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Suit Up With Baez
Level up your real estate, mortgage, and business game with the 'Suit Up with Baez Podcast!' Tune in for bold strategies and expert insights to fuel your success!
Suit Up With Baez
From Business Grad to Exterminator Ace: Sealing Homes and Wild Encounters in NYC
Ever find yourself sitting on the edge of your seat, not just for the Knicks' big win, but for the lowdown on how to keep your home free from tiny, uninvited guests? That's exactly where we're taking you in this latest buzz of an episode, with Louis Pignatello joining us to recount his off-the-beaten-path leap from business grad to exterminator extraordinaire. Listen to Louis's invaluable advice on spotting those telltale signs of infestation and why sealing up those sneaky structural gaps shouldn't just be an item on your to-do list—it's a must.
But it's not all about the bugs; we've got wildlife tales that'll rival any blockbuster – think raccoons holding court in attics and close encounters with bears that'll have you gripping your seat. We trade stories that'll have you laughing (and maybe cringing), all the while weaving in practical nuggets on seasonal pest control maintenance to keep critters at bay, whether you're bracing against Yonkers' famed field mice or the all-too-familiar urban skunk.
And as we venture into the concrete jungle of New York City, prepare for a gritty take on the rat race that's more literal than you'd ever hope. We're dishing out essential tips for renters and homeowners alike, from leveraging city services to holding landlords accountable. So strap in for a conversation that's as enlightening as it is entertaining, because we're about more than just stories here – we're arming you with the know-how to defend your home against the wildest of foes.
welcome to suit up with bias podcast episode nine. I'm here with my co-host, angela bias, angela, and I'm here with my special guest, louis pignatello. Yes, and we are super excited to have you here on our platform. Before anything, the Knicks won, guys. Amen, man. Finally we're going to round two, second year. I'm excited. Hopefully the Knicks win. So let's go, knicks, keep it up, guys. So tell us about yourself 32, same age as you, you know, moved to New York, always lived in.
Speaker 1:New York but moved after I graduated college for good. Wasn't even supposed to get an exterminator, honestly. Got my degree in business and I kind of got conned into it. You got conned into it. Yeah, I got hired for a completely different position.
Speaker 2:Oh wow, how did that go.
Speaker 1:Like can you explain that? I knew it was going crazy when he told me to meet him at a Starbucks. Oh my God, that's so shady, that's like, where everyone wants to meet and do business right. I had a similar story as you.
Speaker 2:I went to a bookstore and there was this guy that was saying oh, I had this business idea. I want to run it by you, let's meet at starbucks. And I'm like okay. And then I realized wait, there's a pyramid scheme or something like that.
Speaker 1:I swear to god, no, you gotta be careful with those. I swear to god. I had my girl was texting my girlfriend during an interview. I'm like, make sure this is legit such and such. Nevertheless, it was legit. It worked out perfect, thank you. It was a crazy opportunity, crazy like introduction into the company, but it worked out great in the long run.
Speaker 1:Um, yeah, man, so lewis, this is an exterminator. He actually have done a lot of things for me and he helps a lot of our clients. But I have a funny story I want to share. So I was selling a property I believe it was like westchester county so where I was selling the property at right right it was a single family and of course they did an inspection to the house. In the inspection right it was people in the basement right which the seller didn't even know, and we had basically squatters in the basement. And guess what it was? It was raccoons and we never even knew about it. So the homeowner didn't know that they had raccoons in the basement, because it seems like this homeowner never went to the basement. Yeah, it's crazy. So we almost sold this home with squatters, raccoons. So eventually it was a whole family down there. It was about four or five of them. We got them out and we got the home sold, but thank God to the inspection that we were able to find out that we had squatters in this property.
Speaker 1:All right, so we have you here. Hey, I definitely want to ask you a really a big question. It's a lot of first time home buyers that we work with, right yeah, you being an exterminator for how many years? Going on three now, three years, great. What do you recommend to those buyers out there that are first time buyers, or any homeowner out there? Why is it important to be in contact with exterminator and what tips do you give to the public? I will, for it. Usually, I want to make sure whoever's showing you the property make sure they have extermination currently for that property.
Speaker 2:That's a given.
Speaker 1:While you're looking around most older homes, condos, apartments they have the old space heaters along the walls, stuff like that. They keep that same type of design. You want to check those out? Actually, make sure and look everywhere else for the same type of thing little holes, debris, shit. Honestly, to be bland about it, anywhere you could see light coming from a door, a wall, a wall, but highly unlikely to wall, obviously because you know inside of the house, but through a door, garage, entry. If you're looking at a house, that's bad, all for it. That's already showing signs of mice activity. It's usually not good. Unfortunately, when you do real estate just in NYC or we're doing New York and Connecticut and now we're going to Jersey as well.
