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This time of year can be hectic with the holidays, and once you add in the COVID-19 crazy, we all probably need to stop, catch our breath. and gain some perspective…
Please enjoy Rick’s tour of Perspectives…
We hope that you find joy, peace, love and understanding while we celebrate the holidays and move into 2022!

Charlie 

Welcome to the Trade Secrets Inspections podcast, because “You need to know!”. Here’s your host, Rick Kooyman.

Hey, welcome back to the Trade Secrets Inspections podcast. I’m back Charlie McDermott here with Rick Kooyman. Rick, how you doing?

Charlie 

Welcome to the Trade Secrets Inspections podcast, because “You need to know!”. Here’s your host, Rick Kooyman.

Hey there. This is Charlie McDermott, the producer of the Trade Secrets Inspections, podcast. And as always, my partner here Rick Kooyman, the owner of Trade Secrets Inspections. Rick, how are you today?

 Rick

I’m doing excellent, Charlie, and it’s great to be with you again.

Charlie 

Thrilled to have you. And I always enjoy our sessions.

Rick

Yea we have a good one today.

Charlie 

For our listeners, Rick has been teasing this episode, he has something real special. A little bit out of the box. Is that a good way to yet you give me a lot of details that a good?

Rick

Yeah, we’re going to talk about something other than real estate today we’re gonna we’re gonna enjoy understanding or appreciating ourselves and today and, and what’s important to us.

Charlie

Oh, man, I love that. Well, let’s, let’s hear it, man.

Rick

All right. So what I’m gonna start talking about is how we, how we live our lives, how we measure ourselves, and you know, the history of where that comes from, you know, we all follow basically, a week a calendar, you know, we chase the clock around all day long. And it’s just kind of something that goes unobserved or where did all that come from? You know, how did that how did that stuff come to be? Yeah, yeah. So, so let’s look at the history of calendars to start with. Okay, so let’s talk about real primitive stuff, you know, way back when there was, you know, no, no scientific instruments. So, as a primitive being, you had basically two ways to measure time, right? You had day, the time between the two nights? Right? And you had essentially what was the month, or the lunar cycle, the time between the new moons and that was pretty much what you had to observe. There were other nuances to be seen. But in general, for the average person, you, you saw the sun come up and go down. And that was your day. And then at night, you saw this other thing come and go. And it changed every day, throughout the month. And that was the other measure of time was the lunar month. Okay, so the stars in the sky appear in different locations, depending on where the earth is in its orbit around the sun. But you know, that wasn’t really known at the time. But through observation, it became pretty obvious if you paid attention that, well, there was a CYCLE occurring, you know, and you could predict that this was going to happen, or this was going to rise at this location. Because it did this once before. Right. Okay, so way of measuring or our, let’s create a cycle, right? The Egyptians, we all know, we’re lovers have the night sky. They, the priests really studied the night sky. And they essentially watched what was what was called the Dog Star or Sirius, okay. And they watched and were able to notice that Sirius came up at the same point, every 365 days.

They took that, and we’re able to use that measure to measure the number of days in the year as opposed to the lunar cycle. Because if you look at the moon, the moon cycles are 29 and a half days. So it’s out of sync. Right. Right. And, and a lunar year is actually 354 days. Okay, so if followed the lunar calendar, which was what early people did, because it was easier to track the lunar cycle, and people live by the moon cycles. This shifted, because you were missing a few days in your year, you’re essentially you were 11 days short, while you followed the lunar cycle, right? Since figured that out by rocks and Sirius or the Dog Star and said, Hey, there’s actually 365 days in this rotation. And that helps us keep our seasons in line. Okay, so they switch to the solar calendar at that point. Right. And it came about from watching the stars. But they moved to a day cycle calendar of watching the sun. Okay, so it changed that irregularity or that shift. And historically we have a record of when the Dog Star gear was first recorded. So this is kind of an oddity in AD 139 was recorded in Egypt as a dog star here. And based on the relative shifting of time, you could calculate when they first originated their calendar based on the shift because they’re, they’re still missing a little bit of time and their count of the days, because our earth actually orbits the Sun in 365 days, and approximately six hours, so that six hours is still an air for them. And they weren’t accounting for it. So their calendar also drifted a little bit due to the six hours, but instead of drifting on like a 32 year cycle, it shifted on a 14 160 year cycle. So it was less noticeable, if you will, right. Okay. But as we got more and more civilized, these shifts in times started to become more noticeable because civilization was prospering, you know, people were starting to travel and alignments were becoming more important. And then we got into the Roman era. And Julius Caesar comes to power and says, you know, this is, this is all out of whack. I need this better.

So he employs someone to figure out how to make it better, and they figure out hey, we’re missing the six hours. So we end up with what we call the Julian calendar. So he left the Egyptian Calgary went to the room and calendar, the Julian calendar. So essentially, he said he they figure this out. And in 46 BC, he says, Alright, we’re going to start over, I’m going to add 99 days to the this year 46 BC to correct for the slippage and we’re going to start January 1, 45, BC, with the new calendar, the Julian calendar. So they add that six years and, and doing it, they create leap year. Okay, so we all here to leap year, which is basically every four years, we add one day to the shortest month of the year, to compensate for the six hour shift. So Feb 29th occurs every four years, essentially is a leap year.

Now, this is kind of I found this interesting, at the same time that the Romans were figuring this out and making their calendar on the opposite side of the world, independent. The Maya, were doing the exact same thing. They created a 365 day calendar, as well. They divided it up into 18 months, and they had 20 days in a month and they created a calendar round. Is that is what they called it. You know, it was intriguing that similar things were happening in society development on completely opposite sides of the earth when they were fully not in contact with each other, or as far as we know. Right. Right. Right. Right. So that’s intriguing that, and that worked for a very long time. Wow. As we advanced into the new modern times, though, and we started to record and measure time more accurately, I guess, blocks. Again, it was realized that 365 days and six hours wasn’t correct. And there was still an error there. Really, really. So the actual right thing was 365 48 minutes and 46 seconds. So that’s three, it’s 365 days, five hours, 48 minutes and 46 seconds.

