Pressure washing doesn't just make your home look nice and clean, it also extends the life of building materials and prevents long-term property damage. On this episode of the Disaster Podcast, we talk with Joe Marinaro with Marinaro Pressure Washing about the benefits of pressure washing and why it's so important to do it right. Joe is the founder of Marinaro Pressure Washing, a premier pressure washing service that offers a full range of pressure washing, gutter cleaning, asphalt sealing, and holiday lighting services! Would you like to take control of your future and build a business you can be proud of? CALL OUR FRANCHISE TEAM TODAY to learn how you could get started today at 302-242-1042! Start your future today in a $ 210 Billion industry that is always in high demand with Disaster Blaster Franchise Ownership! 🔵 A $210 Billion industry AND GROWING! 🔵 Offer THE MOST SERVICES in the industry! 🔵 Training and Support from INDUSTRY EXPERTS! 🔵 A unique model primed for YOUR SUCCESS! 🔵 And more! Disaster Podcast is brought to you by Disaster Blaster! https://disasterblaster.com/ With franchise opportunities available across most of the country, Disaster Blaster is YOUR chance to take control of your future and be part of a thriving restoration brand. Contact our Franchise Team at 302-242-1042 or Franchising@disasterblaster.com to start your future TODAY! Franchise Opportunities: https://disasterblasterfranchise.com #DisasterBlaster #DisasterPodcast #Podcast #Franchise #news #announcement #Business #Entrepreneur #FranchiseOpportunity #FranchiseOpportunities #BeYourOwnBoss #BusinessOwner #SelfEmployed #RealEstate #Realtor #HomeSweetHome #HomeBuyer #HomeSeller #Interview #home #house #pressurewashing #guttercleaning #gutters #siding #windows #roof #tips

- Coming up on this episode of the Disaster Podcast, we talk with Joe Marinaro, with Marinaro Pressure Washing about home and commercial pressure washing, the difference between pressure washing and soft washing, and how pressure washing as part of your property's maintenance can improve the look of your property, and extend the life of building materials. Stay tuned... Hello, everyone. I'm Matthew Lyons with Disaster Blaster And today we have Joe Marinaro with Marinara Pressure Washing to talk with us. Joe provides high quality pressure washing services for residential and commercial customers, along with other exterior services such as gutter cleaning and asphalt sealing. Thank you for joining us today, I'm really excited to learn more about the do's and don'ts of pressure washing and why it makes sense to hire a professional. - Hi, I'm Joe Marinaro, Marinaro Pressure Washing. I want to thank Matt for having me on. Yeah, we're gonna learn more about what I offer today. - Great, great. Yeah, I'm sure that a lot of the folks listening probably don't know a lot about pressure washing. I know that I don't know a ton, so I'm definitely very curious to learn more. You know, first off, you know, let's learn a little bit more about you. How did you end up starting Marinaro Pressure Washing? - Yeah, so when I was a sophomore in high school, I was, you know, getting a little eager, what am I gonna do in my future? And school was not my thing. I was like, what do I want to do? I wanted to start a business, something, what can I do that's easy to get into? So I was gonna start landscaping, but then I realized, you know, there's so much saturation in the market, you know, everybody does landscaping, you know, a million landscapers. So then I saw pressure washing and I was like, you know, that's an up and coming service. Saw it online, tried it out. So I had like a junk pressure washer at my house. Did a few things around my house, got my parents, my mother bought me a pressure washer, a good one from Home Depot. Started doing, you know, friends, family, nothing crazy that year. And then into my junior year is when like, we kinda started really picking up. But yeah, we started just wanting to have a career, but not go to school and not work for somebody. So that was the goal. - That's great. I definitely support, working on your own. So you were initially kind of doing it in the evenings and weekends, that sort of thing? - Exactly. You know, there wasn't much work that I was doing, so it'd be just like, oh yeah, maybe every once in a while on a Saturday or in the summer is when I'd really do it, and when I wasn't in school. So it'd be, you know, every once in a while. - Okay. And now you're graduated, so you're, you're doing this full time then? - Yeah. Yeah. So now it's changed quite a little bit. We picked up last year, we got a lot more work under our belt, figured out how to put ourselves out there and market ourselves, and it went pretty well. - That's great. Your marketing is very, very, strong, I will say that. - Thank you. - So what do you like the most about being in the pressure washing industry? - Like, one of the things that I love, and I'm sure anybody could agree with this, how satisfying it is. You know, like there's nothing, like when you go to a house and it hasn't been touched in five years and you co you leave and it looks brand new. It looks like they just got painted and brand new gutters. And then the homeowner's reaction. That's probably one of the best parts of it, in my opinion. And, you know, it's a pretty nice industry. I actually attended a, a contractor event at a pressure washing supply store. It's about an hour and a half away. I was there on Monday. It was a great time. I met a few pressure washers from around the area were here that I've never talked to before. It was nice to meet them, but there was people from New Jersey I got to meet, and that was a great time. - Wow. Very, very neat. Yeah, it's definitely, I do agree with you. There's, there's a certain part of being in the trades or the cleaning industries specifically, where you really can see what you've accomplished. - Yeah. - And it's very rewarding - For sure. Like, yeah, you, with the restoration, you could completely see like the before after result. That's probably my favorite part of the industry. - Yeah, yeah. And you post a lot of before and after pictures. So - That's, that's my favorite way to market, you know, it's like you see