Transcript

Marketing, Sales, Capacity Planning, and Scaling Home Services with Ismael Valdez

From Home Service Expert · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 1 h 7 min · 15,050 words · 338 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "Marketing, Sales, Capacity Planning, and Scaling Home Services with Ismael Valdez", an episode of Home Service Expert published February 23, 2026 (1 h 7 min, about 15,050 words). It mentions 42 people, works and ideas, including marketing, Ishmael Valdez, Sales, HVAC, lead generation.

What this episode is about

A practical overview of evaluating a home services business for investment or growth, focusing on leadership, organizational health, and core operations. It emphasizes meeting top management (CMO, COO, GM), assessing the management system, and understanding daily flow and culture before making strategic decisions.

Key takeaways

  • People first, data second: unless you trust the team, the numbers are just pretty graphs.
  • Operations energy trumps org charts; you can sense culture the moment you walk in the door.
  • Investing in the top five leaders is buying the company’s heartbeat before the balance sheet
  • Sales-driven mindset transcends trades; profits hinge on relentless lead generation and performance incentives.
  • Ken Goodrich’s fix-it approach works, but scalable value often comes from smaller, investable, high-leverage tweaks.

Who speaks in this episode?

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 10:00: marketing, lead generation, Marketing Genius, Ishmael Valdez
  2. – 20:00: Real estate, marketing, Home Service, NextGen Air Conditioning, Heating, and Plumbing
  3. – 30:00: Private Equity, Home Service, Real estate, Pace Morby
  4. – 40:00: marketing, direct mail, Valpac, IBIDA
  5. – 50:00: Financing, Mantle, personal brand, marketing
  6. – 1:00:00: Ishmael Valdez, marketing, Sales, A1
  7. – 1:06:57: marketing, lead generation, Service Titan, Tim Howard

Notable quotes from "Marketing, Sales, Capacity Planning, and Scaling Home Services with Ismael Valdez"

  • All right, guys. It's a special day. It is Super Bowl. And I got my good buddy Ishmail here. Ishmail Valdez. He's an expert in business, air conditioning, heating, and…
    about Ishmael Valdez · at
  • You know what I'm saying? We are a salesdriven organization. Obviously, I' I've said it before. You cannot move from the most important thing, which is marketing. After you…
    about marketing · at
  • She's like there's some laws passing that make it harder to do the creative financing.
    about Financing · at
  • Look what happened at NextGen bro was the perfect timing to what's happening right now. Look, so in 2018 161 17 18 when we were barely starting NextGen the blue dots and all those guys and the.
    about NextGen Air Conditioning, Heating, and Plumbing · at
  • This is the greatest opportunity in home service industry. Not just because look at and I call this the perfect timing.
    about Home Service · at
  • Critical to get the massive growth. So, this is the hardest thing about private equity is they're going to put debt on your business. So, if me and you went to go buy…
    about Private Equity · at
  • Then I found out from like a company like Groundworks, Matt Malone, they're doing like 280 million of IBIDA.
    about IBIDA · at
  • Please keep letting it go through. We're closing about two to three deals every single day. But the one thing that we are is a [ __ ] sales machine, Tom. Like we have 25 some of these SAS companies that I talk to and.
    about Sales · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Ishmael Valdez — Person · Main guest · 2 mentions · first at
    He discusses building/scaling trades businesses, exiting NextGen, and building 'New' (thermostat + membership/ARR) with deep views on marketing, sales, and PE dynamics.
  • Uncle Luke — Person · Referenced operator/leader · 1 mention · first at
    Discussed as a key leader behind Tom's company performance and as a counterpart in debates about funnel math, booking, cancellations, and financing goals.
    Company. look, right now, last year, we're 17% of our revenue came from financing. I'd like this year Luke's goal is 30 to 35%.
  • Ken Goodrich — Person · Referenced expert · 1 mention · first at
    Used as an example of an operator/investor who buys broken businesses and fixes them; also referenced as advising Tom on learning PE capital mechanics.
    He buys broken businesses and fixes them all the time.
  • Leland — Person · Referenced mentor/peer · 2 mentions · first at
    Credited with a key insight: if starting over, focus heavily on service agreements; also referenced as an influence on recruiting strategy.
    And really when you thought about it, you built it and you said this based on what Leland did is you just take his top guys, you plucked them one by one.
  • Pace Morby — Person · Referenced influencer · 2 mentions · first at
    Referenced for creative real estate financing concepts and as part of a comparison with Grant Cardone on portfolio/financing strategies.
    Yeah, I like Pace Morby a lot, but he's cool, man. But I don't know who told me and they're like but it needs to be a portfolio. So CBRE and then I started using CHBT and.
  • Tommy Melo — Person · Referenced peer · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a benchmark for ownership scale and deal-making; Ishmail Valdez references 'doing the Tommy Melo' as buying/owning broadly in the industry.
    Cash right now then I could have bought a business here. I could have bought a business I could have I could have done the Tommy Melo just [ __ ] owns. Well, the thing is with…
  • Grant Cardone — Person · Referenced influencer · 1 mention · first at
    Used as a reference point in real estate financing discussions and contrasted with Pace Morby regarding creative financing approaches.
    He's Dude, that was probably one of the dopest videos I've seen them do. Cardone's just What? I feel like I've been doing this [ __ ] wrong my whole life.
  • Cody Johnson — Person · Referenced operator (acquisition example) · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as an example of a strong operator whose company was acquired/engaged with, illustrating how improving booking/conversion/call volume changes effective multiples.
    I you know I've bought some really cool companies like Cody Johnson. Cody, dude, that guy's the hardest worker. Him and his brother Ryan, you're.
  • Rabbi David Aaron — Person · Referenced peer/advisor · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced as someone experiencing greenfield expansion spend dynamics and as the connector who introduced Mantle to Tom.
    Aaron's going through the same thing when he went into like Cleveland.
  • Tim Howard — Person · Referenced advisor · 2 mentions · first at
    Cited as providing guidance on valuation/multiples and gross profit dynamics for Ishmail Valdez's thermostat business and ARR framing.
    Probably lower than that. But we also make a ton of money on the thermostat, too. So we would like I tal I talked to Tom Howard. He's the one that told me this. Like we running…
  • Andrew King Andrew King — Person · Referenced collaborator · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned in the context of spending money on leads alongside recruiting, reinforcing the need to match talent acquisition with demand generation.
    And then you built a good business off of that. One thing you did do as well with Andrew is you spent money on leads.
  • Victor Rancor — Person · Referenced anecdote source · 1 mention · first at
    His story illustrates that compensation/equity alone isn't enough; infrastructure, stats, meetings, and culture matter for sales talent retention.
    Victor Rancor talks about this. He goes, I left Service Champions. I was promised equity. They gave me equity.
  • Jeffrey Edward — Person · Referenced operator · 1 mention · first at
    Cited as someone who did 'amazing stuff' in water restoration/California, used to justify interest in that vertical and performance potential.
    Adigar and Edward did exceptionally well. but here's one thing that I am working on the next deal. the PE company doesn't care at all about the real estate. In fact, this ne the big.
  • Tai Lopez — Person · Referenced influencer · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as advising Ishmail Valdez to shift to longer-form content, which he claims increased social growth—supporting the personal brand strategy.
    And then I had a meeting with Tai Lopez and he's No, no, no, no.

Companies & orgs

  • NextGen Air Conditioning, Heating, and Plumbing — Organization · Referenced company (guest's prior business/exit) · 3 mentions · first at
    Ishmail Valdez references founding and selling NextGen; used to illustrate timing, recruiting access, and PE-driven industry disruption.
  • Service Titan — Organization · Key referenced platform · 3 mentions · first at
    Central CRM/dispatch platform discussed for operational data visibility and as an integration partner enabling dispatch directly from the thermostat/app via APIs.
    We just finalized our deal with Service Titan. They're going to be able to dispatch a technician from the thermostat and the app. Meaning, hey Sophia, my water heater is not working. Can you send me a technician?
  • A1 — Organization · Host's company (referenced) · 2 mentions · first at
    A1 is used as the benchmark for marketing/lead generation scale, funnel metrics, and brand credibility; also tied to Tom's personal brand and market expansion playbook.
    Every day. A1 is hiring great people and you just make it like recruitment. It's all but people are hearing your name. A1 A1 A1.
  • Mantle — Organization · Recommended product · 4 mentions · first at
    Mantle is discussed as a sales presentation/shopping tool that increased conversion and average ticket, and that can incorporate dealer fees into financing options.
    To make sure that you educate them and let them mantle. We just started with Mantle and it's this thing that basically it's software that allows the client to kind of do their own shopping. They scroll through the and.
  • Wrench — Organization · Referenced company (operating model comparison) · 3 mentions · first at
    Discussed as a company that buys great companies and leaves them decentralized; contrasted with Tom's standardization approach (one CFO/COO, same trucks/tools).
    Like seven commercial buildings anywhere from 10,000 to 54,000 ft that I leased out back to Wrench. so I had seven buildings. I had a like I have like nine houses that I had.…
  • Valpac — Organization · Referenced vendor · 2 mentions · first at
    Valpak/Valpac is cited as providing strong demographic and household targeting data and as a high-performing direct mail channel reducing marketing % of revenue.
    Savannah's not that far away. So I go to Savannah if I could get So you got to look at the demographic. And Valpac, believe it or not, has some of the best data. No, Valpac's still doing good.
  • Service Champions — Organization · Referenced company (talent/culture example) · 1 mention · first at
    Appears as the prior employer in Victor Rancor's anecdote, used to highlight differences in infrastructure and team environment.
    Victor Rancor talks about this. He goes, I left Service Champions. I was promised equity. They gave me equity.
  • Groundworks — Organization · Referenced benchmark company · 1 mention · first at
    Used as an example of aggressive pre-market advertising for greenfield expansion; cited with large EBITDA to justify heavy upfront spend.
    He goes in four months before they're even in that market and starts doing one ads. So people are hearing your name every day. A1 is hiring great people and you just make it like recruitment. It's.
  • Renovo — Organization · Cautionary example · 1 mention · first at
    Used as an example of a home improvement company that failed due to excessive leverage and debt payments, illustrating PE risk.
    How the formulas work. And now I understand all this stuff. And I'm going, Wait a minute. There's a great big company that's went out of business.