The correct two from the Julian calendar, to what we live with today. And today’s calendars actually known as the Gregorian calendar. Where do you get that name? Well, it was created by Pope Gregory the third, who again said, Hey, we have an issue in shipping and scheduling. And we need to figure out how to solve this problem. So he employed a mathematician, Christopher Claudius to resolve that issue. And they decided that that missing little bit of minutes there amounted to an extra three days every 400 years. So they had a simple solution. They were like, well, how are we going to figure this out? Well, Pope Gregory the third had a moment of genius. And he said, You know what, let’s take the centuries ending in 00. So you know, 2000, whatever, just your zero ending centuries. And if they’re divisible by 400, then we’re going to make those leap years and if they’re not, then they’re not leap year. So this simplify that. So like the year 1600 There is a leap year any year 2000 is also a leap year. But in the year 1700 18 119 100, we didn’t have a February 29. Leap Year, those years skipped the Leap Year to correct for the time.

Charlie 

So is is that in addition to the every four years?

Rick Kooyman 

Yeah, exactly. That’s it’s the correction to the Leap Year principle. So there’s a little bit modification to the four year every four year thing. And in that if the century ends in zero, and is divisible by 400, then it’s not a leap year. Oh, my goodness, well, actually, it is a leap year. And if it’s not 400, then it’s not a leap year. So it’s kind of interesting. So there’s a calendar. Okay. So now we know we live with our Gregorian calendar, and it came through, you know, all of its developments. And then we’re like, but really, we live by the week, right? Well, geez, the week is fully subjective, isn’t it? Well, China developed a five day week, which was basically established for work privileges. And then on the fifth day, was the day of bathing and hair washing. So work your servants to the bone for five days. On the fifth day, you allow them to take a bath. And then they actually moved that to 10 days. And I guess she took a bath every 10 days. We have a seven day week. So where did the seven day week come from? There’s two general kind of ideas where that might come from. One is the biblical story of creation, which we all know, you know, God created the earth. On the seventh day he rested. Or, there’s the more likely story where the Romans created in the first century, the seven day week, and they named it after the seven known planets. So it started with the Roman names of the planets. And it got a little bit taken over by the Norse and the Norse gods. And they changed half of the days of the weeks to Norse Gods name. So you have the beginning of the week with Roman planet names like Marty and Mercydie. And then you have Tui, Wote Thor and Frig, which is actually Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. So they’re just they started off as these names of planets and names of gods and the words have just been changed through dialects. And, you know, they’re kind of not exactly what they started with, but they have their roots and in the names of planets and gods. Okay, so this is arbitrary stuff right? Now, now we got this calendar that we’ve taken, I don’t know, a couple 1000 years to figure out how to get right. And we made up this arbitrary week that we all live by, and we divided that up into hours so that we can all meet each other for lunch accurately. But what does all this mean? We’re talking about numbers. So this is where I want to really take you for a ride. Okay, so let’s look at numbers mean, one to 10, we all know, you know, we can we can conceive of one to 10. Or you know, the zero in the one, you know, so it’s pretty easy to get ourselves from one to 10. But when we start talking about big numbers, it’s hard to wrap your head around it. Okay, so let’s take a look at money, because we all can conceive of money. And let’s look at Mr. Gates. So let’s say Bill Gates is worth $56 billion. Okay, so if we looked at that in a different way, we could say that he earned $3,000 a minute, or $50 a second. For his time, he worked at Microsoft. A pretty good hourly rate.

Charlie 

And not too shabby.

Rick

I mean, it literally, it says if you took if he took five seconds to stop and pick up $100 bill off the floor, he was literally not using his time wisely.  But again, this is the power of numbers. Okay, so we’re trying to conceive it. What does this stuff mean? All right. So we take one to one to 10. And we had, you know, billions and trillions and all that. So let’s make sense out of that. So, instead of money, let’s look at it in time. We have one second. It was one second, right? Well, if we take a million seconds, how long is that? It’s actually 12 days. That’s a nice vacation, right? Okay. million seconds is 12 days. It gives you something to conceive of, right? Right. Well, what’s up billion seconds. Long is a billion seconds. It’s actually 30 years. Right? So when you go from a million to a billion, it’s hard to conceive of how big that step is, you know, you went from 12 days to 30 years. Well, geez, trillion. You know, we keep talking about this new number with, you know, to me, I’m like, man, we’re talking about money and trillions. Now, I can’t even conceive of this. What does this mean? Right? So what is a trillion seconds?

Okay, it’s 30,000 years. Right? So you went from one second to a million seconds being 12 Days to a trillion seconds being 30,000 years. That’s longer than the historical record of human civilization. I mean, there’s some relevance, or archaeological evidence that say there might be societies of 100,000 years or whatever. But you’re still talking. A trillion in seconds is 30,000 years. That’s a huge number, right? So right, we’re getting there. We’re getting there. Okay. So now let’s, let’s take this one step further. All right. So we all measure ourselves according to this earth, year, day, hour period thing. Right? Completely relative to ourselves. So how do I mean that? Let’s say you meet an alien, this afternoon, you go out have lunch, and you’re gonna have it with the first extraterrestrial you ever met. Now, the first thing you want to know is you’re going to eat you, when we figure out that they’re not a threat. Okay, let’s see what we can learn from each other. So what would you want to ask your first alien friend? What would you want to know?

Charlie 

I don’t know.

