United
(15:14):
States.
75% of all transactions areperformed by 375,000 agents
across the country.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Like 15 to 20% is what this article said it's that
parade of 80-20.
Right.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
So what he's saying is that all these brokerages are
going out and they're courtingthat 375,000 agent group.
So, then you've got these othergroups, like you've got new
agents coming in and this andthat, and so brokers are
complaining that agents aren'tgoing into training, they're not
(15:52):
doing this, they're not doingthat and so on and so forth, and
that they're starting to try tocrack down on people in their
offices and if you're not doingstuff, then they're going to
just get rid of their licensefor that agent.
But you know, we've also seenwhere you've got people coming
in straight from Hondros orstraight from wherever, and
(16:12):
they're not given any directionat all.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Oh no.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
They have no clue what to do.
They have no clue that this isa business, and that was one of
the things that this articletalked about.
You know, like they think theycould just pop up whenever and
go do work, that they're notapproaching it as a business.
Well, I don't think that whenthey get into it that they're
told you're now a small businessowner, you need to know your
numbers and and have thatbrokerage set them up and teach
(16:38):
them those skills.
Speaker 2 (16:39):
I do remember that article.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
You read it to me.
The broker was complaining thata lot of the new agents expect
the broker to do everything forthem to get them the leads to do
everything.
It's like, no, this is yourstuff.
I'm just here to kind ofsupervise you.
Speaker 3 (16:55):
But that should be part of their training.
Coming in Like there shouldn'tbe any, shouldn't be the agent
thinking anything.
There should be an interviewprocess prior to you taking
somebody on at your brokerage.
These are the expectations.
You're going to be attending Xnumber of trainings.
You're going to be making Xnumber of cold calls.
(17:15):
You're going to be doing Xnumber of mailers and you're
going to keep track of yournumbers.
These are the numbers thatyou're going to be doing X
number of mailers and you'regoing to keep track of your
numbers.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
These are the numbers that you need to keep track of.
That sounds good.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
Well, as they're all independent contractors, you
can't make Right, but you canguide them and you can say this
is my expectation for mybrokerage that you do this as
part of this.
And if they come in and theychoose to do that, that's their
choice.
They should be doing thosethings.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
There should be some minimum standards.
Speaker 3 (17:44):
There should be minimum standards.
Let everybody see who floats.
Right, or just to takesomebody's money, because that's
part of the problem with theindustry.
I think that you've got so manynew people coming in that don't
look at this as a business,that don't understand that this
is your reputation and theindustry's reputation, because
this guy is evidence of that.
I mean, he'd never heard of us,which really offended me,
(18:07):
because he's like well, are youguys going to be able to get in?
Speaker 2 (18:10):
I'm like I don't want that agent.
Speaker 3 (18:12):
We've been in business for 22 years.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
Who trained this guy?
How long has he been inbusiness?
That agent?
I don't know.
We can look that up for that.
How long has he been an agent?
Or does the person who trainedhim train him to try and find a
sheet inspector?
Speaker 3 (18:26):
Right.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
That way it won't blow your deals.
Right, which instead is goingto blow all your referrals down
the road.
This agent assuming that's allhe does is just give you
recommendations.
He'll be out of business in acouple of years.
Speaker 3 (18:43):
Nobody's going to recommend him, because what's
going to happen is somethinglike this is going to happen
again and he's going to have acrappy inspector come out.
They're going to miss something, like they did this time, and
he's going to get sued and he'sgoing to end up having to go out
of business because he's losthis shirt.
Yep, and you can't even protectthem because at this point, you
(19:04):
didn't give the three peopleyou just gave one.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
It's obvious to me, as we do this for years and
years and years, that someagents see homeless vectors as
an impedance to their sale goingthrough, when in reality, we
are keeping your ass fromgetting sued and we're helping
the buyer make an informeddecision.
Speaker 3 (19:24):
Well, do you remember when we first started like 20
some years ago?
