00:00:00:03 - 00:00:10:09 Speaker 1 See the hatch, I open it up and boom! It's like this wave of the mold, moist air hits me in the face. And as I open the hatch. 00:00:10:11 - 00:00:14:22 Speaker 2 I could be a part of organic compounds. That is literally the smell of mold is in the air. 00:00:14:22 - 00:00:31:12 Speaker 1 And of course, I wasn't quite ready for this. I mean, I wasn't expecting it hit it. So I was like, you know, stick a flashlight down there, start looking around. There's like mushrooms growing in the crawl space, not just like some little fuzz on the dirt. I mean, like, there's, like, actual mushrooms growing in the crawl space. 00:00:31:14 - 00:00:52:00 Speaker 2 This home is fortunate because you and I have done a ton of these projects together. The process was defined. Hey, I'm here. I'm the builder. There's something going on. Here's toner. We explain what's going on, she hires us. We put together the the explanation building science definition and the steps resolution. You take action on them. Some things pop up which do in every project. 00:00:52:02 - 00:01:15:01 Speaker 2 We're always able to respond, we're able to modify. And now the end result is she has practically a completely remodeled structure, a vastly superior crawl space application. This is going to be the best bungalow on that block, and it will probably outperform most modern homes built. Yeah. 00:01:15:03 - 00:01:21:13 Speaker 1 Welcome, everybody. Back to the Your Project Shepherd podcast. And welcome back to Toner Casting with Toner Home Performance. 00:01:21:13 - 00:01:22:09 Speaker 2 It's been a little bit. 00:01:22:11 - 00:01:31:09 Speaker 1 It's it has been a little bit since you've been here. We did a lot of episodes there for a while together. And then you went, incognito or a wall, or you started ghosting me or whatever. 00:01:31:10 - 00:01:50:19 Speaker 2 We had our office in Austin and Dallas opened up, so I'm spending so much more time in those other markets. But you did have Ryan Atley, our GM, on with you, and he he does a great job. He's a good juxtaposition to to my personality. Sovereign, real happy that he's been on here. And I've been listening and hearing all of our friends and, colleagues on the, on the podcast. 00:01:50:19 - 00:01:52:20 Speaker 2 So it's been a lot of fun. I've had a lot of road time. 00:01:53:00 - 00:01:57:18 Speaker 1 So I know that you, like, have a big road trip with your wife for seeing a bunch of stuff I did. 00:01:57:18 - 00:02:05:23 Speaker 2 We finished the, the 50 by 52, getting all 50 states before we turned 50. Yeah. So that is done. I have no place else to go, though. I don't have anything I've seen at all. 00:02:06:01 - 00:02:09:17 Speaker 1 Did you save all the boring states for last? Like, let's go drive through some cornfields. 00:02:09:18 - 00:02:28:12 Speaker 2 You know, the, the the state that I thought was going to be boring was Nebraska. And it wasn't, it was the National Grasslands. And these geological features they have. It's amazing. It was a beautiful state, and I really appreciate it. And I feel bad. I feel like I need to write an apology note to the state of Nebraska. 00:02:28:14 - 00:02:36:13 Speaker 1 I went hunting there a few years ago, and this area called the Sandhills of Nebraska. And it was really nice. It was not what I pictured in my mind for Nebraska. 00:02:36:13 - 00:02:53:12 Speaker 2 Yeah. And then my butt out of all the states, the one that it was the most surprising and I feel like it could be a separate like it's two states is upper Michigan was amazing. The people were so nice. I didn't know what a pasty was. I now know what a pasty is. It's this Hastings or the little. 00:02:53:12 - 00:03:14:15 Speaker 2 No, no, not those person. Not that kind of trip. So the it's like, Eastern European, like like an empanada fight for Eastern Europeans, and they're super good. Because we got all the Great Lakes at the same time and Niagara Falls. And so we just kind of went on a trip. And I also didn't know that there was such a Big Apple production. 00:03:14:17 - 00:03:15:19 Speaker 1 Oh, yeah, up there. 00:03:15:19 - 00:03:17:20 Speaker 2 And we saw the changing of the colors of the. 00:03:17:22 - 00:03:19:08 Speaker 1 Wisconsin has all the apple. 00:03:19:08 - 00:03:24:05 Speaker 2 Yeah. It was it was great. Upper Michigan. And I will most definitely go back and revisit. 00:03:24:05 - 00:03:27:19 Speaker 1 There's a pasty kind of like their version of a Karachi, like a fried Karachi basically. 00:03:27:20 - 00:03:36:05 Speaker 2 It's like a, it's like a more like an empanada. Right. And it's super fat, kid. Like, you don't need to eat these things on a regular basis. So. 00:03:36:05 - 00:03:39:09 Speaker 1 But did they have, pasty shops, like, they have coffee shops here? 00:03:39:09 - 00:04:00:15 Speaker 2 Yeah. It says you walk every time you go into it says this is are the best pasties in town. I'm like, okay, figure that out. But it was it was fun. I recommend everyone do that if you get a chance. Of course I benefited from having an airline pilot for a father, so I had a big jumpstart on a lot of people that weren't. 00:04:00:15 - 00:04:01:21 Speaker 1 You trying to get Rhonda to hit all those? 00:04:02:00 - 00:04:20:16 Speaker 2 Well, my wife got them all. She had that last road trip was 11. Her for her last dates. I only had one left in her last year. She did, 23 states. Yeah, to catch up. And we got Hawaii in there, which is always Hawaii in Alaska. Those outliers. Right. Like how do you get to those? So we were able to do so. 00:04:20:18 - 00:04:25:05 Speaker 1 So there's just driving across the corner of a state counter, you get to like stop and do some. 00:04:25:05 - 00:04:45:09 Speaker 2 Kind of like, monopoly rules. So we have airports don't count in in our, our family. You have to spend the night or do something of significance. So we're big hikers. So we chased waterfalls. So we saw waterfalls in almost all of these states. Or we spent the night or did like we went to the Kentucky Derby, for Kentucky, stuff like that. 00:04:45:11 - 00:05:02:11 Speaker 2 But also if you go to New York City, that doesn't count for New York State. If you go to LA, it doesn't count for California because there's plenty of people. New York State in New York City are not the same thing. They are so different for each other. And if you go to LA and you have not experienced the rest of California, you were that's you're doing yourself a disservice. 00:05:02:12 - 00:05:02:23 Speaker 1 Oh, yeah. 00:05:02:23 - 00:05:24:03 Speaker 2 So those are kind of in-house rules. But everyone kind of there's actually websites dedicated to this. I didn't realize it. It was just kind of a thing. Now we're moving on to the seven by 70, which is all seven continents. Before you turn 70. And we only have two continents left. And then you have all the seven seas and all this kind of stuff that you can kind of mix in there. 00:05:24:06 - 00:05:31:07 Speaker 1 You should do, like all the, all the, Caribbean island, Caribbean islands. Like, I have to hit every island, every one. 00:05:31:07 - 00:05:50:06 Speaker 2 That's right. And I saw some really, really great houses and went to the DuPont mansion in Delaware. That was absolutely amazing. On my Instagram, I spent so much time in their mechanical room. And it was really great. I went to the oldest house in Maryland, and we spent time in Philadelphia and went on an old historic house tour. 00:05:50:06 - 00:05:52:07 Speaker 2 So a lot of house content for me. 00:05:52:07 - 00:05:54:15 Speaker 1 Also, was your wife like, oh my God, let's stop looking at houses. 00:05:54:16 - 00:06:09:01 Speaker 2 No, she's more house crazy than I am. I have to hold her back. She loves homes. And I'm like, you know, this is what I do every day. Do we have to? She's like, no, no, let's go. So, I appreciate that. I have a wife that supports my, my addiction to homes. 00:06:09:03 - 00:06:30:05 Speaker 1 That's awesome. So, speaking of houses, we're going to talk about, I thought it'd be fun to, like, talk about some projects that we've been a part of recently. On the forensic side or, you know, helping people figure out some some weird stuff going on. We talk about, you know, we mentioned these things a lot on different episodes, but I thought it'd be cool to spend some time just kind of focusing on a couple different projects. 