Ian Robertson
Welcome back to Inspector Toolbelt everyone. We have a another segment of Drinking With Jay. And it should have a little tagline that Jay just said before the program started. Hey, if this episode’s a flop, at least we get to drink. So, how are you doing, Jay?

Jay Wynn
I’m all right, pretty tired, long day.

Ian Robertson
You had a big septic inspection this morning, right?

Jay Wynn
This afternoon, actually. So I didn’t even get the luxury of the cool morning, was in the afternoon. And for anybody that knows it’s been in the 90s up here, so..

Ian Robertson
And the 90s up.. So anybody who’s listening, if you’re in Texas, or Southern California or Florida, you’re like 90, that’s like a New Year’s Day. For us northerners we have thicker blood, you know that, that’s basically just shooting us. That’s not something we’re used to. Yeah, give us minus 40. And we’ll be like, Yeah, let’s go for a swim. You give us 90, we’re like, yeah, we’re dead. Yep, we died.

Jay Wynn
Well, the other problem is last week, it was 47 when I walked, woke up and walked outside. So we’ve gone from 47 to 92. Yeah, in the span of a week. So it’s like, we just don’t get a chance to get used to any of it.

Ian Robertson
I was. I was like, breaking out my pumpkin spice last week with the 40s, 40 degree weather. I’m like, This is amazing. Get my sweater on. No, no, not gonna happen.

Jay Wynn
Yeah. Didn’t have that for long. And that’s the problem with it is you don’t get a chance to get used to any of it. Yeah, you gonna get rained on or it’s gonna be nice.. Is it going to do all of it? None of it. You know, am I in the snow, coming out of the snow? It’s interesting. But yeah, I find myself layering up and layering down a lot for a home inspection.

Ian Robertson
I think that’s one aspect of being a home inspector that’s difficult is one day to the next. I mean, it’s like, how do you dress for your job? Like, people are like, Oh, should I wear a coat when I go from my car to my office? For us it’s like, Okay, how many layers? Should I Where should I wear layers? Like, will it be 140 degrees in the attic? And then, you know, 40 degrees outside? What what’s going on here today? Especially for you. I mean, not just the home inspection. But you’re out there digging the septic and you’re checking the well, and then you’re back in the house. And then yeah, but anyways, today we’re going to talk about training. And we’re not talking about training home inspectors, we’re talking about training our clients and training agents and training others. There’s a quote that we were talking about, I don’t know who said it, it says be careful what you allow, because you’re training people how to treat you. That’s not exactly what we’re going to be talking about. But we’re going to be talking about how we can train those that we work with, to how things should actually work. Because I think that’s a lot of problems that we run into as home inspectors like, I expected this and you delivered this instead, there’s a lot of ways that we can kind of train our clientele. But in the spirit of Drinking With Jay, by the way, Jay, you know that I actually started a another podcast based on the segment. I do. Yeah, well, because everybody’s like, I want to drink with Ian. Like, I want to drink with whoever is going to drink with me. This sounds great. Yeah I”ve been listening to it actually. It’s been fun. It’s called Drinking With Tom, I often drink with him. And he explains things to me that I don’t understand. Yeah. So that’s basically what the podcast is.

Jay Wynn
The wealth of his knowledge is incredible.

Ian Robertson
It is.

Jay Wynn
I think what blows me away is I have a pretty good memory, but nothing compared, he can pull up details. And it’s so specific, and it’s all in his head. And it’s like, on demand, he can pull it up. You know, I got to think about stuff for quite a while, but it’s just like, right there. And he’s always learning too, that’s the kind of cool thing about it, is he’s always open to learning something else that he didn’t know before. So just it’s been fun listening to him. I like the one on how alcohol was made. And I also liked your comparison of the pit barrel smokers and how you both had kind of different feels for it.

Ian Robertson
That’s good. I’m glad you asked if anybody else wants to listen in, Drinking With Tom, but we’re going to focus in on Drinking With Jay tonight. So what are you drinking tonight, Jay, before we get into our subject?

Jay Wynn
So this is something we found at the Scottish games from a local distillery. I am drinking the Helderberg bourbon.

Ian Robertson
There you go. So for audio listeners, Jay’s showing a bottle, but the Helderberg bourbon.