Rick

Where are you from? Mm hmm. Okay. Maybe How do you measure time? Or how old are you? What scale? Would you use them? You can’t measure it in Earth years. He’s not from our solar system. Right. So how do we relate to that? Do they die? Do they have a life cycle? What do they know about how the universe was created? Or is there a god? I mean, these are deep thoughts, right? Okay, but we can all say that we can all ask these questions, whether we’re from Earth or not. So how do we look at the scale of things? Well, in an alien representation, we can look at it on a solar timescale. Right. So now that we’ve got an idea of what billions and trillions sounds like, our solar system that we live in, is about 5 billion years old. Okay, the Earth was created about, you know, we’re about three points. 13 point. Well, I misspoke there, our solar system. Present day, we’re at 13 Point 7 billion years since the Big Bang is what they say, Okay? Now, if the sun was created, somewhere after the Big Bang, but before the earth, and all that the sun is about 4.5 billion years old. And it’s said to be about halfway through its life. So let’s say that the sun lives to be 10 billion years old, at which point it’s supposed to go into become a red giant and absorb the earth and all that and the earth will be gone. But that’s not what we’re looking at. We’re looking at solar timescales. So if we measure the universe, according to solar masses, at the end of the energy being consumed in the universe, it is estimated that all the stars will burn out in about 15 trillion years. Okay, so that’s a really big number. But it’s a really big universe, right? So think about it. In 15 trillion years, there will be no stars left in the sky, the universe will have gone completely black. Well, then what? Well, then you have all of eternity. So you’re in you’ve lost, you’ve left the solar era. And now we’re into the next era of the universe or the dark era, which we can’t even begin to conceive of. Right. So So, I guess the end of the story is or where I’m taking on all this is, you know, just recognize the absolute value of your actual personal existence, your actual time here. You know, that I think, therefore, I am position, you know, this moment right here right now. And it’s absolute relevance or you know, the specialness of it, and appreciate its for its full value, you know, and the irony of what we think of is important to us, is often not really what’s important to us, what’s really important to us is our recognition of our time. And, and appreciating the value of being able, being able to recognize it. And appreciate it while we’re here.

Charlie 

So from this point forward, I now address you as Professor Rick Coleman, number one, and we’re poorly I mean, my goodness, you You really did a nice job. Going through the history i had 90%. Of what I had no idea I snooze through that class, I guess, or I just never heard of it. So that was insightful. But, you know, to put this all in perspective about, like you said, our time here and the power of now, right, really appreciating, you know, every day every moment.

Rick

Yeah, and our loved ones and, and what’s important to us and what’s, you know, maybe, relative to the moment, important to us, but not overall important to us. And in the grand scheme of things, and yeah, yeah, the power of numbers is it’s an interesting thing, the zero and the one, how far they can go.

Charlie 

And amazing how that was figured out so long ago without computers, and you know, all that stuff that we just take for granted.

Rick

Wow, yeah, it all starts with watching the sun, and then watching the night sky, and then figuring out the difference between the two. And then trying to make sense out of what a trillion means. Alright, goodness, I still can’t wrap my head around man. But man, it’s such a leap. And then if you take those concepts and yet you apply them to something that they actually hold relevance to, which is kind of soldiers timescales. And there’s a finite period to that even.

Charlie 

Alright, we have Yeah, blew me away today. So thank you for cheering i I have no idea what’s next man. This is uh, this is great stuff. Yeah, yeah, it was fun. So thanks for the ride. And we look forward to the next episode. 

Rick

Till the next time, Charlie.

 Charlie 

Thanks for listening to the Trade Secrets Inspections podcast. To learn more about Trade Secrets Inspections, go to www.TradeSecretsInspections.com or call to 239-537-1186.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

All Episodes

Today Rick explains how the temperature you set your thermostat on can directly affect the mold in your home. Listen in for some clarity on the subject!

Charlie 

Welcome to the Trade Secrets Inspections podcast, because “You need to know!”. Here’s your host, Rick Kooyman.

Hey, welcome back to the Trade Secrets Inspections podcast. I’m back Charlie McDermott here with Rick Kooyman. Rick, how you doing?

Rick

I’m doing excellent. It’s great to be back with you, Charlie. Looking forward to having a great discussion today.

Charlie 

Yeah, and I love today’s-well… it’s a love/hate, relationship today. Anyway, I don’t love mold. But I love talking about mold and how to make sure one, you don’t end up in a situation where you have an existing situation with mold. And but that’s a hot topic and important topic for Southwest Florida. And so glad you’re going to share a lot of information that you have today. This might be one of those longer episodes, which is fine, because I think this is well, well worth it. So Rick, let’s start with the old topic. You take it away.

Rick

All right, excellent. Yeah, that’s uh, let’s discuss one of the hot topics is Southwest Florida, really all of Florida but yeah, mold is huge., and an issue and a definite concern. We often jokingly call it the “fungus among us”,  but you know, we’ll talk about why that is and what we can do about it. So how’s that sound?

Charlie 

I love it. I love it.

Rick

Alright, so, like I said, mold actually a fungus. In general, when we look out on the planet, there’s basically three things out there that we see. There’s a little more than that. But for our purposes, there’s animals. there’s plants, and there’s fungus. Yeah, well, mold falls under the fungus family, but not all fungus is mold. So we could clarify that now. But there’s basically three types of molds that are really of a concern to us. And we consider them either allergenic meaning that they’re irritants to us. They’re pathogenic, that they’re, they’re a little more than an irritant. They make us sick. They cause lung irritations and sinus infections. And then we have toxigenic molds. And those are the ones that can actually kill us. You know, and they make us really sick. And we call them toxic mold.

So we’ll get to that topic here shortly. But yes, so what’s going on with mold, and what happens is, it’s always around us. So mold is always out in around us. It’s, it’s in different levels, because it is a plant of a nature, and it responds to the environment. So depending on the time of day, the season a year what the weather’s doing, you know, all those environmental factors will attribute to what molds and to what level those molds are present around us. So people always say, Well, is there mold in my house? The answer’s yes. Yeah, there’s definitely your house, there’s mold everywhere and includes your house, that’s what we really want to know is, is are we creating an environment for that mold to grow? And okay, so when we look at mold, when I look for mold, I’m doing a comparison, I’m looking at what’s outside in the environment, and what’s inside in the house. And they ideally should relate, right. So there should be some correlation to what’s seen inside and outside. And if we see something going on inside, that’s what we call elevated or, you know, substantially different from what’s outside then we can say, well, something’s growing inside that house.

