Empire State of Mind
Empire State of Mind
Expanding Horizons: Hank Lobdell's Journey of Taking Home Inspection to a Beautiful Tropical Paradise
Imagine expanding your business to a tropical paradise, bringing your expertise to a place where it is much needed and appreciated. This is precisely what Hank Lobdell, owner of Radiant Property Inspection, did when he branched out to Aruba, a venture that we thoroughly explore in our latest podcast. Listen to Hank as he shares his journey of transitioning his extremely successful domestic inspection company to an international level. This episode is packed with insights about the unique nuances of home construction in Aruba, the lack of crawl spaces that make the island an ideal location for home inspections, and the unconventional roofing types commonly found there.
As we delve deeper into the conversation, you'll discover how Hank strategically structured his company, dividing it into departments dedicated to services, operations, and growth. This innovative separation allowed his team to handle the day-to-day operations, leaving him free to focus on relationship development and forward-looking strategies. Hank also shares the process of recruiting and training his team in Aruba and his ambitious plans for future expansion into other tropical destinations. This episode is a goldmine of information for anyone in the home inspection industry or for entrepreneurs who aspire to grow their businesses internationally. Join us for this exciting, inspiring conversation and embark on your own journey of discovery and growth.
Contact IEB -
- web: www.iebcoaching.com
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Contact Matt -
- email: matt@dciabq.com
- IG: @the.matthew.williams
Welcome to the Empire State of Mind. On this episode we have guest Hank Lobdell and we're talking about how to build an international inspection company.
Speaker 2:We believe the purpose of owning a business is funding your perfect life. Welcome to the next generation of growth and opportunity in the inspection industry. This is the Empire State of Mind Helping build companies with faster growth, higher profits and more time freedom. Finally, a podcast for the home inspection industry and beyond. This is the Empire State of Mind and this is your host, Matt Williams.
Speaker 1:Well, welcome to the show. I am so glad that you are joining us for this episode. On this episode, I have a guest that's been a friend of mine for a number of years, and it's Mr Hank Lobdell. Hank, how are you doing today? I'm doing great, matt.
Speaker 3:Couldn't be happier sitting here with you today.
Speaker 1:That's right, man. It's a beautiful day, it's wonderful weather, action Austin Texas right now, at the IEB Mastermind in the fall, and it's been an incredible gathering get together. I tell you what my mind has already been stretched by some of these conversations.
Speaker 3:Oh, absolutely. I've already been blown away a couple times today.
Speaker 1:Right, and we're just on the first day, so I'm just so excited. If you've never been to an IEB Mastermind or an IEB Unite event, I'm telling you like these events are life changing. If you show up with an open mind and say I'm just going to hear, to learn and figure something out, and I tell you what my hallway conversations with people, the stuff that happens from the stage this is one of the most impactful inspection conferences that is out there and the whole organization as a whole and all the mastermind and coaching that happens between conferences is also phenomenal. So if you're not already a member, you need to be a member. You don't want to miss out what's going on here. So in part of our conversations this week, hank, you mentioned that you are currently building your company on an international scale, which sounds very impressive and very challenging. What is going on, man?
Speaker 3:So last week I was in Aruba. I've been there already back in September and last week I made it official, going through all the legal work, and I was incorporated in Aruba. So I'm now a Radiant Property Inspection in Aruba is a corporation in Aruba.
Speaker 1:That is incredible. So Radiant Property Inspection now. Currently you're in the Tampa Bay Florida area, st Petersburg, and so then you have this opportunity to expand into Aruba. Why Aruba?
Speaker 3:Well, I have a fraternity brother of mine who's from Aruba. He just went to school in the US and he was a freshman when I was a senior. I kind of took him a little bit under my wing that year and we became really good friends. We've kept in touch In the last eight years. He's been trying to get me to come down to do home inspections down in Aruba. He is a attorney, business attorney and a real estate attorney. So he says there's a need. I'm like whatever. So talking to some other IEB members Greg, brian and Chris.
Speaker 3:I was having dinner with them. I was in Houston doing some training videos for the IEB and I was talking to them about it and they were like dude, why aren't you there?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And I was like, and I gave them an excuse, that's all it was. I gave an excuse. Then I started to think about my why? Why do I do what I do? And I said, man, that's an excuse. Then I started saying, well, why am I, why don't I go there? And I started making more excuses. I said, man, this ain't right, this is not who I am. So got on the airline schedule, called my friend. Is this date's okay? I'm coming to visit, I'm like it's time. So I flew down in mid September and he set up six meetings with me with six different real estate companies, had my meetings, saw there was a need and I was looking to open up the business after the first of the year. They're like uh-uh, our busy season starts November.