Jay Wynn
So it’s a locally made bourbon, and they’ve been in business about five years now. This is the first year it’s aged five years. And it’s actually a really nice bourbon. And you know, that’s something I actually try to do when I can is check out the local breweries, local distilleries and see who’s making good product. And I know sometimes that some of them aren’t that great, but a lot of the local places are really getting to that they’ve got some really nice stuff they’re turning out. And in fact, what I’m drinking it out of is my Murray’s Fool glass, which is down on Route five, just down the road from us. They’re pretty good to the local distillery. So try to support the local businesses and keep them in our area.

Ian Robertson
Well, you know what’s interesting about the Helderberg bourbon, they’re the it’s called New Scotland distillery. Is that what it’s called though?

Jay Wynn
Yeah,.

Ian Robertson
Something like that. Yep. What’s interesting about them is they only started a few years ago, he was an ex marine came out of the military. And he’s like, Okay, what do I do? And then he started distilling. And now he’s actually one of the biggest distillers in all of New York State. Yeah. So he’s not even like small time. He’s, he’s, he’s gone big time in a very short period of time, and his stuff is really good. I tried his winter wheat.

Jay Wynn
Yeah, that was the thing. There’s a lot of guys that try it. And there’s a lot of guys that do okay, this is actually a really, really good bourbon. So it’s real smooth, it’s really easy to drink. It’s got good subtle flavors, and there’s nothing harsh about it at all. So I think the guy’s just earned his place because he’s putting out a really good product. So and it’s New Scotland spirits, I guess is the name of it. Looking at the Helderberg bourbon, it’s a real nice bourbon. What are you drinking?

Ian Robertson
So I’m actually drinking a Laphroaig. I don’t know if I’m saying it right. But it’s Laphroaig, but it’s from the Isla region of Scotland. So same region as like, Lagavulin and other very peaty scotches. I was super surprised because you know, a bottle of Lagavulin’s like 100 bucks, stuff like that. This was not an expensive bottle $45 a pretty decent sized bottle, so I was expecting it to be not that great, but it tastes like the eight year Lagavulin, except slightly better than the eight year not, nowhere near as good as the 16. That’s that’s off the charts. But this is really good scotch. I’m going to keep this on my list for you know, just like Thursday nights kind of thing. Sounds good. Oh yeah, very peaty. Definitely drink this around the campfire. Or I’ll drink it around the pizza oven that I’m building in the woods. Nice. You’ll have to come drink, drink with me around.

Jay Wynn
It sounds good to me, that’s on our to do list. We put a large patio in the back a couple years ago. And one of the things I want to do is a large barbecue pit with a built in pizza oven so we’re kind of in the designing slash planning phase of that, then someday we’ll grace our backyard.

Ian Robertson
I tell you what, I was not expecting refractory mortar to be so expensive though. It’s like a bag of mortars like what four bucks for a 50 pound bag at most, but a 50 pound bag of refractory mortar which you need for anytime you’re going to heat anything above, you know, a few 100 degrees. Even then, regular mortar can go up to 600 degrees, they say it’ll start falling apart on you if you do that more than a few times. But refractory is like 1900 or something, $50 A bag, you know, a bag doesn’t get you very far on mortar, you know.

Jay Wynn
Yeah I do, and you don’t want to be breathing that in because regular mortars nasty. That refractory stuff is really nasty so..

Ian Robertson
Well it has silica in it. So that’s not good for your lungs whatsoever. It won’t come out once it goes in. Isn’t that basically how you get silicosis?

Jay Wynn
Yeah, then it just sits there and just shreds and shreds and shreds your lungs until it forms scar tissue around it. You can’t breathe anymore.

Ian Robertson
That’s wonderful. Well anyways, after that part’s done. You should come and drink with me around my pizza oven.

Jay Wynn
Well, I’ll sling mortar with you, doesn’t matter. I’ll just wear a mask.

Ian Robertson
Well, me and my daughter are doing it, I tell you what, she can sling mortar with the best of them. She’s she’s a young girl, and she can just she’s laying stones, slinging mortar.

Jay Wynn
She’s a coach. I love it. Yeah, she really is. She was throwing axes at the Scottish games, wasn’t she?

Ian Robertson
Yeah, she was throwing axes along with your son. Yeah, he was landing them though. He was landing him.

Jay Wynn
That was cute too, two little kids throwing axes at a wall, was a lot of fun.

