[00:00:00] Eric Goranson: Welcome to the round the house show. This is where we help you get the most out of your home through information and education. Thanks for joining us today. We've got a special episode here ahead, and this is one I've been looking forward to. John couple, this is one of the leading real estate professionals out there.

[00:00:16] Eric Goranson: He is an appraiser and has one of the best Facebook groups out there in his ask the appraiser. Welcome to around the house, my friend.

[00:00:24] John Copulos: Oh man, I love it. You don't mind. I want to try to call you easy. E cause you're so easy to talk to. So easy. Thank you for having me, man. I'm happy to be here.

[00:00:34] Eric Goranson: Thanks brother.

[00:00:35] Eric Goranson: It has been a hot subject out there over the last, jeez, over a decade about real estate appraisals and people thinking that, there's so many misconceptions, right? What's my house worth and why isn't it worth this or. Why does this add value? There's, this is a big old rabbit hole we're about ready to jump into.

[00:00:54] John Copulos: No doubt about it. And I'm excited to be here and I think, we'll be giving people a big value add as to what they can [00:01:00] do to their house and things that they can do to make their home more valuable to them.

[00:01:05] Eric Goranson: So I got to first start out what got you going in the appraisal business?

[00:01:09] John Copulos: Oh man, it's a long story. I've been in the business for about 37 or 38 years. I just fell into it. I was going to college. And trying to make some money while I was off on breaks and things like that. And I was working for a temporary agency. I was all over the place. They had me at the airport. They had me at the hardware store.

[00:01:26] John Copulos: I almost turned into you. It's good. I could have been you if I stayed at that hardware store, but then I they put me in a, at a bank. In the appraisal division and I hung out with a guy that was a couple of years older than me. I saw the flexibility in the job. I knew that I was going to be a hands on father and I wanted to I didn't want to work corporate.

[00:01:47] John Copulos: I wanted to work for myself and be flexible with the hours. So I said, you know what? This is a perfect fit for me. They offered me a job right out of college. And this is the only thing I've ever known. So if I ever lose it. My ability to do this. I don't [00:02:00] know what the heck I'm going to do.

[00:02:01] Eric Goranson: I love it, man.

[00:02:02] Eric Goranson: And you just are living and breathing it. And there's nothing better

[00:02:05] John Copulos: than that. No doubt about it. So I worked for a bank for 10 years. I learned all about the ins and outs of the appraisal process and how not only the appraiser does it, but how the lenders do it. The underwriters look at things, how the loan officers work.

[00:02:19] John Copulos: And then about 10 years in, I went on my own and, I've been doing it for what? 25 years on my own. I've got guys all over. Lower Hudson Valley, so I've got a number of guys working for me. I also have a satellite office in Florida, so I guess I should say I'm in New York state in case you didn't recognize that from the accent.

[00:02:38] John Copulos: So I've been doing it here for that long and I'm also have a satellite office in Florida. So I've got some appraisers down there working also.

[00:02:44] Eric Goranson: And that is great. I wanted to bring up we're going to do a bunch of different dives into a bunch of different, facets of this subject. But 1 of the things that I see in my area, which is 1 of the big holes in the home buying process.

[00:02:58] Eric Goranson: I just wanted to get your take [00:03:00] on it because I'm sure you've seen it. And I've had many clients in my remodeling past run into this. So they go buy a 1920s home that's been remodeled a number of times and that's 2400 square feet. They go buy it, they get through the whole process, it's closed, a year later they go, I'm going to do a master bathroom remodel on the upstairs.

[00:03:24] Eric Goranson: And the contractor pulls the building permits, they show up and the building department goes, hey, this upper floor in your basement were never permitted. You actually have a 1000 square foot house and now we have to bring this upstairs room into 2024 code and it seems like these people just fall through the cracks.

[00:03:44] John Copulos: No doubt about it. That does happen, man. And that's tough on them because it's, we as appraisers, we really aren't going to be able to look at that property the way they think we should, or they do, right? Because there's no permits for it. The, maybe the [00:04:00] work wasn't done right. Electrical's not up to code.

[00:04:03] John Copulos: Plumbing's not up to code. These type of things really do come into play. And I guess the best thing that a buyer or a home buyer needs to make sure that is their agent does the do, does their due diligence and the home buyer does the due diligence on making sure everything is legal in the house.

[00:04:20] John Copulos: That's there.

[00:04:21] Eric Goranson: Yeah. And what I tell people, at least in my audience and their role in their eyes, cause they've heard me wave this flag a bunch right now, and that's okay. But. I tell them first thing they should do if they're putting an offer on the house, look at what the listing says, how many square feet it has, and then call your local building department and verify that's what it is.

[00:04:39] Eric Goranson: Don't call the tax assessor because if you've got a thousand square foot house, you tell the tax assessor that you've got a 4000 square foot house. They'll happily tax you for 4000 square feet, even though you don't own it. But I always want to see what the building department says, because that's going to give you at least what the permit office says.

[00:04:54] Eric Goranson: And then you'll have an idea of how many non permitted additions were done over the years.[00:05:00]

[00:05:00] John Copulos: Listen, my man, you are waving the right flag. If you're waving that flag to your listeners. You're waving the right flag because that's exactly what they should be doing.

[00:05:08] Eric Goranson: Thanks, man. Thanks. It's just one of those rabbit holes and I've seen people go out and I've ran into this personally working with design clients over the years.