It wasn't real estate agentsagainst home inspectors, it was
a team Well, not so much a teambut it was part of a team
approach.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
Yeah, but I never.
Speaker 3 (19:41):
There was always some agents like oh your,
inspector's a ruin of a deal,but for the most part, though,
those are the piece of the shit.
Speaker 2 (19:46):
Agents that really want to go out of business.
Speaker 3 (19:48):
But for the most part , though, the attitudes were
different from the real estateindustry and home inspectors
were looked at.
You know, we had the sameclients, we had the same
protection of the client'sinterests at heart, and that's
changed somewhere down the road,where real estate agents don't
think that home inspectors havetheir best interests at heart
(20:12):
the clients or that they don'twant it because they're going to
blow the deal.
And if that's the case andyou're just doing crappy houses
like that, you need to prep yourclients better, or you need to
have better understanding ofwhat they need.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
We have a good agent that referred us for years.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
And they even tell us their whole process where they
tell the client hey, you'regoing to get the report, there's
lots of stuff on that.
Look it over, we'll go over ittogether.
Where they set the expectations, what the report's gonna look
like, what's gonna be on it whatkind of dollar things?
That they're gonna look at.
It may be scary, buteverything's repairable.
We'll sit down, we'll talk,talk right, and those agents
(20:54):
close almost all thoseinspections that we do.
Yeah, because there's no allright.
When you are you doing sales orsomething some, if you get a
client too many choices, theyget confused, right, and they
don't make a decision right youneed to guide your client so
(21:16):
they know what's going to happenand you don't want them to be
confused like, if you like, thisguy, this client today who
hired us.
He had questions, he wasconfused about the report
because all his concerns werenot addressed, nor were they
being addressed when nobody washelping him, so he probably
would have backed out of thesale anyway oh, I'm sure if it
(21:38):
had pushed come to shove, hewould have backed so we, we were
there.
Actually, they could make sureno, because he wasn't he needed
he needed to make a decisionwell, he and his wife there was
a couple.
So yeah, confused people don'tthese people don't buy homes
they don't buy homes, they don'tmake decisions well, if at all
(22:00):
no, because they they need theinformation.
Speaker 3 (22:03):
That is what a home inspection does.
It gives that clientinformation, it gives them peace
of mind, it gives them theability to know that they can
walk into that house and thatwhatever's going on, they can
either handle or they knowsomebody that can help them
handle it will be interestingthe next day or we'll get the
mold test back see if there'sany mold spores elevated amounts
(22:24):
in that house.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
There could be, because there's definitely some
mold issues in there.
Speaker 4 (22:31):
So we'll see.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
Yeah, we will find out, but I don't think that real
estate agent is going to getany recommendations.
Speaker 3 (22:40):
Oh, I'm sure he's not at this point.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Because too many issues.
Speaker 3 (22:46):
Too many red flags, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
So, Eric, I think that's it for this one, who you
recommend has a huge impact onyour future business, like us
Habitation Investigation.
What did we win this year?
Speaker 3 (23:00):
We won Consumer's Choice Award this year.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
We did yeah didn't even yep, didn't even thought
about it, it wasn't even on ourradar.
Speaker 3 (23:07):
We got contacted and hey, guess what?
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Y'all just won this.
You guys won this.
Oh, that's cool.
So we got that going for us andwe also a couple years we best
in midwest for home inspections.
We also do commercialinspections with heartland
commercial property inspectionswell, there's a difference in
commercial and that would beanother podcast and that can be
another podcast that getsseparated out.
(23:31):
Yep, so I think, if, for this,make certain you give your
client three choices, if yougive them any, like you know, at
all, or you know, tell them tomake sure they're good companies
.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
Yeah yeah, I mean, it is your name, it is your
reputation on the line and ifyou're recommending somebody,
for example, like this company,what do you think would have
happened down the road if theclients had purchased this house
and then found rot, foundtermites, found this.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
Like who's the client going to go after?