Ian Robertson
Yeah. But anyways, getting getting to our subject here of training agents and clients. When I first started out, I keep saying this on on air, you know, almost 20 years ago, it’s hard to believe that almost 20 years ago, I started in the home inspection industry at the very beginnings. But I remember delivering a report early on, and an agent getting upset because my report didn’t look like another home inspectors report. And I’m like, well, it meets New York state standards. And my report’s better, I didn’t say that part. But she’s like, but this is not what we’re used to. How do I explain this to my clients. And I remember thinking to myself, that’s a good example of delivering the right product, but having the wrong expectations there. So I went on a campaign to try to any agents that I work with, I would train them. And there’s lots of ways that you do, I’d train them to say, Okay, this is what you should expect instead, like, for instance, I was one of the first people in our market to do digital reports. And I remember some of the older agents freaking out about it. They’re like, what are you doing? Why are you playing on your phone? I’m like, I’m not playing on my phone. It was like a palm pilot at the time, you know, those old things. And basically, I just, I just kept like, before the inspection, I would build up to it, I’d say, Hey, I do an electronic inspection report. Clients love it, just so that you know, when we get there, we get there. They’d be a little leery. I deliver it. And then I’d even like maybe even call later on and say, Hey, did you notice this feature of the report? Do you notice now that it’s a PDF? You can just forward the email. You don’t have to scan it or fax it or anything like that. Again, going way back. Do you find some of the market expectations call on us to kind of train agents a little bit?

Jay Wynn
I do. But I guess I don’t think about it so much anymore. Because it’s just part of it’s, I think it’s one of those things that, and I’m gonna say this, broadly speaking, but I think in general, the good successful inspectors that have a few years in are kind of doing it automatically, mostly from, like you said, poor experiences, we found out that if you don’t take a few minutes, and explain to everybody on site, what you’re going to do or not do, I guess it comes down to managing the expectation. And if you can do real quick and really easy and set the tone for how the whole morning or afternoon is gonna go, and or you can just ignore it, expect things to fall into place, and they rarely do on their own. So I’ve noticed that with a lot of really good guys, because I have the luxury too of doing the septic inspections, while other inspectors are doing the home inspection. So I’ll sit and I’ll listen to them, I’m going to tell you, they’re really good ones and take a few minutes, and I’ll explain what to expect what they’re going to do you know, what they can and can’t do, both per their personal and New York state standards of practice. And I’m going to tell you in like three minutes, four minutes at the beginning of an inspection the guys got it. So they’ve already greased the wheels, and everybody’s on the same page. But the guys that have trouble with it are the guys that kind of just show up and go, yeah I’m here to do an inspection, and then take off and start looking at the building. I think the danger is we know what we do. And we know it so well that sometimes we take for granted that nobody else really knows exactly what a home inspection is involved. And I’m going to throw another layer on to this, a lot of people will watch those stupid HGTV shows. And that has not helped us in my opinion, because they have all these weird notions that we’re going to be ripping stuff apart, calling people idiots and morons and cussing people out and put on this big show. So sometimes you really, really have to counteract, if you will, a very false impression of what we can and can’t do.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, and you’re taking a very broad approach to of bringing in clients and agents in your statement there. There’s a lot of truth in what you said there because there’s unrealistic expectations. And then sometimes there’s no expectation. So I kind of relate it to going into a restaurant. Like maybe a type of food that I’ve never had before. I love it when a waiter or waitress says, Hey, have you eaten here before? And as soon as I say no, okay, let me explain things real quick, this page of the menu. That’s the really spicy stuff. If you like that pick from that page, and they kind of break it down for you. In just a few seconds. That makes me feel awesome. Because now I know what to expect. And I don’t have to wonder. So when you get your food when they don’t do that, you’re like, what’s this, they’re like, that’s spicy Thai. It’s, you know, three chili Thai, it’s like, this is going to destroy me. They’re like, this is a Thai restaurant, you should have known that, it’s like, but I didn’t. So we’re delivering a report, just like a waiter would deliver food, get prepared, handed to the person and present it to them. If it’s not what they’re expecting, it doesn’t matter if it meets New York State Standards of Practice, my waiter can tell me this meets USDA standards, or whatever state we’re in for whatever standards we’re going by, well, InterNACHI standards great, not what they were expecting, you’re still gonna have a ticked off agent and a ticked off client.