Concepts & topics

  • marketing — Concept · Core topic · 12 mentions · first at
    Marketing is framed as the first and most important department in scaling home service businesses, driving lead flow and enabling sales/operations performance.
  • Sales — Concept · Core topic · 2 mentions · first at
    Sales is positioned as the second step after marketing, requiring mastery before scaling operations; discussed via conversion rates, average ticket, and in-home time.
  • HVAC — Concept · Core topic · 12 mentions
    HVAC is the primary trade context for seasonality, service agreements, average ticket economics, and PE roll-up dynamics.
  • lead generation — Concept · Core topic · 3 mentions · first at
    Lead generation is repeatedly tied to marketing mastery, funnel math (booking/cancel/conversion), and the idea of using thermostats as a lead-gen engine.
    Marketing is the first step in the operation. After you master marketing, you could and you could lead generate on a snap of a finger and you got your message out there of who…
  • Private Equity — Concept · Core topic · 2 mentions · first at
    Private equity is discussed as both an opportunity and risk: leverage against EBITDA, debt service burden, industry disruption, and mistakes creating talent availability.
  • IBIDA — Concept · Core topic · 1 mention · first at
    EBITDA (spelled 'IBIDA' in transcript) is central to valuation, leverage, PE deal structures, and performance targets for markets and IPO planning.
  • Home Service — Concept · Core topic · 4 mentions · first at
    Home service is the main industry context for scaling playbooks, valuation multiples, seasonality, and PE roll-ups.
  • Financing — Concept · Core topic · 4 mentions · first at
    Financing is discussed as a major lever to increase close rates and average ticket, especially in garage doors/electrical; also tied to dealer fees and payment framing.
  • Real estate — Concept · Core topic · 6 mentions · first at
    Real estate is discussed as a wealth strategy post-exit and as a PE-adjacent portfolio play (buy buildings, long leases, portfolio premium).
    Adigar and Edward did exceptionally well. but here's one thing that I am working on the next deal. the PE company doesn't care at all about the real estate. In fact, this ne…
  • personal brand — Concept · Core topic · 4 mentions · first at
    Personal brand is presented as a major growth lever for recruiting, deal flow, and customer trust—often more powerful than the company brand.
    Let's talk about a couple more things here. So personal brand, you're you're one of the biggest things I think with this AI world is just build your personal brand.
  • Service Agreements — Concept · Core topic · 2 mentions · first at
    Service agreements are described as the 'lifeblood' in shoulder seasons, stabilizing revenue and reducing seasonality risk in HVAC.
    Y he goes service agreements is the lifeblood when there's no weather.
  • direct mail — Concept · Core tactic · 5 mentions · first at
    Direct mail is emphasized as a shoulder-season lever and follow-up mechanism (handwritten letters, buyback offers), often integrated with data and automation.
    You're freaking hammering your customer base all day long. You're you're hitting them with direct mail. You're hitting more with email blast ringless voicemail text messages. You're hitting them with outbound.
  • API — Concept · Enabling technology · 3 mentions
    APIs are discussed as the mechanism for automating direct mail personalization and for integrating thermostat/app actions into dispatch/CRM workflows.
    Depending on who it is. Who's the finance company service type the exact same playbook the data the exact same APIs you're going to are you going to use trip you going to use…
  • Capacity Planning — Concept · Core topic · 2 mentions · first at
    Capacity planning is discussed as the driver of cancellations and same-day service ability; Tom mentions building an advanced capacity planning tool to balance staffing and outbound.
    I've got a company building the most advanced capacity planning tool. Then you staff up and you overstaff and then you got to do outbound.
  • CRM — Concept · Core topic · 1 mention · first at
    CRM quality is framed as essential for managing by numbers, diagnosing performance, and enabling scalable playbooks across markets.
    Whether it's service titan or house call that would be my second thing dial in the CRM I need to see the numbers where can I make impact do you think the do would you want to…
  • Customer Fulfillment — Concept · Core topic · 1 mention · first at
    Defined as the operations function from sale to collecting payment; positioned as the third department after marketing and sales.
    And there's operation department the operation department is the customer fulfillment what happens when the sale goes through to when we collect a check that's what I call the…
  • Marketing Genius — Concept · Descriptor / theme · 2 mentions · first at
    Ishmail Valdez characterizes Tom as a 'marketing genius' to explain A1's lead volume and brand presentation as a competitive advantage.
    I think you're probably one of the dopest marketers in the world.
  • Home Improvement — Concept · Referenced category · 2 mentions · first at
    Home improvement is contrasted with home service on valuation multiples and used in a cautionary example (Renovo) about leverage and debt service risk.
    I like software a lot because it's revenue. It's annual reoccurring revenue. And I like home service and I'm starting to like home improvement, but the multiples aren't there…
  • turnover — Concept · Supporting topic · 1 mention · first at
    Turnover is highlighted as a major challenge in seasonal HVAC, with employee churn spiking during demand fluctuations.
    Turn turnover. Your turnover rate on employees [ __ ] skyrocket in seasonality.

Full transcript with timestamps

All right, guys. It's a special day. It is Super Bowl. And I got my good buddy Ishmail here. Ishmail Valdez. He's an expert in business, air conditioning, heating, and plumbing. He's based out of Anaheim. Founder of New and founder of NextGen Air Conditioning, Heating, and Plumbing. Ishmail is the founder and CEO of He was at NextGen and now he's 100% in on New.

Yes, sir. Uh been in the trades for almost 20 years. I just want to that [ __ ] sounds old, man. Honestly, Tom,

20 years, bro. So, I started 17. Yeah. So, I'm going on 21 years now. I feel like, dude,

that's crazy. The overnight success everybody talks about. How long you been on it, Tom? 20.

Uh, yeah. No, I was painting garage doors for I guess 2005. Yeah. So, 21 years.

Yeah. Um, so if you were to go in a company, let's call it a $20 million company, what's the first thing you do?

If you were, let's just say, call it, you're an investor, you're buying 20%. Yep.

Where do you start? The uh the top five people in the company, the CMO, hopefully they have one. Um, the COO, the the general manager for sure. Um, so probably if they have a seuite or just a manage managed system in there, that's the first people I want to talk to. without the owner being there though. I would my first move is I would I would walk in, you know, I would I would say hi to people and, you know, just see how the operation flows to me. Like energy inside the operation is super important. Like I've been to operations like even yours, you walk in and everybody's just like,

yeah, everybody has their everybody has their their their their roles in their operations. So, and then I would grab the seauite or the upper management and I would probably take them out to dinner and I would want to like dig into them because they're the ones that they're the ones running the business. You know this, right? And I would probably spend a really really good amount of time before making the investment. Then after I talk to them and and figure out that, you know, we're on the same page, then I would I would go in there. But I would start with those those those people.

Then I would walk into the, you know, show me your financials and all that. That's the thing is I think the data I want to know how well do they have whether it's service titan or house call

that would be my second thing dial in the CRM I need to see the numbers where can I make impact

do you think the do would you want to talk to the people first or would you want to would you make your decision all based on data meaning the P&Ls the balance sheet the service tit setup all that

I'd want to meet the people but at 20 million of revenue you're talking about probably that's a good operation

$3 million of $4 million at $20 million of revenue there's something there it's not like they're trying to figure it out Right. No, no. I I would just say like if I didn't feel good about the data in which they were managing, there's no point to talk to the people. But then I say,

could I make a ton of impact in this business because these people are capable and they've got the data to to know.

Well, they got it up to $20 million, right? So, there's something there. There's something to work there.

Um, now you tell me to walk into a five four million company, that's one man driving that whole business. It's

not fun. It's not fun. So, a and there's more opportunities. You know, I'll say this about Ken Goodriches cuz he'll say this to your face.

He buys broken businesses and fixes them all the time. But I don't want that. I don't have time. It's a lot of headache.

I think there's a lot of money there. Just like in real estate, you can go section 8 housing.

Exactly. And you're It's exactly how I look at it. It's a lot of work. I rather go and look at a a $10 million house that needs a little bit of work and, you know, put a little bit of investment behind it and make it be worth 1520$20 million overnight than get a million dollar house and dump another million and still be 23 million.

It's like how much is your time worth? And you know, but Ken's Ken's done some cool stuff. Um,

I think we all got our little I think we all got our little things that makes us special, Tommy. I think what like what what I what I love being around you and and and AG and all these guys that everybody has their own little thing that we're all that that we're all learning from. You know what I'm saying?

I think you're good at your your number one thing is recruiting. Yeah, bro. I'm relentless. I'm relentless.

And really when when you thought about it, you built it and you said this based on what Leland did is you just take his top guys, you plucked them one by one.

