Restoration Insights: Navigating Disasters

In this episode, we welcome Cesar Zavala and CeCe Adame of Service Master Restore to discuss their extensive experience in the restoration business and the vital services they provide. Cesar and CeCe share insights into the empathetic approach they take when helping individuals navigate challenging situations. We delve into the aftermath of the recent Mountain Fire in Ventura County, exploring the process of making homes habitable again, the time and manpower required, and the complexities of working with insurance companies. Cesar and CeCe also highlight the unfortunate rise of scams following disasters and recount their team’s mobilization to South Carolina after Hurricane Helene, where Service Master Corporate coordinated teams from across the country. Cesar shares one of the most unusual experiences from his 11 years in restoration, including dealing with biohazard materials. The episode wraps up with advice for consumers on working with insurance companies, preventative maintenance tips, and details on the areas their team serves, along with how to contact Service Master Restore.

Watch the full episode HERE:

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:
0:00 Welcome to the show and some background information on today’s topic
0:29 Introduction of our guests Cesar Zavala and CeCe Adame of Service Master Restore
0:47 Find out how long Cesar and CeCe have been in the restoration business
1:34 We learn about the services that Service Master Restore provides and the empathy they display when walking individuals through their trouble
3:41 The recent Mountain Fire in Ventura County
5:10 The process of making a home habitable after damage
7:30 The time and manpower it can take to restore a home
8:20 Dealing with insurance companies and what happens if the work is not approved
9:54 Scams that are occurring in light of the recent fire
11:15 Cesar’s and his team mobilized to South Carolina after Hurricane Helene
12:28 Service Master Corporate sent teams from all over the United States to South Carolina
13:36 The most off the wall thing Cesar has seen in his 11 years of restoration work and what happens with biohazard trash
14:50 Find out the areas that Cesar and CeCe’s team serve
15:35 Cesar’s advice for consumers when dealing with insurance and preventative maintenance
16:35 Service Master Restore’s contact information
17:25 A special thank you to our sponsor: Opus Escrow

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Colm FitzGerald – Deluxe Window Cleaning

ServiceMaster Restore by Restoration Pros
3051 Sturgis Rd.  Oxnard, CA 93030
Cell (805) 750-5638 | Office (805) 388-1409 | Fax (805) 512-9212
www.smrpros.com

Contact Paul Ward:
805-479-5004
paul@homeandranchteam.com

Have ideas for future episodes? We’d love to answer your questions – leave a comment! For any home buying or home selling needs in the Ventura County area of California, please reach out to Paul@HomeAndRanchTeam.com or visit www.HomeAndRanchTeam.com

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A special THANK YOU to our sponsor, OPUS ESCROW! Farm Talk with Paul Ward would not be possible without the support of our sponsor Opus Escrow. Supporting our sponsor ensures Farm Talk can provide listeners with the best possible episodes.

Paul Ward (00:05):

Hi friends, it’s Paul Ward here, and welcome to On the Road. Well, we’ve had quite some excitement and not the good kind here in our local Ventura County area. Recently we had a fire that burned, I think over 200 homes in an, in an afternoon, in a 24 hour period. It was quite devastating. And so I wanted to bring some folks on who are part of the cleanup crew with Service Master here in our local area in Oxnard, we have Cesar Zavala and CeCe Adame. Welcome to On the Road.

Cesar Zavala (00:38):

Thank you. Thank you for having us today.

Paul Ward (00:41):

Absolutely. So tell us guys, how long have you been in the, I guess you call it the restoration business?

Cesar Zavala (00:46):

Correct. restoration Business and I, I’ve been doing it for 11 years now. So fresh outta high school, I decided that this was the industry I wanted to be in. I had multiple family members in the industry and saw how much they enjoyed it, and I just figured it was, I’d give it a try. After giving it a try, I figured it was a fit for me.

Paul Ward (01:08):

Great. Well, it’s great that you’re, you’re passionate about it and that you could spread the word and, and help our help our audience understand what it’s all about. And Cece, how long have you been doing this?

CeCe Adame (01:19):

I’m new to the area. I’ve been with the company a little bit over a little bit under a year and a half. Okay,

Paul Ward (01:26):

Alright.

CeCe Adame (01:26):

Yeah. But I’m very passionate about helping people.

Paul Ward (01:29):

So in, in restoration what all areas do you do you cover?

