0:00

Today , we are going to dive into a

0:02

topic that's often overlooked but

0:04

incredibly important for maintaining

0:06

the beauty and integrity of your home

0:08

Drywall repair . Now

0:10

, whether you're dealing with a small gash or a major

0:13

hole , knowing how to fix drywall

0:15

correctly can save you time

0:17

, money and a lot of frustration

0:19

. My guest today is Ted Spears , the president of

0:22

the Patch Boys , the only national drywall

0:24

repair company in the US . So

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why should you , as a homeowner , care about drywall

0:29

repair ? Fixing drywall the right

0:31

way is crucial . It ensures the repairs

0:33

are seamless , durable and blend

0:35

perfectly with the rest of your walls . Now

0:37

, whether you're preparing your home for sale , just

0:40

moved in or have been putting off repairs

0:42

for years , this episode will equip

0:44

you with the knowledge you need to tackle

0:46

drywall damage head on

0:49

. I'm George Siegal , and this is

0:51

Homeowners Be Aware the podcast

0:53

that teaches you everything you need

0:55

to know about being a homeowner , ted

0:58

, thank you so much for joining me today , george

1:01

, excited to be here . Yeah , it's exciting

1:03

. We were talking before we went on and you're

1:05

in Michigan . I worked in Detroit

1:07

for three years , so that's an exciting

1:10

connection and , as I was telling you , I

1:12

loved living there , minus the cold

1:14

weather .

1:17

Yeah , it gets a little chilly up here , but

1:19

it's predictable and it

1:21

makes spring , summer and fall

1:23

all that much more enjoyable .

1:25

Oh , there's nothing more beautiful than fall . When the leaves

1:28

are turning , the apple cider is out

1:30

and it's incredible . But

1:32

that's not what we're here to talk about today . We're

1:34

going to talk about the Patch Boys . Sounds

1:36

like a gang , but it's not

1:38

. You guys do some interesting stuff . Tell me

1:40

about the Patch Boys .

1:58

Yeah , the Patch Boys would be trying to get

2:01

small drywall repair fixed

2:03

and nobody wanted to do it because you

2:05

know a lot of the drywall companies . They

2:08

did the big stuff right . You know they drywall

2:10

your home or you know you'd want to drywall

2:12

your basement but the problem

2:14

is when you have a leak in your upstairs bathroom

2:17

and it comes through , you know , through

2:19

the ceiling and it's right in your dining room and

2:21

it looks terrible . You

2:28

know you get the plumber to come and fix it but nobody wants

2:30

to come in , you know , and fix that hole and so along the

2:32

way , you know this concept was developed and you know

2:34

the Belfort Franchise Group , who I work for

2:37

, purchased the Patch Boys about four

2:39

years ago and

2:41

we'd grown it from 35 franchisees

2:44

to over 110 , now

2:46

a national presence and we're still growing .

2:49

So it sounds interesting . But

2:51

what I would wanna know is okay

2:53

, so I have this hole . I need somebody to come

2:56

out and fix it . A lot of times when

2:58

I've had that and unfortunately I have had that problem

3:00

a handful of times the painter

3:02

has done it . So what's the difference when

3:04

you is this just an extra

3:06

step and then it's easier to find somebody to run

3:09

out and paint afterwards , so you're kind of separating

3:11

those two tasks .

3:13

I mean good question . I mean I'm

3:16

sure there are , you know , painters that

3:18

can do this . You know

3:21

there are great . You know people

3:23

, you know that can come in and

3:25

do a variety of things . What

3:27

we do is we specialize in

3:29

making sure that hole goes away 100%

3:32

, and

3:34

so we not only fix the hole

3:36

right , and probably 60%

3:38

of our jobs , george , are ceiling jobs

3:40

. You know , when you think of it , water

3:43

coming from upstairs , water coming

3:45

from the roof , people stepping

3:47

through things , you know , basically

3:49

in the attic when they're working

3:51

on things , that's where those holes

3:54

come from . And then our

3:56

franchisees , you know

3:58

we work , train and hire

4:01

technicians that

4:03

specialize in drywall repair

4:05

and then , once we make that hole

4:07

go away , sure you know

4:09

, we prime and many of our franchisees

4:12

paint too , because customers

4:14

, they , you know they like to make one call and

4:16

have that hole gone and

4:18

have their house , you know , back to the way

4:20

it was .

