A 75,000 square foot mold inspection? That’s just another day in the field for Kristian Geiger, owner of Avid Inspection Specialists, and episode 54’s guest on The Ride Along.
From baby rodents in drains to shady mold testing tactics, Kristian’s seen it all. He breaks down how to win trust in a state with no mold licensing, why he leans on real certifications (not shortcuts), and how his EMT background shapes the way he approaches safety on the job.
Also? His viral video got over 2 million views. No big deal. (Kidding – it IS a big deal!)
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Transcript
Brad Lowery
Another freaking week, another episode here of the Ride Along with my co-host, Mr. Matt Brading out in Houston with Texas Edge and Spec. How’s it going, buddy?
Matt Brading
So what’s up? It’s going well. It’s going very well, but very busy lately.
Brad Lowery
Dude, this is good. Spring Market, it’s rolling along. You’ve been busy. That’s awesome.
Matt Brading
I got a new guy started a new a new guy started with me today. New inspector. Yeah. He did OK. He’s right now. He’s just kind of walking around with me, you know, but in upcoming weeks and you know he’ll slowly get more and more, you know, things that he’s doing and get his hands on more stuff. More hands on type training right now. He’s just kind of shadowing, but will increases his workload coming up in the upcoming weeks.
Brad Lowery
Dang dude, hey how did you do? Is his workload increases as his liability decreases. It’s based on how it works, right? You do now. So what do you do for like when you’re training somebody, is he just carrying the ladder open in the windows, running the faucets, things like that? Like, what do you have them doing?
Matt Brading
Yeah, you gotta learn. I will say that carrying a ladder is a huge thing, by the way. But so yeah, he has actually done some ladder carrying, but for the most part, right now, he’s just walking. This was his first inspection. He did do a ride along with me. We’re on the ride along, but another, you know, an actual ride along. He did a ride along with me a couple of weeks ago or something like that, just to kind of see if we wanted to do this. And it worked fine. And so we said, okay, so right now he’s just in the shadowing phase. There’s more watching.
Brad Lowery
Yes.
Matt Brading
Yes, some ladder carrying or it might be like hey girl, we see it reset that GFC I but I would imagine that by the end of the week He’ll be doing some stuff to kind of help out the inspection process And that way he’s doing a little hands-on and a little learning at the same time.
Brad Lowery
Dude, I love it. And we’ve actually got somebody riding along figuratively speaking with us today. But he is no stranger to the home inspection industry. In fact, this guy is one of the best there is out of freaking Louisiana, Eastern Louisiana. Mr. Kristian Geiger, how you doing bud?
Matt Brading
We did.
Kristian Geiger
I’m doing great man, how are you guys doing?
Brad Lowery
Wonderful man. I’m just I’m glad you’re here. We’ve we follow each other on social media for a minute. So I’m glad that we’ve got you on the show because inspecting in in in LA as you are is got to be fascinating that I mean, the termites that you guys deal with the just the different terrain and part of the Gulf that you guys are on. It’s very unique.
Kristian Geiger
Yeah, it is. Mean alluvial soil always leads to a little bit more foundation issues. We don’t really have any bedrock that you have to deal with, I believe, in your neck of the woods. But yeah, Formosans are pretty big out here, Formosan termites. So it’s always something that you have to watch out for.
Brad Lowery
Yeah, definitely man. So yeah, yeah, Matt’s out of Houston. I’m out of Tampa Bay, Florida area. We don’t have rock. We just have sand over here. Yeah, it’s a whole lot of sand. Yeah, we don’t need base.
Matt Brading
Yeah.
Kristian Geiger
I gotcha.
Matt Brading
You used to be from, you probably dealt with bedrock a lot more.
Brad Lowery
Yeah, no, definitely. And that’s actually something I want to get into. before we before we talk, usually, you know, we’ll start the show like I’ll ask Matt, like, what’s something interesting that he’s seen in the field this week? But, you know, since this is mainly because, you know, we’ve had some really interesting characters on the on the show recently, if you haven’t caught up, go back, watch the episode with Jesse Hernandez, watch episode with Brian Wall. We’ve talked everything from AI to insurance adjustment. All kinds of cool stuff, things that intersect with our industry without always just being strictly about our industry. But today it’s, it’s inspection heavy baby. And, so we’re going to, we’re going to talk a little bit about what we’ve seen this week, but before we do that, of course we got to plug inspection fuel cause that’s coming up. I’m going to be a September eight through the tenth in NOLA over in a Kristian neck of the woods which you going to be there, bud?
Kristian Geiger
Absolutely, tickets are already purchased. I will be there. Look forward to seeing you guys.
Brad Lowery
Dude, this is actually going to be cool because Matt, you know, we’ve all got something in common on here. And I feel like maybe we need to lobby Dave Kogan at porch to maybe be the featured entertainment of inspection fuel because we all play music.
Matt Brading
We all do have a musical background. do indeed. I used to play guitar for many years and a little bit of singing. Brad, you got a little guitar and I believe you slap it at bass, as they say. And Kristian, you…
Brad Lowery
We do. I bring that low end, buddy.
