Slow Season?

[skaboot]

Hello

I looking into starting a HI business and was wondering if there is a slow season. I'm located in Wisconsin so we can experience some HOT summers and COLD winters. Logic would tell me the winter months HI's would experience a slow down in business.

Can anyone confirm?

Thanks in advance!

[ericwlewis]

my slow season started in January of '07

[kurt]

January really slow, builds through February to a peak of March, April, May, and June, July slacks a little, August drops some more, some pick up in September and October, November and December trickle in and out. Oddly, the last week of the year can often be a time of extreme activity; folks are doing deals to beat tax issues.

There can be oddball weeks of feverish activity within any of the slow periods, but that basic chart has held for the last 24 years for my business.

[Brandon Whitmore]

My experience is right in line with Kurt's.

[Nolan Kienitz]

My ten years in the residential side of this business is the same at Kurt's as well.

I did commercial inspections/construction for ~20 years before that with a corporate giant.

As Eric noted ... I've also have been experiencing an overall slowdown since July of 2011. Mostly because I won't do a "drive-by ... aka: cheap" inspection.

[hausdok]

I see a slowdown every year from mid-August to end of September. I think it has something to do with folks' kids getting ready for, and starting, a new school year.

ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!!

Mike

[Scottpat]

Yep, I see about the same as Kurt.

[Phillip]

Mine is about the same as the rest of them

[Steven Hockstein]

My business used to be very predictible. There were slow times and busy times and I could plan when I should take a vacation. More recently, it seems that there is no predicting business. I will get a rush of business when I expected to be slow and I will be sitting in my office cleaning files when I had expected to be busy. Nowadays I am relieved when I have business!

[Mark P]

I'll just add that the days (week) around hollidays are typically slow as folks go on vacation.

[skaboot]

Thank you all for your input!

I'm currently a web designer/web developer. I didn't necessarily choose this as a career but, it requires a lot of sitting looking at a computer. I'm more of a hands-on type of person and would much perfer working for myself as opposed to working for "the man."

[John Kogel]

Since the bulk of our inspections are for home buyers, you can get a good idea of monthly home sales from real estate stats.

Kurt's general pattern is right on, but with today's economy, the pattern is a bit scattered. Unpredictable for me here as well.

Some highbrow analyst recently announced on the national news that home values would be dropping in 5 or 6 months. Good one. My phone just stopped ringing. []

[Jerry Simon]

My first 15 years, without fail, February was my busiest month; did 54 inspections one year in Feb. (never could explain why Feb was consistently so busy).

Now, as Kurt once expressed, all fits & starts for the past four years.

[Les]

I have very good records for the past twenty five years in Mid-Michigan. I have also trained or started many inspectors. The pattern is pretty much like above. We started losing raw numbers in August 2007 and continued downward right along with real estate home sales, but not as rapid.

May is always a good month. February the worst usually. Last two years December has been great and March was the leader.

I usually start a new guy in April or August.

90% of the time we can predict numbers over a two week period based on real estate offers and our history.

[skaboot]

Thanks for the info, I appreciate everyone's experiences and willingness to share.