So we take it to the next step and try to figure out what that is, and how to correct it. But typically, with any mold, you generally need really basically, a few things for it to grow. You need the spore, obviously, you know the seed, you need a food source for it, which can be any organic material, wood, dirt, you know, skin, dead insects, any organic material will grow mold, and that includes any synthetic material that has organic debris on top of it. So we often see mold growing on plastics and metals and all kinds of things you wouldn’t think are organic, or a food source, but they have a food source on top of them, because they’re not sterile, if you will, right. So if we have those environments, and we give it a little bit of water, okay, so generally humidity is all it needs for water. Typically humidity levels above 60%. And boom, it’s it’s in its zone. You know, if the temperatures between, let’s say, 40 and a 100 degrees, that’s its ideal range, it’s going to grow. So

Charlie 

as chilly is 40 degrees?

Rick

Yeah, there’s actually molds that are grow sub freezing. And there’s many that’ll live above 120. But you know, for general reasons, general topic of, you know, discussion is 40 to 100. So, anywhere inside your attic, you know, even if you’re up north in a freezing environment, it can happen. So the biggest thing we look for then is the water. Because the spores are there, there’s probably a food source there, because it’s not a sterile environment. And humidity, that’s something we control can control. And that is the variable in which we play with basically to mitigate what’s going on. And so water intrusion, humidity levels, you know, like I said, 60% or above, you’re, you’re itching for mold to grow, you know, so down here, we have a lot of part time residents. We often see thermostats get set up at 80 degrees, or even they turn the ACS off. Yeah, you’re, you’re just looking for a problem, in my opinion, right. So you really need to keep the thermostat set to about, I would say, 77, a lot of people will go to 78. But what we’re trying to do there is drop the humidity, it’s not the temperature, because obviously it’s in the 40 to 100 degrees zone, it’s the humidity, and it’s the air conditioner that’s drying out the interior. So as it’s cooling air, it’s pulling that water out, which goes down the condensate drain, hopefully that’s not blocked. And it goes outside. And then in turn, the humidity in interior is lower than the humidity outside. And we hopefully are at 60% or lower. Me personally, I run a dehumidifier in my house, in addition to the air conditioner. And in doing so, it drops another 10% of the humidity in the interior. And in 1500 square feet and 24 hours, I’ll dump five gallons of water.

Charlie

Wow. Yeah. So the water that’s in your house that you don’t… amazing. Isn’t that incredible? Yeah. And

it’s already a condition.

Rick

Yeah, yeah. And you know, it’s in the mid 70s 75/76 degrees. Yeah, five gallons a day routinely.

Charlie 

So yeah, you can see how quickly, mold can just take over. Wow, yeah,

Rick

I’ve seen horrible things happen. I’ve seen mold takeover cars, you wouldn’t even imagine, you know that you’ll leave your car locked up. And it might have a little moisture leak in the floor. I’ve seen those bucket dehumidifier products left in a cars that collect supposedly, the moisture in a bucket, if you will. And it turns the inside of the car into like a big, fuzzy, growing green thing.

Charlie  

You know, it’s interesting, you brought back memories, you know, when I first got down here, yeah, I saw these heard about these air conditioned garages in these places actually, place was just built off of Bonita Beach Road that has air conditioning. Auto storage garage, you said and now I get it, you know, you just you can’t leave her car garage, just sit there.

Rick

No, it and you know moisture and heat down here contribute to the deterioration of all our products as well. So not only invites an opportunity for molds to grow, but it also is causing the components to basically off gas and decompose at a rapid rate. So we see things get gooey and fall apart a lot down here. That’s a part of the environment, if you will..

Charlie 

on a paradise. Yeah, right. So even. Yeah, negative side. Yeah,

Rick

yeah. So so just to get back to the mold for a second here. There’s basically well let there’s four major types of molds. We have aspergillus, which is one of those irritant kind of ones we see all the time. And then penicillin, which is very common, and it’s also what we call the pathogenic where it can make us sick. It’s definitely an allergenic it’s not toxic, though. So we get into the toxic molds, and we call those stachybotrys. There’s a few others, but those are the ones that the common name is black mold. But not all black mold is stachybotrys. So that’s kind of the misnomer there. And that’s why just because we see something growing we don’t say that it’s mold right away. We call it a microbial growth. It needs to be tested and determined what exactly microbial there is growing. And maybe it’s a fungus, maybe it’s a fungal mold. It could even be a bacteria product for that matter. But depending on what type of mold we find there, the kind of anticipates what practices, we’re going to need to mitigate it or remediate it. And it will also you can also take these results straight to your doctor, because this has a direct effect on our health, because we’re living in it. And you would be amazed that when a doctor sees what’s in the air, and you’re living in it, and they go, Oh, aha, this or correlates to this other, we didn’t even think about it. And oftentimes, you know, it’s sinusitis, or lung disease, or something of that nature. And we’re trying everything else. But really, it’s the house we’re living in, that’s really aggravating the situation. So what we do is we come in with our various tools, and we look for oddities, if you will, we’re looking for moisture, discolorations, musty odors, using various tools from, humidity readers, temperature gauges, and thermal cameras, if we can, because most of what we try to do is non invasive, borescopes, to see kind of in walls and behind and look at plumbing fittings, you know, but air conditioning vents, here’s a big thing, because you know, metal is cold, and it condensates and you often see mold growing on the vents. And you just, if you just leave it there, you’re you’re inviting the condition to be blown around in the house. So you know, areas like that we should keep an eye on and don’t be afraid to take those vents down and put them in the sink and clean them. Let them dry. Put them back on the wall. It’s there’s nothing wrong with that. Take a vacuum clean up the vent hole, you know that those things are good practices for homeowners to do if they can do it. And it’s not 20 feet in the air because it’s a big, huge vaulted ceiling.