Kristian Geiger
Oh yeah, so I sang for many years. toured the country, played South by Southwest. So it’s many moons ago, but you know, guitarist, play every day, you’re a singer, you sing every day. So, I mean, you still keep your chops sharpened as it were.
Matt Brading
Nice.
Brad Lowery
Dude. I’m sure it’s like riding a bike. Okay, so we’ve got the home inspection band. There’s another inspector we were just talking about plays drums. So mean, we’ve got we got a four piece band ready to rock, man. And, you know, look, the chili peppers pull it off with what three, so for see, there you go. We got this guy’s. Hey, sound off in the comments. If you want to hear Matt sing, you know, if he’s if he’s really bad, then just stand there and just be like, it’s not supposed to do that.
Matt Brading
Come on. Come on.
Kristian Geiger
That’s right.
Matt Brading
We’ll just hand the mic to Kristian because he’s a singer.
Kristian Geiger
Ha ha.
Brad Lowery
Yeah, that’s it.
Kristian Geiger
Yep, that is true.
Brad Lowery
He’ll take over. Alright, so drink of the day. Guys, what are we sipping on? On Cinco de Mayo. Kristian, what you got?
Kristian Geiger
Well, Cinco de Mayo, have got tequila.
Brad Lowery
Dude, that’s the proper thing to do. But what is in there? Is that just a whole tumbler of freaking tequila?
Matt Brading
Just to hear.
Kristian Geiger
Yes, it’s about, well, no, no, no, no. Look, we are trying to get through the show, right? No, I do have some sprite in here to kind of tame it down a little bit. I gotta stay focused with you guys.
Matt Brading
With you.
Brad Lowery
Yeah. I love it, man. What are you sipping on?
Matt Brading
Tequila. Just kidding. It is though. It is. I got a ranch water. I don’t have stuff for margaritas, so I got a little lime flavored liquid death, some salt on the rim and some tequila. So, is. I’m a liquid death fan.
Brad Lowery
Also to Hewlett.
Kristian Geiger
Yeah.
Brad Lowery
I do.
Kristian Geiger
That lime flavored Liquid Death is amazing.
Brad Lowery
Dude, I will have to check it out, man. I am just, cheating guys. Like I’m just sipping on a nooner. And I honestly don’t care just because yesterday was the final day of country thunder here in the Tampa Bay area. And I did good to wake up this morning. I tied one on just a little bit. And so I’m keeping it, I’m keeping it as light as possible for this episode while still honoring the segment, you know, try to do anyway. But, but now, now that we got our something to sip on here, I want to go around the horn and talk about, what we have seen in the field because it’s been an interesting week for those of you that, that don’t follow Matt, definitely go follow them. Kristian, where can they follow you at first of all?
Kristian Geiger
You can follow me anywhere, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, everywhere.
Matt Brading
I’ll follow you anywhere, Kristian.
Brad Lowery
Yep, love it. Wherever you will go throwing it back to the 2000s. yeah. So, uh, but no, go follow them because I mean, like we talk about, uh, one of the best things about the home inspection industry. It’s like, feel like we were all down to like call our buddies. It’s like, dude, you wouldn’t believe this thing that I saw or I just saw the wildest thing today. You wouldn’t believe this agent or you know, is it like we tell stories and that often translates onto social media for the content creators. So go follow those guys so you can pay attention to the stories throughout the week. But Matt, you have seen some pretty cool stuff and you had a little bit of a war.
Matt Brading
I did. did. Yeah. So today I was coming out of a closet. This was an occupied house. They had like a under stair storage inside the closet. And I saw I was trying to get back there and make sure there was nothing going on back over there. But I had to like make my way out of it through like their clothing and everything. I was wearing my meta glasses here. So this is what I looked like. Like I had these on. And as I came out, there was a door that was open and I hit the door and it smashed my ear between the door and my metaglacid and it cut my ear open very, very small little work related injury. I think I’m going to live guys. But it did bleed though. It did bleed. I was a bleeder. And so yeah, I had to kind of walk around with a paper towel on my ear for a while, I’m going to make it. I’m going live.
Kristian Geiger
Oof.
Brad Lowery
We will pray for you. Yeah. There’s plenty of other guys that have had big pillowy coverings on their ears after they’ve been wounded. Look, you could probably run for president next, is all I’m saying.
Matt Brading
The guy’s an impressionist, I didn’t even know.
Brad Lowery
Some say it was just the baddest wound that they’ve ever seen on an inspection job site.
Kristian Geiger
It was actually pretty good, I’m not gonna lie.
Matt Brading
Can’t even touch that. I can’t even touch that. But yeah, I got a small injury on my ear.
Brad Lowery
What did you see this week, Kristian? What’s the coolest thing that you’ve run into in the field?
Kristian Geiger
Man, this week I would have to say, yeah. Well, this week and last week has been pretty heavy with focusing more on the mold inspections. And the interesting thing this week was actually kind of sad. I haven’t run into this before doing a trailer inspection and
Matt Brading
He says that like he has seen a lot. Like it’s like he has to exhale first.