That's it. And then you built a good business off of that. One thing you did do as well with Andrew is you spent money on leads.

And so you were good at recruiting, but you had enough leads for them. You can't get great people. Victor Rancor talks about this. He goes, "I I left Service Champions. I was promised equity. They gave me equity. They gave me way more money, better commission, but I didn't even know my stats. Like there was no team there. It was like I was the guy. There was like three other dudes, but like there was no infrastructure. Like there was no meetings. Yep.

There was no rahrh. There was no dealers coming and feeding you, getting you excited.

I can't I can't I don't care how profitable and how um dope the operation is, Tommy. To me, there has to be some kind of like competitiveness inside the operation. There has to be some, you know, hey, you know, bonuses and and just if you if you would see the way I drive the these businesses from home comfort next to now, I drive them exactly the same way, bro. We are a salesdriven organization. And I don't care if it's an air conditioning, a garage door, a thermostat, or a toilet. You know what I'm saying? We are a salesdriven organization. Obviously, I I' I've said it before. You cannot move from the most important thing, which is marketing. After you master marketing, marketing is the first step in the operation. After you master marketing, you could and you could lead generate on a snap of a finger and you you know, you you got your message out there of who you are. After you do that, then you

move on to the second step, which is the sales process. And and you don't move on from the sales process to the operation process until you master the sales. And this is where all the $5 million operations get it wrong. They they they they think that they're working on something all the time. They're always working on something all the time, but they're not doing anything, though. They're busy, but they're not productive. They're busy, but they're not intentional. They're busy, but they're not, you know, moving the needle forward. And that's where that's where I think they get it wrong.

to to me it's it's hey it's there there's three different operations to growing any freaking business I don't care what it is there's three different departments there's a marketing department there's a sales department and there's operation department the operation department is the customer fulfillment what happens when the sale goes through to when we collect a check that's what I call the operation right anybody could dude you know what you know you know what I found out any all these four five 10 15$20 million guys are exceptional operators they freaking suck at marketing and sales, bro. They suck at marketing and sales.

That's all I live for. Marketing and sales. Make the phones ring. Do you know what your Do you know what your superpower is?

What? I think you're probably one of the dopest marketers in the world. It's marketing. Get the phone to ring off the hook. We We generate 34,000 inbound calls a month.

That is insane, bro. Yeah. And I think I'm just getting started. And 34,000 leads in a month. Let me tell let me put this into you guys into into perspective. You guys are probably going to generate 34,000 leads in your whole lifetime. Tommy's doing that [ __ ] in a month. Just to give you guys the perspective of how like his superpower and and but correct me if I'm wrong. I know you're super operational. You're super methodical with numbers. You you know, you're very data driven, but I think your superpower and mo what most people underrate you is you're you're a marketing genius, bro. That's what you are. You're a marketing genius from the way you carry A1, from the way you lead generate A1, from the way you present A1, right? I I think you do okay in sales and operation and that's why you know you have amazing people like Luke and all these guys behind you.

Yeah. But I think your superpower is you can Well, I understand the funnel here. Here's what I want people to think about and this is where me and Luke,

we got a healthy relationship that I could kind of combat with him a lot. Yep. And I said, "Luke, let's just do some quick math here. We've worked really hard to get to 90% booking." 90%. Now, we're in 40 markets.

True 90%, by the way. Not like you're [ __ ] Yeah. No, it's it's 90%. But here's the problem. 14% cancellations. And that's just because, you know, we had 62 guys training capacity planning. I think we could get that down to seven. But so, so I'm losing 10% out of the gate, right? Because I'm a 90. Then I'm losing 14. So, I got 10.

And those cancellations on the 14%, is it because you can't get there fast enough? Because

Yeah. So, I've analyzed the hell out of it. How booked out do you stay before you answer? How booked out do you stay all year round?

Oh, yeah. It's We don't have any seasons. So, that's in the colder climates, uh, installs goes down quite a bit. But, I I I don't have a month that's ever going to be less than the last month. Unless it's all we do is say, "How many Monday through Fridays do we have?" The month that we kill it, we got 23. The month that we don't, we got 19. Even though we're open Saturday,

you know what? I would like to see you operate Yeah. an air conditioning business.

I'm telling you right now, dude. I would love to see because look at the one thing you mastered is marketing, operations, sales, all that, right? You're you're phenomenal at that. the the seasonality. Tommy, let me let me give you the imp the the influx of seasonality.

We have to sell service agreements. $15 million. This is at peak at Nation, right? We did $15.1 million in our top month. In our low month, we were like at

6.2. So that $9 million fluctuation is what drives people nuts. Why nobody can and look, service agreements do do help a lot.

It's tough. It is tough the seasonality. So I asked Keegan, I said, "You're the only guy I know that's run lots of millions of IBIDA through garage doors and lots of millions through an air conditioning company." I said, "Honest to God, I'm in his office. We're doing an interview. You were there." And I said, "HVAC or garage doors?"

Hrack all day long. He goes, "Mean tough? What's tougher?" No. No. He goes, "If if I'm going to do something, my non-competes over." He goes, "I'd rather do Hrack all day because it's such a big ticket." Yeah.

He goes, I can get 20 25 grand from a home garage doors. I could get six or seven and that's a new sale.

But but look at you're not used to seasonality and you're not you look at you want me to tell you what you're not used to though. One thing that you're not used to that you probably never thought about.

What? Turn turnover. Your turnover rate on employees [ __ ] skyrocket in seasonality.

I'm at 35% turnover of in your first year. No, I was at 45%. You're way lower than that.

But check this out. So you're losing 10%. So Luke, you're losing 10% in the call center.

14% cancellation rate. Study the cancellation rate. And all these cancellations are due to one thing. Customer resolve themsself. Customer found somebody quicker. Nobody resolved it themselves. They just called somebody quicker. So it's all about getting out there to these demand driven.

So I go, wait a minute. 10% plus 14% and then conversion rate. That's when you're face to face.

We're at blended 74%. So that means we're losing 26%. Let me ask you a question on that blended 74%. Do you include the $88 complimentary tuneups or whatever you guys charge?

We we don't consider a conversion unless it's 125 bucks. I would consider in HVAC guys in HVAC plumbing electrical I would consider a true conversion 500 bucks and up. 500 bucks and up is a true conversion to me. Why? Because it already costed you two 300 bucks in there. It already cost you another two 300 bucks to get the lead like the labor behind all that. So, if you are not producing 500 bucks inside that house, I believe you're losing money on every single one of these.

You You do as a We look at I've my scorecards are really really good. But, you know, a good guy will do about $1,500 average ticket. That's blended.

Uh I got guys that are doing four grand, but if I'm losing 10% plus 14% plus 26%, that's 50%. That's half of my leads. I'm not earning their business.

I know. So, don't ever say it's a marketing problem. the operations wants to go and say it's a marketing problem

and they're like we need more leads. I'm like well let's get rid of these cancellations. Let's get rid of these people not booking because the worst one on lace that I see pop up is um that the service times didn't work like we didn't you know found somebody. Yeah. It's like

so so you look at that. So I believe we could get to 94% no no no 94% booking on the on the contact center. Okay.

I believe we could get the cancellation rate down from 14 to 7. And I believe we could get our conversion rate from 73% to 80%.

Do you think you're always going to but you're always going to be at 14% because of hey, I'm going to add more. I'm going to add more staff, but I'm going to increase marketing and then it's going to keep go. You're going to keep chasing your tail on that. Do you think you're going to

So, here's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to spend as much possible money as I possibly could

and still have a staff to where I've got to do outbound that day. So 20% of my volume in that market will be on my my list. So I can pick up the 20%. But here's the deal. Same day call out.

That's what I was going to say. I'm okay. Now I'm down. I only need to fill 10% of the board.

I got a guy that his daughter just got sick. She she he needs to go pick her up. Y

the [ __ ] happens. Y So it seems like something always happens. Guy got on a fender bend or something. So, I want to have all my inbound to where it's 80% 70% certain markets, 90% certain markets depending. We're building out a whole tool.

I've got a company building the most advanced capacity planning tool. Then you staff up and you overstaff

and then you got to do outbound. Okay. And that's the way you do outbound right now.

We we use a third party. We use Jack from Elite. Um for my for the H track guy for H at track electrical plumbing time. We live on ABBA like

that's an important and this is where this is one of some of these air conditioning guys miss it and plumbing and electric guys miss it. You guys when it's shoulder season and there's not enough leads on the board. You're freaking hammering your customer base all day long. You're you're hitting them with direct mail. You're hitting more with email blast ringless voicemail text messages. You're hitting them with outbound.

This is this is one thing that Leland said that really stuck out. He goes, "I start over today. the only thing I'm doing drag

focusing on ser service agreements. Y he goes service agreements is the lifeblood when there's no weather.

Yep. That's his that like no one's really I don't know a lot of companies and stuff like that. You pulled it off.

Yeah. Um and Leland's just every single year 22%. I think I think I pulled it off because of my growth. If I would have had a slower growth, I would have lost more people and I would have I wouldn't have done what we did. We were just growing so freaking fast. Right. But you invested in things that very few companies will invest in. Like you guys did the baseball stadium,

the billboards, and you did a lot of billboards. And you kept it clean. Yep. And I remember showing up at your shop and you were laughing. You're like, you got like 18 guys doing the lettering on your trucks everywhere in your parking lot. You're like, I just added 20 trucks. And then you got two Raptors sitting over there cuz I think you won some from Service Titan.

