EP. 8 | How to Finalise Properties through Video Walk Through

Parag Dixit

Hello guys. Welcome back to our new, new, new, new podcast. How is it? How's everything? How's it going with you?

Mudit

Yeah, going. A lot of things happening. Of course, work is busy. There's lots going on that front. But also, we bought a house just a few months ago, and it's an old property, and we've moved in already. The idea was to renovate it my Of course, my wife was strictly against it. She she knows that when it comes to things like this, I am not one of the most proactive guys, so she was shit scared when we bought it, but, yeah, I eventually coerced her into buying it, and now we have to get the Renos done. It's a lot of work to be done. So we are just looking at, I mean, it's, it's different when you, when you're on the other side of things, right? So I'm calling a lot of renovators builders, to kind of understand what the define the scope of it, and then we have to, we are getting into that phase. We have to choose every single item and what exactly we want to do. So going through that, that's it's time taking. It is a lot of time. It's kind

Julius

of a lot of detailed work, different codes, type of bathroom renovations.

Mudit

We are looking at bathroom, Renaults, kitchen renos, some major upgrades in the house. So yeah, and when I look at the codes, I'm like, wow, it's gone that high. I didn't expect it

Parag Dixit

to be. So I know it's construction. Cost has gone through the roof, everything. It's not so easy to just make a new house today. And something which you dream of that's something not so easy,

Mudit

one one bathroom upgrades is like, it's not, it's not small amount. Now it's straight away fear. And we have like, four bathrooms. We are planning to upgrade all four. So it's like, straight up

Julius

renovation cost is as as big as you build new house nowadays. It's too expensive. It is, it is, it is like that you should have told me before I bought it.

Parag Dixit

No, no, no. In fact, today, that's what we are talking and today we'll be coming across, it's a good it's a very, very good topic. And it's, you know, when good you brought it up. So we, we're talking about how people are investing into various areas, how they are going interstate and boundary less investors and going to the other part. And you, you doing inspections on videos, and you're deciding, okay, on pictures which you get from the real estate agents property managers. And then you decide, okay, I want to buy this property. I don't want to buy this property. And in this your decision making points are pretty three, four minutes video or 10, 2050, pictures of the property. And then you have to go yes or no. And that's where the dilemma of investors are that, how do I really decide on buying a property just on the basis of a video? It's a half 1,000,000,600 $700 million purchase, which you're doing, and the the inspection points are not which allow you or doesn't give you comfort. They may be right, they may be wrong, but they don't give you comfort enough to get into it. And then what should you do? And in fact, we are bringing across today, very, very well known building and pest inspector, and we'll take his views on what video shows for a layman like me, what do I see? And what do? What will he see with his eyes? And say, Okay, if you, if I were you and I was buying it, what kind of things I really point out and take care of and see with naked eyes. You covered a lot by the building and pest inspection codes everywhere. But still, you can always save a bit of money, your point two, five and your 5000 which you give up front, which is non refundable at the at the time. So that's a phenomenal talk, which we'll have today. And it's a it's something which every investor would always look forward to. How do I really decide on a property, right? How do I get into it? First half,

Julius

exactly because bas are pretty common nowadays, like a lot of Bas, because people needs help after covid. Borderless investments is quite open. And then there's this new field, which is quite booming, being in industry. From last five years, I've worked on more than 1000 inspections, so getting that report, and then when you're looking at a property, for an example, I'm sitting here and buying a property or helping my clients to buy property in Perth or Adelaide or Brisbane. Only thing, what we get for in the first instance is the just a video, just a video, just a video, just a video, and that's it. Well, that that is also been shot by real estate agent who want to sell that property, yeah. So when we'll get that video from then, how to analyze it and what to pick up? It's a big

