PODCAST TRANSCRIPT:

Ian Robertson
Welcome back everyone to Inspector Toolbelt Talk. Today on we have a friend of mine, George, I’m gonna say Karampoulis. But tell us the proper pronunciation of that, George.

George Karampoulis
So yeah, in English Karampoulis is okay. Nobody would know that proper if they are not Greek. But in Greece, we m and b makes the sound of B. So it’s actually Karampoulis.

Ian Robertson
Karampoulis..did I say it all right?

George Karampoulis
Perfect.

Ian Robertson
You’re just saying that because I’m hosting the show today. But we’re not teasing you. It’s really great to have you on George. We’ve had some great conversations, especially as of late here. And I wanted to have you on and talk about a subject that’s very important to me. And it’s very important to you. And ultimately, it’s important to all of us, but sometimes I think it gets a little lost in the weeds, which is client first marketing. But before we get into that, let’s learn a little bit about you. So obviously, from what you’ve told us, you’re from Greece originally. Where are you from? You know, what do you do? Tell us about your business?

George Karampoulis
So yes, I am from Greece, in case you didn’t know, realize from the accent. Usually, I don’t hear my accent until I see a video or hear a recording. And I’m like, Oh, I hate it. But yeah, I was born there raised there. Calabria, the name of the village is a small village historic, because goes against, you know, Ottomans, Germans with wars coming with times. And then I found that I have family in Savannah, Georgia. And I wanted to meet them. So I mailed them. And they mailed me back. And they were like, actually, you know, my daughter is getting married, my uncle said, and how about you come here? How about how about you visit and see, so we can meet you. So I did that. And I liked it. And I decided to move in USA. And that was in 2012. After that my Greek military. So I can take it out of the way. Because we have to do it in Greece for from 18 years old to 30 years old, you have to do it as a man. So I moved to in Savannah, I finished construction management. And at the same time, I had the mindset to say, hey, you know what? Life is different than books. Let’s just go to work for a construction company to see if I really like it. And that’s when my boss said to me after a while you know what, you’re good at what you’re doing, but you’re annoying. Yeah, why annoying? And he’s like, Well, we got to fix this wall, right? You don’t have to tell me that all the rest left and right are wrong. You should become a home inspector. I’m like, what is the home inspector? And didn’t even know. And he told me and I’m like, wait a minute, so I don’t have to carry stuff, sweat in the heat and everything. I just have to say what’s wrong? And I’m okay. Yeah. Okay, bye. So, and then after that, yeah I found a friend that I found that he was an inspector, I shadowed him. And that’s how I started Owl’s Eye Home Inspections eventually.

Ian Robertson
Okay, so I’m really glad you told me that story. Because to be honest with you, I was actually kind of wondering, how does how does a guy from Greece end up in Savannah, Georgia and, you know, become a home inspector and you’re a certified master inspector, right? Like you’ve been doing this for a bit?

George Karampoulis
Yes, now I am. I just became a couple of months ago actually. Thank you. Yeah, from Savannah, Georgia. I moved with my family up to Atlanta area. So now I’m up here, Flowering Branch I’m based but it was hard because you live with your family and your friends, everything. You know, a lot of things that you might think that it’s normal here, for me was like, what? And I see things only in movies, for example, and then suddenly, well, I’m here.

Ian Robertson
Congratulations. So I don’t want to go too far off. But what was a weird thing that you found out when you got here? In the US? You’re like, whoa, but give me, give me an example.

George Karampoulis
The fact that I’m walking out, I go for a walk and everybody’s like, good morning.

Ian Robertson
Oh, they don’t do that in Greece?

George Karampoulis
No, they don’t. They just wave. And just nods their head and that’s it, if they know you, if they don’t, we don’t care.

Ian Robertson
Okay. Well, that’s good. Well, it’s the south, southern hospitality. Yeah. So and your company is Owl’s Eye Home Inspections LLC, correct?

George Karampoulis
Correct. Yes, yeah.