Kristian Geiger
I found a baby, not sure if it was a baby rat or a baby squirrel in the drain and the mother was nowhere to be found. So I had to make a pretty hard decision. you know, it’s either let it starve to death or, know, kind of quickly, you know, do what you got to do. So I had not run into that before. Thankfully, not too many. I’ve never ran into a snake under a crawl space. I’ve never ran into wild animals or anything like that. But that was pretty interesting and pretty gross.
Matt Brading
I saw this video. You put that out on the video. saw this video of you in this baby creature. Now you very cleverly made a video that was actually very successful for you. Am I, am I mistaken with that?
Kristian Geiger
No, yeah, it’s done pretty well. Well, look, in hindsight, even my wife was like, look, you cut it off face in the toilet for a reason. That’s why everybody thinks I flushed the thing. But I did not, I’ll set the record straight right here, I did not flush it. You know, I’m not that cruel. But it’s
Matt Brading
Mean, you did that on purpose, right? Yeah!
Brad Lowery
That mouse came back and got him. Jeez, what happened?
Matt Brading
Yeah, I so. Hold on.
Kristian Geiger
It’s done fairly well. The video’s done fairly well. think it’s just a hair over two million between Facebook and Instagram.
Brad Lowery
Well, Kristian, let’s give it a minute for your camera to catch up there. I think it’s something something kind of froze on you. Well, while that’s.
Kristian Geiger
You guys are both frozen on my end.
Matt Brading
Oop, and he’s gone.
Brad Lowery
And he’s gone. You know, we’ve never had this happen on air before. Now I feel like this is actual radio, you know, it’s like that caller that that long time caller first time listener that, you know, shows up when I think that’s the other way around. Yeah. But anyway, okay. Well, I got a little something too, man, while we’re waiting for him to come back online here. So yeah, no. So okay, when it’s, it’s awesome to be moving between different locations. All right. Up in Virginia, you know, again,
Matt Brading
I know. Yeah, yeah. Shoot me.
Brad Lowery
Eight or nine years up there. I can’t remember exactly how long it was, but every place is just so different. And I thought that inspecting in Florida would be much more simple just because, hey, we got him back. There he is. Now, Kristian, I was just saying, you know, it’s neat what you find between different places of the country. I really am kind of still learning some things about the Florida market that where I thought it would be much more simple down here just because you don’t have basements. Everything is slab above grade, not always the case. And, I don’t know if you guys do wind mitigation inspections, up on your side of hurricane alley, but, it’s something that I got called for this past week, insurance agent I’m friends with, need one done. And, you know, I was looking at pictures and she goes, yeah, I think they got solar panels. hate solar panels and go back. We talked about solar in a previous episode, but, I get up on the roof. It was not solar at all. It was actually a hydronic solar pool heating system where basically it’s just very thin piping with connected to a manifold at the top and the bottom. It almost looked like a solar panel from a distance, but basically the pool pump will send it through the filter and then up to this manifold where it will trickle down very slowly and get heated by the sun and this thin black tubing and then run back down to the pool. And it wasn’t a huge pool. I looked at the cost, it means maybe a few thousand bucks to install. But for a moderately sized, a small to moderately sized pool, it made so much sense because it’s like, why do you want to pay for another heat pump? Why do you want to pay for a gas furnace to heat your pool when you can just do it this way, one and done, and so long as you don’t have a hurricane that comes along and mess things up. Then you’ve got a fairly consistent source of heated water to keep it pretty livable. You can keep that pool open through the winter down here.
Matt Brading
Yeah, that’s pretty cool. Certainly uncommon. I haven’t ever seen anything like that. But although I’ve seen some like solar, like water heater situations, I’ve seen that like very, very rarely, but I’ve come across something like that before, but not the pool. Yeah.
Brad Lowery
Yeah, yeah, I’ve seen those too. This is a much smaller version of that is what it is. Much more simplified version of it. yeah, hey, always learn it, man. We’re always learning. But there’s another thing, another way that we could take this thing too, guys, which is that since we’re always learning, we’re always adding to the toolkit, right? And I want to talk to you guys, especially Kristian, you do a lot of mold inspections as well in your neck of the woods, correct? Is that kind of one of your specialties?
Kristian Geiger
Yes, it is.
Brad Lowery
Yeah, tell me a little bit about that and how you added that to your scope of work. Because that’s what I really want to get into is how we define our scope of work as inspectors.
Kristian Geiger
So a mold inspection, at least in our area, is not actually considered part of our standard of practice. So we will notate things that have the appearance of suspected organic growth, right? We can’t call it mold unless it’s tested. But a mold inspection will be done separately, separate contracts, separate scope, separate terms. And that way it doesn’t fall under our standards of practice. Yeah, I started that a couple years ago almost the same time that I started home inspections It’s been a I can’t really call it an ancillary service. That’s that is my primary source of income and so it’s been It’s been a great learning experience especially the more The more you do it the more you learn the more you understand what to look for and the more you can help your clients, know, because some of them are spending all kinds of money scratching their head trying to figure out why they’re having an issue and we’re able to help them. And so it’s very satisfying.