Mudit

task, understand Correct, correct. So mostly contracts are exchanged just not by a physical inspection. Contracts are exchanged for properties worth, like you said, half a million dollar, million or whatever, based on videos, based on photos, not physical inspections, because that comes much later. Most likely you're buying a property which is not in your city, not in your state, and that's how these are exchanged, right? Yeah, now and and you see a video, what somebody wants to show, right? So Not, not, not talking about the intention here, but yeah, if it's a sales intention video, right? So it is not an assessment video of the property, right? So it is different, and that's where it becomes important to understand what exactly is going on into because it has a huge implication. The impact can be very high. One is, of course, losing money. The second is, of course, you are getting into the process of. Of exchanging contract. It's a hassle. It's operational hassle. It's a lot of stress, unnecessary that now, later on, if you have to take a call, so what goes inside it? What can you take care of before you sign the contract? What can you ask for?

Parag Dixit

Yeah, it is important. And we've been seeing there are states like in the last three or four years, a state like WA, there's like South Australia. They have been moving fast. So a buyer, when he's trying to buy in the other states, they you will find that, okay, you have split time. So you know, one hour, two hours, not too much of a time is available to you to decide, yeah, because properties would have gone to multiple people and they and and to be fair to everyone, everybody's giving you their way of showing the property. Nothing is wrong in that, nothing is bad in that, but it's their way of showing the property. Obviously, when someone's selling, they will show the good things about the property, but those good things may or may not be the full picture. It's not because of anything wrong. It's not because of a malaise, but it's more because of something which you which is their perspective. And when you're looking at some with somebody's eyes, you need to be very sure of what we are doing in the time frame is low. The information available is not complete, and that's what makes it complicated to be able to decide on that exactly, because when you look

Julius

at report right, report will be classified in multiple section, like you have a minor defect, major defect in major also your major defect versus major structural issue, then every report will have your entire building is conducive to termite infestation. So how to read the report? And sometimes there are issues in a report where it will be classified as a major structural issue, and few defect would be like major issues, but the fixing that major issue or minor issue might cost you more than fixing that major structural issue. So how to do that assessment about those reports, how to read that report, plus how to understand what kind of issue that will result into, and then what is the characteristic of that issue that is something which is big void in a market, which need to understand by an

Parag Dixit

investors absolutely correct? No. And it's a tricky bit, because earlier, I remember good old days, you know, you you will go into the next suburb and buy something. Now we are going all over the place and the because of all of these things which are making our generation quick decision generation. So we are also getting information which is digital, with the risk of making mistakes is increasing a lot because it's a high value purchase, it's not a small value purchase. And with that high value purchase comes the risk which comes along with it that you can always go pretty bad at some point absolutely correct.

Mudit

It's a high value purchase, the risks are higher, and at the same time the timeframe is is much lesser. One is the decision timeframe, which is, you probably might have to decide in a few hours itself. Sometimes that kind of pressure is there. On top of that, different states have different timelines for things. So there is cooling off period, there are finance clause, there are building an inspection clause. And this, these vary state by state. So a lot of people who are buying for the first time, or even somebody was bought earlier, but now buying, I bought earlier my house in Sydney, and now I'm buying first time in WA. Let's say I may not need be aware that. What are the clauses there? What are the legal clauses if there are just a few days of cooling off period, a lot of times, if the and the cooling off period can vary from two days to three days to five days to seven days between different states or cities, right? If, within that period, if I am able to do a building and pest inspection or not, that becomes a question mark, because during that period, if the inspection doesn't happen, if the report doesn't come, then it goes into the BNP clause. So within the cooling off period, it's easy to withdraw from the deal, although there might one might lose some money depending on which city or state they're buying in, but you still can withdraw. But if that clause, the cooling of clause, expires, then you are into the finance clause and building and pest inspection clause. Now there in most states, what can be covered would probably be just major defect or major structural defect. What if, like Julius, you were saying that, what if a defect is not classified as a major structural defect, but it's a major problem, a leakage because of some reason or moisture, high moisture. Now, it's not a major structural defect, but it is a high problem, which may cost the entire repair of a bathroom like I'm talking about the renovator. I'm talking about 40,000 $50,000 just for one bathroom upgrade. Now, if that kind of problem is there, now that becomes a bigger problem. So timelines from that angle, play a big role there, and people are forced to take decisions