Yep. Yep. I gave them to my general to my general manager and my office manager. So, what what what did you get? Cuz you what was the contest? Whoever could get service time the most

clients. I just kept giving them referrals. People kept coming up to me touring my shop and I would show them how service time would benefit the business and they just kept they gave me a Corvette. They gave me three Raptors. They gave me money. Like they just they just went above and beyond for me. But I honestly I grabbed all that and I gave it away. I never never really stayed with it anyway. Let me let me go let me ask you another question. Um this is something I've been studying a lot of. So you just sold NextG. Today's the day the wire hits.

Yep. Uh I think this is important cuz a lot of people are probably going to exit in the next few years,

which I hope you guys do. By the way, what's the best adi? I'll give you just a few things. Number one,

buy a nice car. Yes. Buy your dream home. Go on a dream vacation. Y but keep I didn't do the dream vacation. I did the the

keep keep the money though for a while because it there's a lot of opportunities day one, but if you wait for a year,

deals find you like so many good opportunities. So, what what else would you say? Cuz nobody's there for you when the money comes.

Um, look, when I had the wire come into me, um, I did something that most people wouldn't have done. I had I think I have like seven seven commercial buildings anywhere from 10,000 to 54,000 ft that I leased out back to Wrench. Um, so I had seven buildings. I had a like I have like nine houses that that I had. So, like when that money came in to me, I went and bought, you know, a watch and a car and like all the nonsense that that that I wanted to get off my chest, but then I paid down all my debt on my real estate, which looking back was pretty dumb because I could have grabbed that money and I put it, you know, stocks, bonds, and it would have created some some pretty good return. Yeah. But I've sold I've sold I think two of my commercial real estate buildings and I made between just the two a little bit over 3.1 mil on them and you know and I only kept them a couple years. So I've done good in that and I and I shouldn't

have paid down because now that I had if I would have had that access to all that cash right now then I could have bought a business here. I could have bought a business I could have I could have done the Tommy Melo just [ __ ] owns. Well, the thing is with me is like

you own half of the industry now. Tommy, I've burned a lot of I've got all mine sitting in the market and it's killing it. It's doing very very well. And you know Joe,

course Joe does good for me. Uh he just got me the Ax. He gave me the AX black card. He just got it. He figured it out. And I'm like, do I want to pay for this? It's only five grand a year and you get all this access.

Yep. Um what else was I going to tell you? Well, what else would you Okay, now that I answered that, I think I would have kept a little bit more cash to have a little bit more liquidity to be able to step on these huge opportunities because I bought into some dope ass businesses.

There's some deals and that's one thing is on this next on this next deal, uh, you're on my list of just people I want to do business with because you're a hustler.

Thank you. And I probably got a list of like 25 people that like I've got an I've got a plan to like really really

who who what business gets you excited besides AI? I know you're going to say that, but what business?

I like software a lot because it's revenue. It's annual reoccurring revenue. And I like home service and I'm starting to like home improvement, but the multiples aren't there cuz it's not demand driven. So the multiples are half of what they are in home service.

So there's 20. So I like roofing a lot. I like water restoration a lot a lot because I think Edward did Edward did amazing stuff, dude. I mean, those guys did well in California.

Are they Are you guys going to uh they got the 10 million eBay. Are you guys going to turn this year?

Um they're working on it. Um it's not my place, but uh he's done they've done it. Adigar and Edward did exceptionally well. Um but here's one thing that I am working on on the next deal. Uh the PE company doesn't care at all about the real estate. In fact, this ne the big the bigger PE companies, I'm going to go tell them I'm going to buy a building in every market that has substantial IBIDA and it's got to be 20

20 plus buildings. And I'm going to put 10ear leases minimum on them. That's fine.

And then you sell this portfolio. It's worth 50% with the 10-year lease. Yeah. And it's on a triple net. And so let's say my average building I go out and buy 20 is $5 million. That's hundred million. It's worth $150 million the day I put them all together. Then there's a PE company, not the PE companies we work with, their real estate. All they're shooting for is 10 12% return on investment IR internal rate of return.

So they're happy. It's slow money, but you know, the rent goes up every year and we're happy cuz they're really good properties and we we do tenant improvements and everything, but you make 50%. So just by doing that,

just by stacking them up. 50 million bucks. God, bro. And I'm doing a favor for A1

cuz I'm getting the best locations. True. So, and it's not like you're going to take advantage of on the lease. You're going to give it to them at whatever market cost and they got to sign off on this, but that's day one. And here's the cool thing. You might say, "Hey, he made 50% on 100 million."

No, because there's hundreds of millions in the bank. I'm getting loan 90 to 10. So I I literally spent $10 million, paid a little bit of interest along the way the first year.

So on the 10 million on the 10 million I made 50 and you could grab that 90 back.

Oh yeah. So the banks because the banks they look at this and they go, "Well, you got hundreds and hundreds and hundreds over here. We're good. You're not going to default." So they'll give me all the money I freaking want for that. So that's that's

Where'd you learn this from? Cardona or that other Pace guy? Who you know? Yeah, I like Pace Morby a lot, but

he's cool, man. But I I don't know who told me and they're like but it needs to be a portfolio. So CBRE and then I started using CHBT and they're like it if you can get 20 year leases

now you got 10 year yeah 10 years are great. I mean it's very very very safe. That's what's so cool about real estate. Now Pace is a genius. Cardone is really good too. You know I will say like you got to respect all these people.

I do. You know what? I seen the video when him and Cardone are are talking about what you seen that video and Cardone just like what the [ __ ] Like

I said that to Matt and Jacob and Eric. Yeah. And then I text Pace in the text and I said I need you to give us just a one day class.

He's like, "Dude, that that was probably one of the dopest videos I've seen them do." Cardone's just like, "What? I feel like I've been doing this [ __ ] wrong my whole life."

Well, Hannah told me that. That's a smart girl, too, bro. She's she's like there's some laws passing that make it harder to do the creative financing.

So that but he's a very creative guy. I know he is. And me I'm like wait a minute

like what if we went to like the Brian Collins of the world like all those bankers we we know Eric and Rob

I say bring us deal flow like there's a lot of deals that they're like they're not even big enough yet.

You're about to open up the floodgates for you. Huh? Well look you got to have a system. It's got to be here's one thing that you should think about like is it Linux? is at Goodman and I know you might change depending on who it is. Who's the finance company service type the the exact same playbook the data the the exact same APIs you're going to are you going to use trip you going to use lace you going to use a voca like whatever you're using bam because all the companies you negotiate that that's the thing is you pay less y

and that's one thing Ken Haynes you know I know this I mean these guys said we're going to start buying together

so Parker is going to buy what they buy in Atlanta when and by buying together they're going to save like $40 million of eBay

bro trust me. I've been I was I was the number one person knocking on Ken Haynes door telling him, "Bro, we're not taking advantage of our size. You can go to Dykin, you could go to Linux, you could go to all these finance companies and leverage our size and put so much money on the bottom line just by leveraging it

so much." And then the way you buy insurance, the way you buy your trucks. I know that's the way you do it, right?

Yeah. I buy the same trucks in every market, the same exact tool set. That's what I'm saying.

Uh everything is the same throughout the whole company. I only need one CFO too. That's one thing. Like I think Wrench is a genius company and they've done extremely extremely well. And their answer was, "Well, we buy great companies and leave them like they are." And I'm like, "But then you got a CFO in every market."

Yeah. I got one CFO and then all those CFOs there's friction between them and like you get one CFO, one COO

and one COO could run 100 markets. So I think Frank's doing a killer job, bro. I think they're about to

I've heard some rumblings. Hopefully hopefully there's a press release any day now. By the time this comes out, might have already been announced

hopefully because we need these uh portfolios to start turning. Um you know what I do want to talk to you about though uh Tommy that I that I don't think a lot of people notice this and because you know their EQ is a little low or they're just you know living. Look what happened at NextGen bro was the perfect timing to what's happening right now. Look, so in 2018 161 17 18 when we were barely starting NextGen um the blue dots and all those guys and the ARS's were coming into our industry and they were trying to you know do what they're doing right now and they pissed off a lot of managers bro they pissed off a lot of C uh seues and highle managers high level sales guys and everything so I came in as a fresh face into the industry with this you know nextg 494 4,995 does it all and everybody was talking [ __ ] on me how could you be selling systems for 5,000.

You're crazy. You're going to go out of business. All I was doing was stacking labor, bro. Because labor, you can't do nothing without labor, right? So, that happened in 2016 17 around there where every dude, I had access to people because I was the fresh face and I was advertising. I was being aggressive with with my recruitment. I had access to people that I would never have access to ever in my life. Some of the, you know, $5 million guys and $3 million technicians and all these guys because PE was pissing them off. Well, the same thing's going on right now. And this is why I tell all my my $5 million companies, you guys are in the best place of your life right now. You guys are in the best. You guys are going to have access to NextG people, which look, you know, unfortunately NextGen went backwards, right? And they let go of like six or seven of the highest drivers in there. Now they're starting

still there. Who? Daniel. No. So now they're starting their own little companies and they're starting like they're doing their own little look. So, what I'm what I'm getting to you, if you're a $5 million company or you're a $10 million company, you want to get to 25, 30, 40, 50 people. The people that need that are going to take you to those milestones, you have access to them right now. I promise you guys, if I was at NextGen right now, you guys would have zero access to my people. They would laugh at you guys when you guys would try to give them more money or equity in your company or whatever it is. So, take advantage of what it is.