Charlie 

Wow. Wow. So it’s a it’s what you don’t see that could be a real problem, obviously. Yeah,

Rick

yeah. And you know, going on that topic, that’s a good transition for us, here’s what’s safe for us to deal with and what’s not. And what’s the law say? Again, molds a very sensitive topic here in Florida. Really, nobody unless you have a license is allowed to do mold work if we use that word. So there’s basically two people with that license. There’s a mold assessor and a mold remediator assessor is the guy that goes in and finds the degree of the problem and writes the protocols. And says, This is what needs to be done. And this is how it needs to be done. And then the remediator comes in and follows that protocol. And then when they’re done, the assessor comes back and test to make sure that it’s all clear. And then the project can be put back together. Those people are, must be involved, if we have a condition that’s greater than 10 square feet in total affected area, which isn’t a big area. So basically something a little bigger than three foot by three foot. And it’s a remediation project. You know, so behind the bathroom cabinet that’s been leaking for 15-20 years. You know, that’s typically enough area that that’s a remediation. And why is that important? Because if you open that, and don’t treat it properly, you’ve just exposed the whole rest of the house and every nook and cranny and like a big burst of spores when you open it up and it just goes airborne, and you’ve contaminated now the whole rest of your house. Wow. And, you know, so the environment is what we’re trying to protect. Like I said, mold is around us it’s always outside when it’s growing outside, there is no remediation practices because it’s outside. We just remove it and clean it up and and in that regard the remediation practices for inside is just that there’s no real easy way to just spray treat it and move on. It physically has to be removed. So it’s about treating it with a biocide. Sometimes a bleach mix of products but bleach by itself will not solve the problem. It just kills the stuff on top and bleaches the spores that are still alive and it just comes right back. Right so we got a we got to physically remove it and then it’s gone and that’s why you know encapsulation prop processes and you know negative air processes are all used contained, so that we’re not spreading it around. So 10 Square feets the rule. Under that, you know, any homeowner is allowed to deal with that issue. Technically, they could do it and test it themselves, if they could get, you know, a self test for maybe a DIY store or something. Our lab tests are very high, accurate. You know, they’re PhD lab tests. So they’re, they’re a little expensive, but they’re worth the money. Like I said, they’re definitive in nature. And you can take it to the doctor basically.

Charlie 

So, so the obvious is, you know, before buying home equal to make sure it checks out as best you can. So certainly, that’s, that’s where you come in. But I know we have listeners who have no intention in moving/ buying a home, but maybe in the back of the mind are going, geez, you know, I’ve had some sinus issues, or I just want to know, just from a health standpoint, is, is that something that you can help them with? Is that something?.

Rick

Oh, absolutely That’s absolutely what we do. We do everybody from the buyers and the sellers, you know, to the people that are living in their house, and have no intention of moving, you know, that that is a good portion of what we deal with. Because when you when you’re moving, you generally move all the belongings in the house and expose things that are kind of hidden, non visible, you know, when we live in the house, and we build up our collection over 20 plus years, or whatever, we become a little bit not aware of what’s going on. And it gets a little out of hand sometimes. So yeah, a lot of it is dealing with just that. Right there. And we welcome all kinds so yeah, we’re here to help everybody.

Charlie 

Awesome. Well, this was a great, great episode, like all of your episodes, but really, I think important for a lot of different reasons for for our listeners, and folks in Southwest Florida, like you said, all over the state of Florida, cuz I know you’re, you broadcast this podcast all over the country, for that matter. So good for you. Any final words on mold, Rick, that that you want to circle back around and emphasize and maybe something we forgot about?

Rick

Yeah, absolutely. Let’s just remember that mold is everywhere, it’s always going to be around us. And the way we remediate and treat for it is to, you know, keep our environments clean and control the exposure of water and humidity, and, you know, and the food which is the debris and dirt in our environment. So we control these things, and it’s within our realm to to deal and live with this product. It’s always going to be there.

Charlie 

Well, hey, thanks again. Look forward to catching up in the next episode.

Rick

Absolutely. It’s great talking with Charlie, I can’t wait to do it again.

Charlie 

Thanks for listening to the Trade Secrets Inspections podcast. To learn more about Trade Secrets Inspections, go to www.TradeSecretsInspections.com or call to 239-537-1186.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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In this edition of Trade Secrets Inspections Podcasts, Rick explains the purpose of an insurance report called a “4-Point Inspection” and how it relates to your insurance coverage. Especially if you own an older home, listen in for some clarity on the subject!

Charlie
Welcome to the Trade Secrets Inspections podcast because you need to know, here’s your host, Rick Kooyman. Hey this is Charlie McDermott, I am back in the trade secrets inspection studio with none other than Rick Kooyman. And Rick, how you doing today?

Rick
Excellent, Charlie, great to be with you, again.

Charlie
Great to have you and your your knowledge, I just just hear far and wide how every time I talk about your show, oh, my goodness, I always learned something new from Rick. And then you have a great topic for us today. And that being the four point inspections, I couldn’t even tell you what one point is. So I can’t wait to hear all four. So, Rick, let’s start with that. Tell us about the importance of the four point inspections and what they even are for that matter.

It’s more for going to get insurance, and it’s generally used on older properties.

Rick

Yeah, right.  The four point inspections is is one of those insurance documents in a sense, and people often get that confused right off the bat, because they think it’s just another form of inspection for a customer. And it really isn’t for the customer in that regard for them to interpret. It’s more for going to get insurance, and it’s generally used on older properties. So it’s a way for underwriters to get the details, basically.

Charlie
Okay, so is the concept that, you know, obviously, insurance is all about risk. And they need to understand the risk level of older properties is that kind of the point?