4:21

Well , anybody that's ever well first of all tried

4:23

to do that themselves or seen a bad

4:26

drywall job . It really

4:28

stands out . So with the

4:30

artists , the people that are good at it , you don't

4:32

even know there was a hole there when they're done .

4:34

I mean , and I'm fascinated . I always

4:37

joke that , hey , I am not

4:39

a drywall specialist , I can do it , but

4:41

you wouldn't want to pay me to do it . Okay , I just want

4:43

to . But it's art and

4:45

science because it's

4:48

a combination of you

4:50

know making sure that . You know you're putting

4:52

the mud , mud on it , right , you're fixing

4:54

the hole , you're putting three

4:57

coats . There's sanding involved

5:00

, then there's priming and paint with you

5:02

know the goal . Then there's priming and paint with you know the

5:04

goal . It's that hole is gone . And so you're

5:06

right , it's fascinating . And

5:12

we all go . I travel with our franchisees out . You know I was just

5:14

in Jacksonville , fort Lauderdale , you

5:17

know , a couple of weeks ago and we go out and work

5:19

with our technicians and

5:21

they're pros , I mean you know

5:23

, they know how to do , you know fix

5:25

any of those issues that are there . Make

5:27

sure it's clean too , because the last you

5:29

know , drywall is messy , I got to tell you . So

5:32

you know we make sure that that home is

5:35

clean and plastic is there . So when we

5:37

walk away , it's not only

5:39

the hole is gone , you know , we make

5:41

sure your house is as clean

5:43

as it was when we walked through the door yeah .

5:46

Now yeah , anybody that's ever even tried

5:48

to plug little holes where you had pictures

5:50

or something . It's hard to get that

5:52

right . You know you put , you put the spackle in

5:54

and you get it down there . But when a painter has done

5:56

that for me , I haven't even noticed it . When I do it , it

5:59

looks like it's a polka dotted room .

6:03

I have to tell you and it's

6:05

a no judgment zone for us , you know

6:07

, in terms of but we get so many

6:09

calls from spouses

6:11

, husband or wives , and

6:13

say , well , we

6:15

tried to fix it , it didn't turn out

6:17

that well , can you come over

6:19

so that it looks right ? And

6:21

so , yes , people

6:23

try it all the time but it's

6:26

not easy . It is not easy

6:28

and there's definitely , you

6:30

know , science to the process in

6:32

terms of getting that mud to dry

6:35

and making sure that

6:37

it's . You know that whole smooth

6:39

, and then you know the priming and painting to make

6:41

sure it blends in . So it's

6:44

gone . Because that's as a homeowner

6:46

I've had it done in my house a number of times . You

6:48

want it gone , that's all you

6:50

know . I don't care how you do it , I just want to make sure that

6:53

it's gone so that , hey , when we're entertaining

6:55

or whatever , my brother's not pointing

6:57

up at the ceiling going . Hey , ted , nice

7:00

try .

7:02

Yeah , hey , nice job , ted . So

7:04

when

7:07

you call somebody out , is it by the job

7:09

, is it by the hour ? How do you guys

7:11

price out ? So somebody knows ? Well

7:13

, I'll wait till I have a few more holes , then I'll call these

7:15

guys .

7:18

It's , we set it up by the job and

7:20

you know , we we try to keep it as simple as possible

7:23

half day , full day , and then increments

7:25

of that and and then there's , there's

7:27

some fine tuning of the pricing . That's there

7:30

, but it , you know , we try to keep

7:32

it as as simple as possible for

7:34

the customer so they can kind

7:36

of understand in terms of

7:38

, hey , you know , the smaller

7:40

the job for the most part , the less time

7:42

it , less time it takes . And

7:45

then when you get into ceiling work , like

7:47

I talked to you about , you know that takes

7:49

more time because , hey , the higher you go

7:51

, you need ladders , you need to make

7:54

sure your site is

7:56

clean , and when you're working

7:58

up on the ceiling , you know , dust

8:00

kind of goes everywhere . So we have to set up more

8:02

plastic . And

8:04

then , yeah , sometimes we will come into

8:06

a home and if you just have one hole , you

8:09

know , one wall , you know we'll say you

8:11

know what , you got a stress crack over here for

8:13

this , for the same amount of money we can do both

8:15

, like I did a . I did a laundry

8:18

room . You know I had , uh , guys

8:20

do a laundry , my laundry room and my

8:22

dog . We kept my dog in the laundry

8:24

room when we weren't there and she had

8:26

scratched up the wall and and

8:28

the guy goes tell you what I , I'll do this and

8:30

this and I can get it all done . For

8:32

that half day job I was like fantastic

8:35

.