[00:05:16] Eric Goranson: I've had people, wow, it's 2017. I had a client that had to pay an extra 120, 000 to do their bathroom remodel because it was already gutted. They already had the building permit and the inspector walks up the stairs and goes, we show this as storage. And the demo had already happened. So they didn't have a choice, but to do that, to put it back together.

[00:05:33] Eric Goranson: Oh, there's some ugly things that happen out there that, of course, this isn't appraiser's job, but it's part of the whole real estate transaction. Right?

[00:05:42] John Copulos: Exactly. Exactly. You're hitting on something very key. It's not the appraiser's job to be the private police, right? So you're right about that.

[00:05:48] John Copulos: So that would. That doesn't fall under our kind of jurisdiction and too much of what we're concerned about, but we're talking about scenarios for homebuyers here. And that scenario you just painted. Can you imagine somebody putting [00:06:00] aside 50, 000 to fix their bathroom and then they realize, oh boy, we need to come up with another 120 to fix everything that's been done in this house.

[00:06:09] John Copulos: Yeah, and

[00:06:09] Eric Goranson: the homeowner and the bank or what, whoever gave the loan on that has to turn around and say, wow, we just gave you a loan for 2400 square feet, but sorry, about a thousand.

[00:06:22] John Copulos: This comes up in different scenarios for us. Many times it's with the basements in houses, Eric, where people think their house is 2400 square feet.

[00:06:31] John Copulos: 1200 of it is in the basement. And when we're finished appraising it at 1200 square feet, they're like, holy smokes. I thought my house had three bedrooms three bedrooms and three baths. You're telling me it's got only got two bedrooms and two baths now. So this comes into play. It's a gray area. The agents are coming, putting their hands around it, realizing how to talk to borrowers, but we got to explain it to the real estate professionals out there.

[00:06:56] John Copulos: You know how we do our job and how the lenders want us to do our job, right? Fannie Mae [00:07:00] is when we're doing a bank loan, we're working for the bank and we're working, we're doing it the way Fannie Mae wants it done.

[00:07:06] Eric Goranson: Correct. Correct. So what are the, some of the hottest subjects that you see out there right now in the appraisal side of things?

[00:07:13] John Copulos: So we're talking to homeowners here, right? And homebuyers,

[00:07:16] Eric Goranson: We've got homebuyers. We have professionals. We got a whole mix in our grand audience out there. 60 percent are

[00:07:22] John Copulos: homeowners. When you asked me the question you want me targeting homeowners? You want me targeting agents?

[00:07:27] John Copulos: Because that's what I do. I talk to agents every day. On my Facebook group. So I think

[00:07:33] Eric Goranson: all of them, this is such a grand group that we have all of them in this audience. So let's have some

[00:07:38] John Copulos: fun. Gotcha. What's, what is the biggest bang for your buck these days that, Hey John, I want to do, I want to do something to my house.

[00:07:48] John Copulos: I've got a couple of hundred thousand dollars. Where am I going to get the biggest bang for my buck? I actually got that call the other day. We've got a 1, 400 square foot, two bedroom ranch. We've got 400, four to [00:08:00] 500, 000 to fix it up. What do we, what should we do to get the biggest bank for our book?

[00:08:06] John Copulos: Spent a half an hour on the call with them talking about different things that they have to consider. Do you have any children? Are you going to be having children in the next three or four years? I suggested they go up, put up a second floor. I suggest that they added garage space, so I suggested all these different things and the conversation just keeps on going, and she says so we've got 2 bedrooms now, obviously, we've got 2 bedrooms now, shouldn't we keep the 2 bedrooms down there and put maybe 2 bedrooms upstairs?

[00:08:33] John Copulos: And I said are you going to have any kids? She said, yeah, we're going to have kids. I said okay. So you're going to be wanting, you want to be sleeping downstairs in your primary bedroom with your two children, your two small age children upstairs? No, we don't want to do that. All right. Then you need to put a second floor up.

[00:08:47] John Copulos: We're going to, we're going to put a second floor on your house. You're going to go three or four bedrooms. You're going to have a Jack and Jill. You're going to make sure your bathroom is your primary bath is large and Extravagant and nice and all the [00:09:00] different things. Steam showers, towel racks, all the good things that go on.

[00:09:04] John Copulos: And this is something, I had that conversation last week and it was a lot of fun for me. I really enjoyed it. We don't do it a whole hell of a lot because people don't come to us beforehand. They come to us afterwards. A lot of the time we got to put values on it, but these folks were smart enough to realize, Hey.

[00:09:19] John Copulos: Let me talk to an appraiser who's seen thousands of homes and knows what the market is looking for, what the typical buyer and home buyer is looking for. So they called, we had a nice call and. I'd love to get your feedback on where in the bathroom, what's important in a bathroom, something that comes up on my Facebook group called ask the appraiser is a bathtub important?

[00:09:42] John Copulos: I want to put a steam shower. I want to take away my bathtub in my primary and put a steam shower. Do I need a tub? And you know what my answer is. And I'd like to hear what your answer is. But my answer is, Hey, listen, if you have a tub in one of the other bathrooms, that should be good enough because typically either you're going to have.

[00:09:59] John Copulos: And [00:10:00] I'm not trying to sound sexist at all, but you're either going to have a wife who loves baths or you're going to have kids who need baths. So if your wife or your partner is not a bath lover, why do you need it in the bathroom?