Rick
So they’re they’re looking at when they come up with a four point, the four major systems that they’re evaluating the risk of, they want to know what their general conditions are, when they were last serviced, you know what they are, you know, they have some very specific questions. So I was actually going to go through each each of the sections, because as a homeowner, there’s stuff you can do with this to kind of prepare for when this actually comes out. And it’ll affect how I have to record it. And you know, that some a little preparation ahead of time, a little cleaning up a little paint here, and there can go a long way, in a great world a lot better off.

Charlie
Awesome, awesome. Yeah, go ahead.

The 4 Systems Inspected During a 4-Point

Rick
Yeah, so let’s just start with what are the four systems, right? So we can look at is the electric system, your air conditioning, heat, your hvac, your plumbing system, and your roof system. Within those four components, they want to know a bunch of information. So when we get hired by the insurance company, or you the customer to come out and do this for you, we’re essentially made to ask a whole series of questions, you know, they basically checkboxes and input data kind of thing on a form, you know, so starting with the electrical panel, they’re looking for manufacturer, and then conditional wires, and what kind of wire systems are used, specifically is aluminum involved because they want to know, aluminum can be a high risk activity.

In older homes, you often have wire that is not insulated, we call it knob and tube wire, or there’s even the older style cloth wire, that actual cloth line wire gets, especially down here, it gets really brittle, and it becomes a fire hazard just in itself. So they they look for things like that. And then we take pictures, everything. So if we find something wrong, or something that needs to be reported, we have to show a picture of it. If it you know is presented in one of the topics on the form, you know, such as blown fuses or you know, corrosion or scorching, or something like that, we’ve got to show the proof of it. And then if we find nothing wrong, well, then we just take a picture of it is one big shot and the underwriter can see it and we check it off is satisfactory, we’ll move on to the next section. You know, so electrical, we don’t ever encourage people to get involved with themselves, because it’s often hazardous.

But people often ask, why does it matter that these things get corrected? And I always say, well, it generally matters for insurance forms. So when we do the other inspections, and we’re like, hey, you’ve got a you know, these double taps in here. And it’s not really a huge issue, except for the insurance underwriters won’t give you a policy if they know about it. Right. So this is why those things got to get corrected. And again, this is why I say you know ahead of time, then you can prepare and then instead of me coming out there and saying oh there’s this problem in here. And if I say there’s a problem, they’re immediately going to disqualify it and say yeah, we don’t want to be involved with that until there’s no problems we want to clean form essentially.

Charlie
No surprises right.

Rick
There in there in comes the next section of the hvac you know, and this is one where people can definitely help themselves out especially in Florida with all this moisture and humidity and rain and heat using using the air conditioning excessively. They specifically ask is there indications of water staining from you know, condensation leaks or interior air handler condensate tray leaks, you know, water staining on your ceiling. Those kinds of things matter when we come out and do this inspection because they’re specifically asking those questions. And then we have to show a picture of it clear if it’s not. So it’s not about just our discretion. It’s literally about checking the boxes and then showing the proof, you know, so if in the past your drain line has gotten clogged up, because you know, who hasn’t neglected your condensate drain and Florida. And it backed up and made a stain on your ceiling, and you got it fixed three years ago, and it’s never been a problem. And there’s just a brown spot there. Well paint the brown spot before we come out and do this inspection. Otherwise, we got to report that there’s a stain on the ceiling, and that’s unsatisfactory, as silly as that might sound.

Charlie
Wow, that’s great. Yep.

Rick
Well, it matters keeping, you know, making things look good, I guess, in a way actually does matter, to some extent more than some people would like to think it does. Right. And then the next section, they talk about plumbing, and this is sometimes more about conditions of equipment. Again, water is their biggest concern when they’re writing risk policies.

What kind of the pipes? Are they specifically they want to know what are your drain pipes made out of where your supply pipes made out of? And then they want to know about valves are they functional, or they show signs of leaking,again this question of leaks, they actually asked, Is there an indication of a prior leak Yes, or no? Water staining again, you know, it goes to that point, I got to put a picture around the toilet if the toilet leaked A few years ago, and the floors all messed up because of it. Well, they’re not going to want to be part of that. So yeah, those occur and those things are going to need to get taken care of, but they go as far as wanting to know about the kitchen appliances, they you know, dishwasher, refrigerator, washing machine, of course, your water heater, and then all your fixtures, your bathtubs, your toilets, your sinks, you know, any of your main valves, if you have a sump pump, which you probably don’t in Florida, but they want to know about anything to do with water, essentially, any of those things where you have those those past issues that guy got taken care of, but never got cleaned up. toilets and around air handlers. Yeah, that’s some that’s some, some a few minutes with some paint that can really go a long way for your insurance coverage and your rates and stuff like that.

And then the last one we talk about is roofs, because, you know, of course, the roof in Florida is one of the most important things and it’s one of the first things to go and when the storms hit. So again, they’re just looking at conditions. Is there damage? How old is the roof? What kind of roof is it? You know, has it been partially replaced or fully replaced, you know, different kinds of roofs they ask different kinds of questions about you know, if it’s asphalt shingle, is it, you know, sun worn and cracked and cut and all that kind of stuff? And if it’s tile, are they cracked and missing? You know? And again, are there any indications of leaks past or present? That question comes up in all four sections. So you know, these matter, as far as you know, taking care of your home, and when the insurance appraisers come out, and when they send out us to do these inspection reports. You know, conditions make a difference is the is the note for today.

Charlie
Wow, that’s great, great stuff. I mean, it reminded me I have a closet, of course in the ceiling, if you look up, which is right below the HVAC unit from spill over years ago, it’s like, you know, who’s ever gonna look in the closet is a good reminder. You know, it’s worth getting a paintbrush out, right?