I guarantee the agent will go.
Oh, you should go after thedispatchers.
They missed it Like dude you-.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
You were the one that said you were the one that
fired them.
You gave them no choice.
This one that said you were theone that fired them.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
You gave them no choice.
Yeah, so and yeah, insurancecompany will go after both.
Speaker 3 (24:26):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
And home inspectors legally in the state of Ohio.
We are reliable up to the costof the home inspection.
Speaker 3 (24:33):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Which means if there's say there's a we'll say
$10,000 worth of damage, theygot missed, we'll say, Wow, All
right, here's your $550 for thehome inspection.
The rest is we're going to haveto go after the agent.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
We're going to go after the agent.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Because the agent scheduled this.
I don't feel bad If it's a badagent.
If it's a good agent, I wouldfeel bad.
But that's the E&O insurance,yeah.
So I think that's it for thisone.
But oh, choose your homeinspection companies, your
termite companies, anybody yourecommend choose your associates
wisely choose them wisely,because it is a huge reflection
(25:13):
on your professionalism andethics.
Speaker 3 (25:16):
And you're yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
Yep.
Thank you everybody.
Speaker 3 (25:18):
Bye, bye, bye and your.
Speaker 1 (25:24):
Yeah, yep, thank you everybody.
Bye, bye.
You've been listening to thestanding out in ohio podcast.
Be sure to subscribe on spotifyor google podcast to get new,
fresh episodes.
For more, please follow us oninstagram, twitter and facebook,
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Company athomeinspectionsinohiocom or
jimtroffcom.
That's J-I-M-T-R-O-T-H andclick on podcast.
(25:48):
Until next time, learn and godo stuff.
Welcome to the Standing Out in Ohio podcast,
where we discuss topics,upcoming events, news and
predictions with real estateprofessionals and entrepreneurs.
Listen and learn what makestheir companies and themselves
stand out and gain advantagesover the competition and gain
market share.
Subscribe for the latest newsand discussion on what it takes
(00:23):
to stand out from the crowd.
Now here's your host, jim.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Hey everybody, Welcome to the Standing Out and
how podcast.
This is Jim Troth and of courseI have Laura Troth, the office
goddess, here.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Hello everyone.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
So all right, it is.
What is this?
January 5th?
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Is it the 5th already ?
Is the 5th?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
wow, we're doing this .
Um, as you know, not allcompanies are the same in
quality experience.
Give a shitness right seriouslyyou're right yeah and then, and
nor are all agents, but it'ssomething you need to be aware
(01:08):
of, because who you recommend isa huge reflection on who you
are.
And so we have a story todaywhere somebody called in
emergency inspection becausetoday's our last day.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
Okay, but first let's listen to this Habitation
investigation is the way to gofor a home inspection in Ohio.
Trusted licensed homeinspectors for your needs.
From radon to mold towarranties For a great home
(01:42):
inspection, you really can't gowrong.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Visit home inspections in ohiocom all right
, laura so I get a call, yeahyeah, go go to the store and go
ahead so I get a call today.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
Gentleman is panicking because he has been
asking questions and askingquestions and asking questions
and has been blown offapparently for two weeks because
his inspection period was twoweeks.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
So when did he have his first inspection done?
Speaker 3 (02:19):
The first inspection was done December 27th,
according to the report that I'mlooking at from the first
company.
Okay, which we will not givetheir name, which we will not
give their name.
So what ended up happening ishe had specific questions about
specific items.
His agent had contacted aroofing company, writing that he
(02:41):
needed specific things lookedat, that he was concerned about
the ventilation in the atticbeing blocked off, and so on and
so forth.
So, needless to say, one of ourinspectors said you know what
I've got a few minutes before myinspection today.
If I can hit it on the way out,I'll stop, I'll do the mold
(03:03):
testing and I'll look at thosecouple of things he wanted.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Because the client, the buyer, is concerned about
moisture issues in the atticspace right and mold.