Jay Wynn
You know, it’s funny that you’re mentioning this, because I was thinking about one of the disconnects in our industry, especially with new inspectors, and even sometimes with older inspectors that have been doing it for a while is we tend to think of I’m going to go there, and I’m doing the inspection. And that’s what I do. But the fact of the matter is, I would argue that the report we’re putting out is actually the product that we’re evaluated by, and that the report is, I would say 70% of our obligation to our clients. So we can do a phenomenal home inspection. And I’ve seen guys do great home inspections, but the report is terrible. So I think your idea of preparing them for what the report will entail is important too. Because that really if you want to get down to it, that’s the product we’re putting out. That’s the product that’s going to touch most hands and that’s the product that ultimately is going to affect their decision. So we can do a great inspection like I said, but how do we report it? And then do the agents know how to use our report to the best advantage and then they, I guess you can by extension to say is your report one that is is conducive to allowing agents and clients to clearly understand and use it to their best advantage too.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, no, that’s a very good point. We need to be able to prepare them for the report that they get because let’s be honest, agents can let’s focus on agents for just a moment, agents especially have their quote unquote favorite home inspector. And there’s inspectors that I know in a lot of markets including our own that still do a very let’s call it an old school report. So if they’re used to using that guy for the past 30 years, one inspector in our area in particular, still mails his report, mails a hardcopy, there’s no PDF, there’s no web based report, nothing most consumers now by the way, prefer web based report, that’s with the PDF option but anyways, that’s neither here nor there, but an agent’s used to that and then all sudden they get an email with a link in it, you’re gonna get an email later that night saying, What’s this? So now we just delivered the food. And it could be the most amazing meal ever. But they don’t know what it is, and they’re not eating it. So now it’s a lot of time after the fact, when we’ve already delivered our report, the product that we’ve promised to make, and they don’t like it. So can that agent use our report? Can you help them basically know what they’re expecting? And I like to do that with driveway speeches, the driveway speech is probably the most valuable four minutes of any home inspection that we will ever do. Would you agree with that, or no?

Jay Wynn
100%. So and it’s funny you say that because it also gives us an our real first chance to make the impression on the client and especially a new agent on who we are, and how we’re going to represent ourselves and how we’re going to take care of our people too, you know, it’s it’s there’s, I think there’s an incorrect idea is that you shouldn’t judge people, we shouldn’t evaluate them in it. But the fact is, we’re always judging each other all the time. It’s it’s just human nature, we’re we’re making judgment calls about each other all the time. And my point that I was thinking about was something that a mutual friend of ours, Doug Allen said, a long time ago, and just, you know, background on Doug, as at that point, he was doing probably six figures a year with medical sales. So he was doing high end sales, and he was representing a company had a large circuit, talking with, with hospital professionals, doctors, people with, you know, training, with education with background with a lot of work experience, but he said something to me a long time ago, he said, he says you got about 60 seconds, within 60 seconds, 90% of people have already made up their decision of whether they’re going to deal with you or not. So And his point was, you got to create the proper first impression. And that drive was just part of how you do it, you know, and if like your work already working your inspection, you already doing stuff, great. There are many times I’ve been on a roof, looking at a roof because I got there early, and people show up and they’re kind of walking up the driveway, I’ll call a greeting out and I’ll say, I’ll be down in just a second. I’m just gonna take a quick look at this roof for you. And I’ll be right there. And everybody’s been good with that, come down, walk up, shake their hand and then go right into our driveway speech on what we’re going to do, how we’re going to do it, what they can expect, and kind of basically, how we’re going to run things for the next hour or two. It’s huge.

Ian Robertson
Did you steal that roof trick from me? Because that was always my thing. I always wanted to be on the roof when the people got there. So I’d always save the roof for about five minutes to till the inspection time started. So people would be pulling in, right when I’m been hanging out of a chimney?