8:36

Now a lot of the challenges with trades

8:38

are and especially from an employer

8:41

point of view is finding good people that

8:44

want to work and want to show up . How

8:46

has that challenge been ? Because you guys are growing pretty

8:48

fast .

8:49

That's the number one challenge . I mean , I think everybody

8:52

understands that . You know in . You know

8:54

in our business or any type of construction

8:56

business is getting good workers

8:58

, and that's our number one priority

9:01

when we launch a franchise

9:03

. And it's our focus because , you

9:05

know , we like to differentiate ourselves not

9:07

only from our quality of work , but

9:10

you know in terms of what our brand stands

9:12

for . And so you know

9:14

we want to be on time , we

9:17

want to make sure we're treating the customer with respect

9:19

, we want a clean job site and we want

9:21

a great job . In order to do that , you

9:24

need to have people that are working with

9:26

you , that understand the importance and

9:28

then can do the work working

9:31

with you , that understand the importance and then can do the work

9:33

. And so that is one of our , you know , biggest focuses of the company is making sure

9:35

we're getting experienced technicians , because

9:38

it takes time . You know the art and science

9:40

. You know it's not something you know I can

9:43

train you on in two weeks . You

9:46

know we like to hire people that have

9:48

years of experience , have gone

9:50

through it , and then make sure

9:52

that they understand what our brand stands

9:54

for and then treat them great . We

9:56

really , you know , try to treat

9:58

our technicians well

10:01

and they're part of the team and

10:03

with that we've been able to grow .

10:06

Now anybody that watches HGTV or

10:08

DIY channels or YouTube

10:11

videos . They're always trying to show you how to fix

10:13

things really quickly . What are some of the common

10:15

mistakes that people make

10:17

when they're trying to fix drywall ?

10:32

you know , the longer you wait , the worse it can get

10:34

. And so normally when you have drywall and it's a ceiling

10:36

, it's some type of leak . And you know we'll walk into a home , george

10:39

, and they'll . You know , the first

10:41

question we'll ask is , hey , have you fixed

10:44

the leak ? Because the last thing we want to do is fix

10:46

something and then it comes back

10:48

. It comes back later , and

10:50

so we want to , we want to

10:52

make sure that you know that leak is

10:54

fixed . And you know

10:57

, having something sit there , I've walked

10:59

into a dining room , you know

11:01

, in Chicago a couple months ago and that

11:03

that ceiling was getting ready to fall . Somebody

11:06

left . If you let it , if

11:08

you , the longer you wait , the , you know , the

11:10

worse the circumstances that are there

11:12

. So you know , the sooner you raise

11:15

your hand and reach out , reach out

11:17

to you know , to us or someone

11:19

, the better it is , so that

11:21

you can come out . And you know we can come

11:23

out and make sure we get those . Get those fixed that

11:25

are there , get those fixed that are there . And

11:28

water is , you know

11:30

, is something that impacts

11:32

your drywall . You know sometimes you'll see

11:34

bubbling , you know in a paint , you

11:36

know on a . You know a side wall

11:38

and a lot of times that's because

11:41

of the water that's come in , you know

11:43

, either through , you

11:51

know your window , or it's leaked down , you know , from from the ceiling and those

11:53

. Those are things that , hey , you can , you can just fix it , but you know you also

11:55

have to make sure you get rid of that moisture

11:57

, because moisture can lead to a lot of other

11:59

things besides bubbling , mold and

12:01

, you know , eroding of , you

12:03

know of the wall or the structure .

12:06

Absolutely , and you know , I looked this up . I thought it was really

12:08

interesting . You know why they call it drywall ? Yeah

12:10

, tell me . Oh , there's

12:12

actually a story behind it . There was a whole section on on

12:15

Google , so then I guess I don't know how accurate that

12:17

is . But when I said

12:19

because it's dry , all four walls are dry

12:22

and there's no but

12:24

, but . But as I was reading that , I was going but if

12:26

you have to put the mud on there and you have to do

12:29

certain things , isn't that putting wet on

12:31

dry ?

12:40

So if you don't have the answer for that , then we really don't need to go down this trail , because

12:42

I know nothing about drywall yeah , well , and the funny thing you bring

12:44

it up is have you heard the term sheetrock ? Yes , so what's the difference between

12:47

sheetrock and drywall ?