the difference and then people realize, oh yeah, well look at how dirty it's, but can then it could look like that, you know? - Yeah. Yeah. And so anybody that's, that's really interested in seeing before and after should definitely follow you on social media. We'll have links at the end. Yeah, Facebook, Instagram. We're also check us out on Google too. We're starting to grow that, so, - Perfect, perfect, - Perfect. Yeah. - So how has Marinaro Pressure Washing grown over the years? I know you were talking before, it's changed quite a bit. - Yeah, so back to my junior year, we'll go back to that. That was when I kind of ramped things up, got a little bit more out of the realm. A few people other than family friends, I did probably about 30 jobs, you know, nothing insane, a good amount. So I got some good knowledge on how to clean, some good knowledge on my equipment. I understood the surfaces and that, so now I was getting the basics of marketing. Now fast forward to the 2025 season. Last year was when I graduated high school, I'd be sitting in senior year, like everybody says, easiest year I'm sitting in class and I just be on my computer trying to do work come the spring season. So now we're, we're doing pretty good. I was booked out work until dark every day after school weekends, Saturday, Sunday. I worked all day until my graduation, went to graduate. We did pretty well. I got 165 jobs under, under the belt last year. So that was a huge jump compared to 30. And over the season last year I started investing in the commercial equipment, you know, make us more efficient so I could start, you know, I plan on, I want to start having somebody with me, somebody running a truck. So we got that. Then fast forward to this winter, we, we picked up a new truck and then we put all our equipment on that. We picked up a few new machines. So now we have state of the line commercial equipment ready for this year. We can handle any task we need. - Wow. Great. - Bigger and - Better. - Yeah, exactly. We're growing - That. Is that, that is amazing. And so you've gotten more into the commercial side as you've grown? - Yeah, yeah. We're starting to get into commercial, commercial. We're, we're looking to get more into, it's great, you know, we do quarterly, biweekly, monthly, for example, we have gas stations that we do, we do quarterly at the gas stations. We have a car wash that we'll do twice a year. So every six months, you know, do it beginning, like, we'll do it like once this time, and then we'll do it once right the end of the fall, right before it gets cold. - Okay. And that's keeping their parking lots and everything clean and their sidewalks. So at the gas stations, it's cleaning up all the pumps, the pump areas, the concrete, the asphalt that we don't do, we do do that, but that's, we're not contracted to do that, that they just have sweepers like, you know, like the road, like the road trucks that just go to there. But we clean off all the concrete, we neutralize any oil stains, lift them with hot water. And then at the car wash we have to clean like the self bays, you know, it's, it's pretty intensive because you have to remove all the mold and it's like an ecosystem in there with the closed doors and all the water. But then when you get up there, then we have to like aluminum brighten all like the, the big tall brushes and that stuff. So it gets pretty intense in those car washes. You'll spend two days doing one bay. - Oh wow. - Wow. Yeah. - Okay. Okay. So definitely something that you want clean because you're taking your car through it to get clean. - Exactly. Yeah. And so the car wash that we were working at, they have a worker that like does all their landscaping that like is under the company and they have a pressure washer for him and he's tried and tried and tried and he could never get it clean. And with our soft wash system, which we'll get later into, it really helps us. We were able to get it completely clean. - Wow. That that's great. So, for a homeowner or a business owner that is considering having their property pressure washed, what time of year is best to do that? - So there's really not like an actual best time of the year. Obviously, we say it has to be above 40 degrees at night, you know, just so the water doesn't freeze, you know, create any problems. You wanna let the, the house dry itself out. But my personal recommendation would be spring just because then you get to enjoy a clean property all summer long, you know, when you're outside. Because it makes such a big difference. - Okay. So you're really, for the most part, a year-round business then because you do the pressure washing through, you know, spring and summer and then you're doing the gutters and things in the fall to prevent, you know, ice dams and stuff like that. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Very cool. And I know that everyone thinks about siding when they're talking about pressure washing, but you can also have your patio pressure washed your sidewalk, your walkways, your driveway, your roof, anything. Okay. Now is there anything... what are the most popular things for people to have Pressure washed? - So we pressure wash everything. But the main thing we see our biggest service is house washing, you know, siding, gutters, like the exterior of the gutters, the windows get clean with that. That's our biggest service. Then probably concrete patios, driveways, etc. But we also do fences, roofs. We do a soft wash on the roofs, which we'll get later into. We do decks, we do wood and vinyl decks, wood and vinyl fences. And then we do commercial cleaning. Anything you can name, you know, storefronts, gas stations, we do fleets, trucks, anything. - Okay. And one question I'm sure that people watching are gonna have is, so when you're pressure washing the side of a house, you know, I'm assuming that cleans the windows and things too, but you know, I mean everything gets cleaned? - So pretty much, because we never like "pressure wash" a house. Okay. That's, that's the name. You know, everybody considers Oh yeah. Pressure washing. Yeah. We use a pressure washer just for the water. You know, we use a pressure washer to apply our chemical and then we actually, we just