00:06:30:07 - 00:06:52:08 Speaker 1 And so, today I wanted to talk about one. It's an old 1920s party, late 20s bungalow over near the Med Center here in Houston. And, this one is, it's so it's a it's a family friend. It's one of my daughter's, best friend's moms. And, so I'll say, as we do this, I'm going to have Danielle to pop some stuff on the screen. 00:06:52:08 - 00:07:13:15 Speaker 1 So there are people that are watching, can kind of see some photos and videos of what we're talking about, some examples. But, so anyway, this is a 1920s bungalow. She bought it back in like May, April, May of this year. So she's had it for six months and moved in back then. House is all original, I think, except for the master bath had been remodeled. 00:07:13:17 - 00:07:31:19 Speaker 1 So, anyway, she goes out of town for the weekend, to see her daughter in Austin comes home and her wood floors are all buckled. Which, you know, we get a lot of calls for. Hey, my wood floors are buckled. There's something going on, but it's not usually like, like an overnight thing. Right? So she goes out of town, she comes back home. 00:07:31:19 - 00:07:53:02 Speaker 1 Boom. The wood floors are messed up. Now, I'll say this. I think sometimes people are living in the house. They may not notice, like a little bit of me being like. It may have been there for a while. She didn't notice it, but. And I'm not saying that was the case, but typically I see that happen. Like I walk into houses and I see wood floors or I feel under my feet and I mention other like, oh, I never noticed that. 00:07:53:07 - 00:08:05:04 Speaker 1 Yeah. So it's like being nose blind to a smell in your house. Right. So, anyway. But this, this was major. Like, she comes home, the floor is right popping up. It's like they were buckled. 00:08:05:04 - 00:08:07:03 Speaker 2 These were not warped wood floors. They were buckled. 00:08:07:03 - 00:08:16:01 Speaker 1 Yeah. It hits you in the face. Yeah. And it's the, you know, the beautiful old original, 1920s, red oak flooring, which, by the way, was like the cheap flooring back on the. 00:08:16:03 - 00:08:31:04 Speaker 2 Shorty Oak, which we, we fight for right now. 2.25in or 2.75in Shorty Oak. And that was actually long throw Shorty oak. So we had some planks there that were like 13ft long. That was almost utility grade sub flooring at that point. 00:08:31:04 - 00:08:47:07 Speaker 1 Yeah. But now it's like everybody wants it. So no, of course everybody now is like, oh man, we had to save that old flooring. Right. So anyway, she calls me freaking out. She's like, Curtis, what do I do? So I go by there on a Sunday or something like that, and I'm like, well, yeah, there's definitely a moisture issue going on here. 00:08:47:07 - 00:09:03:21 Speaker 1 It's like a classic symptoms of moisture, water under the house. You know, but the house is on a crawl space. I forgot to mention that. It's like, you know, the 12 to 18in off the ground, depending on the grades. You know, my my fat ass is not going to crawl under that house and mess with it, right? 00:09:03:22 - 00:09:08:13 Speaker 1 So, I said, all right, let's get toner out here next week. Toner would love to crawl into your house. 00:09:08:14 - 00:09:13:08 Speaker 2 That's right. I think she expected that I was going to shimmy under the house. 00:09:13:10 - 00:09:35:11 Speaker 1 So anyway, I said, let's get toner out here next week and let's let's get a plumber, see if there's a water leak going on somewhere. So, I call you out, you come out on a Tuesday, beat me there. Kind of. We kind of talked to her and also on the on the the day before, the plumber does come out and he finds a shower pan leak under the under the master shower, or we shouldn't say master shower anymore. 00:09:35:11 - 00:09:38:05 Speaker 1 It's the primary shower. Sorry. It's, 00:09:38:07 - 00:09:54:12 Speaker 2 In the wrong language. You connected her? Oh, to me over text, right? Which is a very common way that we get that. That initial connection. Hey, this is toner. You do need to have a conversation with you. With him. And I had scheduled a phone call right after that. Or the office scheduled phone call, and we always do our initial intakes. 00:09:54:13 - 00:10:10:11 Speaker 2 It's at my myself for Ryan. That takes that initial call. We do. I spent a lot of my day doing these initial calls. And we have them. It's very common. Or a very regular conversation. Hey, this is ours. Thanks for time. Tell me what's going on in your home. That's all we say. And then we just sit back, and we. 00:10:10:11 - 00:10:24:23 Speaker 2 And we listen. And she explained everything. The context that you just brought up, that she bought this house in April. She left for vacant for a trip, came back and her wood floors were buckled. And that they had found but they found a shower leak. So she swears that's it. 00:10:25:05 - 00:10:25:12 Speaker 1 Yep. 00:10:25:12 - 00:10:29:16 Speaker 2 Right. But the buckling is not just around the bathroom. 00:10:29:16 - 00:10:35:11 Speaker 1 Oh, yeah. That the bathrooms is like the back corner of the house and the floor is in the front of the house or buckle. Yeah. 00:10:35:13 - 00:10:52:07 Speaker 2 So normally we would go under contract before we would have it to the home because everyone such just come out and take a look at it. And that's actually a little abusive of our information. Right. Hey, just you know, you charge for this when you come out and do it for free, but because she was a connected person, right? 00:10:52:07 - 00:11:13:17 Speaker 2 She knows Curtis Lawson's if she falls into the connected person category, I said, hey, you're really you're right around the corner from our office. And the reason why our office is located where it is, it's literally the Google Map geographical center of all of our projects in Houston. So we are on average, based on moving there less than 15 minutes between projects. 00:11:13:19 - 00:11:38:01 Speaker 2 So she was like 4 or 5 streets away from us. So I swung by on my way to another project. Met her. She's super sweet. Really cute house. Nice part of town. And elevator bungalow. There have been some minor modifications to it. Going to the home, and the wood floors are warped and buckled across the entire, base. 00:11:38:01 - 00:11:58:03 Speaker 2 It's only a one story house, and. But then she is still adamant, based on the inspector and this shower being leak, and that's what's creating it. So I, I know that it's not the shower and leak is likely other things going on, including that this house had been vacant for a very, very long time. 00:11:58:05 - 00:11:59:06 Speaker 1 Right before she bought it. 00:11:59:06 - 00:12:00:20 Speaker 2 She bought it? Yeah. Well, it's someone. 00:12:00:20 - 00:12:02:04 Speaker 1 They probably bypassed away in the house. 00:12:02:04 - 00:12:03:07 Speaker 2 Just sat there. They just sat. 00:12:03:07 - 00:12:03:18 Speaker 1 There. 00:12:03:20 - 00:12:25:18 Speaker 2 Right. And it ran the AC, but not very much. Well, she is of an age where air conditioning becomes more of a biological priority, right. Because she gets really, really hot at certain times of the of. That's just that's the time. Right. So I ask her, what do you keep your AC at? She keeps it very, very cold. 00:12:25:18 - 00:12:26:08 Speaker 1 70 I. 00:12:26:08 - 00:12:47:03 Speaker 2 Think. Yeah 70 degrees with 70 degrees on a thermostat that's in the hallway. Right. Which means that it's actually turning it down lower than that. It's going to go over cooling the rest of the space, because the thermostat is not in the area where it can actually respond to the temperature load. Right. So I'm already thinking, okay, what has changed between then and now? 00:12:47:03 - 00:13:07:07 Speaker 2 Well, we had a very we actually had a mild, spring here. It didn't get really hot, but that period that she did leave was the first two and a half to three weeks of legit not only heat, but overnight relative humidity. So she's making her house cooler for the first time in years. Yep, it's hotter and wetter than it's ever been before. 