This is the greatest opportunity in home service industry. Not just because look at and I call this the perfect timing. Private equity making mistakes. You have, you know, the industry being dis discombobulated like this is the perfect freaking time to grab those people, put them in a team and let that and and and let them and and cruise into 25.

There's a lot of other things going on. People don't know this, a lot of people, but PE borrows money and is the coolest thing in the world. Ishmail, what I really

that that is what I need to learn from you, by the way. So, I hope to have a good conversation with you later on.

This is crazy. Listen, the PE company borrows money. Yep. Against my IBIDA. Yep.

Yes. They put in some hard money, too. But they borrow the money, then I'm responsible for the payments. Every time they fly out, who do you think's paying for their flights?

What about their hotels? What about dinner? So although they're amazing and I made all the right moves,

I I remember when Ken Goodidge called called me about He goes, "Tommy, you you're probably one of the better guys I've ever seen at this trade. It's just home service." He goes, "But you don't know what they know." He goes, "You learn how they raise capital. You learn about their LPs. You start going to their meetings. You understand exactly how the formulas work. And now I understand all this stuff." And I'm going, "Wait a minute. There's a great big company that's went out of business. It was uh Renovo. And Renovo had all these home improvement, kitchen remodel, bathroom remodels.

They were making a ton of money. But guess what? Their debt payments were too high cuz they took six times leverage. So let's say you're a $30 million company.

IBIDA. Yep. I could take on that 30 million. The bank will give me 6x. So I could borrow 180.

Okay. But now that company that I bought into is responsible for the payments on $180 million of debt

and the interest too. Well, the interest is what kills you, right? So, dude, I'm like that's what happened is Black Rockck was their lender and they're like they just shut down. So, when you sell your business, be careful.

Of course. Now, debt is a great thing because debt cuz I rolled 50%. So, the debt actually makes the numbers way better if it's done right. But you got to be able to grow, too. Those first couple years are critical to get the massive growth. So, this is the hardest thing about private equity is they're going to put debt on your business. So, if me and you went to go buy businesses, I'll give you an example. We were at the suite. Yes. Yesterday, and it was on uh might have been Friday. Yeah. Friday.

And I look over and my buddy Tony's at the booth next to us. And he goes, "Yeah, I'm the president of this bank now." And Eric walks up and he goes, "Dude, you know that guy?" I'm like, "Yeah, I've known him for 15 years." He goes, "He'll loan us all day long at 2x." So you go into a business that's doing 5 million of

you give you 10. They'll give you 10 out of the gate. But now this company, call it ABC HVAC company, is responsible for that debt. So that's how these multiples come up because they take on more debt.

Is it always is it always good to take on that much debt? Let I don't think so. I I think

what's a healthy debt that you want to be when you're when you're acquiring these businesses. Let's say they're doing $5 million of IBIDA.

Well Well, the more IBIDA they're doing, the more the the more debt you want to take because at a certain point it's more expected. Like if you looked at our financials, you'd understand that we've never had a down month or a down quarter. And what that tells you is we don't really have a lot of uh we don't have Home Depot

because if we lost Home Depot, let's say that was 20%. Yeah, that's a big area of concern. Let's say we had a huge contract with Costco.

Now, those are great contracts to have, but let's say Costco says, "Hey, we're taking you out. We got a better all of a sudden." I know.

So, that's why having a lot of different clients and a massive database and a lot of different markets.

Let's say there's right now in Florida, there's a massive crisis going on there. Real estate's going backwards. And one of the biggest reasons, too, is that the houses are on uninsurable. Hurricane comes, like the insurance companies are charging so much freaking money. And Keegan lives there. He's like, "Dude, this market's upside down right now." Well, I'm in Florida, but that's only one market and we don't really feel it. You know, we're also in Detroit. We're also we're in Reno. We're in all over the

Is there a number that you look at, Tommy, when you open up like a Florida location, right? And let's say you're going to be that you have a three-year plan and you want to be at X amount on top and bottom. And and this is good for your listeners because this is one big huge mistakes that I believe a lot of contractors do is that they start their business, they you know they get a four or five employees, they grow it, but they're not making money. They're not and they keep holding on for dear life. Is there a certain amount of threshold time that you go like, "Okay, cool. If in three years we're not at X on top and bottom, how long do you hold it before you go like, okay, we got to shut that market down?" Well, my biggest thing is finding the right leader, but now we're a lot more analytical when we go into a market. But it takes

bigger companies with bigger average tickets could turn a company could turn a green field around 6 months to where it's profitable. Takes us 18 months.

Okay. But I don't want to have a popsicle stand. So, I'm putting in a lot of money into TV radio billboards, which you don't see a return on that.

I know. For over a year. I agree. I mean, Aaron's going through the same thing when he went into like Cleveland.

He's like, or Cincinnati. I'm going to spend a fortune and I'm not going to see an ROI for a long time, but then all of a sudden it seems like you were there for 10 years. You're buying credibility.

So, what's the threshold that you're looking for? Is it like a year? If if you're not training, if you if you didn't hit your goal,

I need to be able to hit I need to be able to hit a three to $4 million EBIT a company within 3 years.

And if you don't, how long do you hold it for? Well, I I guess the question is, did you go into the right markets? Because let me give you a good example. Um I'm never going to be able to get that much money out of a uh Tucson.

Amen. But it's so close to Phoenix and just like Northern Arizona. So if I go into an Atlanta, it's a lot different than me going into Savannah, Georgia.

Okay. Like Atlanta, Georgia is way bigger opportunity than Savannah. But Savannah's not that far away. So I go to Savannah if I could get So you got to look at the demographic. And Valpac, believe it or not, has some of the best data. No, Valpac's still doing good.

Okay. The the the head guy there of all the data was just in my office last week. The [ __ ] that they are able to do.

Got it. Um I got to show you because you can take your whole database and upload it into their thing. It'll tell you exactly who your ideal client is and how often it hit them.

Do you prefer Valpack over direct mail or do you think both of them? Yeah, both of them. Both of them do well, but my val pack.

So, so every single month I have a meeting with all of our vendors. Yep. For marketing. Yep.

And it's the same deck and I give them all the data and it's green, red, green, yellow, red or purple's really bad.

But how's our mailers doing? If they're in the green, I go, "What other can we put a double insert in? Is there more people we could hit here

or just keep it right?" And since I started doing these meetings, I mean, we've gone from 17% of revenue to 15% to 10. Like, Valpack's killing it for us.

But in certain markets, I'm not even hitting half the homes because guess what? I don't have the technicians writing the tickets there. Our conversion rate is not good yet. So, I tell the guys, listen, I'm not going to be able to get you a lot of leads until I tell I tell the managers all the time, I can't get you leads until you get the average ticket to this and the conversion rates are this.

Okay? And it's true. And I tell these guys, don't ever complain to me until you get the performance better. You got to have stronger one-on- ones, do more training, you got to recruit better because your market I can get more leads, but it's it's a return on ad spend.

I let me do another question back to back to um before you go do Valpack magazines, direct mail, what else is there? I call

PBC LSA. No, no, no, no, no. I'm saying hard um print. So magazines of Alpac and and Dragmail are like the trio of print, right? So before you do that, and this is for your for your listeners too, do you is is there a certain amount of of reviews? Their GMBB, their Yelp, their

Yeah. So what we do is we do friends and family for free for the first two weeks? Like we just opened up St. Louis.

Okay. Day one before we got got there because we did friends and family, we already got 65 reviews. Um,

when do you start dumping into Google? I I you start Google right away. Okay. And and

even though they don't have that many reviews. So, here's what I did. I I did exactly what you would think, what I thought to do is go in super light. Just focus on reviews, spend the first year, and then hit all the other stuff.

Okay. Then I found out from like a company like Groundworks, Matt Malone, they're doing like 280 million of IBIDA.

He goes in four months before they're even in that market and starts doing one ads. So people are hearing your name every day. A1 is hiring great people and you just make it like recruitment. It's all but people are hearing your name. A1 A1 A1 A1 A1.

And that's a lot of money to think about. You're spending four months worth of endorsements and radio and TV.

Y and you're not making a dime. You can't even run a call. But that's what it's going to cost cuz people will remember you. They'll be like, who's that company all the time that's hiring those awesome technicians?

But uh this is the biggest thing. the next company that's looking at us is going to say, "How good are they at green fields? How quick can they go take market share?" And if you build that playbook, that's worth more than gold. Because an acquisition is like, "I might be able to get a good acquisition." True.

But I can't plan it. Maybe. What I found though, when you go into a market like St. Louis and you're spending 300 grand a month,

now everybody's calling you saying, "I want to sell because you're going to freaking It's already expensive to market here and now you're spending this much. I see you on the bus stops. I hear your name every morning. Like, we don't want to go. So, now they're like, "How do we do a deal?"

Yep. And your competitors see you as like, "Hey, my employees are going to want to go work for you because you have

Oh, yeah. They they Well, hopefully they understand that I'm willing to lose money for the first 18 months.

Not only willing, you can too. Well, think about this. You know, just like Hack, the multiples are going up. Yeah.

So, my question is, you get a million dollar EBA at a company. What are you going to pick up? What's a fair price for a million dollars of Ebida? I know what they're getting an H. uh six to eight maybe

eight. Some people are paying 10. Yeah. So, so the question is on $8 million for that million dollar of IBIDA,

you're paying eight. Yep. Could I go into there and spend $8 million if I could spend five and get the same reaction?