[00:10:14] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Yeah. Very true. And, here's one thing that's interesting and I'm going to throw another facet under that.

[00:10:20] Eric Goranson: Which is bathtubs are now coming back into style for 2024. As we've spent 15 years taking them out. What happened? The pendulum swings the other way, and now we're going to spend another 15 putting them back in, but I totally agree with you. I think if you've got one bathtub in the house.

[00:10:37] Eric Goranson: And as a minimum, and you're going to put in some killer shower in a bathtub's place with a steam shower or something that's really nice. You're still going to get that value. It's going to be there. Cause people are going to walk in and go, Holy smokes. That's gorgeous. Yeah.

[00:10:55] John Copulos: You're going to, lose that person who loves the bath, but you're going to, you're going to gain so many other buyers that love the [00:11:00] shower.

[00:11:00] Eric Goranson: Yeah, and so it's so funny how styles go, and my house is a perfect example. I had one bath in here and I, cause it was next to the master bathroom, basically was a master bathroom. And I took it out. I put a steam shower in because my wife and I wanted to, when I do my addition on this house here in the next few years, I'm going to add a, another little room onto that bathroom.

[00:11:21] Eric Goranson: That'll be his own bathtub room that will work great. And it'll pop right off for that. And you won't know any different and they'll have both. But That was the sacrifice to get the steam shower in so we could really have someplace enjoyable. Instead of having kind of what would have been a very small 1970s bathtub.

[00:11:36] Eric Goranson: Now we've got a better

[00:11:37] John Copulos: solution. That's what I have. That's what I'm sitting in now. My, and I'm thinking about, I've made calls to remodelers. I want them to come in, take my bathtub out. Give me a little extra room because it's a narrow bathtub and it's an hour shower in there. Give me a little extra room.

[00:11:53] John Copulos: And we set up a nice steam shower with a nice big seat for me and my wife to hang out and enjoy the [00:12:00] steam, all that good stuff. The shower heads from the ceiling as opposed to the wall and all that, a couple of different shower heads. It's great. I'm excited. I'm excited about it.

[00:12:10] Eric Goranson: Oh, yeah, I put in one of the thermosol systems, so I've got the touch screen so I can watch Netflix while I'm taking a steam shower or anything else in there, catch up on the news or whatever,

[00:12:18] John Copulos: I heard he's talking about it on one of your episodes and I was so glad I heard it, waterproof walls.

[00:12:24] John Copulos: It's not enough. You have to have steam proof. And when they come to start talking to me about the steam, that's one of the questions I'm going to be asking, and it's all because of you.

[00:12:33] Eric Goranson: Thanks, man. Yeah. You think about it, waterproof is one thing of trying to keep water through, but trying to keep vapor is a whole different

[00:12:40] John Copulos: ball game.

[00:12:41] John Copulos: So if they talk to me about not offering that, or it's an add on, I know that's a crew that I don't want to be working with. If that's not exactly, if that's not what they're going to do in their basic install.

[00:12:53] Eric Goranson: Yeah, it's funny. And it seems to me in the remodeling world where I come from, that is one of the, that is the largest failure [00:13:00] point in a kitchen and bathroom is that shower leaking and specifically a tile shower.

[00:13:05] Eric Goranson: That maybe somebody came in there, maybe it was a homeowner special. Maybe it was a Chuck on a truck, handyman special, whatever they did. They didn't do that waterproofing perfectly. If they don't understand that you just have to realize that you're probably going to have to tear that thing out and do it all over again.

[00:13:19] Eric Goranson: And that's. That's scary when you're paying somebody five to 10, 000 bucks for a simple shower install.

[00:13:24] John Copulos: There's no doubt about it. No doubt about it. I want to if you don't mind, I'm going to take this in a little bit of a different direction. I'm in social media, so I belong to a couple of mastermind groups and all that, try to get my presence and my brand out there more.

[00:13:38] John Copulos: And one of the influencers said to me, you know what, John, I want you to lead with this question for yourself. It's called a lead magnet where you throw something out there to your public, to your listeners or your members and it draws them in. So this was it agents. I've got 10, 000 to [00:14:00] do some work in my home.

[00:14:01] John Copulos: How am I going to turn that 10, 000 into 50, 000? So that was what he told me to do a video on. And I thought about it and I haven't figured out a way, but you're the perfect guy to talk to about that. If you don't mind, I'll take you of course, special expertise. If a, what should a homeowner do if they've got 10 or 15 grand, but they want to try to get.

[00:14:26] John Copulos: 50, 000 back on their investment. Very difficult to do as far as I'm concerned. I wanted to see what your answer was. Cause I don't think I would be able to come up with an answer and I wanted to throw it into your lap.

[00:14:37] Eric Goranson: Mine's going to go in two places. I'm going to say curb appeal.

[00:14:41] Eric Goranson: And energy efficiency, like insulation, really? So here's two things that I've noticed that people are getting the most back on their remodels from my perspective, at least is curb appeal. If you've got that 1990s home with with the beat up steel door that, that has got its few dents [00:15:00] from the ice and the things getting carried in and people moving appliances in and out or whatever, just the normal road, where the, you get on a front door, that's steel.

[00:15:08] Eric Goranson: If you put in a nice brand new front door, maybe change out a few lights on the front, maybe some landscape lighting, get things a little more manicured. You're probably not going to do a garage door for that, but maybe some new paint and some freshen it up out there and make it look like you really care about the front.

