Keeping It Real Podcast • Secrets Of Top 1% REALTORS ® • Interviews With Real Estate Brokers & Agents

Brittany Ranew a St.Petersburg & Tampa Bay’s Real Estate & Lifestyle Expert talks about her own life journey with background in music and event planning and her transition into real estate. Brittany mentions the importance of mental health, consistency and commitment in what you do and what you want. Next, Brittany talks about her St. Pete Soul Podcast and what she offers to her listeners. Brittany also discusses how tracking the transactions like buying/selling is very important to build a trustful environment in the field of real estate. Please check and subscribe to Brittany’s St. Pete Soul Podcast here. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! Brittany Ranew can be reached at 727.258.1064 and brittany.ranew@premiersir.com. This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks. Transcript D.J. Paris 0:00mindset is talked a lot about in the realtor training and coaching space. But what does it actually mean? What we’re going to talk about mindset today and do a deep dive. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solution so that you can easily generate more business. There agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now on to our show. Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the largest podcast made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris, I am your guide and host through the show. And in just a moment we’re going to be speaking with top producer Brittany Renu. Before we get to Brittany, just a couple of quick favors that we ask of you. One and really the most important favor we ask is to please keep this train moving by telling a friend about the show. Think of one other realtor that could really benefit from hearing from top producers like Britney and send them a link either to our website, which is keeping it real pod.com Or any podcast app, they could just search for keeping it real, hit that subscribe button, we’d appreciate it. But please tell a friend we really want to help as many Realtors as we can this year stay in the business. It’s a very vulnerable year for realtors with the way the market conditions have been going. And we just want to make sure everyone has got all the resources they need. And hopefully this podcast can help them. So please tell a friend and then also please support our sponsors. They are the reason we can keep doing these episodes, they pay the bills. We are so grateful to our sponsors. So please check out their products and services, consider investing in them. And all the services that we promote on this, this podcast are only to assist your business going forward. So please consider sponsoring or actually supporting our sponsors sponsor our sponsors by buying their services. Anyway guys, thank you so much for being a valued and trusted member of this podcast. We love you so much and we’re grateful to have you but now on to the main event my conversation with Brittany Renu. Today on the show we have Brittany renew with Premier Sotheby’s International in St. Louis and Tampa Bay. Let me tell you more about Britney. Britney Renu is a licensed realtor and relocation expert with Premier Sotheby’s International as the official relocation expert of Tampa Bay. She’s also the host of the St. Pete soul podcast, and Brittany provides valuable resources to her customers by immersing herself in the community in which she lives and works and we’re going to talk about that today. She believes it’s not simply about buying or selling a home but building community I could not agree more. I want everybody to go visit Brittany’s website which tells you every all things Brittany including her podcast, which is Brittany renew.com Let me spell that for you br ittanyranew.com There’s also links to that in our show notes. And I also want you to follow her on Instagram and YouTube search for Brittany Renu realtor on both Instagram and YouTube. Also links to that will be in the show notes. And if you’re in the Tampa or St. Pete area, please consider Subscribing to our podcast, the st. A St Pete soul which you can also find on her website. Brittany, welcome to the show. Brittany Ranew 4:35Hi, DJ. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it. D.J. Paris 4:39I get very nervous when I talk to other podcast hosts and when people hear this final version, they won’t know that I screwed up three times in my introduction to you. So I am a little frazzled right now so I have to get back to my center or else I am going to be it’s funny I get very nervous like I can’t screw up in front of another another broadcaster Oh I did. Well, I think I think this is great. It’s actually a great segue into what we’re eventually going to talk about which are, which are one of the topics would be mindset. So we’ll get to a place where maybe I can take a lesson from you and learn how to quiet the, you know, the voices in my head that are telling me I’m screwing this up. But before we get to me, let’s, let’s talk about you. And I would love to hear what actually I don’t know this story is how you got into real estate. So if you don’t mind sharing that. Brittany Ranew 5:34Yeah, so kind of an interesting path. I have a music background. So I actually went to school for music. I was a vocal major. D.J. Paris 5:42Wow, wait, did you do that in Florida or somewhere else? Brittany Ranew 5:45So I’m from Mobile, Alabama, originally born and raised. So it was a local school there. And so we moved to St. Pete 2015. So I just like my husband, and I born and raised in mobiele, and took a leap and moved to St. Pete. So so yeah. D.J. Paris 6:01So did you did you have dreams of being like a singer? Did you want to sing professionally? Or? Brittany Ranew 6:07I did I and I had a writing background as well. So definitely in that creative space. And so I was like, Well, you know what, I’m not going to be a professional singer, at least at this moment in time. So why don’t I pursue the music industry as on the business side. So there was a local company media company that I started working for immobile. I mentioned having a creative side. So that was something I wanted to have my own business. So I started an event planning company. So I was doing that on the side while I worked full time at this media company. And that was like, slowly growing, kind of getting my feet wet. And then I got laid off from my job after they sold to another company, and closed down operations in mobile. So I was like, Oh, what am I supposed to do with myself now, I mean, I’m young and my first like, real full time job at a college. So it was kind of traumatic to get laid off. So had the event planning company and I was like, you know, what, I’ve always loved houses. Real Estate sounds like something else that I could really make my own. So I got my real estate license, it was I was doing both trying to, like build real estate had the event planning company, then that wasn’t really going the way I wanted it to. And I was starting to fall in love with real estate. I was like, You know what, I’m gonna just go all in, in real estate. And that was about I got licensed in 2013 and 13. And 2014 is where I really kind of like went full time so D.J. Paris 7:44yeah, it’s that’s a quite a shift. But I guess with the event planning background and the media company background, it probably especially you were doing your own event planning. I imagine that probably was that the sort of first entrepreneurial thing that you did where you’re like, Okay, I want to be in charge in my own life and my own time and all of that. Brittany Ranew 8:01Yeah. And my husband was in kind of a not so great work environment. And I was like, you know, what, if I have my own business, that the it’s limitless, I can do whatever I want, you know, the income is limitless. And so I just had these dreams of like, Alright, I’m gonna help us build this different life, you know, life that we always imagined. And things didn’t go exactly as planned. It was a lot slower growth than I wanted it to be. Which came back to my mindset but I didn’t know that at the time. So when we moved to St. P It was a job opportunity for my husband Steven. That was just life. It was a life changing move. And it just really helped me kind of get out of my shell and it helped put us on a path for really a better future. D.J. Paris 8:56But so when you move to St. Pete And by the way, if anyone out there has not visited St P it is just a lovely even if it’s just a day trip because a lot of times because I visit my sister in Tampa which I’m there a lot and I was telling Brittany earlier that I mean, we didn’t really talk about St. Pete But because my mom my parents didn’t Clearwater which is also kind of a comparable type of area. Although very different but but cool as well. In a different way. And St. Pete I always I love the Dali museum. I love it. Just everything about St. Pete is just it just feels kind of fancy and trendy and fun and cool and easy to fall in love with. It is easy to fall in love with and every time I leave it I even though it’s only like a 30 minute drive back to my sister’s or 40 minutes. I’m like, I love this place. There’s more going on, I think in St. Pete And Clearwater and that’s not a dig at Clearwater at all I love Clearwater it’s just a different Clearwater is more of a beachy vibe and st Pete’s a little bit more like an upscale kind of fun but it It’s also a very difficult place to become a realtor, because it’s such an exclusive area. Obviously, prices are high competition is high. There’s just lots going on there. So I am really curious how you got started in, you know, in St. Pete, because that’s not an easy place to get started. Brittany Ranew 10:20No. And, you know, I was, like I said, I had some mindset issues that I was dealing with. So that was a struggle as well. So I decided to not start selling right away when we moved. And it was a hard decision, because I loved real estate. But it was the ultimately the right one because I needed to kind of get my get myself settled. So I actually was the office administrator for my office that I’m at at Premier Sotheby’s International Realty. So it was, it was cool, because I got to immerse myself in the market, learn. And I had like a steady, steady paycheck. And then I could learn the company, and how amazing an amazing company is, and all the resources that we have. And it gave me time to build that sense of community. So that was in 2017, is when I got back into sales full time. And I hit the ground running at that point. Yeah. D.J. Paris 11:25Because you you know, that is, that’s the first time and all of the people I’ve interviewed, that I believe someone has gone that particular path. And as I’m hearing it now, it makes perfect sense. And I’m sort of shocked that I don’t hear more people having done that, you know, basically the way I think about it is it was almost I mean, yes, you were paid. And you know, you were paid to do that role. But I imagine it was just a learning experience, you had to absorb so much, probably great best practices, and maybe things not worth doing. And really just watching other you’re basically or just if you were at an office where people came in and the agents work there, then boy, I can’t even imagine what an education that was. Brittany Ranew 12:06Yeah, it was, it was tremendous. And also just kudos to my, my company, for letting me make that transition. You know, I went from office administrator back into sales. So, you know, sometimes that can be a little sticky. Because competitive, you know, environment, especially, like Florida, you know, yeah. But yeah, it was, uh, it was, it was the way I needed to do it. And I’m not gonna lie and say it was easy, because it was, it was tough. It hurt my pride a little bit to not be selling. But it was, it was definitely the right way for me D.J. Paris 12:43when he finally got into production, and that so you had been in St. Pete for for several years at that point. Correct? Brittany Ranew 12:51Yeah, so 2015. So it was it was two, it was about a year, year and a half, basically, from when we moved to when I got back into sales. So D.J. Paris 13:01and so at that point, still, and again, I don’t know your sort of social life and how active you are getting out meeting people. But essentially, I’m assuming you didn’t have a sphere of influence when you move there, or at least a small one. Right now. Yeah, zero. And, and then having to build that in, in. It’s interesting, because I have Matt and I don’t know that much about St. Pete, like the residents of St. Pete, I don’t know how many are born and raised, lived their whole lives there. But I bet it’s a lot of people who move there at some point in their life. And it isn’t a lot of born and raised and sort of you know, I’m there my whole entire existence. So it’s kind of be tough to really sort of establish oneself, because there’s so much so many people coming in and leaving, that you have all these other agents that are also trying to make those those relationships with these new residents, or people who are newer to the area or thinking of moving there. How did you go about, you know, finding clients when when you got into production? Brittany Ranew 14:00Yeah, you know, I’m, I’m a very social person. So like, my husband, I joke that just about all the friends that we have here is because I made them first. So I was not afraid to get out there and meet people. And I think that’s something that people forget is it’s kind of hard to make friends as an adult. Totally hard. Yes. So you have to put yourself out there and be vulnerable, to be able to connect with new people. It’s almost like dating. It’s kind of a it is very much that way. Yes. So it’s like I had to take the initiative to constantly meet people. And then when I met people like, Hey, would you like to hang out? You know, and it takes that until you get into rhythm with people before they start contacting you. So it was me just being really persistent because I wanted to build community because that’s how I thrive. So again, it was just me being consistent and pursuing really friendships. And, you know, over time, it just got easier and easier. And sure, you know, we’ve lived here for eight years now. And it’s just, we just love it. And we have the best friends. So D.J. Paris 15:14I was meeting with a newly licensed agent last night or at 430. Yesterday. And she was asking me, you know, she was, you know, interviewing our firm. And she’s like, if you were me, and she was new to Chicago, she’s like, I mean, she’s been here for a year, but she’s like, I don’t really know, hardly anyone. And I said, she goes, What would if you were me? What would you do? And I said, you know, it’s, it’s not easy. That’s a tough position for anybody to be in. And I said, Really, if it was me, I would figure out everyday how to meet like two or three new people and add them to my database. And that’s actually a pretty difficult thing to do. It sounds like pretty simple. But I said, if I go, your biggest problem is, you know, you don’t have a large sphere, but you can remedy that it just, it’s going to take a year or two. And you’re going to have to meet people that’ll be like part of your day, every day is yes, you have to learn the real estate business and develop those skills, and all of all of the normal being a good realtor stuff. But you really need to get out there and meet as many people as you can get their information, and then figure out a way that you can stay in contact with them, and provide value to them. And so that whenever they eventually are ready, but it was this adding people to your database, I’m like, it’s kind of like I call it the push ups of real estate when you’re new, like nobody really wants to do push ups. But it’s a good idea if you want to, like build strength. And you can do it anywhere. That’s kind of how I think about like building your business when he first starts, like just meet as many people as you can get their information, and then start to figure out how do I stay in, you know, in communication and community with them. And that actually leads me to this other thing I want to mention, or talk about, which I think really fits into community. Is this, the podcasts that you do, tell us why you started doing it, and how it’s sort of gone for you. Brittany Ranew 16:55Yeah, so I, well, I will say that kind of the initial thought came from Tom Ferry, which a lot of us agents listen to Tom Ferry. So, you know, he’s always been so big on being video first and being like, what he would call a digital mayor of your community. And I got inspired by that. It’s like, Oh, that’d be so fun. Like, I love small business. I love shopping local. Maybe I can be the digital mayor of St. Pete. And then I was like, oh, gosh, I don’t know how like, it wasn’t doing video consistently at that time. So I was like, I don’t know how to do this. This was probably in about 2019. I would say I was really mulling this over. I was like, I don’t know how to have videos and like, go into a shop. And I was thinking like, news anchor, you know, it was just kind of that’s what I was coming to mind. So I tabled it because I felt like a stuck. I don’t know what to do with this. And I, I then started thinking about podcasts. And I was like, oh, wait a second, a podcast is way easier to start. Because it’s just audio, I don’t have to worry about the video. I can just get a business owner on the other side of the mic and ask them questions. And it’s actually inexpensive to start up too with like the hosting platforms. So then I was like, okay, cool. I’ll work on that. Well, I didn’t get into it right away. It was like an idea. I had that kind of set there for a couple more months. And I started 2020 And I was I’ve been working with a business coach since the fall of 2019. So when we started 2020. And I was sharing these goals, he was like, Okay, what are we gonna do for you that you got to get this started, like you’ve been holding on to this for too long. So I’m slowly but surely kind of putting these thoughts together to make a plan to launch the podcast and then COVID happen. So I was like, oh, in our whole worlds change. So then I thought this is definitely a time that people need to be reminded about small business. Yeah, buy local. Yeah, it’s I think it motivated me to, okay, we got to launch this podcast like this is needed, we’re doing this. So that’s kind of how it was born. So D.J. Paris 19:08and I and so I love this idea because you interview local artisans, local retailers, you know, just local people in the community who are important to St. Pete And and the surrounding areas. And I love this because just the marketing the marketer, part of me just thinks this is such a brilliant strategy because what you’re what you’re doing is what a lot of these like shop owners are constantly receiving communication from ad agencies, people who want to sell them advertising people that want to say, hey, we we’d like to put you on a billboard or radio ad or whatever. And that’s going to obviously cost money. Whereas you’re basically contacting these retailers saying, hey, I really love your store. I like what you do. I would love to just have a chat with you on my show and kind of introduce you to my audience. And you’re basically giving them free marketing and free advertising and also So obviously, that’s a super generous thing to do. And it’s it’s part of you supporting your local community. Also, you’re probably very rarely going to get a Nam not interested. Because there’s no real downside, right. And then also, when you are sharing these podcasts, you’re I’m sure you’re tagging in the businesses or the business owners, like, Hey, by the way, if you want to promote this to your followers, or your you know, your shoppers, it’s really a brilliant strategy all the way around. I’m curious, not that you’re doing it to get business, you’re doing it to really support these local, these local merchants and, and their services, which I think is ultra noble. And I love that. I’m just curious, has it also resulted in people knowing you more in the community? And has that actually resulted in business? Brittany Ranew 20:48Yeah, so it’s kind of like, I think there’s like a two fold answer to that. Because number one, it plays back into the overall brand strategy, you know, I’m been working very hard at trying to build an online presence and build my personal brand. So it it, you know, rolls back into that in a really nice, nice way. So I get, I’ll get referrals from agents across the country, and only because they found me online and saw my online friends. Oh, that’s interesting. Okay, so so there’s that piece to it. But then from like, a very literal sense, the relationships that I’m making from the people I have on my podcast. You know, it wasn’t something that happened right away, because like I said, this is my fourth year, so that, you know, whenever you’re building relationships, it takes time to build that trust, know, like, and trust factor in so this past year, 2022, I will say, I had to say two transactions that I can directly link back from guests that I had on my podcast. So like, a very direct, like, you know, this is the lead source that generated D.J. Paris 22:00Hey, listen to your show. I’m reaching out to you that kind of thing. Yeah. Brittany Ranew 22:04Yeah, like, actually, those were get two guests that I had on my podcast. So then the indirect part of it from, you know, people that have reached out to me that have been listening to the podcast, you know, more just more relationships. I mean, the more conversations you have, the better chance you have for, you know, bringing, bringing in those transactions. So, yeah, D.J. Paris 22:25were any other realtors having a similar type of show another podcast that you were competing enough that I don’t always think podcasts compete with each other? But were you kind of the first person to do that in the St. Pete area? That’s a real estate agent? Brittany Ranew 22:39I think so. I mean, I researched it to a degree and I really didn’t see anything like that online. So I believe so. I mean, there’s definitely some other agents that do really good video content in our area. But from the podcast perspective, I’m, I guess I was a pioneer in that. D.J. Paris 23:02I mean, it’s, it’s really funny, because so my sister lives in Tampa in a neighborhood, or I don’t know if it’s a neighborhood, but an area called Pomocy. I’m sure you’re familiar. And I was thinking about this like, well, there’s probably Tampa agents that already have Tampa podcast, and I’m sure that’s true. It’s a much bigger area. But is there a policy a podcast? I don’t know. Probably not. And it’s like that would be you could even just be a policy, a podcast host. If someone’s listening, and I guarantee my sister who lives there would would listen because she’s like, I want to know what’s going on in policy. So you can get hyper specific, it doesn’t have to have, you know, 10s of 1000s of followers on every episode, if you’re still meeting the needs of whatever the community is. And I think it’s brilliant that you did that. I just love that. Brittany Ranew 23:48Well, and I’ll tell you, this literally just happened to me. So a couple months ago, we were at a at a event and I had someone come up to me. And she was like, You don’t know me, but I’m so and so. And I’ve been following your podcast for a couple of years. And I just love you know, it was just like, she was so excited to meet me. And I was like, oh, okay, wow. So that was such a cool moment to have like a fan in a sense. And anyway, so she’s a lender, and she had recently moved to St. Pete So that was kind of her like connection. And you know, we’re able to continue talking and we recently got together for coffee and just to hear her her say we me and my husband, listen to your podcast, and we have a date, like a date day once a week that we always try to pick places that you have on your podcast and go to so like my podcast is helping them find like a new spot to show. So just stuff like that. I’m like, Oh my God, that’s so freakin cool. D.J. Paris 24:49It is it’s like it even if it never resulted in actual business. It’s it’s just a good feeling of like I am providing for the community. I’m supporting the community. I’m doing it because I love live and I love and, you know, I love and I live in this community. So whether or not it ever actually translates into business, I, you know, it’s a grind. Of course, doing podcasts are not easy. But it just hearing one person say, you know, I like your show I listened to that is, is really, really heartwarming. And so I always say it’s kind of one of those things that even if it doesn’t generate, like this huge spike in production for someone, boy, you’ll get a lot of just good feelings, knowing that you’re helping the community. Brittany Ranew 25:34Yeah, and you got to do stuff that fills you up, you know, don’t fill ourselves up, we’re not going to be able to be the best for our clients. So D.J. Paris 25:43I could not agree with you more. Okay, I want to talk, let’s talk mindset. And there’s something very specific about mindset that we talked about mindset a lot on the show, and a lot of our guests, you know, reference it, and I almost don’t like the word anymore, because I feel like it’s just one of those words that gets used very, very often, without any real clear awareness of like, what does that actually mean? But I you have a particularly like, interesting story about how your minds how you identified a mindset issue, through your coaching, I’m guessing through Tom, the Tom Ferry coaching. But tell us a little bit about what was the mindset that was stopping you? And then how did you identify it? How did you first become aware of it, where you’re like, Oh, I’m doing this thing to myself? And then how did you overcome it? Brittany Ranew 26:28Yeah, I kind of fell into coaching it was, which I, you know, I don’t believe in coincidences. So I feel like God was like, Here, here’s your answer. So I, I have I’ve had a history of anxiety. And so when we moved here, that was a life trigger. And I was having a D.J. Paris 26:48that’s tough for people with anxiety moving to a new a new city where they know nobody that is brutal. Brittany Ranew 26:55I mean, you know, like I said, never lived anywhere else, because I went to school in mobiele. So, yeah, um, so yeah, so I started, you know, well, I went to therapy to help myself, you know, as I make the transition, which I highly recommend therapy. But getting back into real estate, you know, as I said, I started selling again in 2017. And I was just kind of struggling with, I couldn’t get any momentum, like, I just couldn’t get that traction and get over the hump of, like, I know, I can be a top producing agent, like I see it. I see that version of myself, but I can’t figure out how to get there. And I met a local coach through our chamber, because I’m really involved with the St. Pete chamber, and I met him just by happenstance. And he started probing and asking questions, and he made an offer, he was like, I feel like you could really benefit from coaching, would you be interested, and we, and that’s how we got started. And he helped me figure out that I was my own obstacle, like, it was all coming back. To me, it was limiting, limiting beliefs that I have. For myself, I couldn’t let go of that story of, well, I haven’t had much success before. So that’s just gonna be what it is. It’s just those like things that you get on repeat in your mind. I had a fixed I had a fixed mindset, I didn’t have D.J. Paris 28:17that sort of, sort of hobble somebody, when they’re, it’s like, I’ve always heard, like, whatever container you think your life fits in, is you’ll fill up that container, but you won’t go beyond it. And so same sort of thing with like, however long a task takes whatever amount of time you set for it, you’ll eventually just go to that whatever amount of time. So this idea of, of not even acknowledging or understanding that there’s this sort of box that’s limiting because, you know, there’s anxiety, there’s fear, there’s, there’s real feelings that are are coming up that are based in reality. It’s not like some people have anxiety that’s not based in reality, but yours obviously, is based in reality. So there’s a lot of reason to, to take that anxiety on because you’re like, No, this is a real thing that’s happening. How did you how did you start to move past that? Brittany Ranew 29:06You know, it’s just, it’s really tough work. It takes a lot of time to reprogram your brain. And you know what, like, with anything, you have to be consistent, and I think some people kind of, they’re like, Okay, cool, I’m gonna meditate and do some affirmations but then they don’t stick with it. It’s like you’re never gonna see the results if you don’t do it consistently. So through through my coach and also, I’ve been to ninja selling so I’ve done the ninja selling installation, which mindsets are really big part of what they teach. So learning some of those practices I would say from a daily basis really helped me so that morning morning routine of writing and reading affirmation, positive affirmations, meditation, you know, it’s really just it sounds it sounds so simple, but it’s not. But it’s like this, the basic steps that if you keep doing them over and over again, you will reprogram your brain because that’s how our brains work. You know, our non conscious brain can’t take a joke. So it’s going to whatever you feed it, it’s going to feed back to you. So if you keep feeding it positive stuff, eventually it starts to, you know, reprogram, D.J. Paris 30:21agreed, and there’s, most of our programming comes from mom and dad, when we were little, and a lot of it is just not helpful anymore. But it’s so deeply ingrained. And I think that’s where good therapy can kind of say, Okay, I see that you are running this old pattern that doesn’t really make sense anymore. Based on your family history. This makes perfect sense to a therapist, but to an individual, they might go God, how do I keep sabotaging? Or why am I keep? Why do I think I’m worthless? Or why do I think I can’t make it? Well, that’s because somehow you pick that up as a child from something or somewhere or whatever. And it just is unresolved, and it and it manifests and things like anxiety, and you know, certain types of behavior. I didn’t know I was an anxious, I mean, this is so funny, because everyone in my life knows me as an anxious person. I didn’t know that I’ve been in therapy for a million years, I just in the last two or three years have identified oh my gosh, I’m a really an anxious person. And I’ve had to learn how to self soothe and how to cope with anxiety and write it out and, and know that it’s not, it feels real. And it’s, it’s a real thing that’s happening to me, but it doesn’t mean that it’s actually happening in real life. Coming in, you know, so anyway, the point is, is that journey is a really important journey, I think, to go on, because you probably most people probably aren’t that aware of their limiting mindsets, or their limiting beliefs or some of these things. And, boy, if you can get out of your own way, life just gets a lot easier. Brittany Ranew 31:53Yeah, it, I always think about that, quote, Jim Rohn quote about, you know, your level of success rarely exceed your, you know, level of personal development or something like that. I’m not saying No, exactly. But that’s kind of what I realized was my spinning time on myself, then I was, you know, like I said, reprogramming, and it’s just, it’s that domino effect that snowball, it just starts to, you know, over time, work its way through, and it becomes like this repeatable consistent thing. And it’s almost like working a muscle, you know, you get that muscle memory and you get, it just becomes more natural to, instead of staying in the negative, you automatically flip to the positive. So it just, it just takes that repetition over and over and over again. D.J. Paris 32:48Yeah, it takes a tremendous dedication and a commitment. And a lot of you like you said, I, I consider it harder than digging ditches. But it’s it really is. I mean, it’s it takes a turn, and it’s exhausting to do. That being said, it’s really the most important work anybody can do. You know, take care of your feet, you take care of you’re not you I’m saying in general, we we think we want to take care of our physical health, I’m sure you do that as well. But you know, we don’t always think Well, I am going to the gym three times a week, what am I doing? For my mind? What am I actually doing to sort of explore and, and, you know, look, nobody’s mom and dad were perfect. So there are lots of wounds that every single person on this planet has, and you can start to identify and go into, and there’s, you know, all sorts of professionals that can help you sort of navigate those waters. But I’m glad you’re talking about it. I think that’s really, really important. And I every single person on our podcast deals with a some sort of level of anxiety, especially when they’re new to the business or they’re meeting you know, maybe they’re, they’ve never done a million dollar sale and they have their first listing presentation with, you know, somebody that seems like it’s Oh, I don’t think they’re gonna choose me. There’s a lot of that, that is totally normal. Totally. Okay. And there’s, there’s solutions that help through that. And then once you get through it, you realize, oh, that didn’t swallow me up. It didn’t kill me. Oh, I might actually be able to tolerate some of these. These these challenges. Let, I would love to talk about so you talked about the morning. And I know that Realtors there’s a book Miracle Morning that like every realtor loves yes, you’re a fan as well. How al Ron’s book, I have yet to meet anyone who was like, yeah, that just doesn’t work. So I’m going to assume on the 90,000 people that have told me about this book, and I’ve read it as well. That it is a really good idea. Can you talk a little bit about how you structure your mornings you talked about meditation, journaling, things like that, you know, are you still doing those things? Brittany Ranew 34:48Yeah, so with the ninja selling installation, it did. It taught me a lot about starting the day with gratitude. So gratitudes and affirmation was kind of my first, you know, way into having a morning group tene and I saw immediate results with that. Because again, you’re getting yourself out of a negative state by waking up watching the news or being on social media, but staying in a positive state. And then I would say in the past year, I learned about Hal Elrod and the Miracle Morning. And that took it to a whole nother level for me. So I’ve been doing the Miracle Morning for, you know, several, several months. And like there’s an app. So it’s, it’s easy to stay on top of, and, you know, just combining like a commitment to the gratitudes and affirmation, which was already important to me. But the silence which, you know, having like a daily devotional, reading my Bible praying, that’s another really big aspect for me, and the reading a book, you know, which is usually a personal, something personal development wise, and exercise. So it’s like, putting all that stuff together, was definitely took that to another level for me. So, D.J. Paris 35:58yeah, I think we’re talking about process, right? So we have now a process that you can follow each morning, it’s not wake up, and what do I feel like doing as much as before I start my day, I have these things that really help ground me, center me, and, you know, look, people’s look, all of our lives are chaotic, right? We have, we have things going on in our personal lives, we have things bouncing around in our heads, you know, with spouses, children, other financial situations, you know, all sorts of conflict and challenge. And those are things that just that’s just what happens, that’s just part of life. And those things can bounce around in my head at least, and I can wake up. And I, if I’m not intentional about what I’m focused going to focus on today, those anxieties about all of those things that are uncomfortable or scary to me really take the forefront and jump in front and kind of run the show and color, the way that I approach the rest of the day. So having this process in the morning that says it’s not that I’m avoiding those things, I’m going to take care of those things I’m going to you know, I’m not, I’m not being