Speaker 3 (03:14):
And mold.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
And then, after we got all scheduled, he goes hey,
can they take a look in thecrawl space also?
Because X, y, z and Drewawesome as he is, he's like yeah
.
Yeah, he'll do that he'ssqueezing in.
He got things done.
Luckily there's nobodycurrently there in the way.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
So he got things done .
He was able to.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
But wait, so there's, a.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Go ahead.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
What did Drew find in that brief amount of time he
was there?
Speaker 3 (03:39):
So in the brief amount of time we were there,
drew found.
So let brief amount of time wewere there, drew found.
So let me backtrack.
So this agent had a homeinspection company come out, a
separate termite company comeout and a roofing company come
out that he had to take care of.
So he had the report for thetermite in the home inspection,
(04:03):
didn't get a report for theroofing company oh, okay, but
nothing arrived but at thispoint was told that everything
looked great, there were noproblems.
Drew goes out, he gets into theattic.
He finds two leaks.
He finds ice.
He finds that the bathroom isventing directly into the attic
(04:24):
space and he found areas of moldbecause he did a swab in the
attic.
He gets into the crawl spaceand he finds termite tubes.
He finds that the dryer wasvented into the crawl space.
That's a huge no-no which is ahuge no-no vented into the crawl
space.
(04:44):
That's a huge no-no, which is ahuge no-no, and apparently the
client's parents had had thatdone to their house and it
totally damaged their foundation, which you know.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
It would ravage the floor, joists.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
The floor, joists.
So that's just a quick brief.
What all Drew found in the halfhour he was looking in there
and you talked to the client.
Brief what all Drew found inthe half hour.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
He was looking in there and you talked to the
client he was not happy.
I can't think of how thequestions came about.
What order?
But the client was not giventhree inspection companies to
shoot from.
No, he was not the agent justscheduled.
I'll schedule an inspectioncompany.
I'll just schedule aninspection company with one from
(05:25):
.
No, he was not the agent justscheduled here.
I'll schedule an inspectioncompany, I'll just schedule it
all with one that I know, onethat I work with or I like
working with you, do that.
He's got a roofer, he's got atermite.
So, first of all, that's you'renot supposed to do that, and
here it gets even better.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
So the client is not sure that he paid for the roof
inspection.
He doesn't know that he did,which means literally that the
agent had a roofing company comeout and go oh hey, everything's
fine.
When we go in, and we're noteven on the roof, we're just in
the attic, and we find two leaks, and you know what I mean.
(06:06):
So, and when the agent calledme to see if, you know, we were
like contractors and could getin, like he made it seem as if
this client had waited, just youknow, lollygagging about for
two weeks until now, when he waslike, oh I, I need all this
(06:27):
stuff done, not, you know, notrealizing that the client had
already told us listen, I'vebeen trying to get answers for
two weeks yeah, well, thespecial only like a week or so
ago well, a week and a half, somaybe who knows.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
But anyway, it's very suspicious when the agent
doesn't give him a choice to whoto pick.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
Right.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
And there's no good quality customer service because
they're not getting theirquestions answered.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
No, the inspection company didn't get back company
didn't get back.
The um roofing company didn'tlook at what he wanted and he
had it in writing that he wantedspecific things looked at and
actually those were a problem,those.
There was something that wasn'tbig enough, there was stuff
that was blocked, so he had ajustifiable concern with those
(07:18):
vents in the attic yeah, some ofthem were not open as much as
they should so but we looked atthe well the client our client
now sent us the report becausehe had moisture concerns.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
We I think, instead of a report, we'll look at the
location, an idea of where to dothe mold testing yeah, and see
what the moisture issues are,but man, I can't there weren't
any in it that report.
I'm not going to tell you thename of the company, but, man,
it was not an easy report toread.