00:13:07:13 - 00:13:14:17 Speaker 2 So the thermodynamic differences between inside and outside are completely magnified. Yeah, and that's what it's going to take. 00:13:14:18 - 00:13:28:12 Speaker 1 Yeah I was going to say if a time this this happened that weekend when she came back and this happened, it was upper 90s very high humidity, very high end Houston at that time. And she left the AC on 70 while she was out of the den. 00:13:28:14 - 00:13:33:02 Speaker 2 Yep. Because it was a pretty rudimentary thermostat at that point. She didn't like. 00:13:33:03 - 00:13:36:10 Speaker 1 Yeah, there's no way Programable is just to set the temp and walk out the door. 00:13:36:10 - 00:13:56:07 Speaker 2 Walk out the door. So that made sense. We of course, had to kind of give her a little bit of information to prove that, hey, this is different than you think. And then we, sent her a contract to do a building forensic review. You showed up right at the end when I was leaving. It's it was a good hand-off. 00:13:56:09 - 00:14:14:17 Speaker 2 And then I know that we went under contract, and then Ryan went out there and did the review. Went through all of the outside of the house, all the inside. Use sonar so we can see how moisture and energy is moving through the assemblies. We don't ever use infrared. It's not an actual forensic tool. It just creates a bunch of unnecessary pictures. 00:14:14:17 - 00:14:38:16 Speaker 2 And the way that people utilize it is problematic. I do appreciate infrared. And there we own I don't really, really beautiful infrared camera that we will use very specifically, but the reason why we don't use it is so many people use it maliciously, that we avoid that, same thing with people don't they don't understand how moisture meters actually work, and that it's nearly a metric tool in the hands of the person interpreting it. 00:14:38:18 - 00:14:47:13 Speaker 2 And you have to understand densities and materials and, and assemblies. It's like you have to do a wolfy model in your mind when you're using that. 00:14:47:18 - 00:15:00:19 Speaker 1 And there's a big difference in the in kind of the quality of moisture meters too. You can get a $20 moisture meter on Amazon, or you can get a hundreds of dollars, one that can give you very different readings because they're they're they have different settings. They're exactly for different purposes. 00:15:00:19 - 00:15:29:12 Speaker 2 But I would say that I can buy the cheapest moisture meter in the most expensive moisture meter, but if you just stick with it and become consistent, then you can take that consistency, whether that consistency is an 80 on a moisture scale or ten on a moisture sale. But if that consistency is then brought through a brain that understands these other metrics and these other dynamics, it's interpreted the meter is only as dumb as the person holding it. 00:15:29:14 - 00:15:51:09 Speaker 2 And it's not that they're they're just ignorant to these things. It takes a it took a long time. I mean, I've been using moisture meters for almost 26 years. And I can look back, you know, 20 years ago and I used to say, this thing is wet and it wasn't wet. It is because it had a vapor barrier under the wood flooring that was reflecting the signal. 00:15:51:09 - 00:16:17:22 Speaker 2 And and using pen set versus pad, it's a I could do a whole class, in fact, where we just got hired by a big manufacturer to develop the training class for their, moisture meters across the United States. So Ryan went in and did the work, evaluated it, and presented a report back to her that said, hey, based on building science and building forensics, this is what's going on in the home. 00:16:17:22 - 00:16:40:13 Speaker 2 And the chief thing was we had a crawlspace that is an unmitigated crawlspace, one that's never been, you know, you have to maintain a crawlspace, right? Like it's you have to maintain it like any other yard portion. And crawlspace ventilation originally, people believe that that air would come through the crawlspace and dry it out, but in the hot, humid climate zone. 00:16:40:17 - 00:17:02:02 Speaker 2 And this is important for folks that are living all the way through up into Austin and and as climate migration moves forward, everyone will become the hot, humid climate zone, replacing hot wet air with hot, wet air and expecting it to not be hot. Wet air is an oxymoron. So ventilation of assemblies in the hot, humid climate zone don't don't work in any format. 00:17:02:04 - 00:17:21:12 Speaker 2 Ventilated attics, ventilated, crawl spaces. There are some cases where an attic can operate based on some other condensing conditions. But the crawlspace ventilation, has kind of gone away. And now we actually, even by code standards, ventilating crawl spaces is really for flood mitigation, not for ventilating. 00:17:21:14 - 00:17:21:23 Speaker 1 Right? 00:17:21:23 - 00:17:42:09 Speaker 2 So this this crawlspace is full of hot, wet air from the outside, but also the majority of the moisture is from hydrostatic pressure of the earth pushing water up to get to a lower area of pressure in the surface. Then it vaporizes into that atmosphere. So we have two points of moisture introduction. And then we make it dry and cool on the inside. 00:17:42:14 - 00:18:03:13 Speaker 2 And I told her thankfully, she hadn't replaced the ACS yet or replaced the windows because this would have made it even worse, right? Because we'd have a lower pressure environment inside, dryer and extra cold. So she's already on her way there. She would have made it. She would have put it on mechanical steroids, is what we like to call it. 00:18:03:15 - 00:18:24:05 Speaker 2 So that water vapor is dissipating up and it starts to collect inside the sub flooring and then the oak. And I think this has been going on for a long time. And the good thing about wood is it has a lot of memory. So it will go back. It'll lay back down. But the more this happens, it expands the cellular capacity, which you can hold more and more water, and eventually you hit a point of super saturation. 00:18:24:11 - 00:18:45:21 Speaker 2 And then the buckling occurs. And that's what happened when she was gone. And it always happens when people are gone, you know. But I've seen it push walls apart. I've seen couches up at an angle because there's a buckle underneath it. And the good thing is it was consistent. This was this isn't a mystery. But the recommendations, were pretty, specific. 00:18:45:22 - 00:19:06:10 Speaker 2 They always had to be a crawl space. Something that you can't do halfway. So code energy code. Crazy that they are the ones that actually require polyurethane sheathing on top of your crawl space. It has nothing to do with energy efficiency. This is why we do have to remember that the energy energy code is kind of the garbage can code. 00:19:06:12 - 00:19:25:04 Speaker 2 We throw a bunch of extra crap in there that has nothing to do with energy efficiency. But then, because it's not part of the or her's rating, those elements get ignored. So we go to houses all the time with these issues that are brand new and I'm like, where's your vapor barrier? Where's your polyurethane on on cheating on your crawlspace? 00:19:25:08 - 00:19:32:17 Speaker 2 Well, we don't are supposed to do it. I'm like, no, you do per energy code. Well, I have a sticker in my panel that's not said. That sticker in the panel doesn't say you pass energy code. 00:19:32:17 - 00:19:34:10 Speaker 1 Yeah, they're not inspecting the code base. 00:19:34:10 - 00:19:57:23 Speaker 2 99% of readers, they don't actually evaluate the code. They do just what you need to get to your sticker. And then we spent all this time in the training with ResNet and all these guys, and they don't even speak to everything that's actually in the code. So but that is actually one of the most important parts of energy code that doesn't get adhered to, because without a resilient structure, energy efficiency means nothing. 00:19:58:01 - 00:20:14:12 Speaker 2 And that is actually a very, very important part of the resiliency of our new structures. So we had to go in there. We had to grade the crawlspace. You can't have potholes from raccoons and all this kind of stuff and, you know, dead bodies and, you know, there was a clown that lived there before. So you got to be careful with what they buried, right? 00:20:14:12 - 00:20:32:10 Speaker 2 That kind of stuff. So you go ahead and get to grade it properly. I know that some people like to kind of pitch in the middle and grade to the sides. That only works if the yard to the right, in the left hand side or the front of the rear can accept that runoff. I prefer to grade to a corner and put a sump pump. 00:20:32:13 - 00:20:33:08 Speaker 1 Right? Yeah. 00:20:33:10 - 00:20:34:09 Speaker 2 Or drain. Right? 00:20:34:09 - 00:20:35:00 Speaker 1 Yeah, exactly. 00:20:35:00 - 00:20:40:10 Speaker 2 Start with the drain. But make the make the drain. Well, large enough to accept a pump later on. 00:20:40:10 - 00:20:45:22 Speaker 1 Also, if you drain to the sides and you're in your vents not at ground level. Yeah. It's not going to go anywhere. 