Cesar Zavala (01:35):

So I would say we cover water damage, which can be simply from a pipe break over to weather related, which would be rainstorm roof leaks, water intrusion through there, backups from toilet drain lines, drain lines that crack or fail as simply to a kid putting a, a toy where in, in the tub where it doesn’t drain and it overflows. We’ve had it where people forget to turn the water off while they were gonna take a a, a bath and <laugh>. You just never know what’s gonna be the issue of the, of the day. But it, there’s always some type of aCeCeident that happens where people end up with water damage. We do fire as well, which can be like what we’re going through now with the wildfire situation. Or it could be a typical house fire. We do mold, so mold as if people had a leak and they didn’t know about it or they were negligent about it and just let it be. And unfortunately it became mold. We do odor such as like skunk wow. Just various things. People call us in for tenants that they had that smoked in the home and there’s an order that they can’t get rid of. We do trauma as well, which can be anything from suicide over to people not being found that they were dead over a period of time. It could be a dog that bled throughout the house, just various ways that it can oCeCeur.

Paul Ward (03:16):

Wow. So you never know what kind of, what kind of call you’re gonna get from day to day.

Cesar Zavala (03:19):

Correct. The one thing we do know is that somebody that’s in need of our services and they’re gonna need a lot of empathy in order to be able to walk ’em through it and get ’em back to ho

Paul Ward (03:30):

That’s a, that’s a key word right there. Empathy. ’cause you never know what, what folks are going through.

Cesar Zavala (03:35):

Correct.

Paul Ward (03:37):

And now I mentioned that we had a, a fire here. It’s called the, it’s called the Mountain Fire. And I’m not sure sure exactly how many homes burned, but it was definitely in the hundreds and all within a, you know, 24, 48 hour period. And all the homes were, you know, in the million dollar plus range. Pretty, pretty dramatic for the area. You must be very busy with that,

Cesar Zavala (04:03):

Of course. Extremely busy. Ever since the moment the fire oCeCeurred we were getting calls from insurance companies to see if we were able to go out to these properties and see what we can do in order to prevent from the fire to completely wiping ’em out. They were asking us to grab the garden hose, use the pool water if needed, whatever it was that it took in order for us to prevent from the fire to wiping out the home. And we were out there, we did what we could to be able to save some houses. However, it comes to a point where it’s dangerous and we take the decision that, you know what it’s best if we leave the property instead of us risking ourselves in order to save somebody’s house. That’s materialistic.

Paul Ward (04:49):

Right, right. And then when you are able to save a house and it’s now full of soot and ash and, you know, melted plastics and all kinds of, you know, hazardous chemicals, what’s the, what’s the process for cleaning it up and making it habitable again?

Cesar Zavala (05:09):

So first off, we start off with an inspection because every home as similar as it can be, as close as it could be to a fire the fire itself or a, a home that burned entirely, every single home is different. So we start off with an inspection, checking the levels of so, and what areas of the home were impacted. One thing that a lot of people don’t think of is sit in their, stood in ash in their attic. Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. So that’s one of the main areas that we start in. And once we go out there, we’ll crawl in the attic and see if there’s any ash and soot. If we determine that there is any we’re gonna recommend for the installation to be removed, attic to be hepa, vacuum and deodorized. And then the new insulation would have to be installed in the home itself.

Cesar Zavala (06:03):

Another area that doesn’t get caught is ducting for the heating and air. So take a look in there and it’s pretty much whenever a home is that close to the fire, it’s pretty much a given that that has to be cleaned. Right. So we go ahead and clean ducting. Then if we notice any soot in the home, then we start with cleaning. And there’s different levels, light medium and heavy. Pretty much the bottom line would be cleaning ceiling, walls and floor and the contents itself. So if, for instance, somebody has a bookshelf, we’re gonna empty the bookshelf, clean the bookshelf itself, and then clean the contents as it goes back. Upholstery cleaning for any couches. We do carpet cleaning area rugs, and if there’s anything that we can’t handle ourselves, we do bring in a third party company that’s gonna be able to fulfill the needs of the customer. We do use air filtration devices. They’re gonna pick up any of the particles that we’re making airborne as we’re cleaning. We’re gonna use hydroxyls ozones in order to be able to properly deodorize the, the home so that it’s habitable for the, for the customer.

Paul Ward (07:25):

So this could take, I mean, weeks right? If the house is big enough.

Cesar Zavala (07:30):

Yeah. Well, considering the sizes of the homes out in this area that we’ve been dealing in we’re trying to fulfill everyone. So we do have say three to five people on each home. Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. And it’s taking us roughly about a week.