Pollyanna. But I’m also by the way, even though I don’t feel like doing it, right now, I’m going to journal or I’m going to meditate, or I’m going to pray or read or whatever it might be to help sort of you realize, you know, life has all sorts of ups and downs, and you, you can structure some some self care in that in that morning, and then you can tackle the anxiety and stuff later. So I just think that is such a brilliant strategy. So I applaud you for I need to start doing the Miracle Morning, I need to start doing it. Brittany Ranew 37:38It’s wonderful. And it helped me get get up earlier, because that was I struggled with that just like I don’t have kids. So I didn’t, you know, didn’t have that motivator to get up earlier with kids. Sure, I would find myself you know, sleeping in too long, just not like sleeping in really late, but just to where you feel like you’re starting the day behind, you know. And so that was, you know, getting up earlier than I had been, you know, like 645, which is to be able to get up way earlier than that. But for me, 645 was like, Alright, this is a milestone, I’m gonna do this. So that’s been that’s been great, because it’s just giving me time back, you know, I’m getting, getting my day setup, like you’re saying being intentional. And I think it does help. I think when you get your get your day started like that, it just helps the whole rest of the day, go way better and be able to tackle as they come comes your way. D.J. Paris 38:31I could not agree more. I told my girlfriend if she ever sees me or hears me and she hears me do this a lot. Go into like a negative rant where I’m like really fired up about something. If I’m going on too long, like it’s one thing to have an expression of anger or whatever or be upset about something that’s perfectly okay. I’m not here to tell people, they can’t have negative feelings. Because of course, you should have negative feelings that are really important. But if you’re if you if I said to my girlfriend, sometimes I get swallowed up a little bit in them. And I don’t realize that I’m really like, Okay, I’ve been going on for 15 minutes about something that’s like, just not that important. So I said, If you catch me doing that, can you just put your finger up in the air, and that’ll be my, my, my cue to stop what I’m saying. And immediately say, as bad as things seem right now, I got to list three things that are going really well in my life. You know, and it doesn’t mean the other thing that’s not going well is gone. It just means I’m trying to balance it and realize it’s not all bad. And it’s not all good. It’s kind of in the middle and I can acknowledge both things, but I have to get out of that repetition because I grew up, you know, in, in, you know, my family, lovely, amazing people, but they were more critical than you know, I would have preferred so I’m just kind of used to being super critical. So I have to have these little interruptions that go Hey, okay, you can be critical in a minute. But for now, let’s at least think about some things that are out actually going really well. So those are, Brittany Ranew 40:02you’re giving power to I mean, you’re right, you’re giving power to that, that negative negativity. And then it just becomes this monster, he’ll like, take takes over D.J. Paris 40:14can Yeah, it’s really awesome to be able to acknowledge something without giving it power. Like you’re like, No, I know you’re still there. And I know that still a problem. And I know we’ll we’ll figure out a solution, but it’s not going to swallow me up, it’s not going to take over my day, and it’s not going to ruin my day, I’m going to try to, you know, you know, try to keep persevere in the face of, of any sort of obstacle. And, and that’s where a good coach can come in, right? Like a therapist, a coach, somebody who can say, hey, I noticed you’re not doing this thing that would be really helpful for you what’s going on? What’s stopping you? Well, I don’t want to do it. Okay. And then you can start from there, you know, and kind of identify what’s what’s been what’s been missing. So I love all of this. I think this is so well said a quick. So I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about 2023. Because so I have a little bugaboo in the industry, because anyone who’s paying attention, not every market is this way, but most markets in the country, I just want to be really honest about it. I think this is going to be a tough year for realtors, it just as rates are high inventories low, let’s just, you know, for a lot of us, it’s it’s going to be a more difficult year than it was a year and a half ago. I think most of us would agree that’s a reasonable statement. It doesn’t mean it can’t be a great year, it’s just going to be a tough year. At least I think so. I am curious, what are you doing this year, to stay on top of it to stay active? Just you know, the markets shifted? And it’s changed? What are you doing to sort of stay on top of things so that you’re not like, again, just taking in all this? Oh, it’s gonna be a brutal year, and then sort of letting that not let you, you know, sort of take action? Brittany Ranew 41:57Yeah, I mean, I think one of the biggest things that I’ve learned last couple years is what what am I in control of, versus what am I not in control of? And we’re always in control, D.J. Paris 42:07or St. Francis, speaking back to prayers. Yeah. Brittany Ranew 42:11So we’re, we’re always in control of our thoughts and our actions. And what I fall back to, whenever I started to feel some of that negativity, like when we hear, okay, hey, it’s gonna be a tougher to Premier, you’re going to need to double down and do more to get kind of the same same results, is just getting an action. All right, I’m gonna get super focused on what I need to be doing. And I’m going to double down on which for me, I’m just focused focus on having more conversations. While that’s kind of my you know, that’s my focus for this year, and I always break things down into like, months and quarters. So because, again, want to be like super intentional and focused, and I don’t want to have like this overarching goal for the year and then not know what to do, I want to like strategize and make that actionable. So, you know, just having, having more conversations getting in front of people. And I think that also goes back to that brand, brand strategy. You know, I think some people when they hear negative news about the market, they just kind of stick their head in the sand, and then they stop doing things. And I choose to have an abundant mindset, I mean, so I’m going to keep moving forward, and I’m going to keep, you know, pursuing my marketing channels, I’m gonna have my podcasts gonna make videos, videos is a big part of that strategy for me this year, so I’m gonna keep putting myself out there. And there’s a there’s always a market and every market, there’s market, you know, like, there’s always people that are out there that have to buy and sell, it’s, it’s life, people move, you know, gotta live somewhere, location, people move, you know, obviously, marriages and unfortunately, negative things like divorce and, and people have passed away. So, you know, it just can’t stick your head in the sand, you got to get out there and take action. And it’s that it’s that snowball effect. Once you get that momentum, once you get going, it starts to, you know, roll roll faster and faster. So D.J. Paris 44:13and yeah, and I’ll give everyone who’s listening a couple of predictions that I pretty sure are gonna come true. That will make you feel a little better about this year number one, lots of agents are leaving will lead the industry. I know this because we own a holding company, which is for agents who are leaving the industry. And and we had within the last year, we’ve added 250 new agents to the whole, I mean, used to have 500 agents in it. And now it has almost 800 agents. And that’s just been within the last year and as much as that pains me to see people leaving the industry for people that are committed and still working in the business and on the business. It’s actually a really good thing for everyone who stays in because you can pick up some market share. Of course, lots of people will I have realtors that are still in the business that they, you know, there’s a lot of people that want to be up for grabs. And so if you can double down, especially and I love that you broke it down into the most sort of basic activity for you, which is probably the most important activity for all realtors, like, I would imagine, is having conversations. So do you have like a certain goal, you talked about having, you know, a certain amount per quarter or per month? Do you also have like a per day goals, like I really want to have X number of conversations per day? Brittany Ranew 45:29Yeah, I kind of have it by week. And really, I’ve always had that in the back of my head. But this year, I was like, I’m gonna track this, like, I have whiteboards in my office. And so I put up on the whiteboard, like, you know, these are the number of buyer and buyer and seller, like, you know, buyer consultation, seller listing consultation appointments that I want to have for this year. And then these are the amount of conversations that I want to have per week. So I’m like, just, you know, checking those off on the board, and for each week. So I you know, what gets measured gets managed. So it’s like, just having that in front of me. And a really visual way, I think it’s gonna help because I just like I said, it’s kind of known that’s there. And that’s a metric, but I’ve never really tracked it. So that’s, I want to D.J. Paris 46:18dive just a little deeper into your conversations, because I know, whenever we would we’ve ever we’ve had guests on the show, and they talk about conversations, I’ve always failed to ask this question. When you say conversation, what specifically are what what defines a conversation in your mind? Since you are measuring it? Brittany Ranew 46:37Yeah, I mean, to me, it’s just a meaningful conversation. So whether that’s me calling a client, a past client, and I have to leave a voicemail, because it didn’t answer, it still counts, because, you know, touching them, and it’s just having a meaningful conversation. So that or if I go to a networking event, I’m getting like 10 conversations at one time, you know, for the whole evening. D.J. Paris 47:00So it I’m sorry to jump in, does it have to be a real estate conversation? Or could it be anything related to just life in general, Brittany Ranew 47:08just having, you know, talking to someone like you care, they’re a real person, you know, hey, what’s, what’s going on with you? Do you have any vacation plans this year? Oh, okay. Your your daughter’s graduating, like just diving into life with people, because that’s how you build that rapport. I mean, in real estate always comes up at some point, because people love to talk about real estate, so you don’t have to worry about bringing up come up. Yeah. So just being a human, I think that’s what it comes down D.J. Paris 47:41to. But is it but isn’t that the best news of all that that is, all you have to do is show interest in someone demonstrate that you care about them? And you should, obviously, you should only do it authentically. If you do it authentically, it’s not going to work. But but it doesn’t have to be it doesn’t have to be this pressure of like, well, I know everything about the St. Petersburg real estate market. And I know every fact and figure, you know, maybe you do. But you know most agents don’t feel that way about their you know, the area they work and maybe they are like, Oh, if I talk about him, I might not have an answer for you. You don’t have to talk about real estate, right? Like you should know enough to be able to have a conversation that’s to keep to keep that going. But you can also, you know, I always love social media, I think is particularly good for this. Because if you see somebody who’s gone on vacation, you know, instead of just being the realtor that’s like, I just listed this home and I just sold this home and look at how cool I am. I personally that’s that’s that’s that doesn’t speak to me that sort of advertising. And I’m not putting people down. I’m sort of sounded like I was putting agents down who do that i really i that that is not what my intention is. And I think you should absolutely brag about your accomplishments. I think that’s an okay thing. But I like the idea of social media to go the other way where you could be like, Oh, I saw you just went on this vacation. Tell me about it. Brittany Ranew 48:59Yep. And people love that. Because then they course Oh, you care you actually paid attention. You know, people always want like, people want to talk about themselves, you know, they want to know that you’re interested. I mean, that’s how we work. So just showing interest in people and to your point of saying, like, do it authentically. I mean, that’s a huge part of it. And I just, it goes back to building a brand. It’s like, just be yourself. Like, you gotta be yourself. You can’t be afraid to be yourself. Because if you put yourself out there authentically, you’re going to Your vibe attracts your tribe, you’re gonna get people back, that are like minded like you. So I agreed, D.J. Paris 49:39and you’re right, there’s enough business for everybody. Even if agents aren’t exiting the industry this year, which they will be, but even if everyone was flooding into the market this year, and it was going to be twice as many agents. You know, people can still have incredibly successful years but I think this is the year of action. I think action will overcome on some of these, you know, again, to quote the prayer of St. Francis like things we can’t control, market conditions, etc. Those are things outside of our control. But what we can control is our effort and our action. And all all we really ever have to do as real estate agents is get people to know like, and trust us. That’s not an easy thing to do. But that is your goal. If you can, if people know like and trust you, they will choose you as their agent. Or they’re going to choose somebody they know like and trust and you want to be on that shortlist. So I think this is is just amazing. And so for everyone who’s listening, I want you to check out Brittany’s podcast. And if you’re like, Well, I don’t live in St. Pete, I don’t really care about the, you know, restaurants in St. Pete, that’s not the reason I want you to check it out. I want you to check it out to see what she’s doing and how she’s affecting her community. And why that might be something that you may want to consider for your local community. It is a brilliant strategy. This my podcast was based out of a very similar principle, which is I just want to provide value to other agents by talking to top agents like Britney, that was five years ago, I never I wasn’t sure if anyone would listen. And here we are now all these episodes later. And thankfully, we have incredible listeners and people who are really, really appreciative of what we do. And that’s not to put a feather in my cap. But it I will, what I will tell you is it is it has helped me in my business of recruiting agents. And I don’t use this to recruit agents. But obviously, we have almost 800 agents in our company here and a lot of them come over because they listen to our show. So yes, you will likely see a benefit to your business down the road. But boy, you’re going to help the community along the way. So check out Brittany’s podcast. Also, you know a lot of people retire to Florida why because state taxes are really really impressive. A lot of people move to Florida at some point in their in their lives. I’m in Illinois, so we have a lot of people who spend their like my parents, they spend basically their winters there now, and will probably eventually move moved down there for those tax benefits as well. So a lot of people move to Florida. And you probably know people in your sphere that are also moving. And you can connect with Brittany because you can say not only do I have a great Realtor in St. Louis, she actually hosts like this great podcast, where she’s like super connected to the whole community. She knows all the best areas, the best places to go and visit and she would be a great resource. So this could be a great referral source for you. So if you have clients that are considering making that transition, Brittany, what’s the best way an agent should reach out to you? Brittany Ranew 52:47Um, I would say shoot me an email if you’re an agent that will see it faster. So that’s Brittany dot renew at Premier ser.com. So that’s premier ser SAR short for sup dummies International Realty. Yeah, shoot me an email, follow me on Instagram, you know, send me a DM, any, any, any way. I would love, love to connect. D.J. Paris 53:11Yeah, and I just think I always love this idea of when you make a referral, you really want to know that the other person is going to take great care of the client. And you know, with the fact that you’re so integrated with the St. Pete community with, you know, different boards and just also with your podcast, I would be very comfortable without ever knowing how you’ve treated a client. I would be comfortable sending a client to you because I’m like, Oh, she’s really dialed in. She knows stuff. And she’s an important person in that community. Whether Brittany, whether you think you are or not, you know, I know that you are so so guys, this is how you can build you can build this exact same brand for yourself in your local community. And you can use things like podcasts video doesn’t have to be a podcast, you could do just video stuff on Facebook, but whatever you want to do be of service to your community. And, and you will find that over time people really really appreciate it. And you know, more business so if you have somebody that’s looking to move to Florida, Southern you know or Tampa, St. Pete Edgewater or Clearwater, rather, you know, any anywhere around that area. Definitely reach out to Brittany. And if she can’t help, she’ll know who to send you to. But she would be the first place that I would go. So everybody visit her website, you can find all things Brittany at Brittany renew.com. Again, that’s b r i t TANYRANEW. I’ll have a link to that in the show notes. also linked to her Instagram and social which is Brittany and renew Brittany renew realtor. And yeah, guys, check out what she’s doing. You can do this too. So, Brittany, on behalf of our audience, I want to thank you for your time you were an amazing guest had a lot of fun with you. And think I’m really grateful that you came on. So on behalf of everyone we say thank you to Brittany. And on behalf of Brittany and myself want to thank the audience for continuing to listen, support our sponsors, support our guests. And also please, the best way you can help us grow is just tell a friend. Think of one other realtor that is this is Look, guys, it’s a tough year 2023. I’d love to tell you it isn’t, but I think it is. So people need help this year. Let’s send them a link to our podcast. Obviously, it’s complimentary. We just want to get in front of as many ears or eyes as possible. And so we would appreciate that. So just send anyone you know, maybe you have somebody in your office that’s being feeling a little down right now, this would be a great opportunity to send them a link to this episode, haven’t send send them over to keeping it real pod.com Every episode we’ve ever done can be streamed right from a browser there. Or if they’re a podcast listener, just search for keeping it real, hit that subscribe button, we would appreciate it. And also support our sponsors are the reason we can do our show. So keep check out their goods and services and buy them all right, Brittany, thank you so much. It was a pleasure chatting with you and I am going to come and see you because I go down to that area three to four times a week. So our three to four times a week three to four times a year. And I go to St Pete every almost every time I go down there so I will definitely come by and say hi in person, I can take you to all the cool spots. So I apparently you can Yeah, I am excited for that. So anyway, Brittany, thank you so much. We will see everybody on the next episode.

Matt Kirkkegaard with Movement Property Group in Nashville talks about the transition from his career as a musician to real estate business. Matt talks about and explains his strategies and tools he uses as a real estate agent that has brought him success. Matt also discusses why he believes communication, cooperation and empathy are very important tools in building relationship with the clients. Last, Matt discusses a the motto “fail big to win big” and its importance. Please check out Matt’s Lift Up movement here. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! Matt Mirkkegaard can be reached at 615.933.9711 and matt@movementpropertygroup.com. This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks. Transcript D.J. Paris 0:00from living in his car to build a multi million dollar real estate team, how did he do it? We’re gonna find out today. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solution so that you can easily generate more business. There agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now on to our show. Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the largest podcasts made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris. I am your guide and host through the show and in just a moment, we’re going to be speaking with top producer Matt Kirkegaard. But before we get to Matt, just a couple of quick reminders one, the best way that you can help us grow is simply by telling a friend this is going to be a tough year 2023 In real estate right read what the economists are writing what we know other agents are experiencing out there. This is a tricky year. Let’s help our fellow Realtors send them a link to this episode and all of our episodes. They can be streamed right at our website, keeping it real pod.com And also if you are not yet a subscriber to our podcast, whatever podcast app you might be listening to us on whether it’s Apple podcasts, Google Play Stitcher, Spotify, Amazon, Pandora, etc. Hit that subscribe button and leave us a review we would really greatly appreciate it. Alright guys, let’s get right to it my conversation with Matt Kirkegaard. Today on the show, we have Matt Kirkegaard moved to property grid in Nashville. Let me tell you more about Matt. Now Matt Kirkegaard has been a Nashville resident since 2008. As a professional musician, he has lived and worked in every area of Nashville and the surrounding areas. He has a passion for Nashville and a passion for people. Matt and his team bring a deep level of simplicity and honesty to the buying process. They strive to make the process of buying a home an exciting one. Matt also started a program called Lift Up where 10% of his company’s profits go to the lift up Fund, which provides mortgage and rent relief for struggling families and individuals. To learn more about Matt and his company movement Property Group, please visit movement property group.com. And also follow him on Facebook, Instagram and Tiktok. Just search for movement Property Group, we will have links to those social platforms in the show notes. Matt, welcome to the show. Matt Kirkkegaard 3:41Hey, thanks for having me. D.J. Paris 3:43Yeah, super excited to to chat. But right, right before we were going live, I was telling Matt, the last time I was in Nashville was for the Eclipse. And I was like, Oh, were you there and you were in Puerto Rico and I was saying it was really a cool thing because I don’t know that most people knew this I certainly didn’t was that because we were at Nashville which was considered like a perfect latitude longitude, no point to be able to see the Eclipse. We we were able to safely take our glasses off and stare directly at the Eclipse only for a minute or so. But there because we were at that that one space, we were actually able to see it without glasses. And it really was I honestly I think it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. Aside from being in beautiful Nashville which is also just such a dream place to I always fantasize if I was going to move Charleston or Nashville. Anyway, enough about me. Let’s talk about you. Thanks for Thanks for coming on the show. And let’s actually I’d love to hear about how you got into real estate. I know you’re a musician, so and still a musician. So I’d love to hear about you know how you had you know the path you had through musicianship and also real estate and how you married the two. Matt Kirkkegaard 4:57Yeah, how long do we have I mean, flowers right? I mean, it’s it’s a it’s a kind of a crazy story I obviously as you said, I’m a musician I, I grew up musics kind of been my only most of my life, I started playing professionally I was nine. And so I’ve never known anything else. And so at school for music, I moved to Nashville for music. And, and for all intents and purposes, I really made it the music industry or started you know, kind of my my best selling music career and was on a good trajectory and moving forward really well and met a girl as all of these stories start married, said girl, and in our in our shortly after we got married, actually, we had a family member that basically stole a lot of money from us left us with a pretty intense amount of debt. And long story short, we lost our house, we were homeless for a year and a half and, and I say homeless, my wife’s corrected me many times on this, we weren’t fully homeless, we have lots of friends that offered up their couch or spot in their garage, or, you know, their driveway for our car or whatever. So we had, we had lots of lots of people who stepped in and took care of us during that season. But we were unable to we did not have our own space for a year and a half. And D.J. Paris 6:09you were still performing during that time. Matt Kirkkegaard 6:11I was yeah, some music was still the primary at that time, which, you know, I made Okay, money doing music, but not enough to recover loss like that. And this was, you know, pretty substantial. So we had, you know, an extraordinary hurdle to get over in order to even get us back to solvent and ground zero and pursuing a music career and a life as a musician of hard enough, let alone adding that to it, it just kind of became a non starter. And so I pivoted, a buddy of mine, at the time worked as a mortgage lender, he’s like, man, you should get your real estate license, and I’ll send you a deal once in a while and do the math and the money. As a musician, the money looks really great. And I was like, Man, I know a lot of people, if you are a musician, and you’ve made it as a professional musician in Nashville, Tennessee, you know how to network like nobody’s business. And so I know people and I’m relational. And I love diving into people in their stories. And so I found a buy or sell a house, I can help them with that. And that’s at least some money that I would not have had any other way. So I was of course, working about five days. And the way to do it really, yeah, just knock it out. D.J. Paris 7:12I always I always tell people who are taking their classes, I’m like, You’re gonna forget it anyway, you might as well forget it after the test. So do it as quick as possible. Matt Kirkkegaard 7:19There’s not a single thing in that class or in that education process that I’ve actually applied realistically in my career. And so anyway, sorry, State of Tennessee real estate exam, but it ended up just being something I could kind of blow through and then learn the practical side of it on the other side of it. But I just dove in. And again, I tell people all the time, you know, part of part of my success story is a factor when you don’t have another option. But for it to work, it has to work and you figure out how to make it work. And so I got very, very determined, very driven to figure out how to recover from this because the other side of this is, is that I really am passionate about music. And I knew music was where I needed to be in my career path. And, and I don’t have a long time to take my time recovering from this, I need to get to the other side of this and get back to music. And that really was my goal for the whole first part of my career. And then there’s been some shifts and some additions in there, which I’m sure we’ll get to but So ultimately, for me, it was out of necessity that this this kind of came up real estate was never on my on my purview. And it was just a mansion. And, and what’s amazing is, is I’m really grateful for that moment because real estate is such an incredible tool and vehicle as an agent, but also learning the investor side of it and how property ownership leads to wealth building and passive income. And there’s so many pieces of real estate that I never knew super countercultural in my from my world, my parents, you know, people that had given me financial advice up to that point in my mid 20s, I had heard very polar opposite advice from when I started being in the real estate industry watching investors who were making a lot of money. I started weighing those two things and realizing that there’s maybe another path here and a whole bunch of stuff that I didn’t know before that could help me become a little bit more financially solvent and still have the freedom and capacity to pursue music and do what I want to do there too. So anyway, that’s how my real estate career started and how it kind of developed there. D.J. Paris 9:11Wow. Well, there was lots I’d love to unpack some of that. So number one, I when you were talking about I know you’ve recovered since Otherwise, I wouldn’t make any joke at all, but I was like, well, at least it was a family member. Right? Sure. What if it can’t be family stealing? I don’t know. No. It’s awful, awful, awful. Matt Kirkkegaard 9:32It was it was really heartbreaking. And it was it was on top of a lot of other things. My wife and I there’s like the Barna statistics of the top 20 stressors and marriage experiences in a lifetime and we hit 18 of them our first year of our marriage. And so it really was just a hellish, hellish season for sure. And I can look back at that now and there are actually a lot of beautiful moments in there. My wife and I feel like we’ve been married for 40 years when in reality we’ve only been married. It’s probably D.J. Paris 9:55brought brought you both a lot closer together because you had to be Bantu Gather as a team and really, really figure life out when you were at this huge disadvantage. So in some ways it again, not that there’s that it’s a good thing. It’s not Matt Kirkkegaard 10:08the ideal. But the result of the less than ideal is that We clung to each other for survival, and we figured out how to move forward. And that doesn’t mean by any stretch that it’s been easy. And we’ve had an immense amount of hard in our marriage, I think they’re just too hard. Every everything worthwhile is hard. Yeah. However, through a lot of counseling, a lot of therapy, which we’re still going through, I need to proponent of therapy. We are recovering from the trauma and we are still married and still trying to fight for something we believe in. So, but I do think that that that early part of that definitely. It got us real real fast with each other got us real with ourselves real fast. And I figured out what it looks like to believe in yourself when honestly, no one else does, or no one else can, because there’s nothing to believe in at the moment in that way. So you just kind of just charge forward. And again, when you have to do it, you don’t have an option but to do it, you do it, you figure it out. You know, D.J. Paris 11:05it is it is like that. It’s that expression, what is it necessity is the mother of invention. In which is absolutely, it’s it’s it’s like it’s so interesting when, because people will call me a lot who are in the process of getting their real estate license. And they’ll ask that the biggest question, I think that people like me who are recruiters get from people who are entering the business is, well, I, I want a steady income. So I’m gonna stay part time for now. And what do you think about that? And I, it’s I always say, well, nobody can give you the right answer. I said, however, people will tell you that there’s no way to do it part time. And that full time is really the only way. And while in theory, I think that probably is the right approach for most people. I have seen people do it part time, but the people that do it part time because they want that steady income from their previous you know, their current job, I understand that I get that. But I think what you’re saying actually does so tend to bring out the best of somebody when you cut off the the the lifeline and you’re like, I’m just going to make this work. I’m going to figure it out like you guys were in that forced to situation. It does actually seem to get make people more resilient, and they’re able to sort of find resources, when they have that lifeline. It’s harder, I think to access that drive, when you’re trying to do two things at once. Not to say that you can’t be done. I’ve had people on the show, who started part time for years and was able to then eventually become a top producer. But I think that I think that extends the journey by doing Matt Kirkkegaard 12:37my argument therapy is that those years that they weren’t a top producer would have been erased had they just gone full in parallel to music per minute. I like I said, I’ve done music my whole life. So that really is my background. I went to school for music in Los Angeles. And my first day of freshman one on one class. This was a commercial commercial music business class, I was a commercial music major with a piano performance emphasis. And first day music business one on one, there’s 68 freshmen in this class. And the professor comes in kind of blows through the doors, doesn’t really even introduce himself just kind of sets his briefcase down and says how many of you guys have a plan B. And my immediate thing is, oh, well, this is where I get the lecture about how I need to have a plan B because music is so unstable, and you’ve got to have a backup plan, blah, blah, and I have a vendetta against Plan B’s. And that has never been me. So I didn’t raise my hand really ready to fight this fight. Like you don’t have a plan B when you’re a musician. And And oddly enough, 38 kids rose raise their hands with their Plan B’s and he dismissed him from the class. He said, If you have a plan B, you will end up taking it you probably should end up taking it and honestly you’re wasting my time and yours. So there’s the door. And obviously a little nicer than that. But at the end of the day, he he made a comment after you’re left, but the people make it music are the ones who will make it or die trying. And those are your options. There’s no option. There’s no other plan D because music is a notorious notoriously difficult career to enter into. And it’s going to take everything you’ve got to get there. I would say that’s true with entrepreneurship, with leadership with ownership with any company, any of that, that’s the reality is that if you are not willing to literally risk it all and put 100% of it on the line, then that doesn’t happen. And it’s not going to happen until you’re ready to do that. And so trying to weigh some sort of safety net of steady income or whatever, and then still trying to start something else. Even if you’re one of the lucky few who kind of balanced that and get to someplace where that happens. It’s going to take an extraordinarily it’s going to take a much longer period of time to get there than if you just are 100% You’re going to get it down here and move on, which is why entrepreneurs, clinical entrepreneurs, you know, Elon Musk’s and Steve Jobs and these big folks, clinically, they do something they started, they get it running and they move on to the next thing and firing people to run the thing for them. Because at the end of the day, the folks that are able to do that, or the ones that are just 100% they’re gonna establish something and then I can move on to the next thing. And so I think that I think for me getting thrown into that, already having my background in music my wife and I are both notorious risk takers as is so we’re not we have no risk aversion anyway. But there was just that was an easy transition for us to