We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Alex Byron. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Alex below.

Alex, appreciate you joining us today. Innovation comes in all shapes, sizes and across all industries, so we’d love to hear about something you’ve done that you feel was particularly innovative.

In my career as a home inspector, I quickly noticed how many houses that I inspect were suffering from what we in the industry politely call “deferred maintenance”. This means homeowners did not take care of their homes and perform the necessary maintenance to keep the house in good shape and prevent premature deterioration and failure.

Things like annual roof inspection, annual HVAC service, keeping wood components painted, changing air filters, testing shut-off valves and GFCI outlets, replacing old smoke alarms, etc. It’s a little bit frustrating to have to write up the same defect over and over again, when it could have been prevented with some basic maintenance.

I started to gather photos of common examples of deferred maintenance. I started writing blog articles with home maintenance tips. I gathered information from the web, manufacturer manuals, and other resources about home maintenance. Over the years, I amassed a large amount of information that I wanted homeowners to know.

Then one day I sat down and started writing it all up. I spent countless hours of my free time over the course of several months compiling this information into a comprehensive home maintenance guide specifically for Southern Arizona.

The first section of the book covers the different components of the home (such as roof, exterior, windows and doors, water heaters, HVAC systems, etc.) and provides important information about them. Each chapter has many photos to illustrate the various issues.

For the second section of the book I created an annual home maintenance schedule. It breaks down home maintenance into small, easily managed tasks spread out over the course of the year. There is a record for each task where you can keep track of when you did it and keep notes.

To make sure people would enjoy reading it and not fall asleep, I added some humor to it, and also incorporated Mojo The Home Pro, my dog who is the company mascot.

I printed 500 copies of the book in color, (so the photos would look good), ring-bound (so you could keep it open on the table as a reference when performing a task), and on good quality paper and with a plastic cover (so it would last for years).

I started handing out a free copy to every client at the end of the home inspection. People absolutely loved it! Especially first-time homebuyers who were pretty overwhelmed by the prospect of buying and then having to maintain a house.

You might ask, is this really innovative? Don’t home maintenance guides already exist? Don’t you get one when you buy a house? That’s the crazy part! Even though this is the biggest investment of your life, nobody gives you a manual on how to take care of it. You’d think your lender, your realtor, your insurance company would give you a manual since it’s in their best interest that you take care of it. Nope.

And the few home maintenance guides I’ve seen in the wild had many deficiencies. For example, they were too short and missing important items, too long and overwhelming, poorly written, didn’t include a calendar, too generic.

I’m really proud of this unique tool I created to help homeowners take care of their biggest asset and avoid unpleasant and costly surprises.

Alex, 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?

I am a home inspector. I inspect homes for home buyers, do home check-ups for homeowners, and help people prepare their homes for sale by doing pre-listing inspections. I spend several hours investigating and collecting information about a home so I can give my client a detailed overview.

For home buyers, it helps them either move forward and negotiate with the seller, or walk away if there are more issues than they can handle. For homeowners, it helps them stay on top of their home maintenance and keep their home in good shape. For home sellers, it helps them understand what to expect when a buyer brings in their home inspector, and what they can do to get the house in better shape to get more money and ensure the sale is successful.

I also offer additional services such as termite inspection, sewer line inspection, mold testing, and water testing. I am also a certified residential thermographer and use an infrared/thermal camera during my inspection at no extra charge.

For me, this is much more than just a j-o-b. I am very passionate about what I do. I really enjoy helping people, empowering them with knowledge, reducing their stress level, and providing them with all the information they need to make a good decision.

Home buying is pretty stressful as it is. There is so much to learn and consider. There is so much information coming at you. It’s quite overwhelming, especially for first time buyers. As a result, when my clients show up to the home inspection, they are often nervous, intimidated, hesitant, anxious.

I know I have done my job right when at the end my clients leave with a smile on their face, a spring in their step, a sense of relief and direction, and generally so much happier than when they first walked in the door. Seeing this makes me really happy.

One of the many things that sets me apart from others and shows just how passionate I am about my job is that I wrote a book about home maintenance. The problem when you buy a house is that nobody gives you a manual to show you how to take care of the biggest investment of your life! Many people don’t know all the stuff they’re supposed to do, and learn the hard way. Something breaks, they call a professional, and only then learn what they should have done. So I decided to write that manual.