Speaker 2:Okay, all right, so we're doing all three states right now.
Speaker 1:Well, my coverall, though. In New York, main thing is roaches and rats. To the contrary, as they say, the percentage has gone down. It hasn't. If anything, it's going up more. It's going up more. Yeah, it's going crazy. Like I said, look for the holes and the main thing with the roaches is when you're cooking and you get that grease buildup.
Speaker 1:Obviously in a new home or apartment or condo you shouldn't really be seeing that. So if you see that, that's more what we call frass. It's like where the eggs can be, where their poop could be, all types of stuff. You'll see dismembered pieces of them because the exoskeletons rip off. Look like wings and stuff like that. Not all of them fly, don't worry, I don't like the ones that fly either. But yeah, in a nutshell, and when you look on your baseboards too and I know it sounds very nitpicky Real estate agents have definitely given me the side eye and I don't care. Look at the rent we pay. I don't care, I'm with you.
Speaker 1:You know, what I mean, especially if you're buying a house. Don't care about doing that. Always look at the bottom of your walls, on your baseboards. Make sure there's no gaps.
Speaker 1:That's like for ants, and at the end of the day, little roaches can come through their beetles can come through their worms. You know stuff like that, so I have one that's also. Um, actually I personally bought a property that actually had termites in it so I wanted to get into the termite. But I actually bought a property. It was actually scary. I bought a single family and the wood was all eaten, right. It had a huge problem with termites and the house it actually was eating one of the main beams, yeah, so I at one point felt like the house was a little tilted because the main beam was basically eaten by these termites right.
Speaker 1:Of course, I called the termite company to come and clean it out. Are you seeing a lot of homes with these termites? Is this something they should be aware of? Homeowners Not even trying to just go along with the pod. I literally did a termite job today in Jersey. Really.
Speaker 1:Was it big. It was a big home. Okay, it was a big home. Luckily the deterioration of termite activity wasn't bad, so just a regular spray job. Tell us exactly what the termite situation? What exactly happened? Why is this such a big danger for a home? It's well, definitely with New York, because not a lot of homes over here you're not allowed to use just straight cement, you have to use wood. Okay, so that's where they go to.
Speaker 1:It's like the ant version of a carpenter bee. Carpenter bees go after your, make little quarter-sized holes. That's why sometimes you'd be like where'd this hole come from? It's from a carpenter bee and wow, yeah, no, it's super annoying. And they come by a bunch sometimes and it's nasty. You think they're honeybees, but they're just carpenter bees and it's the ant version of it. They go to the wood, they eat the wood, like when you go in your attic sometimes and you see that nice glow, you got good wood. Pause, no ditty, that's where they're going to be attracted to. You start seeing the. When you go outside, you see the old pieces of wood that got the cracks in them and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:They still look like that deterioration. It looks very rigid. That's where they come from. Yeah, it gets bad there's been a couple of times and always check with who you're buying the home from too, because you have to get a certification letter to be able to sell your home. If you have one termite activity and two how bad the termite activity is, yeah, Because you'll have to fix that before you're able to sell your home. So, yeah, it's a pain.
Speaker 2:Definitely is. I mean, what are the? You probably had a lot of stories of your house control situations. What was the most extreme one that you've ever kind of it was a good story there. Man, I feel like extremes relative, because man I feel like for each animal is a different story which one stood out to you the most like when you think of like cases that are kind of like come to mind as fast as possible.
Speaker 1:Have you been chased by a red Coleman? Oh, definitely. There'll be people who call you and this happens a lot and it's crazy, but it's, it's nuts how often it happens. A lot of people will call you and be like hey, I think I have a squirrel in my attic. I'm like I don't think you have a squirrel, I'll flip. I automatically think you're a liar. You're not going to know until you go up there and I don't recommend anybody go up there. So by colonists you're doing the right thing, but still. So you'll go in the attic and raccoons aren't going to attack you off rip, unless they're pregnant, Unless they just had babies. Because they think they're coming for babies, they're going to go right after you. It's nuts and that's happened a couple of times. I'll go right up in the attic one time. Oh man, Nasty, nasty place. As soon as you open the attic doors, you see the poop coming down.
Speaker 2:Oh my God, yeah, it's falling down, it's nuts. So they basically never opened the hatch or anything.
Speaker 1:I don't think he's ever opened Gosh, at least since who knows how long. Wow, over 10 days easily. So, just like mounds of it coming down, yeah, it's not a squirrel, I'm going to be completely, I don't even have to go up there. He's like hey, can you confirm that? I'm like, yeah, I can confirm it by just looking at the pool. But then, like sometimes you know, you get those clients that just like they're all headed I'm like do you also handle the bears?