[00:15:24] Eric Goranson: That seems to get you some great value just in the curb appeal thing. And then insulation is an interesting one because there's a lot of rebates out there from your energy providers, right? So maybe you're going to spend a few thousand bucks on insulation, but you might get 50 percent of that back, 75 percent of that back in a rebate.

[00:15:43] Eric Goranson: So you'll get that money back. And then if you're worried about it, you're going to get a lower energy bill. So it's going to give you back on that, in the future,

[00:15:51] John Copulos: you're very quick. You're very good on your feet. That's fantastic. I definitely agree about the curb appeal, but I never thought about the energy efficiency.

[00:15:59] John Copulos: I know [00:16:00] you're you're a guru on that also. So I appreciate that because you're right though. Not only will they get the rebate back, but then they'll be saving on their electric, right? So they'll be seeing the savings right there for years.

[00:16:12] Eric Goranson: They could be in there for six months. They'll notice a difference.

[00:16:14] Eric Goranson: If they're in there a couple of years still left, it'll pay back even more. And then you're getting that rebate money back. And who doesn't like to do any remodels with other people's money?

[00:16:23] John Copulos: No doubt about it. No doubt about it. So that's my take. It's a damn good take the kitchen. What obviously that's where.

[00:16:31] John Copulos: Where we tell people to put their money in the most of the time you'll hear you'll get 60 or 70 percent back on your investment. That's not always the case, but that's what the common thought is out there. I was listening to one of your podcasts about the kitchen and you say, I heard you say that the vinyl plank or the the plank floors are out now.

[00:16:53] John Copulos: Is that correct? Yeah.

[00:16:54] Eric Goranson: Style wise, those are on their way out because, they sold a lot of those as having a, a [00:17:00] 20 year lifespan. And so many of them at age four or five years are getting tossed in the dumpster and something else is going in. And I bought a really nice one for my house and I've already in three years replaced the under warranty, the stair bull nose, tread off of that.

[00:17:15] Eric Goranson: I replaced those stair treads twice now. And finally about a month and a half ago, they went in the dumpster and I put real hardwood in because it's just not holding up as to what they said it would. And they're coming apart, even if they were installed correctly, they're scratching up.

[00:17:30] Eric Goranson: You're starting to see traffic patterns in them. It's still vinyl. And it's floating. So there's a lot of different issues that you can run up with it. But I think that is on its way out. You're seeing the large format tiles and stuff come in, hardwood is still in, but I think my, at least take on kitchens to steer back into that is that I think if you do a cost effective kitchen refresh, that's going to be your best bang for the buck if you're trying to sell the place, but if you're going to be in there for 20 years, do what you want.[00:18:00]

[00:18:00] John Copulos: No doubt about it. No doubt about it. The granite counters you move into a place. It's got granite counters. Granite counters are nice, but you really don't like the coloring of it. This and that. Are there good options out there to paint the countertops?

[00:18:15] Eric Goranson: Not really. Granite is granite. You could do an epoxy over the top of it, but it's still got a scratch because it's still a piece of rock that you're throwing some paint on.

[00:18:23] Eric Goranson: And you're really, you might get a little bit out of it, but in the end, you're still going to bust it up and haul it off and put something else in there.

[00:18:31] John Copulos: When you talk about the refresh, you're talking about paint the walls, maybe paint the cabinets, put some new hardware on the cabinets, that type of thing.

[00:18:37] John Copulos: Yeah,

[00:18:37] Eric Goranson: maybe new appliances, maybe new tile backsplash, some new lighting, that kind of stuff. Keep it pretty simple. If you can keep the cabinets, if the cabinets are painted, maybe give them a fresh coat of paint. Org have, here's one little trick that I've done for, somebody's five to 10 year old kitchen.

[00:18:54] Eric Goranson: I hire a furniture repair person to come out. Okay. The ones that come onto your dining room table that [00:19:00] save it to put where you put the scratch or you burnt a hole in it from a hot pan or something that you set on the table, have them come out and spend a day. And maybe they'll charge you a thousand bucks, they'll charge you 1, 200 bucks, whatever that is, it's going to look like a million bucks.

[00:19:15] Eric Goranson: I've had furniture repair people go out to brand new kitchens or an installer drilled a handle in the wrong spot, and it was going to take 6 weeks for the door. They came in and filled it in and airbrushed it in. You couldn't tell that there was ever a drill hole through it. So they can fix a lot of sins in a kitchen, make things look pretty good pretty quickly.

[00:19:33] John Copulos: Gotcha. Nice. Very nice. And it's a

[00:19:36] Eric Goranson: good bang for the

[00:19:36] John Copulos: buck. No doubt about it. Good stuff.

[00:19:40] Eric Goranson: But yeah, kitchens are tough. The other thing that we just did a story here this last week, that's going to be interesting is that places like Australia now just as of what, July 1st of this year, 2024, they're banning quartz countertops in Australia.

[00:19:56] Eric Goranson: So they've already passed the ban. That's coming. What's that all about, E?[00:20:00] That's all about what we're seeing is that there's a lot of fabricators out there that are not following the best safety practices for that stuff. And so they're just dry grinding it and it has the highest silica dust content of all the countertops out there.