Matt Brading
So out there where you’re at, it does require a completely separate license to inspect from old.
Kristian Geiger
Um, actually no, uh, in Louisiana mold inspectors are not licensed. Um, you, uh, it has a very low bar for the state of Louisiana, uh, for mold inspecting. Now obviously remediation, you know, is a different story. You have to be licensed and insured. Now, um, I am very heavily certified in the state of Louisiana for mold. Um, and, uh, so I went through LSU, through programs that they have there where they certify you and you’re taught directly by a microbiologist and a mycologist. And then I’ve gathered many other certifications to make sure that I’m giving my clients a good product. And in a few weeks, I’ll be able to challenge the test for the board certified indoor environmentalist. And so that will be a very large piece of peace of mind for my clients that they’re getting somebody who knows what they’re doing, knows what to look for, and can help them complete a project from start to finish as far as giving direction to the remediation company, giving direction on what to look for, what chemicals to use, what methods to use to be able to successfully get them back to a normal fungal ecology.
Brad Lowery
Now that’s awesome man and again that’s your normal gosh that’s where you’re making most of your money. So that’s fantastic but when did you kind of realize that that was going to be the biggest differentiator in your business.
Kristian Geiger
first six months of even being in business. So I say the first six months, the first six months of consistent work. So I got licensed in as a home inspector in September or October of , I believe it is. And it really didn’t start picking up until
Matt Brading
Are we going to lose Kristian again?
Brad Lowery
I think he’s fading. He’s fading out here. So to keep it going though, Matt, do you do mold inspection where you are in Texas or?
Kristian Geiger
Can you hear me?
Matt Brading
I don’t know. So we do have to be licensed here in Texas. We actually require additional, like not just a certification. I think you have to get some certifications to be able to apply for the license. You have to take additional tests and actually be licensed. I have considered it. I am thinking about it. I was actually talking to inspector Randall about that just the other day because he has done mold inspections for a few years. He wants to be on the show.
Brad Lowery
Eww. I want him on the show by the way, not to shortchange our guest, but I don’t really want Randall on the show. want the handle on the show. Yeah, that’s it. Yep, definitely.
Matt Brading
Handle. Yeah. Yeah. All right. We lost you for a minute there, Kristian, but where were we at with that?
Kristian Geiger
Yeah. So, I mean, it’s not licensed in our state, but so you definitely have to make sure that you’re getting somebody who is very qualified for what they do. So my professor, the person who taught me is one of the top expert witnesses in not just Louisiana, but really across the nation for mold inspecting, but also, you know, things to look for philosophies. You know, there’s not all mold inspectors are the same. you know, yeah, some of them, it’s just, you know, call it like it is. You know, some of them are have unethical practices, you know? And so you hear that you hear that I hear that every week. That’s the biggest concern that, my clients have is, the horror stories they hear about mold remediation companies and, and mold testers. So.
Matt Brading
Right.
Kristian Geiger
You definitely have to make sure that you bring and exude confidence and trustability to your clients.
Matt Brading
These horror stories you talk about, that like people that maybe had a mold inspection or these, they had a mold inspector out, but they recommended a whole bunch of remediation that maybe wasn’t necessary because of some feedback they’re the remediation company or is that what you’re talking about?
Kristian Geiger
Yeah. Yes. So, the biggest conflict you’ll have out here, which is, something that you’re not supposed to do. And of course they legally try to find ways around it is let’s say the inspector is, has his own mold inspection company and his wife just so happens to run a remediation company. And so that is convenient, right?
Matt Brading
Yeah. So, as luck would have it.
Brad Lowery
Imagine that. What a quanky
Kristian Geiger
Yeah,
Brad Lowery
dink.
Kristian Geiger
As luck would have it. And so they obviously they trade work back and forth and there’s a clear conflict of interest there. As far as the inspector side, you do have some inspection companies, ones that are used quite a bit, who will take a single air sample and walk around an entire house with it and collect air out of the entire house and pass that off as a mold inspection. Right. So traditionally,
Matt Brading
Definitely.
Kristian Geiger
the way it’s done. Depending on the openness, if there’s an open floor plan or if it’s an older style home where you’ve got lots of hallways and twists and turns, if it’s an older home, you generally want to stay somewhere between the five to seven hundred square feet per air sample range. And if it’s a large open floor plan, you could very reasonably get away with eight hundred to one thousand square feet per sample. But the idea is you want to break the house down into segments. Right? So if one segment has extensive mold in it in the air, then you’re able to narrow your focus down to that one spot. And so what some of these other companies will do, they will walk through with a single sample, they’ll find something. And now you have no idea where it came from in the house. And so that incentivizes them to be able to come back and charge a client again to do a more focused inspection, which they should have done in the first place. So yeah, these are some of the things that the clients hear about. And some of the times it’s some things that are actually done to them. So it’s not just rumor or speculation. These are things that I’ve personally in last two weeks heard about from a client who reached out to me for a different mold inspection.