Speaker 1:I've gotten a bear call before, and not through the job, through a friend of mine. So you square up and know about the bear. I don't recommend that don't recommend. The thing is is like you're not gonna see much bears over here.
Speaker 2:It's more north yeah and that's the thing my man scared of the city I went to school up in saratoga.
Speaker 1:Oh, so you, so you came across the city.
Speaker 1:The guy who I was renting my college apartment from. He called me he's like you deal with bears. And I was like I mean, I lived in Florida, I dealt with crocodiles, I could deal with them, and I dealt with panthers, I could deal with a bear. And he was like, well, I don't know how you could handle that, but if you could, I got an opportunity for you and I didn't technically handle it, but I had some friends up there and took a trip and handled it.
Speaker 2:You handled it.
Speaker 1:Gotcha. The laws up there are way better so you can actually carry a gun up there like a nice Remington. Isn't there a thing called bear spray? Yeah, oh, there is. I didn't even know that. Yeah, no, it's. Oh there is. I didn't even know that. Yeah, no, it's absolutely Beer spray.
Speaker 2:Yeah, is that effective?
Speaker 1:That's what I use. Oh, that's what you use.
Speaker 2:That's what you use to fight when they're coming at you, Definitely it neutralizes them right Completely.
Speaker 1:What it does to them. I never knew this. It does neutralize them. I, if they're really pissed off, spray them and run. Don't think you're going to square up with them, or nothing like that, definitely spray them.
Speaker 2:They'll eventually kind of they back off, gotcha, they back off, yeah.
Speaker 1:So If you can keep a Remington on you up north, keep a Remington on you up north as well, honestly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, I actually had a. That's where I met him. A few months ago I actually had a bee house in my backyard. How many months ago was this? Probably a year, about a year ago, I had a bee house. Now I got to call him again because the bee is back. It's my fault when we first did the job, as I told you, because you said you were doing construction there. What I told you is I'm going to remove what they got on the exterior. You're going to get your construction done in the wintertime, as you said you were going to do, and now it's about to be the summer. You never got it and in the wintertime they're dead. That's me, I know. In the wintertime they're dead.
Speaker 1:You don't really have to worry about something like that. You're going to have construction. While you're doing the construction, make sure that's taken care of and you're going to go. I would say yo, that B thing is no joke. No, it's no joke. You know how we found out about it, guys. The reality we found out was that in my house and I noticed there was Bs coming in the window, but it was like. My wife was like whoa, I've never seen so many bees. You know how they operate. Oh my god, they they scary. I'll tell you that don't.
Speaker 1:Don't go in the area, yeah yeah, you saw the suit I came out in, so he had a whole suit up had to go in this, like he went just to world war three just now with these bees, he went in there and took care of it. He definitely I mean he killed a lot. It was a lot of bees I say shout out to the people with the honeybees, because that is like that's the real deal, ten times worse.
Speaker 2:Did you have that suit from the honeybee?
Speaker 1:I have a version of that suit. Yeah, ok, theirs is a little bit thicker. Okay, dude, it's nuts. I've like we don't really have honeybees over here. I kind of want to do a job because it looks it's really easy. I've dealt with honeybees and like when I lived in florida I lived in florida for 20 years you deal with everything crazy people, crazy animals, like it's nuts. So you deal with alligators and all that everything everything and like growing up, you have like awesome redneck friends like what was the name of that guy that died.
Speaker 2:He's a dude with like alligators and everything oh, steve, irwin, yeah the crocodile yeah, he was nuts with that that's not my damn stingray what a way to go out when you're manhandling crocodiles every day.
Speaker 1:It's terrible. Were you handling like that with the crocodiles or not? My friends were. I got ballsy a couple times but like, hey, they're crazy. We have like a rope swing um in like the neighborhood and, if you can oh my god, it was nuts like you. You go there. Sometimes there's nothing. You go there. Sometimes there's gators all over, wow, and sometimes they just go right in and hit over the people's elbow. You know what? Which animal was so ugly? Yeah, I see them a lot around here. Possums, dude, I knew it, you know it's crazy. There is one around here. They're. That is huge and he can't even walk. They're nasty, I'm not gonna lie. They're disgusting. You handle them as well. Yeah, no, I catch everything. Did you see their teeth?
Speaker 1:yeah, it's crazy you understand they're not gonna bite you right. Really like they look scary man. Yeah, they're honestly one of the coolest things ever. They're like a big version of a rat.
Speaker 2:No, they're a rodent. They're a rodent.
Speaker 1:They're disgusting. They are disgusting. I'm not going to hold you there. And when I lived in Florida, I had friends who had them as pets.
Speaker 2:I remember seeing a meme of a girl at nighttime kind of walking beside a car with the door open.
Speaker 1:She was outside and she's like oh, I found a friend yeah.