00:20:45:22 - 00:20:47:05 Speaker 2 No, it's not going to go anywhere. 00:20:47:07 - 00:20:50:05 Speaker 1 Sit there against the grade beam and maybe cause some foundations. 00:20:50:07 - 00:21:10:14 Speaker 2 Exactly. And it is easier also when you're grading to go to one end of the of the crawlspace and pull back towards yourself because it's a really horrible place to work, right? Like it's prison level kind of sin. I committed a crime and now I have to fix crawl spaces for living. So grade. 00:21:10:16 - 00:21:15:02 Speaker 1 At least on new on new, new construction crawl spaces. We generally build them big enough to. 00:21:15:03 - 00:21:15:16 Speaker 2 That's right. 00:21:15:17 - 00:21:17:03 Speaker 1 Even I can get in there. Right. 00:21:17:04 - 00:21:35:21 Speaker 2 The crazy thing is, we like to get in there and set grade as soon as the joists are finished, but then people will pound on it sometimes. But that's generally fixable. Then you put your polyurethane down, but then you had to security, get the tape into the posts and the beams and a lot of that. So when you get a flood, it doesn't just push away. 00:21:35:23 - 00:21:55:18 Speaker 2 And then you have to put some type of aggregate on it. The aggregates there for a couple purposes, one to keep it in place. So you could do like a 4x4 block or a, six inch by 16 CMU block every four square feet. That will hold it down. But when you do get those like little dips, you can do full aggregate and that will level everything off. 00:21:55:18 - 00:22:16:05 Speaker 2 And I think if you have a visible like if you can see into the crawl space, it's nice to do like a row of black star around the perimeter and then gray gravel through the interior. And then it was supposed to be simple to flip over and do the closeout foam properly. Right. And then you found that was not civil. 00:22:16:07 - 00:22:31:02 Speaker 1 Right? So after you guys went in and did your forensic review, made the recommendations, she moved all of her stuff out. You know, we're going to start doing work. And I found a, a hatch in the in the hall closet, you know, and when she was living in the house or she had towels and stuff in there. 00:22:31:02 - 00:22:49:11 Speaker 1 So I didn't see the hatch. It was like a little, I don't know, 30 inch by 30 inch section of wood flooring that had a brass pull in it, and she didn't know it was there. She'd never seen it before. The home inspector that she hired when she bought the house never saw it right. But I've been in a canal today. 00:22:49:12 - 00:23:03:23 Speaker 1 I've been in enough of these houses to know that there's usually some kind of little crawlspace hatch somewhere in the house. So anyway, I see the hatch, I open it up and boom! It's like this wave of a mold. Moist air hits me in the face as soon as I open the hatch. 00:23:04:00 - 00:23:09:21 Speaker 2 And VOCs, right. Microbial volatile organic compounds, that is literally the smell of mold is in bio. 00:23:09:23 - 00:23:27:15 Speaker 1 And of course, I wasn't like ready for this. I mean, I wasn't expecting it. And so I was like, you know, stick a flashlight down there, start looking around. There's like mushrooms growing in the crawl space, not just like some little fuzz on the dirt. I mean, like, like actual mushrooms growing in the crawl space. And Danielle has got a picture. 00:23:27:15 - 00:23:46:02 Speaker 1 She'll pop on the screen of that in a second. But, incessant shouting of the flashlight around all in there, all the all the framing is covered in mold growth. And I'm like, man, we got to get this checked out. So I called, the mold testing company. They come out and test it. Thank God it's it wasn't stinky, Beatrice. 00:23:46:04 - 00:23:48:00 Speaker 1 It was like Penicillium aspergillus. 00:23:48:00 - 00:23:54:18 Speaker 2 What we'd expect to find in an area that's been exposed to water vapor. Introduction for very, very long periods of time. 00:23:54:18 - 00:24:12:04 Speaker 1 Yeah. So this this leak, so there was a shower pan leak for sure. Right. The plumber wasn't lying about that. I mean, I saw pictures, like, you could see water coming out of the shower pan, so that was legit. But probably that shower pan had been leaking for quite a while, and there's no one knew about it. 00:24:12:06 - 00:24:31:15 Speaker 1 Because that part of the crawlspace was was really hard to get to. But, you know, the, the kind of moisture that she had going on in the crawl space, you know, was kind of a latent problem that had been going on for a long time. And then the shower panel leak, I think, accelerated that combined with the humidity and the temperature. 00:24:31:15 - 00:24:37:05 Speaker 1 Yep. And it's like it'd probably been kind of teetering on the brink of having a real issue. But then the shower pan stuff. 00:24:37:08 - 00:24:37:17 Speaker 2 Well. 00:24:37:18 - 00:24:38:10 Speaker 1 Just kind of brought it. 00:24:38:10 - 00:25:01:12 Speaker 2 Up that that situation or this situation occurs after our big floods. Right. And they want to try to say, oh, the floodwaters created that. I was like, no, the floodwaters were just it just aggravated an already preexisting condition. Right. The good thing is, in those flood cases, people can claim it on their insurance because there was actually a natural occurrence right now, you could try to claim this on insurance because of the shower pan leak. 00:25:01:14 - 00:25:23:04 Speaker 2 Most insurance would not cover that. It's a slow moisture introduction. Yeah. And when that requires maintenance and and we could talk a whole day when forensics when forensic issues are covered and not right. We spend and I'm a previous insurance license. Insurance, adjuster in the state of Texas. I understand how these things kind of work and don't work together. 00:25:23:06 - 00:25:29:16 Speaker 2 And we're going to see more and more of these actual construction issues not covered by insurance. Yeah. 00:25:29:19 - 00:25:50:17 Speaker 1 Well, you know, fortunately for her, her insurance covered kind of the repair of all the quote unquote, water damage, right, that they attributed to a shower leak, which is great, right? Yep. So good for her. And but also, fortunately for her, she had the financial capacity to go ahead and fix these other issues while we were at it that insurance didn't cover. 00:25:50:18 - 00:26:05:07 Speaker 2 Is also fortunate that she didn't have ten years of living in this house. Right? Like she was able to to to move out a little easier than someone that was totally entrenched in a, in a structure she had not been in in that long, and it was just her. So she didn't have kids to deal with in schools. 00:26:05:07 - 00:26:30:02 Speaker 2 And yeah, really serendipitous right? This but so you opened it up and now we have rot and mold and mushrooms and it is super important folks understand that going underneath a house and implying that, integral layer or, excuse me, a monolithic layer of air, water vapor pressure and thermal barrier has to be applied onto a substrate that can accept it. 00:26:30:05 - 00:26:51:17 Speaker 2 Right. And that minimum substrate has to be dry. So I go to many, many houses that have had the close up foam applied to it, and it's not functioning in the as actually the material rots in place even faster. And the biggest sign that that's happening besides soft spots, is just this rapid increase in roaches and earwigs and pest. 00:26:51:20 - 00:27:07:20 Speaker 2 It's really nasty. Because that closeout foam has to be done 100% or not at all, and it has to be done to at least, two inch barrier. If you don't have two inches, you're not going to meet that vapor quotient. I don't really care about the insulation that has. I don't care about the R-value or anything. 00:27:07:23 - 00:27:27:14 Speaker 2 It's about vapor. Right. Now, water vapor barriers always work better when they're in conjunction with the thermal barrier. Otherwise you can you are going to have a tendency to find yourself in a condensation plane. If it's on the wrong side of the assembly. Of course, this is the correct side of the assembly, the outside. So you we weren't able to dry this out. 00:27:27:16 - 00:27:28:08 Speaker 2 That was not going to happen. 00:27:28:09 - 00:27:39:05 Speaker 1 Yeah. So yeah, this mold issue and rod issue kind of forced us into now we're going to remove all the subfloor. And you know that old 1920 subfloor was like two by 12. 