use that to apply it. And then we use our soft wash system usually to rinse. But even when we use our pressure washer to rinse, we're still only using a tip that's like 500 PSI hitting the house. So, you know, it's a very light rinse. We're more so on a house wash, we're using more water than PSI. You want more water, more volume, you know, the chemical does all the work, the chemical lifts everything. And the same with the windows. You know, the only thing is if you let it dry on the windows, then they'll leave spots. You know, not that it stains them, but leave spots until you clean them for the next time. But if you do them the right way - you wet them, you treat them with our soft wash chemical that 1% mix and you rinse them off, you have a spotless window. Okay. - Okay. - That was - when we were starting out, we had, you know, we would never even say, oh yeah, our windows are included. And then after the service, the homeowners would be, wow, my windows have never been so clean. Now I have to clean my inside windows. You know, and we'd be now, so now that we tell everybody, you know, during our soft wash, we get a real nice clean window out of it too. - Okay. Very, very cool. Everybody thinks pressure washing, but it's not really pressure washing, it's the soft washing. It's, you know, doing different things. I know, years ago, I decided I was going to pressure wash by myself, which, which wasn't, - It wasn't fun. - It wasn't a great idea clearly. But I actually ended up taking the paint off of a, of an exterior door. So yeah. So yeah, - A little bit. Yeah, we don't, did you have lesson learned? I throw all those little like white green colored tips that come with any pressure washer. I throw them right out. We use different tips, you know, that are designed. We have pressure tips, we have soft tips. Like we have, we have tips that are as light as a garden hose. But the thing is, they're pumping out two times as much water as a garden hose. So that's where your real power comes in. - Okay. Because you definitely want to have a professional that understands those sorts of things do That. Exactly. - You know, because I'm sure you see it all the time, you know, a homeowner job that - they did their best, but there was so much they didn't know and you have to kind of fix it then. - Exactly. You know, I've learned so much. Some of them have been easy lessons that you just learn and some of have been hard lessons and that's just what happens at the business. But you know, that's what you're paying for too. With our service and knowledge, 200 jobs, we know what we're doing when we go to a siding, you know, there's almost pretty much everything at, at a residential property. I would say 95% of anything there we've washed before successfully. - Okay. - And - Pressure washing doesn't just look good though. It also increases the life expectancy of some materials, right? - Oh yeah, absolutely. So exterior cleaning can actually prolong a lot of surface life. But I'll give you concrete for example. So like when you get real dirty concrete, when you get that black over it or even moss on it, you get moisture that'll trap between the grime and the, the concrete surface. And over time that will loosen up the, like the moisture will weaken the concrete and loosen it'll break a lot sooner. You know, so, and especially like if you get like road build up, salt, and all that stuff, then you're really screwed. Because salt just does not mix well with concrete. So, and then there's many other services, you know, when you have dark mold on siding, it's gonna heat it up faster and help oxidize it. - Okay. Okay. So you, you can really extend the life of a house. - Exactly. And, - And you can kind of prevent some maintenance - Exactly - And we also provide concrete sealing you know, so a lot of times, we'll pressure wash patios and stuff, put a sealer on it, you know, and then that extends the concrete life drastically. - Oh wow, okay. You just have to do it right. Not the way I did it. - Exactly, exactly. It's all about, you know, we have these pressure washers that are 3,500 PSI, we don't turn them up above 2000 PSI ever, and that's concrete cleaning and that's the max we ever get. We're usually probably run a thousand PSI, like I said, it's all about the water. - Okay. Very, very interesting. - Yeah. - So most people think pressure washing is used for everything, but soft washing is a completely different method that you mentioned previously. Can you explain the difference between pressure washing and soft washing and when each should be used? - Yeah, so soft washing in my opinion, it's just the best way. Like we soft wash pretty much everything. Not fully, like we use pressure on concrete surfaces like that, but we pretty much always do a form of soft washing on everything just because our chemical works so well and our solution. So it's completely different style of cleaning compared to pressure washing. You know, it's actually done with a controlled amount of our chemical solution. And then it's followed by a low pressure rinse with high volume water as I was saying. So it's 11 gallons a minute of water, you know, which is a lot. That's why we have the big holding tanks on the truck to buffer between the garden hose. And then we use maximum of 300 PSI in our soft wash system. But we can go all the way down to a hundred. So we can go a hundred to 300 PSI in our soft wash system to make sure we're safe. You know, that's, you can put your hand in front of it, you put any, anything you need to in front of it and you won't damage it at all. And so the main chemical in our soft wash is sodium hypochlorite, which is pretty much just pool chlorine that kills 99% of the growth when you use the right strength. Now you can't just blast the bleach, you have to use the right strength for the right surface, you know, but it kills all the algae, mold, buildup, dirt, cobwebs, it'll make drop right away, Bees nests just breaks apart... And what's really important about it is we have a mixing manifold that we can precisely control our bleach percentage to our soft wash system where we can go from 1.25% all the way up to 12.5% and we control up to the nearest 0.25 of a percent. And that's how we