[00:20:16] Eric Goranson: Where granted it's under, they're. 15 to 40 percent silica in there, the courts countertops are 90 plus, depending on how many binders are in there. And so what's happening is you're getting a bunch of fabricators that aren't cutting it with water. They're just dry cutting it.

[00:20:31] Eric Goranson: And in Australia, they were getting silicosis, which can be fatal. It's the new asbestos scare, shall we say, of people getting lung diseases out of that. Once it's installed as an issue, no, is it an issue for a fabricator? That's grabbing the grinder and deciding to make a cloud of dust.

[00:20:46] Eric Goranson: It's a huge issue for them. Instead of trying to go after the fabricators, they're just trying to stop the product altogether, which could show back up here. Usually when something like that happens overseas, we'll see California and some other places try. Bye. Running with that flag and [00:21:00] seeing if they

[00:21:01] John Copulos: can get up the mountain, right?

[00:21:02] John Copulos: No doubt about that. Yeah. Wow.

[00:21:05] Eric Goranson: So that's an interesting one. But am I putting what I put courts in my counter in the countertop in my kitchen? Absolutely. I wouldn't have, I wouldn't, think twice about it, but you're

[00:21:12] John Copulos: talking about the fabricators that are in danger. Yeah, it's the workers were with the asbestos and all that kind of thing.

[00:21:19] John Copulos: Yep. I got you. Yep. Same

[00:21:20] Eric Goranson: kind of thing. If you're not being careful, guess what? It it can go badly. And you'll see that too. You get sit that see that with guys cutting sidewalks. I don't know road project with with a dry cut and the big hot saw out there. They're cutting the sidewalk open to do some work.

[00:21:33] Eric Goranson: You'll see the cloud of dust. Same thing. Oh, good. Okay. Very good. But yeah, it's an interesting one, but really when it comes down to it, I think kitchens are a big thing. But again, and there's probably better than I. I think there's some context that has to go with it too. If you're in a neighborhood where you've got an average suburbia home.

[00:21:50] Eric Goranson: That is 500, 000 bucks. Let's say, and I'm just going to pick a mid range number right there on a home and low range for some areas. And you've got a half [00:22:00] a million dollar house. And that kitchen is decent. And if you go look at the comps around the neighborhood and everybody else is decent, I don't know, putting a brand new kitchen in it is going to get you the money out of it.

[00:22:11] Eric Goranson: You thought you might sell it quicker, but I'm not sure if you're going to get a big jump in value out of that money. You might be better spending it someplace else.

[00:22:17] John Copulos: Very true. The appeal is one thing. The value out of the appeal is another. So you hit it right on the head. If your market is not demanding a top of the line kitchen, you might not want to do it.

[00:22:29] John Copulos: What is the market demanding? What does the typical home buyer in that area want in their house? Do they want the basement finished? Do they want the gym in the basement? Do they want an office an office space that might be more important? To the buyer in that neighborhood. As opposed to having the brand new kitchen.

[00:22:47] John Copulos: Although, there aren't a whole hell of a lot of people that will walk away from a nice, beautifully done kitchen.

[00:22:53] Eric Goranson: Yeah. And the question though, as is will they pay another 60 to a hundred thousand dollars for it?

[00:22:58] John Copulos: They won't, they might not do that. [00:23:00] Exactly. Exactly true. But the thing that I found, it is still going on, in my market, in the New York markets, it's still pretty strong.

[00:23:07] John Copulos: I'm not going to tell you that it's appreciating it any kind of crazy levels, but it's certainly not. Certainly not hurting right now. The turnkey home is what our buyers are looking for. A lot, most buyers are not looking to go into a home and have to spend 60, 70, 000 to revamp it or more obviously, but so that's what I'm saying, turnkey does go quicker and it's more it's, the appeal is there for it, but do you, are you going to get the bang for the buck?

[00:23:35] John Copulos: That's the question.

[00:23:36] Eric Goranson: Yeah, absolutely. One question for you. I know this is a hot topic and it can be regional as well depending on what's going on But what is your opinion on converted garages?

[00:23:48] John Copulos: Do you does the neighborhood or the typical buyer in that area want the garage? Okay, so good question I'm looking to buy real estate in Florida as I told you I've got the satellite office there [00:24:00] I want to put my boots down there also and in Florida, there are no basements, so garage space is key for more than your cars for storage around Florida.

[00:24:10] John Copulos: You don't see anybody have their car in the garage. It's all storage because that's like their basement. If you're going to convert a garage in Florida, it all depends on what the market wants from the area and needs. I love. I love a garage conversion or a garage that's turned into a she shed or a man cave.

[00:24:30] John Copulos: . But what are you losing with that conversion? If you're gonna Great point, convert the attached garage into a man cave or a gym. I hope you've got some room on the property to, to throw up a two or three car garage, right? Yeah,

[00:24:47] Eric Goranson: absolutely. And of course, there's some great garage conversions out there and there's some that you can go.

[00:24:53] Eric Goranson: You pull up out front. You haven't even gotten out of the car truck yet. And you go that was a garage conversion.

[00:24:58] John Copulos: No doubt about it. No doubt about it.[00:25:00] What's your read on the garage conversion.

[00:25:03] Eric Goranson: I think it's regional, here in the Pacific Northwest where I live. I, it depends if it's that single car garage that's barely usable in those 50 60s homes on smaller lots that you see. I think that's less important than if somebody takes that 2 car garage and makes it into a.

