So I get a call out of the blue today from a company that needs "a lot" of winterizations done soon. The guy says they are all in my area. I asked how much they pay and the guy says "well since I need them done soon I will pay more $34.00". I actually had him repeat the price 3 times and I think he was getting excited that I was talking to him.
Well after the 3rd time I told him to jump in his truck and get hopping himself. I told him good luck with those prices and to never even think of calling my number again.
I seem to be getting alot of offers from the private sector doing carpentry services (what I did before this finacial fiascal)....Makes it harder to swallow these national/regional service co's pricing.
I have a feeling alot of these properties will be left hanging....
THEN, when they can't find needed services the pendulum will swing back....Most of us that know what is up will be doing something else.
KNOWONE can work for free, that's what we have here.
a. These wints are $34.
b. Your covering Indiana and your still trying to do wints yourself?
c. You can find subs to do these and still make money?
I just had a guy at a property yesterday that was winterized by LPS in 09 and Safeguard in 2010 and a regional in 2011. The water was still on at the street and dripping thru a leaky interior shut off valve. The water heater had roughly two gallons left inside. That seemed to us to be a 15 minutes $34 wint. Just saying, Doberman....
Many of the assett companies we used to do wints for required that the system had to hold continued pressure for x amount of minutes. If I were sending a guy to bang out 6-8 wints at those prices per day, he isn't going to spend a lot of time at each one, chasing hidden leaks, itemizing and taking pics of specific damage for bids, etc. Things get missed. The return just doesn't justify the risk.
Shoot walking around and opening each valve up until it reaches a fine misty haze takes a good 10 minutes if not more, and THEN you add the anti-freeze. Granted p traps are cheap in comparison to broken lines, but nonetheless the a-f shouldn't be added until all fixtures are free and cleared.
These guys who say they can do a wint in 15 minutes straight DON'T GET IT. They are only setting themselves up for failure, but who am I to judge. Different strokes for different folks.
I have been doing them for years and never had one single issue. They don't all go that quick of course but some do. I swoop down on a property like a nascar pit crew.:thumbup:
To blow them out properly you need to hold 40-50# of pressure in the WH to get enough volume to blow to a mist. It takes my 9.4 CFM gas compressor just under 4 minutes to charge a system to that pressure WHILE the WH is draining. I also blow all fixtures AT LEAST 2X. I run 30-45 minutes on the average wint. If i am unsure i blow a gallon of pink through the lines. All my private jobs get pink in the lines no matter what. I ALWAYS do at least a 15 min. pressure test at 50PSI or better. 30-40% will not pass this test and you better damn well document what is leaking. Normally a fixture but still when the REO contractor comes in and the PT fails (even slightly) your at risk of chargeback although 90% of the time it never happens. I report nearly half of my REO's as not holding pressure. 75% of those are done by the local SG contractor and are usually broken shower valves.....
Extra for additional water heaters, multi units, 3 + bathrooms, pools, hot tubs, outdoor kitchens, sprinklers, plumbed garages, commercial, yada yada yada.
Doberman, I got to thinking about your process. If you hook to the hot side and blow your lines while the water heater is draining, you're blowing water right back through the dip tube into the cold side of the plumbing system. This is the reason I blow no lines until the water heater is totally empty. If you think I'm full of crap, ask a plumber if you can blow lines before the water heater is totally empty.
The only feasible way is if there are bypass valves in place...which we all know is NEVER the case, and even if there were I would NEVER EVER start clearing lines until the wh was drained, or at a minimum start blowing back toward the wh to expedite the process.
it's a continuous system once the tank drains and begins blowing mist there is no water left in any lines.
I don't have time to sit and worry about that stuff guys I get the job done and I get it done fast. It looks good in pictures and gets us paid. If I wanted to do proper by the book Wints i would have been a plumber and i would charge triple.
We are in this business to make money not be knit picked by realtors. That is why we don't do REO work. We don't work for flat fees or package deals.You can't make money in this business at the prices they pay if you don't bust ass and get things done. I have never used a blower for anything other than to blow out a property in order to leave it in "Broom Clean Condition". If I was going to finely manicure lawns, or do sales cleans, do plumbing work I would be charging full retail and working for John Q. Public.
Doberman one more thing to think about on your $40 wints.
There is absolutely no money to be made for you doing them by yourself.
Let alone pay a sub, you've said before that you have problems keeping subs.
