Eva: “I would like to introduce you to Ben Persinger, Ben is the owner of Persinger construction. They provide amazing creative Renovations for home renovations, construction updates as well as investor Consultation Services.”
Eva: Hi Ben, I seen a lot of your work. And my first question for you is, where do you get your inspiration for your Renovations from?”
Ben: “I think probably the biggest thing is in kind of creating a useful space and and I like to bring you know, as far as much of the renovation part of things, I like to bring new life back in the old homes, that are kind of beat up or run-down and I bring new life to it. I think that’s probably the biggest area and kind of meshing it to the neighborhood in and bringing back value to the to the property. That’s really my probably one of the biggest things that I enjoy doing.”
Eva: “How do you get the ideas for something like the kind of backsplash? Is this something The Client provided or is that something you came up with?”
Ben: “It’s a Collaboration a lot of time, so I work with a client on whatever the style of the home is and stuff like that a lot of it just kind of comes from over the years. I’ve just kind of picked up different things that I like and the different things that I pair together usually I’ll give the client some options and things like that. A lot of times it comes down to looking at the type of materials were working with like a countertop for working with the natural lighting at the house. Certain kinds of homes have better natural light. So I like to look at all that and I kind of take that full scope into into what we’re trying to do and if it’s like a ranch, kind of Farmhouse look then you kind of go One Direction, with your color tones and things like that. If it’s more modern or retro then we kind of design it to make those things are kind of pick materials that mesh with that. I get a lot of that just from from reading and observation, looking at what other people are building you know what the trends are.”
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Eva: “How did you get started with Persinger construction.
Ben: “I started Persinger Construction three years ago, that kind of came about because of another job that I had I was a project manager for another construction company and they ran out of some contracts so I needed to have a new new job and I didn’t really find anything that I was looking for so I decided to just get back into it. And yeah, I just I really love construction for real estate. I’ve been doing investment properties and all that stuff and I like working with people on it. So that’s kind of what inspired me to do it. As far as Construction goes, I’ve been building since I was you know, my early teens.”
Eva: “What does a typical project look like?”
Ben: “One of the most common sites is what you are looking at. So these are these are reskins of the whole whole house. That’s probably my most common ones. We change all the bathrooms, sometimes we res sheet rock it. That depends on how how beat up the walls are. Re floor them and fix everything. Sometimes new heating electrical systems and new kitchens. That’s the main bulk of what I do is just re-vamps of the whole house a lot of the time.”
Eva: “I recently saw a video which they had an aquarium put into a wall and I was just wondering what is the most interesting request that you have received?”
Ben: “I’ve seen some pretty pretty far-out ones. We’ve done lots of things, I wouldn’t really know where to start with it. I mean home theater systems, like all kinds of really unique projects. Some of the decks are cool to wrap them around landscaping and other features in the house.”
Eva: “So you mentioned renovation trends, what are some of the latest trends and how do you and your team like to use them?”
Ben: “There’s different trains of thought and it really depends on the class of work that I’m doing. So there we have several different kind of lines of projects that we take on. We have some higher-end stuff for like an end-user homeowners and then we have investor grade projects. There’s different trends for different projects. One trend now is probably a lot of the greys and barn wood, wood flooring, stuff like that. Subway tiles have kind of come back in vogue and we’ve done a number of projects.”
Ben: “There’s a huge gamut, lighting changes a lot. We’re probably moving away more from the track lighting type stuff and moving more into flush mount light fixtures and you’ll see more of the Crystal Light, champagne glass, so I could I see a lot more of those kind of trends coming in right now, I always kind of look at the long-term hold of the property. It depends on if someone’s going to keep it or it’s going to be a rental or whatever. I try to not try to encourage us to not over stylize it to a certain specific thing. Unless you’re really going for like a hip vogue look, you know, or a really retro look then you got to do the whole thing that way because if you pick bits and pieces of it, it kind of feels a little disjointed and it also kind of falls out of style sooner especially for appliances.”
Ben: “You know, they have a special colors and shades of stain with some things like that. If it’s a rental you keep it for a long time and that’s how you know, when you can’t get that fridge anymore in that color and it’s a bummer, you know, if it dies on you than you got to figure out how to tell how to make that look good. I try to look at how long they’re planning on doing the renovations. Over a big long time span, you know, you want to do bathroom here than in the kitchen and whatever then you need to come and look at the overall like what they’re going to want the house look like in the end. So it’s not disjoining. You don’t look like you have a different vintage in each part of the house, you know,”
Eva: “Do you have any tips for us, renovation tips?”
Ben: “There is a lot of things you can do, although I’d say the best thing you can do, value for your buck wise is probably especially with the interior stuff – repainting, reflooring, things like that are relatively inexpensive options. They’re good for DIY-ers too you know, who delve into that stuff. You can do a lot of cool stuff with accent walls. I just refrain from going for it unless it’s something that you want to keep for a long time. Nice tasteful accent walls are great. You can do a lot with textures too.”
Ben: “Probably just get on Pinterest or Google images for different wall images. I just search for images of what I’m kind of looking for and figure out what terms to search for any kind of pallet wood walls and Barnwood. We need a lot of cheap inexpensive ways to update stuff and get yourself some inspiration to know if you got a fireplace or something, you know, you can do whitewash from brick and you can do all different kinds of things like that. You can do cool mantelpiece without really spending a huge amount of money.”
Eva: “Can you tell me about the work BrushPic did on your website?”
Ben: “It was one of those things. I wanted to be able to develop an add-on to as I kind of expand long-term ideas that I was working on and I tried working with some other outfits and that it just didn’t work. They were kind of out of state and just kind of corporate…but they were just weren’t really effective at getting what I need it because I had one created a number of years ago and it was just a disaster. They just didn’t meet my needs and it didn’t meld with what I’m trying to kind of create as a company and I would have had to do almost all the work myself to make the thing work and it was like I just don’t have the time and energy. That’s what kind of led me to check out BrushPic and have them work on my website. It’s been a great experience, as far as getting stuff done a lot of the holdup on everything was on my end.”
Eva: “What is BNI and what are some of the benefits you’ve experienced in the Connectors Chapter in Alaska?”
Ben: “BNI is a networking group for business owners in the chapter. I’m a general contractor in the connectors chapter and for me, it’s been a great way to meet other folks and network as far as that goes.”
Ben: “One way it’s really helped me a lot is it’s allowed me to serve my clients better. Through that, I mean it’s as far as having working relationships with all these other fields that I would not normally interface in my everyday constructionwork. I need a mortgage person if I need a website design, if I need whatever. I have lots of clients are business owners and maybe they’re complaining about something while I’m working on their house, frequently, I can help them solve other problems that they have in their business. BNI is also good for having a good reliable referral source like that that so that has been a big help.
Basically just allow me to serve my clients better. So it’s been a really positive thing for my company.
Eva: “What’s your favorite thing about Alaska?”
Ben: “The summers! It’s always nice going out. I can say my family likes to do that. I am usually fishing when I’m not working during the summers. So yeah, thats my favorite thing.”
Eva: “Thank you Ben.”
About the Interviewer
Eva Ohenewa Anno is the founder of BrushPic™. Eva is a multi talented digital artist and entrepreneur with a passion for helping others show up as their best version.