Parag Dixit

sooner than later, a very quick time frame. Yeah, cooling off. Cooling offs are there which, which are two days, three days, five days, at max, depending on the states, some states don't even have cooling offs. And you, you're in it, you sign it, and you're in it. And if you, if you are, let's say good that you have. You say pre approved, your finances are all in order. That's all the ducks are in line. So, you know, no problem at all. There. You get your loan approved, and that becomes a problem, because if the property's got some minor repairs to be done, but that minor is a cost of five grand, 10 grand, then that's a lot of money. Now, finance clause is fine. BNP is fine, but you. You got something which is, which is there, and you have to decide it is split few hours or

Julius

something at times. That is that, especially towards the WA, when we have seen the contracts, there is no cooling of that is number one. Number two is basically you have certain days to satisfy your building in pace condition, after finance approval. Sometime it's prior, but most of the cases is after finance approval. So for an example, your finances approved, you have seven days to do building and paste inspection. You have done the building inspection on Sixth Day and seventh day, if your solicitor did not respond to email stating that, what are the repairs required? And if you are an eighth day, then you might not get the discount from that cooling off, because that cooling off period is already expired. Sorry, not cooling off building laws is already expired. So those timelines might be a bit disastrous when, when lot of investor might caught into this. So this type of things are very important. Similarly, like when you go towards the other states, like you go to Adelaide, your two days of cooling off, and then sometimes you'll not get an inspector. So only only come out is you pass the cooling off, and then you go towards the before you get a report. If the former is not safe, then probably you can come out of the contract. Every state has a different combinations. Yeah, absolutely. And, and

Parag Dixit

that's, that's what brings us to a lot of mistakes, which people do. And that's what brings the point across for people that, okay, I don't have time. I like the property. Okay, that's the premise. I like the property. I think it fits with my circumstances. It fits with my objectives. I want to decide on it. I want to get this property. There's a bit of a FOMO in your mind. There is a bit of a you know, you want it. You like it. Everybody likes it. And you've got some dreams around it, and then you have to decide it in few hours, and the information set which you've got is too low, 2345, minute video, a few pictures. Most of the pictures would make the house look good. And they are good. There's a good house. That's why you're buying it. And then you you, then you get into trouble. And in fact, a lot of states, what they also do, or a lot of areas, what they also do that as a process. What's built up is that you first get finance ready, so you get your loan ready, once you get your loan ready, then you do a BNP inspection. But what that does is it leaves it to too late. You know, you by the time you've reached a BNP inspection stage, you're a couple of weeks into the contract, and there's not much you can do to come out of it. There's not much which you, which allows you to move out of that contract. And you, you, you can get caught out with a large expense on that. And we've got people heard hundreds of stories, hundreds of bad stories, of people got stuck because they just couldn't do the due diligence which they needed,

Mudit

sometimes, because of the time pressure, people have to sometimes rush through the report. So you got the report, but now, because there's only one day left, so you try and rush through the report, the numbers of the property look just too good, too lucrative, that sometimes it can be blinding as well. That Okay, I want to buy this property and okay, this might be a small issue. You rush through the report during the clauses. You still have some negotiating power, but once that period is over, then your negotiating power is also gone. So not asking follow up questions with the inspector dressing through the report. These are some common mistakes that happen, which can be very, very costly,