Speaker 3:So they like now like how soon can you be here? Well, that was six weeks ago.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness, what an incredible story. So I Is a can. Home construction styles in aruba. Are they anything like the United States style of construction? I know in some countries like it's radically different style. What is it like for the home construction style there?
Speaker 3:Very similar to Florida. Okay things want to slab. No, no cross bait. Very little. Couple cross bases I saw, but most of it's just on a slab. Okay, the biggest difference is the interior walls is all everything's block, so there's no drywall that they block, and put plaster on the interior walls Wow. So that's the biggest area. And then they have a totally different electrical system. It is 110 but it's a European style electric panel.
Speaker 3:Oh it's a different wiring system that we're getting used to. But pretty much what are heaters are mostly Tankless. Okay, propane tankless tank. What are heaters there like? There are the regular tanks you see in the US, but very similar. So wasn't that big of a push for us to adapt what we need to do right.
Speaker 1:So technology wise for inspectors and knowledge wise for inspectors, it's not a huge shift to go from Florida to aruba. How does that work, do you? Do you send an inspector from your home office down to aruba to start working there?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I. I have an inspector that she's 28 years old. She's been with me almost three years now. When she started with us, she no experience. She was cleaning pools. We told her to be a home inspector. Wow, she's one of my most requested inspectors at this point. Wow, I see a lot of potential in her Mm-hmm, so I Be in single as well. I was like all right, hannah, I'm, I want you to go to aruba with me and train my chart trading the team down there.
Speaker 3:Wow when I'm not available. So she's down there right now. She's working with the two people we hired.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness, that's incredible. And so what's the difference like when they say there's a big need for inspections, are there? And home inspectors?
Speaker 3:in aruba there's one on the island right now oh my goodness, Wow and so Wow.
Speaker 1:So the people that are buying homes in aruba, is that a customary for them to get inspections or how does that? Well, like culturally in the United States at this point, like home inspections are kind of like almost expected right.
Speaker 3:So in aruba they call them ex-patriots. 75% of ex-patriots are from the US and Canada, and Canada who are purchasing homes there. So there is a market for that and the when someone from the US or Canada gets an inspection and pave money for the inspection, it's not their upset because it's not what they were expecting, because it's not like what they get at home. Oh so I'm bringing the US way of doing things, adapting to the building type, but bringing this to aruba.
Speaker 1:That's excellent. So then are you? Basically, a lot of your customers are gonna be US, canadian type people used to our style of home inspection. I would say 90% of my clientele will be US and Canadians and so the the one inspector that's there doesn't do it the way we do it, because they're from aruba.
Speaker 3:Well, he's from aruba but I could tell I looked at his reports uses Spectora, okay, and he, you know, he says he's a Certified property inspector, so I knew right away that he went through internet. She, okay, yeah. So he took some courses and he does a decent job. Okay, but it's not. Still it's not to the standards that we would be used to Got you Okay, oh, that's awesome.
Speaker 1:So now you have supply and demand right. So you have a demand from the US side and the supply isn't maybe hitting it the way that US demand requires. So whenever you have a gap there on supply and demand, there's always opportunity. That's incredible.
Speaker 3:The biggest thing is it's a one-man shop. Basically, if we do 300 inspections in a year down there, I'll be excited.
Speaker 1:Oh, okay, so it's a smaller, much smaller market.
Speaker 3:Well, aruba only has 110,000 people. Citizens on the island. Oh, wow, okay, any given day, there's about 225,000 people on the island because of tourism. Okay, and you can drive from the one point to the longest point on the island in 45 minutes.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow. So it is a really small place With traffic, with traffic, the rush hour, the rush hour traffic.
Speaker 3:When the Kurzlein's are in, you go through the one area you have to deal with everybody walking across the streets and everything.
Speaker 1:Oh right, that's your traffic jam. The traffic jam is the tourism walking around. That's the life right there. That sounds actually kind of fun. So what is it? I know you well enough to know that you are planned and structured and organized on what you're doing. So how long before you're ready to start actually inspecting? You've been out there working for six weeks so far. Right, you've been like no, I did my first visit six weeks ago. First visit was six weeks ago.