Paul Ward (07:47):

Okay. And then how do you keep

Cesar Zavala (07:49):

In mind that’s the interior of the home, keep in mind we have the exterior, which we can tell pressure washing the home itself, the roof, the driveways and whatnot in order to get all that set up.

Paul Ward (08:01):

Right. And then how do you deal with the maybe you’ve got some advice. How do you deal with the insurance companies? I mean, some seem to be, let’s say cooperative, more cooperative than others. How do you deal with them when these folks have real, you know, problems and the insurance company’s like, well, you know, we’re not sure about that.

Cesar Zavala (08:19):

So for us, it’s always a big concern whether the insurance company is gonna approve the scope of work. So the moment we inspect the home, that’s our biggest concern is, and we start to hound them for approvals and present our scope of work, try and get, if they request an estimate, get our estimate as soon as possible, submit it to them so that they can review it for approvals before we start. Because to a homeowner it might seem like, oh, they’re just coming to clean my house. My housekeeper, they charge, I don’t know, 300 bucks every time they come in. They’re professionals, they’re probably gonna charge me a thousand bucks. But in reality it’s more than a thousand bucks considering we’re pulling installation. It’s more detailed work in order for us to properly deodorize. Right. So, considering that we always, it’s gonna be, we know it’s gonna be an expensive process and the last thing we want is to leave a bill on the, on the insured. So we make sure we get approvals. If for whatever reason we can’t get any approvals or they don’t approve our scope of work, if there’s anything that we need to change, we will. But if it’s an automatic no, hey, you don’t know, we don’t feel that this house was impacted by the wildfire for whatnot, we go ahead and let the customer know that it’s not covered. And then we present the estimate over to them and they can decide whether they wanna pay outta pocket.

Paul Ward (09:42):

Gotcha. And I understand, unfortunately, I mean, there’s honest people and dishonest people out there, but I understand there’s some scams going on right now just kind of given the scope of the problem.

Cesar Zavala (09:53):

Yeah, definitely. There’s a ton of other companies out there that are knocking door to door and they’re not being sent out by insurance or recommended by anyone. They’re just knocking the doors and letting these people know, Hey, we can clean it. We will take care of it. Your insurance is gonna pay for it. And no one’s a hundred percent sure <laugh>, no matter how many wildfires we’ve been through, we’re not a hundred percent sure that it’s gonna, it’s gonna be a cover. Right. And considering that there’s a great chance that the customer’s gonna be left with a bill. Hmm. Not only that the insurance companies work off of a certain software. That software pretty much you put measurements in and it gives you a price. It’s not a price that we can make up. Right. So if these companies come in and say, Hey, we’re gonna do it. We’re gonna get it covered, and insurance, you’re not gonna pay a dime. And even if it is covered, say the insurance says, okay, our estimate was, I don’t know, $20,000 mm-hmm <affirmative>. But this customer, the, the, these other companies they’re writing and putting their own pricing for it. And maybe it was $30,000 what they wrote up. Right. So the insurance company’s gonna pay the $20,000 and then the customer left with the $10,000 difference.

Paul Ward (11:07):

Interesting. And I understand Cesar, you recently went to South Carolina to help up after Hurricane Helene?

Cesar Zavala (11:14):

Correct. We mobilized out there. We were there for roughly about seven weeks. Wow. And helped a ton of people out there. Everyone’s really appreciative out there. The hurricane just pretty much wiped out a good portion of the state. Right. Tons of trees that fell on homes. Same deal, just like the wildfire, people trying to take advantage of the customer. I’m talking about 35, $40,000 to remove a tree off of a home. And they’re the customer’s in just desperate to have it done right so that they can get a tarp placed over the roof. So that, trying to mitigate everything they can. And unfortunately they’re signing people’s contracts, not knowing what the price is supposed to be. And an insurance company comes in and says, Hey, that should have only been 5,000. Here goes your 5,000 check. Right. And they’re stuck with a bill. So same deal is not just in our hometown, but pretty much anywhere we do work, we try and be honest with the people and let ’em know that we’re gonna try and get approvals on the front end so that they’re not stuck with a bill at the end of the day. Right.

Paul Ward (12:21):

Now, did ServiceMaster mobilize from all over the country to go to South Carolina? Did you, did you bring a team?