There's lots of pictures.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
That was all.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
There wasn't any explanations?
Yeah, there's no explanationfor the pictures, they're just
like here's 15 pictures of thisarea, but nothing telling you
what this picture is showing.
Speaker 3 (08:06):
Did you see the part where your exterior is in good
working order?
Speaker 2 (08:11):
I, yeah, I did, I did , I did okay that that's
interesting.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
I'm just kind of funny, that's kind of I gotta
get the.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
The siding isn't the shape, but there's things that
just don't make.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
There was another one I forgot because drew saw
sunlight through the chimney andsaw issues with the chimney.
Oh, the chimney flashing.
I don't know if it was theflashing or the chimney itself,
but this guy had no problemswith the chimney, said it was in
good shape and continued tomonitor.
And please understand, repairsmay be required in the future.
(08:43):
Well duh, it's a chimney.
Of course there's going to berepairs in the future.
You always need to upkeep stuff.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Yeah, it's just not a good.
I mean, if what you're used tomaybe and we're very used to our
report, but our report At leastyou explain stuff.
Our report has hyperlinks, soif you want to jump down to the
attic, you click a button thattakes you down to the attic
section.
This thing has no easilyrecognizable organization that I
can see.
There's no at the top.
I don't think there's even alist of here's the sections.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
Yeah, there was.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
There was a table of contents.
Okay, but no links, but nolinks.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
Like you, literally just have to scroll through this
whole report.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Yeah, not great.
But an issue is the agent isnow Didn't give him a choice.
Yeah, did not give the buyerchoice and so the client is not
Happy.
Yeah, I'm sure he's not happywith that agent.
That agent will never getreferrals from this client,
(09:46):
which is why some agents neverget busier.
As the years go on, they don'tget busier.
You know, as the years go onthey don't get busier because
their referral sources aren'tthere.
There's no big chance to worklike that.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
I mean you'll occasionally get somebody just
because you've got somebodythat's in a hurry and they don't
read reviews or they don't seethings, and so you'll
occasionally get somebody justjust by virtue of the fact that
there's a crap ton of people inthe area.
But you're not going to grow.
And at this point this clienthas every right to file an
ethics violation with that agent.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Oh, yeah, yep.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
Like every right to do that and every like all three
reports that this guy got in ahalf an hour.
We found contradictory evidenceon all of them.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Correct yes, yes.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Because the termites Drew wasn't looking for termites
.
No, he didn't and found them.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
He's looking for moisture and he goes oh, there's
the tubes, here we go, go.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
So I mean it's not about whether an inspection
company does a thorough job ornot, because they all should.
There's a minimum standard thatthe state requires, but that's
not the point.
The point is that your clientsthis is the largest purchase of
(11:09):
their lives.
Let's be realistic at least upuntil this point and in all
probability, unless they buyanother house, this is going to
be it.
But when you do that and youdon't give them all the
information that they're sittinghere begging for, begging for
this because something doesn'tfeel right to them, and like
(11:31):
there's been comments aboutthings that, oh well, you know
we work with this agent all thetime and don't worry, you're
good and and you know just we,we work with this agent, you're
fine.
You know this guy doesn't feelfine, he's concerned, and that
threw red flags up to him.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
He's concerned and that threw red flags up to him.
Well, it's a sad fact thatagents only get paid if the
house sells.
Yeah, and we have seen socialmedia posts where somebody's
like some agent's like, hey,where can I get a quick sale or
I can't make my rent this month.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
My closing just got canceled.
How can I get into anotherclosing really quick to make my
rent?
Speaker 2 (12:12):
You just saw that like four days ago.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
And then, before that , somebody needed a sale in
order to make their mortgagepayment.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
It's been a rough year for a lot of real estate
agents.
It's been a hard year for homeinspectors as well.
But a home inspector here's abig difference.
A home inspector here's a bigdifference.
A home inspector their bestinterest is to protect the
client.