Parag Dixit

absolutely right? And that's where, that's where the windows important. That's where it's it's important to have a sane mind, you know, but to have a sane mind, to have your mind calm down. You sometimes you feel that you don't have enough information. And maybe the bigger problem is we don't know what are the right questions to ask. How do I ask the right questions so that I get a report which is more conducive to me being able to decide on what I want to do, because, again, like when, and we'll talk to when we talk to Raymond, when we are coming to the interview him, we will talk we understand that every kind of a report is not to be feared about. Every kind of issue is not to be worried about. And sometimes the smallest of the issues are the most expensive ones, which may not be structural, maybe you mean non structural, but they become an expensive affair to get into. And then I remember, there was one client who There was everything was nice. The the garage door, they didn't check and the it was, it was a bit faulty, and there was nothing wrong in it. They bought it one. But once they bought it, after about a week or so, somebody was closing the garage. This was an owner occupied purchase, and that whole thing fell down. And when that whole thing fell down, they eventually had to take change the full structure and the full garage door and the and the electronic the one which moves the door up and down, and that's a good amount of money. That's about 10 grand on it, straight up, without you, without it, now, without anything. And there's nobody's mistake there. It's a simple garage store. But again, it can cost you so much of money, nothing structural around it, nothing there. But it's a good expense to you when you're suddenly into it. So it's about a thing which you need to be very sure about what you're getting into. And how do you really, how do you really do your due diligence, which is proper due diligence into buying a property and. Deciding about buying a property and deciding about what all to check. You can't check everything as well. You know, you can't go around to the lens, but you really need to know what to do exactly, so

Julius

especially when you look at the videos, right? So video has to be detailed inside and outside of the house as well. Like when you walk into house, is there any cracks on the walls when you look at the cornices, then are there any cracks on the cornices when you go towards the skating boards? Is there any dampness near bathroom, or when you take a video towards bathroom, then have you seen anything like mold or any moisture in a bathroom? Also, all the windows and the doors are closing correctly when you walk past the house. Then basically, outside of the house is very important as well. Like you would have a shed in your backyard, which would be asbestos, and then if you want to remove that shed, it will be additional around five to 10 grand of work. So even though there is nothing in the house but something which is lying outside of the house, which will cost you fortune.

Mudit

I think you're absolutely right. I think first the rule number one. Rule number one is, if it's not shown properly, yeah. Then especially video, if it's not shown properly, then probably there's something hiding there that is, that is the lens to look at the videos from, not the view from. Okay, it all looks very nice like of course, that's one lens to look the video from, whether the property looks good or not, the layout, and all will be very clear. But if it's not shown clearly, if it is fast, if it is just a glimpse of it, or just not going too close, showing from a distance, and you see something there, but the video doesn't focus their moves on, then it's time to ask. These clear videos. Asking the

Parag Dixit

question is important, right? We have to keep on asking, you know, the roof line, the gutters, so people just miss out on watching the gutters on whether they are the right things or not, whether it is, it's it's falling in place or not. They are. They're very clear things, you know. But and when you go around the exterior, most of the time, most, most of the structural bits lie around it. You know, what kind of if there is any kind of a crack in the wall, if there is any kind of that stuff. So it's just by visually doing. It's the same way we would do if I were, if I were to go around and buy a house on the next, next street, then I would visit it, and I go around the house, and I would look around to see, oh, is everything okay? Is the exterior wall showing some kind of a water coming through from the from some leaking tab or leaking pipeline, or is there a crack coming in the window? Or, you know, there's a fresh render somewhere fresh. This such an easy giveaway to being concealed. About something is concealed, yeah?

Julius

Like fresh stuff somewhere, fresh paint or fresh paint on the ceiling. Because there are a lot of times what I've seen in videos, we could say small stains on the ceiling, and then it can be easily covered by paint itself. Yeah? Sometimes when you buy a brand new home, or not brand new, actually, old homes fully freshly renovated, yeah? So most of those flipping houses where the type of renovations, when they do the property will looks fantastic in the first glance, but after like three or four months, you'll see, okay, bathrooms are leaking again. You will have a cracks on the ceiling because they try to do a superficial work. It's not great, because we are buying an old properties