clean. And then we usually will use it on roofs, patios, houses, but our roofs are where it really comes into play. For roofs, you can't use any pressure because you're just risking the integrity of the roof. And the same with the moss. You can't force the moss off because it's growing into the asphalt shingles. So if you're forcing it off, you're essentially risking to damage some of the asphalt on the shingles. You could pull up some of, you know that sand grit type a shingle. You pull some of that up. So what we do, we will lightly, like for a roof, we'll lightly brush the moss with a, a light bristle brush. Whatever comes up, comes up. We lightly blow it off with a leaf blower. Then we treat it with approximately, depending on the roof's severity, go 4% to 6% bleach, spray it on the roof, let it sit for 10 minutes, rinse it down with water. And it looks like you just had a snow storm where the moss is, you know, it all turns white because it's dead. And then within a month all it falls off. We tell our customers, you know, wait, we tell them this before the job starts, obviously before they approve the price, we tell them. And we also say, you know, give us a call two months later if you still got moss up there, for free we come back and we treat it. We've done over 10 roofs and we've never had to come back and treat anything. So it's effective, but, you know, it does take time. You know, like the amount of time that it's been up there - takes time to come off to properly do it. You know, yeah, you can go up there and brush it off with a, a wire brush, but then you're screwing up your roof if you're putting wires on shingles. So yeah, soft wash is a completely different - our chemical, if you use the controlled amount, you can remove almost anything at a hundred PSI - Okay. - That, that makes a lot of sense because people like to to build their homes and live in the woods, right. You know, around where we are here in Pennsylvania, you see that a lot. But when you have trees all around your house, you end up with things like moss growing on your siding and your roof. - Exactly. - You just have to deal with that. Then - Wherever the sun, whenever the sun doesn't get to spots, well that's where you really see bad buildup between moss and algae. And on the flat surfaces is where you'll see the moss start to grow. Yeah. You're not gonna have moss grow on your siding, but you're gonna have algae on it. But on a flat surface or a horizontal or a slanted surface, your roof will grow very easily. - Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Very, very good information. Really interesting. - Thank you. And also I wanted to mention about our soft wash system. Some homeowners have the concern, oh, well what's your sodium HypoChlorite gonna do to my plants? You know? And what we say is our process, we water your plants before, during, and after. So we water your plants before we touch the house, we spray the bleach while the bleach is working on the house, we're watering your plants, then we're spraying the house down. We've never had a problem with over 165 houses. And the other thing is bleach is essentially water and salt. So, you know, when it breaks down, it just dries up as a salt crystal. You know, it's just making sure that you dilute the stuff that it's going on. You can put it on anything as long as you dilute it to the right ratio. Plants, you just gotta make sure you're wet around at all times and then you rinse them after good, nice rinse to water them, they'll be nice and healthy. We've washed 160 properties and we've never had a callback about plants - That, that's great information. A lot of people look at bleach and they think, you know, it, it's a harsh chemical and it is... - It Definitely is, don't get me wrong, but - When it breaks down, it's really - Not when it's properly used, you know, when it's used with education, that's where it's fine, you know? - Yeah, yeah. I mean, you're using it right? And when it breaks down, you're basically getting a little bit of salt and you're getting water. - Yeah. You know, it's like in a standard house wash, we use about five gallons of bleach to about 500 gallons minimum of water. You know, so you can do the math that dilution, let's say we're using one and a quarter gallons of, of bleach on each side of the house, and then we're using 125 gallons of water on the side of the house. You're slim to none it. So 1%, you know, when we do roofs with that harsh of the 6%, you know, you put garbage bags over the gutters. - Okay. - And then we have at our shop, we have a big waste tote, you know, that we fill and we dump the bleach into, and then, you know, at the end of the month, we'll go dump it at the chemical plant, you know? - Okay. Yeah. The public perception of bleach is just not really accurate to what it is, I mean, - No, - You know, you're, you're basically - we deal with it with the mold as well. - Oh yeah. I can only imagine, - Like, they'll say, okay, you know, there's bad information out there about spraying mold with bleach and it breaks down to basically a little bit of salt and water. So what you're doing is providing the mold more water to grow in. So it just kind of, it makes the problem worse. So it's really, there's really no, no risk to using a bleach product when you're cleaning. - Exactly. You just have to be careful on, you know, there's some, some finishes that you can't go near. You know, like woods, there's certain wood stains that bleach will affect, there's some that won't. And there's some that will. Water based stain, forget about it. You're destroying it. So, you know, like when we wash a house, we cover the doors, you know, like we'll tape off the doors with plastic and simple as that, you know, you'll never have an issue. - Oh, that's, that's why you hire the professionals. - Exactly. You know, and then on if people will be like, oh, a big wooden deck, what do you do? You know, unfortunately it's a little more expensive, but we're gonna have two guys there. And one guy, when you're working on that side of the house, when you're spraying bleach by the wooden deck, there's a guy sitting there just watering it. He's like a sprinkler, you know, because like I said, dilution. - Okay, - Dilution. Very