be right in that right in that mix and just go for it D.J. Paris 15:07reminds me speaking of like a musical metaphor that I think speaks to what you were just saying I was, I don’t remember who the musician was who did this. I don’t know if it was a violinist, and I don’t know if it’s at Pearlman or I don’t think it was him. But if somebody else some super famous violinist considered best in the world, you know, 2030 years ago, whatever. Anyway, so there was that somebody was at a party in New York, ran into this person, and was like, Oh my gosh, I’m such a huge fan. I wish I could play the violin like you are. I think it was violin and maybe it was cello, yo, yo, Ma, or something, whatever. It doesn’t matter, somebody super famous. And you know, I’m totally miss remembering who the person was, but doesn’t matter. Because what the person said was, so So the someone went up, I wish I could play like you. i Oh, no. He said, I give my life to play like you. That’s, that’s what the fans said. And he goes, No, you wouldn’t? Because he goes, Yeah, exactly. He goes, No, you wouldn’t, because I did. And he goes, You don’t, you aren’t. And he wasn’t trying to be mean, he was like, You don’t understand, like, this is all I do, this is what I do. And, you know, I, and he’s like, if you’re willing to give up everything else, then yes, you could probably play like me. And that’s, and that’s not to say that you can’t have balance in your life. Obviously, everyone, we should strive for that. And having, you know, personal and professional, you know, balance with with our activities. That being said, it is like one of those things, you dive in you, you cut off all other options. And even if it doesn’t work, I still think the lessons learned from putting in a solid, you know, attempt will then lead you to the next thing, even if that Matt Kirkkegaard 16:43failure is never an it shouldn’t be a negative. No, you’re it’s just simply a stepping stone, it’s a learned how not to do something when they go do it differently and do the game. And I think you said balanced. And I’m definitely a big proponent of balance, I am anti workaholic, for sure. And you have I think you need to really align your priorities and figure out what takes priority in your life. And of course, for me, my family is a huge priority my kids and and that there’s nothing real estate or music, actually, that will ever take precedence over them at the end of the day. But, but in that, I think that you, I still think that the things that you’re going to put yourself to, you’re going to find more success in those things, if you’re willing to put yourself 100% into those things and be fully present and fully there. And 100% committed. And taking the safe route almost always keeps you in the safe zone, which is which is some sort of a mediocre, not mediocre in a bad way. But mediocre mid level average zone, the people that get above that are the ones that are willing to kind of take risks to get there. So I think risk is the key component to this no matter where you are. And that doesn’t mean you don’t prioritize things that are important. It just means that you’re willing to jump into those things. Those other things that you do full, full force at first. D.J. Paris 17:53I think too, there’s there’s an aspect, I’m curious to your thoughts on this. There’s an aspect of getting comfortable with failure. And I don’t mean failure, obviously, we’re talking about feedback, you know, things that aren’t the ideal outcome that you’re shooting for, you know, just doesn’t work. I call it failure. But I don’t put a connotation on that that’s a bad thing. I just call it all that didn’t work. Well, it’s called did things that didn’t work, I’ll say that. It’s Oh, I think the most successful people I know are ones who are like, Well, that just like you said, it didn’t work, I learned from it, I’m going to try something else. And it’s a really simple idea. But it’s very difficult for a lot of us to sort of get comfortable with that discomfort of like, Oh, I really went for this and it didn’t turn out. So now I have like you were saying with your business and you’ve pivoted multiple times, and you’ve had to pivot obviously, with your living situation. And that’s, you know, that’s obviously a very, very serious and difficult stressful thing. This idea of being able to, to just be present for some of these, these feelings, and then go oh, okay, I’m sad that something didn’t work out. And, you know, the in the way that I wanted, but I’m going to really take it as feedback. And then and then just keep going forward and moving, I think is, you know, into a different direction, possibly. But I think it’s important to get comfortable with, you know, things not working out the way that you would anticipate them. And so that way, you can just, you know, I mean, probably 80% of the as a marketing guy 80% of the things I do don’t provide the results I’m really looking for. But yeah, it but I think Matt Kirkkegaard 19:23it’s a numbers game. And at the end of the day, I think you have I think I think far too many people give far too much time and emotional energy to a failed attempt. Yeah. I think that I think that those things come and oh, man, that stings. Okay, back to the drawing board. It should be a pretty quick roll off to keep going forward and move forward. And I think if you devote a lot of time and energy, you lose any momentum you did have and then you’re always starting from square one or you’re square zero. Whereas if you can roll that off, you can still capitalize on some of the momentum and keep moving with that death. And I think that becomes and again, it doesn’t matter who you are you ask anybody in the world who’s found any measure of success in any discipline, they’re gonna say that their path to that success, has 80% of the time been, oh, I failed. And I kept going. Like, that’s the that’s the point, right? It’s how it works. And again, I think part of me as a musician comes with that. And it’s such a natural thing because I was in front of juries, and on stage getting judged for my playing since I was nine. Right. So I, I there was always that, Oh, that wasn’t great. Here’s how you do it better. Oh, great. I’ll go learn to do better and blow you away next time. I mean, there’s just never, that was never a problem for me. I have a colleague, I won’t mention his name. I say colleague, because he’s, I’m not a huge, huge fan, per se of some of them. But all that to say he went bankrupt a millionaire three times, and to get to his multimillion dollar world right now. He was bankrupt three times back to millionaire and so he did the bankrupt to millionaire low three different times. And third, fourth time theoretically, got to millionaire and a stay there. But I appreciate that story. Because at the end of day, that’s just kind of what it is. It’s a numbers game, you’re gonna fail, it’s gonna happen fail big win big. Yeah, as an investor, I buy a lot of we do a lot of investments. And I challenge champion a lot of clients to be investors in the market. And I always say two out of 10 times, I’m going to break even maybe make a little bit of money. Five out of 10 times, I’m going to make some money, and three out of 10 times, I’m going to make a lot. And so then overall, in the course of 10 deals, I’ve made a lot of money. And I find that a lot of my investor friends tend to, I’m going to have one investor right now he’s been wanting to invest in Nashville for four years and hasn’t pulled the trigger on anything yet, because he’s too scared to lose any money. And I’m like, bro, you could have bought anything four years ago, and you would have made money didn’t matter, like so I think that at some point, you just gotta go for it. And man, you win some you lose some, but as long as you grow and learn and win more than you lose, yeah. D.J. Paris 21:44Well, that and I think there’s, there’s really even something deeper about the example you gave about the gentleman that that went broken millionaire, you know, three, three different times, is you could take all that person’s money away tomorrow, it’s already happened to him several times built, and he’s built it back up. And so he he is not worried about well, he’s probably worried about failure in the sense of he doesn’t want to lose what he’s built. But it’s happened to him. And he’s like, Oh, I know how to do this. I know how to build up from nothing, you know how to build from nothing, you have done that. And that is I mean, that in and of itself, it’s not something that can easily be taught, it sort of has to be lived and Matt Kirkkegaard 22:22exiled, or cut through it. It just says exactly that. But what it does is there’s a ton of freedom in that. And I wish I could communicate that freedom to someone that hasn’t experienced it, because that would allow them to launch without having to go through it. But I’m not totally sure that’s actually possible. But that is a huge part of where my story is, is the fact that I’m actually not scared of losing it all. Because I’ve been there done that. And so I lose it all. I’ll figure out how to figure it out again, like I just I’m not scared of that. Therefore, it allows me a lot of freedom to go take those risks and dive in headfirst into things that I believe in. And, you know, so I think that’s a huge part of it. I think you’re absolutely right. If you can get past the fear of losing it all and understand that there’s there’s freedom and safety in the fact that you’re gonna be able to keep going. There’s no, the worst case scenario is not really worst case right now. Like, it opens, it opens you up to keep going forward, you know? D.J. Paris 23:09Yeah, well, at least in this country, we have a lot of opportunity. And we’re very fortunate to live in a country where there is a lot of economic opportunity for people that absolutely are disadvantaged, not that it’s easy, of course it is not. And we should have empathy and compassion for people who don’t, you know, have have a lot of resources. But but the but it is amazing. I’m always so amazed at people who just do it. And you’re right, it seems I’ve had a lot of them on my show over the years, you’re not the first person that has told me they slept in their car. And when I mean, it’s, it’s like, they just go well, I just didn’t have another option so that I just put everything I had into it. And and it’s it’s that it’s that gift of desperation. It really is, in some ways a gift. Not a fun ride. But it is it is a ride that’ll get you there. If you can stay in the car the whole time. Matt Kirkkegaard 23:57I think it usually proves something about yourself to yourself. When you’re in that desperation place, and you get out of it, you look back at yourself, and you’re like, oh, I don’t I can do that. I’m not scared of my own ability to do that anymore. And I think people I just was having conversation with one of my one of my girls that works for me yesterday. And we were just talking about how sometimes she she second guess herself, she’s wildly skilled, she’s wildly talented, but she doesn’t necessarily believe in herself a lot. And that hinders her from really stepping into some of that and knowing her value as she presents herself. And I was like you’re wildly valuable. You have a ton of skills, you know, you’re you’re you have to believe in yourself. 100% Even if no one else does, and the gift of desperation. I like how you said that oftentimes give someone the ability to believe in themselves. Because you did no one else was going to do it at that point. Right? You have to believe in yourself to get there. So and D.J. Paris 24:48I want to I want to honor you for something that you just said because I think what you just said really highlights why you’re I would assume a very effective and a Boston mentor, because it’s something you just said that I wonder how many of our audience members have heard this from their managing broker? Where use you sat somebody down, you know, this, this woman who works with you, who is maybe not feeling super confident or struggling with, you know, her own capabilities? And you’re like, oh, no, you’re super talented. You’re super skilled, like you can do this. I don’t think that’s all that common. I think there’s a lot of training that goes on at brokerages. I mean, we we certainly do it at our brokerage, there’s lots of training, and there’s lots of here the skills, here are the activities, but to be put to put to actually say to somebody, you’re super talented, you have this, I actually think that’s pretty rare. And I want to honor you for saying that, because I bet that was exactly what she wanted or needed to hear in that moment. And for you to, to to give her what she needed. I think that is a very special thing that you say I think it’s very vulnerable to say that, and I think that probably meant a lot to her. And I would encourage anyone who’s listening, who is a managing broker who runs a team who has people, right now we know it’s a tough time, you know, rates are up, inventory is down, people, brokers or realtors are struggling. So this is a great time to make sure that people that are struggling on your team do know how valuable they are to you and how skilled they might just be. Maybe they’re feeling down, but you could maybe lift them and I think I just want to honor you for doing that. That’s that’s, Matt Kirkkegaard 26:20that seems so obvious to me. Maybe I suspect, I figured you would say right. But But that being said, I’ve watched a lot of team leaders bulldoze their their teams before and have the looming boss mentality and squish you down until you submit and do it. And I just think that that’s not ever working. I take leadership actually is the lowest position on my team. So we usually invert the whole org chart, and I’m at the bottom, and my team’s at the top. Because at the end of the day, they at the end of the day, I’m not going to be able to do what I do without them at this point. And I think one of the things you have to understand about people in general, and maybe this is where my this is probably where I’m I know that I’m a little bit unique in this aspect, because I get told that from my partners on a regular basis even but I I am wildly empathetic, I’m very much a relational person. So that’s what I do, I dive into relationship and I will I will give my I will give myself under the bus to ensure that someone else thrives. And in stepping in with people listening to their story, hearing where they’re at hearing who they are, I would challenge anybody trying to build a team or any brokers, managing individuals, leaders, anybody leading anybody else. Understand that the people and you not only are wildly talented and really skill set, actually really skilled, their skill set their talent, their value is something you could never bring to the table. At the end of the day, I have a skill set that I bring to the table that’s very valuable. I don’t doubt that at all. However, the other people that I work with have a skill set that they bring to the table that I do not have. And I need to know that they do something better than me, and that’s okay. My team members under me do things better than I do. That’s okay. That’s not that’s the point. That’s why teams work at the end of the day is because other people do things better than you do. Everyone did everything as good as me and I just happen to be the one in the driver’s seat just a matter of time before someone jumps in the driver’s seat and takes over me. D.J. Paris 28:10Well, normally I wait till the very end to say this, but I want to say it now. While I think the iron is still hot. Basically, I think what you’ve demonstrated to a lot of our audiences Boy, I wish I had a managing broker or a team lead like that. So if anyone is in the Nashville area, I you know, might as well do it now because I honestly think, you know, you spoke from the heart I think I think it was a very unique sort of value proposition in a sense and and talking about how you relate to your team members and the support you provide to them. If anyone out there is working in the Nashville area, and maybe you feel like you’re not getting that kind of support, or, or encouragement or empathy or help from your existing I guess they’re called Managing brokers in Tennessee, I’m guessing, but whoever team lead, whatever the person in charge, if you’re not getting that, you know, reach out to Matt, you can go to movement property group.com He would love to learn more about you and see if you might be a good fit for his his company. I know we haven’t talked much about the business yet. But what you just said was was a lot of really impressive things. And right now we know realtors are in recruiting mode because the markets down they’re starting to look around, maybe see what other options exist. So if you’re in the Nashville area, go to movement property group.com We can learn more about Matt and his company and maybe be a good fit for them. Matt Kirkkegaard 29:27Yeah, absolutely. Well, come on. I’m a huge coffee fan. So I’ll buy you a cup of coffee every time. Just let me know. D.J. Paris 29:34So speaking of being the market being having shifted, of course from 2021. We noticed here we’re in Chicago, we noticed that we have about 700 Some realtors that are at our company and we had a pretty good first three quarters of last year and then the final quarter was kind of where everything changed and fell apart and we’re now you know doing about half of what we were doing prior a year ago, which again to be under to be, you know, that seems like it makes sense based on what happened in the market, but certainly an uncomfortable place. And I, I’m pretty active with the realtor community here locally and I talked to a lot of agents outside of our company. And there seems to be top agents seem to be like, everything’s just gonna be fine. agents who are struggling or newer are feeling a little discouraged and down, I think right now and also isolated. And I that was another reason why I want to add that back to the sort of commercial I was giving for free for your group, because I think you probably you would be an amazing boss to work for. But I also think that if you feel alone right now in this industry, and you’re not getting that personalized attention, this would be another reason to maybe reach out, because you seem like you’re able to provide some guidance, not Matt Kirkkegaard 30:47on my team just have a cup of coffee, I’m all about it. I think that’s important to someone else, you know. D.J. Paris 30:52So how are you keeping your agents motivated? Right now, obviously, the market has shifted, it’s changed. It’s not quite as as busy as it was, although we hope that that changes this later this year. So what are you telling your agents to keep them you know, sort of on track? Matt Kirkkegaard 31:12I mean, I come at this, I’m a very bullish person in this type of a market. This doesn’t scare me at all. In fact, I’m really I’m actually great with it. Me and one of the other partners I have, we were both very tellers, top 100 agents. So we’ve spent a lot of time in the room with Gary Keller, if you don’t know, Gary Keller is Keller Williams, Millionaire Real Estate guru, a billionaire real estate agent, but brilliant, brilliant, brilliant businessman, and he has a really good pulse on things. And he thinks outside of the box. And I always get a lot from those times with him. But he wrote a book called shift and he talks about shifting markets and how basically, there’s just as much opportunity to capitalize on business now as there was a year and a half ago, like there’s it just as a different business, it’s a different type of market. And you’re you’re looking at a different skill set a different, you know, your day to day looks different. For our team, I you know, Nashville is unique, I have to give that preface because Nashville has its own ecosystem anyway, doesn’t rise with the rest, the country doesn’t follow the rest of the country. And currently, Nashville is the number one market in this country to move to. And so we’re a little bit insulated from some of that. So to be honest with you, we, we felt a little bit of a slowdown in September and October, we were back up in November and December to our normal numbers, and we’re, you know, exceedingly beating those numbers this year. So I don’t see. So that’s also that’s part of this. However, the conversation rates and stuff is is right now we have. And I think in any market, you’re gonna have a lot of real estate agents that exit the business, which for anybody that staying in the business is fantastic, because it just gives you awesome, right? Yes. So the people that are going to be able to stay in the business and watch all the people leaving and make sure you will call their friends and say, Hey, I do you have an agent, because your your previous agent may have left, and I would love to buy your coffee and take over and you take over that business and take that market share. So we’re really preoccupied with taking market share this year, as a lot of folks are leaving. I think the conversation is also I try to somewhat control the narrative a little bit. When the rates started going up, and inflation started going up. And things were kind of having a heading down, there was a good half of the community builders, bankers, you know, ellos, and real estate agents that are the sky is falling, we’re heading towards total economic collapse, and they just read all of this massive amounts of fear that the sky is falling. And what that does is that that that spews all of that to clients and buyers and sellers, and they’re like, Well, I don’t need to move and I’m too terrified, because everyone’s saying the sky is falling. I try to be a little bit of a voice of reason and and bring some data to support the other side of that and say it’s not falling. We’re in this type of a shift. And this is what it looks like we’ve done it lots of times in the past, we’ll do it again. And we’re fine. We’re not on the bar upgrade brink of global economic collapse, we’re just not there. I have I can’t tell you the amount of my daily conversation has been with people who are basing all of their fears on a 2008 meltdown. And I continually try to bring data to the table again and be the voice of reason in 2008 was not due to an economic recession. It was not due to to, you know, massive inflation or any of this other stuff. 2008 was due to wildly unethical lending practices subprime mortgage fraud at the end of the day, and it finally caught up with everybody and we had to pay for that. And so that’s what 2008 was. This is not 2008 this is a typical market shift. And in six of the seven last, the previous typical market shifts, properties are still appreciated, houses still sell, and so I just am not. So I try to arm myself with as much data and facts as I can to bring those conversations to the table bring a little bit of balance and reason to everybody. I have a few people in the market that are experts that I usually I always stayed very very finger on because they’re always going to bring a lot of really good data to the table that is above and Beyond my, above my paygrade, but good data that I can then bring to my clients and I say, Hey, listen, here’s some really, really great financial advisors, economic experts that are saying, This is what we’re looking at, here’s what you can expect. Here’s what this means for us. And then the second piece of that is then I pitch why I pitched in this season, what that means for you. So while right now for Nashville, what that means across the board is that while yes, rates are higher, and you will pay a little bit more sellers are getting mask mass credits and mass discounts right now. So while you might pay a little, so I’ll take that right. And I’ll say, Sure, we were 3% last year, and we’re at 8%. Now, the difference in that is going to cost you an extra $10,000. This year. However, the seller of this house that I’m selling right now that we just showed is willing to give you a $35,000 credit, which means that that would never have happened six months ago, six months ago, we were eight months ago, conceptually, we were pricing above market value, things were selling $100,000 higher than that with no appraisal, zero concessions and 00 movability from a seller. So at the end of the day thing, your foundation is broken, sorry, it’s on you to fix like at the end of there’s nothing and so I’m telling you, I’m telling my buyers, right now, it’s fantastic time to buy, because the rates are gonna go back down, you’ll be able to refinance in a year and you get a property for the actual market value with the $35,000 seller concession. And they’ll probably fix all the stuff that comes up on the repair proposal. Let’s buy the house now, refinance next year, and you’re gonna be in a better situation in a year than you would have been if you’d bought eight months ago. Yeah, D.J. Paris 36:37yeah, because number one, it was probably certainly overpriced because or most likely would have been overpriced due to multiple offer. Yeah, and, and even though, like I’m locked into a 3% rate, and I need to, I need to make sure that I don’t think of myself as well. Now, I can never move, because and I think, I think I think Realtors would do themselves a huge favor in really understanding the mentality of the 3% mortgage. Because most of the people who own a home refinance in the last several years or purchased a home at a low rate, those people are thinking, I don’t want to move because I don’t want to lose that rate. You as a realtor like you need to be armed with data, and in and just education to say, here’s how it could work if you were to move. And here’s why it’s not quite as ugly as it might appear Matt Kirkkegaard 37:27well, and understand all of the other nuances that come into play. One of my favorite things that has worked so well is I have really fantastic partners. So I have four different lending partners that I refer to all the time. My primary lender guy is one of the top in the southeast, but I have local banks and the credit union and another banker that do really specific things. So I go to a lot of my sellers. And I’m like, Okay, let’s do this, let’s turn you into a real estate investor, let’s keep your 3%. Right, let’s pull your money out on a HELOC. Let’s go buy another property that you want to buy. And this property is going to pay for that property. And you’re gonna refinance the property here, how to properties cash flowing, paying for your to live for free. And there’s so many of those opportunities right now to tell people about what it means to become a real estate investor. And now, yes, you have one property at 3%, which you get to hold on to that rate. But there’s all of this other opportunity to still do what you want to do to move forward in life to get the next house to become an investor to build whatever it is. There’s all those opportunities that you can do. And some of that’s being armed with the right tools and understanding what those tools are that you have at your disposal, which sit down, I do this probably on a two by weekly basis, I sit down with my lenders with my bankers, and I say, tell me what you’ve got right now. And all of them have really unique opportunities and unique products right now to meet the market demand. One of my one of my lenders, and this is great, is offering basically they prepay for the refinance, ultimately. And so I’m offering so they’re buying the property and they’re getting a free refinance within the next two years. That’s all we’re planning on. We’re planning on rates being down in the fives this year, I think and probably for us next year. And that’s kind of iffy, but that’s probably where we’re planning on. So at the end of the day, you can ultimately get your get your house now get the seller credits to cover all the difference and then some and then you you have literally have a zero posture refinance, when the rates go, D.J. Paris 39:09that’s amazing. That isn’t and and that’s just you staying in touch with your lenders going Hey, guys, what do you got right now? Matt Kirkkegaard 39:16Absolutely. And then helping present that to my clients because they don’t, usually lenders are a little more data driven, they’re a little bit more numbers, so they’re a little bit less personable. So then it’s me being able to interpret that data and walk through it really slowly and gently with my my buyers or sellers and say, here’s some opportunities that we have. We we’ve done a lot of right buy downs, we’ve got three to one buy downs right now happening. So rates are at seven, you buy down 3% For the first year 2% For the second year, 1% For the third year, and that’s all part of something the seller pays for. And then you refinance by the time that that goes back up and again, you save yourself money. So at the end of the day, the rate doesn’t have to be a scary thing. There’s lots of ways around it. Having a house with a 3% rate doesn’t need to lock you into that house for the rest of your life. There’s lots of ways to still make the moves you need to move your house I had one of one seller climb and they would they called me actually to list their property because they have grown out of their property. And they actually love their neighborhood there. They love their kids school, which they can walk to from their house, they brought other kids home to this house, they absolutely love this house. And their dream would be to be able to renovate it, add a little bit face to it, but they just can’t afford it. And so I talked myself out of the job, and I sat down with him. And I said, Hey, here’s, here’s, here’s what I think. I think you take the $500,000 in equity you have in this house, I think you get that and a HELOC. And then I think we’re gonna go buy some investor properties, that’ll cash flow that you’re going to take on and 50 of that and do the renovation in addition to your house, and these investment properties that you’re doing are going to pay for that renovation, and you’re going to be at the same cash monthly cash flow that you are right now. Long story short, that’s the that’s the route we went. So I talked myself out of a listing, but I talked myself into three investment purchases, and they get to stay in their house, they get to do the addition. And who are they telling everybody about, you’ve got to go talk to Matt, he has options you don’t even know exist. So it’s about arming yourself with the options and how to creatively get around people’s problems. And that starts with listening to people knowing their story, knowing what their pain points are, but then figuring out creative solutions to be able to get around those pain points and knowing the tools you have in your your back pocket. And by way of lenders and banks and options for them to be able to do the things that they need to do this market this is the perfect market for that. D.J. Paris 41:15Perfect. Yeah, yeah, I could not agree more. I think what we’re really talking about is education and real Realtors realizing the marketing and branding. That’s one part of your business. But continuing education, I don’t mean to be every two years thing that you have to do for your state your license, I mean, regular studying the market, and also studying what other people are doing to pivot and, and compensate for some of the deficiencies in the market. You know, and it’s really as set I mean, this podcast was birthed out of me think look thinking of, you know, top Realtors in the country going, I wonder how they did that. And I said, I wonder if I ask them if they, if they tell me on a on a podcast, there’s really nothing in it for them other than the time when I first started, right, like no listeners. Now we have, thankfully a lot of listeners. But back then I was like, I don’t think anyone’s gonna want to do this, because there’s literally nothing in it for them. And sure enough, I was I think we got turned down once or twice out of hundreds of times. So it’s one of these things where anybody could you can reach out to the top agents in your area, not everyone’s going to reply, but say, Gosh, I really admire you, I admire what you do. I would love to take you to coffee, and just get a better understanding. And you will, I think what you’ll usually find is that they have more information than you have. Matt Kirkkegaard 42:31And here’s what I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you that if if someone turns you down for a coffee date like that, at that type of request, they’re not actually a top agent in the area. They’re a mid to high level agent. But mid high level agents tend to be like no, my business I do it. The top agents are like, yeah, let me help you. There’s no secret. All of that. Yeah, we’ve been through this long enough that we know there’s plenty of business for everybody. Let me sit down to help you figure out your business. Oh, and what does this relationship do for me as well? Because I can, you know, you never know who you’re gonna meet and what that’s gonna lead to as well, either. So, D.J. Paris 43:01yeah, it’s a, it’s a great thing. Because number one, you’re not really bothering them. If they don’t want to go to coffee with you, they won’t. But the ones that do are smart, because they’re going to think, well, maybe this person might join my team, or this person might join my brokerage. Or maybe I can just be of service to this person and give them something and then they’ll have a positive feeling. You know, it’s just, top agents are generous. In my experience, this whole podcast, for the most part, for the most part. Yeah, there’s Matt Kirkkegaard 43:26exceptions. Absolutely true. D.J. Paris 43:28Yeah. And, and, you know, I think this is actually a really I know, we didn’t get to as much of your story as I as I would have liked to. However, I think this episode in particular, we’ve done 400, and I don’t know, 50 episodes or so. This is a really good episode. And I hope i Yes, because I think what what we talk, what I think came through very well and very eloquently, was how you think about the industry, how you think about managing your team, how you think about working with buyers and sellers, investors as well. It really just sort of your overall attitude approach and strategy, I think came through really, really well. And if for nothing else, listening to Matt say I am not worried about 2023. And you probably shouldn’t be either, but you should be paying attention to what successful agents are doing in the area. This is this is a great opportunity, when times are slower to reach out to some of those agents and really get some of those those coffee dates set up. And even even if you just want on one of those a week. I imagine if that I mean, that’s so funny. You’ll appreciate this. But back when you were not a top producer and you were not you know running your own business. Can you imagine the amount of of information you would have gotten just once a week you would have taken a top producer for a year to to launch it, it would have been incredible. Matt Kirkkegaard 44:49Oh, for sure. Well, I tell people, I tell people my team all the time. One of the things that I did do that I create a lot of SSS for is I probably took about 60 Coffee days a week. I would go to a coffee shop and I would sit there, and I would introduce myself, everyone in the coffee shop. And I would do that multiple days, multiple times a day, every single day of the week, just because I want to meet people. And so now, to your point, had I gone back and taken one of those days and actually met with other top producing agents, that probably would have been wildly valuable. But at the end of the day, meet people meet everybody you meet, because they’ve always got something to offer, everyone has something to offer, everyone has some piece of wisdom, everyone has a story. And at the end of the day, there might be business or there for you there as well. And it always begins with this relational kind of organic level. But um, everyone’s got something to offer and that space for sure, too. So yeah, go to coffee dates with everybody, you can go to coffee dates with for sure. D.J. Paris 45:35And I want to I want to back up one second, because what you just you also just said something that is very, very profound. And probably people’s anxiety spiked when you said it, because it is kind of a scary idea for a lot of us, which is you when you go to a coffee shop, and you introduce yourself to all the patrons there, in which by the way, not