EP #1: What Sets Me Apart From My Competitors
EP #15: What Sets Me Apart From My Competitors
Sergio DeCesare 00:09
Sergio here, Max Business Profits certified profit and growth expert certified business coach, business broker and business real estate broker as well. I’m here today with Rick Kooyman from Trade Secrets Inspections. And he’s going to talk to us a little bit about what he does and why he does what he does as well as he does it. I can tell you, I’ve worked with Rick in the past, and being a real estate investor myself, I can tell you having a good home inspector is worth his weight in gold. And Rick’s gonna tell you some of the differences between him and other inspectors, and why you need a really good inspector. So Rick, go ahead and take it away. Where would you like to start?
Rick Kooyman 00:53
Well, first of all, thank you, Sergio, for a wonderful introduction. I’m excited to have this one with you. But yeah, you know, I got into this business of inspections. Basically, because I came from construction, I have all the background to build nice houses and doing all these things. And hence the name basically trade secrets. You know, it’s basically a 35 year background of doing the work in the trades and bringing it to inspections, basically. So my approach is totally different from most of the people in the industry to start with just based on my experience. But more importantly, we got started where we started trade secrets, specifically, because there was a lot of complaints I was hearing from home buyers and home owners about bad inspections in particular. And I found that interesting. And I thought, you know, it would be a great opportunity to bring what we can bring to the market and try to change things for people. So that’s kind of where we started. And, you know, we started just like everybody else, and kind of figured out how to do it better.
Sergio DeCesare 01:58
Yeah, well, that’s a great way to start. I mean, anytime you can better an industry. That’s that’s a great reason to the industry. So I’d like to know a little bit more about how you do it. You mentioned about how you do it, you come from a completely different point of view versus how some of these guys are doing it down here in southwest Florida. I mean, I know quite a few of them down here. And sometimes for from what I’ve seen, it’s a lot of this in and out stuff, get it done as quickly as possible. Because, you know, some real clutter is at the back end tugging on the strings on this one, we get it done as quickly as possible. So tell me, tell me, what’s the big differences between you and some of these other guys I see down here?
Rick Kooyman 02:37
Yeah, absolutely. I get this all the time from people like, especially from the really, from the realtors, one side or the other is going well, how come they got away with doing it so poorly? And how do they manage to write such a thin inspection report and still be in business is a common common I hear? But yeah, essentially what it comes down to is how the industry is set up. The whole industry, basically, we’re a standard, that’s a national standard. In particular, the biggest group, the Training Agency, that pretty much 99% of the people are working under is called Nachi. It’s the National Association of Home Inspectors. And it is literally what it says it’s national. So it has a very general fundamental standard of practice to it. It is kind of like what we call the basic beginnings of what it should be, you know, it’s the bare minimum. And when everybody in the industry is operating by the standard that is really set up as the bare minimum, and it’s not specific, particular to where you are. I mean, we’re in Florida, and and particularly my mouth. Yeah. You know, it’s everywhere in a country really, because it’s it. It’s very standardized, right. And it’s very limited. And it says a lot of things. It says more things about what I don’t have to do that what I do have to do just that way. Yeah, it is interesting. So, you know, we we, we started there. And of course we went above the standard, but in the process of trying to figure out a better way of doing it. I came across another group, which is Florida based. It’s literally what we call Fabi or the Florida Association of building inspectors. And it is ironically small because it is a challenge and it is a higher standard. And it is the industry base of Florida. It is the people that fundamentally are involved in the rural writing and producing the forms that the industry uses. It’s Florida based. It’s Florida focused. It’s Florida centric.
Sergio DeCesare 04:57
So you’re so you’re saying that a lot of The Other Guys we’re seeing around here doing these inspections, more than likely their members and not so much Fabi.
Rick Kooyman 05:08
Absolutely, there’s less than 3% of the inspectors in the state of Florida are going to be Fabi. Associate hitting,
Sergio DeCesare 05:15
that doesn’t even make any sense to me. Because if the standard is so low that it applies to both a place like Boise, Idaho, Boise, Idaho versus Naples, Florida, where you have two completely different climates, two completely different set of challenges. I mean, it seems like you’re almost if you’re just working off of Nachi, you’re almost shortchanging the people down here. And we’re calling for an inspection if those are the the sets of rules you’re using.
Rick Kooyman 05:45
In my opinion, I agree. Absolutely. I think you are. And I think that’s exactly where the complaints come from, of, you know, how did they get away with doing what they didn’t do? In particular? And what are they referring to. And oftentimes, it’s not even pertinent to what we do down here. And in a lot of ways, what we do down here building Eiseley, backwards from everything else, everywhere else. And a lot of that incorrect information gets shared. Because, yeah, if you’re not specifically looking at being accurate to your area, you’re not going to be
Sergio DeCesare 06:23
Wow, that’s, that’s incredible. I understand also, there’s some other things that separate you from your competition, not just the, the Nachi in the lobby thing. But there’s some other programs you have that I I’ve never seen them from any other inspectors around here. And to me, it seems like you almost are holding yourself accountable. To an extent where some of these guys, they just want to be magic. Yeah. Right. And they just they’re like, Well, you know, that’s really kind of drag this on to kind of dragon type of thing. So explain a little bit about like, what your warranty is, because I was fascinated by that when you were telling me about it.