Rick
Yeah, right. I mean, you know, you can wait until the insurance tells you you need to have this done. But most people don’t even know that. And they don’t tell you ahead of time. And oftentimes, I don’t get to speak with the customer, necessarily when it gets scheduled. I mean, if I’m talking to somebody, I always try to give everybody a heads up on what’s going on. But you know, everybody’s different. A lot of people are out of town. Most of these homes are not occupied. So that’s where I just get sent in and report what I see.

Charlie
Yeah, yeah. Well, this is really helpful. Besides the fact that I now know what a four point inspection is. our listeners also know some of the things that they can do to ,yeah,. Make sure the process goes a lot smoother without any surprises.

So this is awesome, Rick.

Unknown Speaker
Excellent. Excellent. Yeah. And this goes hand in hand with the last episode we went, we did together on the wind mit form. So wind mitigation goes hand in hand with insurance and as the homes get older, they ask for this four point inspection and depending on who The underwriter is depends on how old the home is when they ask for it, it might be 10 years it might be 30 years. So it’s all over the spectrum. Wow.

Charlie
Wow. Great stuff. Rick, really appreciate you spending time with us again today and I look forward to our next episode.

Rick
Excellent speaker with you again, Charlie.

Charlie
Thanks for listening to the Trade Secrets Inspections Podcast. To learn more about Trade Secrets Inspections, go to www.TradeSecretsInspections.com or call 239-537-1186

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Ever wonder what a home inspector really looks for? Or were you curious  what they’re not allowed to look at?  Listen in as Rick reveals more secrets of the trades!

All Episodes

Charlie 

Welcome to the trade secrets inspections podcast because you need to know, here’s your host, Rick Kooyman. Hey there, it’s Charlie McDermott, and I am back with Rick Kooyman, Rick, the owner of trade secrets inspections, Rick, how you doing?

Rick

Very good. Good to have you with me, Charlie, Thanks.

Charlie 

Yeah, yeah. And again, you know, this is awesome. You’re putting this podcast out there to help folks, not just in the Southwest Florida market, but all over and I really appreciate your expertise and really tap into that expertise. In this episode, I have a handful of questions here that you probably get all the time. And you could probably, you know, answer these with two eyes tied behind your back and your arms close, or maybe I have that reversed. But anyway, you get the idea. So let me start with the first question. So when it comes to general inspections for the home, you know, what, what all is included in that general inspection?

Rick

Yeah, absolutely. I get asked that question all the time, what is included in the general inspection? To start with, you know, the basic definition, if you will, or what Wikipedia would tell you is that a home inspection is just a visual examination of what is essentially the major systems of the house, by Florida standards. And it can be limited to just a short list of things like structure, roof, exterior, your heating and cooling system, your plumbing, and your electrical, and, of course, parts of the interior. But depending on what inspection company you are working with, everybody’s got different what we call standards of practice, or SOP. And those are established by our training councils. We here at Trade Secrets, in particular, we follow what is known as FABI or the Florida Association of Building Inspectors, which, as the name implies, is focused straight on Florida. And the special needs, if you will, because of its environment, and its unique challenges. A lot of other inspection companies out there are following the international standard. So that applies to Alaska, just the same as it does Florida. Um, so you know, there’s a difference between who pick, it does matter. But yeah, we follow FABI where we have a far more detailed list of our standards. And then we follow it pretty tightly. It’s a pretty inclusive list includes everything from your kitchen appliances, you know, to the roof to the yard and how it draining, and everything in between.

Charlie 

So interesting. Yeah, that again, another important piece, especially in Florida I never thought about how the yard is draining. I never even thought about that.

Rick

Wow. Yeah, for sure. Come rainy season, people find out they’re underwater. They’re not too happy when they tried to give him a dog.

Charlie 

Oh, but you know, again, I didn’t even know there was such a thing as a rainy season until we moved down here. And fortunately, on a lot on the higher part of the island here in Fort Myers Beach. But we have we have neighbors right down the street that you know, with enough rain, that water literally they’re there outside sometimes slowing the traffic in the in the neighborhood, slowing cars down, because the you know, the waves that are created. Yeah. Right. Go right in.

Rick

Right. For sure. Some of the older houses definitely out on the island communities that, yeah, that the water drains accumulates and these low spots that you don’t realize you’re there. And lo and behold, you’re like, wow, that happened really fast.

Charlie 

Yeah. Wow. So how about the limitations was, are there any limitations when it comes to the Home Inspection?

Rick Kooyman

Yeah, unfortunately, there’s always going to be limitation. So, you know, obviously, we’re not like a futurist. And we can’t predict the future things, unfortunately. And as much as I would love the superpowers, and I can’t see through walls…

Charlie 

wouldn’t it be great?

Rick

…but I have some special tools that can help me almost see through walls and and I make use of those quite liberally. But yeah, I still am just like every other human out there and fallible and have my limitations. So yeah, in that regard, for sure. And there are other things, you know, it’s not a property appraisal we’re doing. It’s not a code inspection, we’re not doing the same thing to cities, and in you know, in their inspection protocols going to do and we don’t do health and biological things and geological and you know, environmental hazards too much. We’ve just, you know, there are standards we stick to but for sure, some limitations do exist. That’s why we have that standards and practice to, you know, ultimately define exactly what it is we’re going to do. You know, so if anybody really wants to know and dig into it, it’s readily available. It’s on our website. They can go to FABI and look at it. It’s not meant to be a secret.

Charlie

Yeah. How about during the buying process, you know, a lot going on, what, you know, is there an optimal time to schedule an inspection?