Parag Dixit

absolutely right in your useful right? So just we have to the make, we have to make the video the way our eyes would look at so when I would go around a house, do I look up? Do I look down? What do I look around? What do I see everywhere? Does it show me? I've seen when I go to a normal my naked eye vision for a house. And when I'm doing an inspection, I can even see sometimes, you know, there's a gutter which going there, and there's a plant which is growing inside the gutter, at least, that's not getting cleaned. And there is, there is it's blocked at a lot of places. And if it's blocked, then water may be seeping into my roof, I don't really know. And that's a flag to me that okay, the maintenance has not been done pretty well. So I may ask the real estate agent at that time. But when I'm looking at a video, do I get a video of that? Do I get a picture which shows what is happening there? Do I see the rust which is coming there? Do I see if the eaves are stained or not, because the water may be moving inside, into the eaves? So all that bit is, is something which we need to maybe see how it's happening, how the roof is sloping through? Is the roof sloping? Fine? How the land is sloping into the house? Is it sloping into the house, or is it flatter? Because if it's sloping into the house, there may be a chance that there's kind of a water it's dip there, and something is happening. Something is happening there. So, and when you kind of get something there, okay, something is happening there, then you can ask questions. And when you can ask questions, it gives you an answer.

Julius

Biggest issue with that which have seen, when you have a we don't have a flat contour, then you have retaining walls. And retaining walls always very expensive to maintain. So if suppose the house is on the slope, and then you have retaining walls. And then looking at those, retaining walls are very. Important, because to fix those major cost

Parag Dixit

absolutely, absolutely retaining walls are always the biggest cost and and see, you know, we've spoken a lot about external even internal walls, whether it's retailing walls outside or internal walls of the rooms. Internal walls, you know, ceilings, floors, whenever think things are going we it's it's very easy, because when you're looking at a room, you just glance through very quickly. But when you're glancing through very quickly, you also see, okay, where there's a corner out there, which is meeting the ceiling, there's a window or a door frame, and is everything looking okay? It's at the bottom. You know. Where is the bottom? Are there cracks out there? Obviously, if you see holes in the wall, it's pretty easy to give away. But all these corners and all these services are the one where you really need to see what it is. Then if your video is not showing that, then you then it's important that we ask for it. Okay, if you go inside, I've been there, I'll tell you once I was in a inspection, and there's these guys, what they had was, when you go into their go into that apartment, it was, I could feel that that apartments, that floor near the kitchen, was a bit different, and it was flat, okay, but you can feel that, I It's a bit awkward, it's a bit not straight. And then you, when you ask, you said, Oh yeah, there was this thing here, which they had to redo it, and then, so then you know that there is something there, eventually we could get through. And we found that it was nothing much they had made. They had put up another tile over something else. So it was fine, but at least you could find that out. In a good video, you should be able

Mudit

to do that so you could see, or you could realize that because you were physically walking there, correct? But in a video, if the video is not capturing things like that or not capturing the floor properly, it's very easy to miss. It's very, very easy to miss. So how do you replace physical inspection, physical viewing of a property? How do you do that via a video? I think that's where it becomes important, and it becomes important to understand that, okay, what exactly to look for in a video? Where should it focus? Where should it not focus? And if you're not getting that, then can you ask for something more? Can you have a checklist around it? I think that's becomes very important, and that's where, I think that's where listening from Raymond will be very useful. And like you were saying, that we can, we'll walk through a video along with him to see that. How does, how does somebody like me perceive it versus What? What? What a specialist who's whose job is to do that, who? How is a professional looks at it? What perspective does he bring into it? I think that becomes very, very important. That becomes

Parag Dixit

very critical. You know, because they're experts into it, and I and they can really see through things in a much easier their naked eye vision is also much better than what they do with their tools and what to do with their expertise, which they bring in. I know if there are, if there are, like, for example, the most important places where we will always or not always, will will find, if there are issues, we find issues. You know, your bathrooms, your kitchens, the wet areas, kitchen things, the wet areas, right? And in the wet areas, it's sometimes with clear vision. You can see there are stain on the roof below the bathroom. So in the bathroom, you can see that there is a stain out there. So there is something out there or not in the kitchen, you open if the if the agent shows you a video which is open, after opening the below the sink, you will know what's happening out there. So these kind of things, if there are in the videos, it's nicer. If they are not, then it gets hidden. And that's where you start deciding or and you get into something, and it becomes an expensive thing once you, once you are into it, about whether you had made a right decision or not made the right decision gives you sleepless nights, you know, gives you, gives you a bit of a stress around things. And because you eventually, you you want to have a nice experience. You don't want to get into a purchase or a property where, you know, it gives you a headache at some point. Oh yes, absolutely.

