Inspector Toolbelt Talk
A weekly home inspection podcast hosted by the founders of Inspector Toolbelt - the premier home inspection software. Get tips, insights, strategies, and more from our hosts and guests to help give your home inspection business a boost. Ian and Beon are property inspection and tech industry veterans with over 20 years of experience each. Sometimes they even stay on point :)
Episodes
201 episodes
Q3 Market Outlook - 2026
“Inspectacles” might be the funniest name in home inspection tech right now, but it points to a serious shift: AI is accelerating how inspections get done, how reports get written, and how buyers compare one inspector to the next. We’re watchin...
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Million Dollar Success - With Ian Mayer
A million-dollar home inspection company is not built by grinding harder in crawl spaces, it is built by designing a business that stops depending on you for every booking, every call, and every dollar. We sit down with Ian Mayer of I Am Home I...
Do Not Let AI Write Checks Our Knowledge Can't Cash
A home inspection report is only as strong as your ability to stand behind every line of it and AI is testing that in real time. We pick up a thread from our conversation about legal issues with veteran inspector and legal expert Joe Ferry and ...
"All The Legal Stuff" With Joe Ferry, The Home Inspection Lawyer
A furnace dies, a roof leaks, a heat pump quits during a blizzard and somehow the home inspector becomes the villain. We sit down with home inspector attorney Joe Ferry, who’s responded to roughly 4,000 claims, to explain how most complaints ac...
Value Over Price
“We made how much in 40 minutes?” That question hits different when you remember what a great home inspection actually does. We unpack a story from Jay Wen: a septic inspection goes sideways fast, the system is flooded, and the discovery isn’t ...
Are People Getting Harder to Deal With?
People aren’t magically “worse” overnight, but the stress level in public life is undeniably higher, and home inspections sit right in the blast zone. We kick back for another Drinking With Jay conversation and get blunt about what we’re seeing...
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Higher Level AI For Home Inspectors
Your phone rings while you’re in an attic, your inbox is full of scheduling questions, and you still need to train new inspectors without burning your week. That’s where AI can actually help, but only if you use it for systems, not shortcuts.
Manage Expectations
Clients don’t judge your inspection against your standards of practice. They judge it against the story in their head and that story is often wrong. We talk through one of the most overlooked skills in home inspection: managing expectations so ...
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Liability Layers For Home Inspectors
Most inspectors think liability is solved by one thing: being right. But lawsuits don’t run on righteousness, they run on economics. If it’s cheap to chase you, even a shaky complaint can snowball. If it’s expensive to fight through your proces...
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Q2 - 2026 Home Inspection Market Outlook
A single software change can ripple through an entire industry, and that’s exactly why we open with the Spectora Fixel blowup. When an ad appears before a client can download an inspection report, the immediate question isn’t “is it optional?” ...
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Growing Pains
Growing a home inspection company is supposed to feel like progress, but sometimes it feels like you are sprinting just to stay upright. We sit down again with Mike Ortiz, one of our favorite returning guests, to unpack the real “growing pains”...
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Quick Tip: Control the Situation
Someone is going to get emotional during a home inspection. It might be a client who is stressed, an agent who is defensive, a contractor who disagrees, or a family member who wants to argue about a minor detail. When that moment hits, raw logi...
The Commercial Mindset
Commercial inspections aren’t a bigger version of home inspections—they’re a different ocean. We sit down with Lance Kaufman of Focus Building Inspections to unpack what separates a true commercial practice from an ancillary add-on, and why the...
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A Thousand Little Things Build an Inspection Business
Looking for the “one big thing” that fills your calendar? We make the case that there isn’t one—and that’s good news. Real growth for home inspectors comes from a thousand small moments: the first second someone sees your face online, the way y...
The Human Element
Feeling the grind without the gains? We sat down with Mark from Inspector Empire Builder to unpack why so many home inspection pros hit invisible ceilings—and how to break through them with identity, focus, and smarter systems. We challenge the...
Questions with Answers
What if success isn’t about the money, but about the engine driving you to chase it? We open up about the uncomfortable truth of trauma-fueled ambition, why “validation loops” push many entrepreneurs to grind past reason, and how to define a ve...
Should You Add Solar Inspections?
If solar on a listing makes everyone nervous, this conversation will become your new playbook. We sit down with Spark Solar’s Corey Vanderpool to unpack a low‑risk, high‑value way for home inspectors to add solar inspections without pretending ...
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Things Are Moving Fast
The ground is shifting under home inspectors, and the real threat isn’t a gadget—it’s losing control of our craft and our clients’ trust. We open up about a clear pledge to never sell client data and why that line in the sand matters more than ...
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2026 | Q1 Home Inspection Market Outlook
We map the year ahead for home inspectors, cutting through AI hype, clarifying what “mandatory inspection” really means, and focusing on the only dial that matters: inventory. We share why rates alone won’t fix housing, how regional pricing ske...
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Ubiquity is King
Want more bookings when the market cools? Start by being everywhere your clients look. We close the season with a clear, tactical breakdown of why ubiquity beats hyper-targeting and how to layer small actions into big awareness. Instead of chas...
Continuing Education - The Ultimate Marketing Engine
Forget cold calls and cookie trays—authority is the best marketing, and the fastest way to earn it is by teaching. We sit down with solo inspector Carrie Cheek of Rosie Home Inspections to unpack how building state‑approved continuing education...
How To Explode into 2026
Ready to stop coasting into December and start launching into January with real momentum? We sit down with Mark Hummel of Inspector Empire Builder to unpack how home inspectors can design a life-first vision and then build the business to match...
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Avoid Slow Season Pitfalls
Quiet calendars don’t have to mean quiet growth. We break down the most common slow-season mistakes home inspectors make—and replace them with practical moves that compound into spring momentum. From why turning off your website or pausing SEO ...
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How Home Inspectors Add Lucrative Verticals
Want a playbook for turning slow seasons into growth? We sit down with Tony from Villa Property Inspections to map out practical ways inspectors expand beyond a standard SOP without losing credibility or crossing ethical lines. From balcony ins...
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Should You Do Home Inspections for Tenants?
Tenants keep calling for inspections, but the reality behind those requests is far more complicated than a simple walk-through and a quick report. We pull back the curtain on what really happens when renters ask for a home inspection and why ma...
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