You're right. I I'm way better off. Yep. Because now I'm building it with my same culture. And then you Here's the other trick. Pay your top guys 150 grand a move. Get them to move. You got to get your top guys to move to a market and that's an

adback all the all the things you've been through right now, right? You um the green filling the the acquisitions because you're doing both. What do you enjoy the most and which one's giving you the best return?

Yeah, green field's been difficult but it gets better and better and better. You enjoy the green field? I I would dude I would I love to start from nothing and go on.

I you know I've bought some really cool companies like Cody Johnson. You know, Cody,

like, dude, that guy's the hardest worker. Him and his brother Ryan, you're never like, I've never seen that because they're just great. And then Dons's, the guy had been marketing there for 32 years

on the radio. Like, but they had an average ticket of like $400. So, we go in there, and this is what's so cool about knowing your numbers

is I'm like, well, their booking rate's 78%. We're 90, so they just picked up 12% there. Their conversion rate, they're not working nights or weekends. They're running four calls. They're running like seven calls a day. I'm running three a day. So I cut I cut their jobs in half. So now they could take the time. So my conversion rates up. My average ticket goes up. So let's say you paid 8x for them. The effective multiple two by time you fix these things. And people don't realize that. I'm like all that I care about is these numbers.

Did you Okay, slow it down for them because I want them to really get that substance that you just said. Look at

you're running six to seven calls a day and then you're wondering why your ticket is $300 to $400. Okay.

Yeah. It's wham bam. Thank you, man. They're waiting for that easy customer. They're waiting for the easy one.

The best guys I know, they go to those hard clients and they take the time. And I say this, if your average job's an hour and a half, I'd like you to get to three and a half hours.

And it's just the time. I don't know. The people feel better about spending the money when you're there for 4 hours with them.

Look at people ask us how we how we were carrying a $21,000 average ticket at Wrench.

We go in there for three hours with a certified technician, good-looking, knows how to communicate, knows how to work on those units. He's in there for 3 hours. Okay. Project man, if when the customers ask the right question, uh, a project manager or comfort adviser will go in there for another 3 to four hours.

Yep. Another 3 to four hours to educate the client on different options of why they should replace their systems and, you know, make all these headaches.

And they get to know the clients. They see who's sleeping in the rooms. They look for inhalers. They look for air quality. They're looking at. They got to get to know the people, diagnose the person before the problem. Five, six hours we're inside that home and we come out with 20 $25,000 tickets. You guys, I've mentored hundreds and hundreds of you guys. And the first thing I ask you, tell me what the technicians do every day. Oh, you know, we got calls when it gets busy. We're running 7 8 9 10 calls. They're running Saturdays and Sundays.

And I'm like, "So, how do you expect to build any kind of trust, any kind of value when you present a 20, $30,000 average ticket when you've been there for 45 minutes?"

The other thing is that I look at is how long did it take you to start that first estimate. So, I do garage doors are a lot different because a lot of my revenue comes from straight repair.

Okay? I don't need It would be great to get a million turnovers, but our gross profit on service is way higher. the the dollar amounts are not enough,

but just cuz the material. And I had all these technicians a couple weeks ago. They're like, "All we do is talk about turnovers now."

And I'm like, they're like, "We used to be a service company. Now you just want us to sell new doors." And I said,

"Well, I was a technician for a long time. I run a lot of calls personally in the client's home."

Do you think it's not right to mention it when it's a 20-year-old door and it's falling apart and the styles are coming undone? It's not insulated, the paint's oxidized, the trim's messed up.

You're going to make a lot of money on a service call, but it's the right If it were your mother, would you at least say, "Have you ever thought about a new door?"

One of the biggest mistakes that I see contractors do, taught me, and their technicians do, and their project managers do, is that they do the shopping for the client. They do the shopping for the client. They get in there and they're like, "Oh, but the capacitor is $390 for us to and and I'll get your AC." It's like, okay, did you guys give them options on replacing the a hard start kit, a capacitor circles, a coil cleaning, something like you guys cannot listen to me. You guys cannot ever ever do the the shopping for your client. That's not what you're there for. Your job as a technician or a project manager is to present three to four different options to make sure that you educate them and and let them let them

mantle. We just started with Mantle and it's this thing that basically it's software that allows the client to kind of do their own shopping. They scroll through the and this guy called me, one of my product specialists. He's like, "Dude," he's like, "There was no way I was selling a threestar. They saw the difference of the price because

they went with the four star. They went with the fivestar and then they added windows."

There you go. And the crazy thing is with Mantle, just starting out with it a couple

sales presentation. Is that what it is? Sales presentation tool. So the first page it shows you all the work we've done in that neighborhood

like and it shows you little Tommy characters. So you see like this we've done work for all your neighbors. Okay.

Then the next page is a video from me and the next page it shows you what you need and then you could add subtract. But here's the cool thing. Mantle adds in my dealer fees.

Do you own Mantle by the way? No. Okay guys, we're going to draw because you should see how many freaking uh links we get on our group of like what's sales representation? Why service sign sucks and

well let's just say I I think Mantle is great for $10 million plus companies. That's right.

And what I got to tell you guys is my conversion rate went from 55% on turnovers to 68.5% and the average ticket's up $1,500. But no, Zach's a beast and and Aaron brought him to me and they were like, "We didn't make this for garage doors." And he he for 90 days made it

person on my group because that's a wonder. You'll dig this, dude. And Zach's a really smart guy. I mean, these guys like it made a large impact in my company. And now we're rolling it out to Dons's a garage door and the companies underneath. And I'm like, man, this alone who increase

that alone could bring in an extra $20 million of IBIDA because here's the deal. It's eating my dealer fees. So now I can start marketing, pay nothing till 2029. But the

the client's paying the fee for the the dealer fee. Of course, it's built into it and it's legal. You got to show them and say if you want this one, but it's just a small monthly number. So now like the cool thing about a garage door is I could do it for 20 years. 20 years.

Is that one thing that you um wish the your your team and your and your um and just your industry in general did better better? The financing?

I know, dude. We're not good as a company. I mean, look, right now, last year, we're 17% of our revenue came from financing. I'd like this year Luke's goal is 30 to 35%.

I think we're 64%. Yeah, that's a route. That's probably the right number. Yeah. 64%. Was that next year?

These bigger tickets people want to use the financing. Yeah. So, what could you imagine what it would do if you finance half of your And this is for your garage door people because garage door people and electricians, Tommy, suck at financing.

They don't they don't even suck at financing. And the thing is, if you just show them the price,

that's all you need to do. Stop talking 20 stop talking 510 15,000 and start talking for as low as 80, for as low as 90, for as low as $100, we could replace your garage door. And guess what? You you you it brings this warranty and peace of mind and and and you never have to worry about it. So,

I like the idea. So, my buddy Rob that was just out, he goes, "You're going to spend the money anyway. They're anyway dollars right now. Do you know how much air conditioning you're losing in the summer just out of this garage?" I believe you.

And if you add in the installation% 20%, let's say it's 30%, your bill is three 300 bucks. That's 100 bucks a month. It's the same monthly payment of what we're going to save.

By the way, the garage door seven years in a row, Remodel Magazine, the number one. So, you never say the cost, you say this is the investment. And then I show them right now we're building this health monitor. It basically is like it's not your it's not new. It's we go through all these questions and it says you've got two more years left on this store. The lifetime.

So it's like your tires on your car. We've learned it from discount tire. So you could we could bandaid this and make it work for the next couple years.

And then it shows you your Zillow price of your home today and after the door. Can Let me ask you a question. Um and I don't want to miss this one. Do you you you said something about um repairs right now. Dude, I don't want to miss it. I don't want to miss it. Um Oh, do you credit then? And this is what we do.

Yeah. No. So, I'll give you So, here's the deal. You get it up to $1,000 most of the time. We'll say

we No, what I'll do is I'll say cuz I want to build urgency. I want to say today and today only. Either we're going to brace it or replace it. I'm working on your door, Mr. Ishmamail.

Okay. Do you want me to fix this thing 100% or what if I took the money we just spent and I'm able to work with my product specialist and apply some of this towards a new door?

Well, what we do and I I I agree with how you're doing it to build the urgency. What we do in the lecture and and this is for the listeners too because most of you guys aren't doing this and then you guys are wondering why there's no urgency behind your calls. So, I think we give a three-month or sixmonth ad. We used to give it, but I'm I'm I'm sure they still do. So, hey, as long as you know in the next 6 months you call us back and I know you're about to invest $1,500 into this air conditioning and we you know we we

smart we always tell them, hey, if if in the six if the in the next 6 months you change your mind and you say, hey, you know what, is I've been thinking about it. You know, those $1,500, it's a seven-year-old unit. I know I could still go on with it with this for three, four, five more years. I thought about it. Yeah, let's go ahead and do it. Come back. I I want a new air conditioning so I could get those $1,500. always offer and and and and the the don't go a year, don't go four years, don't go 5 years. Don't do that [ __ ] It should be 3 to 6 months. You can always call back and get your money back applied to a purchase of a replacement system or in plumbing to a replacement of a repipe, a tankless water heater, water filtration, electricians to your, you know, your panels and all that. You're you're replacing breakers inside those panels and you're charging the customer $45 $500. Hey, by the way, what really needs

to happen here is this electrical panel needs to be upgraded and you really need to, you know, get it permit and all that.

Yeah. I think I think if you had a great mailer that went out, let's call it Amen.

the three in 6 months, let's say final offer. Yep. And we just got this new program through our finance company,

and you offer the best one. If you could do a handwritten letter that they open up with the hand cuz that, you know, gets open. I can get those now for like a buck 50.