Brad Lowery
Man, that’s nuts. So this is where, you know, it does benefit to have licensure, right? Like for the state of Florida, mold inspections have to be done. Like Ryan Wall, who we had on the show previously, he’s now licensed for mold as well, I believe. You know, Ryan, correct me if I’m wrong at that, but I’m pretty sure you said on your site that you are. But anyway, that’s kind of the different process down here. I don’t hate that, right? Because again, there’s…
There are things there that protect the consumer, right? And it weeds out some of these people who are going to mess the industry up for perfectly exceptional inspectors like yourself, who are going to go through and actually look out for the good of the homeowner.
Matt Brading
Well, and also like if you’re licensed, then they’re probably going to have some sort of code of ethics that they have to follow, which would eliminate, you know, the people that you were talking about, or at least to some degree it would. But, know, I want to talk about in getting prepared for the show. We were talking to Kristian about, you know, some upcoming work you have, and you have a rather large mold inspection this week, I believe.
Kristian Geiger
Yes I do. The details are still being finalized but it’s somewhere around 75,000 square feet.
Brad Lowery
It’s a rather small inspection. Yeah, yeah.
Kristian Geiger
Yeah, yeah, it’s a little tiny. Yeah, it’s.
Matt Brading
I don’t know where to start asking questions about this, be honest with you. Like, I don’t know how you even go about it. I don’t know how you go about pricing it. How do you break it down? Like give me, give me the cliff notes on this massive structure.
Kristian Geiger
Yeah, it depends on what function you’re going to serve, right? So I can do the inspections and the assessment, but those two things aren’t necessarily done with the same price point, right? So if I’m going to come in and just do a basic inspection, typically with these types of buildings, it’s narrow hallways. It’s, you know, eight, eight and a half, nine foot ceilings. So you know, they’re dropped tiles, a lot of these types of inspections. So it does introduce a different dynamic because you want to sample indoor conditioned air, right? You don’t want to sample outdoor, unconditioned air. And so with these older buildings, they’re very leaky, right? So you have to pay attention to that and just make notes. But the basics of it, something like this, if you were going to do the assessment, the first thing you have to do is figure out where they’re getting the problem from. You do your initial air sampling and swab sampling or tape lifts or what have you, just to get a baseline. But the purpose of the mold inspection is not just to get the fungal ecology of that space or of that room, but also to find out where the moisture is coming from. Right? So if you are going to do the assessment and create the scope of work for the remediation company, then you’ll have to have a firm grasp on the condition of the building envelope. You’ll have to have a firm grasp on where the moisture problems are and have a way to eliminate those. If you don’t eliminate those, there’s no point in starting any kind of remedial work whatsoever. That has to be addressed first before you can start that process. And so it is a long and drawn out process. is time consuming and it does take foresight, but it’s something that can pretty easily be done. I mean, the difference between a large project and a small project is simply time, right? The principles and the aspects to get from point A to point B are still the same.
Brad Lowery
Now in getting from point A to point B, what’s your methodology for accomplishing an inspection of that size? Or I guess like what’s your standard walkthrough? And that leads me. You’re good. Yeah, let me pause this real quick. Hold on. We’ll just let it keep rolling. Cut it right here.
Matt Brading
So you’re just gonna edit all this out.
Brad Lowery
Yeah, yeah, that’s fine. can cut this section out. Easily done. But good internet matters.
Matt Brading
Yeah, no kidding. I’m actually surprised that it’s, I mean, I feel like the internet that I have is garbage and, yet I have very little problems whenever we do this. Most of my problems today were just literally created by me unplugging stuff and like needing to plug stuff in pulling too hard on it. You know,
Brad Lowery
Yeah, now I hear that man. Yep. Don’t do it. You can’t do it.
Matt Brading
Well, yeah, sorry. I was hoping this would be a little smoother.
Brad Lowery
No, it’s all good. No worries. It can be edited. They’re not all going to be bangers.
Matt Brading
We’ll figure it. Yeah, so you probably didn’t see it, but Kristian had this video. I’m going see if I can show it.
Brad Lowery
Yeah, I’ll go watch it. Actually, I can’t watch it right now because I’m using my phone as the camera.
Matt Brading
Show it. Let’s see if you can see this. Where I get my…
Brad Lowery
There you go.
Matt Brading
So we found it in the sub-frame.
Brad Lowery
Man. He’s back. Kristian, we’re watching your video. Positive right by the toilet. Wait, but did you flush it? No, you didn’t, right? said.
Kristian Geiger
Sorry about that guys. No, no, I did not flush it. That was about 90% of the comments saying I’m a terrible individual for flushing it. And the other 10% were people offering me money to eat it. So I don’t know which is worse.
Brad Lowery
Okay.
Matt Brading
Yeah.
Brad Lowery
My gosh. Yeah.
Matt Brading
Yeah.
Brad Lowery
Which would you, which would you be more likely to do?
Kristian Geiger
Well, I would not eat it. So that’s, I think, you know, 13th century England had that problem with the plague or something like that with rats, I don’t know. So I’m good. Yeah, definitely not gonna flush it. I don’t know if I can mention on camera how I dispatched it, but we’ll just say that it, you know, it’s, no, it may have involved a beer bottle, but we’ll just leave it at that.