[00:25:20] Eric Goranson: A big weird sunken living room or something that's off the kitchen that feels like a garage, but they still left the fire door in and, it just doesn't feel cohesive to the plan, in those situations, I'm almost like okay, that's like that. She shed thing where you've got it.

[00:25:36] Eric Goranson: Or the man cave where maybe you still have the concrete floor, but you got some couches and the big screen out there. And if you need to store stuff out there, it's not that big a deal, but I just look at it and say, yeah, and again, that's the neighborhood, in the style that you're looking for.

[00:25:50] Eric Goranson: But here are a lot of people like their garages. And again, it's a storage thing. You got to put it

[00:25:53] someplace.

[00:25:54] John Copulos: No doubt about it. And, and definitely so where we, how we look at those conversions [00:26:00] is that. Yeah. It's got to have the same feel and flow as the home has. So like you said if you feel as if you're walking into a converted garage, that's not a good thing.

[00:26:09] John Copulos: But if you feel like, Hey, I didn't even realize this was the old garage. The ceilings are high. The everything is beautiful about it. Just like the rest of the house. I think it's, I think it's a great use of space, but that, that half assed conversion. No, it's not going to work. It's not

[00:26:26] Eric Goranson: going to work.

[00:26:27] Eric Goranson: Absolutely. Absolutely. What do you feel about with carpets and stuff these days in homes? It seemed like for the last seven to 10 years, carpets and many markets have been just going away that the hard surfaces have been hot.

[00:26:39] John Copulos: There's no doubt about it. I think it's a matter of taste, right?

[00:26:43] John Copulos: But if you're asking me, what am I seeing? I'm definitely seeing that I'm seeing more hardwood. I'm seeing these floors that you were talking about, The newer plank, the newer items that are out there in plank are really interesting. I don't know if you have it out on the west coast, but we have a place called floor [00:27:00] decor

[00:27:00] Eric Goranson: here.

[00:27:01] Eric Goranson: Oh, yeah, they just came in. They just came out here in the northwest. So yeah, tons of stuff

[00:27:06] John Copulos: great store to go check things out in my opinion, and it's The choices are Amazing that's out there the choices the colors and paints it's fun to DIY your house, although I'm a guy who has two left hands, so I'm not a guy in your position like the way you can, but I can pay somebody to do what I like, what I'd like to do, and there's a lot to be done.

[00:27:31] Eric Goranson: Tell you what, there's many times I'm halfway through the project going, I wish I would have paid somebody to do this. So I get it, man, that whether or not you can do it or not, if you can afford to have somebody do it, hats off. I have no problem with that whatsoever. The biggest thing that I'm seeing out there though, right now.

[00:27:45] Eric Goranson: Large format tiles, so style wise, I'm seeing these, as big as 4 foot by 8 foot, but 4 foot by 3 foot tiles now for living spaces. And those have been a really big new upcoming trend right [00:28:00] now. That's starting to go across the country and. Yeah, that floor and decor, they've got them in there on the shelf right now, and it's pretty cool.

[00:28:06] Eric Goranson: I gotta

[00:28:06] John Copulos: tell you, Eric, I don't think I'm familiar with 4x8. Wow. Yeah.

[00:28:10] Eric Goranson: Yeah, they're pieces of porcelain that are 4 foot by 8 foot, like a piece of plywood that you can stick down. And it, the problem is it's not a DIY friendly project. You gotta have 3 or 4 tile installers out there so a lot of people just on that 1 just on this time of labor are going to a smaller piece where maybe 2 people could do it.

[00:28:28] Eric Goranson: There may be a 4 by 4 or 4 by 3 and putting those in. But the cool thing is you get. This really cool green pattern that you get to see all of it. Now, you need to have the right space for that because you're not going to want to put that in a little tiny hall bathroom because it doesn't make a lot of sense.

[00:28:42] Eric Goranson: It's just going to look like a piece of vinyl or something down there, but they're coming out really nice with the colors and the textures. And as when you walk in, then, the high definition printing they're doing on tile and some of the other stuff, you have to reach down and touch it to see if it's

[00:28:56] John Copulos: wood or something else.

[00:28:57] John Copulos: No doubt about it. Is it affordable or not quite [00:29:00] yet?

[00:29:00] Eric Goranson: It's, the materials are affordable because it's not much more than what a tile would be. You're just getting bigger pieces of it. Where it gets you is labor, because you've got to have, two or three tile setters out there to be able to do that.

[00:29:12] Eric Goranson: One guy's not going to be setting flat correctly one piece of tile very easily unless, unless they're a superhero or something.

[00:29:19] John Copulos: You know what I love? I love the new accents on walls. Yep. I think they're great. My only concern and I'll, I'll ask you is it a passing fad?

[00:29:28] John Copulos: Like the panel that my parents put in their house in the seventies that we have from the seventies to the nineties? Is it something that's going to fall away?

[00:29:36] Eric Goranson: Let's, as and you've been around this business longer than I have, but I think everything has its own fad to it. But then it always comes back again in a kind of a remade kind of way.

[00:29:49] Eric Goranson: I will say though that styles change faster now than they have ever before because of how we consume things, you can sit there and go, Oh, that's a 50s house, which kind of gives you maybe that mid century or a [00:30:00] 60s, which is a different mid century or a 70s or an 80s. You have these styles, right?