an easy thing to do, like we can be, you know, we can pretend that it’s easy. But for most of us, that’s a very, very scary proposition. Because we’re like, we don’t want to bother people. We don’t want people to yell at me, we don’t want to be rejected, etc. But if you can get comfortable with the fact that approaching somebody and saying, Hi, I am always so impressed when I go to a party, or when I go to any sort of social event, and somebody comes up to me who I don’t know. And it’s like, Hi, I’m so and so and they don’t know me. It’s not like they know me from something else. They just may right, randomly come up. And I was with a friend of mine last night who we were at a an event for the local Chicago, or association of realtors. And I asked her I said, Amy, I haven’t seen you all night. Tonight, she goes, I’m walking around talking to people who are standing by themselves. And I was like, that’s amazing. Because amazing, amazing. That amazing. Love that. And and so the point is, you guys can do this. And it’s a good idea doesn’t mean you have to pitch your services and your products. And you know, nobody really wants to be pitched in a coffee shop, or has an Matt Kirkkegaard 46:52idea. Here’s an idea. And this is what’s your idea. And I’ll put it out there. I think it’s I think it was one of the best moves I made is you got to spend money to make money, right? So spend a little bit of money, but I would go on every three or four times a week, I’d go to a coffee shop and I talked to the barista who know me because I’m in a coffee shop every day. And I’d say for the next two hours, I’m buying everyone’s coffee, and I’d give them my card and said hold my card and everyone that comes through the line. They’d say, Hey, your coffee is covered by that guy sitting over there. They’ll come introduce themselves to me. I didn’t have to introduce myself anyone anymore. They came in introduce themselves to me and we talk and I’d say man, I just love my community. And I love my neighborhood. I want to know the people in it want to serve my community? Well, oh, by the way, I’m a real estate agent. Here’s my rental car. Let me know if I can help. D.J. Paris 47:30That’s huge. Yeah, not not that not that you you, you know, it’s not easy necessarily to always draw straight line to business. But any idea about how much business that might have generated for you. Matt Kirkkegaard 47:44obscene amount of business. D.J. Paris 47:47It was a great return on investment. Matt Kirkkegaard 47:49The ROI was very high. For sure. Oh, my gosh, D.J. Paris 47:53I got to have you back on the show this this is incredible. Because let’s, let’s, let’s do it. Alright, so I want everybody who lives in who’s a realtor in the Nashville area, you got to reach out to Matt Now, understand, he’s a busy guide, and he will get back to you when he can. But if you are not getting this kind of attention from your team lead, you need to reach out property, man. He’s incredible. He’s done an incredible job on the show. And I want to make sure anyone listening, you should reach out to him. Oh, and by the way before, before we end I do have to ask you before I’ll give your your plugs here in one sec. But who’s your favorite pianist? Who are your favorite pianists of all time Matt Kirkkegaard 48:30highs? I’ll give you my first two hours. D.J. Paris 48:33I’ll give you mine first. And I only have one. I mean, there’s lots that I admired. The only one that ever really was do Bill Evans. I’m a bill up in the sky. Matt Kirkkegaard 48:40I was gonna say Bill Evans is one of my tops. I love Bill Evans. He’s just I mean, he’s essential though. And he’s kind of made he made like Michael Jordan. Yeah. Right. He’s the Michael Jackson, the jazz pianist. He’s amazing. So he’s, yeah, Bill Evans is great. I will go probably a little bit old school. I’ll go back to the Romantic Period say Rachmaninoff Rachmaninoff’s, my favorite composer. Oh, and, and just I think the hit the brilliant, brilliant composer always played with passion. You know, you know, 10 fingers and he would write 12 notes at once. Like, I know the amount of passion that came into his writing. And so yeah. D.J. Paris 49:11What was the what was the movie? The Rachmaninoff 90 shine. So everybody you need to see the movie. It is well, it’s kind of a sad movie. It’s very sad, actually. But but it’s somebody trying to attempt Rachmaninoff second, Matt Kirkkegaard 49:27third, third, which is the hardest piano piece in the world of all time. Yeah, there’s only several dozen people that have ever played it successfully. One of which is my teacher, actually. So I grew up. I grew up with that. And she played all while she taught at Juilliard. And D.J. Paris 49:40she didn’t go crazy as as in the No, I mean, everyone goes Matt Kirkkegaard 49:43a little crazy when you get to that level. So she was a little eccentric, but she didn’t lose it for sure. But um, but yeah, shines the David helfgott and it’s about the D.J. Paris 49:50David helfgott. Yes, yeah, that was the story of David helfgott The Oh my gosh. Oh, right. Gosh, I could talk to you forever. For everyone, everyone. Listening, I want you guys to check out and also support Matt’s music too. I want everybody to go to movement property group.com If you’re a Nashville agent reach out to Matt he’d love to chat with you see if you might be a good fit for him and his team or maybe he can just provide you some great advice about how to continue on in your business. And that what is your music website as well? Matt Kirkkegaard 50:16Matt Kirk music.com So macro music.com for music movement Property Group for real estate I have instances and Facebook’s and tic TOCs for both and and personal as well. So finally follow me connect with me. I’ll buy a cup of coffee and all that. D.J. Paris 50:31Yeah, yeah, in fact, maybe I’ll move to Nashville just so I can get a free cup of coffee from from time today. Let’s Matt Kirkkegaard 50:36go. I know a great agent. I gotta D.J. Paris 50:40love it. All right, Matt. On behalf of everyone listening, we want to thank you for being on our show your amazing, great, wonderful energy. And on behalf of Matt and myself, we also want to thank our audience and make make sure that they feel appreciated. We just ask everybody to do one thing. telephoned think of one other realtor that is struggling right now. Guess what a lot of realtors are struggling. Tell somebody else in your office who could use a little encouragement, maybe a boost and just wants to sort of know that the sky isn’t falling send them a link to our website and keeping it real pod.com Every episode we’ve ever done can be streamed live, or, or right from the browser rather, or they can just pull up a podcast app search for keeping them real. Hit that subscribe button. So Matt, thank you so much, and we will see everybody on the next episode. Thanks, man. Matt Kirkkegaard 51:22Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.

Welcome to the January episode of Learn With A Lender with Joel Schaub of Guaranteed Rate! In this episode Joel discusses how important it is to educate the first-time home-buyers about the opportunities, rates and rents. Joel also describes why the strategy that makes most sense is being comfortable with payments and today’s rates. Last, Joel sends a message to new agents which is to take off your selling shoes and put up your education and helping shoes. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! Joel can be reached at joel@rate.com and 773.654.2049. This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks. Transcript D.J. Paris 0:00Do you have clients that feel they missed the 3% rates of 2019? Well, there’s a solution for that. It’s called a two one or a three to one buy down. We’re going to talk about it today. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solution so that you can easily generate more business. Their agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now on to our show. Welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the largest podcast made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Parris, I’m your guide and host through the show today, once again is our monthly series called Learn with a lender with Joel shop from guaranteed rate. Joel is the vice president of lending at guaranteed rate. He’s been doing loans at a high level since 2003. And he’s got to that level because of what he does specifically for agents, which is he gives back part of his commission to the buyer on every transaction. Now last year alone, Joel gave back over $300,000 in closing costs to buyers have worked with them. And that put Jolles production in the top 1/10 of 1% of all lenders nationwide. In fact, out of 400,000 loan officers in this country, Joel is currently ranked number 137. Now last year he closed 319 transactions is and that was over $126 million. Now if you’re looking for a loan officer, we cannot more highly recommend Joel he’s the very best we’ve ever worked with Joel can be reached at Joel his emails joel@rates.com J oel@rates.com. Or you can shoot him a text message or call him 773-654-2049. Let’s say hello to the biggest Cubs fan. I know Joel, good to see you again. Joel Schaub 2:54A DJ, thanks so much. I love hearing the numbers. But it’s just so important to be here and give back. We love coming on and being able to share what I’m seeing out there in the industry. And it really is making a difference for agents who listen. D.J. Paris 3:10Yes, it really is. And I’m so grateful that you do come on. Because you know, oftentimes, our loan officers are calling agents asking for business trying to, you know, build a relationship with an agent, but not always providing a ton of value, right? There’s loan officers who will call and say we’ve got this new product, we’ve got this new service. And that’s very interesting. But I love the you know, having conversations with you because you really instruct our audience on how to actually grow their business. And oh, by the way, you also do loans on the site. So I just think that’s just a tremendous value to our audience. So I appreciate the dedication you’ve had to our show for all these years. Joel Schaub 3:50We’ve talked about this offline where years ago, I realized DJ like I could not control the rates. I couldn’t control what happened in the market. But I can control how much I gave. Right. So I gave my time. And I gave money and I figured out ways that I can contribute. And if you’re an agent, you need to be doing the exact same thing. Find out who your core sphere is, and figure out ways that you can give back to them, because it’s gonna be a wild year here in 2023. And you need people that are on your team and ready to promote you and help you grow your business. D.J. Paris 4:28Yeah, and I think that it is it is a good point because, you know, let’s face it, there was a little bit of order taking going on on the agent side and even on the ello side, you know, while rates were at, you know, almost historic lows. So I think now it’s it’s a great reminder for everyone to you know, really ramp up your activity ramp up the amount of value you can provide so that when clients are ready to start buying, selling, you know that you’re the person that’s providing It’s so much value along the way that they it’s called in, in a psychological principle called the, the rest of the rest of the reciprocal principle, which is you provide so much value to somebody they feel a psychological need to pay you back in that could be in the form of using your goods and services. So just something to keep in mind, not to Joel, of course, because that’s Joe’s whole business was built on that exact model. But it’s something to really keep in mind as you move through this year where we know activities a little slower right now. Joel Schaub 5:31Luckily, just finished 2022, where the mortgage brokers Association came out with the stat this week that the applications were at 26. year lows means that we gotta go out and actually drum up the business and be providing value, the days of waiting for the phones to ring are over. And this year is literally going to be the year where you have to get out, do the work and provide value. And so if you’re listening here today, one of the things that you can do is make sure that you know where your leads are coming from, who you’re getting ready to give back to and put a plan in place. D.J. Paris 6:10Yeah, I let’s dive into that. I think that’s all great stuff. Joel Schaub 6:15Well, right now we were talking about the air about buyers that come to you as an agent that say, I think I’m gonna wait until rates come down, right? I don’t want to buy it. Okay. And so let’s flush this idea out so that we have a response. If you’re listening, right now, you’ve heard a buyer say this, sure, think I’m gonna wait until rates come down, D.J. Paris 6:34I missed the 3%, boom. And now I don’t want to pay, you know, six plus percent. And I’m gonna wait. Joel Schaub 6:44And what happens, if all of a sudden rates dropped two points, there’s going to be a flood of buyers back into the market, we’re going to see it again. So the strategy that makes the most sense, is be comfortable with the payments, where the rates are at today. Go out and buy a property when there’s not much competition, and then refinance the loan down the line, we have to be comfortable explaining and teaching the story. Okay. We can’t wait for rates to drop to jump into the market. We need to be able to buy a property now and be comfortable that when rates come down, not if when they do, we’ll be able to refinance that mortgage. D.J. Paris 7:24I think that’s this is a good point, you know, I’m thinking about what agents might even say to their clients, like you were you were just mentioning, because I think we can, well, a lot of clients who weren’t ready to buy back when rates were at those lows, don’t didn’t really know how tough it was to actually buy or buy a property back then. So I think that’s part of the problem, too, is that we see the 3% rate, which we’re not at currently. And we go, Oh, I missed it. But the reality of it was, you were pretty lucky if you were able to buy a property during that time. And you probably overpaid for it based on all the all the competition. So Joel, what you just said is is so important, because you’re right, if if the rates dropped by 200 basis points tomorrow, you know, they go down 2%, well, gosh, think about how much competition is now flooding that same market good, great for sellers, not necessarily great for buyers. Joel Schaub 8:17And if I’m a realtor, we’ll get to that business when it comes Okay, when rates do come down, we’ll have all that business as well. But the strategy right now is finding those that maybe are spending too much money on rent, and you can find them an equivalent type of property, you can get out there and buy because if you’re paying X number of dollars in rent, there’s definitely properties in your market that you can buy even with smaller down payments. And that’s kind of taking the time to partner with a loan officer and figure out what those numbers look like, so that you can actually provide value back to the buyers. D.J. Paris 8:50I think that’s great. You know, it’s one of the great joys of my life, you’ll you’ll get a kick out of this because you’re in this business. But one of the great unexpected joys of my life, because I don’t know, maybe I’m just was ignorant around how, you know, loans worked. I’m still somewhat ignorant about how they work. But when I bought my first property, and I was not in this industry in any capacity, I was I was at the time, what was I doing? Anyway, doesn’t matter wasn’t working for an IT company. But regardless, I didn’t know the tax benefits that were coming my way through having a mortgage and they were significant. And it was one of the saddest days of my life when I sold that property because I was losing. I was I was going to I rent it after that because it made sense for me to do that. But I lost all of that great interest deduction. And so I think that’s also something that a lot of renters, they just don’t know. I mean, I didn’t know. Joel Schaub 9:45It’s absolutely true. And it comes back to this first point of being able to provide value and have a plan right? So if your market is working with buyers that are renting and getting ready to buy, understand the numbers you have to be ready and be able to explain exactly the questions that are going to come up. If you’re a buyer talking to you as an agent, what is the rent versus buying scenarios in my market, it’s very important that you actually understand it so that you can go out and provide value, you’re not going to get ahead, you’re going to be like anybody else who’s going to have a slower year unless you can actually take time, figure out what your market is going to be and then add value. D.J. Paris 10:23Yeah, too. I think you’re saying no, your numbers, it’s so important. Because if I have somebody who’s worried about rates and going, Oh, I missed out, that’s a lot of it, I missed out that FOMO fear of missing out. All you have to do is find out what properties they would have been looking at back during those times when rates were low, and show some of the close prices that that you know that that happened, and then show what they’re those same types of properties are being listed at today. Odds are in most markets, those prices are going to be a heck of a lot lower today than what they actually closed for two years ago. So you really do you show the numbers you show your work, like they used to say in school, show the math, and then that really, hopefully should make a pretty compelling argument, why now is still a reasonably decent time to buy a property even with higher rates. Joel Schaub 11:16Especially now with sellers being able to come to the table and give credits to a buyer. If you’re an agent right now, and you don’t understand the concept of temporary rate by downs for your clients. Take some time to look into what a temporary rate, buydown does, because right now we’re locking in clients, back in rates in the threes and fours for the next couple of years, while rates are higher. And using seller paid closing costs to do that. So we’ve seen all the rage, right? People are talking about to one rate by downs, and three to one rate by downs. And right now I kind of wanted to pull the curtain back and really hammer home, if you maybe are familiar with what this concept is, what the numbers look like, and how you can use that to get another deal for your next buyer. D.J. Paris 12:09Yeah, we’re talking about education. And this is the time when you go out and educate people. And you you I think it can be as simple as how would you actually do this, you would pick up the phone, you would make a list of all the people you know that are renting. And even if they’re your close friends who you want to test this out on first, maybe not your exact, you know, your your prospects who aren’t, you know, as close to you as maybe other people, get some family members and say, Hey, I’m I want to try to explain this this sort of situation we’re in, let me know if this is compelling. Does this make sense does Are you able to follow this. And I think it’s great to test it with people outside of the industry. And because the vast majority of buyers and sellers are not really connected to the real estate industry, they just own or rent. And this would be a great opportunity to get that pitch down. And then if it was me, once I got a thumbs up from a couple of friends as they heard my 510 minutes sort of explanation about where numbers are options, why it might make sense to buy now, and just having that information in front of you, I would be picking up the phone and calling every single person I know and saying, Hey, if you have a couple of minutes, I’d love to swing by by a cup of coffee and just talk about what’s going on in the market so that you can make the best decision. I mean, no one else is really doing that. So I not not nobody, I’m sure top agents are but a lot of agents are sitting on the sidelines, they’re depressed, they’re sad about the conditions in the market, they’re not making these kind of calls. Joel Schaub 13:38So let’s take that buyer right now and run the numbers so that if you’re listening, you really understand what the temporary buy downs offer for your client so that you can understand it, and see if it makes sense for your buyers or not. So I’d like to use the number of a $500,000 purchase. And the idea would be getting a closing cost credit of 3%. Okay, using a 3% credit where that dollar amount is 15 grand. And that 15 grand is used by the bank to lower the rate for the next two years. So right now, as of the taping, the rates on 30 year fixed mortgages are just over 6%, by the way, is down from some of the highs that we’ve seen in the last few months. So for this calculation, I’m going to use 6.125. Okay, and that means the rate gets locked in, but for the year number one, the rate is two points lower. So now the client is literally paying 4.125. In year number two, it goes up to 5.125. And then for the rest of the life of the loan, it’s at 6.125. However, we feel in the next couple of years rates are going to be lower than that so they can refinance that loan for free with almost any bank. They’re offering free refinances. And so Let’s take a minute to understand the numbers here. Because I already know you’re listening. And you say, Well, why $15,000, I’ll just take 15 grand off the price DJ, right. And so if we look at the math on that, and we take 15 grand off the price, sure, that certainly does save the client, somewhere around 150 to $200 a month, okay. But if you take that same $15,000, and apply it to driving the rate down into the force, for the first year, the payment is six or $700 less per month. And now you have buyers that are off the fence, right? Now you’re using that money, because the sellers are going to provide it. And it’s just another way for you to get a buyer and have them not have the fear of rates being so high, because it’s a temporary problem. And now we have a solution if the sellers are willing to do a credit to cover a two, one buyer down, or even a three to one buyer down. So there’s a lot of options out there. Call one of your lenders that’s calling you all the time. Ask them to explain it to you. Ask them if they understand it, and partner with them. Okay, there’s a lot of agents right now that need a good lending partner, and mortgage companies all over right now are coming out and saying, We need deals. And so it’s good to find somebody that’s local, and make sure they know what the heck they’re talking about. Work with them and make sure that you have a good partner that’s local that can help you. D.J. Paris 16:29Yeah, I mean, it really is that simple. And I think these are the times when agents need to lean on their loan officer relationships and really extract out of their ellos all of this information so that that the agent, because what it really does is it doesn’t only give you an actually viable strategy for somebody who’s not ready to buy or thinks they’re not ready to buy, or maybe doesn’t want to sell currently, it doesn’t just give you ammo, when you’re working with those people, it also gives you a reason to pick up the phone and call people who you maybe wouldn’t have a reason to call or wouldn’t really have much to say other than just checking in hope everything’s well, which is great, too. But when you’re calling somebody say, Hey, I wanted to have a quick conversation, and just explain to you a couple of options that I’ve seen work really well right now, just in case you guys were thinking about it. And I just want to keep you in the loop of what’s going on. I mean, that is it’s kind of like my fantasy with every single service professional in my life, whether it’s my accountant, my attorneys, I don’t you know, I don’t think we need attorneys too much. But like financial advisor, that’s a great example. Now, financial advisors are usually pretty good at this kind of thing. But let’s go back to accountants, because accountants tend, in my experience, not to be as proactive as reactive, I would my fantasy, and I love my accountant. But my fantasy would be my account calls me three times a year, and he’s like, I got this great idea how you can save tax money on your taxes next year. She doesn’t do that. That’s not really her role. But boy, I would love that, right? I would pay for that kind of advice. And so you’re really providing that level of service that really everybody wants. But very few people actually get right all the realtors come around when you’re ready to buy or sell. But when you’re not ready to buy or sell, they tend to disappear. You want to be the one that that swoops in and says, Hey, I’ve got some information for you here, whether you’re ready or not, I want to tell you what I know, so that you can make a good decision. I mean, it sounds so simple. And it really is how you in particular have grown your business over 20 years. I mean, also, you know, you’re a heck of a good loan officer on top of it. But the education piece is what every single person I know says about you. They’re like, Oh, we see Joel, all these events, you know, and he’s very present, and he does all these fun things. But when you actually talk to him, he just knows more than the average loan officer. And of course, that’s why you’re really are that successful, because you actually deliver on that. And that’s what agents can do by leaning on their loan officers relationships to get this information. Joel Schaub 18:56is so excited that you said that because last year was a down year, it really was right. But we still average every single month, I was able to help 26 families last year when you looked at the entire year. So 26 families closed or individuals every single month. And I talked to agents that say I would like to get to just 26 in a year. What are you doing? And the answer always leads back to education. I’m educating the borrowers do you know how many people come to me and say the same thing where I don’t think I’m ready to buy. And then we look at their scenario and we help them and we empower them. And we teach them and then the next thing you know, even though they talked to their bank, they’re ready to buy. The agent now has somebody who’s educating fears usually the number one thing they weren’t taught, nobody was helping them. Everyone was selling them. So you can take off your selling shoes, put on your education and helping shoes. You’re going to grow your business and that’s what we’re looking forward to Helping agents this year by making sure they know their market and making a plan and giving back. That’s D.J. Paris 20:07why I always love when I get a phone call from a new licensee, a new realtor who pass their exam. And they go, you know, just so you know, I’m a teacher, but I have the summers off. So I can I can work more in the summers, but for now, I’m probably going to keep teaching. And I always say, Well, you know, look at teachers, I think oftentimes become the best realtors, because they’re so used to educate it, like it’s literally their life and being of service, right teachers are of service and, you know, obviously, they’re, they’re one of our most valuable resources in our country. But I always get excited when when anyone who’s a service person, you know, maybe they’re a police officer, or you know, firemen, teacher, people who are of service, they sort of understand that that idea that I can be of tremendous value. And I need to earn the business and earning the business requires that you you know, you’re out there talking to your, your sphere of influence, and, and the people who are not quite ready to make a decision. But you’re that you’re ready to continue to help them. I think I think most most agents will turn you away. If you’re not pre approved. If you’re not ready to buy, they’ll just go okay, well call me when you’re ready, right? They’re not, or they’ll put you on an email list. And you’ll get their email every two weeks for the next couple of years. And that’s fine. But they’re probably not calling, they’re probably not really providing value they might be calling every so often just to go, are you ready? Are you ready? But think about just like turning that model on its head and you don’t wait for somebody to be ready, you just continue to provide value. Joel Schaub 21:40BJ, you are so correct. I have a new program that would be really helpful for people that are listening. And it’s catered to the first time homebuyers, right. So Freddie Mac has a loan program called the low to moderate income AMI program. And so you can actually go to Freddie mac.com and look up the area median income for your county, where we’re at here in Chicago, the area median income is $105,000. And that means for buyers that make under $105,000. They could put down as little as 3%. down and lock in rates today at 5.875. Even if they had credit scores in the six hundreds. So let me repeat that again. Yeah, say that when Mr. tambor what we talked about? Just a few moments ago, we talked about mortgage rates being above 6%. Right, conventional loans, if you’re a low to moderate income borrower, and let me ask you, I don’t think $105,000 Very low income. Good. No, in D.J. Paris 22:47fact, I’m looking at it. And while you were where you were doing that, I went to Google and typed in, and I’m actually at the Fannie Mae website in my neighborhood. In Chicago, same thing 100 And $6,000 is the medium income, it is kind of interesting, because I’m i It does not seem like a low number. But but that’s technically considered median. Joel Schaub 23:09And so that means all of the adjustments on these loan programs are taken away. So that means low downpayment, that normally results in a higher rate wiped away, the higher rates for lower credit scores wiped away. So that means literally, we were quoting borrowers just last week, where the banks were quoting them rates in the high sixes and sevens. And we were in the fives, because we know about the programs. And so it’s important that you work with people that know what they’re doing, and partner with them. Because it can literally make the difference DJ for a buyer that says I’m comfortable and ready to go to somebody that says, I think I’m going to wait. And so I send out a weekly newsletter. And I know that so many people have gotten in on this. And so if you’re listening, and you want to have access to just smart, easy, digestible tidbits that you can share, and sound like a million bucks, you can just simply drop me an email at joel@rate.com. And in the subject line, say add me to your newsletter. In the body, you can say Joel, I love you send me the letter. You don’t have to have a lot of paragraphs in there just a simple message saying you want to be added. And then we’ll drop you weekly things that you can use, that’ll be very relevant, but it is digestible. And it’s in layman’s terms instead of being so over the top with the speak of mortgage. Okay. D.J. Paris 24:37I love that I you know, again, we always come back to the fundamentals, but it’s also the fundamentals really are what win the game at least it’s been my experience that way I know. John Wooden the UCLA coach who won the most believe he’s not been surpassed the most number of NCAA Men’s championships. I think he wants seven in a row, by the way at one point in the 60s or 70s. He was all about the fundamentals, he’s he just everything was information and hard work and discipline, he never looked at the score, he didn’t look at it, he would, he wouldn’t be looking at the rates, he’d be looking at activity, you know, he made his player shoot 500, free throws a day, things like that, you know, just getting in the repetition get getting the skill down. And I think this is the year of skill. And we’re also going to be seeing probably a number of ellos leave the loan officers leaving the industry because you know, my activities down, we’re also seeing a tremendous number of Realtors leaving the industry. So that means there is market share up for grabs, you know, now is the time to really start establishing yourself as the Education Source so that you can swoop in in case maybe someone else’s previous agent leave is leaving the business. Just to give you an idea in the last while worrying in January. Okay, so in the last two months, prior to the last two months, are we at a holding company, which is for agents who aren’t practicing just want to keep their license active, they’re basically out of the business. We had 500 agents in that company today through two months later. And we started that company like eight or nine years ago. In the last two months, I’ve added over 200 agents, not our agents just agents in Illinois, that’s because we can serve as the whole state that way. Literally 200 agents have found us we do no marketing at found us and go hey, I’m getting out of the business. So guys, yes, that that’s that’s an unfortunate thing for them an amazing thing for you. Because you get to come in now and sharpen your tools, to everything Joel just mentioned these different loan products, you know, this is now the opportunity, you have to pick up that market share that’s being left behind. Joel Schaub 26:39And lead with honesty, I can’t tell you the number of times DJ where somebody just wasn’t ready to buy and they were getting pressured from somebody else, another loan officer at a bank telling them it’s a great time. And I slowly help them and say actually, what we should do is fix x, y and z. We could close this, but I can get you much better terms and lower rates, if we just did the following three things. And yes, it will take you some time. And the honesty that comes through and somebody hears that somebody’s in it, not just for themselves, the buyers then realize you are looking after them. And sometimes we never even in closing them. And they refer us people because we were honest, and we took care of them. That’s what you need to be doing as agents as well. Not everyone’s ready to buy. Just because you want to go get a commission doesn’t mean they’re ready to buy. So understanding leading with empathy and trying to find out how you can help people that’s always going to win. And especially in this market, when people are leaving, you got to find ways that you can give back, lead with honesty, and get your plan together for 2023. D.J. Paris 27:46And I want to remind everyone of a statistic that my friend Ryan always reiterates when he’s on our show. And it’s an important one for those of you that are feeling like there’s just no activity out there right now. And I know how it can feel that way. I talked to top agents who feel that way, right now, I talked to new agents who feel that way. So I get it, I understand that that that thought, and I’m not saying you’re wrong. But what I will tell you is this great statistic from Brian that says, and it’s not his, he just read it somewhere. And he always reiterates it, which is 16% of the people in your sphere are going to transact in real estate this year, they’re either going to buy something, or they’re going to sell and then maybe buy something else, you know, 16% of the people you know, so you have business coming, right if you know, 100 people that’s 16 to maybe 30 Plus transactions, based on how you know if someone’s buying and selling or both. So this is the time to really lean into that education, because you can make some huge inroads. So don’t worry about the business that you don’t see right in front of you today focus on your activity, because again, you have people in your sphere that you just don’t even know are going to transact and you want to capture that and by capturing it, you’re going to want to be a value. And then, you know, that’s pretty much how it works. Joel Schaub 29:01And remember guys rates are down, we did see just three months ago that rates were over 7%. So take everything that you can and get out there and educate and let people know rates are lower now. And even though the feds will continue to raise short term rates, we’re gonna see a trend and that trend is lower. Okay, we might have a few bumps in the road, but this year is going to be better than you expect. Okay, so stay positive, go out and teach and find the people that really need your help. D.J. Paris 29:31I think that is so important. And I just got to watch the chief economist for NAR, the National Association of Realtors. We’re very lucky in Chicago