It's official

[Cleanworks]

Soooooooo then....you water people....
What happens when you get served legal
Papers on the house that is destroyed by the mold and mildew that YOU missed?

That's why you have insurance.

 

[Mikey P]

Are ya gonna take howard class?

Howard who?

 

[bob vawter]

That's why you have insurance.

Funny.....they make you pay for the insurance BEFORE.yor allowed to do the work......

 

[DAT]

Howard who?

Colorful dye guy?

 

[Mikey P]

Colorful dye guy?

Chris Howell.

 

[DAT]

give it a shot, you might be able to afford a hot tub. or a 370.

Dude, i work 45 hour week avg..im just stuck with with wife med bill and others. Otherwise i probably could afford your SC rig and do even better than before. Im trying hard to get out of it.

 

[Nomad74]

Dude, i work 45 hour week avg..im just stuck with with wife med bill and others. Otherwise i probably could afford your SC rig and do even better than before. Im trying hard to get out of it.

Ill give you a deal on my chevy 3500/Amtex.

 

[Nomad74]

Chris Howell.

I think he’s referring to Howard Partridge.

 

[DAT]

I think he’s referring to Howard Partridge.

Chris Howell.

You did give me a deal on that rig. Id take it if i could. I wouldnt mind using it for 2 year. But dont wait on me if you found a buyer.

 

[Nomad74]

Moving chems to the shop today. I need a truck.

 

[dealtimeman]

What happened to the el camino?

 

[Kenny Hayes]

I agree with the trailer part. I work out of a 14’
and it’s to small. But it’s the way to do it, short of a box. I think that list of equipment is a good start and rent the rest.

 

[dealtimeman]

A lot of you don’t live in the real world.

Most water damage companies don’t get but a few calls a week if they are fortunate and are paying a high cost campaign like AdWords.

I hope he get overwhelmed with work and can afford to pay a full time guy to help him and that guy can take the van with the Amflex home and be on call with a couple of dehus and some fans on the van at all times.

Risk and rewards guys or risk vs reward.

Anyone can clean carpet not all are willing to perform water mitigation the correct way.

 

[Kenny Hayes]

Go get that trailer now. You can move with it.

 

[Kenny Hayes]

A lot of you don’t live in the real world.

Most water damage companies don’t get but a few calls a week if they are fortunate and are paying a high cost campaign like AdWords.

I hope he get overwhelmed with work and can afford to pay a full time guy to help him and that guy can take the van with the Amflex home and be on call with a couple of dehus and some fans on the van at all times.

Risk and rewards guys or risk vs reward.

Anyone can clean carpet not all are willing to perform water mitigation the correct way.

I don’t think most of us who answered him live in that world. Most who answered said, “flee”!!

 

[Nomad74]

And I love you all

 

[Nomad74]

What happened to the el camino?

ELCO is in the garage. I need to get it smoged. I might try and do that today. I'm probably going to sell it and get a truck. I need something with more than a 1k payload.

 

[Cleanworks]

ELCO is in the garage. I need to get it smoged. I might try and do that today. I'm probably going to sell it and get a truck. I need something with more than a 1k payload.

Starting off, your promaster and 870 make a great pair. You should have enough room for a couple of dehu's and 4 fans. And in your misc. Tools and equipment and you're good to go. If the job requires more equipment, you or your helper just go to the shop and get more. You're paid for the travel time. You don't need a box truck or trailer loaded to the gills until you have the work to justify it. Don't spend more than you have to

 

[Nomad74]

Starting off, your promaster and 870 make a great pair. You should have enough room for a couple of dehu's and 4 fans. And in your misc. Tools and equipment and you're good to go. If the job requires more equipment, you or your helper just go to the shop and get more. You're paid for the travel time. You don't need a box truck or trailer loaded to the gills until you have the work to justify it. Don't spend more than you have to

First thing is to get the training, then I'll start building equipment. I see deals all the time on CL. Seems like someone is always going out of business. I already have about 20 fans I've collected over the years. Going to look for a dehu and air scrubber after I get some training. Thank you @Swani for the info in your PM! Those were certainly great deals.

 

[Nomad74]

I'm not looking to go nuts. I realize I have a ton to learn. I'm basically starting out with no knowledge of drying work, other than what I come across with my normal carpet cleaning adventures. If I can do an extra $1500 to $3k a month I’ll be happy. I’m trying to set my goals at realistic levels just starting out.

 

[jmo]

Start with your property managers. We only offer dry outs to them as we don’t have a lot of equipment. And it’s easier to collect, for us anyway.