Speaker 2:I remember seeing that one.
Speaker 1:And like alright, they're omnivores, so technically. I see a lot of people do videos like that with the possums. That's what I'm saying. They're harmless and they have like a chemical that literally makes them pass out. Really, yeah, that's what the whole playing possum thing like over-simulated and dumb. You know what I do when I'm driving, angelo knows what I do when I'm driving and I see any type of raccoons or paws on a squirrel, nah, I drive after them and you see them running their life on you know what Angelo, oh my God.
Speaker 1:I was driving after a squirrel and yo after him, because I don't let them come near my house. So I chased him with my car. I actually chased a positive. He came in front of my house. I was like out of my truck. I was like I'm gonna chase him. And I chased him and he went. No, he's going everywhere. Yeah, my pops that's a skunk one time and learned his lesson. Oh and I don't mess with skunks he learned his lesson very quick for some reason, right in front of my property it rate three or four.
Speaker 1:They kill other skunks, but those things, it's like the smell comes into your house and it's like wow, how'd you get that smell off? Yeah, good question on you off, like if it gets like I'm saying tomatoes, tomatoes, interesting, do you have to bathe in like tomatoes? No, yeah, oh man. Rest in peace, vander.
Speaker 1:My dog got sprayed by a skunk one time uh-huh nuts and like they, if they get straight, like sprayed, like head-on, they can get like um caesars, pardon me oh yeah, they can get like bad caesars. But he didn't. That was cool. But yeah, no, we were like it was like eight, nine o'clock. We're in stop and shop getting mad cans of tomato sauce. She had him in the basement shower.
Speaker 2:Just bathe him in tomato sauce exactly because I think I, I've seen that yeah, I think I've seen a video of someone like getting sprayed I think it was a movie and then they went into like a bathtub of like red and it's tomatoes yeah.
Speaker 1:And man, that stuff, even still after the tomatoes it kind of just like lingers, but you know it gets it off. But let me ask you a question On every. You know it's different, it's four seasons, but it's different. It's four seasons, right, it's different seasons. I'm on every season on a home, like, let's say, I'm the homeowner, right? Is there a treatment I should do every different season as a homeowner? Or there's a treatment that we should do every year? That you think is the best to do every year depends where you live at, depends as a homeowner. Let's say, new york city, new york city, new york city, you should have maintenance the year in, year out. What type of maintenance? The full pest control maintenance.
Speaker 2:And that is what?
Speaker 1:Let's be specific because over here, like I said, it really depends what you live at, where in New York, let's say Yonkers, new York, all right, we'll say right around here, okay, all right. Over here you can get away with like a quarterly maintenance. If you have a newer home, that's maintenance, like your own maintenance. If you have an older home, that is still maintenance. You want to make sure, like I was saying when you were looking at your home, what you should look for and stuff like that. If you don't have any of that, you can get it with like a quarterly maintenance. Quarterly is literally by season, every three months and Drear, like the situation that we eventually ended up handling for a friend of yours. The mice situation. Yeah, field, field mice a dime, a dozen in yonkers, especially your soil is amazing. So that's gonna happen and it's gonna call a lot of mice as a soil okay, had um over here too.
Speaker 1:I've dealt with a lot of inlay yonkers. Like you have a lot of field mice in the attic. In the attic, yeah, oh interesting when you're attic and then sometimes you go up you poop all over your insulation. Yeah, that happens. All these mice just got everywhere. That's so disgusted by night. That's why it's so funny that they say that they had like a big thing percentage went down this and that they use this to do this, and now they're changing it all up because it didn't.
Speaker 2:Yeah so like for the summer.
Speaker 1:Right now that the summer's coming, summer's the hottest season, yeah, so what service do you think you should provide in the summer? I would always get full service during the summer, regardless if you're in the Yonkers, bronx or definitely Bronx, manhattan hot cities.
Speaker 2:But when you?
Speaker 1:say full service, what?
Speaker 2:is full service for the public. That's out there.
Speaker 1:Always make sure you are good for road and activity. If you have one mouse, it's better than one mouse turning into 10. Gotcha, you know what I mean. So you always want to make sure you have pest control service that's going to provide poison boxes, to make sure that your perimeter is always monitored. Always make sure your house is not easy, not vacant, for them to come in. Make sure there's no holes around. Make sure there's no gaps around stuff like that. No gaps around stuff like that.