[00:30:04] Eric Goranson: That fit in the decades. And now you're getting it where. And a lot of that's because of how we saw things, if a designer designed out a custom home. And they built it that let's say that took a year for them to get through that process or even 16 months to get through that process where a photographer for a magazine would come out.

[00:30:24] Eric Goranson: They'd take the picture and 6 months later, it's in a magazine and then it takes it's long time to get through stores and retailers. And designers and it gets out there. Now, a designer walks out of the design meeting where they just got pitched and it's already up on their Pinterest or Instagram or whatever else.

[00:30:42] Eric Goranson: And so now we're seeing a, when styles change, we're seeing it in target in 16 months. Wow. All right. So I think things are going to change a lot quicker. Just like how we've gone now from that the tones of gray and white to all the colors that are in and all the textures and all the wall things like you were talking [00:31:00] about from the wood to the wallpapers, to that kind of stuff.

[00:31:03] Eric Goranson: So that, that has made a, an abrupt shift over the last year or so.

[00:31:07] John Copulos: Yeah, no doubt. But that's something that I I'm looking to do in my home and I enjoy it and I like looking at it when I enter other people's homes and see what they've done. I got

[00:31:18] Eric Goranson: a question for what do you see in value in outdoor living spaces?

[00:31:22] John Copulos: Great question. I'm a big proponent of it. COVID, I think did a one 80 on that for us people in case this, something like this ever happens again. People want to be able to get outside and hang out outside and enjoy themselves. So I see the pool has come back into play much more than it was.

[00:31:44] John Copulos: I see the outdoor kitchen in a lot of different properties. The TV's out there. If you can live out there for six months, why not have a space that you can use or nine months or whatever it might be wherever you are. That you can use so [00:32:00] the answer to that question is I see a big change and the pool guys, Are still very busy.

[00:32:06] John Copulos: So that's my read on it. I'm a big proponent of it You know, there are appraisers out there that'll say yeah, i'm not so sure it adds to the value of the home I typically disagree with that. I look at it very closely and I do give value for a nice outdoor space. It makes a lot of sense to me.

[00:32:25] Eric Goranson: In my opinion, it's the cheapest addition you can do to your home. If you have the climate to pull it off.

[00:32:30] John Copulos: And it's, there's so many things that are available now to, so many things to, to enjoy it in the morning, in the nighttime, all the time. It's just, I agree with you. I agree with you. Patio space, decking, pool area.

[00:32:45] John Copulos: Fire pits, right?

[00:32:47] Eric Goranson: All the fun stuff. All

[00:32:50] John Copulos: the fun stuff. Makes sense to me.

[00:32:53] Eric Goranson: So if you had any advice for homeowners before we end up going out here because we're going to run out of time here in a little bit but [00:33:00] what's your best advice that you can give for homeowners that are out there looking around because I know they're always many times at least scared of the appraisal process to go Oh!

[00:33:10] Eric Goranson: Is the house even valued what i'm buying for it? And can I get that to the bank?

[00:33:14] John Copulos: So I guess the biggest you know Listen, I could come here and I could talk to you about Give you what everybody the answer that everybody's going to give you I like to be a little bit different So sure i'm not bypassing the main answers Okay, but i'm just throwing in some different things and I alluded to it before I think that Storage space in a home is very important.

[00:33:38] John Copulos: I think that people, I think that the public wants to feel openness in their home, right? So whether it's widening a hallway of some sort, or whether it's taking down the wall between the kitchen and the dining room and making that a big family area these are the type of things Adding an additional garage.

[00:33:56] John Copulos: If you don't have the type of storage or adding more closet [00:34:00] space, don't be afraid to put some closet space in a room and take away from the room. So much, but the storage and taking things taking mess out of people's vision, I think is really important. So that's something that I like to talk to people about, believe it or not for me.

[00:34:18] John Copulos: And this is only my type of taste, but I think the circular drive is pretty cool too for people to have when they can put it in. I see so many homes that would benefit from a circular drive. The patio area, the outside living area is huge. Like we already spoke about.

[00:34:36] John Copulos: Those are a couple of things that, I would tell people.

[00:34:39] Eric Goranson: Got a sidebar question on that. And those are some great comments, by the way, because I couldn't agree with you more if you not changing the square footage of the home. What would technically, and this is a broad brush, so I get to that.

[00:34:52] Eric Goranson: That's not a black and white answer probably either, but if you had to give up maybe a bedroom. For [00:35:00] storage, is it worth that or should you just is the bedroom count still very important in an appraisal?

[00:35:05] John Copulos: Depends. If we have a 1600 square foot, 4 bedroom home. Those are really small rooms. You might want to, you might want to convert that into a 3 bedroom home and have a really nice primary. Bedroom for yourself with a walk in closet and that type of thing. So square footage is what's King. All right. It's not so much the bedrooms, what do we got?

[00:35:29] John Copulos: Like we averaged two, two kids a household or something like that. So something like that. Yeah. You need three bedrooms, four bedrooms is fine. Once you start getting it to five or six, there's no real difference that all the difference that an appraiser is going to see is going to be in the size.

[00:35:44] John Copulos: So I would never tell you to take away a bedroom to just to add storage, but I would say maybe you shrink one of the bedrooms to give the other bedroom a little more storage area or something like that, or a nicer closet space. I don't know how some people or couples do [00:36:00] it when they walk into their bedroom and there's 1, Three by four closet in there.