Every word and every photo in the book is directly based on my experience inspecting homes over the years. The first part describes the various components of the home and what to know about them. The second part is an annual home maintenance calendar that walks you through maintaining your home. One little task every week or so, very easy, spread out over the year, makes home maintenance much easier and much less intimidating. My clients love it when I hand them a free copy of the book at the end of the inspection – especially first time home buyers!

I’m proud of the brand and reputation that I have build for my business over the years. It’s reflected in the hundreds of 5-star reviews I’ve received online over the years. I’ve developed a great balance between doing a thorough job and communicating with my clients in a positive and constructive manner. Home inspection doesn’t have to be all serious and very scary. People appreciate my friendly style and approach.

One of the many things I enjoy about this business is all the interesting stuff I see every day. It’s fascinating to see what people do to their homes. Some of it is pretty awesome, some of it is pretty scary. I share some of the crazy stuff on social media for entertainment purposes.

Most importantly, my business has the best mascot ever: Mojo the Home Pro. He helps me with my marketing, he entertains people on social media, and he is the co-author of my home maintenance book. People love this handsome fur bag. I’ve lost count of how many times I show up for a job, and the first words out of the realtor’s or client’s mouth is not, “Good morning”, but “Where’s Mojo? Did you bring Mojo the Home Pro?”

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

Obviously in today’s world having a social media presence is essential to a business. If people cannot find you online, you’re losing out big time. Both on potential new clients for your business, as well as on staying in touch with and top of mind with existing clients.

Creating a brand new social media presence for your business can be overwhelming. Which social media site or app should you use? Which one is right for you? How do you handle managing and posting on multiple ones? What do you post? How often? How do you make time for it all? How do you stand out?

You need to decide on who is your audience and what do they use. If you want to reach Gen Z, Facebook is not going to help you. If you want to reach Boomers, TikTok is not the right path. Since my clients come from different age groups, I decided on Google, Facebook, and Instagram,

Handling multiple social media accounts is actually not that complicated thanks to online tools specifically designed for this. Tools like SocialBee allow you to connect all your social media accounts to one place, post to them simultaneously, schedule when you want to post, and analyze how well your posts are doing. They enable you to sit down once every week or month, spend a few hours creating and scheduling your post, and then you don’t have to think about it again until next week or month.

As for what to post, think about how you can demonstrate your competency. Share small facts that show you really know your stuff. Think about how you can provide value to your clients. Share tips they can use. Most importantly, people want to be entertained, so think about how to make them smile.

For my business, I share defects I find in houses to help people understand what I do and why I’m worth it. I share home maintenance tips to help people take care of their homes. And I share crazy/weird/scary/funny things that I encounter for entertainment.

To stand out and make people want to watch your content, come up with a hook. This could be something silly like a costume, an accent, a catch phrase – use your imagination.

For my business, I have a great mascot: Mojo The Home Pro, my very handsome dog. People love dogs. You’d be surprised how many times people have hired me because of the dog. I swear at this point the dog is more popular than I am.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

One thing I had to change about my approach to the business was my style. Coming in, I was very eager to show my clients that I was professional, I was serious, I was punctual, and very knowledgeable. And my German nature amplified it all. As a result, my style initially was a bit overwhelming to people, I think. I came across as too serious and didn’t show much of a sense of humor. I showed up 15 minutes early to appointments which caught some people off-guard or made them feel bad. I was too longwinded with explanations and sharing knowledge.

I eventually changed my approach to be a bit more light-hearted. Buying a house is a intimidating process. So much information and paperwork, so many decisions to be made – it can be scary. So I started to add a little humor to my style, paid more attention to how people feel, helped them relax a little and reduce their stress level, changed how I explained things to a simpler style, just to name a few items.

Today I pride myself in having developed a great balance: On one hand, I am thorough and do a great job, on the other hand, I am very good at explaining things to my clients in an easy to understand and humorous manner that puts them at ease and doesn’t scare them. Both my clients and their realtors really appreciate this.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://desertdiamondhomeinspections.com/
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