Speaker 3:So I will have to say the process. If someone was looking, say, oh, I want to go to an island and do this. I was lucky because my fraternity brother was there, Right near the connections. I had all the connections necessary. I already knew about what process it took to get incorporated.
Speaker 3:You have to have a Rubus citizen to be a partner with you majority partner so I had to put all this together, but because of my connection and my friend, I was able to get everything together quickly. Otherwise it would take months to get all this done.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so then now onboarding a home inspection you've got to get there and do sales. You've got to get your name out there. You've got to work on marketing. Like any other business You'd have to do that down there. How long is it going to take you, or how much are you planning on this taking before it's like really running right? As far as processes? Yeah, I guess I mean I have so many questions. I'm like how long would it take to onboard somebody, get this thing going. You've got to fill your pipeline, you've got to get the sales done, and is there like a timeline that you have of like, ok, we hope this thing to be like fully operational and running well within a certain amount of time. I hope to be fully operational by January.
Speaker 3:Ok, we're in mid or November now. Like I said, we got officially incorporated October 31.
Speaker 1:Wow, you are moving so fast.
Speaker 3:Did my first presentation to a group of agents 20 agents on November 1. Ok, I'm just waiting. We have one inspection.
Speaker 1:Well, and to put it, in context for our listeners, this is being recorded on November 8. So we're talking like yeah, because I don't know when this will air exactly, but the recording November 8, which means seven days ago, you were in Aruba giving presentations. Eight days ago you officially incorporated Correct, and so I did that.
Speaker 3:Next day I hit some other offices and, unlike here in the US, when we go into Solicit to a real estate office, everyone scatters. When you walk in, they see your logo. Oh no, no, I can't, I don't see you. Let me go in the back room. There they're like what are you doing? Who are you? And I introduced myself and they're like when can we get you in to do a team meeting with us?
Speaker 1:That's awesome.
Speaker 3:And I was like I'm founded, I was like I didn't know. Well, obviously the need must be great the need and it's the clients being upset that they didn't get the inspection that they were hoping for.
Speaker 1:Wow, wow. So at this point you're looking at roughly 45 to 60 days. You're hoping to be up and running an operational and starting to run really decently.
Speaker 3:Yes, I mean. Let's see, I came home Saturday night from Aruba, out here today, or flew in yesterday. I get home Friday and I hear Tuesday, what's that the 14th? Yeah, I believe so November 14th. I'm back in Aruba.
Speaker 1:And how long are you going to be there?
Speaker 3:To December 21st.
Speaker 1:Wow, ok. So All right, how do you run a business in Tampa and run a business in Aruba? You were gone for a week setting stuff up. You're back in the States for a week or so. You had this conference here. You got a couple things back in Aruba again for another month, give or take. How are you able to run that? Because that seems like it'd be crazy, overwhelming.
Speaker 3:Well, the one thing is you got to have the right people. I could have never done this one without my connection in Aruba. And two, the staff that I have in my main office.
Speaker 1:So you have high quality staff and a great culture and a great workplace in Tampa. How do you do that?
Speaker 3:Well, it was hiring the right people. My director of Ops, Teresa Clovis, is fabulous. I knew I had the right person in the first month when she came in and said you look a little stressed today, what can I take off your plate? I almost fell out of my chair because I've never had someone ask me what can I take off of you? Wow, she's been with me wow a year and a half now and she has taken over all the day to day operations. Wow, Until this Aruba thing came up, I was getting a little bored because she took all my tasks away from me. I'm no longer a task master, I'm a full-blood business owner.
Speaker 1:You're a business owner, not a business doer. That's huge.
Speaker 3:So between Teresa then Melody Wheeler, who is my director of growth, I recruited her for four years and finally, last November, I got her to come over to the dark side and come work for me the underbelly of the beast, the home inspection industry.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And she's been a huge asset to me. We also hired another growth person, so that's running smoothly. And my inspection team they're great at what they do and they run everything smoothly. They do great inspections, very little concern calls and when they do, Teresa's taken over all the concern calls Wow.
Speaker 1:That's incredible. So you have your company structured in the IEB format.
Speaker 3:Correct.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so which is? You have a services department handling everything in the field, you have an operations department which handles the operating of the company, and you have a growth department which handles your marketing and your sales, and you're getting your name out there and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 3:Yeah, melody's helped me with talking to my web designer, so she's been handling all the web design. She's handled the marketing material that I'll be taking back with me and getting all this takeover. So she's handling all the stuff, that detail work that allowed me to go down and do the meeting with the attorneys. All right in Aruba.