Ian Robertson
All right, cool. So you’re a home inspector, you’ve done, you’ve done well for yourself. You’ve, you’ve built a good reputation. And the reason I kind of pick this subject to talk about with you is, this is something that I’ve found you talking about a lot in our conversations. Well, how does this benefit my client? What.. I like to do this for my client, I like to do that for my client. And you kept saying that over and over again, I’m like, this guy is very client focused. But at the same time, you have a broad marketing campaign, I love your videos that you do on Facebook. I don’t know why the most recent one is you pointing at a sign over a toilet, you know, those are funny, engaging, they bring in but at the same time, you’re very client focused. So if you don’t mind me asking how has being client focused, helped your business because we kind of get lost in the weeds if we talk a lot about marketing to agents. So an agent is worth, you know, 10 inspections a year, and we we put on demonstrations and shows and office presentations. But when it comes down to it, it’s a very basic principle of being client focused, how’s that worked out for you?

George Karampoulis
Yeah, it’s funny how we remember it, the times that we, that it’s convenient for us, meaning Oh, we don’t get paid from the realtor, we get paid from the client. But we try to make the realtor happy, not the client. And that’s wrong to me. My focus is on the client. He’s the one that pays, he’s the one that will be satisfied, will leave a review, will refer me, I will get more business from them. Yes, we know statistically and probably you know best. Realtors are a big piece of that, and they give us a lot of work. But if your clients are not happy, then your realtors eventually will not be happy. So what I try to do is that even after hours, 6, 7, 8 well, between eight and nine o’clock, actually, I put my kids to bed, so I don’t but 10 o’clock. After that I, I am there to answer questions if my clients have those or concerns. I will pick up my phone, it’s five minutes only, mostly most of the times they respected that I did answer the phone. So you know, I do that. And they’re very happy. And that’s a small example of what I do for them.

Ian Robertson
You know, it’s it’s funny, too, because I mentioned that you have a you have a good marketing campaign going on. It’s not like you say, I don’t market to agents or I only market agents. A lot of times we think it’s one or the other in our industry. And it’s really not it’s it’s all encompassing. It’s I market to everybody. But in your marketing campaign, you’re very client first. And I think it’s important to remember that, because I think about there’s a burger. Well, it’s a burger pizza joint, I don’t know if they can figure out what they are down the road from me. They have a great advertising campaign. They do a lot of grassroot efforts, they market on Facebook, they have a great sign up front. So you can’t really miss the place. But their burgers are terrible. I’m not that picky. And their burgers are just terrible. So we just never went back. And people ask us Would you eat there? I’m like, oh, you know, you can try it if you want. But I have not had a good burger there. We have a product. And agents are looking at our clients, they’re their clients too, those clients represent more work for the agent. They represent their reputation, all of this stuff. If that client isn’t happy, we are not going to get referrals. So even if we’re like, Hey, I only market to agents. Oh, okay, that’s your gig, that’s fine. But if you’re not making your client happy, and doing a fantastic job, you’re not gonna get anywhere in business because what agents going to refer you?

George Karampoulis
Correct. Correct. And, you know, don’t forget that there are clients that they find you from your website. So they despite them, their realtor gave them one option or three options of inspectors, they made their research, they found me, then when I do the inspection and give the report to them, and they say to the realtor, oh man, George was fantastic. I love him, and I will refer him to friends, family. Well, the realtor will listen to that and would be like, You know what, I would suggest jobs again to someone else. Despite that they originally I wasn’t the one that suggested him. So yeah, what goes around comes around. They all tie together. I do several networks, open networks. I am part of a closed network, the BNIs, some people hate it. Some people love it. But I get a lot of referrals from there from realtors that I meet. But in the end of the day, if the clients not happy, that realtor will leave me or will not come back. Yeah.

Ian Robertson
Yeah. And I think that’s just the important part of it. Now, a lot of times home inspectors will say things like, you know, my client was happy with me, but it agent was mad. To me that that tends to be the rare occurrence, I’ve had that happen, I can think of one experience where an agent was just, I don’t know, not happy with something in life. Just completely livid with me, my clients were happy. And I couldn’t figure it out. But 99% of the time, agents have come to me and said, I really wouldn’t refer you otherwise. But my clients love you. And I’m like, Thank you, I think. Kind of like your boss telling you, you know, you’re annoying. So I think that was a compliment. Yeah.