 

[Desk Jockey]

I'm not looking to go nuts. I realize I have a ton to learn. I'm basically starting out with no knowledge of drying work, other than what I come across with my normal carpet cleaning adventures. If I can do an extra $1500 to $3k a month I’ll be happy. I’m trying tonset my goals at realistic levels just starting out.

That's a very achievable goal. Like anything you'll need to market for WDR work. Start with your clients, they already know you and trust you.

Direct mail, email, Facebook, Adwords, Website. Also your business cards (I'd make one specific for WDR) cards are cheap, vehicles. Tell every client and leave behind your WDR card and a magnet with emergency number.

 

[Hack Attack]

I'm not looking to go nuts. I realize I have a ton to learn. I'm basically starting out with no knowledge of drying work, other than what I come across with my normal carpet cleaning adventures. If I can do an extra $1500 to $3k a month I’ll be happy. I’m trying tonset my goals at realistic levels just starting out.

You should be able to do those numbers, I'm not big into wdr but get those numbers easily

I've got 1 XL dehu (phnxr200) 2 L dehus (bd2500) dozen fans, thermal camera and meters.

I'm not a preferred supplier (2 franchises in front of me) and I try to stick within my knowledge and equipment limitations

 

[hogjowl]

Your market needs someone willing to do it wrong.
And charge accordingly.

 

[Acp]

What was this talk about color dying? just meaning spot dying?

 

[Acp]

Thats awsome Damon. $450/month is nothing. Idk what the sqft. of your shop is but here youll easily pay $3/sqft after NNN + rent unless your out in the sticks.

Having a "brick and mortar" location is huge, especially if it is on a street with decent exposure.. get a nice sign made.

 

[randy]

I dumped water damage 100% in 2005 and never looked back. Sold my security guard business the same year and for the first time in twenty years turned off my phone when I went to bed. So wonderful to not have one of 34 guards call me at midnight when their relief calls off. Even better to not be getting up at 1am and working 24-36 hours straight while soaking wet doing water damage. Think long and hard about water damage, Damon. Test the waters in a low cost way, like working for another provider on a subcontract basis for a year. You may find other avenues of expansion more easily assimilated into your business. Are you currently doing Tile, area rugs or better yet chasing commercial accounts ?

Water damage sucks if you are an owner operator or 1-3 truck guy. Over the years I have seen a ton of carpet cleaners get over leveraged with water damage debt. If you don't have $100,000 in spare change to carry your costs while waiting on insurance checks, forget it. If you aren't "juiced in " with a preferred provider network it can also be challenging.

The average carpet cleaner thinks "if I had a couple hundred grand a year in water damage I would be set ". Been there, it's a nightmare and a 24/7 operation for weeks at a time when it HITS. Then there will be nothing for weeks. Water damage ruins your core business as it's a whole different business within a business with the same people. The costs continue when you have zip coming in. Then it hits when you are extraordinarily busy and falling down tired Carpet cleaning. Frankly our industry exaggerates the profitability of water damage and minimizes the required capital costs and impact on core operation. When you add in the LONG TERM cost of lost carpet cleaning customers that are pissed when you have to cancel and reschedule them because of massive water damage work and the 24/7 nature of the business it's not such a great add on because its NOT an add on, it's a whole new business.

Go get $200,000 in commercial carpet cleaning and then think about water damage.

 

[Desk Jockey]

I still believe the only hard part is staffing for all the work. Once you start getting what you're asking for, it's like trying to drink out of a fire hose.

Grow slow, partner with another cleaner for bigger jobs. Work out an agreement with a restoration company to sell them jobs too big for you or ones that you can't or don't want to process.

 

[dealtimeman]

No wonder guys are so scared of water damage because of horror stories like this.

I have over 500 pieces of equipment and yes can have upwards of 200000 sitting in receivables but I’d rather have that income at some point incoming than have it to go out everyday trying to fetch 1000 Per day cleaning carpet.

My biz carries zero debt and it wasn’t carpet cleaning that bought the three vortex’s, box trucks, vans and pickup trucks, it was the water damage.

I don’t encourage anyone to take a loan to get into the biz as that is what will sink you fast as you stress to make that additional payment while you might be in a water damage loss drought.

a buddy of mine has a phrase that goes like
“ water damage is a feast or famine kind of biz”

So in the times of feast I put up enough for the time of famine.

Hopefully, God willing, we will be completely personally debt free in 2019 and again this wasn’t by cleaning carpet.

 

[rick imby]

I have one thought to add.

Focus...

It is the key to success and if you are split between several directions and no sleep.... nothing gets the proper focus. Everything looks simpler from the other side of the fence.