Brad Lowery
Okay, yeah, yeah.
Matt Brading
I’m sorry.
Brad Lowery
Yeah, send it for a swim. That’s funny,
Matt Brading
What?
Brad Lowery
You stopped it.
Kristian Geiger
So.
Matt Brading
I’m just imagining like a bar scene where you smash it over the little guy’s head.
Brad Lowery
Sorry. Yeah, all right. I’m gonna hit.
Kristian Geiger
It may have been something similar to that, Matt. Yes.
Matt Brading
Okay, wow, okay.
Brad Lowery
That’s amazing. All right. I marked it right here to cut back in and I’ll edit out everything in between. So PETA doesn’t come after you. okay. We were talking, so Kristian, when you’re, when you’re doing a property this size, first of all, it brings up a couple of questions into my mind. Never one, if there’s no licensing board in Louisiana for mold, who establishes the standard of practice for a mold inspection? Is that InterNACHI or how do you come about that?
Matt Brading
Where were we?
Kristian Geiger
No, I mean, there are guidelines that are set forth. there are practice. So the EPA has guidelines, The ICRC, the cleaning residential code. There are a lot of different regulatory boards that are national, CESB, that speak on best practices. But then you have opposing philosophies. So this is where it gets kind of murky. you have the ICRC and then you have other philosophies such as NORME. And the very, very basic differences on the cleanup. But your standard mold inspection remediation process is going to be testing, find out what your ecology is, fix the problem. And then you have to, obviously in fixing that problem, you have to remove those mold spores. You have to get those four counts down. You know, it’s interesting, the second edition of the bio aerosols remediation and control is an interesting point it makes where it says that the spores viability, so whether it’s alive or dead, can propagate or not, does not in any way affect its toxicity. And so it could be completely dead and still have many of the same health effects to the person. with regards to a large building, that’s very difficult to get a good control of the building envelope. I mean, in this case, it’s two buildings, it’s multiple floors. It’s just tens of thousands of square feet, right? It’s an older building, right? You still have a lot of asbestos in there. You still have a lot of lead-based products. And so it’s definitely a process.
Brad Lowery
Sure, yeah. Now, when it comes to determining your standards, which did you go off of when you were setting it up? CRC or?
Kristian Geiger
Yeah, I mean, you know, you always want to go with the most stringent when health concerns are involved. In my opinion, obviously, now I’m not an authority on that, but you know, you always want to realize why you’re there. You know, you’re not there just to get paid. You’re not there to solve a problem. You’re there to, or to remediate rather, you know, you’re there because likely someone’s feeling sick. Right. You’re there because likely someone is not feeling well and so if you look at two different methodologies and one of them is more stringent and would lead to a, maybe a better health outcome and one of them is less stringent, you would always, in my opinion, you would want to lean towards the, the more stringent of the two.
Matt Brading
You know, you’re talking about healthy people being healthy or people being sick. And that reminds me of your line of work prior to inspecting. You had something kind of interesting going on before you got into the inspection field, did you not?
Kristian Geiger
Yeah, so many, years ago, many moons ago, I was an EMT with Acadian Ambulance. And so I’ve seen, unfortunately, a lot of a lot of carnage, a lot of lot of things that and some of which relate directly to the things I now expect. You know, it didn’t happen often, but, you know, I did happen upon a few deck failures, right? B and cervical spine damage and issues. And some people ending up with paralysis, others with paresis, which is like a loss of full strength either on one or both sides of your body hemispherically, either left or right. I’ve seen people that have been shocked. I never came across anybody that got electrocuted, right? So there is a difference. But you know, it’s many of the things that we deal with and many of the things that maybe you get pushed back on your reports. Where people tell you, it’s not that big of a deal. Well, I’ve been on the other end of that out of the inspection field and it is a big deal. So.
Matt Brading
Yeah, it’s never a big deal until it happens to you, you know.
Kristian Geiger
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
Brad Lowery
Now what was the title for when you are over the condition where you lose strength on both sides of your body?
Kristian Geiger
So it’s something called paresis. So yeah, paresis. Yeah, so the Cliff Notes on it is basically, you have some movement on that side, but you are weakened to a noticeable degree, right?
Brad Lowery
Okay that’s not I felt after day drinking at Country Thunder. I don’t know if it’s the same thing, yeah. Now yours sounds like an actual serious condition. But anyway, no, that’s so you’re dealing with some, some very serious health issues there, which makes sense for why you want to go with a beefed up standard of practice for sure. Now tool wise, I mean, do you, do you find that it’s advantageous to continue to add to what you have to offer to clients in terms of exceeding the basic standard for a mold inspection? And at what point do you kind of cap that where it’s like, at the same time, you don’t necessarily need all of these excessive things in order to do the basic job that they’re tasking me with, which is evaluating the condition of this environment.