12:49

see now , you stumped me , I , I haven't , I don't

12:51

.

12:52

No difference . Sheetrock is a brand

12:54

name for drywall that

12:56

, especially in the South , has

12:59

kind of taken over for

13:01

the generic term of drywall , just like

13:03

Kleenex and tissue . You

13:06

know that . You know Kleenex is so

13:08

popular and so Sheetrock is actually

13:10

a brand name for drywall

13:12

that a lot of people will

13:14

use , you know , as a synonym

13:16

for drywall . That's there .

13:19

And I did learn that it's not as simple as just running into

13:21

the local home supply store

13:23

and buying it . You need to know the thickness of what you're

13:25

trying to match it with . I mean , there are certain

13:28

elements and I saw a guy take out a

13:30

bunch of popsicle sticks and

13:32

all this other stuff and I'm going

13:34

yeah , I probably want a professional to

13:36

do this , because I'm going to make a mess .

13:39

Yeah , I mean it's amazing the

13:41

things that we run into . You

13:43

know . You know you might say popsicle

13:45

sticks , we call them backers . So you know , a lot

13:48

of times behind the wall you need to

13:50

affix the drywall and a lot of times

13:52

it's not a full sheet . I'm cutting

13:54

out maybe a three by three you

13:56

know piece of drywall and then cutting

13:59

the drywall so we fit it in and then I

14:01

use what we call a backer , any any

14:03

type of you know wood that I

14:05

can screw into so that I can put my

14:07

drywall in . But

14:10

it's , you know , there's so many different ways

14:12

that that you can use it . But you

14:14

know you really want to make sure that somebody knows

14:16

what they're doing when they're in your home .

14:18

Now , earlier this season my wife

14:20

and I were at a Tampa Bay Lightning hockey

14:23

game and this young guy they put

14:25

up on the board before the game was his first

14:28

game in the NHL and

14:30

he scored a goal that night .

14:42

And then when I was reading about you , you have something in common with this guy . Tell us about that

14:44

. Yeah , yeah , that is funny . I knew where you're going when you said that . But but yeah , so I I was

14:46

a hockey player , uh , growing up in Michigan and I played at

14:48

university of Michigan and then I I

14:50

signed with the wings and I played mostly

14:53

in the minors , but I got

14:55

called up to play with the Detroit Red

14:57

Wings back in the late eighties and

15:00

, for a variety of reasons you

15:03

know , I had been called up before and sat

15:06

in the press box and my dad was coming

15:08

in for this game that I

15:10

was going to play with and I asked the coach

15:12

if I was playing , because my dad was going

15:14

to fly in from Baltimore to Detroit the

15:16

day of expensive flight . And the coach

15:19

said tell you what , ted , if your dad

15:21

comes in , you can start . So

15:23

Brad Park was the coach and

15:25

I started that game . First

15:28

shift , first game . 52

15:31

seconds into the game I scored a goal . So

15:34

I only

15:36

played four games in the NHL . You can look

15:38

it up , it's there . But

15:40

my claim to fame is I

15:43

still am in the top

15:45

10 of the fastest

15:47

first goal in the NHL

15:49

for somebody .

15:50

That's just started . Wow

15:52

, congratulations , did you get in many fights

15:54

, that's just started .

15:56

Wow , congratulations . Did you get in many fights ? I didn't , I

15:58

didn't , I , you know . I mean , back then everybody

16:00

got in some . Uh , you know

16:02

, I , I definitely got in , you know some

16:04

fights . But uh , you know , coming from college

16:07

, at that time , you

16:12

know if you fought in college you got suspended for you know the game . So I , I'm not gonna , I'm not

16:14

gonna lie and say it was a great fighter , but uh , I definitely

16:17

got in a few fights and uh , and

16:19

you know , I was probably more of a wrestler than a fighter

16:21

when I got in those fights .

16:23

Man . One of the greatest moments I've ever seen

16:25

when I was living there was when , darren

16:27

it was Darren McCarty and Claude

16:29

Lemieux when- Lemieux had injured Chris

16:32

Draper and , uh

16:34

, and it was payback time . That

16:36

was incredible it was .

16:38

That was unbelievable . You

16:42

know you talk about the Wings against the Avalanche and that you know that

16:44

was in 97 when

16:47

the Wings eventually won the Stanley Cup for the

16:49

first time in 42 years . And

16:52

you're right , that rivalry and

16:55

you know those fights and you know Detroit

16:57

, such a , you know such a blue collar

16:59

town sticking up for somebody

17:01

that we felt was wrong and wow

17:04

, that that was a

17:06

lot of fun . And you

17:08

know those , you know those years with the wings

17:11

. You know fond memories .