Amen. So, it's a handwritten card. Same. and it says, "We could take the $1,500 off of your repair." And you could programmatically build this with an API, so it's not a human being. Yes, you can.

And it's an envelope. It shows up, you know, personalized letter. It's going to get read. It's got a normal stamp on it.

It's got a return address on it. It's got handwriting and it gets opened up and it says,

"We got this program. We could do this. By the way, it's 268% return on investment." I'd bet you 30% of the people would do it

all day long. But the problem is our our contractors aren't, you know, really good at direct mail or follow-up or putting these little implementations inside your operation like the buyback program or incentivizing the technicians to always bring that up inside the operation. Like all those little things, guys, is what you guys are missing and what's keeping you, you know, under the $10 million um u mark.

Let's talk about a couple more things here. So personal brand, you're you're one of the biggest things I think with this AI world is just build build your personal brand.

I've been going so hard and you're but but it's so important. It is I mean right now PayPal came out and said the personal brand of the CEO is important of the company itself.

Y for talent recruitment for clientele I I I everyone should be So everyone I'm working with a coach right now and do you know how much Alexi spent on his book launch?

No. 8 million. Jesus. So, I'm looking at how could I do that maybe 10 million on my book launch.

All I want to do is get my money back. I don't want to make money. I I don't want to make money on the book launch. I want to grow authority.

Your personal brand. Look, um I saw a statistic on uh uh also that said your personal brand is 20 times more effective than your company brand. Your personal brand is 20 times more effective than your company brand. And look at just to give you give you guys um why it why it it it resonated with me. Um, my following on Nuv page is like, you know, I don't know, like 5,000 people. My following on my Instagram and Facebook page is like over 250,000 people now. Like your personal brand is way more powerful. And everybody in the home service industry, listen to me because I've told this to you too. I told this to you. I've told this to Chad, to AG, which he still hasn't got his ass in there. But you guys, for the next 3 years, it's all put a freaking camera in front of you guys and just pretend it's not there because you will catch the most dopest moments.

You get it happening at work. I mean, that's what these guys are working on is like the in your natural habitat. And and I think it's super important and I think certain PE companies probably are like that's a waste.

You don't understand the deal flow, the connections, the learning that happens.

And this is where and this is where you connect the dots back to the company. Every single video that I post, what am I rocking? My new hat. My new

learn to I'll tell you this. I just had a really good meeting with a guy who's got tons and tons and tons of followers, like 700,000.

And I said, "Do you ever get caught up in the vanity metrics?" And he says all the time.

Yep. A and Rob Williams would say, Roy Williams would say, "Hey, you want to just get as many people as possible because they all have friends."

But I know this girl, she's making 200K a year. She's got 900 followers and it's all sold to those 900 people.

Is I want the right followers that trust me and know I'm giving them good information.

You know how I um how I measure my uh my uh my personal branding affecting my business? by the revenue spike when I'm putting the content out. So, meaning if I didn't have if I had all these followers, you know, 250,000 plus followers, if I had all those followers and Nuvet wasn't doing [ __ ] and we weren't closing deals and we weren't making, you know, uh uh we weren't increasing our MR, we weren't selling, dude, we sold $14.2 million of [ __ ] thermostats in our first year. If that wasn't happening, then I would stop the personal brand. But because I know how much it's affecting my my my actual baby new. Yeah. That's why I keep going so hard on it. That's why you always see me with my Nuvet hats. That's why you always see me talking about it because my the personal brand is feeding it. You said it be you said it uh best and this is what this is one thing I'll never forget. You told me uh you you marketed

for A1. How'd you say say? Yeah. So basically A1 built my reputation. There you go. That's what you said.

And then I'm rebuilt and now I'm doing it back the favors. Amen. And you know, A1's a beast,

bro. And that's why people are like, man, if A1's on this, it's got to be good. Like even even like the way I lease the vehicles or the finance companies. So now I'm able to negotiate for them because of how quick big we've got. But they're like, dude, you've been podcasting for a decade. Amen. You're writing books. You're talking on stages. You start doing that, getting comfortable with that, you become a secret weapon. I mean, you know, if we put our name on something that we believe in, it's going to do well because

of course, I've never really did anybody wrong. Like I just I talking about Mantle. I'm like it's a great software for the right person, but I don't have secrets. That's why when people come to my shop, I'm like this is everything we're doing.

I think that's one of the people that's one of the your um your things that that nobody really gives you enough credit for, Tom. How many people have been through your shop? When I when I was at Next, we had, you know, hundreds of contractors there. Every Thursday, we would have people come in and just tour the shop around for a day. And that's one thing you do for our industry. And I think that industry is always going to pay you back for that.

They do. And that's why, you know, guys like Aaron told me, "Try this, do this."

Half the stuff he tells me, I don't do it because we look at it and say, "We've already got software doing this."

But every once in a while, it doesn't need to be Aaron. It could be somebody. And I'll go,

I just told you 15% higher conversion rate, $1,500 more per ticket because somebody was willing to call me and say, "You've helped me out enough. I'm going to repay you the favor." You know what I think people do really wrong, Tom, that that they need to do a little bit better? Uhuh. They need to they need to start paying attention to those little golden nuggets that people drop because look, I'll give you one example. When I was when I was growing my social media following, um I was just doing 30 second, 30 second, you know, 90s quick.

And then I had a a meeting with Tai Lopez and he's like, "No, no, no, no. You're doing it wrong. You're doing it wrong. You got to [ __ ] start putting, you know, two, three minute content." And I just saw the [ __ ] spiked up. So yeah, you got to listen to people. You

know, that's why I got and my Ed my LS work with me. He's like, "Dude," he's like, "This is going to be fun."

And they're like, "You're doing it wrong." And so I'm just listening to the playbook, hiring the right people.

And then we're going to start treating the content like we do the business where how many people

watch this video and then you change it and you like I I must say we we haven't been running the social media like a business. Y

and now we are. Good. Um, so what's up with New? Good, man. So, you know, first year, $14.2 million. Um, ended it. I'm super proud of our team.

How many demos are you guys doing a day, bro? On a slow day. We're doing and and and look, it goes back to how salesoriented I am, okay? And how sales driven I am. Um, we're probably doing six to eight demos a day. Um, right now, for the last 45 days, knock on wood. Please keep letting letting it go through. We're closing about two to three deals every single day. But the one thing that we are is a [ __ ] sales machine, Tom. Like we have 25 some of these SAS companies that I talk to and I'm like, "Okay, how many SDRs you have?" Which, you know, are lead setters or how many AES, which are sales guys.

It's the same thing to contracting. And I always ask them, it's like, "Oh yeah, I got two SDRs and I got a couple AES." It's like, "No wonder you're stuck where you're at. Like, you need to turn on the [ __ ] gas, bro. My goal is to have 50 SDRs. Listen to me. 50 SDRs by Q2 of this year. and I want to have 15 AES running two two appointments every single day. If I get there that it took service time 14 years or 12 years to get there. I'm going to do that [ __ ] on.

So So are they just doing outbound outbounding? Yeah. Outbounding trade shows. So I'll try to bring around the trade shows too just so people could put a face on it. You know what's the one thing that I that's funny to me? When contractors see us at a home show, at a, you know, at a at a freedom event or at a Pantheon, the first thing that they come up to me and they say, "Ishmail, your people will not stop calling me." Yeah. You know why? Because they're incentivized. They're incentivized to call you.

Let me ask you something. So, a stat that I'm really would be interested in if I'm you running new

is I'd be looking at a graph of purchases by company and I expect those purchases to go up because

what I find the biggest mistake is people chasing people coming in the front door but don't realize the back door cuz what if you could get every single company to say I'm going to start including these on every service call

or I'm going to start including these on all every membership. My goal, my goal, Tom, and we're almost there. Um, in the next 90 days, we we're going to release our our our third version of of of version one, which is, knock on wood, we're going to be able to sell thermostats for $99, which would freaking open up the floodgates to contractor. That's what me and you talked about. I said, figure out a way to ever since you told me that, that $99 thing has stuck to me. contractors will give a $99 thermostat with their logo and all the and all the technology behind it to every single customer if I could give it to $99. You know what it's going to do to Honeywell and all those guys.

I told you forget about the EBID game and play the ARR game. I am because that's such a better deal that you've got the ability to play both.

Now, if you're not playing the EBID game in the beginning, it'll crush you because it costs a lot of money because you got to wait for the membership. Exactly. That's where you said,

"So now that I picked up the memberships, now I could decrease the the Yeah, because now you got this money coming in."

So So now it's kind of selffulfilling. The the next six months for new uh Tommy are probably going to be the most um insane months. My goal is to take new IPO by the end of next year. Um I've hired a badass CFO. I have my my serious

Where do you want to be in ARR? By the end of this year, I'll probably be 24 26 AR

this year. Then when for IPO, what do you want to get like 50 48 to 50? 40 48 to 50 uh mill of ARR and I

What do you think it's worth multiplewise? Have you talked to anybody? 48 to $50 million of uh of ARR. You're probably close to 800 750 because we also pick up on the on the thermostat, Tom.

So you're like 20x, you think? Probably lower than that. But we also make a ton of money on the thermostat, too. So we would like I tal I talked to Tom Howard. He's the one that told me this. Like we running 39% gross profit right now with our thermostat. Sophia, which is our version two with voice and monitoring, and it's just a sleek, round, beautiful thermostat. We're gonna sell it for 289 as a premium thermostat, and it's going to pick up about 11 points of 10 to 11 points of gross profit. My CF already calculated it. So, we're probably going to be running about 50% gross profit on our thermostats.