Kristian Geiger
I mean, everybody’s different, but personally, I feel like your first tools that you should use are your eyes. Right. We should use the visual. It is a visual inspection. Right. You know, it, doesn’t do anybody that good to go dig through a 40 or 50 year old home too much. Like no house is perfect. No house is going to have everything functioning correctly, but we are there as home inspectors to observe function and safety. Right. So function and safety is what we focus on. Now you can go overboard. Right. So I think I’ve talked to Matt about this before and other inspectors where let’s say you’re using a thermal camera, right? A thermal camera looks at the something that’s either hot or cold. So it displays it in many different colors. Right. But typically something that’s cold is blue and something that’s hot is more orange or red. Now, evaporative cooling from something like a leak is going to draw that heat away, so it’s going to show up as blue. However, it’s not always as cut and dry. So there are times where I’ve had a wall that’s completely saturated and it does not show up on thermal. And so it’s reached the same temperature as the room now, right? So it blends in with the rest of the room. And so there are some dangers with relying solely on your tools you do have.
Matt Brading
You definitely have to know what you’re working with and know your tools for sure. And I mean, I’ve said, I’ve made videos on this tons of times where I say, you know, the first tools we need to walk in with our eyes and our brain, you have to look and you have to think, right? And you have to think about that same stuff whenever you’re using the tools, you just have to use your eyes and your brain when you’re using the tool as well. I mean, without the tool, you have to do that for sure. That’s your first, the first thing that you should be using. But even when you’re using your tool, the tools and the specialized tools that we have, you still have to think about things, look at things, you know, with the knowledge of, you know, and the experience that we have to know what you’re looking at. Because like you said, you look at something and it just because it’s one temperature doesn’t mean just because it’s blue doesn’t mean that it’s wet. That just means that it’s cold. And so you got to you got to be able to know where these problems might exist and think about it think about what you’re seeing and verify that kind of stuff. Anyway, picking up on your land.
Kristian Geiger
Yeah, what I’ve always said was that the tools should be the seasoning and not the meal. Right? So the tools should be used to add emphasis to your inspection, but they should not be solely relied on. Look, I love Tony Sacheris and hot sauce like the rest of us, but I’m not going to take shots of Tony’s or take shots of hot sauce. They add flavor to the report. They add flavor to the meal.
Matt Brading
Thank you.
Kristian Geiger
But they should not be relied on as the basis of your report.
Brad Lowery
Now I hear that, but at the same time, like everything, you gotta season, man. You gotta use some seasoning. And there’s some of you out there that don’t, and you need to come to New Orleans next year, or I’m sorry, in September to find out what season is all about because they some good cooking down there. Just to write them out a seasoning.
Kristian Geiger
Yes.
Matt Brading
This year. I mean, I think, you know, you have to figure out like, I know we’re talking about seasoning. we talking about tools or we’re talking about inspection report? But in terms of the seasoning in the report, I mean, I do think that you need to figure out where you’re going to draw the line in terms of how much, you know, tools and tech you’re going to bring in because, know, at least in huge or in Texas, the Texas real estate commission and the standards of practice that we go by says that we do not have to use special.
Brad Lowery
Yes.
Matt Brading
But I can’t imagine doing a home inspection without my thermal camera. I wouldn’t do it.
Brad Lowery
Right. No, definitely. But at the same time, then, know, Matt, we were talking about this earlier, you know, there’s times where I know for me, I’ve, I’ve left my flashlight at home and the best inspectors out there, you know, will always carry spares. And yet at the same time, I’ve gotten by using the camera flashlight on my phone in a pinch, right? This was like twice. I think that this has happened, but, you know, I still much prefer my lumen, you know, Phoenix torch, but, at the same time, you don’t necessarily need everything to do that simple job, which is to evaluate the major systems and components of the home. at the same time, you’re kind of looking at evaluating how can I offer the most value to the client that’s going to separate me and set me apart from my competition. But at the same time, it’s just about doing just as good of a job as you can at what you’re being paid to do, right?
Matt Brading
Yeah, for sure.
Brad Lowery
Sometimes you don’t necessarily have to charge it up too much. I mean, so for you, like, where did you draw that line?
Matt Brading
Me? where did I draw the line? Man, I…
Brad Lowery
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Matt Brading
Where did I draw the line? I mean, I think like man, I have to think about that. Like I know it’s, draw the line of the tools that I possess. I don’t really push it any further than that. You know, like I can tell you that, like, I was, I, you know, a lot of research getting into the business and, and, getting started, led me down the pathway of thermal imaging, but I feel like you’re not, there, there’s no sense in carrying it. You know what? Enter Naji, had a lot of videos on, using, you know, thermal imaging, but not just finding something with it, but verifying, you know, because all you’re doing is looking for temperature anomalies and then verifying with a moisture meter whether or not moisture is present. And so, and that’s pretty much it for me. I mean, in terms of specialized tools, I do carry a drone, but that’s just in case I can’t get on the roof. I don’t know that I would call that a specialized tool because that’s like a just in case tool. But, like for me, yeah, thermal imaging and then moisture meter. That’s about as far as I go in terms of specialized. I take that back. I do carry a gas detector. I don’t know if that was a, I mean, I do think it’s pretty, pretty industry standard around here. I know that my, it’s not required, but I know that my, one of my instructors said that that was the only specialized tool he carried. And, and so immediately I thought, well, I got to get one of those. And I did, man. And I guess now that I’m thinking about it, like I found so many gas leaks with that thing that I can’t imagine doing an inspection without that. But I think that’s about it really. I mean, for me, because there’s people out there that have all kinds of gimmicky and gadgety stuff. Like I don’t even have a microwave tester, man. I just use a cup with water. I got a cup that I put water in, man.