George Karampoulis
So yes. And that’s, that’s, you know, you’ve said it in another podcast. And I totally, totally agree with that. We don’t fire enough of Realtors, not as you said, it’s very rare that you will have that situation. But if I find a realtor, that he’s just unhappy with his life, or he’s unhappy, because I said something that I observed, that’s why I’m there to observe and report. I’m sorry, I can’t do anything to change it. And if that’s the case, let’s not work together again, and we will go be happy.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, and and that’s the point. So I don’t think anybody would, would disagree with us saying that if you have a happy client, most of the time, you’re going to have a happy agent. But if you don’t mind me asking, I think it comes down to customer experience. So you had mentioned before good customer service being available for your clients. That always helps. But what are some what are some hardline things that you do to make not just your customers time with you enjoyable, but their customer experience overall to be very good? What are some things that you do in particular?

George Karampoulis
Well, first of all, I think that it only goes down to communication. From the time that you pick up the phone, and they don’t know your face, or you don’t know their face, to explain what you do, how you do it, why you do it well. Like you’ve tried the other CMI like that, what does that mean, I have experienced, I have my hands on how on houses and I know what I’m telling you. And then to the point that when I arranged the appointment, I always put a buffer of 30 minutes, something like that I leave in the end. So I can explain to them not only the findings, but how the report will be. So they won’t be scared when they see red and orange arrows everywhere. To explain that, Hey, pay attention to the words. And this is what we do. This is major, this is minor, I am telling you that this exists, not because it’s something to be terrified, but the opposite. To know that it’s okay. For the age of the house, you’re good, you’re safe. Just keep an eye every year, something like that.

Ian Robertson
So I think that’s a beautiful point that you just made. And I think that’s something that we could take home, leaving extra time, actually physically budgeting it into our inspection, we know that’s a two and a half hour house that we’re going to inspect. So we plan on three hours, have that extra half hour. I think that’s beautiful, because sometimes we all like to think that we’re great communicators. But if we were to get honest answers from people, we probably say, Well, you could do better this way or that way. So the only way to make up for our lack of good communication, which all of us are going to lack good communication to one degree or another is time. Okay, we thought we explained it, but they’re gonna go home and freak out. Can we take that extra half hour? I use, I do the same thing I like to budget at the end of the inspection when we’re outside the house. And that is actually for the agent. Because oftentimes the agents like I had to get to my next inspection, I had to get to my next listing appointment. So now I’m in the driveway. The client doesn’t have to worry about being recorded in the house, typically. And yeah, we’re just talking. I said I budgeted an extra 25 minutes. What questions do you have? Most of the time they’d say none but you know, some people are like, wow, okay, yeah, I have a list. That’s awesome.

George Karampoulis
See. Exactly, and I’m sorry for interrupting but even in that part that the clients are recorded, because nowadays we have all the cameras in the house. I explained to them, Hey, how about we step out and we talk? You know, with our cameras, I want you to feel comfortable without having anyone listening to what we say. Um also you know that that time I explained with simple words you can say for i joist beams and things like that, but people that buy houses sometimes don’t know these words, even the simple ones. So what you try to explain is that okay, you know the floor you have the sub floor, the support, you tried to explain that where we saw the discoloration, the deterioration, something that the moister, so you try to explain the impression with simple words, and then when they see the report with the proper words, they are not surprised or like okay, what does that mean?

Ian Robertson
Yeah, so it’s good bedside manner. I remember one time when I was like, 19, I had, there’s this part of my ear around the eardrum that became perforated. And he, the doctor used all these big words, he’s like you have a perforated something. And then finally, I have to say, I don’t know what that means. It goes, you have a hole in your eardrum. I’m like, thank you. Okay, just, that’s all I needed to know. I didn’t know you didn’t know which part of my eardrum it was.

George Karampoulis
Speak English.

Ian Robertson
Or Greek, depending on your client, I don’t know.

