Joe the Winner – Bonita Springs Florida Weekly

Home inspection businessman wins season 13 of ‘The Blox’ national competition

Joe Nugent, waiting on a flight home to Naples out of the Caribbean with his partner in dreams made real, Melissa Severance, is not by anybody’s definition “a man of leisure.”

The couple had merely taken a three-day break from a year of astounding entrepreneurial successes for Nugent built on wisdom, willingness and a charismatic and winning personality — the personality of a fine teacher, perhaps, or an exceptional performer, or both, combined with the temperament of a focused risk-taker.

“I thought about being a teacher once,” said the Cleveland native and now Neapolitan, speaking by phone before the flight, “but then I found out how much they made.”

Earlier this year, and at the suggestion of a Naples friend and fellow business owner, Nugent decided to throw his hat into the ring — in this case into the ring to compete as an entrepreneur in season 13 of “The Blox.”

You can see what happened next either with the BetaBlox app or online at Betablox.com, season 13.

Joe Nugent announced as the Season 13 winner of “The Blox.”

His baby: Joe the Home Pro Home Inspections, a business he’d started and operated part-time beginning in 2015 when he was still working as an upper management hotelier.

He worked in that service industry world exactly 20 years (not almost exactly 20 years, but exactly 20 years), from June 16, 2000, to June 16, 2020.

Then he was laid off.

So he took everything he’d learned about service, on the one hand, and finances, on the other hand, and pumped it straight into his own start-up, shifting into fulltime gear as an entrepreneur.

“As much as I don’t miss the hotel industry, there’s so much I can cred- it to my 20 years in corporate America,” he said. “First and foremost, the service aspect — it’s all about customer service, relentless service, and what does that look like? That’s No 1.

“No. 2, from my years in upper management, meeting large numbers of people, Nugent added. “And then how to understand marketing and sales, what does it mean to start one direction, pivot and go to something else? All that stuff serves me today.”

Melissa Severance and Joe Nugent.

And it served him when he headed out to strut his stuff in the head-to-head competition.

An innovative and rigorous competition show for entrepreneurs of start-up companies nationwide, “The Blox” is no easy affair. Competing against about 40,000 entrepreneurs all seeking to get on the show, he made the cut and got the invitation after submitting a video and having extensive phone interviews.

Then, he flew to Tulsa to compete against many others who had also made the cut.

“It’s very much an education and an intense competition, not reality TV in the way we think of it,” he said.

Although it is very real.

“There’s a three-hour lesson every morning on a topic, then you have 15 minutes to prepare a presentation on the topic, then you have a one-on-one consultation with a coach or judge — that’s extremely challenging,” Nugent said. “You’re going 15, 16, 17 hours at a time, meeting with people. It’s really intense.”

Joe Nugent shares victory with the Season 13 finalists of The Blox. COURTESY PHOTOS

Then he flew home and waited for a long time — too long for comfort. Until they finally called him one day to give him the news.

Nugent had won the whole shebang.

“I had to sit on this for months. I could never be on another reality TV show — too much pressure. But this show, The Blox? I thought just being on it was cool. But winning the whole thing was a whole different level of wow!”

For the win, he took home $10,000. But there was more: Doors began to open. For one thing, he’s being considered for a callback as a coach or judge for the show itself.

His partner in life, Severance, is surprised by none of this. A business coach and motivator in her own right with years of experience working for big companies both in accounting and in human resources, her own Naples-based corporate-coaching business is Inspire Big Dreams.

She puts it this way about Nugent.

“It’s his personality. You want to be around him. Everybody loves him,” she said. “That is what attracted me to him right away — his entrepreneurship, his leadership, following our big dreams together. And we’re both in line with wanting to dream big.”

A lot of people may dream, but not all of them can make the dream a reality.

“Joe’s vision is amazing,” Severance said. “He has heart, grit, passion — and you need that to be a successful entrepreneur nationwide.”

Her mention of nationwide is not only a dream, it’s now rapidly becoming real.

He’s just launched his licensing division, he revealed, preparing to license Joe The Home Pro Home Inspection businesses to entrepreneurs elsewhere, both in Florida and in other states.

“The beauty of the licensing division is that a person in another city owns their company 100%,” he said. “We have processes that will allow us to be hands-on with them as much as they want us to. Every Monday is coaching Monday, for example, you can ask any questions you want to, and there’s an entire portal on the website dedicated and donated to licensees.”

The first licensee recently opened a business in Lynchburg, Va., “and we have three other locations we’re in talks with: one in Ohio, one in South Carolina and one in Texas.”

Nugent compares the licensing aspect of the business to franchising, pointing to advantages for such a business owner he didn’t have when he started.

“It cost me $10,000 to $12,000 and six months of effort to get started. But for a licensee, it’s $5,000 for a one-time license good for five years and you get everything at your fingertips — an established brand, established every which way. It allows you to get running faster and cheaper at a fraction of the cost and time — you could actually be up and operating in two weeks.”

That is if you’ve done the necessary work required by the state first.

“Each state has rules and guidelines for what it takes to be a home inspector,” he explained. “In Florida, it’s 120 online hours of classroom work, and then you take a state test. In Virginia, it’s 80 or 100 hours, a test, and 25 joint home inspections with a licensed home inspector.”

Nugent relies on transparency and a completely open approach to both employees and customers, which is part of his success, he said.

“It may cost me some money out of pocket up front, but people see they can trust you,” and over time, that pays off, he said.

It pays off both in money and recognition. Joe the Home Pro Home Inspections has earned “Best Of ” acknowledgments in Naples and Fort Myers publications three years running.

But what does Joe the Home Pro really do on the ground?

It’s a “full-service home inspection company with a service area that spans from Marco Island to Punta Gorda,” the literature explains. “The company offers an array of inspection services, including general inspection, wind mitigation, 4-point inspection, mold/air quality, radon and termite/WDO testing, drone and more to ensure safety, security and peace of mind for every property and owner. To learn more, visit joethehomepro.com.

Putting all that together, says a spokeswoman for Nugent, can be chalked up to “his entrepreneurial acumen and drive, as well as his charismatic and energetic presence.” ¦