because our Chicago Association while the national association is headquartered here in Chicago, and our local Chicago Association happens to be in the exact Joel already knows this. But for our listeners, the Chicago Association, the local one is actually inside the national association building. So we’re sort of lucky when we go to the car offices, the Chicago offices because we actually get to see sometimes some of these national people. And I will tell you that, you know, and I certainly am not an economist in any capacity. But the chief economist for National Association of Realtors, who is literally just a stats guy. He was not he was comparing what where we’re at now with the the 2008 to 2010 crash. And he’s like, he showed us statistics, he was like, this is just a totally different thing. This is not that. So we don’t, he was not concerned that we’re headed for some huge catastrophe. He goes, the sky is not falling. In fact, he suspects rates will be coming down even further throughout the end of the year. So he says no, things are actually pretty good. It might not feel that way. But he goes, let me show you why he made a compelling case. And I won’t, I won’t make his case for him, because I’ll probably screw it up. But the good news is National Association realtors. And again, you might say, well, they’re incentivized to want to think that things are rosy, but no, I found them to be pretty accurate. Over the years, and boy, things are not so bad. Right now, it’s just going to require more work this year, you’re just gonna have to work a little smarter. But it’s fun to educate people. I think that’s the easy part of the job really, right? Like the dealing with actual transactions. That’s the hard part. So I love the idea that you can just be of service this year, think about this as a service here. And business will come because people again, like I have that fantasy of wanting my accountant to call me now, again, I could call my accountant and I’m not picking on her in particular. But if somebody were to call me and say, I’ve got somebody who does that? I’ve got an accountant, who does that? Do you think I would take that call? I sure as heck would. So I imagine you’d be of service to somebody, they might tell other people and they might be the ones calling you. Joel Schaub 31:43And this is your call to action right now you can call back and say, I know you’re a first time homebuyer, I was just listening to an amazing podcast, I think we can get you back with your bank and get rates lower than other people. Is it worth us doing some business together? No, go, Wow. Thank you. And so that’s the call to action. Let’s get out there and make sure that you’re doing the things that it takes because the phones just not gonna ring. Well, I D.J. Paris 32:08have two, two action steps for everybody. Of course, number one, take some action from this podcast. Think about what you can do to reach out to your sphere and educate them. You know, listen to this again. Also, my second thing is sign up for Joel’s newsletter, all you have to do is send an email to joel@rate.com. Because guys, let’s face it, this stuff is complicated. And it we we as agents need to see it in small bite sized chunks with with, you know, little bullet points that we can, we can hammer home and Joel does this. And his team does this every single week. So joel@rate.com just mentioned, you want to subscribe to the newsletter, and also reach out to Joel to he provides value to agents, he will talk to your buyers and sellers possibly, and his team would love the opportunity to work with you if you don’t have a good relationship with an ello or somebody that really isn’t providing a lot of value these days. This is these are the times you get to lean on your loan officer and say, Hey, I really need some help here. This is this year’s a little tricky. Can you help me? Joel and his team are absolutely able to assist with that. And Joel, what’s the bet? Well, people can email you joel@rate.com. And is there any other way they should reach out? Joel Schaub 33:20People are surprised when they call and they actually get us live on the phone. So 773-654-2049 That’s a direct line right to my office. And then joel@rate.com You can sign up, I promise you, we don’t have anything to sell you. I’ll get you on the newsletter so that you can learn what we’re seeing on our end. And then if you do have buyers that you’re interested in working together with, you can actually introduce us and have no closing costs on those deals, we give a $1,500 credit so that all of the lender fees are covered. So it’s a great way to work with us for the very first time and have no fears that their clients are going to have high fees or high rates. We’re just here to help for sure. So yeah, thanks so much. D.J. Paris 34:07I have one last great one last question. And this is kind of a fun question. It’s it’s more of a there’s not a specific answer that I’m looking for here. But I’m just curious, because you are deep within the lending world. And you saw what people had to give up the concessions they had to make back when rates were at those historic lows. Would you as knowing everything that you know, would you and again, there’s a million variables that would influence this, this answer. But would you in general rather have been a buyer during that time, also being in competition with all of the other buyers who are also taking advantage of those rates, or being a buyer now Do you have a particular sense of whether obviously you’d be paying less if you bought this property for the same price, but it wouldn’t have been the same price. So I’m curious, do you have a general thought of what you would have preferred per Personally, Joel Schaub 35:01I’m all about ease. And you already know the answer to this question. I don’t like things being difficult. I want things my way, I want to make sure that I’m catered to and taken care of, and I want to see the house before, D.J. Paris 35:15you don’t want to buy it unseen. Joel Schaub 35:18Right, with no contingencies and everything waive. So right now, don’t worry about rates, if you can afford the payment, now you can go out and get the sellers to cater to you. Okay. And so it is definitely easier right now as a buyer, okay, to go out and get a property compared to what it was 1218 months ago, I still like the lower rates, I’m in mortgages, I would love to have the lower rates, but it’s so much easier now. It really is. Okay, so today would be much better than getting rates at two and a half percent where I had to go find five houses. I loved all five, and I couldn’t even get into one. Now go out, find a home, submitted a value or submit an offer under the value. And when? Awesome, well, D.J. Paris 36:05well said. So everyone two things, take some action, call your clients get, give them some information they can us tell them that rates have dropped and tell them why that’s significant. And yes. And explain to them what that means for the marketplace. And then also send joel@rate.com and email, get on his mailing list so he can provide you this value so that you can rely upon his team every single week to give you talking points, guys, that’s what he’s going to send you talking points. It literally gives you a reason to pick up the phone and call everyone and you don’t have to ask for business when you have talking points. You’re an educator. You’re an educator. Okay, awesome. Joel, on behalf of everyone, we want to just thank you again, I can’t tell you how amazing these episodes are for our, for our audience, they love it. And on on behalf of Joel and myself, we love you. We love the audience, we are so grateful that you are here we are at record numbers ourselves, which I’m not saying to brag, because I don’t think it’s most I don’t think I have that much to do with it. But I’m just grateful that this content seems to be resonating with agents. So please also tell another friend and you’re telling another agent about this podcast, especially someone who’s a little bit down right now, guys, I just watched the video last night, the top producer in Chicago out of 46,000 agents was not complaining. But he was saying this is going to be a tricky year. So I have to work harder. Now this is the top agent in Chicago saying he is going to work harder this year so that he can be a value to his clients. Right. So this take take these these tips we’re giving you and take put them into action. Let’s do it. Let’s all do it together. We’ll keep providing value in this in these episodes. You keep telling a friend to subscribe to Joel’s newsletter, and keep showing up every every week so we can provide you more and more value. You can grow your business and then you can tell Joel and myself how grateful you are to us for helping you and I’m teasing. You don’t have to do that part. But we’re just grateful to work to get to your ears and we’re so honored that you listen so thanks on behalf of Joel and myself Joel we will see you on the next next month and we’ll provide even more value then. Joel Schaub 38:09Thanks so much DJ was really really good and take this to heart. It’s going to be a great year everybody. 2023 is going to be strong.

Welcome to our monthly feature, Close-ing Time – in partnership with TheClose.com. Chris Linsell from TheClose.com as a real estate coach discusses strategies for the real estate agents to use. Chris discusses how new agents, especially the ones with low transactions per year, need to use lead generation and social media to start conversations with their clients. Chris also emphasizes the importance of using “boom times” as an opportunity to change the angle on how the relationships will start and the fact that the need for housing doesn’t change. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! Chris Linsell can be reached at chris@theclose.com. This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks. Transcript D.J. Paris 0:00We know the market has shifted in 2023. And we know it’s going to be a tough year for realtors. So what are the cornerstone activities that you need to be focused on right now? We’re going to talk about that today. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solution so that you can easily generate more business. Their agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now on to our show. Welcome to get real the largest podcast made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Parris and your guide and host through the show today is our monthly series called closing time with Chris Lin sell from the close. This is a partnership between keeping it real and the closed.com. Let me tell you more about the clothes. The clothes.com is the kind of real estate website designed to give agents teams and brokerages actionable strategic insight from industry professionals, they cover real estate marketing, lead gen technology team building strategies, and many other things from the perspective of working agents and brokers who want to take their business or their brokerage to the next level, please visit the closed.com That’s th e c l o s e.com. Just like it’s just like you would assume and check out some of their articles. I highly encourage everybody right now go to the clothes.com. And at the very least subscribe to their newsletter because if you’re like me, sometimes you forget to check websites that you check regularly. Maybe you’ll forget. But what’s great about the clothes is when they publish articles, they send out these digests emails that are incredible. Every article they they produces I’m I’m just such a big fan of their writing style. So go there, subscribe to their newsletter, so you’ll get their regular communication with us as always as crystallin cell. He’s the staff writer, he is a staff writer at sorry, senior staff writer and real estate coach. He’s actually Head of Content creation for the whole site. I always forget to that he is he is the big kahuna over there. Chris is the closes also, he’s the closest resident expert on real estate topics, ranging from marketing lead gen transactional best practices and everything in between. But what what what else is Chris all about? Well, he’s also a licensed real estate agent in Michigan. He’s been part of hundreds of sales transactions from modest role starter homes to massive waterside compounds. And when he’s not writing or coaching, he you can find him fly fishing or I don’t know, maybe not this time of year, but he is into fishing. And also he performs on the stage of his community theaters, local local production. So Chris, glad to have you back on keeping it real and excited to speak with you. Chris Linsell 3:41DJ, thanks for having me. That might be the longest intro. I stumbled over places I speak so I’m not complaining about it. I like hearing about but you’re definitely putting in putting in the word the word count there. I like it. D.J. Paris 3:58Yeah, well, it’s it You deserve it. Because not only are your gracious enough to come on our show, but you speak all over the country. You’ve spoken at the NAR annual conference, you’ve spoken at local, more regional and even state level. You know conferences, you are a sought after speaker. And so we’re just excited to have you so I probably aren’t. I’m not saying enough things about enough nice things about how how lucky we are to have this. Chris Linsell 4:25Well, that’s nice of you to say, Yeah, happy to connect with folks wherever I get a chance to share a little bit of conversation, maybe hop on a stage and impart some some knowledge and some maybe some ideas for how we can build better businesses and actually I kind of came with a bee in my bonnet today. I hope it’s okay. That I hijack things a little bit but I let’s do it. I had some conversations over the weekend with some real estate professionals in my local market. I’m in Michigan, Northern Michigan and And, you know, up here in the northern, the northern reaches of the Lower Peninsula, it is not uncommon to real estate for real estate as a business to really be a tale of two cities, you have the agents who are like, crushing it seeing you see their signs in every other yard. They’re doing 40 5060 transactions a year, really staying busy. And then you also have the agents who are maybe clearing 10 transactions a year that are maybe working for smaller, less aggressive brokerages. And then I had some conversations around that latter group of agents that were interested in this weekend, I’d love to chat with you a little bit about it, specifically, some of the things I was talking about and hearing from agents who, you know, aren’t they, they don’t have their name up in lights, they do real estate full time, like this is their job. But they’re, they’re not clear on more than 10 or 15 transactions a year. This is going to be an interesting year for those folks, especially if they are not adequately preparing themselves. D.J. Paris 6:08Yeah, I agree. So the top producers I know and the ones I feature on the show when I asked them, hey, you know, sort of behind the scenes, like what do you think about 2023, they’re like, well, it’s definitely going to be most of the agents I’ve spoken to say I believe it’s going to be, you know, I’ll definitely not be hitting the number of transactions I did. 2021 2022 was also first three quarters were fine. But last quarter was was pretty tough for most people. But these top producers don’t seem to be too worried. You know, their business may take a small hit, but they have so much that their sphere is so big, and their previous client list is so vast that they tend to do just fine. It’s your right, and our brokerage in particular, the vast majority of our agents are in that lower producing category. That’s just kind of our model. And we love those agents. But we also those are very vulnerable agents when the market shifts and so I love to talk about this because it will help our agents as well. Yeah, I Chris Linsell 7:02mean, I mean, think about it, like if you make a million dollars GCI you’re crushing it in any just about any market. And if you take a 30% hit on your business, and that’s that’s nothing to sneeze at, but you’re gonna have to subsist on $700,000 GCI this year, which you know, I’m sure you’re going to be able to figure figure your way through. If you make $50,000 a year, and you take a 30% bath, all of a sudden you’re making $35,000 GCI is difficult to pay the rent and the mortgage and the daycare bills on 35k. So yeah, but I want to talk more more than just GCI here. I wanted to bring up the first the first kind of interesting question that I had was an agent I was chatting with said, Should I be worried about my brokerage this year, like they work in a mom and pop brokerage. They’re one of six agents. Everybody’s kind of in the same boat here. They don’t have like a big marquee. They’re not buying billboards, they’re running a pretty small business. Do they need to be worried about their brokerage right now? And I said in no uncertain terms, you don’t need to be worried. But you do need to be actively asking the right questions. It is not out of line to my will to your managing broker and say, Hey, listen, I just want to make sure we’re set up for the for the for the year for the future here. Just want to check and see how things are going. You’re gonna find some interesting conversations are gonna come from that for sure. D.J. Paris 8:39We found 1000 brokerages here locally that when we looked at their production, we looked at their numbers, the number of agents, number of transactions, and we said, oh, wow, we we don’t see, we see. We see challenges for these 1000 firms. And so I sent out 1000 emails to these companies and saying, Hey, if you’re nervous about this year, if you’re, if you’re worried about, you know, whether you I didn’t say stay in business, but that was the assumption. If you’re nervous about this year, you know, we may want to merge with you, or we can absorb some of your costs. And we can figure out some sort of structure that works. And so we sent out 1000 individual emails and what was really interesting, whether were the results about 30 brokerages wrote back and said, You know what, we are pretty nervous. And we would like to talk and see if there’s a way we can go join forces, awesome for us, you know, great opportunity to pick up a bunch of agents and, you know, merge and whatever. But what was really interesting was I got about a hunt, man, maybe not 100 Maybe I got another 50 responses from brokers that I can see their numbers and I’m like, I don’t know how they’re paying the bills now. But whatever, they’re somehow surviving, and they were like, this is going to be a great year. Yeah, I don’t need you like almost even a little offended and we did very polite about it. But now got offended, but just sort of like, yeah, no, I’m good. So we’re like, Okay, those are the 50 that I’ve got my eye on, because I don’t see a path forward for them. That’s, that’s easy, unless they pick up a bunch of more realtors. So that would be a concern. Now, the agent who the agents who work at these firms, I am sure that is not on their mind, they don’t think about the health of the business. They’re focused on their own production, their own business. But if it was me, I would want be wanting to have a quick conversation with whoever owns the business and say, Hey, just wanted to check in and see how are things going, you know, what do you think was gonna happen this year? How’s the business doing? Is there anything I can do to help, you know, sort of being of service of that sense, and also, hopefully getting some information? Chris Linsell 10:47Yeah, I completely I that’s absolutely the right approach. And I would go, as far as telling agents, if you are working in a brokerage, like this, like that is, you know, that you don’t feel has a 100% chance of of survive and thrive in 2023. I would go as far as saying, if you are in that place, you need to do some internal reflection on your own business and the health of your own business, as it applies to, you know, Surviving and Thriving in 2023. You know, it’s, it’s interesting. I don’t know exactly what the classes look like in Illinois. But in Michigan, when you’re getting a real estate license, there are no personal accounting, there’s no business planning, besides maybe half a chapter in the in the pre license class. There are no requirements for you to have the knowledge and the strategy necessary to plan and evolve a successful business when pivots come. And the reality is DJ, most agents who are currently working in the United States right now have never worked a real estate season with the sort of downturn potential that we are seeing in 2023. Never, ever, if you look at the the tenure of license, the majority of agents have only been licensed during boom times at Nationwide, this truly is uncharted water for the majority of licensed real estate professionals. If that’s you, there’s no shame in saying, hey, this might be something I haven’t experienced before, I need to do a little self reflection to make sure I’m ready for this in addition to my organization. D.J. Paris 12:36Yeah, and I think if the phone has stopped ringing for an individual agent, I think that’s normal. And that’s what I’m even hearing from top producers, top producers I speak to either at our firm or on this podcast, have said they have to do a lot more outbound effort. These days, they have to reach out directly to the clients, or prospects, your sphere, whatever you make, call the people in your database, and reach out and check in with them. There’s a lot more outbound effort, let’s face it in in, you know, in 2021, and even some of 2022. For a lot of us, the phone was just ringing. And we were busy. It doesn’t mean it was easy, but we didn’t necessarily have to make as many outbound touches. And now is the time when I talked to top producers, they go, Oh, I’m just doing a lot more outbound touches, that seems to be the consistent message I’m hearing from so I think that’s a great lesson for for the smaller producers. Chris Linsell 13:36And I think just generally speaking for the smaller producers, and for those who have not worked through a downturn year. There’s a couple of other specific strategies in addition to and I think that’s, that’s the important one to identify is lead generation. The generation of the top of your funnel during boom times is mostly inbound people are calling you, you are buying ads on Zillow or through bold leads or top producer, you are creating opportunities for people to get in contact with you, because they are already looking for those services. In boom times you are simply activating those needs and giving them a way to reach out and connect with you. during a downturn times the script gets flipped. People are the people are less looking for those services. And instead of waiting for the phone to ring, you have to make it ring for somebody else. But there is something important here that a lot of people miss that I want to make sure I highlight. The fact is, the need for housing doesn’t change. In fact, it’s pretty. It’s pretty well established that the amount of people who need and I say need instead of want who need To housing doesn’t really change much year to year, maybe as the population grows, we’ll see a number of you know, we see the number of transactions move. But there is not this extraordinary jump or dip in the need for housing, this number stays pretty steady. It’s how people approach the kind of activation of that need. Because in boom times, they’re happy to reach out, they’re making all these moves themselves, they’re getting in contact, they’re starting conversations, during slow times or cautious like market retractions, it’s up to the real estate professional to identify where those needs exist, and activate the buyers and sellers who are going to meet those needs. So we are just turning the corner as far as the how the relationships start. And if you take that, and expand that idea out across your entire real estate strategy, think about how that would affect your social media, for instance, your social media is no longer about creating opportunities for someone to reach out to you. It is now about creating media, that gives you a chance to conversation and do the outreach yourself. So like a 10 second strategy you can use here, create content that engenders interaction, we want comments and shares. But this time you want those comments so that you can get that comment and then have maybe a mini personal interaction in the comments. Or you can start a conversation in a direct message. Or you can take it offline, get on the phone get in person. But that that initial social media interaction is not about just exposure for you so that somebody can reach out to you. It is about exposure for them, so that you can reach out to them. The need doesn’t change, but our approach gets flipped. D.J. Paris 17:07I have a I have a social media suggestion when I hear you’re very specific. So I was thinking while you were talking. Now this does isn’t exactly your suggestion, but I think it still will get you a similar result. So what I would one of the ideas that came to mind that I would consider and I want to hear if it’s a bad idea, I want you to tell me what I would what I might do is we know that Zillow is the number one, you know, client customer facing, you know, web website that people visit to of course, see home values, search for properties, etc. And people who aren’t looking for making a move might still be on Zillow to see what their own home is worth just looking at the Zestimate and I’m sure there’s a collective groan from our audience because realtors have a particular either affinity or non affinity to more non affinity I think to Zillow, Zestimate. But we know it’s a metric that your consumers do look at. In fact, it’s probably the only metric they look at when they’re trying to figure out what their home is worth, before calling a realtor and saying what’s my home worth? They’re gonna go on Zillow, or they’re gonna go to another, you know, comparable website and see some sort of estimate. If it was me on social media, what I might do is do either a live video, or a regular video, you know, it could be a real it could be whatever, where I literally show a random Zestimate it just pick one, I would not pick one. That’s one of your customers just pick a random one don’t even show the address. And say, here’s what Zillow is showing, I went and did a did a more in depth sort of review. And I actually came back with this number. And this number, I’m pretty confident is more accurate. Demonstrating that kind of value, I think in a video and then you can say, by the way, if anyone else out there is wondering what their home is worth, I am happy to run the same thing. You know, there’s no charge. It’s just what I do. I know that homeowners want to know what their home is worth. Or at least that’s a metric that they’re probably always interested in. So just just a quick thought there. Chris Linsell 19:05I think it’s great. Absolutely I love you know, those those who know me know that compare and contrast content is some of my favorite no matter what you’re comparing and contrasting people like holding things side by side and picking out the differences. Whether those differences are good or bad or the other. That’s very engaging social media content. The other thing that I think is important, just generally speaking, is to remember as you are thinking about your overall strategy for 2023, especially those who are operating a smaller business, you do have a little bit smaller margin for error than you did when you are in the big times when when you had the phone won’t stop ringing for you. And it’s important to remember that your brokerage is likely offering or excuse me, operating with a smaller margin of error as well. So what does that mean? Well, it means that the leaders in your brokerage, the ones who are maybe authorizing spend, or the ones that you are negotiating your, your split and cap agreements with, these folks are in protective kind of conservation mode right now. So, plan accordingly, just like everything in real estate negotiate based on what is important for the other party. If you are up for a renewal renegotiation on your cap and split, consider taking cable, I’m gonna say this out loud, consider taking a hit in 2023. Even if it’s minuscule 2% In an effort to maybe create a balloon for yourself in three years, where you get a 10% Bump, kind of thing. Like if you can afford a 2% drop right now in your split. Just just an idea to remind us that our brokers are probably negotiating from a place of protectionism. So be thoughtful about that. Likewise, when it comes to your own business, be conservative and thoughtful and strategic about your own decision making. Right now 2023 is likely a time where you are going to lean on the things that have worked and do a little bit less blind leaning on things that you don’t have an idea of whether that they work in your market, it’s not saying that you don’t want to innovate and take some calculated risk. But this is definitely a time to lean on the things that work. And if you’re new to this business, then it’s time to lean on the things that have worked for others, rather than trying to reinvent the wheel right now. D.J. Paris 21:45I agree. And just one last tip, if you predict that your business may be down a certain percentage, and you can, you can, the easiest way, I think to figure that out is talk to your managing broker, have them look at what they think forecasts for your your local market. And the next year, you know, the oh, by the way your association is can help with this too. And in fact, you’re paying them a lot of money, along with whoever the MLS provider is, I would call both and say hey, what do you guys forecast for? And I shouldn’t say guys, but But whoever is doing this, what does your team predict? Or what is your best guess for what you see via data trends? And let’s just say it’s the thing, maybe the whole market is going to be down 15% for your local area? Well, I would assume that that’s going to hit me at that same level. And here’s my here’s what I’m, here’s the action step, make sure that you are reducing your expenses by at least 15%. Because if you don’t, and you just say, Well, I’m just going to grind it out and try to get as much business as I can. Well, we hope that that happens for you. And we hope that that extra effort will result in more business, but you need to take care of your business and you need to be fiscally responsible. So please, please don’t do what some of these brokerages, I think some of these brokerages are struggling to even do this as well, which is why I’m reaching out to every small brokerage in my area, because I suspect a lot of them aren’t adjusting expenses, much less the agents doing their own adjustment of their own expenses. So please talk to your managing broker, make sure that they have a grip on what’s happening. If they’re like, this is going to be an awesome year, I would say well, why do you think that? You know, what data do you do you have that’s causing you to think that and if they don’t have it, I’d be a little concerned, and then look within your own business and say, hey, where am I spending money? Maybe I could, I could, you know, reduce some of the those expenses and just try to get through this year without, you know, being non profitable? Chris Linsell 23:39Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. No, one little caveat, I will say is that often, opportunity is is placed in the hands of those who are willing to get off their heels and onto their toes the fastest. So this isn’t to say if you if you see an opportunity for success that you don’t leverage that opportunity, but it is to say, apply a strict and stringent criteria for what opportunity looks like. Basically, it’s not a license to just sit back and let opportunities fly by you. That is, you know, certainly an approach but not the most profitable one. But you have to be really thoughtful about what those opportunities look like. Yeah, I D.J. Paris 24:23honestly believe if you do a lot more outbound calling, texting, emailing, staying in touch, letting your sphere know that you care about them, giving them reasons to pick up the phone, hey, I want to I wanted to give you an update on what I think your home is worth. Give me a call back. I’ll have a few quick questions. I’m gonna send it over to you just so you know what’s going on in the market. Those kinds of things are gold. And you can do that all day long and demonstrate value and by the way, people who are renting right now rental prices again, depends on your local market have come down significantly with the concessions going up meaning more amenities, less pay. So if you have somebody who’s sitting on the sideline, because they’re worried about the six and a half percent lending rates to buy a property, maybe it’s better for them to rent right now and you can still help them do that. But having that conversation going, Hey, you’re a renter right now, you know, let’s take a look at some of the other buildings in your area. When’s your lease up? Okay, let’s talk about that. Whether or not you earn a commission from doing that is another issue, but you are demonstrating value and setting yourself up for for future success. Chris Linsell 25:23It’s the truth. I couldn’t agree more. D.J. Paris 25:25Well, let’s let’s cap it at that. Oh, what a great i, what a great place to end off. want to remind everyone to visit the closed.com. And also, so 90 to 95% or higher of their content. It’s totally free. You can go there. It’s amazing content. And actually, like, I’ve been noticing this if you go I’ll just quick aside for a moment. I’ve been doing some videos about chat GBT just because it’s fun, which is this open AI free piece of software that Microsoft owns that you can go in and ask all sorts of fun questions, and you can get some interesting results. And anyway, I won’t go into chat GBT now. But what’s interesting is I’ll ask Chet GPT writing a persuasive email to recruit a realtor because that’s what I do. And they write it. It’s pretty interesting. But But what I was gonna say is, you’re really it. The information that comes back is pretty generic. So I love chat GBT. But what I really love is great journalism. Even more than just getting you know some some some bot to regurgitate information that finds online. The close does not do that the closes got real journalism, really deep dive articles. It’s not Hey, for your next open house, let’s bake some cookies or it’s it’s really really specific stuff about what can actually drive people to that next open house or help you with your marketing efforts. They have just incredible content guys, I honestly believe that I want everybody to read it. So go to the clothes.com they also have a pro a subscription model as well. So if you want to take that to the next level, you can check out the clothes Pro. Chris, also, are you speaking anywhere anytime soon? Any? Any plugs? Chris Linsell 27:05Yeah, um, well, I’m actually going to be in New York City for the Inman Connect conference. I’m not speaking at any of the stages, but I’ve got a couple of little things you can come noodle noodle ramen fire, follow me on Twitter, you can find me there. And for anyone in Canada, that’s listening. Next thing I’m booked at is the realtor quest conference in Toronto this spring. So if you are selling real estate in Canada and are in the Toronto area, you should definitely come. I’ve got a lot of really great stuff planned for that event. D.J. Paris 27:40Awesome. Well, that’s a that’ll be a wrap for for this time everyone. Go visit the clothes.com. Consider subscribing to the close Pro as well. Thank you for listening and making it to the end of this episode. Just do us one favor, tell a friend. Think of one other realtor that’s struggling. Almost all realtors are a little bit right now. So this would be a great gift to give to somebody to say, hey, what could I be doing right now to help ensure that I’m building a strong business for this year, send them a link to our website, keeping it real pod.com Or just have them subscribe to our podcast and go get episode updates from whatever app they’re using. So anyway, Chris, great to see you. We will see you next next month. And thank you, of course to our audience and of course to Chris for providing such amazing conversation. Chris, it was great seeing you. Chris Linsell 28:26See you guys next time.