Speaker 1:In the summertime, depending how your house is, obviously in your boiler room, you always want to make sure there's service there. So, god forbid. They usually go to boiler rooms, yeah, yeah, and then water bugs do too. Oh god, just remember, all of our waste goes flushes out. So, yeah, what goes out can also come in. That's right. Yeah, yeah, like, for instance, like for me. I want to do the memory I was telling I want to get the around the whole my yard spray, because these bugs in the summer get so annoying. You can't even be outside with your kids and you're getting stung by all these bugs. And you, you recommended me to to get a spray. Yeah, definitely, because that handles it down. Now, granted, if we have a heavy rain season, we'll have to get it a couple times, but it definitely does help out. That's why I love jersey. Jersey you could like. Jersey is the air is better.
Speaker 2:No, not even that's all, but like you can get even though it's getting worse.
Speaker 1:Because the construction over there is crazy right now a lot of bought up. It's insane how much they're building but they don't have, like crazy, pest controllers. So half the chemicals I could use for a company here I could use as a homeowner over there.
Speaker 2:So it's different laws in every state.
Speaker 1:New York is crazy, because you'll have a chemical that you could use for like six months and they ban it for like four and then they let you use it again after. It's crazy. They do all types of stuff. It's so volatile. Yeah, I mean, there's certain chemicals that are super toxic. There's some chemicals that are eco, but they still switch them out.
Speaker 2:If you have kids, you gotta be careful, that super careful. Yeah, these chemicals are really strong super careful.
Speaker 1:I'm not a big fan of pets, so really I just got a puppy. Are you that? Which thing in the world? It's a multi-poole. Oh, look at this, look at this I'll show you the camera up close later. Is that? It's like my daughter, it's like the kid I never had, so it's. And it's a treater. So, too, I like blow money on this dog.
Speaker 2:My girlfriend does the same thing oh wow, oh, I love them like very expensive dog I got lucky.
Speaker 1:My sister owns a dog business. Nice clients didn't want to like one of the clients that he spent all the money on it's crazy, he spent like six thousand dollars on it and was just like we can't handle it during the like.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 1:What a blessing. It was such a blessing, oh my God, so Wow. My sister surprised me one day. I was like here you go. I was like looking for a dog too. I was like, oh great, Even better. And my girlfriend's allergic?
Speaker 2:Like so we got a cat and didn't do anything. No, he ended up. Yeah, he ended up actually his first couple of days. He actually I woke up and he was on top of me with the dead rat right on on the dude I can't handle that.
Speaker 1:You know it's great. Oh my god, I really. I am so like ah, the funny thing is when you get a cat and they, like, end up being scared of them. I've had a couple I had a couple of clients really, I bought a cat to try to handle this mice problem and now I'm calling you because he's more scared of it than I am.
Speaker 1:It happens it's really hit or miss you know, when I used to go to, when I used to live in the city, in the bronx, I took the train you know the trains are. It was this big rat, so, um, the driver of the the train. So the rat was poison and he was like drugged up, walking left and right like that, like all side to side, and I'm like, oh, and he kept opening, closing, door, opening, but and everybody will go crazy, I mean it was a really big rat and he kept. You know, remember New York City, those train station guys, you're going to see it all.
Speaker 1:So this rat was huge but he was so poisonous he just kept going left and right Like any second he was going to die. So the guy just kept opening, closing the door and the train was full. So all those girls were screaming, everybody was screaming in there. I mean, this ride was huge. Nah, there was a couple times, like when I used to take the train to work and maybe, like a homeless guy sleeping on the train, you had like a rat with him.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, like a pet no not a pet, just like he was there with him and then like somebody would sit down and run right off and then it's in like the cab bro. That happens so much. It's ridiculous. Yeah, I mean those rats are everywhere over here. That's why it's crazy how, like the average rent's like 4 500. I'm like that's nuts, yeah, new york rats are a different. It's not they eat the cables out your car. Oh yeah, they did that to my car?
Speaker 2:yeah twice, what did it to your car? The rats, they ate the cable. We told me yeah, insane it's insane.
Speaker 1:I don't know, man, these rats, I cannot stand them. No, it's, isn't that you know. It's crazy, though, like your problem is becoming a problem for like everyone, the bees are for some reason becoming crazy really the pollen is nuts. I don't know what is like, what happened, but the bees are crazy. I used to be a parent with my kids.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no.
Speaker 1:Because they get staining so little. Yeah, you don't know. So that's the reason. When we saw those bees, they were coming in our house like in and out, and I was like where these bees are coming from.
Speaker 2:Well, I'll tell you something, that you got more business now. That's how I met him, though that was good that I met him as much as I hate to say it.
Speaker 1:I'd be kind of like waiting for the summer.
Speaker 2:You get to use your bee suit more.
Speaker 1:I mean, I hate that thing though It'd be hot. Oh my God, it'd be so hot. But yeah, it's cool. Do you feel the stings if they try to Is there a pest that you think is the most disgusting they all are Bedbugs.
Speaker 2:Oh, bedbugs are so nasty, do you come? Across that too, and then, if you kill them, all the blood comes out from them.