Speaker 1:That's awesome.
Speaker 3:And taking care of that, letting me do the relationship development down there. Yeah, and, like I said, and Anna, who is my inspector down there right now, she helped me interview the two people we hired and she's now, while I'm gone, she's having them each day, she's working with them.
Speaker 1:So she's training them right now.
Speaker 3:She's training them to do the radiant way Wow.
Speaker 1:What did your staff think about it? When you were, like, I had this opportunity to go to Aruba, what do you think Like? Did you ask them, or how did that go down?
Speaker 3:They all volunteered to go down.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm opening a branch in an exotic paradise, boss, can I go Most of the time?
Speaker 3:if I say we're going to do this or you know, the heads are down shaking like oh God, here's another wonderful idea.
Speaker 1:Crazy idea from the boss. Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and this time was I'll go. And everybody's hand was raised and I was like you guys don't volunteer for anything, but when I mentioned Aruba, everybody wants to go Right.
Speaker 1:We're going to go next. The Bahamas, jamaica, turks and Caicos. Like you, guys are spreading out all these like exotic paradises. That would be awesome, I love it, don't tell my secrets.
Speaker 1:Yeah, You'll have the happiest staff that we do, like inspections and flip flops and shorts and a tank top. You know we'll see. No, I probably won't. You probably have to have some sort of dress code, I'm sure. Oh, we have a dress code down in Aruba already, Do you? Yeah, I bet. Well, there's no crawl spaces, right? So, no, yeah, so that that I mean that already like signs sounds a lot like pretty nice, but we're all close to the equator, so the sun is brutal.
Speaker 1:Oh right, yeah, so I imagine you can't. You're going to have to dress a little bit lighter there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the uniforms. Instead of our normal polos that we wear, we have the UV protection long sleeve shirts.
Speaker 1:Okay, like the sporty, like fishing style, yeah, I imagine it'll do something. Yeah, wow, and then, and then roofing wise, like what kind of roofing is common in?
Speaker 3:Aruba. Pretty much what we see in Florida is same thing. It's terracotta, barrel roofs, okay, concrete roofs, flat TPO or asphalt roofs, and somehow even have asphalt shingles.
Speaker 1:Wow, okay. So so I'm in New Mexico, and in New Mexico, virtually everything is slab on grade, and a very large percentage of them are flat roof Spanish style homes with a TPO, yeah and so, with no crawl space and no attic, it's one of the best places in the world to do home inspections, I'm not going to lie. And so, yeah, matt, so that's kind of cool. No, no, crawl spaces. It's kind of nice. Maybe have them occasionally, but but, yeah, that's, that's amazing, man, that sounds like a lot of a lot of fun. Are you nervous about this? Are you excited or what are you thinking?
Speaker 3:Right now I'm too busy to be nervous or excited. I'm just head down focused to get like I said when I was told November was the busy season, right, and they said you don't want to miss it I had just been in a head down. Let's get this done.
Speaker 1:So the gal that's down here, Ms Hannah, is that what you said? Yeah, so so is Hannah doing inspections right now down there?
Speaker 3:She's doing mock ones right now. Okay, the one person we hired is a. He does contracting work as well, okay, so he has a lot of different clients that are from the US or from overseas, and so they have Airbnb. So they're allowing us to go to homes that are out for Airbnb's that don't have any client client to them right now, and that's how she's training until we get our inspections running. That is awesome.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. Wow, that sounds like really, really exciting. If somebody was thinking about going international, what are some of the things that they might consider that maybe I don't know, like you have this experience now. What are some things that like maybe surprised you or you hadn't thought about until you started, like talking with your attorney friend, and like things that popped up along the way that you were like oh, that's different.
Speaker 3:Just don't go to any island. Make sure that it's a island where they have a lot of foreign investors Okay, especially if it's a very friendly US or, in Canada, friendly for investments.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:I would say look at that first. Second is, look at the government structure and what it takes to be incorporated there. Aruba was I had, you know, 60% ownership has to be with a Aruba citizen first. Oh, so then it transitioned.
Speaker 1:So there's different ways around it, and so your friend that's an attorney is in a Ruben citizen right, so he's able to kind of help navigate some of that.
Speaker 3:Right, like I said, without him I could have never done this, because he's helped me. Need an insider to help you get started. He told me every step that I needed to do yeah, I didn't have to do all that research, find out and everything else. I was able just to go in, find out there was a necessity, there was, then it was okay, and then this is not his normal to do this type of paperwork for the government.
