Latest / Connor with Honor: AI, Real Estate and Real Life / Why Most Home Inspections Fail You: And What Jeremy Dean Does Differently

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Why Most Home Inspections Fail You: And What Jeremy Dean Does Differently · Connor with Honor: AI, Real Estate and Real Life

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody, welcome to another episode of Connor with Honor where we talk about everything real estate, artificial intelligence, fitness, and all sorts of topics.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: Today I'm going to be talking to Jeremy Dean, what a local home inspector, but not just local to Santa Clarina.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: He goes pretty far.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: He'll talk about that himself.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: But what was interesting is I'm doing an open house a couple weekends ago, and he shows up and we're he he he he's already he set it up on purpose to come in.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm looking at him and he looks very familiar.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, he reminds me we're friends on social media, and that's the way the world works, right?
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: You know all these people, but you've never met him in person.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll tell you what, he was just absolutely stellar quality guy.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: And he even brought me some uh treats to the open house, which was fantastic.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I guess that's his method.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: So playing it forward like that without really even knowing anybody, you know, handshake to handshake, it really was very honoring.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: So I wanted to bring him onto the show today to talk about his home inspection services because I've dealt with them.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: If your agents watching this, I'm sure you've dealt with good ones and bad ones.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: And just in our quick banter back and forth at the property, Jeremy explained to me a few things I'm going to bring out on the show today that really shows that he's very forward-thinking in the home inspection business and really a value add for the realtors out there and their clients.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: So welcome to the show today, Jeremy.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Connor.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for having me.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's been it was good to meet you after uh being friends on social media and watching your show.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: It's good to meet you and being able to do this.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's great.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, you're more than welcome.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, so how did you get started in the business?
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: Tell us a little bit about your background.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I got started.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I bought my house about 10 years ago out here in Santa Clarita and uh didn't have the best uh uh experience with my home inspection and the buying process.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um and around the same time, I had a few other friends that were purchasing homes and also echoed the same thing that the home inspection was kind of a joke and didn't really help them and they didn't give them the information that they could have had and should have had.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_01: So I looked into it and I did see that um in California, actually, it's kind of a strange industry industry.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: There is no licensing required or anything required actually in California to be a home inspector.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: Anybody can become a home inspector without any formal training.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: So I went I went to the two of the uh top inspector inspection schools in the country, ICA, which is a really good one.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: And then um I went through Internauch as well, which is uh um big school that um does a lot to support home inspectors with continuing education and overall support in general to help you to become a better home inspector.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: You know that what's interesting about that, those schools that you mentioned, I've done a little bit of research on them in preparation for today's show.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: They're not just pay and get license type places, they're they're very difficult schools to go through.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: So congratulations on getting those certifications to add to your clients.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: What you said was very interesting to me because when I bought my first house back in 1996, I think we talked about this.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: We're very similar in nature when you talked about how you offer scoping services for the sewer lines.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: That was the big part of my uh my fiasco when I purchased my house.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: My agent wasn't up front.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: The home inspector that he recommended was his home inspector.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: And come to find out, we had massive root systems growing in those tour lines.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: And when I called the plumbing company, she said, Oh, honey, we were out there last week cleaning it out.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: I guess the buyer was doing it inspection.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: I'm thinking, wait a minute, I'm the buyer.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: So it would have been nice to have somebody a little bit more honest with the technology to back it up.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: What do you find for the most common issues out here in Santa Clarita that you see?
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I don't think there's a common theme out here.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um I mean, there is a lot of settlement out here.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: We have the very mountainous terrains.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so there is a lot of settlement, there's a lot of um um issues with grading with water pulling up near the um foundation.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: So there's some settlement and minor cracking of uh you know the the uh foundations, nothing real horrible, but there is a lot of movement out here and include earthquakes in that, it just happens.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: So you'll see a lot of cracks and foundations, uh cracks in interior walls, drywalls, stuff like that.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_01: But overall, we're lucky to be in Santa Clarita where there's you know a lot of proud homeowners who do take really good of their homes out here, so that's a good thing.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: How far outside of Santa Clarita do you go for your business for home inspection?
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_01: I go pretty much anywhere.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's been as far north as Bakersfield and California City, down through Calabasas, Los Angeles, Culver City.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, wherever I'm needed pretty wide reach.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: With uh your home inspection process, another big complaint that I hear from agents is how long it takes to get those reports.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Not that, you know, we try to not that we exhaust time, but in some cases, it's nice to get them relatively quick so we can start developing strategies for the buyers on their behalf.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: What's your return around time and how do you do that?