George Karampoulis
Am I allowed to say a small parenthesis here, a small story about that?

Ian Robertson
I would love to hear it.

George Karampoulis
Everybody here have that expression of “it’s all Greek to me.” When I first saw that it was like, wait, what? Is he making fun of me now? Or she tries to say something that I don’t understand. If it was Greek to him, then we would speak in the same language. We’re okay. We understand each other. Because when I first moved in U.S., I couldn’t speak as good English. So yeah, that was funny. And then I’m like, Oh, so that’s the expression, okay.

Ian Robertson
I kind of wondered if, if people in as you were talking, if people in Greece say it’s all English to me, you know?

George Karampoulis
Well, actually, we say it’s all Chinese to me, because we probably consider that as a hard language.

Ian Robertson
I think it’s just because you guys have a Cyrillic alphabet. Right? So..

George Karampoulis
Yes. So from, from changing completely, the alphabets, like, the English is kind of okay for us, but for the Chinese or the Asian languages, in general, are completely different alphabet to us. So yeah.

Ian Robertson
Yeah. So I mean, you have the Greek alphabet, which is completely foreign to us. You know, I guess that’s probably where the expression comes from. Yeah. But you know, it makes a good point for, for people who we’re talking to, I have a tendency to shake my head. Yes. And listen, when people are saying things that I don’t understand, as I’m trying to process it, and then they’re usually gone walking away by the time I have a question. So explaining things to people why we’re on the phone when they’re talking to us. While we’re on site and having that extra time at the end. That’s extremely important.

George Karampoulis
Yes, yes.

Ian Robertson
Do you have a driveway speech that you do beforehand? Like when they first show up? Do you give them a like a little bit of tidbits here and there of what you’re going to do?

George Karampoulis
Well I tell them how I will do my inspection, I usually say you know, I will start from the roof, go to the exterior attic garage, go from upper floor to basement, so I can see if everything is okay with running water and stuff like that. So I explained the process to them. But then I make sure I also tell them, hey, the inspection is like a puzzle that you put together all the pieces. So I will be able to, to address all your concerns or your questions in the very end, so I can know what’s what because I might see something on the exterior wall and call you and be like, Hey, you have that. But I haven’t seen the interior yet. So I haven’t seen all the surrounding. So I’ll tell them that. Yeah.

Ian Robertson
Yeah. So that’s, that’s what I call a driveway speech. I’ve seen inspectors, inspectors that I’ve trained, where people walk up and they just start inspecting with them. You know, people are walking in cold, they’ve probably only seen the house maybe once or twice. They have questions. They don’t know what you’re doing. And it’s not a good experience. You know, it’s kind of like you walk into that restaurant that I just told you about. Nobody shows you to your table. They just say yes or wherever you want. You don’t know, nobody’s taking your drink order.

George Karampoulis
Exactly.

Ian Robertson
It’s part of the experience. Yeah, they want to feel comfortable in there.

George Karampoulis
See how many times you go to a restaurant you say hey, what’s your most famous dish? Or what do you prefer, this burger or that burger? It’s not that you have eaten that burger before in another restaurant, but you want to know in that restaurant? Well. That’s kind of the driveway speech. It’s like, this is what I do.

Ian Robertson
Yeah. And you know, now I really, really want a burger. I’m getting kind of hungry. But um, I guess there’s two parts to it too. Sometimes we worry about making the client scared or upset or the agent upset by bringing out a defect and especially new inspectors, I hear them say that all the time, you know, guys who are grizzled and older, we’re just kind of like, alright, they’re gonna have to deal with it. We have other agents, but new guys, they worry so much about that. But it’s surprising because I’ve had, I’ve had agents complain about home inspectors, not because they were alarmist. But because their client moved in. And it was a bigger deal than the home inspector was making it out to be like, the home inspector was trying to make him feel comfortable, he should have just been like, this is a problem, let’s get this checked out, you know, rip the band aid off, so to speak.