[00:36:05] John Copulos: And what are you supposed to do? You need to figure something out and where are you going to take it? And that

[00:36:09] Eric Goranson: is, that is all the 1950s, sixties and seventies homes, right? How many of those did they built that were more just a spec type home that weren't by any means a custom home where they had a four foot closet in there?

[00:36:21] John Copulos: Yep. Yep. So I think closet space is really, you might think I'm a little nuts by bringing something like that up, but I think the closet space in helping home is really very overlooked. I should say.

[00:36:34] Eric Goranson: Absolutely no, we actually took 1 of our bedrooms in my house and actually converted it over to the master closet because we had 2, 3 foot closets in there and.

[00:36:44] Eric Goranson: There's no, I didn't know where my clothes were going to go because I needed about 2 more of those just for my wife's clothes, let alone my stuff. It just wasn't going to work. At the same time, I took out the fireplace that was in there because I had a gas fireplace and I didn't need a big fireplace in my master.

[00:36:59] Eric Goranson: It's I [00:37:00] like to sleep cold. I just didn't need it. So I took out the 1970s gas fireplace while I was at it because. I didn't need it. There you go. So that's how it goes. So John, we're going to be running out of time here. How do people track you down and how do people find out more information about what you got going?

[00:37:15] Eric Goranson: Cause man, you've got everything from YouTube to Facebook, to everything else going on.

[00:37:18] John Copulos: It's I really appreciate that. So my biggest thing right now is social media. I've got a Facebook group where I talk to 45, 000, mostly real estate agents, but there are some loan reps. There are some home buyers and home sellers on there.

[00:37:33] John Copulos: They come to us and they talk to us about the appraisal process. And I got to tell you. It's gone from zero to 45, 003 years. And within the past six months, it went from 10, 000 members to 45, 000 members. So we really hit on a topic that the agents and realtors want to talk about. They want to learn more about what's going on in my in appraisers heads.

[00:37:57] John Copulos: So since it's a national Facebook [00:38:00] group, I have about 70 other appraisers on there that can talk about Micro things. So if somebody from Missouri called, asked me a question, we can point them in the right direction to speak to that person in the ST Louis area, that type of thing. So it's not only me on there, but we've got a group of fantastic appraisers.

[00:38:18] John Copulos: And what I love about the group is, and this is what I think is helping the group so much agents and appraisers don't have the best relationship. Okay. Appraisers think that the agents are lazy. They think that the the agents make too much and we're only making $500 on an appraisal. Why is this guy making $16,000 on his sale?

[00:38:37] John Copulos: And the agents are scared. Crap of the appraiser. Yep. They don't know whether they can talk to the appraiser, whether they can , give them comparable sales. They don't know whether they can talk about value. They have no idea. So I tried to bridge the gap and what I did was I told the agents.

[00:38:51] John Copulos: You come on my group and you ask any question you want. There is no such thing as a silly question or a dumb [00:39:00] question. But the big thing is if anybody responds to that question, any appraiser on that group that is responds in an ego maniacal way or a bullying type of way, they are gone. And all of a sudden I've got, like I said, 75 appraisers on there that are compassionate, gentle, patient with the agent and they're knowledgeable and they're able to communicate.

[00:39:26] John Copulos: Once I find those appraisers, I make the, I ask them to stick around and please help me with the group and the agents love it. They love coming there and talking to us about what our process is, what we think about, because it makes them better. It makes them stronger. It grows their business. If they can figure out that part of the puzzle.

[00:39:44] John Copulos: It can blow up their business and they're actually seeing it and the numbers are showing it. So thank you for asking. I'm really excited about it. If anybody wants to join, ask the appraiser, it's on Facebook. You go in, you type in, ask the [00:40:00] appraiser. There'll be other ones there, but you'll see me and you'll see 45, 000 agents.

[00:40:05] John Copulos: And probably when this airs, there'll be 50, 000 agents on there. We're growing by two, 300 people a day. It's it's taken off and very excited about it. So I appreciate you offering me the opportunity to tell your listeners about it because they won't be disappointed if they're real estate agents, that's for sure.

[00:40:22] Eric Goranson: It's a great group. There's lots of great questions. I enjoy being part of it. And thank you for personally invited me earlier on the last time we talked because it has been a fun and kind group to to be a part of.

[00:40:34] John Copulos: I appreciate it, Eric. And I look forward to seeing you on there and I look forward to seeing you again.

[00:40:39] John Copulos: I'm going to also ask you to do an interview with me. So I look forward to seeing you again, my friend you're a great person to know.

[00:40:45] Eric Goranson: I appreciate it. Thanks brother. Hey, and if somebody wants to work with you in your New York area or down in Florida, where do they find you?

[00:40:52] John Copulos: You know what, they can find me there, but it's my website is copolis.

[00:40:55] John Copulos: Dot com c o p perfect u l o s pretty simple to find me[00:41:00] i'm in the westchester area if anybody needs my help I love talking to agents. I help them all the time So I can be your consultant for you your consulting whatever you want to call me. I'm there for you. All right

[00:41:13] Eric Goranson: All right. Thanks brother.

[00:41:14] Eric Goranson: Thanks for coming on today, man. I really appreciate it. Can't wait till next time great

[00:41:19] John Copulos: great speaking with you

[00:41:21] Eric Goranson: I'm eric g and you've been listening to Around the house.