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Show Summary
In this conversation, Dylan Silver interviews Rebecca and Elizabeth Nietert, founders of Lone Star Home Watch, about their professional home watch services in North Texas. They discuss the importance of having trained professionals monitor homes, especially for absentee homeowners, and the various risks that can arise when properties are left unattended. The conversation also touches on Rebecca’s background in real estate investing, the challenges of maintaining homes in cold weather, and the future projects Lone Star Home Watch is undertaking to enhance their services.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Rebecca Nietert (00:00)
Right now, Dallas, Texas has 547 squatter cases. ⁓ The good news is that the law changed. so what has happened is instead of calling trespassers squatters, when we get there, we’re able to call the sheriff immediately and say, this person is trespassing, not squatting. So we’re eliminating any kind of graffiti.theft, things like that
the criminals are getting very sophisticated. They’re putting toothpicks in the door.
They’re putting standard cameras in the lawn.
Dylan Silver (02:16)
Hey folks, welcome back to the show. Today’s guests, Rebecca and Elizabeth Nietert founded Lone Star Home Watch to serve homeowners in the North Texas Metro. They provide peace of mind through professional home watch services tailored to the unique needs of each client. Whether you own a vacation home, rental property or a secondary residence, Lone Star Home Watch ensures your property is visually monitored, secure and well maintained in your absence. They provide weekly visual observations, detailed photo reports and immediatealerts of any issues. can find them online at lonestarwatch.com. Rebecca and Elizabeth, welcome to the show.
Rebecca Nietert (02:56)
Thank you. Thank you for having us.Dylan Silver (02:58)
Absolutely, and I was talking before hopping on here with you about this idea of having a professional home watch service, how much this is needed, especially for mom and pop investors, people with a secondary residence, because who’s the first person that people are typically asking? It’s some relative or some neighbor to go check on your home and they might not know what to look for,Rebecca Nietert (03:22)
Right, there’s no way that they have the kind of experience and certifications and qualifications that we’ve went through, the rigorous training, the experience of 15 years in the real estate industry, walking along, and just structural engineers walking along, inspectors, making sure that my buyers are taken care of. ⁓So the anticipation that something can happen, something as benign as a corroded hardware or bolt on the top of a water heater can be disastrous.
Dylan Silver (03:59)
You mentioned that this has been a active week, that there was a lot to take care of this week. What’s the types of things that can come up when homeowners are away? The things that come to mind to me are water issues and break-ins in the home.Rebecca Nietert (04:18)
That is true.Right now, Dallas, Texas has 547 squatter cases. ⁓ The good news is that the law changed. so what has happened is instead of calling trespassers squatters, when we get there, we’re able to call the sheriff immediately and say,
this person is trespassing, not squatting. So we’re eliminating any kind of graffiti.
theft, things like that of that nature. People who are homeless and just looking for a place to sleep, people don’t want them in their homes. So when we’re at your property, when you’re not there, what we do is provide presence and they’re less likely to go into those types of homes. And the criminals are getting very sophisticated. They’re putting toothpicks in the door.
They’re putting standard cameras in the lawn.
They’re doing many things, especially in affluent neighborhoods, to get into these homes. And we walk the perimeter before we even enter the home. We’re looking for any points of entry, whether a screen is broken, a back door is unlocked, whatever it is. If we find that situation, we halt our watch and we call the Sheriff’s Department immediately.
and we say we might have a trespasser here. Yeah. So squatters is one of, ⁓ go ahead. Sorry.
Dylan Silver (06:35)
Now.No,
go ahead, I cut you off, go ahead.
Rebecca Nietert (06:41)
Sorry.So squatters is one situation that could come up. also had, we discussed the water heaters. Somebody’s water heater burst. just, you know, like she said, it was corroded. It burst on impact. And then the water damage was so severe that now she has to have a restoration company and her insurance has to pay for a new ceiling. They have to redo the entire attic. Their floors on their first floor are completely destroyed. The carpet on the second floor is completely destroyed. So there’s a lot of work.
maintenance that has to go into that. We’ve seen anything that’s super catastrophic like that to even simple things that people just cannot do because they’re away and they’re at work. So we’ve accepted car deliveries, we’ve accepted furniture deliveries, we’ve coordinated cleaning companies to come and make sure that the home is well maintained before a homeowner returns. Yeah. we have, you name it, we have a vendor list. We do. We have a vetted vendor list that we truly partner with.
and we love to give back to the community, you know, just like they give in to us and say, hey, our client could use Home Lodge. We like to make sure that, that the, we’re sharing. So yeah, within the community. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.