Brad Lowery
Yeah. You don’t? See, I keep that right in the tool belt. See that works too. You do the old paper towel trick too, right? Where you just like dampen it a little bit, toss it in the microwave. But I tell you the one that really helped me the most was a DeWalt, gosh, it’s an electric screwdriver, but it’s the gyroscopic screwdriver. Yeah, freaking love that thing. That saves your wrist taking copper panels off, you know? But.
Matt Brading
Do that. You can do that. I got one. Yeah, yes.
Kristian Geiger
Mm-hmm. yeah
Matt Brading
Yeah. You know where I realized I needed one of those. And I mean, like, I mean, that’s, that’s a screwdriver. So I don’t know if I’d call it any type of specialized tool. We’re certainly not exceeding the scope, but I used to want to take off the panels to look to see if the euphor was connected and, uh, and those screws sometimes are like three or four inches long. And, uh, and I used to just take them out with my little screwdriver. And man, my wrist would be sore. And so I was like, Hey, I gotta get something for this. And then somebody said they carried that and I bought it. And yeah, totally. My inspectors all carry one of those for sure.
Brad Lowery
Best hunter bucks I’ve ever spent though. No, definitely. So Kristian, here’s another thing, getting back to standards of practice. How much of the level to which you exceed basic standards for a mold inspection, how much of it is actually determined by your competition and what they’re doing?
Kristian Geiger
You know, obviously you do want to take a look at what the tools that everybody’s using, right? You do want to have what you need to service your clients. But as far as I mean, I was just asked this today. I was asked for a different project if I knew two other mold inspectors that I could recommend for the bidding process. And I can only think of one. Like I really don’t know a lot of mold inspectors, ironically, in Louisiana with tons of mold. I really don’t know a lot of other mold inspectors in my area. So as far as what equipment they use, I really rely heavily on the instruction from my professor from Bill Fahini to know whether I’m kind of going the right direction or the wrong direction, things I should be using, methods, techniques, know, things like that. But as far as that relates to the home inspection to the standards of practice At this point, I’ve got a whole different contract. I’ve got a whole different I’m no longer under the standards of practice whenever I’m doing my mold inspections So I don’t really have to worry about that per se But you know Oddly enough for the inspection side. There’s really not there’s really not a tremendous amount of liability by the time they call you they already have a problem. They already have a problem. So all you’re there to do is give them a ten minute snapshot. Right? So the amount of time I generally run my samples is ten minutes, but obviously you can change that. But I’m just there to give them a snapshot of what their fungal ecology is at the most basic, no assessment, no anything. Just go in there and take some
Brad Lowery
Right. Definitely, we want to hear from you guys that are listening here as well. Truly, like, where do you guys draw the line as far as the inspection standards of practice or if you’re in mold, you know, what standards of practice do you go by if your state’s licensed, right? I know Florida licensed other states not necessarily so much, but how do you choose that line to where you exceed it or where you just do the minimum if you’re one that just prefers to kind of not make it any fancier than it necessarily needs to be. We want to know where you guys cap it at. And we want to know what’s in your tool bag too. That’s a fun thing to talk about. So sound off in the comments. Let us know what you’re carrying with you. And let us know the coolest thing that you have picked up and added to your toolkit this year, because we’re all looking and learning and trying to figure out what’s the next fun gadget that we need, an expensable item for next year’s returns, right? For next year’s write-offs.
Matt Brading
Well, I mean, as much as I don’t really like use a whole bunch of gadgety stuff, I am awfully interested in, you know, the latest and greatest new toys and tools.
Brad Lowery
Absolutely, man. Absolutely. Well, Kristian, it’s been awesome talking with you, man. I’m excited for for getting the band together in New Orleans. It’s gonna be fun, proverbially speaking.
Kristian Geiger
Yeah, I mean, it’s – look forward to it. I love being on stage. You know, love being with guys like yourselves and playing some good music and, you know, you know, it’ll be fun. Let’s make let’s try to I know one of you one of you high powered inspectors knows somebody who knows somebody who can make this thing happen. So I’m dependent. I’m dependent on you guys.
Matt Brading
We’ll what we can do. Hey, either way, either way, there’s gonna be good times to be had in New Orleans for inspection fuel for sure. So I’m looking forward to seeing you there and you too, Brad, for sure. But yeah, we’ll all get together no matter what. It’s gonna be a good time.
Brad Lowery
It’s gonna be great. Yep, definitely sign up guys. The link’s going to be down in the description. So until next time, we’ll see you right back here, right on The Ride Along.