Speaker 3 (12:34):
And to give the client enough information to
make an informed choice.
Speaker 2 (12:38):
Correct, Because a home inspector will get paid
whether or not the home sells.
So the way a home inspectorstands out, trouble is to do a
good job.
do a good job, not miss thingsnot over exaggerate don't
misrepresent things, do notminimize things.
It is what it is.
(13:04):
Things are not like this.
But for a real estate agent,say there's an inspection, they
minimize issues found during theinspection.
They can minimize that and thenthey get paid.
And then and I had this happenone time I wrote something about
a chimney Leaks around thechimney.
It even had a tarp around it.
(13:26):
Okay, the tarp a little bit,but there's issues around here.
You need to get that looked at.
The disclosure said no leakscoming into the roof or the
ceiling.
That's what the client told melater on.
Because they move in, it rains,there's water coming in.
Speaker 3 (13:45):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
They call the agent and go we have an issue here.
And the agent goes oh well,your home inspector should have
caught that.
Of course I'm like yeah and Iyou did.
Yes, here it is.
But the agent does not want totake responsibility over
anything, even though they knowthat was hidden on the
(14:09):
disclosure.
Obviously it was, and here'spictures.
But a real estate agent, theycan minimize issues and still
get paid where they.
If somebody decides not to buya house because of the issues,
the agent doesn't get paid.
So there's a motivation foragents to let people buy things
that may not be in their bestinterest.
That's definitely not everyagent, no, and it isn't.
We're not saying that.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
But that's like any industry, any job, any whatever,
you're always going to havethat small percentage that
aren't looking out for aclient's best interest, and
those are the ones that justshould no longer be agents,
because you shouldn't be.
Speaker 2 (14:47):
I like to think it's.
Three to 5% of the populationis just Well, did I tell you?
Speaker 3 (14:51):
about the article I read the other day, I don't know
.
I saw it on LinkedIn.
A gentleman who was a brokerwrote it and the title was I
hate real estate agents.
And then you go in and he'slike not really, but here's
what's going on.
So he's saying thatstatistically, there's like
between 1 million and 2 millionreal estate agents in the United
(15:14):
States.
75% of all transactions areperformed by 375,000 agents
across the country.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Like 15 to 20% is what this article said it's that
parade of 80-20.
Right.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
So what he's saying is that all these brokerages are
going out and they're courtingthat 375,000 agent group.
So, then you've got these othergroups, like you've got new
agents coming in and this andthat, and so brokers are
complaining that agents aren'tgoing into training, they're not
(15:52):
doing this, they're not doingthat and so on and so forth, and
that they're starting to try tocrack down on people in their
offices and if you're not doingstuff, then they're going to
just get rid of their licensefor that agent.
But you know, we've also seenwhere you've got people coming
in straight from Hondros orstraight from wherever, and
(16:12):
they're not given any directionat all.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Oh no.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
They have no clue what to do.
They have no clue that this isa business, and that was one of
the things that this articletalked about.
You know, like they think theycould just pop up whenever and
go do work, that they're notapproaching it as a business.
Well, I don't think that whenthey get into it that they're
told you're now a small businessowner, you need to know your
numbers and and have thatbrokerage set them up and teach
(16:38):
them those skills.
Speaker 2 (16:39):
I do remember that article.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
You read it to me.
The broker was complaining thata lot of the new agents expect
the broker to do everything forthem to get them the leads to do
everything.
It's like, no, this is yourstuff.
I'm just here to kind ofsupervise you.
Speaker 3 (16:55):
But that should be part of their training.
Coming in Like there shouldn'tbe any, shouldn't be the agent
thinking anything.
There should be an interviewprocess prior to you taking
somebody on at your brokerage.
These are the expectations.
You're going to be attending Xnumber of trainings.
You're going to be making Xnumber of cold calls.
(17:15):
You're going to be doing Xnumber of mailers and you're
going to keep track of yournumbers.