You might want to reconsider things.
I do burn subs out quickly but I also have some that have been with me for a while. It's a mix for sure. I do agree that I need a better plan for the business and i liked the suggestion someone made about the Landscape company model.
My main client pays me $75.00 for most wints I pay my sub around $40.00 and the processors and overhead eat up the rest. We don't make crap on wints as a company. It takes so long to upload in my clients software and get all their bids and crap turned in it eats up any perceived profit we might have had. There are two sides to this and i just want some of these guys to see both. I am not saying one way is better or worse. I am caught somewhere in the middle.
I figured my pay for today I drove 386.00 miles did 9 properties (too much travel between properties) 8 grass cuts, 9 lock changes, 7 wints, a small trash out, roof tarp, and a window boarding.
by my pay sheet if I was a contractor I would have made $1,250.00 deduct around $425.00 for fuel and materials I still had a good day.
The universal comment I get from all of my guys after I go work with them is how FAST I go. My philosophy is rest between properties and run wide open as soon as the truck shuts off. I feel that most contractors are just slow. They spend too much time thinking about how to do things and discussing options when I could have had it done.
I had a guy 4 hrs from me once tell me he couldn't get to a job for 3 days because he was SO SO busy. I drove the 4 hrs and knocked out his hole list in a day. It's all about attitude i think?
I have yet to see one good argument for me paying guys early. Why is better for only me to lose money instead of both of us? If we go to court our class action case is stronger than me alone. It's kind of a moot point though my guys know up front and sign off on it. The only time I have an issue is if a client is slow one month or something but I often forward emails and try to be as transparent as i can.
My issue with realtors is the duality of their high quality low price standards. It makes ZERO sense. We can do excellent work for the right price and we never get that from realtors. John Q Public on the other hand we usually got more than our competition. The thing is I don't like the petty BS of it all and i am quickly growing weary of it in this industry.
My clients get what they pay for. We make them happy by doing large volumes. They don't care about grass clippings or stupid crap. They are foreclosed homes not Showcase homes.
I did 2 wints today.
The 1st one was for a private customer and turned out to be a cluster ! I am returning in the morning to redo the whole thing!
The second was a PPO for a regional service company. The property was previously winterized by a local plumbing company, and appeared to be intact. Since the wint was not "tagged" by a recognized service company, I had to pressurize the system & go through all the motions of a full winterization, including pics & stickers.
I use a gas compressor that stays in the truck and run an air line into the laundry room to my custom made "Y", with integrated pressure gauge and shutoff valve (patent pending :thumbup that connects to the washing machine HOT & COLD in one fell swoop. I hooked a garden hose up to the WH & ran it outside. Confirmed that the main shutoff was OFF, fired up the compressor and regulated the pressure to 40 psi (CPVC supply lines). Confirmed that WH breaker was OFF and added blue tape over the breaker while pressure was building in WH. Opened WH valve, snapped pic of end of garden hose (confirming it was empty in this case), shut the valve and set about opening & closing faucets, spigots & valves to confirm that all water lines were evacuated. Built pressure back up to 40 psi, shut off valve on custom "Y" adapter thingy, snapped a pic of gauge and disconnected and rolled up airlines and garden hose. Grabbed a gallon of pink & all the stickers I needed out of the truck while I was there and went inside, filled out date on all stickers and posted them all to their proper spots. Went back through & obtained during pics of anti-freeze placement, and installed wint wraps on the toilets. Filled out and posted wint notice on front door & snapped pics. Checked my new iPhone5 (that's right :thumbsup and noticed that the pressure test had only been sitting for 9 minutes and had another 11'ish to go. So I made a phone call to kill the time! Pressure test done, pics taken, tools returned to truck, final walk-thru & lock-up.
I hustled on this one & didn't have to wait for WH to drain.
Total time: 46 minutes from drivers seat to drivers seat
I can't get my arms around it but that is how he rolls.
Brokers usually give us the allowable info and depending on the lender, usually it is in the neighborhood of $160 - $200. Much rather do 4 of those than 10 of the others.
Was this before or after the botched sex change operation?
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Related Threads
?
?
?
?
?
REO Property Preservation Forum
60.2K posts
5.2K members
Since 2007
A forum community dedicated to REO property preservers and enthusiasts. Come join the discussion about the industry, safety, care, tools, machinery, projects, styles, scales, reviews, accessories, classifieds, and more!