George Karampoulis
And what’s even worse, to continue with what you’re saying is that I’ve heard the realtor saying that when they come to me for, you know, so I can do an inspection, they say, my previous inspector, actually was calling all the little things but he never found the big things that we saw. So you have that side, too. I think that the perfect the perfect balance is, you know, there is a fine line, you have to step on that line, pretty much take out all of your emotions. And say like a robot, pretty much, this is what I see, this is what I report, not exactly like a robot, like you want to sympathize, you want to make them feel comfortable with everything, but, but don’t freak them out either. Just walking that fine line of, hey, this is the problem. And you know what, for you might actually I say that a lot to my clients, for you might not be a problem, you might have the budget to fix that. That’s not for me to say or to know, if you have the budget, that might be fine. But for someone else for another time, this could be a major. So the deal is that you have that hole there, you want to fix it, fix it, you don’t want to, it’s okay, you walk away.

Ian Robertson
I heard a home inspector, just to talk to your point there. He once said, Don’t make assumptions for your client. Because a lot of times we may be thinking, Oh, we’re helping him out by making a big deal about this. And we’re not making a big deal about that. When you never know maybe they don’t care about the electrical system because his brother’s an electrician, they were planning on ripping that all out anyways, or on the converse side of things. We may assume oh, yeah, well, this isn’t a big deal. Because you know, I’d be fine with this in my home, but maybe they’re not. So we can’t make assumptions either way about them. Having a good customer experience, being client first, would dictate that we actually take the time to as much as we can say, hey, you know, how do you feel about this defect that I just put in, not every little thing like a handle, you know, doorknob, but you know, hey, this foundation wall, what are you, what are your thoughts on it, we may still mark it the same, we’re not going to change our rating on it, so to speak. But we can get a better understanding so we can give them a better customer experience. They may be freaking out about it and not saying anything. Well, okay, let’s talk this through. This will be some money, but it’s fixable. Oh, it is fixable. I’ve had so many clients say that. Oh, it is? I’m like yeah. I mean, it’s got to get fixed.

George Karampoulis
I agree with you. And you know, sometimes some of the clients are contractors, some they are engineers, some they might not have knowledge about anything. So combat that by asking questions. You know, Socrates said, by asking the right questions, you find the truth. So the right question there is like, yeah, how do you feel about that? Tell me how you feel so, and then they start telling you details that you didn’t know that you will hear but it helps, it helps.

Ian Robertson
I think that’s awesome that you, you quoted Socrates. I often try to quote him, but it’s usually from somebody else. And I always misquote Socrates.

George Karampoulis
Well, that’s okay.

Ian Robertson
Good. Well, I trust you on that one, but I think I think you would know, but um, if you don’t mind me asking, all of this seems very basic to a lot of us but to new guys, I think it, they worry too much about agents. And you know, I gotta mostly with our podcast here, we’ll get like, thank you emails and guys will call me thanking me but once in a blue moon, I had this one guy get really upset. Because he said our industry is falling apart because it’s becoming too agent focused. Do you think that that’s happening to our industry a little bit, that becomes too agent focused or do you think that’s not really an issue?

George Karampoulis
No, I think that it is an issue. I can agree on that. First of all, you had Nick Gromicko saying that he’s trying to change that. And he hopes he will. Yeah, unfortunately, even as inspectors like, I hear your podcasts and you talk with your competitors, you’ve, you work together have or if you’re busy, you send them, you refer to them. And the other way around. Well, I am, I tried that. I still haven’t find someone to do that. I recently had a home inspector, actually, last week that he sent, he sent me an email. And he’s like, hey, I’m newer. Have hard time. I’m looking to see if you’re hiring. I’m not right now. But I had a call with him, I talked to him, I will point to him some things to understanding to know. So I tried to be helpful in other words, and to go back to your question, your point, is that for myself, I found that when I knocked some doors in the beginning in this area when I moved to Atlanta area, they didn’t answer, they answered, but then they didn’t follow up. And all I needed is actually to give them business when I am out of town, and when I’m busy to give them business, and trust them that they won’t steal the realtor. So yes, we fight about the realtors and you…um..but to wrap up, I think that we should move along and work together more, instead of fighting who is better in front of the realtors eyes?