00:27:39:06 - 00:27:40:01 Speaker 2 40 by 12. 00:27:40:02 - 00:28:06:05 Speaker 1 On a 40ft. Yeah. An actual two inch board. Weight, not nominal, weight on a 45 across the whole line. And of course, back then, yeah, that subfloor even now, the subfloor goes underneath all the bottom plates of all the walls. So we're having to go along with the saw and, you know, cut as tight as we can to the interior walls and cut that subfloor away and then painstakingly pry every single freaking plank off that thing, which took forever, by the way. 00:28:06:07 - 00:28:26:11 Speaker 1 So we removed the oak, we removed the subfloor to, expose all the, all the issues. And so we get down there, and now, you know, we're we're scrubbing the there's a, there's a cleaner that a lot of the, remediation companies use called shockwave. It will kill the the active growth scrub everything with shockwave go back. 00:28:26:11 - 00:28:37:08 Speaker 2 And it's important that you don't just spray shockwaves. You have to scrub right. Then you spray, then you scrub and you spray. It is it requires action, right? Not just application. And that's what people forget. 00:28:37:11 - 00:28:53:01 Speaker 1 Just missed it. Right? Yep. And then, you know, this was maybe an unnecessary step. But we also painted all the subfloor framing with a fungicide oil paint. Yep. To further seal, although the, the closeout installation may have, may have made us not have to do that. 00:28:53:01 - 00:29:10:16 Speaker 2 Some, some of that. There's so a lot of what we do, it has a psychological aspect to it. And there are cases where we will still, even though I know the up foam will encapsulate it and I don't need that, but the the clients prefer to have a visual reference that it's been done. 00:29:10:16 - 00:29:16:02 Speaker 1 When you see all your stuff for framing by painted white with this paint, like you feel, you just kind of feel better about it. 00:29:16:03 - 00:29:35:09 Speaker 2 You do and it's not a big cost and it's not hurting anything because I'm still not going to get too close. So foam between the bottom of the of the subfloor and the top of the joist. Right. So they it's and it might sit there for a little bit and we don't want it to accumulate. Right. And sometimes even though it's been cleaned up, there's some dark spots on the new wood. 00:29:35:11 - 00:29:38:20 Speaker 2 And so psychologically it's not hurting anything. 00:29:38:22 - 00:29:54:19 Speaker 1 So we have some photos of the, of the stuff we're, framing painted with that paint also that will pop on there too. But so yeah, we, we painted all that. We, installed new subfloor decking with plywood decking. And then we went in there and sprayed the two inches of clothes. So. 00:29:54:21 - 00:30:14:09 Speaker 2 You know, what's interesting on your plywood decking is the old two by six was a very, very specific height. Right. And you can't just in because it was true form framing and framing material, getting that that new subfloor to be at the height of the old flooring, diagonal. So going through the wall is tricky. 00:30:14:11 - 00:30:29:00 Speaker 1 Yeah. Well actually we didn't even try. Oh we, we just went back with the subfloor and we're actually going back and just adjusting the baseboard. Yeah, it was trying to get that height right. It was going to be it was going to be tricky. Plus the baseboards are in bad shape anyway. Okay. 00:30:29:04 - 00:30:47:01 Speaker 2 So then now when they thought that it was going to be, crawlspace prep flip over. If it's dry, dry it out, spray it got planted because you found the subfloor quality. Or assume that the framing quality was so poor we had to start from scratch. 00:30:47:04 - 00:30:57:01 Speaker 1 Yeah, we had to replace some rotten, subfloor framing as well. And then also we had to go back in there and add blocking for all of our plywood that we put down, because those, again, those you. 00:30:57:01 - 00:30:58:04 Speaker 2 Couldn't get to the walls. 00:30:58:04 - 00:31:08:01 Speaker 1 Yeah. That decking. But there's air before it ran all the way across the house. Continuous. And so now we had to go in and add blocking at all the perimeters to nail our subfloor to. 00:31:08:02 - 00:31:10:23 Speaker 2 And at this point she lost her kitchen in this process. Right. 00:31:11:01 - 00:31:16:16 Speaker 1 Yep. So had to pull out all the cabinets throughout the whole house. Yep. So she ended up getting a new kitchen out of the job. 00:31:16:18 - 00:31:22:10 Speaker 2 And those are, if I remember correctly, were almost original cabinetry that part was going to be remodeled anyways. 00:31:22:10 - 00:31:30:02 Speaker 1 It was it was original, cabinet boxes. Someone had to re face the cabinets at some point, but all the boxes and the countertops and everything were original. 00:31:30:02 - 00:31:33:10 Speaker 2 And we did, some windows, but not all windows. Right? 00:31:33:12 - 00:31:46:00 Speaker 1 Yeah. So we're replacing, she know she had the old, wood windows with the LED weights, on the front of the house. So we're swapping those out while we're there. She didn't want to replace all the windows in the house. She already had some double pain in the back. 00:31:46:02 - 00:32:06:01 Speaker 2 Well, and we have a I had a conversation with her about her attic and her air conditioning and those windows that we need to do it all in conjunction. So we have an agreement to come back around in two years and have that conversation again with her. And we leave a lot of our clients with, if don't do this without calling us, like those kind of warnings. 00:32:06:03 - 00:32:24:11 Speaker 2 Because what I didn't want to do was replace the AC. Now and then do the windows later on it, throw off that load. Right? Yeah. And now we actually have a calculable, load from below. And we've improved the vapor quotient. The crazy thing is with the manual J or the heat load, how we have a determined heat load. 00:32:24:13 - 00:32:45:16 Speaker 2 It has a number, like a rating number of what is the air tightness or the quality of construction is really what it's called. But that quality construction quotient doesn't include anything about water vapor. It's only air, and air is easy. Air doesn't make that much of a difference whatsoever in total performance. It's water vapor that makes the difference. 00:32:45:18 - 00:33:13:06 Speaker 2 So the Hvac system, which can if to configure properly, directly managed, deemed occasion, it doesn't do it naturally and only does it by innate deemed ification. Basically you get what you get and don't throw a fit. Dehumidification. But the metric utilized to determine that doesn't even have the quotient for vapor included in it. So that's something that needs to be improved. 00:33:13:08 - 00:33:35:01 Speaker 2 But why is that right? Why doesn't have it? Because the people that that wrote these, the software that developed meaning today they're not in Houston, they're not in this climate zone. Yeah. We gotta remember that all building science and all building performance is a northern methodology. And so we have to I, I've said on many podcasts, I spent a lot of my time translate into southern speak. 00:33:35:01 - 00:33:37:19 Speaker 2 Right. What does this mean to us. 00:33:37:21 - 00:33:41:10 Speaker 1 Translate that Yankee talk. That's right. I southern drawl. All right. 00:33:41:10 - 00:33:45:08 Speaker 2 I'm by myself. So New York City, right? Like, come on. So, 00:33:45:10 - 00:33:50:11 Speaker 1 Hey, that should be your new slogan. That's right. You wouldn't buy your salsa in New York City. So why buy your building site? 00:33:50:11 - 00:34:10:03 Speaker 2 That's right, that's right. I can I'll call pace right now and see if I can rip off their logo. So, it's it was, it was a but now this homeowner's fortunate because you and I have done a ton of these projects together. Right? So the process was defined. Hey. I'm here. I'm the builder. There's something going on. 00:34:10:03 - 00:34:39:23 Speaker 2 Here's toner. We explain what's going on, she hires us. We put together the the explanation, building signs explanation and the steps resolution. You take action on them. Some things pop up which do in every project. We're always able to respond, we're able to modify. And now the end result is she has practically a completely remodeled structure, a vastly superior crawl space application, one that's going to shed floodwaters at a much higher rate. 00:34:40:00 - 00:35:00:19 Speaker 2 We're not. We were eliminated. Probably the largest, second largest, or if not largest single source of contaminant. Introduction into her home, and she has plans to only modify it even more within the next two years. This is going to be the best bungalow on that block, and it will probably outperform most modern homes built. 