Jay Wynn
No, I don’t think I stole it from you. It’s just the way things kind of work. It makes sense. Well, it’s you know, what it is, honestly, is I wanted to get the roof done before everybody showed up. I was trying to climb up my ladder. So after they follow you in the house and on the exterior and walk around some some people really feel comfortable going right up with you behind you. But I wanted to have that done, basically before anybody showed up so that I wouldn’t have to help get off my ladders. So I do try to get the roof section done before everybody gets there or be in the process of doing it.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, I mean, it does make a good first impression though, being up there. But I will say that wasn’t even that long ago, a couple of weeks ago, I was just talking to a guy and I asked him what his driveway speech was. He didn’t even have one he’s like, I come there to inspect, like you said, I inspect. I’m like you don’t prep people for it? They’re like they hired me, I just inspect I’m gonna inspect the house. It’s unbelievable how many home inspectors don’t have a driveway speech, I had the same speech. And I would modify it over the years. Like, okay, let me add this and add that. And I would overcome about 90% of the issues. Just by my driveway speech. Like I remember one time, this family walked up. And I’m always full of anecdotes and stories. I remember one time this family walked up. And they were really anxious. And I part of my speech is, and most people think we’re going to be inspected for code. But we’re actually not going to be inspecting for building code by New York State law that’s written in New York state law. We’re not allowed to do it here in New York. So whatever your opinion is, this is a that’s what it is here. And I remember the father and the daughter both went, what what are you inspecting for. And the next part of my speech, I just smile and I go, but New York state has its own standards of practice for home inspectors. So it’s kind of like its own code for us to inspect to make sure it works. And then I would always give an example. For instance, my house was built in 1969 two by four exterior walls. Somewhere in the mid 80s. Most municipalities in areas switched to two by six exterior walls. So how are you going to get my house up to modern day building code? Then everybody go, Oh, okay. You look at the house in conjunction with its age, and how it felt like Yeah. I can’t even imagine over the years how many callbacks I would have gotten. This contractor said this chimney is not up to code. Why didn’t you flag that? I’m not talking about turning into a lawsuit just the wasted time of explaining it post mortem. Like, okay, now they have a problem. Now I’m explaining it. Four minutes driveway, speech agents loved it. Agents would always, and I imagine your driveway speech is probably similar to mine. I mean, you’ve heard mine before, too, right?

Jay Wynn
Yeah I have and my driveway speech is real simple. I say. Basically, it starts with Have you ever done this before? And the beauty of this is yes, I have. Well, good, then you’re familiar with what we’re here to do. But just so we’re all on the same page? Oh, well, no, I haven’t. Okay, well, it doesn’t matter their answer, you can go either way. With it. Just on one, you acknowledge their experience and move past it. The other one, you say, this is what we’re here to do. And something similar, I’m going to take a very close look at this place, I tend to focus on the negatives, so expect me to be pessimistic, I’m not going to go oh ah, pretty nice, I’m gonna go problem problem, big problem. So then they’re ready for it. I also mentioned something like we’re not doing a code inspection. But basically, we’re evaluating for condition, for operation, and for safety. And I give them an example of each one of those things, so they can understand and visualize before we go, I invite them to ask questions. And then I ask them, if there’s any area of concern that they have going into the inspection today. So mine’s only like two or three minutes with them talking. And by that time, they’re, they’re on board, and they know exactly how the inspection is gonna go. And a lot of their fears and anxieties have been put to rest. But it also, I think, the other thing that it does is it opens the dialog. So they feel comfortable approaching me with questions, because we’ve already been going back and forth, we’ve been discussing things. So I do always try to incorporate a few questions to them during the driveway speech. Do you have any areas of concern is a big one, you know, is what are you looking for to do here? Is there any you know, you have any needs? Do you have children, something to get them engaged in the conversation? I don’t like talking at people. I like talking with them. So at different points, I have a couple of strategic questions that I always bring into play. And I find that that just gets the everything going. I think it starts the inspection off on the right foot.

Ian Robertson
Yeah. And then that’s perfect. It doesn’t need to be a complicated speech. But the agents appreciate it, because now their client’s informed and I’ve had the agents actually say, I’ve given your speech at other people’s inspections, just so my clients know. Yeah, so if we hear an agent explaining what the home inspection is to our client, or what to expect, we probably didn’t do our job. We didn’t present the food properly at the restaurant, we just laid the dish in front of them, and they have to eat it the way that it is. But it’s also like that for like, new services. One of the big things that I’ve always say on this podcast is where we make our money as home inspectors are on ancillaries, ancillaries, ancillaries, ancillaries, we can make a living on home inspections, we will build a business on ancillary inspections. The problem is a lot of guys are worried. Like they’re like, Oh, I can’t do septics. The markets not used to it. Agents don’t like it, I talked to three agents and they don’t like that. I’m like, would you go to school and ask a kid what he wants for lunch and say, Do you want this broccoli? No, they don’t want that broccoli? No, you’d explain, hey, here’s some broccoli or put some cheese on it. We’re gonna cook it up really good bacon bits. Now the kid loves it. It’s like, oh, okay, cool. Thank you. We have to present that service to our market in a way that’s palatable. And it trains them to expect it. So when you started doing septic inspections, I remember you and me talking about how much septic guys were getting mad at us. Some agents were flipping out, I remember I was doing the home inspection one time. And you were doing the septic inspection. And the agent was on the phone with an engineer on speaker about how you can’t do this. And actually remember that one the the engineer got in trouble and you got exonerated because he wrote the state right. That was a good one.