Mudit

And you say, well, you can save a lot of money, lot of time, lot operational has a lot of stress you can you can save yourself if you're mindful of some things going into the detail, because it's always in the detail.

Parag Dixit

Oh yeah. 100% always in the detail. As simple as having, you know, Windows or a roof voids, if are there, or if there are, if you have a, if you have different floor levels, just going through with a video everywhere. It's important that that video goes through slowly and takes you through all of these bit if you, if these windows are showing that there is a bit of a, you know, timber rot somewhere. If you're showing that there are glasses are cracked and there is something is happening, you know, you'll know if, as simple as that, that if there is an expense which is going to come to me, because there's a fly, fly screen structure, whether there's no nothing in it, so you know that I have to spend some money or the tenant will need that. So you you kind of get aware of what you are getting into when you are when you see stuff, especially

Julius

for Suffolk. So what I've seen is, if you have for the old houses, if you have sub flows when you're walking, and if there's a squeeky noise, then probably, yes, there is definitely a lot of work required to repair those sub flow pillars. Sometimes when you see the windows are not closing correctly, or the doors are not closing correctly, that means the house is moving. And if it is on the slab and it is moving, that means you need to either reinforce the concrete or you need to underpin the house, yeah, which will be more than 3040, grand of work. There will be a,

Parag Dixit

there will be a real expensive, really expensive

Mudit

kind of work, I think, things like, which are moisture, mold, these are things that can be easily concealed as well. So figuring out whether they are being concealed or not, that becomes important, and especially through the video. How do you understand that? That is there something happening to hide a few things, something has been done recently, to hide something, or is it just right there, correct?

Parag Dixit

You're so right. So it is important that we it's not. It's imperative that when we are doing such a high value purchase, we see around everything we see around the house, and we make the right decision and the lack of decision points. And we'll go through a video. In fact, we are going through a video along with Raymond, a video which to me, when I see that video, and there was absolutely nothing wrong in the house, absolutely, a lot of stuff which was already done, but I couldn't see it. I couldn't see it because I don't have those trained eyes. I could you can see, when you see the video, you can see that, okay, there are some things which don't look normal, or some things which are no it's not that, it's just a different color, which you there and you don't point out, because you're not trained to see something which is not in the in the frame, which is not the usual stuff. And because of that, you do that. And when you, when we talk to Raymond, when we are when we go through with it, it gives us a good amount of insight about what we can do. And so, so just before we go there, in fact, both Julius and mudit would interview Raymond. Raymond is a phenomenal building and pest inspector, and he's just moving into a bio agency role as well. And so that brings him to a point where he brings both the kind of knowledge together and when he sees something, and he gives us tips about what is it, which you can see he's a good guy. He's a good bloke. And you know, he will, he can tell us about what would he see when he walks into a house, and how sometimes the videos which you get are different because they have a different perspectives. What? What happens when? When, when a real estate agent, which is more looking at a sales perspective, and you which are looking at a at a good buyer perspective, and also safety perspective, security perspective. For yourself, should get a merged view on these together. So that brings across to us how you can protect your interest. And that will be the it'll be a good point of time. And let's, let's go and listen to the interview which and Julius had along with Raymond in our very studio.

Mudit

Okay, so we have been talking, we have talked so much about building and pest inspections, right? So, but I don't think that we can continue further without somebody who has experienced doing that himself. So I would like to welcome today. We have Raymond with us. Raymond has been running building and pest inspections. He has done 1000s of inspections over the last what years? Raymond for five years, four and a half, four and a half years, and he's built that business. He has that keen eye for understanding that what goes on behind the scenes. So it would be good to know from him, listen from him, and understand what we have been discussing. And how do we make it how do we save ourselves? How do you save yourselves? Yeah. So first question, yeah, Raymond, so what do you do as basic, what do you do as a building and pest inspector? What's, what's your core job?