Welcome to another episode of Coaching Moments With Ryan D’Aprile from D’Aprile Properties! In this episode Ryan and D.J. discuss the merging of Ryan’s company with Coldwell Banker, and how this is a very big step. Ryan talks about the importance of following the “ABC” (Always Be Connecting) rule with clients by agents, and how this rule helps in earning their trust. DJ and Ryan also discuss how important communication is in the real estate business and also what needs to be improved. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! Ryan D’Aprile can be reached at 312.590.6416 and ryan@daprileproperties.com. This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks and FollowUpBoss. Transcript D.J. Paris 0:00What is a top real estate coach telling his top 1% producers to do every single day this year? We’re going to talk about that today. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solutions so that you can easily generate more business. There agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now on to our show. Welcome to keeping it real, the largest podcasts made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Parris, and I am your guide and host through the show, and today is our monthly coaching moments with Ryan de April. Now if you’re not familiar with Ryan, or if you’re new to the show, Ryan comes on every month to give our listeners and our viewers a coaching moment and a coaching session. So let me tell you more about Ryan. Now Ryan de April is a progressive thought leader focused on providing for his agents and staff at D Pro properties. His strengths are his motivational skills, his coaching style, and his dedication to training. He has 13 offices throughout Chicagoland he’s also in Wisconsin, Indiana, and Michigan and Florida, with hundreds and hundreds of top agents. De April properties is a coaching company with eight strategic coaches who work week in and week out with every agent at the company focused on business planning, coaching and accountability. If you’ll take your career to the next level, if you’re maybe just not getting the attention that you need, check out depot properties do April properties.com. Ryan, welcome once again. Ryan D’Aprile 2:38Thanks, DJ. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it. It’s good to be back. It’s been a it’s been a little bit since I’ve been with Yeah, D.J. Paris 2:44it’s been a while. And we have I have some congratulations in order that you have now joined forces with with Coldwell Banker. Ryan D’Aprile 2:53We have Yes, yeah. So I’ve been working on that with them for the past few months. And it’s been exciting. It’s a great, great group of people over there. And I’m very excited about that. And we get to take two wonderful cultures and meld them together. And, you know, work with an organization that has basically a wonderful global presence, a lot of value added to our agents. I’m incredibly excited. My wife’s an agent of the company. So I just excited from all the things that I saw that they have access to makes me very excited. And then I get to, I get to coach I actually get to even coach even more people, which makes me makes me excited about the whole opportunity as well. D.J. Paris 3:33And it’s also I want this to be inspiring too, for anyone who’s in the process of building a team or thinking of starting a brokerage. If you don’t mind, Ryan, just sharing maybe a minute or so a minute or two of the journey from big being your own managing broker, starting a firm and now all these years later, integrating it with Coldwell Banker. Yeah, you Ryan D’Aprile 3:54know, it’s it is it’s quite a journey starts off with anything that you do. It’s you know, you reach something that you’re very passionate about. And I started the real estate company because I was very passionate about coaching agents and helping them develop and we built our company off of that about probably, you know, you know, our company did in 2001, we did about $1.2 billion. No, yeah. 21. We did about 1.2 billion in sales in 2022, which is a down year for everybody. We did over a billion dollars, but we were down. But it’s something to be really proud of the hang our hat on and probably 85% of our agents started their career at our company, and probably a lot of them. It was only seven or eight years ago and we’re putting up some pretty, pretty big numbers which we’re really proud of. And you know, that is based on something I was very passionate about is working individually with the agents i this past Saturday, you know, the company sold and this past Saturday, I was at one of our offices with a bunch of agents and I was doing a group coaching session and it’s allowed me to get back to what I was passionate really passionate about. The company grew it grew quite well. Arjun, I started to find that my desire, my passion of coaching and training was being overshadowed by a lot of administrative stuff, as you know, running a real estate company, there’s more to it than meets the eye, I guess, let’s just say put it that way. So a lot of work. So by joining forces with Coldwell Banker, it allowed me to get what I was back to what I’m more passionate about, which is working with each individual agents, also, loan officers, I coach loan officers, I coach, a coach, title sales reps, I coach insurance agents, anybody who’s in sales, I coach them, I help them, you know, set a goal and then create a path to where they want to get to. D.J. Paris 5:43Yeah, it’s, it’s amazing. And I just I know, you’re, you’re a very humble person. But I do want to stress that you built a company, an independent brokerage. Here in Chicago, you competed with the biggest and the best, and you built a business that really was, you know, is as as big and as powerful and as impressive as the big franchise firms. And that in and of itself, is a very difficult thing to do. And so I just want to honor you for building up a company, a healthy company, a healthy, profitable company that then caught the eye of all your competitors, and what a wonderful position. And what a wonderful testament to how you built your business so that all these other brokerages wanted, wanted, wanted to join forces with you. So glad you landed with Coldwell Banker, our company, our managing broker started at Coldwell Banker. We’re big fans, of course of them as well. So congratulations to all the agents at D APR. And you’re you’ve got a great journey ahead of you. And really exciting. Ryan D’Aprile 6:52Thanks, thanks. Yeah, I am excited. And, you know, it is one of those things when we reflect back, I was telling my wife, I, you know, I never really pause because I was running so hard these past 11 years growing the organization. And it was, you know, after the sale, I looked back said to myself, Jesus Christ, I am probably one of the most competitive real estate markets in the country. Yeah, I mean, Chicago is Unknown Speaker 7:17brutal, brutal, Ryan D’Aprile 7:19it’s very competitive. And so I did have a moment of pride, where I’ve always kind of never really taken the time to do that. And I didn’t, and thank you, I appreciate you saying that. D.J. Paris 7:30Yeah, it’s, it’s a big deal. And very few independent firms have done it. So that is a real feather in your cap. And obviously, again, really highlights your ability to grow a business and keep your agents happy and keep them productive and keep them pride keep the business profitable. So speaking of all of that, it is 2023 It’s our first coaching moments of the year. And everybody I know whether they’re a broker owner or a team leader, or just an individual producing agent, everybody I know seems to be a little scared, nervous, worried about what’s going on what’s right in front of them, what they should be focused on. So they don’t get caught up in you know, inaction or you know, just the business cycles being changed or changing at the currently. So I would love to know as a coach, what you are saying what are you are hearing out there and what you’re recommending to agents who are a little nervous or scared about where we are right now in the house insurer. Ryan D’Aprile 8:39Yeah, absolutely. Well, so the first thing to keep in mind there’s a tremendous amount of distractions. Look, we just sold the company and I think every single recruiter in Chicagoland area his got my agents numbers on speed dial and the calling over and over and D.J. Paris 8:54over so it is a recruiting for people like me and by the way, I have not been doing that to your agents, but because we don’t really compete in that same way but I recruiters are having a field day right now now is the time when agents are struggling so the recruiters come out and they promised the world and every agent every one of our listeners is probably getting prospected by somebody in their local markets, Ryan D’Aprile 9:18you know and for people are listening that are real estate agents that are not on the corporate side or the reloc or on the corporate side or the recruiting side. You know, you got to listen to the message the message is overwhelmingly been coming to my agency has been messages a fair and and and majority of people will be able to be scared and it’s a shame you should be Lee should be inspiring, leading by inspiration. You should be you know, you should lead by hope you should not be you know leading by fear which is basically manipulating somebody to get what you want by scaring them and, and there’s a lot of scary things that are out there and got it really be smart and who you align yourself with. And, you know, when times are rough, I mean, again, I’ve been through this did a great recession. And here we are in another difficult market. You know, when times are rough, everybody is going to look outside of themselves first, and, and make the change. Look, a year ago, you know, you know, a year ago, before I was even thinking about selling or anything of that sort came, a number of agents left my company, they leave every year, they were all top producing agents, and unfortunately, all but one shit the bed. And the reason being, I think, is that we had such a strong culture of accountability and whatnot. And some excuses when he just said, like, well look at these tools and these technology and this and that. There’s tools, technology and gizmos, they’re going to come and they’re going to go, there is nothing that is earth shattering about what we do. Anybody could say tech and tools and technology. The truth is, are you even going to open up the computer six weeks later and use the technology that they gave you? And really what difference is it? And so what everybody does, when they’re trying to improve, right? They change everything outside first. That’s why 93% of them don’t improve. The work comes from within, if you want different results, you need to change. That doesn’t mean you need to change companies. And I’m not talking about my company, I’m talking about any industry, whatever it means you you personally have got to change. You know, it lies within what are you doing? What are your activities on Saturday, when I was with a group of agents, and I was coaching them? One of them said, Look, you know, I’m doing this, I’m doing this, and I and I and I time block, excuse me, I set up my all my social media posts for a month in advance. And, and she looked at me I’m like, and she’s like, well, I go ahead and I pre plan this stuff I’m like, and she’s like, Well, what do you mean? And I’m like, Well, that’s what moves the needle in your business. I mean, that’s not I mean, social media marketing, okay, is seen by a majority of the people that have already liked your post, probably 94% of them are your fellow real estate agents that are saying, Go ahead, friend, good for you. And they’re liking your stuff and is going to the same people over and over again. If you’re doing social media, if you’re using social media, by marketing versus researching and developing, right, then you’re going about this business relationship building business the wrong way. And when you point to some of the top top people out there, right, that have beautiful social media marketing out there, but they’re also selling 3040 50 $100 million real estate a year, you’re only seeing the tip of the iceberg real estate agent that’s out there, you’re not seeing all the other hard work that they put in there that they’re committed to their business. I mean, those people that are selling 50 to $100 million in production a year, okay. And then they have beautiful reels or whatnot. Those reels, net marketing came after all the other hard work and time and effort they put in to build the business. So D.J. Paris 13:11that’s a that’s a really good point is that, so So if I hear you correctly, and I just want to pause you because I think you’re saying something really profound, which is utilizing social media while you’re not busy might the better way to do that might be through what Ryan has said time and time again on the show as research and development lert follow your your your sphere, pay attention to what is going on in their lives, because that will give you number one indications of possibly wanting to move but also reasons to pick up the phone and call them. Hey, just saw you got back from a trip to Mexico. How did it go just was thinking about you looked awesome, that kind of thing. Ryan D’Aprile 13:51I’m actually going in two days with Coldwell Banker. D.J. Paris 13:56I’m Nicole Baker, I want to go to Mexico. Ryan D’Aprile 13:59I had I had my so we had our we had our software’s Anello, our dashboard up at this coaching session, and I was showing everybody in their network tab, right, like look at all the hyperlinks that we have in here to, you know, DJs Facebook page or DJs Instagram page or DJs LinkedIn page and, and then I opened up Facebook, and another tab. And I said here’s the right way the wrong way. You start in your dashboard first. You start there, and you go one by one with each person and you look at you click on their hyperlink and you look at what’s going on with them. If you start on Facebook first you should say alert made a something’s wrong. Because when you look at the newsfeed you are seeing what Michael Zuckerberg wants you to see isn’t a mike Zuckerberg. D.J. Paris 14:46Mark but closer. Ryan D’Aprile 14:48Great, Mark, you’re seeing what Mark Zuckerberg wants you to see in the newsfeed you’re seeing. You don’t have control over on Instagram as well. Right You’re you’re seeing what they want you to see, you know scroll through your newsfeed, that’s just not how it works. You have to be intentional, just like success, and anybody starts a business, you got to be intentional, and what it is that you want to do. But if you’re passive, and you’re thumbing through Facebook newsfeeds, that’s fine, but you’re just wasting your day, you’re wasting your valuable time. And your time is so much more valuable than money. Okay, your time is so valuable. But so many of us in Robin Sharma says this, I love it. Some of us are so busy being busy, very few of us are busy being productive. So there’s a right way there’s a wrong way of doing it. And in these times where it quote unquote, scary for people, look in the mirror, have a direct conversation with yourself. Okay? And ask, are you doing the proper right things to be efficient in this market? Because anybody can be successful? I think the statistics came out at home sell every minute, 11,000 homes sell a day. Right now, there’s more than enough business out there. It’s just that when business was easy, everybody, it was coming to everybody. Right now that it’s scarce, a the first to flee, or the negative mindset individuals, right? D.J. Paris 16:16I want to ask you for a second, because I think you’re saying you’re saying something, it’s really important, I just want to put just put the cap on the social media conversation is that this so what Ryan was saying was, hey, if we were scrolling through social media, obviously, that may sometimes show us information about our sphere that we could then use to call as information and say, Hey, I saw you were just doing X, Y, and Z, I saw your kids were doing X, Y and Z. But what Ryan was saying is to be really super intentional about it is to actually, you know, specifically search for that person, look at their posts, see what they’re up to. And then that gives you possibly a reason to reach out, you can also, by the way, do that via Linked in. So in LinkedIn, a lot of times when people get job promotions, or switch companies, that information is also in their newsfeed. So you can use LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and be really, really intentional about seeing what’s going on in your clients or your sphere of influences life. And the reason why you want to do that is because it gives you a reason to pick up the phone and contact them or to send an email or a text, or however you communicate with with your sphere. This, by the way, this is so much easier than trying to create an a beautiful piece of content for you that you post on your stories, your real your you know that that’s hard to do. And as Ryan said, that comes usually after what you can do today for zero money is you can find out what’s going on in people’s lives and reach out to them and connect with them. Ryan D’Aprile 17:52Yeah, everybody, really everybody that I observed wants to make this about marketing. And it’s it’s yes, there’s marketing is important. But that’s not I mean, that’s, that’s the easy part, right, you have to get out of your comfort zone, you have to grow a network, you have to nourish the network, you have to take care of the network. If you don’t, your business isn’t going to grow period. It just it’s just not. And the more I guess the more communal your neighborhood is, the more work it’s going to take. I mean, when I sold real estate in Chicago, the city of Chicago, it was actually easier than it would be in the suburbs, because the suburbs are so tight knit. So community where there’s larger cities like Chicago or Miami and areas where I’ve coach agents, it’s very transient, right? So because it’s transient, it’s easier to pick up an open house lead, it’s easier to get an online web lead the conversion rates higher because they don’t have those connections, right. But if you take the time to say, I’m going to take care of this building that I live in that I farm, I’m going to be a part of the social events, I’m going to get to know the people in the building, you’ll dominate, you’ll own that building, I owned the buildings, we’re now selling real estate in Chicago, that I farmed, because I got involved with them from a community and it was easier, quite honestly, because there was such a lack of community in those bigger cities, not when you’re in the suburbs, right? And you’re going to have the soccer teams and the football teams and baseball and all the stuff that comes along, you know, with, I guess, families in the suburbs, right? or whatnot, and then you’re gonna have to get even more involved in there. Now. One thing that listeners might be thinking because I brought up the family element of it that somebody said to me on Saturday, he said, Well, I don’t have a family. So is it harder for me to grow my business? So this person has been a real estate agent for five years. And I pointed to an agent of ours that doesn’t have a family doesn’t have any kids and sell 64 homes a year. And I said but look at his network. He’s got 420 people in it. Every single quarter he touches them, I said, it’s I’ve never seen anybody work this system and not be a success. I’ve seen people not work it and be successful. I’ve seen people not work it and be failures. But I’ve never seen anybody working it, and it doesn’t work for them. But it takes a commitment it takes, it takes drive, right? And it takes it takes self reliance, you got to be responsible for yourself. You’re called independent contractors for a reason. But it’s going to take even more responsibility than it is when you get a job and you have a boss telling you what to do, you are the boss. So therefore you got to be able to get plan out your day, and do what you need to do and execute it day in and day out, or it’s just not going to happen. D.J. Paris 20:47And I think to this idea of earning business is I think there’s, well a minimum of two different places where you need to earn business. And I’m curious to get your thoughts on this. And here’s what I came up with. The first is you want, of course, your sphere and I say client, I should just say your sphere, your prospects, you want your prospects to think about you when they do need to work with a realtor. So you have to earn that position. So you first have to earn that. And then you also have to earn once they’re ready to make a decision that that you are in fact the right person. So you first want to be thought of and then you want to be selected. And I was thinking but you do have to earn that right. And you have to earn it through effort. And Ryan, you’ve said this time and time again on our show, social media is a great place to get information to allow you the to show you the steps to earn this, these deeper connection, earn these these deals through deeper connection through intimacy through understanding what’s going on in my clients lives are and that’s as simple as paying attention and reaching out and saying, Hey, I saw that you just did this, I saw that you guys just had a birthday I you know, there’s all sorts of things that social media tells us about our, our sphere of influence. And all we have to do is acknowledge it, tell them we’re watching work, and we’re proud of them, or we’re excited for them or whatever the particular instance might be. We have to do this on the regular so that we can even be thought about when it comes time for real estate. I’ll tell you. One thing I did about a year a couple years ago was I have had an assistant. And I said to my assistant, I said I don’t know any of my friends, birthdays, anniversaries, I don’t know their children’s birthdays. These are my friends. And I said I want to be the friend that knows all of his friends that doesn’t miss a birthday doesn’t miss an anniversary doesn’t miss. So I said can you reach out to all my friends and just ask them, we’re updating our database, we DJ doesn’t want to forget your birthday. And we got their, their their wedding anniversaries, we got their kids birthdays, I know the ages of their kids. Now I’m not a practicing agent. But I’m doing this just for my own my own relationships with my friends. But this is the exact same thing you can do with your sphere. And it gives you reasons to reach out to stay in communication to build community. But but in order to build a community you have to actually build a community you have to actually want to have deeper connections with your with your spirit. Ryan D’Aprile 23:13That’s absolutely right. That’s exactly what you have to do. And it’s it takes time. And it’s like you know, a river running through you know, you know, a canyon or whatnot, it will carve against the stone with the consistency. Day in and day out. It’s not a one and done thing. The most important part of all this is being consistent in these activities. It’s not like there’s no silver bullet out there it is it is time it’s effort if you nurture it, it will pay huge dividends to you. D.J. Paris 23:45I want to pause for a moment to talk about our episode sponsor are one of my favorite companies out there follow up boss. Now after interviewing hundreds of top Realtors in the country for this podcast. Do you know which CRM is used by more than any other by our guests. Of course it is a follow up boss and let’s face it following up is the key to taking your business to the next level follow up boss will help you drive more leads in less time and with less effort. Do not take my word for Robert slack who runs the number one team in the US us his follow up boss and he has built a one and a half billion dollar business in just six years. Follow up boss integrates with over 250 systems so you can keep your current tools and lead sources also the best part they have seven day a week support so you’ll get the help that you need when you need it and get this follow up boss is so sure that you’re going to love their CRM that for a limited time they’re offering keeping it real listeners a 30 day free trial which is twice as much time as they give everyone else and oh yeah, no credit card required. So you can try it risk free but only if you use this special link visit follow up boss.com forward slash real that’s follow up boss.com forward slash real for your free 30 days. Trial follow up like a boss with follow up boss. And now back to our episode. It will but you’re right, it takes out going effort outbound efforts. So in the past, it used to be pick up the phone, we call somebody, Hey, are you thinking about selling? No, not yet. Okay, I’ll call you later. There are much better ways to do that now. And I think the best way to do that is to be entwined with, or at least aware of the happenings of your prospects lives, so that you can know and give them advice along the way. And that they go, Wow, my agent called me they, they saw that, you know, my, my partner just got a promotion they call to congratulate me. I mean, those types of things when Evers whenever somebody does something special in their life, whether it’s with their family or their profession, if somebody else comes along and says, Hey, I saw that you did that thing. Boy, that goes a heck of a long way to building a building, you know, endearment, and it does, Ryan D’Aprile 26:02yeah, and it’s all out there for you to know what’s going on with these individuals. I mean, today, it’s it’s so easy, everybody’s living their lives publicly. So it’s easy to see what’s going on. But again, be be intentional about that research and development that you’re doing. And what you’re seeing, just don’t don’t blindly log in and go through newsfeed, you’re the you’re going to be doing what the algorithms want you to see you have to be intentional. And look up your network, see what’s going out with them. And then and then don’t, don’t do it, don’t consider writing on the wall. You know, a, like a touch, you know, you have to pick up the phone, you need to text him You gotta reach out with them and create a dialogue. And remember Ford, right, family Occupation, Recreation and dreams, ask open ended questions. Right? You know, how’s Little Billy doing right? Or? Or hey, how’s it how’s the new job at? At? Pepsi? whatnot, I just saw you got promoted to director finance? How’s it going? What, tell me about that, let them then tell them about you, you know, have learned the art of conversing with individuals, right, open ended conversations. And remember, it’s more about them than it is you, they’re gonna give you so much valuable data. And then when they have a need and 16% of your network transacts every single year, when they have a need, they’re going to think of their friend, right? And that’s you, right? And I tolerate like, I love this business, because you’re in the business of creating friends. So get to work. D.J. Paris 27:27The other thing too, if you’re a brand new agent, I’ve never really heard anyone say this. So I’m curious, you might have a different opinion, you might say this is a terrible idea. But my first glance, my first thought is that it’s a good idea. But I could be wrong. So if I were a brand new agent, and I had a bunch of friends that owned homes that maybe weren’t even thinking of selling what every homeowner, or at least what most homeowners who aren’t in the process of selling still like to know is what’s their place worth. You know, at any given regular day, we can go to Zillow and look at the Zestimate I don’t ever think to do that. But sometimes people do but you’re a real estate professional, you can actually provide most likely a more accurate thing. So what I would do is I would call everybody I know who owns a house if I was new, and say hey, I know you’re not looking to buy or sell anytime soon. But I really want to send you a comp because I want to practice and I want to get better at sending comps, is it okay? If I send you what I think your home is currently worth? I just would love to get your review on it. It’ll help me in my skill, building my skills. If these are your closest people to you, I think they’d be like, great, send it over. We’re curious what you thought of that. Ryan D’Aprile 28:35If they’re, if mean reaching out to them and ask them D.J. Paris 28:39for an new agent. Hey, I don’t have any clients. I just want to get some practice, you know, running CMAs that kind of thing. Ryan D’Aprile 28:46I would run a CMA but I wouldn’t send it to I wouldn’t send it to I don’t think I would send it to D.J. Paris 28:52to them. You wouldn’t Okay, no, I Ryan D’Aprile 28:55wouldn’t. I want you to focus more on the relationship building aspect of it. They’re going to find out what you’re doing through your Autoflow your direct mail, your email marketing, you know, some of the social media, they’re going to know what you’re doing. Make friends with them. First, they’re going to ask you about real estate. If they ask you about comps, then you run some comps. Now what you should what you shouldn’t be doing you should be running comps, on homes, you know, but I wouldn’t be sending them out. You should be running and going to your manager broker and say what do you think about this? I think this home should be priced here based on the comps that I ran. You should be maybe talking to some friends and saying hey listen, why don’t you come see some open houses with me? I want to go around I want to get to know the marketplace. I love the front and come with me and also Hey, let’s go right up pretend to offer I’m not going to present it but let’s go take a purchase contract. Let’s go get a cup of coffee. I’m going to fill out a contract I’m gonna explain to you a contract. Would you mind me practicing on you that’s what you do with what really good friend of yours. That’s gonna give you some real life experience. Right? But you know, I’m of the mindset of your touches. Your outreach should all be relationship that should be all about them. Your real estate will naturally flow to you D.J. Paris 30:00So I agree you’re right. i You’re absolutely right. i It’s funny you I was talking about putting everyone’s anniversaries and birthdays in my calendar. And so now because I that I do that, especially wedding anniversaries, I routinely get messages from my friends that go, you’re the only person outside of my immediate family that knows it’s my anniversary