Ian Robertson
Yeah, I think it’s a picture as kinda like a bunch of people and fishing boats and overfished waters, you know, everybody’s trying to get trying to get all the fish that are there and are thrown their nets in. So a guy comes along, saying you want to work together, if that’s not happened in your area before. And that’s how it kind of started with me when I was working with other home inspectors. When I first started out, nobody wanted to talk to me, nobody cared. And then you find the few gems that are out there that you that you can work with. But I do think we’re becoming too agent focused as as an industry, sometimes it is the, it is the low lying fruit, I think is the problem of it. But just because it’s the low lying fruit, you can get 10 clients a year from your average real estate agent. That doesn’t mean that we can’t be client first in our marketing, when we work with our clients. So let’s get back to that subject. Because I just wanted to address that because I do think it’s a problem in our industry.

George Karampoulis
And to actually, the realtor will will be satisfied because the clients were satisfied. Yeah. And realtor is working in office, guess what, word of mouth. He will say to the other realtors, hey, I have that good inspector, actually.

Ian Robertson
Yeah. And then after they have one bad inspection, they may be like, Oh, I don’t refer George, they have a bad inspection. And with the not a good customer experience for their client, they’re going to come back and say, Okay, where’s George’s number again, it’s, it’s business 101, you have to have a good burger, doesn’t matter how great your advertising is. And we also don’t want to assume that every agent is going to be you know, just trying to make the deal. The agents that I work with are awesome. I had one guy, just tell me outright, I know that I’m going to lose deals, because you’re thorough, I want you to find that because I want to build my business. And he is doing really well. I met him probably 15 years ago. That’s his mentality, we still work with him to this day, and he’s one of the highest producing agents in our area. So it does work being client focused, it doesn’t need to be one or the other. You can work with good agents, keep them happy by keeping their clients happy. And it really does work out well. So you’ve talked to us about beginning, you know, talking to the client on the phone, when you’re scheduling the inspection, you’re a little bit of a drive away speech, even though you may not call it that, working with them using plain language on site. And I really love that point about scheduling extra time with them. Because I’ve done that. Most people don’t take me up on it, just the offer of it. Most people go that is really sweet of you. I really have to go but wow, that’s awesome of you. It’s just part of the experience. Most people don’t take me up on it. What about afterwards, like sending the report, doing follow ups with the client to check with them? Things like that.

George Karampoulis
Always. So when, when the next day I actually, I always send a text and I say, Hey, by now you have reviewed the report. If you have any questions or any concerns, please let me know, I’ll be there for you. And most likely, they send me a text back I’d say No, everything is okay. Or if they have something, then I give them the opportunity to do so to ask. And about a week later, actually, I tried to send also an email, I’m like, Hey, how about that property? I’ll keep moving forward with that, or did you end up finding something else? This way, if they are finding something else, they can still remember and consider me. And if they are staying with that property, then they say, oh, yeah, look at this. So they the inspector actually really cares. And he asks, and I do.

Ian Robertson
Very nice. So I mean, that, that is important. I personally automate those messages. But people appreciate that. And you know, what’s funny is, they’re not done with that transaction. They’re not done with that agent. So a lot of times, they’re even getting those messages while they’re with the agent. So they’ll even say to the agent, oh, the home inspector emailed me yesterday, or they text message me to see if I had any other questions after they gave me time on site. And it really does make for a great experience. It’s kinda like, the waitress at that restaurant. Bringing you mints at the end. Yes, it’s like three cents of it’s like 3, 30 cents of mints. But you’re like, Oh, that was nice, thank you, you know, or draw a smiley face on your receipt, you know, stuff like that.

George Karampoulis
See, to your example, if you have the meat cooked well, in the burger, then then you can experiment of adding products in the burger, make the mushroom, the Swiss cheese, the things like that. And then in the end, you also give those mints or some fruit or something. And that little thing is what makes the difference.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, it makes the whole experience work out well. So George, I gotta, I gotta throw this in there because I automate my, my messages and everything through Inspector Toolbelt, our software. You’re an Inspector Toolbelt software user, right?