Rick Kooyman 07:02
Yeah, I love that word. You said just their warranty? That’s almost like a bad word in most industries. But right, yeah, you know, it kind of goes along with the FABI thing where we want to, we want to do better for everybody in the industry. So first of all, we stepped up our standards, and we went with, you know, a higher bar of achievement. And we operate at that higher bar of expectation. And then the other side of the industry, I always heard was after the sale, you know, so we go in, and we do a great inspection, we produce, you know, an amazingly detailed report. And ultimately, that only represents that moment in time when I was there, right? So tomorrow is going to happen, it’s going to be a couple of weeks, at least till closing. And over that course of time, things change. And ultimately, people end up moving into the house that they think corrected, according to the report. And lo and behold, there are other things that come up, that are issues to people and they become expenses. And, you know, there gets to be some time some arguing over these of these things. So, you know, we took it one step further, and we found a program to partner with, to provide our customers with an After inspection warranty, literally, we we actually will provide you with a 100 day warranty program that will cover most of the things in the house to you know, it has the small limits of coverage, it’s not going to buy the house from you, but they’re trying to do is bridge the gap. So if I can give you a $2,500 limit policy for 100 days, it goes along with our inspections, that basically pays for the inspection for you to begin with. And secondly, it’s such a peace of mind. I mean, this whole game is a game of Risk and how much risk you can tolerate? And where are you willing to put your money upfront? Or at the end? You can pay at the back door at the front door? Which way? Which way do you want to deal with this problem that’s going to come about so well, and
Sergio DeCesare 08:59
the backdoor payment is probably going to be a hell of a lot more.
Rick Kooyman 09:04
Hence the fact it ends up not being favorable in most cases. So yeah, you know, and it’s not only just the 100 days, it goes past that because you know, a lot of people don’t want to incur the unknown expenses. We all have warranties on our cars so that we know that we don’t have these, you know, transmission bills coming due next week that we didn’t expect. So you can take the 100 day policy we’re going to give to you and purchase the full year coverage from it. And it’s not the average industry policy either. It’s not the average home warranty policy out there, that’s not going to really pay you back. You know, again, we went the distance to partner with the people that are actually going to provide you a product that makes a difference. So we are definitely
Sergio DeCesare 09:54
set up. So to be clear, you’re going to do this inspection, which is going to be a thorough inspect. And while it’s owned by party a, then once a closing takes the new owners pretty much covered for the better part of 100 days. And at some point after that they have the option of extending that coverage to what a year, two years or whatever.
Rick Kooyman 10:16
Yeah, it ups the limits, of course, from our, you know, coverage policy, which is, you know, essentially a gift from us. Right. It gives you the standard home warranty policy that the program offers, you know, which is much higher coverage limits, you know, and I believe it’s $42 a month. Wow, geez, you know, it’s under 450 bucks a year. Yeah, the whole home warranty, for the whole year, that gives you you know, something like $15,000 worth of liability coverage on all your isn’t utilities? And, you know, it’s a, it’s a big risk coverage.
Sergio DeCesare 10:55
Wow, that’s really
Rick Kooyman 10:56
helps people.
Sergio DeCesare 10:57
I don’t know, any other home inspectors that are offering something like that. So to me, that’s, that’s, that’s a value proposition that can’t be beat. I want to, I
Rick Kooyman 11:06
think it works for everybody. I think it helps. I don’t I don’t think it just serves the homeowner or the buyer. I think it serves everybody involved in the process,
Sergio DeCesare 11:16
servicing transaction, it’s absolutely an action. So speaking of transactions, I want to get into the the elephant in the room when it comes to having a thorough inspection, which is the realtor screaming? That, you know, you put too much on the report or, or, you know, this this, you know, inspectors, home inspectors have the the the name of actually being if they’re good, they can be regarded as deal killers. And, you know, before and, you know, we laugh about it, and, you know, coming from the real estate world, myself, and I bought and sold many houses of my own and I’ve never ever bought a house would never ever, and for the longest time they’re like, especially during COVID We used to laugh about it and shake your head and look at each other. Like what are these people thinking? You know, all cash deals above asking price and you don’t want to talk about an inspection? Holy cow, what’s wrong with you? Right, you got an order. So talk, talk to me about why it’s not true. Inspectors are not really deal killers. Because, you know, we both know they’re not because these things are just being notated. It doesn’t. Just
Rick Kooyman 12:36
because I found it isn’t mean that I made the problem. Ultimately, I didn’t kill the deal. The deal got presented in its light, is what happened. And the exposing of the truth is what killed the deal.
Sergio DeCesare 12:53
Or the realtors. The Realtors inability to present that correctly.