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: I I totally understand the urgency of being in escrow and getting that stuff done and getting time to uh get repairs done or renegotiate.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: So normally 99% of the time, I have a report delivered the same day.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um, there's very few occasions where it's the next day, the next morning, it will be delivered.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: Uh sometimes, if if there's something, sometimes I have to go back and reinspect something, but I'll deliver what I have in that report and then go the next day or as soon as possible do that reinspection and then deliver the full report.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: Most buyers, you know, when they're looking at these reports, some of them, another point of contention is they're confusing.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, they I mean, uh, although a buyer should read everything and their agent should read everything too.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, unfortunately, sometimes they just want to get the highlights.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: Some of these reports are difficultly laid out.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: Tell me about yours.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: I've seen some of these reports, 150 pages long with repetitive uh items in there that are very difficult to navigate.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: My report is very clean, very well organized.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you receive it digitally.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: You can print it on a PDF if you're still one of those PDF guys and print it out.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but that also does have a summary page as well.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_01: But digitally, it has a nice summary, um, easy to navigate.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I also have a tool called uh repair request tool.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I was gonna ask you about that.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: Tell us about that one.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: You can you can pull this tool up and it brings up all of the defects found um in the report.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: Uh now as a realtor, you can click on specific, you can select all of them if you want, or you can sure select certain ones that you're interested in in focusing on.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: You click those and it builds a separate report that from that same screen, you can email or text that report to the seller's agent or to a handyman or electrician or whoever you want to, and that delivers a precise, clean report, detailed photos and everything you need to uh communicate to the person you need to.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: For everybody watching, what usually happens is we either have to retype it or we copy and paste certain sections, but it just looks horrible.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: So, really retyping, if you want to look like that consummate real estate professional retyping, it's necessary.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: But this is super streamlined where it's going to highlight what's important, those things that need to be attended to or you would like attended to at least.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: And it puts it in, I guess, one uh particular format in a document that you're able to forward to whomever you want.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: Correct.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: That's correct.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's very precise and neat.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_01: You can also add if you're looking for a credit dollar amount, you can put a dollar amount in each defect that you want a credit for.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: That's very, very good to know.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: I I think I'm the first, you're the first to have put something like this together, at least that I've heard of.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: I've talked to a few people.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: So that's fantastic.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to go into a couple other items.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: Now, you talked about the repair request tool.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: That was a big one that I wanted to hit on.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: Talk about the different technologies you're able to utilize when you go out to these residents to inspect.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: Because some of these cats just, you know, they crawl through the attic if they even do that.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: And really they kind of just step back from the house and they give it a look, or maybe pull out some binoculars, or, you know, they go inside and they look under the sinks and everything, which is which I guess is great.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: But technology has gone to a different place now.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: What do you bring with you?
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: Well, like you mentioned before, sewer scope is one of the big ones.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: You mentioned you had roots in your uh boy sewer.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: I I also did.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_01: And this is why I add sewer scope at no extra charge in my inspections, which is an incredible value, two or three hundred dollar value.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, absolutely.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_01: So, like I said, I had roots in mine.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I was lucky because it was on a piece of soil in between cement driveways, so they were able to get to it through the soil and not have to dig up cement.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: But it was a$5,000 repair my first week living in my new home.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I do that.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: Seuroscope is an amazing tool.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I also like I try to walk on every roof that I can, every inch of it, but there are certain roofs that I cannot walk on.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, so I do have a drone to inspect roofs, which is very effective, actually.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_01: It takes amazing pictures and you can get into small places, so it's a very effective tool.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: Also, I use thermal imaging, an infrared camera, and this helps uh you can find uh hidden leaks behind walls that are not visible.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh use it for watch seeing hot water plumbing go through the plumbing drain lines like that.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you can use it for uh the main electrical panels.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: You can see hot breakers or hot overheating wires and stuff like that.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that thermal imaging, that's it's it's a huge deal, especially out here with the the mold issues and moisture trapped and walls issues.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: You mentioned at the start of the show the grating and you know some of the settling of properties where the actual foundation might go below the actual earth surrounding the residence, and that water can intrude and that weep line.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: And if I mean it can be sitting there for years, I'm sure you've run into this without that particular technology.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: Unless it's gotten to a point where it's deteriorated the interior walls and you see bubbling, you're kind of stuck, you don't see it.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: So good for you.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Those uh that particular technology that's just offered at every home inspection that you do.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: You you run that camera.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely, absolutely I do.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and all those services I don't charge extra for.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: They're always included in all my inspections.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: One other thing that's really, really important, and I know this from a client's perspective.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: You know, most of the home inspectors they say, you know, you can call me, you can ask me questions later on, you could make an inquiry if you have any other questions that come up.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: Because a lot of time we do the debrief, we try to do it outside of the seller's ears, just because there's lots of arguments and fights that happen whenever the home inspector is saying something they found, the seller says, oh, that's not a problem, and that's not a big deal, then there's issues.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: But when we have this debrief, there's a lot of difference between the debrief and the report.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: So there's, you know, because you know, you can remember a lot of things, but maybe this item you just didn't recall from the photographs you took in the inspection.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: So, but it's in the report, right?