Dylan Silver (07:56)
Everyone’s home is in a way almost like another family member because if you if you go on vacation, right, so much could go wrong. I actually have the experience of coming back to my family’s home after a vacation and water pouring down from the ceiling. And I think we had left the water on right and we were we were away for a week. like you mentioned, like that can be disastrous, right? You could have all types of damage in the ceiling, you know, flood damage. can be, you know, electrical issues depending on howhigh the water level is. And I think what most people are assuming is, hey, I’ll have a neighbor check on it. Hey, I’ll have a family member check on it, right? But they wouldn’t know what to look for. They might not know, like you mentioned before hopping on here, where the shutoff valve is for the water. How did you learn what to look for? And you mentioned the certification. I wasn’t aware there were certifications in this space. Walk us through what it was like.
getting up to speed on what to look for and getting certified in this space.
Rebecca Nietert (08:57)
Well, ⁓ like I said, I did have a lot of knowledge initially, which is why I started the company. But ⁓ when I wanted to get involved in it, I aligned ourselves with National Home Watch Association in the Carolinas. And they are oversight. So they make sure you have the strictest ethical standards, that you’re not breaking any laws. They’re fully ⁓an accredited company and they hold week long classes where they take people like us and they certify them in addition to what your experience already is. And the great thing about that is how much I learned.
I learned a lot more than I thought I ever would learn.
I didn’t know that if the air conditioning unit outside was running, there was a weird sound or it just wasn’t coming through in the vents on the inside that something was wrong. I I just thought, okay, it’s just not blowing well, right? So there were a lot of technical things that you really have to look for. And believe it or not,
Dylan Silver (10:38)
Right.Rebecca Nietert (10:46)
⁓ When I started this company, thought, it’s just going to be wonderful. I’m just going to have all this extended family and I’m going to be able to go in and be friends with these people and just visit their house and everything’s going to be great. And unfortunately, and thankfully, we have.saved homeowners hundreds of thousands of dollars because we’ve been there at the right time when situations could have been horrible. There was a squirrel that ⁓ bit through an HVAC line for a homeowner’s house, which is why she came to us. And she said, I came home and my AC hadn’t run in three months of the summer months and I had black mold everywhere.
And she’s like, who knew that a squirrel would be in, you know, in that. And so we were like, yeah, OK, well, we can go up in the attic and make sure there are no squirrels. So we go into the attic, we we make sure every AC unit is running well, every hot water heater, whether it’s tankless or a big tank, whether or not the. ⁓
The hardware on the hot water heater is corroded or not corroded because that’s catastrophe if it’s in the attic. ⁓ So we look at every water source. We look at every single sink. We look at every toilet, every shower. Our visual reports are pretty thorough. And so the homeowner knows that they can see every single room in their report when they’re away and know that it’s all good.
Dylan Silver (12:27)
I can imagine that you must walk into homes on the first day and already realize that, there’s actually some areas where the homeowner may be at risk because there’s something going on that they might not be aware of. A water issue, electrical issue, you walk in and you realize this is a ticking maybe time bomb. just depends on how long this person’s away for.Rebecca Nietert (12:42)
I’m sorry.Pests, snakes, squirrels, ants. Yeah, but we’re also looking for, I mean, you know, she’s had several homes, right, too. So along with the certification and understanding what to look for on the exterior interior, she also has a wealth of knowledge from real estate and also owning various homes herself over like… of my own homes. Yeah, I mean, she invested in real estate, knows all those things. So if we see like, okay, you’re…
walls look like they’re shifting and your sheetrock looks weird you might have a foundation issue and when did you get that checked out or if we knew that a recent hailstorm came through it’s like okay well
how old is your home and did you have somebody come out and just check your roof to see if you have hail damage because if you know you’re one bad storm away from your roof caving in so which again as we’ve said previously could create a lot of issues. Yeah one of the things we just found is one of our homeowners had a
a sheathing issue. So it wasn’t necessarily the roof. It was just one little metal piece on the side. But unfortunately, that metal piece was allowing water to go into their stone fireplace. And what it was doing is it was making the stone sort of disintegrate. And we were like, no, no, no, no, you got to get that fixed like right now. But they didn’t even know that that was a thing. They they were like, okay.