now. Am I such an amazing guy that I because I do that? No, I just put it in my calendar. Like I literally just did the one thing? And how does how would that make that person feel about me remembering their most special day of their life, right, or the birth of a child or whatever it might be the major life events, if you can somehow be be there after the event happens to to you know, congratulate the person. Boy, that demonstrates a tremendous, a tremendous effort Ryan D’Aprile 30:53solely out loud, about, it’s always about them. It’s not about you. And it’s all about you showing how much you care about them through your actions, even more so than your words. And that’s being consistent and continually reaching out to them. Again, the numbers will just take care of it for you. The numbers so D.J. Paris 31:10you’re not. So here’s a question. But rates are really high right now. I’m an agent, none of my buyers, they’re all upset about rates. So I’m just giving a devil’s advocate. What do you say to that? Ryan D’Aprile 31:24About rates? Okay, great. And your buyer? Wonderful. Why are you buying? D.J. Paris 31:33Because I need more space. Ryan D’Aprile 31:36Okay, so the listeners pay close attention to this. Right? It’s the why so why do you need more space? D.J. Paris 31:43So that I can work from home? A couple days a week, and I need a home office? Ryan D’Aprile 31:48Why do you wanna work from home a couple days a week? So that I can? D.J. Paris 31:51Because it’s more comfortable for me? I don’t I don’t want to commute in every day. So I you know, how long 30 minutes? Ryan D’Aprile 32:04So is that an hour a day? Then? It’s 30 mins started our yes, they couldn’t what? You’re commuting five days a week, then if you’re not working from home? Correct? Well, that’s five hours a day. Right? Right. It’s 20 hours a month. Right? So, you know, and take that that’s 240 hours in a year? Yeah, divided by 24 hours? How many days of that? So those are the things I ask you, DJ, as my friend and my buyer. You know, what is it to you that’s more important? Is it a say a 6% interest rate on a 300,000 hour loan? Right? versus maybe dropped down to five and a quarter a year from now. So that three quarters of a point difference? What does that come out till? And then you got to ask yourself, What’s more important to you? Five days in the car 30 minutes each way, or be able to work from home? And I can’t answer that only you can. My friend, you find the home, you make that decision, you tell me if your wife’s strong enough for you to buy the home. D.J. Paris 33:08Right. So the rates just kind of are what they are. And I think most of our listeners have heard the expression, you know, marry the home date the rate. It’s it’s not an expression. It’s an overused expression. But it’s it’s a pretty good one. Because it is actually how most people think about purchasing property. They fall in love with the home. And whatever the rate is, is and people can refinance, of course, thank goodness. So Ryan D’Aprile 33:35most, most agents will ask these questions, TJ, but they don’t even have the buyer client yet. They asked him because they’re building up, they’re building up objections in their heads already, because they’ve yet to do the life flow that’s necessary for them to grow their business. D.J. Paris 33:48Does that make sense? A little bit more about life flow. Ryan D’Aprile 33:51Life flow was simply touching everybody in your database. I think we could do it once a month. Right? Personally, by you know, a text a call, right? Maybe Facebook Messenger to them about them, and checking in with them. You know, keeping keeping current with them, and keeping them in your life and you and there’s so if you have, say 300 people in your network. Okay. Do you have a calculator with you? Because I don’t know I’m pacing? Yes, I do. Okay, great. So there’s, there are 20 working days in a month. Okay, so what’s 23 divided by or what’s 300 divided by 2015? One Five. Fitting, you have to make 15 touches a day. 15 touches a day. Now do that for a full year in a row followed up with a consistent marketing campaign, not take 300 and multiply it by point one six. You know, come the 48 Yeah. 4840. That’s 40 transactions that that are living in that database of 300 people 16% of them are going to transact records Are this the market they’re gonna transact, a lot of them won’t even transact twice. Right? They might sell a transaction Yes, sell and buy. But here’s the reality is maybe 5% or less of real estate agents are actually going to do the activities they need to do. And do those 15 touches a day. Seeing the time in and time out. Right, that’s That’s it, separate you guys from the struggling real estate agent to the very few top producers that are actually out there. D.J. Paris 35:26And plus, like, if you really think about it, and again, everybody’s personalities are different. But I would assume it’s a lot more fun to contact somebody and, you know, you look to see what they’re doing on social you, you know, you have a reason to call them, they just did something on social media that you want to acknowledge, or there’s something going on in the market that you want to make them aware of. Either way, this should all be fun, positive stuff. Right. So making 15 phone calls a day going, Hey, I was just thinking about your saw you just went on a trip. I saw your so and so just got promoted. So you guys just had an anniversary a birthday? Oh, by the way, here’s something that’s going on in the market that you might care about down the street or whatever. Those are all activities. Vijay, Ryan D’Aprile 36:09I’ll even leave that out of it. Okay. That last part. Okay. I would even leave that part out of I would leave bringing it back to real estate out of it. Does that? D.J. Paris 36:20Yeah, just just connect with them. Personally. Ryan D’Aprile 36:23That’s That’s how I feel. Just connect with them. Focus on the relationship. Leave anything about your business out of it. They will ask you, here’s how you do it. Okay, DJ, we’re going to roleplay here. You’re an accountant. Okay. Okay. And say you’re an accountant at a big you know, one of the big five firms. Okay, okay. DJ, how’s business? D.J. Paris 36:44Whoa, I’m slammed it’s it’s it’s the beginning of the year. Everyone’s working on their taxes. It’s brutal right now I’m slammed. Ryan D’Aprile 36:51That’s crazy. What are you working on? D.J. Paris 36:53Corporate Tax taxes are due just clients are asking for everything for just shore up their year. Ryan D’Aprile 37:00That’s crazier, isn’t it? Yeah. Now, what are you gonna say to me eventually, D.J. Paris 37:05I’m gonna say hey, what’s going on with you? What’s What are you up to? Ryan D’Aprile 37:08Right? Now? Here’s my chance. Just busy running around works crazy families. Great. D.J. Paris 37:14How’s the market? How’s it? How’s Ryan D’Aprile 37:15it? Right? Worse, great. Finally, then you just say okay, well, how’s the market? Now, I’m not going in every call thinking that through. In fact, I tend to throw scripts away. Right? I just go and make it about the person somehow, usually, sometimes not all the time, work will pop up. But if I talk to you once a month, I text with you once a month, I send you a Facebook Messenger once a month, two years go by, I am your buddy. You know what the hell I do for a living. And when you are looking to either purchase your home or or sell a home, there’s a really strong possibility. I’m the guy you’re calling. Why? Because it did my job. I kept you close to me, I kept the relationship with you. D.J. Paris 37:58Yeah, this is this reminds me of an old Brian Tracy expression. And we’re not really putting this in the prospecting category. But one of my favorite Brian Tracy quotes is prospecting solves all problems, or sales solve all problems. And of course, of course he’s right. And so what we’re really doing is, even though we’re not prospecting with a capital P, what we’re doing is we are prospecting because we are staying in touch with our sphere. We know people are going to choose their realtor, most people are going to choose based on who they know, like and trust, you have to earn that you have to earn know, like and trust. So the way that you earn it is exactly how Ryan is describing it here. And if you just do this this year, and you you know, you find what 15 phone calls a day, if you have 300 people in your database 15 touches a day. What is that might take what three hours a day, maybe maybe two hours a day, maybe even less. That is a remarkable low amount of effort for building intimacy and ever sorry, not not alone in a bad way. That’s, that’s a very reasonable amount of time to spend. And that will actually result in business. Ryan D’Aprile 39:08That’s absolutely right. And Brian Tracy is right. Prospecting leads will solve all your problem. And I’ve seen agents I’m very empathetic individual. Don’t get me wrong, right. But I’ve seen agents struggle, and I’ve seen him complain about it. But then I’ve also watched him do nothing about it. Yeah, I watch him do nothing about it. Right. And I’ve watched him look around to see what’s gonna solve my problem, guys. There’s no silver bullet out there. You gotta get to work. You gotta look at every professional out there that’s successful in any industry. You know, it’s so funny. You know, again, I’ve worked with a lot of new agents and brought them up, right. And the first year is a lot of emotional intelligence. I have to work with them on right because they comment they might be coming into business in their 40s. Right? And then they’re gonna look at the front like, well, he or she’s so successful, like, we’ll leave it at their career. For 20 years, they’ve been building the career for a long time. Why are you expecting be a number one agent within 12 months? It makes no sense. And then why after seven years of you not doing what you really need to do, are you upset that you’re you’ve plateaued and you’re really not where you should be? Well, that’s because you just gone through time like anybody is going to be, I think it was Gary Keller wrote in his book, The Millionaire, Millionaire Real Estate Agent, the Methuselah effect, you know who Methuselah is, right? Yes. All right. And so you’re going to be in this business for 20 years, eventually, you’re gonna have enough business, just you just want to go through 20 years of being in real estate to finally hit your stride. Right. And there are a lot of agents I know, that had been in the business for 789 years that are finally hitting their stride. That’s just because we’ve been in it for 789 years. Right. You know, it’s, they’re not where they probably should be. D.J. Paris 40:56Yeah, it’s, it’s a really, it’s a really good point. It’s it. Also, it’s what’s nice about having sort of, you know, your life flow, like you were saying, would live flow equals connection with your, your sphere. What is so amazing about that is it has nothing to do with the market has nothing to do with the conditions of the economy. It’s just interpersonal communication, this is something that that you can do. On your best day, your worst day, whatever’s going on in your life, you can always pick up the phone, reach out to somebody, and do this, regardless of the market conditions or what’s going on in your business. So what’s what’s wonderful is if you can put the blinders on, it does, it doesn’t matter if rates are up or down. I mean, of course, that affects your clients ability to buy or sell certain things, but you want to always demonstrate care, compassion, you know, and connection. Ryan D’Aprile 41:49Absolutely. It’s always it’s, I say ABC, always be connecting. People say it’s always be closing, always be connecting, always keep in contact with people, and then the sales will just follow you. D.J. Paris 42:05That’s a great, great thing to end on. And a great reminder for all of us that are noticing all of the job cuts that are going on in the real estate world and all of the just the noise with with of course economists predicting by the way, I just went to Nar conference or saw the NAR Chief Economist speak Dr. Lawrence Yun a couple of days last week and, and by the way, he thinks that the housing market is going to be just fine. He does not think this will repeat back to 2008 2009 10, etc. So he was he’s very excited that things will be returning to normal in the next year or two. But in the meantime, and you should be doing this regardless of whether it’s up down up market down market rental market, you know, buy or sell or market connect with your your spear, there’s always going to be people like Ryan said 16% of the people you know, are going to transact in the next 24 months. That’s just a fact. So how much I’m sorry, in the next 12 months 16% Will transact in the next 12 months, some of those will have two transactions, some will have one. So you have a huge opportunity here. But you have to earn it. And the way that you earn it is through as Ryan just said, ABC always be connecting, find out these things. And guys, this is the fun part of the job. The hard parts actually working with the client. That’s actually the tough part. This is the fun part where you actually get to demonstrate that you care that you you know, this is the stuff that you should get excited about because it doesn’t require a whole lot of knowledge or skill just requires a little bit of effort. And and it requires that you do care about your clients. And if you do care about them, demonstrate it and they will they will be with you forever. Well, Ryan Well I think it’s a great place to pause we are again congratulations on the merger with with Coldwell Banker That is incredible. We’re so so excited and proud of you. And all of your agents I’m sure are thrilled about that. And also want to remind everybody to continue to follow us and sponsz Follow our sponsors and pit tape pay attention to what they are providing because our sponsors are the reason we can keep our show going. So please take a look at their products and services. We appreciate it and last please tell a friend about this show. We really want to blow this out of the water and 2023 We just crossed over 2.1 million downloads a few days ago. So please continue to tell other agents about it especially agents that are struggling and most agents are struggling right now they need a little pick me up if they listen to this episode from Ryan that’ll help get their their mindset back in order and they can start producing or make this 2023 a great year. So and also for anyone out there that is in the Chicagoland area or in Wisconsin, Indiana, Florida. Are you in Iowa Well, Ryan, I forgot if Ryan D’Aprile 45:01no Florida in the Eric Schmidt, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Illinois, D.J. Paris 45:05got it in Florida, Illinois, Florida. So Ryan D’Aprile 45:09we’re just not Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan. D.J. Paris 45:12If you are if you’re if you’re looking to work with a firm that has this kind of leadership, Ryan and his team would love to chat with EG APR properties.com. There’s a link to that in our show notes. That’s the place to go amazing company. And they are amazing, so amazing that they just got picked up by Coldwell Banker. So definitely check them out. It’s going to be going to be a great year guys. Let’s make it a good year. Ryan, thank you as always for continuing to support our show, and we will see everybody on the next episode. Thanks CJ.

Leslie Singer the founder of the Singer Team with Brown Harris Steven’s in New York discusses how she started her career in real estate. Leslie talks about the strategies she used for attracting clients in the beginning of her career. Leslie also discusses the mistakes she sees agents make that can be avoided and how she handles the problems that come in any transaction at some point. Next, Leslie focuses on the importance of previewing a property before going in with the client. Leslie joined TikTok recently and describes how she’s using the platform for her business. Last, Leslie discusses how she’s feeling about and approaching 2023. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! Leslie Singer can be reached at 917-860-8128 and lsinger@bhsusa.com. This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks and FollowUpBoss. Transcript D.J. Paris 0:00Would you like to attract more clients in 2023? Of course you would. Well, today we’re going to talk to a top 1% producer on exactly how she does it. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solution so that you can easily generate more business. There agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now on to our show. Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the largest podcast made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris. I’m your guide and host through the show. And in just a moment we’re going to be speaking with Top New York City agent, Lesley singer. But before we get to Lesley, just a couple of quick reminders I am asking for two favors this episode, but they promised I’ll only take you a minute total for both. So number one, if you could whatever podcast app, you might be listening to the show right now, if you could leave us a review that would greatly we’d greatly appreciate it. It helps us continue to improve and also learn what you like. So please do that. And we would really appreciate it. And also the second thing is just tell a friend think of one other realtor that is struggling right now and guess what most agents are it’s a tough year. Let’s help them as much as this podcast is hopefully helping you and send them a link over to our show so you can send them to our website keeping it real pod.com Every episode can be streamed from any browser or if the person you’re referring over to us is a podcast listener just have them pull up any podcast app search for keeping it real and hit that subscribe button. Alright guys, thank you for continuing to listen and support our show. And now on to the main event my conversation with Leslie singer. Today on the show yeah blessing singer with the Center team with Brown Harris Stevens in New York City. Let me tell you more about Lesley. Now Leslie is an award winning broker and has consistently been one of Brown Harris Stevens top performers leading a team that has repeatedly been number one in sales for the firm. She has also earned a reputation as one of the most approachable and loyal representatives in the industry. Leslie’s track record of success is a function of her exceptional negotiation skills, tailored marketing solutions and an innate ability to help clients navigate the complex New York real estate market. Her honors include winning the Real Estate Board of New York deal of the Year Award, also being acknowledged as one of the top women in real estate by New York real estate journal, and being recognized as one of the top real estate teams nationwide by The Wall Street Journal. Born and bred in New York City Leslie’s informed sophisticated sensibilities in her MBA background guide the team in preparing for transitions and transactions, discerning value and return on investment. Now I want everybody to open up Instagram and Tiktok and I want you to follow Leslie and her team. It’s the same username for both it is singer team NYC that’s si n g R. So singer team NYC both Instagram and Tiktok. And we will have a link to those in our show notes. You can click on those and follow because Leslie is doing some really really cool stuff. Enter team on social especially on tick tock which you just got into which we can talk about too. Anyway. Leslie, welcome to the show. Leslie Singer 4:38Oh my god, thank you for having me. But now I all of a sudden I got nervous because those accolades. I mean, now I have to live up to them. D.J. Paris 4:46That’s true. There’s a lot of pressure to deliver. You don’t I’m gonna say this at the beginning because I since I just really I’m so impressed with with what you’ve done and I usually leave this to the end and then I realized Not everybody makes it to the end. So before we actually start the interview, I mean, it’s funny, I’ve been doing this five years, if you think it would have occurred to me sooner, but I guess better late Better late than ever. But if you are an agent in New York City, and you are shopping around for maybe a new team, a new firm, maybe you think you could be a good asset to Lesley and her team, reach out to them and let her have a conversation, and maybe you could be a possible good fit for, for the singer team. So anyway, just wanted to throw that out there first. Leslie Singer 5:33Except now they’re now they need to listen to see if they actually want to do that. So I know D.J. Paris 5:37they’re gonna want to work with you, I assure you, you are a big, big, big deal. And, and that’s the other thing, too, is, is definitely, you know, we’re, that’s why we’re so excited to have you on the show. But let’s say I would love to start. So what I don’t really know is how you got started, because I know you’re this big, big success now. But everyone starts somewhere. And I would love to hear about how and why you got into real estate. Leslie Singer 6:03Um, so I’ll try and make it a shorter story than but it was actually really interesting. My background is marketing. And I was the vice president of marketing for American movie classics, I had the dream job, truly a dream job. But I was flying all over the place. And I ended up with these two little kids that like immediately, they’re 17 months apart. And I couldn’t be flying around the world and having two little little ones at home. So I tried really, really, really strategized about what my next steps were. And it was really hard to come to this decision. But I was like, huh, I have a marketing background, very, very strong marketing background, I have an MBA, so I can do board packages, and I love finances. And I grew up in Manhattan, I know it like the back of my hand. And if I were to go into real estate, I wouldn’t be traveling. So I took the MBA, and I took the marketing background, my knowledge in Manhattan, and triangulate it on real estate. So it was a very thoughtful and strategic decision for anyone that’s starting out. And so that’s how I came into the idea of real estate. And it was really, truly for those reasons. And for anyone who’s starting in real estate, I talked to a lot of firms when I was thinking about, you know, starting my career, and every firm has a very different corporate culture, and a very different way of proceeding. And so it was really fascinating. And not only does each firm have a different corporate culture, but even within a firm, certain offices, within the same firm even have a different corporate culture. So I interviewed with a lot of different firms. And the other thing I will say is having a mentor when you start is really, really, really important. So I met with someone at Brown Harris Stevens, I met with a manager, again, interviewed with a lot of different firms, but came upon some manager at Brown Harris Stevens who said, huh, I got a call, it was someone who was looking for an assistant who would bring me on and we would kind of did a handshake. But certain certain arrangements were made That I would cover all weekends, open houses, just to start and get the mentoring. And we said we would try it for six months, and six months turned into 18 years on a handshake. And everything was just above board. And it was a you know, again, for me to learn but within six months and kind of like became more of a partnership. And I really brought my marketing background to the to the whole process and marketed ourselves branded ourselves. And it was it was a it’s great. So D.J. Paris 9:13well, before I go I go into sort of how you got started. And with that, because I think in particular that marketing background is so incredibly useful for agents when they get well at any point in their career. But certainly when they get started, I was gonna say with AMC, I just going back to American movie classics. I always I worship the the the lists. I’m thinking of American Film Institute. Okay, American, different. Sorry. I’m thinking of AFI who puts those lists together so so I was getting confused. But But yeah, American film classes Yeah. Big. Your AMC I’m sorry, AMC. Yes. But yeah, I’m a big God I love I love American movie classics, as well as the brand that they’ve built is impressive. Leslie Singer 9:56But it was at Time Warner I was at an ad agent Let’s see, I’m gonna really, I just, I loved what he did. But I have to say, I’m equally passionate that I get to do and it’s a privilege to get to do what I do every day. D.J. Paris 10:11And I imagine you get to sort of scratch the creative itch as well. Because when you get to be in full control of your branding, your marketing, your, your messaging, so does that sort of satisfy the part of you that loves being creative, and, Leslie Singer 10:26oh, that but I also have to say, every deal and no two deals are alike, and you have to be creative in this industry. And think outside the box, a if you’re promoting a property, how to differentiate, but also when it comes to a board package, and someone’s financials, and I’m not saying you have to be creative with their financials, but every deal has some sort of creative component of how to make the candidate the strongest possible presentation, etc. So I get creativity. And there’s a lot of creativity in how I handle my clients. But we can we can get into that, too now, or we can get into it later. D.J. Paris 11:09But yeah, let’s jump into it. Now, I’d love to hear about sort of how you approach clients. Well, first, actually, no, let’s back up, I want to first find out about attracting clients. Because even though you’ve been doing this for a long time now and a really impressive career, everyone, everyone gets started with really no clients. And so I’m curious, how did you when you first started 18 years ago, what were your strategies? I imagine you had some sort of sphere of influence, because you live but New York is so transient that I don’t know how much that helps. But you did grew up there. So I’m curious. Yeah. Leslie Singer 11:45So I mean, interestingly enough, when you’re first starting out, and yes, it was really important that I had a strong mentor behind me, which could show that there was someone with extreme knowledge and a track record as well. And then honestly, the brown hair Stevens brand. So those are definitely great things to have in my back pocket. But you don’t always want or nor do your friends want to work with a newbie, right? D.J. Paris 12:11When they’re buying a million dollar home. Just got her license a week ago. Leslie Singer 12:15Exactly. And nor do they always want to show their finances to you. Right. That’s, that’s, D.J. Paris 12:21you know, it is I’m sorry to interrupt. But that is something that nobody really has ever seen. We’ve done 430 episodes. And just that little piece that you said about, I’ve had lots of guests say, Well, I didn’t want to work with my friends, because I was afraid I would screw things up, or I was afraid to ask for their business. But the one thing I never thought about was what you just said, which is, I don’t know what my friends earn. I don’t, I’ve never asked them I was taught not to ask. And I was taught that any discussion of that was either considered brat braggadocious or being rude. So, so yes, so that’s really interesting. So that’s a really strong point. So you had these people, but maybe you didn’t feel so comfortable asking for business? Leslie Singer 13:04Yeah, no, I mean, absolutely. And look, and again, being that I had someone in my, you know, like, as almost a partnership in the beginning, I could offer that should they want to work with me, not only do they have the knowledge behind and the security of that, but then he could review their finances but even that, like felt it just, you know, I understand their their hesitation. But what I did do is in my little sphere of influence was I actually started like, the old fashioned way. And I kind of went to 10 of my really, really good friends. And I asked each of them for 10 names of people that I could contact just to start my own database. So you know, that’s okay, only 100 people, but then those 10 people so almost like, you know, those what are they like mail chain things that used to get? So that was one thing I did and I started a newsletter, which was something that my mentor had been doing, but there was always a column that was singer says, and it kind of talked about, like the New York school system or you know, those type of things that were New York based truly New York that showed that you had an insider in for like influence on Manhattan, and we would mail the buildings newsletters, and said, D.J. Paris 14:28that’s interested you just you would just blank it Leslie Singer 14:32blank and the part of my working at Time Warner was direct marketing. So I was like, Let’s do direct marketing. Let’s do a newsletter, let’s you know and people held on to those newsletters. It was pretty great. So that was one a couple of things. To think about, D.J. Paris 14:51can I pause? I’m going to tell you something that that’s gonna that’s not going to surprise you but also surprise you at the same time. because, well, so I moved into a new a new development a year and a half ago. And it’s a nice building, there’s 40 units, a townhome. There’s a few townhomes. There’s but but it’s it’s a, it’s a nice building and brand new development. Now, obviously all of us who have purchased probably not leaving any immediate time soon, but in a year and a half. So we’re talking about sending out mailers trying to establish your brand. At some point, all of us are probably going to move it’s at some point, it’s it’s, it’s, it would be unlikely that at our building people with lived there for 40 or 50 years, although we could, but it’s unlikely. So because of the neighborhood that we’re in, and it’s it’s just one of those younger neighborhoods. Not one piece of mail from any realtor, just saying, hey, you know, like, obviously, that would be a long term play, they’re probably like, well, if I’m going to start mailing, I’m going to be needing to mail for the next five to seven years. But why not? And And what’s amazing is not one piece of mail from any realtor in the last year and a half. And I don’t think it’s because people know that I’m in the business. I just think nobody’s thought to do this. So I think even that’s kind of a lost art these days. And there’s so much opportunity. So I just wanted to mention that three. Leslie