Jay Wynn
No, no. That was a different engineer that that tried something.

Ian Robertson
That was the best. So Jay, Jay had a guy report him to the state, saying he can’t do this blah, blah, blah. Jay sent in a letter, Joe Ferry helped you with it, right?

Jay Wynn
Well, actually, so yeah, what ended up happening is, is I wrote my response. I sent it to Joe with all the information in the state and had him preview it, which was money well spent. And then he came back and gave me a suggestion for a couple of tweaks on things. But it was awesome to have him in my corner. So yeah, he helped me.

Ian Robertson
But I remember you sent me the letter or you told me what happened was I think I remember the letter. Basically, they said no, he can he’s doing exactly what he should, leave the guy alone. And the engineer got in trouble for working outside of his licensed field, right?

Jay Wynn
Yeah, the engineer got a written warning from the state of New York State.

Ian Robertson
Nothing feels better than a situation like that. You get a letter saying Good job, buddy. Oh, and this jerk that reported you? This is this is going in his permanent record.

Jay Wynn
Yeah. That felt pretty good.

Ian Robertson
But those are the things that you had to overcome, you had to train the market, to the point where you were really the only guy doing septic inspections for a really, really long time. And now everybody’s doing them. We I mean, everybody’s out there saying, oh, cool, because the market now expects that the agents are like, Oh, you don’t do septic inspections. Whereas eight, nine years ago, they’re like, What are you going to do? No, you can’t do septics. It’s funny how you had to train them. So how did you train the market to do that? You couldn’t just force, did you just force yourself in there and start doing it?

Jay Wynn
No. And I’m going to give you an analogy that I think most of us remember. Most of us remember growing up and making the mixtapes and getting them and put them in your cassette. Do you remember when CDs came along? That was a product that nobody asked for. But it was marketed as a better way to listen to music, it’s more compact, it’s going to last longer, higher quality, and you’re gonna love it. And so in a short period of time, we had this thing that nobody asked for break into the market and it became very high demand. Because it was a better product. We just needed it explained to us why it was a better product. And I’m thinking very similar with with like you saying with the septics, a lot of it was explaining why what we were doing was better, why having inspectors do this was better than having septic companies. Why the report we were putting out was so much better than say the written you know, a lot of we’re just putting out a receipt, tank pump tank look fine. $600, $800. And, you know, light was shined, mirrors, it was it was basically a one page carbon copy of the of the receipt. When they saw my report. I had pictures, I had details. I had information on how I came to my conclusions, so that even an attorney that had no clue and never looked at a septic could go Oh, yeah, I see why this guy says it’s a problem. And that’s what we did. We basically explained why it was important to do it that way. So there was some education that had to go on for a long time. And there was some pushback. But that was okay. Some people still to this day insist the septic inspection is a guy coming pumping the tank out, sticking his head down there and going yeah, it’s okay. No, it’s not. But for the most part, what we’ve been able to do, at least in our area is so much better, that this is what agents have come to expect from a septic inspection. And as a result, a lot of the septic companies now have had to change their inspection protocols. So I’ve been, that too is that we’ve actually forced the septic companies to step it up a notch, because now they’ve got a direct competitor that’s putting out awesome inspections and awesome reports. And it’s not just me, there’s really good guys doing it now, which I’m really proud to be part of.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, it’s funny how you went from the only guy in the market doing a home inspector in the market doing septic inspections, to now, agents, they asked that question.

Jay Wynn
And I want to tell you what, it’s been a great boom for our business. Because now agents know, they’re also one stop shopping, and they love it. So not only are we putting out a better product we’re putting out about, we’re putting together a more convenient inspection package that really works for agents. So rather than making a number of phone calls, and getting different companies there and trying to coordinate maybe multiple trips to a property, we can show up and do everything. And I’ve had more than one agent say, you know, you’re not my normal guy, but you’re a one stop shop. And I’ve courted many agents that way by being able to do everything that they need on one visit. So it’s been a real good for, it’s been a good marketing point for our business.