When you run a $99, is this going to blow? Oh my god, bro. Because look, I'm covering both bases. I have a $99 thermostat. I have $899 thermostat. And then I have a $289 thermostat. One is meant to give away, the other one's for memberships, and the other one's for new installs. Those are the three tiers I'm trying to give. Once we open up the floodgates to that, bro, we we we have Let me give you Let me tell you how exciting uh our version two is. We have almost $500,000 of pre-orders paid for already of people waiting for that thermostat. $500,000 $520,000 of pre-order thermostats of of of people waiting for that thermostat.

Here's something I think about. What if what if you did mailers and you said I did?

No. No. You did them for you. Yeah. For new and you sell for $99 we'll come to give you a tuneup. And then for every one of those you said if you sell if you

I'm just thinking it would cost you money. Let's say it cost you $50. And you just say, "Hey, all I'm asking for I got you a tuneup. I got you a tuneup."

Okay. I got you a tuneup. You got the thermostat and that's the lead. It's 99 bucks including the thermostat, but now you're in the door and all you got to do is you got to pay me

$100 cuz I just like you do all the marketing. But then you're actually in control of your own destiny.

Of course. Right now we're not. We're waiting for them to We're waiting for them to sell them. So now you say I'm going to give you these leads, you got to sell them.

Hey, for you know what would be better? If for x amount of thermostats, I'm going to dump x amount of money into your marketing budget in direct mail for free thermostats or for, you know, free tuneups or whatever. If you sell 100 thermostats, we'll dump whatever $5,000. Or if you

But what if you could generate 5,000 leads per market? Oh my god, bro. That's 5,000.

These contractors would love me, bro. These contractors would be loyal to our brand.

Oh yeah. Because this is what I've told you since the beginning. We're not a thermostat company.

But nobody's offering that 99 bucks with a new thermostat that I control from my phone. So if you drew up the right ad, you can even do social media ads. And if you can generate

if you can figure out that it cost you 50 bucks, but you're getting I I I'd have to look. I mean, your CFO can figure out how this could scale cuz obviously the more homes you're in.

Yep. How many are you guys in right now? 34,000 active units. We deployed about 78,000 units already. Our first year,

um we have a company called Topline Heating and Air Conditioning at Pennsylvania. And really, really good [ __ ] all social media ads. They were running tuneup. I mean, they were running free estimate ads and they were getting the regular conversion 15 20% on on on social media and then they started putting a a free thermostat on on their ads and it spiked like the their conversion like 15 20%.

Badass thermostat especially if you could say it's a smart thermostat so it's going to lower it's not going to be like like if you could prove that it saves a few hundred bucks a year. This is the the the the one proud statistic that I'm most proud of Nuvet and the technology that we have behind. We are generating between 6,800 to 7,000 logo clicks a month for our contractors. Meaning, listen to me, meaning those people would have been searching for you online because

Yeah. So, they're their clicks to book. Yes. 60 6,800 to 7,000 on these 34,000 units that are active right now. So we could already we could already predict what happens at 340 at 3.

That's the whole thing that New does. New we keep people away from Google. We keep people away from Google and online

book the call through the Yep. Just through the app through the app and the thermostat API. We just finalized our deal with with Service Titan. They're going to be able to dispatch a technician from the thermostat and the app. Meaning, hey Sophia, my uh water heater is not working. Can you send me a technician? It'll dispatch a technician from your voice all the way to your dispatch board without talking to a CSR. Hey Sophia, my AC, can you turn on my AC to 72 degrees? Hey Sophia, my AC doesn't seem to cool off. Can you send a technician? And it will give you the slots of, hey, today at 1:00 p.m., tomorrow at 3 p.m. And you click confirm, dispatches the technician without ever talking to a technician.

That is one technology that I'm super proud of. You can get that [ __ ] in Oh, we're done.

Million houses. Oh, it's done. It's game over. After five I talked I talked to Ara. He's like, "Look, Ishmael, between 500 to a thousand to 500,000 to a million units. Once you're that at that, you have

Yeah, it's Bro, you I like the $99, and I like starting to think about lead genen."

Yes. I I'll get on lead gen, but the $99 is already implemented. We'll have three different tiers. One at 99, one at $199, and one at $289.

Well, especially if you could get them the leads in the shoulder season. But, uh,

bro, imagine if we could give thermostats out for free later on, Tom, once we c once we cure the cash flow and once we, you know, we have enough subscriptions coming in where we're just like, "Hey, as long as you sign up for our membership, here's your thermostats. Install them everywhere."

Yeah. Know, if you can get them for free, that's what I've always talked about.

Now you're like, massive. It's game over. You know how many contractors would be like, "Fuck these Nest and Honeywell and Echobes. Let me take them off the wall and put my logo in there." Of course.

And it doesn't cost you anything. And it doesn't cost you anything. That's the main thing. So we'll get you keep up with that kind of production.

Oh, not right now. Not right now. But event by the time I $100,000 a week, bro. More. I was burning $812,000 last year. A month.

Yeah. That's that's that's the thing is that that's when you go to go to the right partner.

Yes. And say I just need a couple hundred million cuz we're going to give these out for free.

That So So you're going to come once I have the right partner. Once I have the right partner, Katam, it becomes that's where the IPO comes into place. So, I'm excited, man. Honestly, I'm excited about Nova. I'm excited. Thank you for partnering up with this. I don't think people know that you help tremendously. I I look I was the first guy that I was like, "You guys, this will work." I mean, I love Travis. I love Tom Howard, but I know you're just going to make the phone calls.

Oh, bro, I'm not I'm not I You know, you did. You found the right CTO and the right CFO with with those hires. That's what's going to make this thing sprint.

Yep. Yep. Um, how do people get a hold of you, Ishmail? Um, look, I have a a Facebook group called the NCU Contractor University where we just put content all day long, free content. Um, my Instagram is Ishma Valdez, CEO. My Facebook's Ishma Valdez CEO. I'm always, you know, I'm just like you. I'm always giving content for free. how to pay people, how to, you know, lead generate, how to bonus people, how to treat the how to, you know, construct the perfect customer experience. Like we we are so detailed in our in our content that we put on NCU that every single contractor, you go on our new home.com, you build a profile, and then you get access to hundreds of videos that we've done. I record everything, Tom.

Everything. If it's going to be a 30-minut Zoom meeting about financial, the Ellen Roar, put it on NCU. If it's going to be a we we just did one with Ara and we we talked about managers and recruitment and all that. Um everything that I do I record and I put on NCU and we label it. There's forms there's forms that nobody Dude, we have forms to write of people. We have we have our our employee handbook on NCU where people could just download it, take out the NextG logo and put their logo and and use it. It's California compliant, meaning you're [ __ ] compliant in the world. We have uh we have customer satisfaction sheets. We we we have everything on NCU. I want to build the first digital uh university for contractors where they could actually get educated because I know I know how bad it feels and I know how you know how bad it is to run an unprofitable business.

I think the biggest problem with most companies is they're the bottleneck. They don't have the talent and they don't have the data

all day long. All day long. And you know they they know just enough about the trade but they don't know anything about being

they're great operators, Tom. Most of them are mediocre. Sorry. They're they're they're okay operators. They're missing the most important thing, which is the marketing and sales, man. Marketing and sales is where the money is at. Marketing sales is where the golden the gold is is is at. You know what I'm saying?

Yeah, dude. You drive the right leads. But by the way, sales come from marketing to the right people. People always ask me, they're like, "How do you get clients pay that?" Like, I'm very careful on who I market to. I don't And I I'm not trying to be discount city,

you know? I don't want to attract those type of clients. Amen. Um, close us out, brother. Any final thoughts,

bro? Thank you for always having me on, Tom. Um you we have a a badass group of people. I mean between me, you, AG, Travis, Tom, you know, we call ourselves LSD. Like I believe we are probably one of the most uh impactful people inside our industry. And the best part about it all is that we're just willing to give it all for for free to our contractors.

Well, it's good, man, because I think Hoffman will do a deal here in the next year and a half.

Peterman's doing a deal. So at that point, we've got like seven of us that have all done deals.

Yep. And so what happens after that? That's gonna be start doing more deals together, but like it's billions and billions of dollars just between that small group.

I know. I know. So, I think I love working with you, brother. I want to do a lot more with you in the future, but uh we'll go out here and enjoy the party. All right. Let's go.

Thanks, brother. All right, man. Appreciate it.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "Marketing, Sales, Capacity Planning, and Scaling Home Services with Ismael Valdez"?

Ismael Valdez (Guest), Tommy Melo (Host).

What is "Marketing, Sales, Capacity Planning, and Scaling Home Services with Ismael Valdez" about?

A practical overview of evaluating a home services business for investment or growth, focusing on leadership, organizational health, and core operations. It emphasizes meeting top management (CMO, COO, GM), assessing the management system, and understanding daily flow and culture before making strategic decisions.

What is mentioned in this Home Service Expert episode?

42 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including marketing, Ishmael Valdez, Sales, HVAC, lead generation, Private Equity. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Marketing, Sales, Capacity Planning, and Scaling Home Services with Ismael Valdez"?

The episode runs 1 h 7 min; the transcript is about 15,050 words in 338 timestamped sections.

More from Home Service Expert

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated October 29, 2026.