These are the numbers thatyou're going to be doing X
number of mailers and you'regoing to keep track of your
numbers.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
These are the numbers that you need to keep track of.
That sounds good.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
Well, as they're all independent contractors, you
can't make Right, but you canguide them and you can say this
is my expectation for mybrokerage that you do this as
part of this.
And if they come in and theychoose to do that, that's their
choice.
They should be doing thosethings.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
There should be some minimum standards.
Speaker 3 (17:44):
There should be minimum standards.
Let everybody see who floats.
Right, or just to takesomebody's money, because that's
part of the problem with theindustry.
I think that you've got so manynew people coming in that don't
look at this as a business,that don't understand that this
is your reputation and theindustry's reputation, because
this guy is evidence of that.
I mean, he'd never heard of us,which really offended me,
(18:07):
because he's like well, are youguys going to be able to get in?
Speaker 2 (18:10):
I'm like I don't want that agent.
Speaker 3 (18:12):
We've been in business for 22 years.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
Who trained this guy?
How long has he been inbusiness?
That agent?
I don't know.
We can look that up for that.
How long has he been an agent?
Or does the person who trainedhim train him to try and find a
sheet inspector?
Speaker 3 (18:26):
Right.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
That way it won't blow your deals.
Right, which instead is goingto blow all your referrals down
the road.
This agent assuming that's allhe does is just give you
recommendations.
He'll be out of business in acouple of years.
Speaker 3 (18:43):
Nobody's going to recommend him, because what's
going to happen is somethinglike this is going to happen
again and he's going to have acrappy inspector come out.
They're going to miss something, like they did this time, and
he's going to get sued and he'sgoing to end up having to go out
of business because he's losthis shirt.
Yep, and you can't even protectthem because at this point, you
(19:04):
didn't give the three peopleyou just gave one.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
It's obvious to me, as we do this for years and
years and years, that someagents see homeless vectors as
an impedance to their sale goingthrough, when in reality, we
are keeping your ass fromgetting sued and we're helping
the buyer make an informeddecision.
Speaker 3 (19:24):
Well, do you remember when we first started like 20
some years ago?
It wasn't real estate agentsagainst home inspectors, it was
a team Well, not so much a teambut it was part of a team
approach.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
Yeah, but I never.
Speaker 3 (19:41):
There was always some agents like oh your,
inspector's a ruin of a deal,but for the most part, though,
those are the piece of the shit.
Speaker 2 (19:46):
Agents that really want to go out of business.
Speaker 3 (19:48):
But for the most part , though, the attitudes were
different from the real estateindustry and home inspectors
were looked at.
You know, we had the sameclients, we had the same
protection of the client'sinterests at heart, and that's
changed somewhere down the road,where real estate agents don't
think that home inspectors havetheir best interests at heart
(20:12):
the clients or that they don'twant it because they're going to
blow the deal.
And if that's the case andyou're just doing crappy houses
like that, you need to prep yourclients better, or you need to
have better understanding ofwhat they need.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
We have a good agent that referred us for years.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
And they even tell us their whole process where they
tell the client hey, you'regoing to get the report, there's
lots of stuff on that.
Look it over, we'll go over ittogether.
Where they set the expectations, what the report's gonna look
like, what's gonna be on it whatkind of dollar things?
That they're gonna look at.
It may be scary, buteverything's repairable.
We'll sit down, we'll talk,talk right, and those agents
(20:54):
close almost all thoseinspections that we do.
Yeah, because there's no allright.
When you are you doing sales orsomething some, if you get a
client too many choices, theyget confused, right, and they
don't make a decision right youneed to guide your client so
(21:16):
they know what's going to happenand you don't want them to be
confused like, if you like, thisguy, this client today who
hired us.
He had questions, he wasconfused about the report
because all his concerns werenot addressed, nor were they
being addressed when nobody washelping him, so he probably
would have backed out of thesale anyway oh, I'm sure if it
(21:38):
had pushed come to shove, hewould have backed so we, we were
there.