Ian Robertson
Yeah. And I think that’s important to remember to we had Juan Jimenez on the show a couple of weeks ago, and he talked about variable USPs. Basically, changing our selling point to the need of the client, instead of just saying what our selling point is. Like, I see a lot of guys say I’m a one stop shop. Yeah, but you only offer three or four services. You don’t offer septic. Well, that’s not what my market calls for. I’m like, Okay, if you really want to be a one stop shop, do the home, do the well, do the septic, do the sewer scope, do the pest, do the radon, do everything in between. Now, call yourself a one stop shop. Now with one phone call. They don’t have to call anyone else. But it really does take some variable USP, we have to understand. One phone call is going to be very important to the agent. Now that’s one appointment time slot. They don’t have to go back to the property three times for three different inspectors. To the client that may not be as important. So training an agent to say okay, here’s the report. Here’s the beautiful part. It’s color coded easy attorneys love it. You’ll get it same day, one phone call, get it all done. Awesome. Now we’re training that agent to look forward to that meal so to speak that we keep talking about. For a client, maybe the same, you know, one stop shop is important to them or maybe not. Maybe, maybe now we need to explain to them why our inspection is better. Okay, well we use sewer scopes, we don’t pump and run. Here’s why you don’t pump before you inspect, you inspect, and then you pump. And that’s why most states like New Hampshire and New Jersey and all those have laws that say you inspect, then pump, those may be the things that are more important to them. And then you can say, you know, we connect the house to the septic system, they’re not two separate units, they’re part of a whole, we can we can connect the dots for you, instead of having two different doctors look at two different ends of you, and nobody connecting the middle parts.

Jay Wynn
No, there’s a lot of truth to everything you’re saying. But I guess I can think it’s some of it’s the fear of the unknown, too, and the fear of how to proceed, like you said, how do you have that conversation with agents, and I was reading a book and it is entitled, How to start, or.. Start With Why. And I realized this real early in my inspection career is it like it or not we’re a people industry, we have to connect with people, it’s we’re not there to look at houses. That’s part of what we do, we put out a great report. But we essentially are a people industry, we need to understand people. And you can go into this. And I think one of the things that at least a mistake I made early was, you know, you got to sell yourself, you got to sell yourself, which is true to a point. But in a way, you know, if you’ve ever been on a car lot and dealt with a used car salesman, you know how sometimes you just walk away and you just you understand that it’s just, it doesn’t feel right. I think a lot of agents have that feeling with new inspectors, it feels like a used car sales pitch. But if you start with why, why is this important? Well, because we’re here’s what we’re going to do, we’re going to give you an objective and neutral opinion about what that the system needs. And I’m not going to sell you repair, I’m not going to sell you a pump out or new lead shield that you don’t need. I’m going to document everything that I find in a report that’s very clean, clear and easy for your attorney to use. That’s why you should be doing this. Also, given the cost potentially, if you start with the why on things, then it becomes a lot easier for them to accept you. And I think one of the big shifts with the conversations I was having with agents is when I didn’t try to sell myself, I just started with why, why should we be doing it this way? Why is this better? It may be different than what you’re used to. And I understand that, but this is why you should think about expanding your horizons. You know, and I think that’s a good leading point that if a lot of guys shift their their approach to start with why I think they’ll have a lot more success at breaking in new ancillary services.

Ian Robertson
You know, I think that’s a beautiful point about not being salesy. I’ve always said, You never have to sell anything that you know well, believe in, and love. It’ll just come out. So, if we’re coming off salesy, we probably just need to step back and go back to the question why? Why would they choose me? Why would they choose this service and have some confidence but not not be salesy? That that’s an important point. Because as we’re training agents to accept a new service, training clients, to what to expect with our services, if we come off as salesy, it’s just going to feel icky. Yeah, I agree. That’s, that’s a really good point.