interesting. Dilution is the solution to pollution. - Yeah. - Little tongue twister. - A lot goes, a lot goes into it. And this is why, you know, you need a professional when you're, you're having pressure washing done, you know? - Exactly. - We'll be back after a short break, but while you're here, don't forget to like and subscribe. One of the questions that I look at whenever you're dealing with a contractor is, you know, what should you look for and things like that in a professional. So what tips would you have for someone that wants to have their home or office pressure washed? You know, what should they look for in a professional? - So homeowners, I think they really should look for someone who knows the cleaning process. You know, when the company comes to provide you with the quote, you should be asking the questions. You know, it depends what service, but if, like, for example, they're washing the house, you should be asking 'how much pressure are you guys gonna use?' 'What chemicals are you guys gonna use?' 'Are my plants safe?' And then obviously you want to make sure that they're licensed and insured. You want to ask for before and after pictures, you know, that would be my biggest tip would be, you know. Anybody that has the knowledge of cleaning that surface will have before and after pictures of that surface that they cleaned. That would be my biggest thing, you know. Ask questions, make sure they know the process, make sure they can properly explain to you what they're gonna be doing with your property. - That makes a lot of sense. And you're very knowledgeable on, you know, the chemicals that you're using and things like that. And I think that anybody that's in your industry should be able to kind of explain that you know. - Exactly. - So that makes a lot of sense. - Exactly. Just like how you're so knowledgeable with the mold, you know? - Yeah. - Absolutely. I wouldn't trust somebody that wouldn't be able to tell me stuff about the mold to remediate. - Yeah. Right. You, you, you want somebody that... When you're hiring a professional, you want someone that knows more than you do. You know, that's a great thing to look for generally. And you are very, very knowledgeable in what you do. So, when it comes to pressure washing or soft washing, what does a professional service include that a DIY homeowner or general contractor might miss? - Yeah, so like I said, back to the chemicals where it all starts, you know, it's our, our chemicals are just, and I went through it too, you know, when I started I wasn't using the chemicals because they're hard. Like they're not hard to get. But you can't go to Lowe's, you can't go to Home Depot and get them, you know, you need to know where to go for them. And they are more, but they do the job way better. So our chemicals make windows, like I said, the window spotless. You could never do that in a million years with the 30 second cleaner. You'll see right when you walk into Lowe's, you know, and because you're gonna see them now, especially now that March is coming, they're gonna have them all over the place. And I always look at them to see what's in them. And it has good stuff, but it just doesn't work, trust me. I've dealt with the pain when I was starting out. They also brighten the gutters, you know, like the gutters will turn out like the outside to them, they'll turn out bright white, they'll look like they just got installed or they just got painted. Then another big thing is, so like we were talking about our equipment. So our equipment's powerful, and with our certain tips, we can reach four stories from the ground. We can apply chemical, four stories, we can rinse to four stories. So that really eliminates risk, you know, and if we need to get up higher, five stories, we have access to the lifts. We have all the ladders we need. So, you know, we can get up to any height safely. That's the biggest thing. Another big thing I would like to mention, the outdoor electrical outlets. You know, everybody thinks they're, they're waterproof, some of them are, some of them aren't. I'll tell it to you that way. You know, over time they're, they're sealed with silicone, you know, over time the silicone wears down and, and breaks, you know, so at every house wash, we make sure we go around with caps, put them over the outlet with the little piece of tape over the top of it. So that way we're waterproofing all the outlets. Another thing, like I mentioned about wood staining, we make sure we tape off all the doors. We water your deck, your stained wood deck, if we need to, if we're spraying bleach on the back of your house and you have a very nice stained wood deck, we're gonna have somebody sitting there like a sprinkler watering it. You know, that's something that a homeowner, Yeah, they can get the bleach spray and the 30 second outdoor cleaner is still gonna do that to the wood stain, you know, so you'll have a hard time. - Very interesting. So pressure washing and soft washing is actually very similar to painting in some ways in that a lot of it is the prep work. - Exactly. - Okay. - And knowledge, you know. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Process knowledge. - Yeah. And, and homeowners, when, when they're doing a project themselves, usually the prep work is not a focus. So, you know, that's something that when you're hiring a professional, you know, they one know the potential issues. So, you know, to tape off the exterior outlets and - which I never would've thought of. - Yeah, no, no. And I didn't, you know, I didn't know from the start, you know, until, there was a few times where we'd be popping breakers, you know, in a few old, and it would never be like a new house. It would always be at an old house, you know, it would never be our fault because it's supposed to be electrical. But, you know, we're a luxury service, you know, you're paying for that, that's included in the price, you know? - Yeah. That, that makes a lot of sense. All the things that you know, and that you think - Of that the average person just isn't going to - Yeah. The plants. You know, like people don't know how much they'll have to water the plants. You know, it's all a learning process. They won't know how, if they're spraying bleach, they won't know how bad their overspray is gonna be at first. They might kill some plants, stuff like that. Yeah. Anybody could fire up a pressure washer and blast water, but there's such knowledge behind the process. This is how I like to put it. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. I mean, going back to my example with the door, you know, I would've preferred that the paint stay on it. So... - Exactly. - A professional's not gonna do those sorts of, mistakes but a homeowner very well could. - Exactly. Well said. - Okay. So even though you are always better off hiring a professional, I mean we've, we've covered that in great detail. You know, there's so much that a homeowner may not think about. Some homeowners are just more DIY types. and may do it themselves. I'm sure you've seen your share of things that you've had to come in and fix. - Oh, oh yeah. - Oh yeah. I'm sure. Right. What are some of the biggest power washing disasters that you've seen? - You know, most of them end up, like, you give your teen the pressure washer as a chore, you know, clean this. And you know, there was one where the concrete, they used too much pressure. Like they used the wrong tip. They used like the straight jet tip on the concrete. And the concrete was only like a few years old. So it wasn't that strong at the surface, you know, and put lines in it. They called me a clean it out and I was able to get the dirt off and I had to explain to them that it was etched concrete. Etched concrete is when you take a little bit of the surface off the concrete, like the finish, you're not taking the structure out of the concrete, but you're taking like the, the nice brush finish and that out, you know, so it'd be like a little uneven surface, but like the lines were like dips in the concrete. So we see that a lot. We also, like you were saying with your door, a lot of the times on like painted siding. Painted siding, over time it gets oxidized. We'll see a lot of, if there's oxidation on a thing, there's either two things you could do. You could leave it, you can try and restore it, you can paint it, you could wash it, but sometimes oxidation you don't really notice it sometimes it's bad, but you can't use any pressure. So a lot of times the homeowners will wash their house and they'll use pressure in the oxidation and they'll get uneven strokes. So if you've ever seen like the old painted siding that has like different lines and it looks almost like a paint gun from afar. That's from the pressure washer and the oxidation. And the oxidation is just sun breaking down. - Okay. - I've seen that. So we often see that they use too much pressure. That's all, that's the biggest thing we see with homeowners, I'd say. - Yeah, I've seen that. Like lines on sidewalk or driveways or patios and things that's the same kind of issue. - Exactly. You know, so those, it depends. There's two different types. They could either be improper cleaning stripes, which are called tiger stripes, or they can be etching stripes, which etching stripes are too much pressure that will chip away and bevel part of the concrete. And then tiger striping is like using the improper technique or improper machine with the walk behind cleaners. That's when you're cleaning. Because the things just spin on the outside, so when you're walking, you get everything that's either moving too fast or not the proper machine. You know, because you're going too fast and it's only cleaning really good on the outsides, but not the insides. So there's times where you'll, so that's where our soft wash comes in. Like yeah, concrete. We pressure wash, we use our high pressure. But a lot of times if it's real dirty, we'll pressure wash it and we'll post treat it to get away those tiger stripes, like the black lines. I'm assuming you know what I'm talking about. They look like mold and mildew lines up and down the driveway. We deal with those all the time and that's normal part of the process. But then we treat it with the thing and we watch it disappear and then we rinse the driveway off of water after. - Okay. And - So, - Okay. And correct me if I'm wrong too. So when you're using a pressure washer, you don't want to point it directly straight at the surface? - No, you always want it, it's like painting almost. You wanna stay fluent, you never wanna hold it in one spot. You know, you wanna stay a little bit far back. You never wanna go too close. And you always want to be, you never want to use tips like high pressure tips. You wanna know what the tips do and how powerful they are before you go on with them. You know? because that's where the real damage gets caused with the high pressure, straight nozzle tips. - Okay. And, and when a homeowner does that, let's say, right, and they have, you know, the stripes all over their patio or, or their driveway or something, is that harder now for you to fix? Or - Now if it's etched, if it's etched concrete, we're not able to fix it. You know, if the concrete's beveled, you know, there's not too much you could do. That's just the surface. But if it's tiger stripes, like I said with the just uneven cleaning marks, it's easy. You know, we'll come in there, we'll water all the plants, we'll spray it down and if it's real bad then we'll go over with our surface cleaner quick, we'll pretreat it, surface clean it, post treat it. But you know, most of the time we probably just have to do one or two chemical treatments and its good if they already pressure washed it. - Okay. Okay. So a lot of times you can make it look right after. It just depends on how much of a mess they did create. - Absolutely. - Okay. So they should definitely hire a professional from the beginning just to avoid all of that. - Exactly. - And you also do gutter cleaning, which I think is one of those home maintenance projects that everyone forgets to do. Being in the property restoration business, I know how important gutter cleaning is because clogged gutters can lead to property damage like ice dams and roof leaks. And that's something that we just see all the time. How often do you recommend homeowners clean their gutters and what can they look for that might be a sign that the gutters may