00:35:01:01 - 00:35:01:17 Speaker 1 Yeah. 00:35:01:19 - 00:35:02:08 Speaker 2 Crazy. 00:35:02:08 - 00:35:05:19 Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah. The sad thing is the next buyer tear it down and build a new house there. 00:35:05:19 - 00:35:35:05 Speaker 2 Well, the sad thing is you can't get any value for these when you sell the home, right. Because you're in a popular area that people just want to be there. Yeah. Right. But then you go to another area where it's not that popular, but you did these, but then in those areas, the values of the houses are so low, the homeowners can't afford to do these things, know there's a whole disconnect between, when a high performance home has actual real estate value and when when it doesn't. 00:35:35:06 - 00:35:36:05 Speaker 2 Yeah. 00:35:36:07 - 00:36:00:15 Speaker 1 I mean, we had a conversation of Curtis shouldn't, you know, should I, should I just move out of this house, sell it for a lot value? And what's my tear down like? That was a conversation we had. Right. Because this ended up being over 100 grand project between the, you know, the the mold stuff, the the crawl space fixes related to vapor and then kind of the ancillary damage from the kitchen, the cabinets and everything else. 00:36:00:15 - 00:36:19:05 Speaker 1 It was it was over, you know, well over 100 K. So yeah, that's a conversation, a conversation that you have to have. It's like, should I put the money into this structure? And she decided, yeah, I'm at the point in my life where I life is location bought, values are still going up. So I'll probably recoup this money at some point. 00:36:19:05 - 00:36:22:04 Speaker 1 You know, and, and just a depreciation. 00:36:22:04 - 00:36:43:02 Speaker 2 So the crazy thing is I've had, you know, customers like her that have done this and now it's, you know, 7 or 8 years later in their houses are some of the most popular rentals for people that are leaving houses that are having environmental issues. So their current house is going through all these modifications and they want to go move someplace, but also a place where they can recover. 00:36:43:04 - 00:37:05:10 Speaker 2 So I have previous clients that have done these these retrofits and these changes and their homes turn into these refuges, for folks to recover while waiting out their improvements to their structure. So I think that had some really cool intrinsic value. Now, the only way that that happened is because there was we are all connected here, right? 00:37:05:10 - 00:37:25:02 Speaker 2 Like those homeowners know me and we know them. And, that kind of stuff. But I think there's some real sense to it. And also, I do know that during the pandemic, there was an uptick in interest in these kind of, facets. And we do have some structures that are on the market that at that market that we did the the building performance design on them. 00:37:25:04 - 00:37:36:05 Speaker 2 And we actually I've had a couple sports folks seek out our previously designed structures and with intent, because they want to live in a healthy structure while they, you know, play professional sports. 00:37:36:05 - 00:37:56:15 Speaker 1 Yeah. So obviously this is a very specific, case study about, about this house. But for people who are looking at buying a bungalow, or an older house like this, you know what, what kinds of things should they be looking at when they're going to purchase a house? Because, I mean, she she felt like she did her due diligence. 00:37:56:15 - 00:38:01:01 Speaker 1 I mean, she said to me several times, Curtis, I hired the most expensive home inspector when I bought this, who. 00:38:01:01 - 00:38:01:19 Speaker 2 Was an engineer. 00:38:02:00 - 00:38:15:13 Speaker 1 Who wasn't. And he didn't find any of these problems. Right. So these are not the kind of things that home inspectors are looking for. And realtors sure as hell aren't. I mean, what, what what what should people be considering and looking for when they're buying these houses? 00:38:15:13 - 00:38:35:20 Speaker 2 Well, I think, there are people who are already out there looking for a more advanced version of, track inspection. And then they find someone. It's normally the upper version is by someone with an engineering degree. The thing is, none of this is engineering. I mean, a dentist could stamp it just the same, and that's a little misleading. 00:38:35:20 - 00:39:04:02 Speaker 2 And I think the state needs to do some things to correct that mis utilization of an engineering designation to upsell non engineering products. I think that's pretty deceptive. But also bigger picture. Realtors don't want that. They don't want advanced inspections. They want the transaction to happen. Yeah. They real estate agent is not incentivized for you to really, really look at the home. 00:39:04:04 - 00:39:23:04 Speaker 2 They want you to be ignorant so that you purchase the structure. So I do have about three dozen real estate agents in Houston and a couple in Austin, in Dallas that would never do a project without us. But the funny thing is, I only represent their buyers. They never use me with a seller. 00:39:23:05 - 00:39:23:14 Speaker 1 Right? 00:39:23:18 - 00:39:47:07 Speaker 2 Right. I guess they want it as a tool for negotiation. But also these are typically very expensive structures where that stuff will snowball and there's enough room in the transaction for a $100,000 swing when also the homeowners don't absolutely have to have that house. They already have a nicer structure. I actually just got done with a $5.5 million purchase. 00:39:47:09 - 00:40:08:15 Speaker 2 We were brought in as a third party because the buyer and the seller got sideways with each other, and they had two different inspectors that were both engineers contradicting each other. So we got brought in as independent and third party, and there was methodologies that those guys were using and some overarching assumptions that were incorrect. So we just kind of pushed them out of the way and said, this is the reality, your situation. 00:40:08:17 - 00:40:26:21 Speaker 2 And there was some, some, incentives given back and forth, but they still that transaction actually happened. And we were real happy with that. But we had, one of the real estate agents kind of bark at me on the, at the table over. What, how would you know that this blah, blah, blah, blah and stay calm. 00:40:26:21 - 00:40:44:06 Speaker 2 And we it's I mean, people bark at me all the time. And I'm okay with that. And then he appalled. He called two days later and apologized. He's like, hey, I didn't know after thought, you know, I'm always arguing for the best of my buyers. And, I'm like, I appreciate that. I do my job thoroughly. 00:40:44:06 - 00:41:06:19 Speaker 2 You do your job thoroughly because my I didn't mean to. He said your points were valid. And I thought that was very cool of him to call and apologize to him. Now, kind of one of my favorite realtors. So. But I think, homeowners need to understand that the the key is the track inspection is the absolute bare minimum. 00:41:06:21 - 00:41:14:17 Speaker 2 And they need to trust their spidey senses, right? They smell something. If something looks weird, if something's swollen, they need to take that extra step. 00:41:14:20 - 00:41:19:06 Speaker 1 I mean, your nose, your is your first your first good tool that you should use right? 00:41:19:08 - 00:41:39:18 Speaker 2 House, right touch things. I always, I look like, like, well, I don't look like I'm. I wish I kind of did, like Tom cruise sliding around on my socks and houses. And you do it too, right? Like that's how we feel when there's undulations in elevation and water for flooring. Yeah. Soft spots. Your shoes are a little misleading. 00:41:39:20 - 00:42:05:03 Speaker 2 So use common sense. But also homeowners think for yourself. Don't go to the realtor because the realtor has economic incentives that are contrary to your needs. So if he's if he smells like a fish, it's probably a fish. Go call a fisherman. Right. That's what you need to do. And I think that's becoming more and more prevalent. 