We didn’t even know it was a problem.
Dylan Silver (14:23)
They’re thinkingthe water is not gonna harm the fireplace, but that’s how these things happen. And I wanna ask you specifically, you’re in DFW Metro, right? I lived up there for a year, and one of the things that I experienced is severe cold, and I was not aware of how much damage the cold can do. There was a tornado where I lived in Denton.
Rebecca Nietert (14:42)
Yeah.Dylan Silver (15:27)
And I’m curious, when folks are potentially leaving their home vacant during times of cold,There’s a whole litany of things that can go wrong that can potentially be devastating. Do you see any recurring themes that people do wrong in cold times in DFW?
Rebecca Nietert (15:46)
Well, yeah, they don’t they don’t insulate their exterior pipes, exterior ⁓ breaker boxes, exterior water sources in the right way. And so unfortunately, when those freeze, there’s a problem. And in Texas, I wish I could say that we had phenomenal builders in every home. But unfortunately, some of them are, you know, kind of so far. So they’ll build a kitchen sink next to an uninsulated exterior wall.And we know because we’ve been in the business, that’s going to be a problem. you know, our recommendation is put some plywood, you know, between, ⁓ let’s get up there and wrap those pipes underneath. Let’s, know, let’s be proactive so that that doesn’t, you know, keep happening as you own the house. So, ⁓ yeah, lots of, lots of issues. We’ve had one woman, ⁓ a vertical, ⁓ tree limb entered her roof.
And of course, of the neighbors knew it because you couldn’t see it from the back. But as it’s raining and you know, you’ve got all this adverse weather and it’s dripping into our attic and we’re like, no, no, no, no, no. We got to stop that right away. So we don’t leave that property until we’ve contacted the owner. We’ve got.
clear directions on where we need to go. We’ve probably called our vendor list. We’re waiting for people to get over there. We have 24-7 emergency services and we’re not going to leave a home on our high and dry.
Dylan Silver (17:22)
I want to pivot a bit here and ask you about the real estate investing that you’ve done. 27 homes is no ⁓ short order. Which areas of Texas were you investing in? And then also, these all rentals? Were any of them STRs? Walk me through ⁓ the investment history there.Rebecca Nietert (17:42)
So in 1998, I got my real estate license in Texas and I was just a real go-getter, had 4.3 million on the books, 156 FHA at the time. And I was just killing it because I had a seller assisted program, mortgage program that I was pushing at the time. It was called the Nehemiah program. SoAt that time, met a lot of investors. was really in the I was in it to win it, you know, and I helped a lot of investors fix and flip.
⁓ but I didn’t own any of those houses myself. It wasn’t until I got to Colorado that I was doing before 2008 when the market crashed, I was doing some, you know, fix, fix and flips of my own and trying to invest in and make the big bucks on the back end didn’t work out so well for me. Haven’t tried it since. But, but ⁓ yeah, I had, I had a lot of fun doing it for sure.
Dylan Silver (18:45)
It’s not easy. It’s a learning experience for many.Rebecca Nietert (18:53)
And most of the property. Go ahead.Dylan Silver (18:54)
When we talk specifically… Go ahead, go ahead.Rebecca Nietert (18:58)
I was just going to say most of the properties that she’s had, those 27, that number that we threw out there, that’s been her own. She has always moved every couple of years and found a different area that she’s just loved. We’ve been in Texas for a really long time, so we love all Texas cities. Yeah, and had two homes at one time. ⁓ that’s true. Yeah, she’s also had two homes at one time. Some people like new purses, she likes new houses.you
Dylan Silver (19:29)
I’ll ask you this question,Elizabeth. Having seen your mom investing in homes all over, do you have a personal favorite Texas city or place where one of these homes has been?