Raymond

Core job would be to essentially guide the client through that due diligence process. So once they've purchased the property, it'll come through to us, and we'll go through and we'll, we'll assess the property's structural condition. Okay? So as a nutshell, yeah, we look at the structure, we look at termites, and we make sure that there's no sort of structural issues, safety hazards and that sort of thing. Some inspectors go a little bit beyond that, and they look at sort of cosmetic things and do a comprehensive thing, but it's mostly structural termites is the main focus. Okay?

Mudit

And when you do these inspections, you get a lot of, I'm sure you get a lot of videos before you go for inspections, and then do your you do your inspections. Do you find that those videos have done justice in general, to what you observe later, after that? Or do you find that this is Apple and this is orange and it's completely different? And then you're like, Is that the same property I've been to? I don't know. I'm just Yeah, that's a good point.

Raymond

I think the first question is, depends on who sends the video. Okay? So I think you sort of have certain people that might sort of mislead it or not understand what to show and that sort of stuff. So I wouldn't necessarily say anyone's doing the wrong thing, but I think unless you understand what to look for, then taking a video for someone. Can be interpreted a million different ways. Okay, so, having some of the videos that I've seen where it seems like it's the perfect house and that sort of stuff, and then I come to inspect it, and I uncover, you know, 1000 more issues from there. I think that there's some key things that you can observe in a video and sort of highlight that, but most of the time looking at the video and to the actual inspection, they've vastly different.

Julius

Have you seen any anomalies in the videos, like when the real estate agent sends the video versus when you compare it on ground? Is there a lot of difference? I would

Raymond

say that yes, there is a lot of difference, purely because I feel like majority of the real estate agents, their core sort of, I guess, objective is to show you the property. Okay? They're not an expert into showing you the condition of the property or anything like that. So again, I don't mean it to be purposely misleading, okay, but they're there to showcase you what the property looks like, what the layout is. So that's their primary objective, to do that. Okay? So I say that the way that the or the intent of the video is not the same as what the intent of my inspection is, okay? And that's why that might be different, okay, but I think that there's ways that you can get around that, where you can sort of look at a video, look at certain aspects of it, and then you can get a little bit more information out of it, even if that's not the objective of

Mudit

it, okay, yeah, because most of the videos you would have seen up front will be coming mostly from real estate agents, the the vendors, agents who are looking to sell the property. And like you're saying, so objective, if the objective is different, they're looking more to showcase the property, and the idea is not to show the details of what may go wrong, correct? That's, that's what you mean by because objective is

Raymond

different, correct? Yeah. I mean, my if I go to the property, my sole purpose, or my sole intent is to assess the structure. Okay? So I'm there to look for defects, look for pitfalls, look for all these things. I think when real estate agents or property managers or whoever takes these videos for clients, their objective is not to do that, okay, because they might not be experiencing it or anything like that. So I think the intent behind the video is to showcase it more so than when I go and I actually do an assessment on it. So I guess to sort of summarize it, yes, it's vastly different, and I think that there are a lot of things, but there's a lot of key points that you can still pick up in these videos. I'm not saying these videos aren't useful. Okay? I think once you understand some of the things that you can look at and some of these things that you should notice and that sort of stuff, then it can still be a value. And there's no reason why you couldn't, sort of, you know, advise people of exactly those types of parameters that you want them to do. So you can change the intent of the video,

Julius

yeah, because real estate agents basic intention to show anything good about the property. I mean, for him, is about, okay, he has to find out the faults and say, not too good about the property, but to give the facts, perhaps, yeah.

Mudit

So you were saying something.