need to be cleaned? - Yeah, yeah. No, that's a very valid point. The gutters - I recommend personally twice a year to clean the gutters. I would say once in the spring after the winter to make sure you're good for the summer, once all the rain's coming in. And then definitely do it in the fall. You know, if I was to tell you do it one time, if you are gonna, you definitely gotta do it once a year. And that's after the fall, get all the leaves out. Because also when the leaves go in the gutters, even if it's not that bad of a problem, if they create a little bit of a drainage problem when it gets cold, you're way more prone to ice dams and the leaves make the gutters so much heavier. We take out probably 50 pounds of debris at the average house. You know, if I had to say like we take out, there's like not the average, you know, there's some real bad ones we have where we'll do 5 five gallon buckets, you know, like houses in the woods and that, that haven't been like, there's been a few homeowners we've had that just moved into like a house in the woods and we go to clean their gutters and they are just, I'm like, I don't know how they didn't like pop off the brackets from all the weight because we bring like 5 five gallon buckets that are so bad we put them down a rope because like the guys aren't comfortable going down ladders because they're so heavy. The weight, you know, because the moisture, you know, when you get leaves and pine needles that are wet, they just hold so much weight. - Yeah. Yeah. That that's very true. And when, so when you're cleaning the gutters, right? You have the main gutter line and then you have the downspout. So do you, do you find debris in the downspout too? Or does it kind of remain in the gutter line? - Typically we don't. Usually it just remains right at the down the top of the downspout. And usually gravity kind of just works its way the downspouts usually don't get clogged. You know, sometimes there'll be a little bit clogged. We hit them with our hand because there's a little bit of leaves on the elbow. Then those break through once you get water pressure, everything goes, you know, and we've dealt with a few where we just bring our pressure washer up there, we put it in the downspout and we let it crank and then, you know, we let it run for five minutes and then eventually it uncloggs itself. You know, so we do deal with the downspouts, but we've probably done 25 gutter cleanings and probably only five of them needed downspout attention at all, you know? Okay. So it's really usually not a problem because of the gravity, you know? - Yeah, yeah. Because I, I think people don't, I mean, gutters have to be one of the, the, the least thought about parts of - The home. Absolutely. - You know, and even if, and I do agree with you, I do agree that you should have your gutters cleaned in the spring and in the winter or in the fall before winter comes. In the fall, before winter to prevent things like ice dams, which I mean, I can't tell you how many calls a year I get from - I can only imagine. - Yeah. The middle or winter, you know, February - Then we had a very bad winter ice - Dam. Yeah. And, and that's when they're asking, well, how can I prevent this ice dam from forming and, and - Clean your gutters? You could even put, you know, people that are real prone to it. We just recommend the heat. You put those little black heat lines that you plug in and they keep your gutters warm enough, you know, warm enough. So nothing freezes the water will still flow. - Yeah. But it'll still, if you have the gutter blocked, and let's say it's the spring, so you don't have to even worry about the freezing, you still now have the, the water running right off the drip edge - Right. Into your foundation. - Right. Into your foundation. - So, and create such bad, in a real bad storm, you can get a really bad basement leak. - Yep. Yep. So that you have, you have the ground water intrusion to the basement, which can lead to all sorts of foundation problems, mold, things of that nature. - A simple call to me could prevent an expensive call to you. - Exactly. Right. You know, you get the gutters cleaned in the spring and it avoids a lot of those potential issues. - Exactly. You know, so - Yeah, I agree with that. I think the spring and the fall are both really good times to have your gutters cleaned. - Yeah. You know, and the spring time, you know, and that's the thing, I also was thinking about making like a little gutter subscription plan. I was thinking maybe for homeowners where it would be like, obviously depending on your house, you know, you pay a yearly rate and you get the springtime. And when you're on the rate, the thing is, if you're on the rate, obviously we know the fall's gonna be bad, the spring's not gonna be bad. The spring, it'll just be put water in the gutters and you have you somebody rinses the gutters, somebody with their hand at the gutters. But in the fall, that's when you gotta get the buckets and scoop every inch of the gutters. So it's like, if you're doing it twice a year with us, your spring price is only gonna be probably half of the price of the fall price, you know. So I'm thinking maybe to start a little gutter plan where it's like you do a flat rate for the year and you get the two services. One in the spring. One in the fall. - Okay. Yeah. And one of the top injury causes for homeowners is trying to do their own gutter cleaning. - Exactly. - So I mean, anytime you're dealing with a ladder, you know, you have a lot of potential risk for, for falls and things. So it definitely makes sense to bring in a professional that knows what they're doing and also has the proper equipment. - Exactly. The knowledge, the equipment, you know, we we have stabilizers for our ladder, you know, that could level them out. And then we also have special clips that go on the ladder that will secure to your gutter. So, you know, our ladder, we don't have to worry about ever falling or toppling over, you know, once it's up there, it's secure, you know, so we have all the proper safety, we have roof climbers, we have special shoes and stuff like that, you know, to ensure that we're safe. Harnesses, etc. - And that sounds like a lot of things the