00:42:05:03 - 00:42:27:09 Speaker 2 In fact, I, I totally disconnected from this. I had an email, overnight, we had, National Night Out was, I think in October. And there was a, a couple who bought a bungalow in the Heights. Beautiful part of town. Expensive now. Right. Remember the heights used to be affordable. Yeah. Like it's ridiculous. And they're about to do a remodel on a heavy add on. 00:42:27:09 - 00:42:46:10 Speaker 2 And they're out at this out on the street. All the neighbors are there and they start having conversations about it. And, they had about seven neighbors said, yeah, we've had issues with our bungalows. And four of those seven had already hired us. And all out of those four, one of them did the work upfront and said, well, I haven't had any problems. 00:42:46:10 - 00:43:05:00 Speaker 2 I use them upfront. So, we actually are going to go do a, do the building performance design for there. So hopefully we have our initial phone intake call with them today. But that's a beautiful thing about Houston. It's a really small connected town. And we got there, but. 00:43:05:06 - 00:43:06:08 Speaker 1 It's the biggest small town. 00:43:06:08 - 00:43:15:17 Speaker 2 Biggest small town, Texas. But I regularly hear clients of ours going, I didn't know someone like you existed. And, like, I wish I could tell you how to find us, but. 00:43:15:19 - 00:43:34:04 Speaker 1 I get that all the time to, like, you know, for our own services. You know, it's like people like. Like with you. A lot of times people don't hire me for that until they're already to a point sideways. Yeah. The same thing with you. Like, you get called in on the back end of these forensic cases. It's like, pay me now or pay me later. 00:43:34:04 - 00:43:34:11 Speaker 1 Yeah. 00:43:34:15 - 00:43:50:08 Speaker 2 It's it's it's kind of crazy. And and I wish there would to be an easy, you know, SEO search term that I could put in there. And it's not you know, and we have improved that. But the, the I think the I appreciate those that talk about the stuff online bring a little bit of prevalence to it. 00:43:50:08 - 00:44:06:02 Speaker 2 It's a very common thing for us now that we asked particular questions. Or homeowners, have you how did how do you hear about us? And a lot of them say, well, I've been watching this person online or the and we don't have any connections to those people other than your your podcast. And I've had plenty of people contact us. 00:44:06:02 - 00:44:14:05 Speaker 2 So yeah, I, I listen to Curtis's podcast, but I appreciate the, the other ones. It's bringing awareness. Right. Yeah. But. 00:44:14:07 - 00:44:34:11 Speaker 1 Yeah, I mean, I think that just over the last so I've been doing this, this is my, my 20th year this year, like, in fact, I think September, the September made 20 years. I heard almost, almost no discussion of building science or forensic issues whatsoever 20 years ago when I started. Yeah, yeah, I'm sure, I'm sure it existed. 00:44:34:11 - 00:44:53:21 Speaker 1 Right. But I wasn't hearing it. But now even the guys who are starting out, even homeowners now, are hearing about these, these topics. So I think, you know, obviously the internet's a huge part of that. But also people are just seeing more and more problems. And so the awareness level has come up because they're trying to find answers. 00:44:53:21 - 00:45:15:17 Speaker 2 Yes. And they're being forced into it with climate, migration or houses are not as resilient as they used to be. And that resiliency is becoming more prevalent faster. So this is it's it's borderline a national housing crisis. That was probably what's going to be said in ten years, but we are seeing it now. So coordinate here today, time stamp. 00:45:15:17 - 00:45:19:02 Speaker 1 So ten years from now, go back and listen to this. And I told you so. 00:45:19:05 - 00:45:40:16 Speaker 2 And and we know it because the our office in Austin is we are fixing issues that we fixed ten, 15 years ago. And we thought that we would see, you know, at least a 2 to 1 design to forensics ratio. And it's about the opposite. It's a 7 to 1 for every new project I can get in Austin, I get seven failure projects. 00:45:40:16 - 00:45:52:22 Speaker 2 Wow. And a lot of that has to do with that market is very expensive. Because there's a lack in trades. Well, when there's a, there's a lack and trades and higher cost doesn't always translate to higher quality. 00:45:53:01 - 00:45:53:09 Speaker 1 Yeah. 00:45:53:09 - 00:45:56:06 Speaker 2 And that type of architecture, modern architecture is not as resilient. 00:45:56:06 - 00:46:05:13 Speaker 1 I was about to say to the complexity of building some of those houses requires better practices and better trades. And so you're seeing more of a disconnect there. 00:46:05:13 - 00:46:30:13 Speaker 2 And they're so focused on energy efficiency because that was you know, Austin is the hub of energy efficiency. And so many people in kind of my arena speak out of that Austin area. And energy efficiency has nothing to do. It's so low priority. So we have lost 15 or 20 years of practical knowledge base. And I'm discussing things and also that no one's ever heard of. 00:46:30:15 - 00:46:54:00 Speaker 2 I'm just down the road. We're only three hours away. Yeah. So it's, it was it's a little disheartening that I feel like I'm going a my, my worst builder in Houston is more knowledgeable about true building science than the best builder in Austin. Because they have to deal with it. It will they will lose their business if they don't deal with it here. 00:46:54:02 - 00:47:06:19 Speaker 1 Well, I think I think they might have a good knowledge of some building science, but not related to but not the not to the solutions that are related to resiliency and moisture management. Yeah. Right. 00:47:06:19 - 00:47:22:07 Speaker 2 And it's and that's the of course this is from my view point right. Yeah. I'm trying to avoid failures. I'm trying to design for resiliency. They may have, you know, some type of stuff sprayed on the inside that reduces their, you know, their leakage rate to 2%, a. 00:47:22:07 - 00:47:24:09 Speaker 1 Great, great R-value, great insulation. 00:47:24:15 - 00:47:45:01 Speaker 2 Thanks for the $40 a year. That was great. But but now I've got rotten walls. So what was the point of any of that? It's just the priorities should shift in that market. But I can only is we're only, you know, we're a relatively small group, and hopefully have more and more employees in Austin. It's also very hard to hire for what? 00:47:45:01 - 00:47:45:22 Speaker 2 Right. 00:47:46:00 - 00:47:50:19 Speaker 1 Yeah. Well, it's it's hard anywhere, but especially trying to hire up there. 00:47:50:19 - 00:47:51:04 Speaker 2 Cuz. 00:47:51:08 - 00:47:53:15 Speaker 1 That's I think it's hard to hire for anything at all. Austin. 00:47:53:15 - 00:47:59:17 Speaker 2 But but I really we, I really like and we could talk about an Austin house case house next. Right. Yeah. 00:47:59:19 - 00:48:00:13 Speaker 1 So. 00:48:00:15 - 00:48:21:02 Speaker 2 Field trip and I hopefully this is we try to be careful with the privacy of our clients when we're discussing this. Yeah. Right. So I know Daniel is going to be can be really specific on the pictures that we put up there. But I do want to remind people listening, do not take the building science and performance and construction recommendations for this house and apply it to yours. 00:48:21:03 - 00:48:29:03 Speaker 2 Right. There are no two houses that are the same, ever. Because of the two natures, mother nature and human nature. No one can calculate those. 00:48:29:03 - 00:48:36:19 Speaker 1 Two, right? I mean, there's general principles that we apply, but every house is going to have a different situation's, different thermodynamics going on. 00:48:36:19 - 00:48:42:14 Speaker 2 Yeah. Hydrodynamics, everything a homeowner situations, microclimates, standards, pressurization differences. 00:48:42:16 - 00:48:58:07 Speaker 1 And that's the same reason that we like we can't take like so so let's say you write a spec, you know, a specs and performance specs for a house that I'm building right now. That's the same reason I can't take those specs and just blank and apply them to every other house I'm going to build for the next five years, because every house is gonna be. 00:48:58:09 - 00:49:03:15 Speaker 1 We're building custom homes. They're all going to be different. They're in a different, sites, different parts of town, different. 