Rebecca Nietert (19:45)
That’s a great question. And I think, you know,maybe not in Texas, which is terrible to say, because she’s had some pretty wonderful homes. think on the top of my list, one of her properties that she had was in Colorado. It was just absolutely gorgeous. There was a lot of land, a lot of, you know, decor. was that rustic Western feel. ⁓ And I really loved that. But I think as far as my favorite home in Texas, we had a house in Plano and it was just so wonderful because it was centralized around our family. And so not only did you have, you know, that
Dylan Silver (20:18)
Yeah.Rebecca Nietert (20:21)
aesthetic appeal of the home and it really feeling warm and cozy but you always had family come over every week and I really loved that property.Dylan Silver (20:29)
do wanna pivot a bit here and ask either of you really this question. When we talk about working with real estate investors specifically, as a realtor I’ve done this before I was licensed, I was a wholesaler working with distressed sellers and investors. One of the things that you learn is investors are looking at this through the lens of, hey, does this deal underwrite, right? It’s non-emotional, but for the sellers themselves, it’s highly emotional, right? You’re not gonna…Give up your your forever home unless you need to sell in most cases or there could be something like death in the family divorce You know sickness or you know financial hard times so when you’re in these investor homes specifically and when you’re when you’re looking Through the lens of hey This is what needs to happen in order to make sure that the home is safe and secure How often are investors like we do need to get that remedied versus they’re saying do we really need to do that?
Rebecca Nietert (21:29)
Well, we’re not going to bring up little things like, you know, the vinyl flooring just doesn’t work in one of the low end houses or that’s not that’s not what we’re going to do. What we’re going to do in investment property is bring up anything that’s going to be costly for them, anything that’s not going to pass an inspection.You know, you may want to ⁓ re-grout some of the brick on the outside because there’s some separation. The rain has washed it away. You know, those kinds of things, because unfortunately, the engineers, the structural engineers that do the inspections on these houses, these licensed professionals that are amazing, they will report everything to a potential buyer or renter or whatever.
So when somebody hires a company like that, what we do is we visually observe and we say, look, you might want to do this, you know? And then as a realtor, I can say, it’s probably going to wash out the end. You probably don’t really need to, but if you did and you wanted to get, you know, a little bit more, then you might want to think about this because there’s no headache down the road. And that’s how we would present it.
Dylan Silver (22:36)
Sure, II know I can speak from personal experience, you know, as long as there’s a buyer for it, sometimes investors will sometimes push things through. And you talked about builders earlier, maybe not the most scrupulous ⁓ build quality in every home, but ultimately it is a numbers game, right? And so if they’re pumping out these homes and I can see new homes all across Texas.
Rebecca Nietert (22:55)
No.Dylan Silver (23:02)
outside some of the major metros that $240,000 brand new. And so you’re thinking, well, is every home gone over with a fine tooth comb and so on? But I think what you’re doing with providing this service for folks both enables them to rest assured that there’s gonna be someone there to watch their home when they’re going away. And also that if something does go wrong, God forbid, that there’s people in place who have the contacts to address that.rather than it’s a chaotic game of phone tag and trying to find who can get out there. But we are coming up on time here. Are there any new projects that you’re working on or how can our audience reach out to you and your team?
Rebecca Nietert (23:39)
Right.Yeah, there’s a ton of new projects. are incorporating a stay home kind of maintenance. We do a winterization and a summer prep. are now, you know, people are at work and there’s a lot of porch pirates. So we’re opening up a package retrieval. So we’re doing ⁓ an entire ⁓
sort of new wing to our operation where when people are home, they can still count on us. And then they can count us when they leave. And we’re also ⁓ trying to partner with builders and investors ⁓ specifically because how great is it if you tell your potential homeowner, look, you know, I’ve had somebody looking at your property. It’s not just been vacant this whole time that we’ve been trying to sell it.
you know, and that gives a peace of mind to a new potential buyer, right? So we’re trying to network into the community. And we’re also trying to navigate in our area, toll brothers, know, Shaddock, all those great builders that are wonderful. So when people come to us because they get referrals, we and they say, do you know of a good builder? Those are who we’re going to be sending them to, you know.
those people in the communities. go into those communities, we meet those people, those salespeople, and we try to establish relationships and we tell them, look, I’m here for you. If you can’t go out there and do that, and because you’re getting out of this particular neighborhood, you know, we’re your people. We’ll go in there, we’ll make sure that your homes are not graffiti, we’ll make sure nobody’s in there, we’ll make sure nothing’s broken.
you know, and we’ll give you a report and insurance companies love us because in the state of Texas, if you’re gone for a certain amount of days, it changes from unoccupied to vacant and insurance may not pay your claim. So unfortunately, that’s a real concern for investors and builders who are leaving those spec homes vacant.
Dylan Silver (25:47)
Hmm.Rebecca Nietert (25:56)
So you can contact us on our website. You can also reach out to us on social media or call our phone number directly. Everything is Lone Star Home Watch.Dylan Silver (26:06)
Rebecca and Elizabeth, thank you so much for your time today. Thanks for coming on the show.
