We were lucky to catch up with Matt Smoak recently and have shared our conversation below.

Matt , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Do you manage your own social media?

Initially, I handled all our social media, then I had my wife participating. As of now, it’s back to me handling the social media. I’ve even come up with a catch phrase (completely by accident!) “That’s Not Normal” was a phrase I presented on one of our social media outlets. This phrase stuck and has not become a huge part of our marketing. I do TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram and the businesss utilizes a mixture of Island Inspections LLC, The Bearded Inspsector, and The Bearded Guy Matt Smoak. Now, we’re not throwing up a huge following yet…I believe one of our avenues just hit 2,000 followers. It’s nothing to shake a stick to, but we gotta start small. If we get to the point where more followers, I could see a need to bring on more people to help manage everything.

Matt , love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

After working 22 years in public safety, from paramedic to a police officer; I was handed an opportunity to get out of the industry and I knew I wanted to do something completely different. I’ve always had a liking for entrepreneurship, I even started a very small custom woodworking business back when I was working as a paramedic. However, I wanted to do something completely different. I had a friend of mine that was working as a home inspector and he threw the idea to me. I knew I wanted to not be cooped inside an office building and with my headstrong mindset and always busy self…I needed something that would keep my attention span and kill any mundaneness. I looked into becoming a realtor (in an already flooded market) I looked and getting back into construction, but didn’t have anything that really struck a chord with me. I kept looking back to home inspections. This field intrigued me…finding issues and reporting on said items. The investigative work still followed me from law enforcement. I worked as a fatality investigator and collision reconstructionist. So I started working toward my home inspector license while working the couple of years as an officer. Protecting and Serving are words many police officers live by….so in a way, I still get to provide that with clients purchasing real estate. I get to help protect my client’s from probably one of the largest investments of their lives by helping them to learn the ins-and-outs of the house they’re buying. Learning is also a big part of my work ethic…I believe the minute we stop learning is when we start failing. I believe you’re either moving forward or backwards. We don’t just do home inspections…we also offer many different ancillary inspections. I’ve also been working on my commercial general contractors license for the last two years. This will help open up commercial inspections for my company.

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

I was able to fund my business by utilizing a retirement account I had set up with a prior job. I accustomed myself to living beneath my means and getting used to my entry level salary. Every time I had a pay raise or step increase, I added the percentage into my 401k and 457 plans. So whenever I left, I initially cashed out my 457 account, as that was already taxed and I wasn’t hit with fees. Once that money ran out, then I had to tap into my 401k. I still have my state and police retirement plans in place too, so once I’m of retirement age, I can utilize it. It also helped that I did not need a lot of capital up front and my overhead was not crazy ridiculous either!

What’s been the best source of new clients for you?

My biggest source of new clients comes from realtors in the area. I grew up in Pawleys and it helps to be a local! However, it still wasn’t easy. There were a lot of going to realtor offices and providing my marketing material, meeting with groups of realtors down the individual meetings. Persistence and trust are key factors. I don’t just want meet potential realtors or clients on business level, we aim to be more personal. I believe if I earn the trust of the realtors, then the clients whom trust the realtors will feel they’re in good hands with us!

Contact Info:

• Website: www.islandinspectionsllc.com
• Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/islandinspectionsllc
• Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/islandinspectionsllc
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@islandinspectionsllc?si=bYR5m9DZ7bsONBvc
• Other: TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@islandinspections?_t=8kY2E0k43mo&_r=1

Image Credits
Donald Hovis-Tides Eye Photography Phillip Hall Photography