Speaker 1:I wish I could show the case. So bedbug is probably the worst pest on your opinion.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it's mice and rats.
Speaker 1:You sure about that? I remember I went to a house guys in the Bronx I was selling, so one thing that happens in the Bronx. I do want to share this story. So a lot of these developers are doing they're doing the egg digging. All those rats start going everywhere, right, and oh, geez, yeah, that's serious.
Speaker 1:Completely covered so all the rats start going, like, for instance, when the Yankees stayed right. You saw, when the old Yankees came to take it down, I was hearing that literally rats were just going up the hills in Anderson Avenue, like literally going up there because I saw the house there and she was like Alex, you will come outside and you will see like rats running slowly up because they didn't find no place. So when, when these developers started digging and started building, that's where all these mice and rats go everywhere. So I went to a basement one time and the homeowner haven't been there for months and I've never seen so many that rats dead in the basement, like I was like I wouldn't have said I told the side I couldn't handle it and guess what?
Speaker 1:guys, I'll be honest with you guys, I didn't even list the property, like I couldn't handle it, like that's how many rats it were. None of them ran on you. No, I ran, I left. I told you, I left the guy with the paper in his hand and I just I couldn't handle, it was just too many rats. No, yeah, I'm trying to sell this house, but I'm like damn this is too many rats.
Speaker 1:Oh my god, there's a there's a super that literally went through like something like that and his wife was recording it and bro he went screaming. I'm so disgusted, I'm not a lot of you guys, I actually left, like I left so fast he was calling me. I was like I'm sorry, man, there's too many rats in there. Man, I can, I can't handle this sale with these rats yeah, Alex gets squeezy around.
Speaker 2:He gets a little squeamish around rats. That's why he told me to kill the rat that was around here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I cannot, oh that little guy.
Speaker 2:I cannot deal with those shit.
Speaker 1:I'll be honest with you, I can't deal with those rats at all. No, yeah, she's a funny thing, and I hate to say this because I've lived here for a very long time. I was born here. But you don't have to do pest control in New York to have a story about pest control.
Speaker 1:It's so true, it's nuts. I used to live on Fordham and Grant, well, specifically 190 and Grant, which is right next to Fordham, south Bronx, is nasty with the rats you were saying about when Yankee Stadium got torn down. It don't even have to be after construction because, yes, that's when the rodents do come up. But, like, walk into Fordham, there's a bodega on the corner every night.
Speaker 1:Walk up there, there's a building before and the super doesn't really take care of the building Story of majority of supers in the Bronx and that little trash room right there. Hundreds of them, yeah, and like when you walk by, because they hear you walking by is when they start running out and they don't have bones so you go to walk, you step on them. It's like stepping on jello, like yeah, and then they would squeeze up from underneath your feet and run off. Oh God.
Speaker 2:I didn't know that they don't have bones.
Speaker 1:No, they have no bones. That's the reason they could fit anywhere.
Speaker 1:Right, they could fit anywhere Like a hole this big yeah, a full-size rat could get through. Oh, it's crazy. Oh my God, they like look, they have videos of it, but I've literally seen it where a full-size rat will come through a hole like this and you just see the squeezing. They don't stop, it contorts. It's crazy. And they move fast too. Yeah, no, they move really fast, and they've killed dogs before because they'd be that big. There's literally some rats down in the city that are borderline the size of like Yorkies and Chihuahuas.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I remember seeing a video of a New York rat right, dragging like a dead pigeon. Oh yeah, oh. I did see that story Like.
Speaker 1:Only in New York you saw the one in the subway where he took those pizzas. Yeah, oh yeah, I saw the one in the city that took that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I saw that yeah.
Speaker 2:I saw that on TikTok. Oh my God.
Speaker 1:That he took the pizza and it was a big slice. It wasn't a small slice, no, no, it was a New York slice. Yeah, it was like no, this is crazy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the permanent residence in New York, yeah.
Speaker 1:That's why it's good to have always a pest control, especially when you're purchasing a home. Right, definitely get some treatment before you purchase a home, before you move in, have a pest control, come in there and definitely give you the service that they deserve. Not for sure. Is there a tip that you would like to give people out there? Is there a specific tip that you would like to give? Do you do only homeowners or you do with renters? Yeah, I do rent.
Speaker 2:I do everything.
Speaker 1:Renters commercial we do it all I specifically for people who are renting as homeowners, shout out to y'all Y'all good, unless you buying a house in the city, and then, yes, listen to this as well For apartments and condos, if you're renting, always make sure your building has a legit pest control company for your building. Other than that, always know that you could take that off your rent. You could always call a pest control company and then take that right to your office and say that's going off my rent because they have to do that.