Rick Kooyman 13:00
Yeah, and you know, oftentimes, it’s, it’s just a lack of what it means to have an aging property in Florida, and how that is going to happen down the road. And you know, time and time again, I deal with realtors, who just simply had no idea of what was going on currently in today’s market, and they’ve been selling homes for 20 years. And ultimately, the insurance world is running over everything. And if you don’t understand what that means, you are going to find out the hard way.
Sergio DeCesare 13:41
The hard way being an AC needing replaced six months down the road, or I very
Rick Kooyman 13:48
often see homes that could easily get a report written form that will overlook 75 to $100,000 worth of stuff and it won’t get reported on. Wow. And you’re gonna like that that’s going to be painful with it. It’s literally going to add up to more than 50 grand to get it back to an insurable state. And ultimately, it’s just not being presented properly. Yeah, there’s anger coming down the road from a lot of Yeah,
Sergio DeCesare 14:20
so now more than ever, I mean, if you’ve been in Florida, five minutes, you know what kind of insurance issues we have here. So it seems like now more than ever, having a good inspector would pay for itself. You know,
Rick Kooyman 14:36
and you know, it’s not just a good inspector for doing your property purchase. It’s a good inspector to help you own the home. It’s a good inspector to actually do the insurance inspections for you. Because if you hire that cheap inspector that comes out there and incorrectly fills out the form. Ultimately when you go to make a claim on that policy, you’ve given the the insurance company, the reason not to pay for it, you’ve already done it when you tried to save money.
Sergio DeCesare 15:05
Great point. Wow. Yeah. So you know, and we’re gonna get into this in a later in the later broadcast, but, you know, kind of going along the lines of what other inspectors do I hear a lot of them basically say, to the people buying the home or whatever it’s like, hey, you know, radon, never never ever saw it never smelled it, never seen it. And, you know,
Rick Kooyman 15:35
agree you never smelled it? I totally agree. Never seen
Sergio DeCesare 15:38
it never smelled it. Right. And, you know, there’s a lot of people out there who are like, Yeah, you know, what I need rain on for the support, you know, radon for basements up north. And yeah, really quickly, just kind of, we’re gonna get into a depth later on with statistics and stuff. But tell people why that is such a false play by other inspectors.
Rick Kooyman 15:58
Yeah, radon is part of our world, radon is a natural component of our environment, it comes products in the soil, in our building materials, in the things we buy at the store and bring home. It’s just constantly present. So it’s not about where you are or where it is. It’s about how much is accumulating? Where you are staying and spending the most of your time? And is it doing it to an extent that ultimately will be the leading cause? Cancer for you. So yeah, it’s not something that should ever be overlooked. And honestly, I find it in the penthouse. And I find it on the slab, it can be any, you can find it seven eight storeys up, Oh, for sure, all the time. And I’ll find it in one unit and not the one next to it. And you know, and it can be that way in a big home, you know, you can have high radon contents in the bedrooms, where you spend the most of your time and then if you test it in the living room, it’s really not that bad. But you don’t sleep in the living room. Right? Wow. Wow, you know,
Sergio DeCesare 17:08
Rick, you’re you’re constantly surprised me with the information that you turned up. And I highly recommend you and anybody listening, if you’re, if you’re going to sell your house, maybe you might want to think about an inspection prior to selling. So you don’t get these surprises at a sale. If you’re buying clearly you’re gonna want to know what’s going on in that property. And you’re gonna want someone to tell you exactly what’s going on. So you know, if you have a high tolerance for risk, hey, get the cheap guy out there. He’s in and out. Hey, no,
Rick Kooyman 17:41
no contingencies, no unspoken thing. Just face roll the dice. Take your chances. Yeah, and we all go to Vegas. If you
Sergio DeCesare 17:49
Yeah, if you really, really want a good inspection, inspection done thorough. It doesn’t have to be a deal killer. A lot of these things actually, for a lot of buyers end up being points of negotiated. Negotiate Yeah, for real.
Rick Kooyman 18:02
And then in the end, it ends up making the deal work out and everywhere, at the end of the day, because the arguments are avoided. But I really would like to make the point that, that our service isn’t just limited to these transactional deals, really what we want to do is present our industry, to the homeowners, we want you to have a resource that isn’t selling you any kind of we’re not selling you a new air conditioner, we’re not selling you a new hot water tank. We’re going to tell you the truth about those things. And we’re going to help you own your house and keep the most value in it. And at the same time, we can do it while mitigating some risk for you at the same time. So I can use
Sergio DeCesare 18:44
beautifully put beautifully put. Okay, we’re gonna wrap up this session right now. So Rick, if somebody wants to get a hold of you, what’s the quickest, easiest way to do that?
Rick Kooyman 18:54
239537186 Online at www.tradesecretsinspections.com.
Sergio DeCesare 19:02
Very good. Excellent. Okay, and until next time, and part two of Rick and his education for would be investors and would be home buyers. This is Sergio from Max Business Profits signing off with Rick Kooyman from Trade Secrets Inspections.