average homeowner doesn't have. - Absolutely. That's my biggest thing. That's the biggest benefit to getting your gutters clean, you know, other than preventing water damage. - Yeah, yeah. because it's necessary anyway, and this way they don't have to do it for one and, two and risk yourself. Exactly. Exactly. So I agree. Yeah. You know, it's well worth bringing in a professional for something like that. - Exactly. - So from the roof and gutters to the windows and siding and even patios and driveways, you are able to clean everything. It sounds great for homeowners because they're able to get everything done all at once. Are there any other services that you offer? - Yeah, so we offer; to finish off the pressure washing, we offer fleet washing. And these are more industrial services. We offer fleet washing, you know, for companies, keep machines, trucks clean. We could do degreasing, all that stuff. We do roadside, mobile washing. We also do post-construction cleanup. We work with a local contractor on a gorgeous build that he completed, cleaned it all up for the homeowners welcoming party. Got it. Great. We did the windows, we did all the, we did the driveway, we did the entire house. The house is like 7,000 square foot house, all the patios. And then we also, like you said, the beginning about asphalt sealing; we offer pro professional asphalt maintenance through our partner company, G&L Asphalt and Seal Coat, the name is. It's between me and a buddy of mine who is now partner. So I do the seal coating, the PennDOT grade hot tar crack filling, and he does the patching and he's starting to get into light paving. So within the next few years, we're gonna be offering heavy paving services. We also do line painting, you know, handicaps, stencils, parking spots, anything. And then during the winter months, I needed something to keep busy. We started a holiday lighting company. It's called Bright Scape Holiday Lighting. We provide custom commercial grade lights to homes, businesses. We don't go to Home Depot for these. We order these online in bulk and they're on spools that we measure cut, professional clips. We could do any type of bulb, any type of pattern you'd like. You know, you could do red and white, you could do red, white, and green. You could do just warm white Christmas. We do trees, we do the bushes, we do the decorations, everything. - Wow. So you're, you can really provide a ton of solutions outside. So if a homeowner needs something, it sounds like you pretty much offer it. - Yeah, we're a full service. You know, we have a, we have a good relationship with the property management, like landscape excavation and all that company, you know, so we're pretty much full service property management between the three companies, you know? - Very, very cool. - Yeah. - You know, that it, it sounds like you're a handy person to know for sure. Yeah. All right. Well thank you very much for coming on and talking with us today. It was really interesting to learn more about pressure washing. I know a lot of homeowners try to DIY it and I think you gave a lot of great reasons why they should hire a professional. I learned a lot about pressure washing that I did not know. So I very much appreciate that. I'm sure there are a lot of people listening to the podcast that you could help with their pressure washing needs as well as all of your other services. - Yeah, we'd be happy to. Can you - Provide your, your contact information in case anyone wants to reach out to you? - Yeah, absolutely. I wanted just say thanks for having us on. It was a good, great show. I'm happy we were able to share what we have to offer and learn a little bit more about you guys. But yeah, so you could reach us at our phone number's 468-5891 and our website is www.marinaropressurewashing.com. If you'd look up Marinaro Pressure Washing on Facebook, Google, Instagram, you'll find us as well. We have a lot of our portfolio of our work up there. We service all of Lackawanna County, and we do a little bit neighboring, you know, depending on what's going on, we'll even take like an hour drive, you know, if we had to. So give us a call and we'll let you know if we service you, you know, we provide free estimates, free quotes. - Okay. Great. Great. Well, thank you very much. I definitely learned a lot about pressure washing today. I can definitely say that I've worked with you in the past and you've always done an excellent job. - I really appreciate that. - Absolutely. I've referred you to our clients that needed pressure washing and they're always thrilled with, - I really appreciate that - Absolutely, absolutely. So I highly recommend you. - Yeah, it's always great working with Matt. - Oh, I appreciate that. Yeah, - Yeah, absolutely. - You know, I've never, had a bad experience working with you. Everything comes out great. Even when we gave you a one that was a porch and I was a little bit concerned about, you know, some of the particulars because I didn't know a lot about pressure washing and soft washing. You had all the answers and everything came out great, so I really appreciate all of that. - Yeah. - If anyone listening needs help with their pressure washing needs or soft washing or any of your other services, please reach out to Joe at Marinaro Pressure Washing and he'll be happy to help. Is there something YOU would like to hear about? Please email us at disasterpodcast@disasterblaster.com and please visit our website for a ton of great content about property damage and the home buying process at www.DisasterBlaster.com. Thank you very much. - Thank you. - Would you like to take control of your future and build a business you can be proud of? We can help. As a Disaster Blaster franchise partner, our industry experts will help you unlock the potential of the $210 billion restoration industry. Disaster Blaster offers the most revenue streams in the restoration industry, training and support from industry experts, a unique model primed for your success, and more! Call our franchise team today to learn more at 242-1042, or visit us on the web at www.DisasterBlasterFranchise.com. Thanks so much for watching. Don't forget to like and subscribe. And while you're here, check out our other great content.