00:49:03:17 - 00:49:33:04 Speaker 2 Know every production home is actually a custom home because there's no two homeowners that are the same. Right. There's no such thing as a standard structure. We had a really cool new partner in Austin, trade partner. And he actually said why doesn't someone just take your specs and use my again I was like, they're welcome to I'll just see them on the forensics later on, because it's actually more dangerous to take a specific set of performance specifications and to apply them to something else than if you just do things generally. 00:49:33:08 - 00:49:40:00 Speaker 2 Right. So it's it is a loaded gun and you can't just, you know, load every type of bullet in there and think it's going to fire. It does. 00:49:40:00 - 00:49:44:17 Speaker 1 Right like that. So again, it's, it's you're still using the same. 00:49:44:19 - 00:49:45:06 Speaker 2 Springs. 00:49:45:06 - 00:49:53:17 Speaker 1 The same principles, the same science, but you're applying them to the different structures differently based on how they're designed with the, the situation. The site is. 00:49:53:17 - 00:49:54:13 Speaker 2 The homeowners everything. 00:49:54:15 - 00:49:55:13 Speaker 1 We the occupant. 00:49:55:13 - 00:50:04:16 Speaker 2 Load. Yeah. We like to call building science is deceptively familiar. Yeah. It feels like, you know, it and you don't. So it is different. 00:50:04:16 - 00:50:24:07 Speaker 1 So so I want to touch on real quick occupant load. So it just how people live their lives. These are questions that on the construction side we ask before we start a project. And I know you do too. And your initial consultation before you start writing your specs. Who's living there? What are their health needs? What temperature do they like to keep things at? 00:50:24:09 - 00:50:38:23 Speaker 1 What like how like, how are you using the house or the doors going to be open all the time? I mean, like there's so many questions that you can ask to find out how people are going to be using the home and how that might affect how it's going to perform. And you have to get that information before you do your design. 00:50:38:23 - 00:50:44:02 Speaker 1 So I know that you guys do that. We do that. And that's one of the big reasons that you can't blank and apply this stuff. 00:50:44:02 - 00:51:05:05 Speaker 2 You can. And even the same family is going to modify when you have three kids. And elementary school is different than three teenagers because you know how many nasty, moldy shower areas I've gone to and like, oh yeah, you got two teenage boys that take 45 minutes, hours apiece, and you didn't tile the top of your shower. You didn't run the transom all the way up, and you don't have an exhaust fan in there. 00:51:05:10 - 00:51:06:11 Speaker 2 What do you expect? Now? 00:51:06:11 - 00:51:08:07 Speaker 1 I hear they never flip the switch. Turn the fan on. 00:51:08:09 - 00:51:32:19 Speaker 2 Or when you do that fan is there for an average amount of humidity. Now you're dragging excessive amounts, humidity across the surface of your sheetrock and it's super saturating. We get those when you turn off the lights and the room, and then you turn on our specialty lights. We can see the saturation marks that have been forming, and I'm like, that's why we have a lot of spore growth inside the medicine cabinet because of all of these different aspects coming together. 00:51:32:21 - 00:51:36:16 Speaker 2 So it's your kid's fault, right? But if the. 00:51:36:16 - 00:51:37:18 Speaker 1 Solution don't, a good. 00:51:37:18 - 00:51:54:18 Speaker 2 Solution is rebuild the shop. You know, we showers, you, go to you, and there's a sheetrock ceiling in the shower. Oh yeah. That's nasty right. And even though it doesn't, it doesn't necessarily grow mold. It still is a breeding ground for microorganisms that then find themselves on to other places. 00:51:54:18 - 00:52:05:05 Speaker 1 And what if you've got like a recessed can in your, in your shower that, that stuff just kind of going around the air and it doesn't have a proper seal or gasket on it, that stuff's just going around that can too. 00:52:05:06 - 00:52:22:15 Speaker 2 That needs to be a bad thing, can light. Right? And that whole idea that there's a transom at the top of the glass is tilted open. Horrible, horrible idea. Keep the wet inside the wet and rate everything for wet. So everything in the shower should be wet rated. The moisture removal should be in that space and it should not infiltrate into the rest of them. 00:52:22:19 - 00:52:36:19 Speaker 2 It is a small Roman bath, a shower, right? That's what it's there for. Tubs are different. They they kind of they don't aspirate at the same rate as a shower does. So little kids tub and then we have the splash overs. We can talk about that. 00:52:36:23 - 00:52:44:05 Speaker 1 So I want to do a whole episode actually on shower design or shower waterproofing or the other solutions just don't take showers. 00:52:44:05 - 00:52:48:16 Speaker 2 I mean, yes, that's right. You could just wait for the rain. I actually anything's overrated. 00:52:48:16 - 00:52:48:18 Speaker 1 Yeah. 00:52:48:19 - 00:53:01:19 Speaker 2 I work with a really cool group that comes in and does all of the. Just the waterproof. It's like a separate trade. No longer does the tile guy do the waterproofing, and they. And they guarantee it for ten years. 00:53:01:21 - 00:53:02:13 Speaker 1 I need their info. 00:53:02:17 - 00:53:10:23 Speaker 2 It's awesome. It's actually extremely affordable. Well, we should have them come on and talk. And he's it's it's it's amazing. It's what we do in hospitals. 00:53:11:04 - 00:53:12:02 Speaker 1 Who is this? 00:53:12:04 - 00:53:14:13 Speaker 2 I had to get the name for you. I don't I don't want to miss quorum right now. 00:53:14:13 - 00:53:15:04 Speaker 1 Okay. 00:53:15:06 - 00:53:16:10 Speaker 2 Guys, because I know, I know the guy. 00:53:16:14 - 00:53:19:22 Speaker 1 I saw somebody like that at the builder show a couple years ago here in Houston. 00:53:20:01 - 00:53:37:13 Speaker 2 The unfortunate thing is, they're their product. Unless you've experienced failure rates. And the thing is, most builders don't know they experience failure rates because it happens at year three. But it's notice and they don't call the builder. Right. Like I love when a builder says I don't need you toner. I don't have any problems in my house. 00:53:37:13 - 00:53:55:20 Speaker 2 It's really. So you go back to all your houses a year or two with forensic education to understand how to evaluate it properly, with the proper tools to see what the leading, examples are of predetermined failure. That's amazing. And where they go. Why build 30 houses a year? Right? So that's like, I don't know, ten houses a year for the last ten years. 00:53:55:20 - 00:54:00:07 Speaker 2 So you've done 300 houses. That's great. That's, that's that's a quarter of the year for us. 00:54:00:11 - 00:54:17:23 Speaker 1 I had somebody call me a couple weeks ago. I went looked at the house here my early on who they had a pretty big name builder here in Houston who doesn't work with you. I know you, who built their house and, they had a they had a leaking shower and they had mold and stuff, like, all around the shower. 00:54:18:01 - 00:54:26:06 Speaker 1 And, I'm like, why don't you just call the builder? They're pretty big. I'm sure. I'm pretty sure they'll come out here and fix it for you. They're like, we don't want to deal with them when they're like, yeah, fix it the right way. 00:54:26:06 - 00:54:30:00 Speaker 2 It's amazing how many passes are given. Right? I'm so. 00:54:30:04 - 00:54:32:23 Speaker 1 I'm like, I'm like, why don't you go after them? They're like, nah, it's not like I feel. 00:54:32:23 - 00:54:46:11 Speaker 2 Like anyone could sue me in any. I'm. I live with the fear of litigation, which is a driving factor to quality. Right? It's not a fear. It's the awareness that that could happen. So you need to be performing at a high level all the time. 00:54:46:13 - 00:54:47:03 Speaker 1 Absolutely. 00:54:47:03 - 00:54:50:04 Speaker 2 Yeah. So but I love this case conversation. We should do this more. 00:54:50:09 - 00:54:58:18 Speaker 1 We should. We'll do it again soon. So great. Great point to wrap it up. I appreciate you rejoining me after a long hiatus. Yeah. I just like the word hiatus. 00:54:58:18 - 00:55:00:01 Speaker 2 Hiatus. 00:55:00:03 - 00:55:05:01 Speaker 1 All right. Well, thank you all for listening to this episode of the Horror Project Shepherd podcast. I will see you next time. Bye bye.