Actually, they could make sureno, because he wasn't he needed
he needed to make a decisionwell, he and his wife there was
a couple.
So yeah, confused people don'tthese people don't buy homes
they don't buy homes, they don'tmake decisions well, if at all
(22:00):
no, because they they need theinformation.
Speaker 3 (22:03):
That is what a home inspection does.
It gives that clientinformation, it gives them peace
of mind, it gives them theability to know that they can
walk into that house and thatwhatever's going on, they can
either handle or they knowsomebody that can help them
handle it will be interestingthe next day or we'll get the
mold test back see if there'sany mold spores elevated amounts
(22:24):
in that house.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
There could be, because there's definitely some
mold issues in there.
Speaker 4 (22:31):
So we'll see.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
Yeah, we will find out, but I don't think that real
estate agent is going to getany recommendations.
Speaker 3 (22:40):
Oh, I'm sure he's not at this point.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Because too many issues.
Speaker 3 (22:46):
Too many red flags, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
So, Eric, I think that's it for this one, who you
recommend has a huge impact onyour future business, like us
Habitation Investigation.
What did we win this year?
Speaker 3 (23:00):
We won Consumer's Choice Award this year.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
We did yeah didn't even yep, didn't even thought
about it, it wasn't even on ourradar.
Speaker 3 (23:07):
We got contacted and hey, guess what?
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Y'all just won this.
You guys won this.
Oh, that's cool.
So we got that going for us andwe also a couple years we best
in midwest for home inspections.
We also do commercialinspections with heartland
commercial property inspectionswell, there's a difference in
commercial and that would beanother podcast and that can be
another podcast that getsseparated out.
(23:31):
Yep, so I think, if, for this,make certain you give your
client three choices, if yougive them any, like you know, at
all, or you know, tell them tomake sure they're good companies
.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
Yeah yeah, I mean, it is your name, it is your
reputation on the line and ifyou're recommending somebody,
for example, like this company,what do you think would have
happened down the road if theclients had purchased this house
and then found rot, foundtermites, found this.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
Like who's the client going to go after?
I guarantee the agent will go.
Oh, you should go after thedispatchers.
They missed it Like dude you-.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
You were the one that said you were the one that
fired them.
You gave them no choice.
This one that said you were theone that fired them.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
You gave them no choice.
Yeah, so and yeah, insurancecompany will go after both.
Speaker 3 (24:26):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
And home inspectors legally in the state of Ohio.
We are reliable up to the costof the home inspection.
Speaker 3 (24:33):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Which means if there's say there's a we'll say
$10,000 worth of damage, theygot missed, we'll say, Wow, All
right, here's your $550 for thehome inspection.
The rest is we're going to haveto go after the agent.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
We're going to go after the agent.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Because the agent scheduled this.
I don't feel bad If it's a badagent.
If it's a good agent, I wouldfeel bad.
But that's the E&O insurance,yeah.
So I think that's it for thisone.
But oh, choose your homeinspection companies, your
termite companies, anybody yourecommend choose your associates
wisely choose them wisely,because it is a huge reflection
(25:13):
on your professionalism andethics.
Speaker 3 (25:16):
And you're yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
Yep.
Thank you everybody.
Speaker 3 (25:18):
Bye, bye, bye and your.
Speaker 1 (25:24):
Yeah, yep, thank you everybody.
Bye, bye.
You've been listening to thestanding out in ohio podcast.
Be sure to subscribe on spotifyor google podcast to get new,
fresh episodes.
For more, please follow us oninstagram, twitter and facebook,
or visit the website of thebest Best Ohio Home Inspection
Company athomeinspectionsinohiocom or
jimtroffcom.
That's J-I-M-T-R-O-T-H andclick on podcast.
(25:48):
Until next time, learn and godo stuff.
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