17:13

A lot of people say that hockey players are really nice

17:15

guys when they're off the ice , but on the ice

17:17

they're crazy .

17:21

I had a lot of teammates and you

17:23

know some guys that are still involved in the

17:25

NHL and

17:29

as teammates they you

17:31

know we do anything for your teammate to . You

17:33

know , to help each other off

17:35

the ice Nicest , nicest

17:38

guys ever . You know I played

17:41

and then I worked for the Wings for 10 years

17:43

on the marketing

17:45

side and you know dealing

17:47

with , you know , professional athletes and

17:50

sure they have a lot of things going on but

17:52

you know , very personable and you

17:55

know had a great perspective .

17:57

Yeah , I was a Lakers fan growing up and

17:59

so I hated the Pistons . And

18:01

one Sunday night bad boys

18:03

. Yeah , I know . And

18:05

who was it ? It was a . Rick Mahorn

18:07

was one of my the players

18:09

I hated the most and he was at the station

18:12

that night and he came up and shook my hand and said

18:14

he enjoyed watching me and it was nice to meet

18:16

me and I felt like such an asshole for hating

18:18

the guy . After that I go . This is a really nice guy

18:20

but he was not nice on the court . Those

18:22

guys were tough .

18:24

Yeah Well , and you know you

18:26

have to be in order . You

18:28

know , I mean , in order to get to a certain

18:30

level , you have to protect yourself . You

18:32

know you have to . You know there's

18:34

there's certain skills that you develop

18:36

, and and so it's , it's

18:39

something that you know . Rick Mahorn , bill Lambert

18:41

, all those bad boys , I mean they , they

18:43

played a certain way of basketball

18:45

so they could be successful . And

18:48

hey , I would . I'm still a Pistons fan

18:50

.

18:51

Yeah , no , I bet , but I'll never like Lambert

18:53

. I'm sorry that's

18:56

that one's off the market completely and ever and never changing my opinion

18:58

all right , I like bill , but that's okay okay

19:01

, let's bring this back around to drywall

19:03

and , uh , wrap it up with

19:05

that . So the number one thing that a homeowner

19:07

should do I have a drywall problem

19:10

. Tell me the the steps I should

19:12

take to tackle that don't , don't wait , don't

19:14

wait .

19:16

Get somebody . You know , if it's batch work , it's

19:18

great , but get somebody in there to take a look at

19:20

it . You know because a lot of times

19:22

you know everything's behind the wall

19:24

. You know weather , and that's really

19:26

where our business started it's . You know

19:28

electrical's behind the wall

19:30

, plumbing's behind the wall . You

19:33

know you have HVAC wall

19:36

plumbing's behind the wall . You know you have HVAC . You know you

19:38

have so many things that are behind the wall , and that's one of the

19:41

reasons we work a lot with . You know a variety of contractors

19:43

because you know you'll do a flood

19:45

cut . You know somebody . You know somebody

19:47

has flooding in their home . You have to go in

19:49

. You have to get two or three feet of drywall

19:51

out of that area and

19:54

get up , and then and

19:56

then they call us . And so you know my

19:58

number one thing is is is

20:00

don't wait . You know , don't wait to do

20:02

it . And then , in terms

20:04

of you know from from our

20:06

standpoint , what we like to talk about is

20:08

is you know , if you call

20:10

us , we're going to make sure it's done right . You know

20:12

we're . We're a national company , we're owned

20:15

by Belfor , which

20:17

is an international company , and

20:20

so you can trust us . If there's ever

20:22

a question , you can call

20:24

one of the franchisees . You call me . I

20:26

get calls all the time from a customer that has

20:29

a question . We're not going anywhere . We

20:31

stand behind our work and we want

20:33

to make sure that customer is 100% satisfied

20:35

.

20:36

Excellent . Well , all your contact

20:38

information will be in the show notes and

20:43

congratulations on that goal .

20:45

I do have the puck on the wall . They

20:47

give you a plaque and everything . So you

20:49

know for my one goal , george .

20:52

That's awesome . Hey , Ted , thank you so

20:54

much for coming on today . All

21:02

right , thank you so much . Thank you for taking the

21:04

time to listen today . See you next time .