Cesar Zavala (12:27):

Correct. So they ServiceMaster corporate pretty much asked all the franchise, Hey, who’s willing to mobilize out to this area of need? And based on the volunteers, the franchisees that volunteer to go up there we put our team together. I took it was 10 of us total. We go out there, we take our equipment, we take our vehicles, and we stay out there. And in this case, we stayed in an Airbnb for the seven weeks we were out there. And that’s pretty much our office and warehouse at <laugh> throughout that period of time.

Paul Ward (13:01):

Well, and you, and you, yeah. You would’ve had to drive, right? Not fly. ’cause You need all of your equipment.

Cesar Zavala (13:05):

Yeah. We need our equipment. So we definitely drove out there. Three day drive is definitely tough. We work 12 hours days, seven days a week. We didn’t have a day off, but we knew we were really helping somebody out.

Paul Ward (13:16):

Right. That’s, that’s, that’s wonderful. That’s, that’s good. Important work. So obviously you’ve seen a lot in 11 years and just out of, you know, curiosity, the, the morbid me what, what’s kind of the most off the wall thing you’ve you’ve seen, I guess without getting too, too graphic

Cesar Zavala (13:38):

The trauma jobs, those are always an eyeopener. It’s always, you never, as much as you try and prepare mentally to walk into one of these jobs, you just never know what you’re gonna encounter. Right. So th those definitely gotta be the ones. We’ve had it not necessarily death related, but it was someone having dialysis in their home and something malfunctioned where there was just blood throughout the whole master bedroom Oof, <laugh>.

Paul Ward (14:07):

Yeah. And you bring in all, you bring in all kinds of equipment and

Cesar Zavala (14:11):

To equipment and then personal protective equipment, that’s the main thing. So that we’re all safe as we’re doing the work. Right. and then being trained more than anything. Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. Knowing what to look out for and whatnot so that we’re able to be able to fulfill the customer, but while being safe as well.

Paul Ward (14:32):

Right. And I would imagine with something like that, you’d have a certain place that you’d have to drop off the

Cesar Zavala (14:39):

Correct. We have certain protocols that we follow for the biohazard trash and whatnot.

Paul Ward (14:44):

Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. So what, what’s your, what, what’s your territory? What guy, what areas do you guys serve?

Cesar Zavala (14:50):

So we are based out of Ventura County, but we do have a license in Santa Barbara County and LA County. So we pretty much cover lopa, Santa Maria east, and then we go as far east as Claremont.

Paul Ward (15:08):

Okay.

Cesar Zavala (15:09):

And then up north we go all the way up into Ridgecrest area.

Paul Ward (15:13):

Okay. So big, big territory.

Cesar Zavala (15:15):

Pretty much. It’s roughly, it comes down to about a three hour drive from our hometown.

Paul Ward (15:22):

Right. Do you have any advice for folks back on, on the insurance piece? Do you have any advice for folks just to kind of make sure they’re protected, you know, and so preventative maintenance type of a thing?

Cesar Zavala (15:35):

Preventative maintenance, I would say when possible definitely try and have a plumber come in and perform leak detections. If you notice any increase in your build, there could be a possibility you have a leak going on. So that’s definitely one thing to look out for. As far as preventative with the company they pick, I would definitely advise them to use a preferred vendor. There’s a ton of companies out there and talk to your adjuster, use a preferred vendor. Majority of the times there’s a relationship between the, the, we frequently see the same adjusters so they understand who’s honest and who isn’t. And they’re gonna, we’re going not just us, but any preferred vendor is gonna be able to fulfill your needs, the way you expect versus any random other company.

Paul Ward (16:26):

That’s a good, that’s a good point. And how folks, how can folks get ahold of you guys specifically? What’s your best website email?

Cesar Zavala (16:34):

So the company name is ServiceMaster Restore, buy Restoration Pros ServiceMaster as a whole, ServiceMaster Restore, but buy Restoration Pros is our franchise name, franchise number 9 7 7 8. And if you wanted to reach us at our office? 8 0 5 3 8 8 1 4 0 9. That’s gonna be the best way calling our office.

Paul Ward (16:56):

Wonderful. Or you can,

CeCe Adame (16:57):

Or you can contact me on my cell phone. You know, my phone is on twenty four seven at 8 0 5 7 5 0 5 6 3 8.

Paul Ward (17:05):

Wonderful. Well, Cesar and Cici, we appreciate you very much being on this episode of On the Road and we will spread the word and you know, if folks have questions, we’ll we’ll ask them to reach out and contact you. Thank

Cesar Zavala (17:20):

You. Thank you. I really appreciate it.

Paul Ward (17:22):

Thank you so much guys.