Speaker 2:Oh, they have to, they have to Okay. So if you call your own pest control guy and they come in, they do the thing. They reduce the rent.
Speaker 1:What they try to do is you have to also follow up, do your writing work and stuff like that. And I mean this you call them the first time. They're going to have the pest control guy come out or he won't come out, Regardless. If he doesn't fix your problem, you hit him up again. You have to do it a couple of times. You call him like two, three times. You let him know. If they don't solve the problem, that's when you can go ahead and call somebody else. I had a leak. Oh my God, Tell me Stories galore, man. They're one of the worst infestations that I've ever seen In the city Dykeman area, Around Dykeman. And she had a baby too. I was like, damn, it's terrible and fumigation ain't cheap. Roach fumigation, bed bug fumigation any fumigation, anything with fumigation, not cheap.
Speaker 1:So if you want it done right, you want it cheap, you're going to go to Home Depot, spend about $100 in those raid cans, get no result. Then you still end up having to call somebody and there you go. Yeah, you know what I mean. So paid over $1,000. He's a two-bedroom apartment. Wow, yeah, bad. And she was stressed. I was like no, no, no, because she called up a couple of times, such and so forth. She called 311, filed a ticket. Nothing, always do that too. Call 311 because it's not a maintainable living space. So you have the right to do that. Oh, that's a no, yes, and you always want to have that written down. Ie 311. So when you do go, do a pest control person get that fumigation, have to spend over a thousand dollars, whatever the case may be, you can bring that to them, have all the back of paperwork. I've done this step. I've done this step. I've done this step. I made a report. Boom, they have to. They act like they don't a lot of times. Push the button, they comply. They have to cause that. Fine.
Speaker 1:So what happened to the lady? She got an appointment right. She eventually got it right. They took that they said alright, boom, they tried to break it down. They were like we'll break it down into thirds. Each month she shout out to my Spanish people Boricua, she wasn't having it. As you know, we don't put up with a lot of shit, and that's one of them. Again, pushed over sucks. So she stood up for herself, got it for the month, and she was good. Wow, for herself, got it for the month and she was good wow, that's good you know, you got to know your rights too right.
Speaker 1:And also, like I say to these homeowners um if you have also renters in your place, you know, do good for them. You know I'm that. I'm that landlord. Like I like to do good for my tenants, I'm do good for them if they call me. They told me they got rodents, I'll take care of instantly. You know I got lewis here, so we're definitely calling him for everything we need.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but they got you going through. Right now you kind of have to yeah right, you can't give them no right to want to not pay rent because God they got you out about the Bulls right now. It's terrible. How's that squatters law going on? Not raccoons, I mean people, though.
Speaker 2:All right.
Speaker 1:So the squatter law actually is good now. Yeah, there's no more squatter rights. Nice, now it's completely trespassing.
Speaker 2:Right, because they're not protected under the tenant rights anymore. I don't understand how it was. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So there's no more squatter rights.
Speaker 2:It's just an arcade, only raccoons got rights.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the only one that got rights to it. They see, louis Bro. No, we can't kill him. They got to evict him for us.
Speaker 2:They got to evict him.
Speaker 1:Make sure your pest control guy always takes them over 10 miles too, or they'll come right back. Oh, 10 miles. I always tell people to do this too. See, I don't mind because I do my job, so I really don't care. If y'all want to make sure to go get some spray paint. Spray paint is till we do like a cage method. They get caught in the cage. No, take them off the property, take some spray paint. Spray paint that motherfucker Bright orange, whatever you want to do. So if he does get caught again, if you see the spray paint, you know they didn't do their job right, because he will come back. They'll come back. If it ain't 10 miles, they will come back, really they will come back.
Speaker 1:Is it it through their scent or something? The scent is insane gosh. Now raccoons are fire too. If you get past, like I didn't even know the bad experiences with raccoon, they fight. Really I'm telling florida got a bad rep. It's pretty bad, but it got a bad rep because new york is pretty bad too. So but like florida, you see some cool shit and you see some raccoons that be on it. Yo, even over here too, like they'll help each other break out of a cage. If they've seen one get caught before, they got memories, they got thumbs, they could move like us better because they like parkour.
Speaker 1:Do they eat rodents, they eat everything. They're smart though. They eat mouses and all that. They eat all that.
Speaker 2:Damn. Alex is about to get a raccoon.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm about to get a raccoon. Go nab up a baby and domesticate it, like my redneck fans. So how is it with the raccoons and the possums? I'm curious about that, as in what, in a sense, like when they come across each other, do they get along or are they eating? I'm telling you, possums pose no threat. They don't fuck with possums.
Speaker 2:Possums so nobody.
Speaker 1:Okay, you got to worry about more or less like squirrels and raccoons Because they try to like coexist in the same areas attics, shit like that.