Jay Wynn
Well, it does. I mean, most of us, at least as adults that have done that, and run into that kind of that, as for lack of a better term, used car sales pitch, and it doesn’t take us long to know what’s going on. And like you said, it gives most people a negative feeling. Whereas if you start with explaining why, and that’s any service, why should you do a radon sample? Why should you do water sampling? Why should you be doing a pest inspection? Well, here are the reasons why you should really be thinking about it. And then you just let people make up their own mind. But you present you present the why, why is this beneficial for you like radon? Well, here’s in our area, I’m going to charge you and then I’m not going to, I’m going to charge you so many dollars, we’ll put the sample in now. And then if it comes back as an issue, typically it’s a quick conversation, and most agents have the sellers take care of this. That’s why you should be considering it now. And even if it’s, you know, there’s a lot of things that you can do, why should I do this? Why should I part with my money to do this? Well, here’s the benefits of doing it now. And again, just if you can identify the why in this, it makes it so much easier to talk about any of this stuff. And guys that are hesitant, I’m gonna tell you what, guys that are hesitant to break in the ancillary services are really doing themselves a disservice. Because that’s that’s saved our business this year. I was checking our numbers and we are definitely down with, with the inspection numbers, they’re not doing as many home inspections in our area. Fortunately, we’re making more every inspection we go out on than we were a year or two ago. So we’re breaking, we’re actually doing a little bit better on our numbers this year. Because the people that are inspecting want someone who is going to look at everything. So I think ancillaries are huge right now. And I think guys really should be branching out into them if they’re not.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, and sometimes we need to think out of the box. Because there’s always another ancillary that we haven’t thought of, like, there was a guy out in, I forget where he was. But he was saying is like, there’s not that many septics near me. So I’m not going to get in septics. And I’m like, but there’s septics, right? Because yeah, I’m like, then dude, man, do septic inspections, because you know who’s gonna get all of the home inspections? You. That’s even better if there’s less septics because now it’s a niche market, go do that. But there’s, I named a few before, there’s pest, radon, water sampling, well testing, sewer scopes, septic inspections, I keep saying septic, because you make almost as much or more than a home inspection, depending on the system. And it’s a beautiful service. But now, there’s also other things like water treatment systems, I brought that up before on the podcast, there’s going to be advanced well inspections. And when we’re saying ancillary services, I’m not talking about things like thermal imaging, that’s kind of expected in our industry now. Like, if you don’t use thermal imaging on your inspection, people kind of ask, you know, the other guys do that. Why don’t you? But there’s always going to be a different service. It’s a matter of if we haven’t thought about it yet.

Jay Wynn
Yeah, like new construction inspections. So 11 month inspections, you know, some areas four point inspections, wind mitigation, there’s a lot of stuff guys get into it, feel out what you can do in your market. See, and who knows. And you know, that point about, there’s not many septics in my area, then be the guy that does it. What a way to capture a section of that market in your area, be the man, be the man that everybody turns to to do those septics and then look at what it’ll turn into.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, there’s always going to be something and it depends on our background. Maybe we have an HVAC background, can we do advanced HVAC inspections? Well, that’s outside SOP some may say, Okay, there’s a lot that we do that’s outside of SOP, in New York state, it says we don’t have to go into an attic, unless there’s a floor in there. Come on, you know, man up and go in the attic, you know, that’s what we do. You know, so it’s like we do a lot of stuff that’s outside of SOP, doesn’t mean we can’t do it. Think about some things that we can offer, and then educate and train our market. But I think these are all great points. We’re, we’re running out of time, and I’m running out of my Laphroaig. I forget how to, I wish I knew how to pronounce that. But my big takeaways from this podcast, are train our market, train agents, and train our clients to expect what we’re delivering. And then also make sure that we add on ancillary services, and then train the market to understand why our ancillary services are the best, that why that you talked about. Why should I hire you for the septic instead of the septic guy? Well, here we go, I’m not selling anything. You know, if we don’t understand the why then we can’t do it. What are your takeaways there, Jay?

Jay Wynn
No, it’s about the same. I think guys, you do need to take the time to explain where you’re coming from, you need to get everybody on the same page. The driveway speech is huge. If you really want to go from being a good inspector to a great inspector, you got to learn how to manage expectations all the way around, and having a few minutes where you can look people in the eye and basically lay down the groundwork of what you’re going to do. You’re gonna save yourself phone calls, emails, so many headaches, so many follow up issues potentially, for that three or four minutes, which frankly you should be doing anyway, you should be getting everybody together and get on the same page. I’ve got more agents with the driveway speech than I’ve converted more agents with that speech than I know, they sit there and they go, Okay, this guy’s calm. He knows how to handle my people. He’s not gonna be reactionary. We can talk with him. This is my new man. Just with that, that couple minutes, it really sets the tone for how the whole inspection is gonna go. So I say get it down. It doesn’t have to be long. It doesn’t have to be complicated. Get a few talking points, figure those out, and then just casually incorporate them every time you do it. It’ll feel awkward the first 10, 15 times you do it, after you hit 20 it’ll become second nature, and it’ll just save you a lot of headaches. So do the driveway speech.

Ian Robertson
Driveway Speech, we could probably even call this podcast the Driveway Speech because that’s going to get 90% of our problems out of the way and market education. Jay, as always, loved having you on. Great sitting around having a drink with you and talking home inspections, appreciate it.

Jay Wynn
Happy to do it. I enjoy this a lot too, thanks, Ian.

Ian Robertson
Thank you. Talk soon.

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