George Karampoulis
Yes. And, actually, I’d like to say, well, I don’t want to interrupt you. You want to say something before I started again?

Ian Robertson
No, please. Yeah, this is your show.

George Karampoulis
So no, I used to be on the HomeGauge software. And actually, that’s part of making the, you know, the clients happy, right? The report is the main thing that makes them happy or not. So I used to be at HomeGauge. And granted, I had bought when it was free for lifetime. So that means no, no updates, no nothing. But from that, I switch to Inspector Toolbelt and from, you know that I asked a lot of questions. You saw my..

Ian Robertson
Yeah, I love it, though.

George Karampoulis
Because when I launch it, and when I start using it, I want to be sure that I will not lose quality and value in my report for my clients. Because if you see all of my reviews, one of the things that they say is that the report, the report is perfect. So I didn’t want to mess up. And actually, I didn’t believe it when I was listening on Facebook or podcasts. But wow, it saves you time.

Ian Robertson
That’s awesome.

George Karampoulis
Later when you go to the office, though, you spend what 30 minutes to put the drone pictures if you have and then look it up. Pull it all together, make sure that everything is okay the way that you want it and send it and that was it. I mean, I was like 30 minutes versus four to six hours that I was spending in the office.

Ian Robertson
Oh wow.

George Karampoulis
I’m ashamed to say that I was spending this much time and now I have time either for a second, third, even fourth inspection in a day, or if I don’t have, I have time for my family, and bottom line, that’s what we work for, for the family and have time and the ability with the money to go places and do things

Ian Robertson
So I really appreciate you saying that, you told me that before and you actually said, Ian, can you give me an opening and I’ll put you a plug in there. Because you know I don’t want to make the whole podcast about our software which I’m very proud of and I love but if I heard you right basically once you learn how to use it after the first few inspections, you’re saving hours and hours every inspection, which, that just makes my heart glad you know, because it not only does it apply to this podcast of you know, now you can give your customers better service, you have time for questions and answers, but also your family. That’s extremely important.

George Karampoulis
And now we say that first of all, yes, you didn’t want to talk about this, about yourself.

Ian Robertson
I’m not a self-plugger.

George Karampoulis
But that, that, I needed to because it’s part of my clients first, because when I actually started the new software, I said to them, Hey, I’m actually I didn’t hide it. I said, I’m actually trying a new software. So don’t be scared, like, whatever I see, it will be recorded. I don’t know how well it will come back to you. But, but you will have all the information. And everybody’s like, Oh, that’s fine. Don’t worry, all of the clients, I was surprised. And then I say I had the strength to ask, actually feedback. And I said, Hey, can you actually, tell me how was the whole process with the software. And if you liked the, you know, from the image that you got to the agreement to the after emails, like after the report, and the report itself, give me feedback. And not all of my clients actually gave me feedback. And that’s how I had some questions. Then you even improved some stuff. And now I’m good.

Ian Robertson
Nice. Well, that makes me happy that ultimately, your clients were happy with it. Because that’s really what matters to us. You know, sometimes we have to be judicious how we adjust our software. Because we actually do, do client based testing. Like, I’ll send it to people and say, if a home inspector sent you this, what would you think? So home inspectors will sometimes ask for a feature, I need this to happen. But the clients don’t like it. Like if every client’s like, yeah, no, I don’t know what that is and made it confusing. I don’t like it. Agents tell us the same thing. We may not put the feature in that inspectors may be requesting because we want to make your product work for your clients. And that’s really what we’re working on.

George Karampoulis
And in the end, you have to as you give so many information to them, you have to ask the questions too, it’s okay to get the feedback. And it’s okay to get bad feedback. And that’s how you can improve it.

Ian Robertson
So let me ask, going to that real meat of the client first mentality. You had mentioned that you are available for phone calls for all this stuff with your clients. Where do you draw the line between client first and your life, though, because you’re a family, man. I mean, that’s important.