Speaker 2:Uh huh.
Speaker 3:So he passed me on to a friend of his that does a lot of this. Okay, and now I, and then I partnered up with him and he's not financially with the company as far as ownership, but he is my managing director. Okay, so I pay the attorney money to be the managing director to make sure that I do everything 100% proper for the group of government so I don't get in trouble and find and kick them.
Speaker 1:Oh man, that's really smart. So, yeah, it sounds like one of the things that you probably should do about what country you're going to is have an insider like a legal advisor that on the inside, that helps make sure that you're in compliance, because Arabian law, or any country, their laws and their methods and the way they do things is going to be different than the United States.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Arab is under Netherlands, so a lot of it is the Dutch law.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow.
Speaker 3:So they follow a lot of what the Dutch law is. So any country you have to go to make sure you understand the law, and the second thing besides an attorney who knows all the local legalities that you have to jump through is also make sure you find a local accountant who understands all the taxes, what it takes and do all that Like a local CPA to navigate that side?
Speaker 3:Yeah so I was able to. So when I went on my first trip back in September, I was introduced to an attorney because his wife was also owns a real estate company, so I went with both of them and I engaged him last week when I was there.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:Him and I were talking back and forth while I was back up here, but him and I we engaged, and so I got all the know what all the taxes are and he's handling my payroll, my payroll taxes, all my monthly government taxes, everything.
Speaker 1:That's awesome Making sure you're in compliance all the way around, and because you want to play by the rules and do things the right way Correct I would imagine there's a massive learning curve unless you have somebody like that in your corner.
Speaker 3:And my attorney, who's my managing director and the lawyer on my accountant. They talk back and forth as well to make sure everything is going well.
Speaker 1:That's incredible.
Speaker 3:And that's really incredible.
Speaker 1:Wow, I just I heard the first part of the story is like we got to talk about on the podcast, because I don't know if I've heard of any inspection company branching outside of the United States. I've seen them like obviously expanding within the territory or the new across state lines. But but you know, going, mr International, I like it.
Speaker 3:Hey, and then I get to go to a Caribbean island every month, so it's not a bad gig, right, yeah, and it's a business expense.
Speaker 1:So you know, right, that isn't, that isn't terrible. Yeah, I'm going to start calling you Mr Worldwide. Yeah, worldwide Hank. Well, I kind of like Caribbean Hank, better Caribbean Hank, I like that too. Yeah, there we go.
Speaker 3:I love it, man. I said move over Caribbean Jack, here comes Caribbean.
Speaker 1:Hank yes, there we go. I love it, I love it, I love it. I am going to have to come visit and I'll make that a. I want to come visit and see how you're doing that thing. It's reallyinction cool.
Speaker 3:Well, I am suggesting that. You know we're now going to be doing these mini masterminds. Yeah, that will have mini mastermind in Aruba.
Speaker 1:Oh, yes, definitely.
Speaker 3:I want to see if I sell out quicker than in any other area.
Speaker 1:You definitely will. I will be there, for sure, absolutely, my passport ready, I am ready to go, man. So I know that this is a topic, that there might be other people that are curious about this, maybe thinking about going international. The opportunity they're in, like I don't have not. I have no idea how to navigate this and they might have questions. Hank, how would someone get ahold of you? What's the best way or something to hold a view if they have questions or they just want to ask you more about this move that you're making?
Speaker 3:So something we're traveling a lot in the next few months or even all next year, because, no matter what, I'll be going to the island at least once a month. Probably the best way is reach me in my email address. Okay, what's your email address? It's Hank. At radiantinspectcom.
Speaker 1:All right, that sounds great. I will have that in the show notes. So if you don't know how to spell Hank, it'll be right there for you. But, man, thank you so much for being on the show and talking about this. This is really inspiring to me to see how you're pushing the envelope of what's going on in inspection space, man. So thank you so much for being here. Well, thanks, matt for having me All right. Well, I'll see you guys on the next episode.
Speaker 2:You've been listening to Empire State of Mind. For the home inspection industry and beyond, our passion is to elevate the home inspection industry with mindset, strategy and tools. We hope you've enjoyed the show. Make sure to like, rate and review For more, follow on Instagram at IEB coaching and don't forget to hit the website at wwwiebcoachingcom. Learn about IEB at no cost and have all your questions answered on our open call once a month on the third week of the month. We hope to see you there and we'll see you next time on the Empire State of Mind.