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: Because your reports are conclusive.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: After that, though, having a client get in in touch with a home inspector, even though the home inspector said, Yeah, call me anytime, I'll be able to get back with you as soon as I can.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: It never happens.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: How's tell us about that on camera in front of God and everybody?
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: Tell us about how you respond.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: No, no, I'm always available.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I look forward to going over the report with you.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_01: If you want to get on a Zoom like we are now, or just get on the phone and go over the report.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: I work realtor hours, so I'm always available.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I was gonna ask you about that.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's I'm happy to explain anything.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, my reports are very, very detailed with photographs and everything.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_01: So most items you'll have a pretty good understanding of what is going on, but I'm always available.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: You can call me at 10 o'clock at night.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: I'm happy to go over things with you, explain things, um, make suggestions.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_01: Actually, that's more the realtor's job.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: I try to be a neutral party and be factual, just explain the defects just factually.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we never know.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: I never I don't have a I don't know the clients.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: I usually meet them at the inspection, so I don't know their personalities.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: I leave that to the realtor.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_01: I try to report just factual, unbiased.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: I don't get excited, like, oh my God, you gotta, this is a big problem.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I just report it and they're gonna react how they're gonna react, you know.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: And uh the realtor is the person to uh work with the client and go through that phase of the of the of escrow.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're not a you're not a shock type home inspector.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my god, it's the end of the world.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: You're just basic facts.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: And when people ask, I'm sure you you respond accordingly, but you're not you know trying to get all the drama involved.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: And that's fantastic because buying a house is just a massive stress bucket of of stress and anxiety.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot to it, lots of money involved.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: I want to ask you one thing as well, from what you've seen in your home inspection experience.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: If you were going to give a tip to those sellers out there as far as maintenance goes, what's a few things or maybe one big thing that you see as a result of their neglect that they might want to attend to?
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, sellers they they usually try to uh fix the more uh mediocre items, you know.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but they leave a lot of small things undone that you know can add up.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it could uh make the number of items that you're reporting a lot larger.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: Uh simple things like window screens, broken window screens or missing window screens, sliding glass doors that don't operate smoothly, uh you know, old yellow smoke detectors that looks like you know someone's been smoking three packs a day in the house, you know.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: Those are small things that that really make a difference.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: You know, uh a lot of small things can be overwhelming for some buyers and you know scare them away more than like a few big things.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: Like if they if you can focus on just a few big things is better than a list of 50 or 60 small things, you know.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: Do you so do you do I was I was gonna ask you, do you do the the pre-home inspection for the sellers if if somebody was getting ready to sell their house and they wanted to have a home inspector come out just to document what's going on and maybe get some suggestions?
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: Do you do those type of inspections as well?
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: Sure, I do do those.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm working on a uh new feature uh called uh move in move in ready certified, where we can certify at home that that it's move in ready, it's safe, everything, all the all the uh systems are functioning properly and um not overly aged.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_01: And we can put a sign out in your yard that says it's move in certified.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: And we'll even have a barcode where they can scan that barcode and see the report.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_01: And we can we can do the we can we can do the pre-inspection, and then if there's items on there that need to be taken care of, then we can update that report until it's uh certified.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's fantastic! Great advice, great technology, and great service.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: How do people what's the best place for them to contact you?
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I have my website, www.teenshomeinspection.com.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's a good place.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: You can go there to get uh a quote of pricing.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: You can schedule an inspection there.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um it has links to my social sim social media, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and you can always call me at 818-472-3585.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: That's fantastic.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'll put those in the uh in the show below.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: Is there anything you want to say in closing before we finish today?
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_00: And fantastic job, by the way.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_00: Really great to hear about your services.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: No, I appreciate it.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, uh, yeah, I'm ready to go to work for you and your clients.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I really enjoy helping clients out to get to know the home that they're purchasing and give them all the knowledge that they need uh to move forward with their purchase and and helping uh realtors, you know, have an easier time reading and going through reports and and getting that that section through escrow.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much for coming on today.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: I really appreciate it.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, having me, Connor.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_01: Appreciate it.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: You're more than welcome.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: Ladies and gentlemen, that was Jeremy Dean.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: He's, you know, you run into a lot of home inspectors in this business.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: And unfortunately, some just don't cut the mustard.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: And when you get down to that zero time frame and you got to get somebody out there, maybe your favorite or whatever you want to consider it, they're just not available.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's nice to have just one go-to that realistically works realtor hours instead of the nine to five Monday through Friday.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: And Jeremy really fits that bill.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: Plus, he has the technology, has the reports, and he's got the brain.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: He's actually expanding his business to put in other things that sellers and buyers will find of value.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: And you just heard it on today's show.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I appreciate everybody watching the Connor with Honor podcast.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much, and we will see you in the next one.