George Karampoulis
I am. Thankfully, I have my wife understanding that, hey, sometimes actually, I might need to work even close to holidays and things like that. But we, I made a promise that I will draw the line that first of all three weeks to a month, actually, a year. And that will be very weird to you, I think. But as a one man show, I still three weeks to a month take off, and we can go either to Greece or to somewhere, because we have made a promise with my wife that once a year will travel somewhere, even it’s, even if it is in New York, something that we will see together, that’s the point to create memories. So that’s where I draw the line, those three weeks, one month, of a year. Yeah, we’ll arrange for the next month. But I’m not like I’m not doing anything. I’m there for my family. And I try for holidays, on some weekends, I book weekends in the very end, if it has to be to be done in the weekend. And if it is from a realtor that uses me all the time, I’m like, okay, you know what, Yes, I’ll do it. So, but in general, I have weekends off as much as I can.

Ian Robertson
So I wanted to bring that out, because you’ve told me that before. And I think that’s beautiful. Because so many times we’re like, well, I want to be client focused. So we oftentimes opened the door to wide into our lives. And people don’t have the limits. Unfortunately, when it comes to that. I’ve had people call me all hours of the night and say you didn’t answer. I’m like, yeah, it’s like 11:30 at night, and then they’re calling 6:30 in the morning. If we open the door too wide, it’s too much, we have our families, we’re working for families and I like that you set limits and I think that’s kind of a good quality of yours. You said at the end of the inspection, I leave 30 minutes. So you allot things, you carve out things and that’s where your schedule is. So for you, it’s those three to four weeks a year. Those are mine, those my family’s, nobody touches that.

George Karampoulis
Yes.

Ian Robertson
That’s a beautiful thing.

George Karampoulis
Yes. And thankfully, not only clients, but if it is a realtor so that is using you a lot, they respect that, they might not like it when they have a house there because they have to find someone else. But, but do they respect it and they come back to me. They don’t just delete me.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, and there’s lots of different ways we could cut that pie. You know, for me, I ended up cutting out weekend inspections many, many years ago. And I wouldn’t do weekend inspections. Did it affect my bottom line? Yeah, to be perfectly frank, but that was the way I carved out those four weeks that you talking about. You carve out an entire month. That’s an awesome thing. That’s incredible. Some guys, you know what, maybe it’s something else, however you carve it out. Make sure you carve out time for your family, client first doesn’t mean sacrificing something that isn’t yours, which is your time, your family’s time with you. Nice, so I think that’s a nice ending to client focused marketing, back to basics. That’s really what it is, back to basics. You make a burger, make a great burger. We’re inspectors, let’s do a great inspection and do for right by our clients. But we don’t need to open the door so wide that it takes something that doesn’t belong to us to give, which is our family’s time with us. But George, I had a blast with you. This was a lot of fun. Thank you for being on the podcast and dropping these gems.

George Karampoulis
Actually, someone asked recently on the Facebook page about, about that and they had, he had problem managing all these clients while his wife was getting mad with him. I’m sorry, but I love my Owl’s Eye Home Inspections. I love my company. It’s my baby but I prefer my family than work, but with that being said, I have the excuse to say hey, I’m there most of the holidays I’m there most of the weekends if you asked me to, but as a last result of course, but that month is my month, end of story. I likewise, I had a blast too, thank you for inviting me, and I hope that you didn’t lose audience because of my accent.

Ian Robertson
No, I think we, I think we gained some but I want to, I want to know, how do you say “Listen in next time to Inspector Toolbelt” in Greek?

George Karampoulis
Listen in and say it again..Let me hear?

Ian Robertson
You can, you can say it however you want. Take us out in Greek.

George Karampoulis
(George speaks in Greek)

Ian Robertson
All I understood was Inspector Toolbelt, and that was awesome. Thanks a lot, George. All right. Have a good one.

George Karampoulis
Have a good one, bye.

Outro: On behalf of myself, Ian, and the entire ITB team, thank you for listening to this episode of inspector toolbelt talk. We also love hearing your feedback, so please drop us a line at [email protected].

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*The views and opinions expressed in this podcast, and the guests on it, do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Inspector Toolbelt and its associates.