Rick

Yeah, for sure. Particularly in today’s market, things are going very fast. There’s many, many offers being put in. And time contingency is becoming a big factor. So that alone, you know, has its own problems, or no, you want to get a three day offer period, that’s pretty tight to get some stuff done. And, get answers that are worth having. And maybe cost of, you know, what those problems are gonna entail. Outside of the radical type of markets where things are moving that fast, there’s normally a 12, or 15 day period for your due diligence. And right off the bat, as soon as you put that offer in, your very next step should be to search out the best inspection company you can get. That is where you are being looked out for. Your realtor can be your best friend in the world, but ultimately, they’re getting paid by a sales closing happening, we do our job straight from a fee for cost of doing the report, we’re not associated with any contract and service provider, the realtor, we’re completely independent, third party educated, knowledgeable on what’s what you were putting your heart in balance and into. So right from the beginning, you want to get that lined up, you want to make sure you’re working with the best people for your dollars, it’s not the place to save money on, you don’t want to save 100 bucks out of the inspection because one guy can get it done in an hour is half the cost. It’s just not where you want to save your money. But uh, you know, that’s where that happens at right after the inspection, or right after the offer, you set up your inspection, it generally takes about three to four hours to do a standard inspection on a typical property, you want to make sure that everything’s turned on, and you want the house to be as it’s going to be when you live in it as possible, because that’s our time to be in there. I can only assess it. For that amount of time when I’m there, I can only report on what I saw when I was there. You know, again, I can’t predict the future. So there’s, you know, the limitation of the report is just a snapshot, if you will, of that little three hour period that I was in there. And while I’m in there, my objective is to really go through and utilize all of it systems and components and mechanical systems that may or may not be used often.

Charlie 

Good stuff, good stuff. So, Oh, my goodness, you know, what 1000 people moving into Florida every day, the latest reports. There’s a lot of new construction out there. What about, you know, these new builds? Do we need an inspection for new construction?

Rick Kooyman 

Yeah, that is a fantastic question. Absolutely. Now, you will talk to your builder and they might have the best intentions in the world in they’re always gonna say we want to offer the best product. And I and there’s oftentimes a lot of limitations they’ll put on having a third party inspection done regardless, it is very important. Again, it’s the third party thing. It’s the independent eye, but you know that there’s no, there’s no skin in the game for it for me other than keeping you happy and making sure that I tell you everything you need to know, why does the new home need inspected? It was built by people like humans. And especially in today’s market, they’re pressured under time these houses are being put together in record amount of time. It is not uncommon for a trade to have to make do with what they have on site when they’re there, put something together. And that generally means it wasn’t put together, specifically maybe perfectly. know, getting done with that day’s goal is sometimes more important than you know, making sure everything was done exactly perfect. And if you can’t get what you need to use what you have be a creative, which happens a lot. For once you get in that house, your biggest opportunity is right before you sign the contract for acceptance. So your walk through is when you have the most leverage with your builder because they want that final payment. So that’s the really key time to want to find out what’s right and what’s wrong. And that’s when you’re going to get immediate attention and repairs from the builder. The other time we do we recommend this regardless is your home goes with a 12 month warranty, typically, you know, a new home builder gives it a warranty. Well, 11 months, you should be calling your local inspection company and saying, Hey, we want to have an 11 month inspection. And again, it’s the same thing we’re going to tell you, what’s up, what’s working, is it installed correctly? You know, are the systems functioning? Are they functioning together efficiently? No, this is a new home, it’s gonna never be better than it is. Generally, at that 11 month time, you know, people think it’s at the beginning. But it’s really after the initial Shakedown, that that houses, that’s as good as it’s gonna get, until something else happens or changes is added to it. So yeah, once again, that list that timing that 11 month period, seem very important stuff, especially when you’re spending the money you’re spending on housing.

Charlie 

Thats a real good tip, wouldn’t have even thought of that! good stuff! So, how about engineer versus home Inspector? Do I need an engineer? Or do I need a home inspector?

Rick Kooyman 

Yeah, another super question. I just got this one the other day, I had a customer call me with a bunch of questions about how the Home Inspection was gonna go and, and what was important and whatnot. And she was decided that she only could have it done by an engineer, she was from a different state. And that was their general practice up there. That was what she expected to happen. My advice to people on that: engineer comes at things with a whole different approach. If you think you need a serious structural analysis of something, that there’s something deficient with the home, then at some point, yes, you will probably want to discuss it with an engineer, it’s actually part of my protocols to point these things out, and specifically tell you, hey, you need to speak with an engineer, or maybe not, maybe you just need to go speak with a general contractor, I can assure you engineers charge a lot for their time, their reports are going to be much more expensive than ours. And ultimately, our whole industry is focused around doing that product, writing that report, we go through hundreds of hours, literally of training, with that focus that priority. That’s not the role of an engineer, that’s, you know, they can produce a report about a property for you. But it’s going to be written in a whole different form with a whole different set of protocols. And ultimately, when a customer chooses that route, they end up paying a lot, and being disappointed in what they got, because the engineer was concerned that, you know, things were built to the math, and it worked. Right. And not about functionality and quality or, you know, installing workmanship and life expectancies on things and, then there’s the topic of insurance. Insurance is one of the huge concerns in today’s market. And it’s one of the specialties in home inspectors that, you know, we are the agent to the insurance industry as far as writing the documents that they write their protocols and their underwriting use, for writing those policies. So ultimately, we’re the ones that are going to have the best answers for you on what is going to happen or what to expect insurance engineers, not even involved in that field.

Charlie 

Wow. Wow. Well, good luck, love it. I’m learning. I’m taking notes here.

Rick Kooyman 

Fantastic.

Charlie 

Yeah. Great, great information. appreciate you sharing all that. And, you know, we’ll look forward to learning more in the next episode, who knew there was all this to learn about home inspections…

Rick Kooyman 

I got hours and hours of stuff, I can teach about, please I can’t wait to share.

Charlie 

And yeah, it’s our number one most important asset right. Not only do we live in it, but especially in Florida, it’s appreciating seemingly every day in this market. So let’s take care of it right.

No doubt about that, for sure. We’ll talk in the next episode. All right, Charlie, thank you. Take care.

Thanks for listening to the trade secrets inspections podcast. To learn more about trade secrets inspections, go to www dot trade secrets inspections dot com or call 239 537 1186

Transcribed by https://otter.ai