Speaker 2:I remember a raccoon got into my home once we left the window open. Oh my God, how was that? What happened? How was that experience? Well, the experience was that I was actually in the kitchen when this happened, and the window that we're talking about is in the kitchen. So I was facing away from the window and I was washing dishes right. We had just recently put the food for our cats right on the side over there. And then I'm turning around to get the other dish right and all I see is my two cats looking at this big ass raccoon eating their food. And I'm looking at it and I'm like he was eating the cat's food. Yeah, he was eating the cat's food, and those my two cats were just looking at him kind of like going like what, what is he doing? Like it's a big fella dude.
Speaker 1:That's funny because you just unlocked it. I just I completely I don't know how I forgot about this. All right, so there was a lady that we same shit raccoon, catch a raccoon, grab the cage, set us up, this lady. Oh, that's another thing too. Don't ever move by somebody who likes to feed stray cats. I'm all down for cats too. I had cats growing up. Cats are cool. That is the worst idea ever. That brings more rodents Ever.
Speaker 2:I would say that it brings raccoons specifically.
Speaker 1:That's literally what a lot of pest control companies use to bait them. You put cat food in. Yeah, that's true what you're saying. Yeah, we'll use tuna sardines when we put it in the cage, or peanut butter, so they love peanut butter.
Speaker 2:They love peanut butter.
Speaker 1:So every rodent is like peanut butter too, because the mice they were saying that. Mice, they love peanut butter too. Yeah, they love peanut butter. That's what cash is? It's strong.
Speaker 2:It's strong.
Speaker 1:They smell it. Yeah, so all right. So we set up the for a lady who's so cool too, bendito, oh my God, I felt so bad for her. She had a dope-ass jungle gym for cats in the backyard. Plexiglass mad tunnels. Dope, she was a cat lady, mad cat lady.
Speaker 1:She wasn't crazy yet but she was a cat lady. The office got a call and they hit me up. They're like we need you to go somewhere right now. I was like I'm gonna work out. It's like nine o'clock, like mad late. They're like, nah, we need pay, no worry, go over there, call. I always call a client before. I'm like when I'm on the way and stuff like that. I call her, she in tig. She's crying, everything okay, like I'm on my way for the raccoon situation. She's like, oh, my god, thank god, I said it's a full crime. I'm like, oh, you crying because it is what's going on. She's like you'll see when you get hit.
Speaker 1:It was a, it was a pregnant raccoon oh no and when I went there to set up the cage it was probably 10 to 15 cats in my yard and there was probably at least 10 dead cats in my yard, oh wow. And when I mean 10 dead cats on, some like saw shit like dismembered body parts. Guts bro. The most of I've removeders before I've removed a lot of shit before I've done dealt with rats. That is the craziest shit I've ever seen.
Speaker 2:Wow, this is something like. You repressed that memory.
Speaker 1:Because you're so traumatic.
Speaker 2:I pushed that shit way to the back.
Speaker 1:I was like nah, nah, nah I was like what story stands out to you?
Speaker 2:I was like I haven't unlocked it yet, mind you.
Speaker 1:I ain't Wow, that was big. I ain't touching none of them dead bodies. I was like you got to handle that. But the raccoon was there. It was in a jungle gym, so you had to go. I had to catch him live. I had to catch him live. Crazy thing is that she was trying to attack you too, yo bro. Probably was next man Yo for type shit, I don't know. Like I've been doing this for a bit now, when you were trying to catch it were they always trying to bite you, attack you, yo bro, they always go for your neck. Really, yeah, they always go for your neck. I don't know why, like, when, like it presents itself, like, because that happens a lot, but how to like get up in there? They got to type shit. Wow, try to go right after me. Wow, this is crazy.
Speaker 1:Wow yeah no, shout out to that lady. She tipped me generously, but at that point it wasn't even for that, bro, that shit was crazy.
Speaker 2:That was something.
Speaker 1:I told the bro, and that's why, because, like she lives like queens, queens, like industrial type, still in the hood area, ish, like that, and like yo they she went, I reckon, wow. So, guys, it's really important to always have your pest control on the dial right, you never know what you're gonna come across, right because I hear a lot of stories all the time.
Speaker 1:But, being a homeowner, guys be on top of your property, make sure you have no termites, make sure you have no beat Right, make sure all these things, make sure you take care of these rodents and make sure give service to your property at least once a year. And if you guys need Lewis information, we'll definitely provide it to you guys. He's my go to guy. I've been working for almost a year now so he's really good, very reliable, always answer the calls, which I appreciate. So thank you for coming to our platform and we appreciate you All. Right, thank you, guys for watching Suit up with bias podcast and please like, subscribe and comment please, and stay tuned to our next podcast. Guys, take care.
Speaker 2:Bye guys.