Raymond

So I was just gonna say so. I think differentiating between the two intent, you know, their intent to showcase the property. My intent is to assess the property. Okay, I think you can find a good balance by sort of creating parameters for people to take a video for you, or representative to do it, so that you can change the intent. Okay, you don't want it to just showcase it properly. You want a little bit more deeper analysis of it so you can sort of guide them to

Mudit

do that absolutely, I think, and and the video, the video that we we played in the beginning, and now I just wanted to go through that again with you, because you saw the video and then you saw later on. How was it different? So if

Raymond

I think that one was, was a lot different. I mean, okay, we sort of thoroughly went through that one, the video, compared to the actual on site assessment that we done was, was astronomical. Okay, so I think that this is a, probably a very, very good example to sort of showcase how you can pick up minor things that could have given you indicators as to what is, especially if you're not physically there at the location, versus what was actually there in the end. But yeah, we're more than happy to go through it.

Mudit

Okay, all right, let's play it then, yep.

Raymond

So just couple of things that I sort of noticed as the agent was sort of approaching and in his going through and then showcasing the house, you notice that they, again, their intent is to showcase you the inside of the property. Okay, so majority of the external walls and roof and gutters and that sort of stuff wasn't necessarily captured. Okay? So you get a very, very basic sort of introduction of the front of the property and nothing else, and he proceeds to go inside straight away.

Mudit

You're right. I don't remember seeing videos that focuses on gutters or on very, very specific details around how this hurting is or

Raymond

exactly, and I mean things like that, don't they're not necessarily considered structural issues. Okay, so oftentimes they're not covered under contract, but it's good to know. I'm not saying that they're deal breakers, yeah, okay, but they're good to know to factor in into your maintenance and that sort of stuff. It's a cost that you still want to sort of be aware of. It's definitely, like I said, not a deal breaker. It's part of everyday sort of maintenance. But you sort of want to. Yeah, before I

Mudit

buy as much information can get about the property, right? So correct. And have you seen like, Okay, anyways, we will talk about this video first. I mean,

Raymond

the video is great. I can definitely see the layout of the property. I so far haven't picked up on any sort of defect or anything like that that I can observe from the video. And so to, I guess, the average investor and that sort of stuff, they can look at this, and they can see that, you know, spacious property, great layout, it's very practical, and all that sort of stuff. But later on in the video, I'll sort of point out a couple of cues that are things that raise a bit of concern for me. And then I'll sort of dive into my actual assessment on site and how much that uncovered, but it's points that I noted on the video sort of prior to the inspection. So you'll sort of see him approaching this, this right elevation corner, and he starts to turn to show you the elevation of the yard, but very quickly scans over that corner of there. And if we can just pause there for a second, you'll sort of, you'll see on the upcoming photographs here, a key point to have taken away from that corner is there was the downpipes were not connected to stormwater. Okay, they basically did an unconventional extension in that end. Okay, so there's a lot of moisture discharging on the corner of that building. If you take a closer look at the video, you can actually see the step cracking on the wall. And so those are things that aren't necessarily showcased in the video, but by being able to see the stormwater was not connected, and it was unconventionally connected. The consequence of that was the cracking so on and so forth. And if that doesn't get addressed long term, it'll

Mudit

continue to get worse. And you're absolutely right. It was captured for, like, not even fraction of a second, for For a layman, like somebody who's looking at just a property as very briefly, it will be difficult to see and notice that and figure out that this could be a problem. So, I mean,

Raymond

if we sort of summarize it, then just on that point when you sort of want to, what you want to look for in a video, in that sense, is things that can start to affect the structure. Okay, so are there large trees close by? Are there storm water? Is that connected to drainage? Okay, what are some things that are going to affect the ground or soil condition around the property? Okay? Because those are the things that's going to cause you issues, nothing like the fence being damaged or the gutter being rusted, they're good to note, okay, but they're not things that can lead to significant consequences later on. Okay, so gutters being a little bit blocked, clear them. Okay, the ongoing maintenance, it can have a catastrophic effect if you leave them, okay, water can overflow and stuff, but the key points would be to look for stormwater drainage, look for large trees and that sort of stuff, because those are the things that can affect your family.