Singer 16:17Yeah, and I think people are cutting back on mailing, right, because we have social media, we have everything else. But it is a really great way to cut through the clutter. And when I do a new listing, I’m mailed the neighborhood, book, and I mail the building as well, because people who love your building like you, you may not be ready to sell but you you may know someone who wants to buy there, because you love the building, and they come to visit you. So like it’s just another way to keep yourself top of mind. D.J. Paris 16:48You also said something else. And I apologize for like interrupting you every few moments using something that at first I sort of was like, I didn’t understand it. And then as you were talking it made sense. And I and this is such a this is no no, this is a thing nobody else has said either. Which was. So there used to be this old sales technique at the closing table, or whether you’re selling a car or I was or whatever the old salesman 101 was like, by the way, I’d like the name of three of your friends. Now that nobody likes that, right? We all are like, Yeah, but what you did was much smarter, and definitely works and isn’t uncomfortable, which is you go to your your friends, and you say, Hey, I’m starting my business. I’m not obviously, you know, if you know someone who wants to buy or sell, obviously, I’d love to talk to him. But I would just love to get to introduce to some of your friends. And basically, that’s what you were asking. And that’s just called networking. And I just want to make, I just want to make sure that anyone listening, that is a really smart strategy, because your friends are the ones that want you to succeed. And you’re not asking them to like, you know, you’re not really asking them for Leslie Singer 17:57a sale, you’re not asking. Like, who do you think would be really good for me to reach out to and talk to now it’s brilliant. D.J. Paris 18:05It’s brilliant. And I know if somebody asked me, I mean, it’s such a simple thing. But no, really people don’t do this very often. I don’t think if somebody if one of my friends were to say I’m starting this XYZ business, whatever it is, hey, could you give me some names of people that might in the future? Maybe be a candidate for me? I just want to put them on my list or reach out? I wouldn’t hesitate. And I’d be like, of course, I will like no big deal. Yeah. Asking asking a client at the closing table. That one feels more uncomfortable. Leslie Singer 18:37Yeah, definitely. I agree. D.J. Paris 18:39I just wanted to honor you for a couple of those. Those. Really, really, it’s always the small things, right? Like, people say things on the show. And and all of a sudden, like they just kind of go past it because they don’t realize how how important I think that isn’t I’ll be like, Oh, stop stop you just so you’ve done that a several times. So I promise to not interrupt as much anymore. No, I appreciate Leslie Singer 19:00that. Um, the other thing was, I noticed this happened. When my when my children were in nursery school. And we were applying for kindergarten, a lot of my parents would talk to me because I grew up in Manhattan, about the different schools and I only went to one or two of them, right. But they would ask me and I had a general knowledge of the school system. And I was like, Huh, why don’t I give back and this is in my first year of real estate, why don’t I give back to the community and by hosting seminars about the school system. And so we would I would have a getting into kindergarten school panel and getting into Nursery School, which is a huge thing in Manhattan. I would have these panel discussions and I would bring in not only parents but guidance counselors. And yes, they have come from nursery school. Yes, they haven’t for kindergarten. But it was my way to give back to the community with also the self serving idea that these people will be making a decision shortly, once they know where their child is getting into school as to where they want to live. Since then, D.J. Paris 20:18I love that and here in Chicago, I don’t know, you know, I’m not a parent myself. So I don’t know if those exist. I have not. I’ve heard of Realtors doing. So you want to buy a condo, so you want to buy a first home? Those those seminars happen? Those are pretty common. I’ve not heard about school, and that is every new parents sort of biggest one of their biggest issues is where if especially in a big city, where’s my child going to go to school? Where are the safe areas? What are the best, you know, academics, etc. That’s really Leslie Singer 20:52now now I do it through college, because that’s kind of as my kids got older, and I had more knowledge, and we still we do college seminars as well. And I have to say, it’s fun for me, it shows how old I am. But there are clients that I helped with the nursery that I’ve also helped with the college. I mean, isn’t that incredible? Yeah. Yeah, the way through? Yeah. Well, I, D.J. Paris 21:17my sister and I both went to Miami University out in Ohio, Miami of Ohio. And then my sister ended up in New York City, they actually have a pretty strong alumni. You know, contingency there in New York, which, which is surprising. Whenever I met people in Ohio that went to Miami, or from New York, I was like, how did you find out about, you know, this, this, this really, we shouldn’t be in Florida. We’re in the middle of Ohio. And, and, yeah, but anyway, um, that’s, that isn’t me. So you still do that as you still do. You’re just, if you go all the way you still do all the way from nursery school up there. Leslie Singer 21:53Really, we’ve been really focused more on the college because again, you know, it’s a life cycle. And it’s really nice way to give back. And, you know, eventually, people will think about, hmm, you know, my home is larger than I need, right as they go off to college. So D.J. Paris 22:13we’ll just even just even planning for college with 529 plans, and the financial part of it is is so daunting, and so scary for new parents, that it’s something that they have to start thinking about pretty much right away. Yeah. In your Yeah, yeah. In utero. It’s, yeah, I Yes. My, my one nephew is five. And so he’s got some time, but my, my sister’s all they’ve already figured it all out. And it’s already all figured out. And I was like, good for them. Yeah. Yeah. But so so that that is a really smart strategy, because you again, you are giving back you’re contributing, you’re providing value. And then oh, by the way, I’m also a realtor so Leslie Singer 23:02well, you know, in my mind, finding the perfect fit for school is very similar to finding a perfect fit for your family in a building. And the application process of a applying for these schools is not that different. Of course, you’re not showing all your financials, but you still have an application process for getting into school, you have an application process for, you know, a co op. So there was so many similarities, but again, it wasn’t, it was a nice way for me to give back with a minor ask, right. So it felt good. D.J. Paris 23:38So you bring in you said, you bring in guidance counselor’s? Do you ever bring in representatives from the schools themselves? Leslie Singer 23:44I have done that. And I’ve done parents, so you have a really, really nice range of people. Yeah, D.J. Paris 23:51that is such a great idea. I love that. Leslie Singer 23:55Wow, I think it’s really important. I think it’s really important to really think about what’s authentic and genuine to you with whatever you do because people will they they can feel it they can sense it. And it’s really where you’re you’re coming from the most honest place and I think it’s great for connecting so I would say to anyone starting out think about what’s really authentic and genuine to you and follow that so that you know those those workplaces for me that felt D.J. Paris 24:34Yeah, it makes makes all the sense in the world. I also want to go back to this idea of open houses because I feel like that too. Is so easily like Yeah, yeah, yeah, sit open houses, but it’s not it may be it doesn’t sound very exciting to talk about. But I will say that almost every guest I’ve had on and I only really interviewed top 1% producers, they all love and they all started doing and open houses for other agents and learning how to talk to clients as they walk in and out how to, you know, understanding how to have conversations about real estate, how to talk to clients understanding their needs, how important was it for you to do a lot of those reps sort of going to the gym, almost have open houses? How critical is that for you? Leslie Singer 25:21So for me, those weekend open houses, where I took over our listings and had the open houses, those were really, really, really critical. And I will tell anyone, even if you are representing a property, you should have a no inside and out all the other competitive properties. Because when you get someone at that open house, and you say to them, because it’s really critical question, does this work for you? And he’s like, Nah, you know what this or that, and then you can say, this may not work for you. But how about this, I think you should look at this, man make an appointment for you. So know your competition, and turn that person if they’re, if you’re not, they’re not going to be the buyer for your property, turn them into a buyer for another property. It’s it’s a art and it’s a great opportunity. So yes, those open houses were really, really, really important. The other thing is when other brokers are holding open houses, go to as many open houses as possible and learn the market, whether it’s a one bedroom, a studio, a two bedroom, a five bedroom, because inevitably, you’ll be at a cocktail party, and you’ll be oh, you know, oh, you’re interested on the, you know, the Upper East Side, I saw this great two bedroom the other day, right? Like, it just get to know the market. And it doesn’t matter. I mean, I’ve been doing this for so many years, and I still go to open houses so I can see what’s out there. D.J. Paris 26:54And also to, it’s great, I don’t love the word networking, because I just feel like that I don’t even know it and always what that means, but this idea of going to these broker open houses, allows you to interact with other realtors. And there’s a real practical reason to do this even other than just being fun and friendly and nice. Leslie Singer 27:15In the market, and you you learn that, you know, when I’m talking to other brokers, and I’m going to the open house, inevitably, there’s a discussion of like, you know, what are you seeing, you know, how, you know, how are you finding the market, this is what I’m experiencing? And there’s also the great discussion of, hey, I’m bringing this on, do you know anyone? Or, you know, I, someone doesn’t want to list this, but they’re thinking about listing it, would you have any, I mean, there are so many dialogues that are important. Plus, just to have your face out there, D.J. Paris 27:51of course, well, and I imagined to like, during the pandemic, for example, when what once once the, the sort of pandemic was subsiding. And, and people, you know, the interest rates were so low and everyone was trying to buy, I imagine it doesn’t hurt to go into an open house, you know, at some point, introducing yourself to the other agent, making nice with them developing some sort of friendship or relationship, professional friendship with them, probably doesn’t hurt them, when they see out of the 30 offers they just received, when they see a friendly a name that they recognize, like, I know this, this woman, she’s awesome. I met her at an open house, she seems great. It probably doesn’t hurt at getting a little bit more attention on that offer. Leslie Singer 28:35Now, you’re absolutely right about that. I’m working on a transaction right now. And the offer was accepted. Honestly, probably a good six to eight weeks ago of which we still haven’t gotten to contract. And I represent the purchaser and the broker on the other side is like, Thank God, it’s you. Thank God, it’s you. I know we’re gonna get there. Yeah. Because she said, you know, never my 40 years have I experienced this, but like, you know, so to your point, making, making contact, making connections, just as someone when a deal comes together, they have a name and a face and they feel good about it is really, truly important. So I am D.J. Paris 29:23I’m curious too, because you’ve been in this industry almost 20 years, you’ve seen a lot of agents come and go you’ve seen as you’ve been building your your business and your team, what are some of the mistakes that you see agents making as they are trying to build their business or, and there’s so many mistakes that that agents make. But what we tried to do on the show is help agents avoid some of those pitfalls. So is there anything that comes to mind? I mean, aside from like, not working hard enough. Yes, that’s usually the main reason I find that people tend to exit the industry. Um, but it isn’t always that. And sometimes people just make, you know, decisions that they could have made differently. So is there anything that that you sort of see agents, you know, any mistakes that agents make, that really they that could be avoided, anything that comes to mind, Leslie Singer 30:16I’m gonna have to think about this for a second mistakes. I think sometimes when you’re young and you’re hungry, you want the deal more than you. Like, you know, you want it too much, and you lose sight of your client, and you push for a deal. And I think a lot gets lost there. And your relationships are so important that you can’t want the deal more than your own client. And, you know, deals are going to come and go, and they’re going to come together, they’re going to fall apart or whatever. But making sure that your client feels really attended to throughout. So really spending that time and not thinking of it as just like a one deal. And then you’re on to the next because you you build your business by clients referring to you or coming back to you. And don’t make something like a one trick pony. Yeah, D.J. Paris 31:17that’s really, really good advice. And I’m curious to F with the amount of time and the number of deals that you have done? How important is it to anticipate your client’s needs? Or their mental state? And I don’t mean, you know, whether they’re sane or insane. I mean, their their anxiety, their fear, fears, their their joy, that? How critical is it to be able to manage those expectations and those emotions for your clients? Because I know, every time I’ve purchased and sold a property, something always goes wrong, there’s always a moment where I’m like, well, something’s going on, this is all falling apart, this is all going to be a big disaster. And then, then, you know, it isn’t. But the stress of that is real. And I’m curious about how you help your clients through those difficult, you know, moments of a transaction? Leslie Singer 32:14Well, so there’s, I mean, you bring up a really, really important point, which is a every deal has a moment, every single, every single deal has a moment. Like there’s you know, and you never know when it’s gonna happen, but it’s kind of like when it happens, you’re like, oh, here it is. And you you, you work through it, I try to the best of my ability, ability to always handle all those moments without including my client. So I try I take on the stress, and try and navigate to get to the right answer without having to stress them out and only go to them at those really critical moments that I’m like, I can’t do it without, you know, including them. But I do think you spend time with the client upfront. And, you know, just in your dialogue of getting to know them of is this a life transition? Right? So you come into people’s lives, whether they’re having getting married, having a baby, you know, it’s their first time purchase, some are getting divorced, sometimes it’s death. Sometimes it’s an estate sale and getting to know a, what their objectives are, where they are in their lifecycle, and understanding that will help you navigate with them. And listening throughout the entire process. You’ll get to sense whether this is someone who makes a really quick decision. This is someone who needs more hand holding, this is someone who needs to see 25 properties, they only need to see five, you know, so it’s a lot of listening, there’s a lot of hand holding. And there are times when you’re a therapist, right? Because you’re dealing with someone’s largest asset. They’ve exposed everything. You know, they’ve told their life story and aboard package, they’ve shown all their financials, they’re extremely anxious, they started envisioning themselves in the property. You know, and for whatever their reason is for their transition that comes to play so and there for sellers, that’s a really emotional time. They may have, they may have, you know, brought up their whole family there and they’re selling because they don’t need that family home anymore. But it’s still emotional, even if they’re excited about where they’re going. It’s still emotional, or you know, if it’s a death or whatever, divorce so, yes, a transitions and getting to know your client, but I really, there are a couple things I do which is I try and understand that client really well in the beginning and I listen. But I really respect someone It’s time. So I try my, if I’m working with a buyer, I try and identify, before we even go out five to 10 properties that I think are going to be a perfect fit. I lined those five properties up in a row, get a car and driver, so I only take them out of their day to day for maybe an hour and a half to two hours. And then we can kind of have a conversation after that, like, what worked, what didn’t work. And then I can refine the search that much more, but I’m always sensitive to someone’s time. D.J. Paris 35:34Can I ask about doing showings? This is such a simple question. Everybody does them differently. Do you visit the properties before your client? Leslie Singer 35:44I love previewing. I love to preview a property A, it allows me to eliminate if I don’t think it if it’s going to be appropriate, but be when I get to that property. And I think it is the right fit. Because I’ve previewed it, it not only gives me ability to be comfortable in the showing, but I have a lot of knowledge. And I can point out to my client, you know, the things that I know are, you know, important priorities for them. So whether it’s closet space, or whatever it may be. I know that that’s important to them, and I can help highlight it. So I love previewing. D.J. Paris 36:26So whenever possible preview, in my opinion, Leslie Singer 36:29yes, it takes extra time, but it’s so worth it. And that property that you see that you’re previewing may not be right for the client you had in mind. But I promise you somewhere in the next kind of like discussions you’re having all of a sudden, and it could be three weeks later, and that property, hopefully still on the market, you’re like, Oh, my God, the property that I saw for seven, so that wasn’t right is totally right for someone else. There’s, there’s no wasted time. It works. D.J. Paris 36:59I guess what we’re really talking about is learning the inventory. I mean, as simple as it sounds. And inventory is of course always changing. But this idea of being a master of the inventory is really, so it’s so critical. It’s not, hey, I’m gonna go on this journey with you. And we’re gonna walk into this home together and check it out. It’s I’m gonna go on the journey. First, I’m going to check everything out so that I can bring back and, you know, it’s it’s a simple thing, but I don’t know that most agents even preview properties, I think they a lot of them show up with their client. And, you know, and that is, it’s, that’s really not the it’s just my opinion, but it’s not really the best client experience that way, I believe. Yeah, I Leslie Singer 37:44think you know, I think, look, everybody has a different you know, a different way of handling their business. Again, it gives me the confidence walking in that I feel like it is really right, I can show it better, even though I’m not the show or you know, the listing agent might be the shower. But again, just as you said, getting to know the inventory is just so critical. D.J. Paris 38:08I wouldn’t I want to go ahead. I’m Leslie Singer 38:10sorry. No, no, I just recently there was a home that I had previewed, I thought it was absolutely like the perfect fit. Brought the couple, the wife looks at me. And she’s like, Oh my god, I love this. I love this. But there was something in the husband’s face that I was like, Huh. And I came back to her a couple days later. And I said, Look, you know, I sent you this listing. And you said you weren’t interested in seeing it for the following reasons. But I noticed your husband’s reaction. And I actually think this will appeal to him more. And she was like, hmm, okay, let’s go. And that’s the one they bought. Yeah. So it’s like, just, you know, you have to also be present when you’re showing, yes, D.J. Paris 38:58you have to pay it pay attention. And it’s actually a so and that probably being that the, the physical space isn’t new to you at that. Yeah. Because you’ve already previewed it, you now can focus your attention on their reaction versus what’s actually going around visually. Exactly. That’s an important tip. And so maybe that’s even the best reason of all to preview is, is well, there’s lots of great reasons to learn the property, Leslie Singer 39:31it allows you to really be watching. Yeah, D.J. Paris 39:35you know, you’re so right, because I know for me, any shiny object, you know, captures my attention. And so if I’m walking in somewhere, for the first time, I’m looking around and seeing everything visually, and of course, that’s what the client is going to be doing and you’re really watching them. Watch instead of you know, being taken in yourself by everything and that is, again, it’s it’s a simple thing, but not every realtor thinks about that and And that is really it. We’re talking about professionalism, I think and being professional. And that is such a such a great idea. So thank you for that. And another question. I wanted to switch gears a little bit because you were telling me just before we got on, Leslie, Leslie and I were talking about I am so jealous because I live in Chicago and we are the second city. And, and New York is, you know, probably the first city of ADD, so I’m, I live in a very wonderful place, but I’m so jealous because New York is such a lovely place. And we were talking about all things New York. 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Also, the best part they have seven day a week support so you’ll get the help that you need when you need it and get this follow up boss is so sure that you’re going to love their CRM that for a limited time, they’re offering keeping it real listeners a 30 day free trial which is twice as much time as they give everyone else and oh yeah, no credit card required. So you can try it risk free but only if you use this special link visit follow up boss.com forward slash reel that’s follow up boss.com forward slash reel for your free 30 day trial. Follow up like a boss with follow up boss. And now back to our episode. But you were telling me that you just recently had some success on social media with Tik Tok. And, you know, this is really interesting because I’ve been doing the show for five years. And no one’s tock tick tock yet. And I’m not I’m not asking you to, to, to, you know, give away any secrets or any but we are starting to see Realtors now embrace tick tock which is being used, of course by you know, the demographic of Tik Tok users are skews younger. And so I’m curious on what you’re doing there, and what sort of results you’re seeing because you just had a big success there. Leslie Singer 42:38Yeah. Um, so I’ve been doing Instagram, you know, obviously for quite a while now. And I have a team that helps and supports me and I kept saying I think we really need to be on tick tock think we really need to be on tick tock. And they’re like, Yeah, you know, it’s new. And I’m like, so I’m, I’m maybe even be late to the game. Because I keep I was harping on this, but we really only started a couple of weeks ago. And again, I’m doing things that are truly, truly genuine to me, and really comfortable for me. Usually around the property, you know, it’s around properties. Although, as I mentioned to you, I just happen to do one around hot chocolate because I do like to bring in a little bit of lifestyle and like things that are popping up in Manhattan, that could be useful tidbits. But they’re usually centered around a property that I’m promoting, and just having a ton of fun with it. But like, you know, again, it’s really, really new to me, and this one particular video went viral and we have like now 270,000 hits on it and like, okay, so and I’ll just share with you that my son who’s 25 He’s like, Hey, Mom, my friends are loving you on Tik Tok and they say, you’re so you’re so professional. Hey, Mom, I didn’t even know you were on Tik Tok. And he goes I don’t have tick tock D.J. Paris 44:08Hey, Mom, stay out of my friends tiktoks Leslie Singer 44:12I wasn’t there watching they’re following me and wasn’t like, D.J. Paris 44:16but isn’t that amazing? If you put out good quality content or fun content, entertaining content, whatever it might be, it can you know, we do have ways you know, we do have the opportunity now with technology where where things can can spread and and it’s all about value. And so I imagine tick tock is an as well as Instagram is fun for you. Because with your marketing background, you get to really project what I am. I’m curious too, about how you stay in touch with clients in between there, their sales, right, so somebody buys a co op there. Maybe they’re gonna live there for X number of years. How are you? Staying in touch with them in between. Leslie Singer 45:02Yeah, so that’s always a really hard thing, because you’re really, really busy with your day to day. So I do do a monthly newsletter. And sometimes it’s not, you know, as frequent. Sometimes it’s more frequent if it’s important, but I definitely do a monthly newsletter. I really love my clients, like I really, really love my clients. So fortunately, that means having coffee with them having a lunch, you know, having a drink. And it may not be as you know, sometimes you can do it more frequently. everyone’s schedules really, really busy, but your clients sometimes become your really good friends sometimes, you know, as I said, some are with me forever and repeat business. And then it’s little things like just reaching out and following up, you know, how are you enjoying your apartment love to see, I’d love to drop by, you know. And then I do every now and then I don’t do holiday gifts, because they get lost in the clutter. But I will pick a different time of year to do a gift, and do a mailing of a gift. So and it could be you know, Gears we’ve did champagne, it’s just another way of just saying, you know, thinking of you. And usually for the first year, when someone buys from me, they’ll get like wine of the month. So each month or depending on who they are. Maybe it’s flowers each month. So each month, there’s like a little and I can write the notes to them. So each like January, a different note for me, like, you know, each month for that first year they’re hearing for me, D.J. Paris 46:42ya know, they love that. I also just because this was you, it’s pulled back the curtain a little bit about how we book our show. We send questions to our guests, and I never ever get to the questions. But there was one that one response that you gave that I just thought was so cute. And I really wanted to you to share us this story this year that you were named the mayor of by a client so so I don’t want to give away the the punch line. But do you mind sharing the story? Because this is this is such a great, great holiday story? Leslie Singer 47:18Well, it’s just so you know, to be the mayor of something right? You should be actually really quite charming. And when a client of yours says you’re like the mayor, it’s like, oh, it should be really, really flattering. But this was a client that definitely wish we had identified the Upper East Side, which I know like the back of my hand. No really, really, really well. But he’s like, you’re the mayor of no foo. And I’m like, Mayor of no foo like, what, what is no foo and he’s like, it’s the Upper East Side. Leslie, you’re the mayor of no foo. And I’m like, What is no foo? And he said, no fun. And I’m like, Oh my god. D.J. Paris 48:02So you’re the you’re the mayor of the no fun part of New York. Leslie Singer 48:06And again, it wasn’t because I’m not no fun. But he was like nervous that the Upper East Side had this reputation of not being fun and that people always went downtown to have fun. So yes, I was I was named the mayor of no Fu and I got such a kick out. D.J. Paris 48:26That is that is that is amazing. So curious how you’ve seen like, for 20. So by the time this will be released, it will be in January? We’re actually recording it here in December 2023. You know, you’ve been you’ve been through several market cycles. You were you went through the crash of awaits. And at just 2023 Do you have any fear about 2023? How are you? How are you approaching? Leslie Singer 48:59I mean, not not only have I been through the crash, right, but the pandemic. You know, like, and I did not leave the city I was here for my clients, I did not leave and I had clients who would call me during the pandemic and they say, what is happening on West 79th street and I’m like, You know what, let me go over there. And I’ll go running over because the Lucerne had given over their hotel to the whatever. But you know, news can news media can make things sound that much worse. And so boots on the ground. But Anyway, point being I’ve been through so many different cycles that I think you really need to just be confident that people do need to move right there are always going to be circumstances and you need to figure out in any given market what the advantage is. So we had low interest rates and there was a time minute moment where the market kind of dropped right, but only like eight to 10%, even during the pandemic, but if you had the guts to buy, then, you know, that was a brilliant time. So 2023, we’re kind of looking at the first half of the year potentially being difficult. Maybe a couple more price increases, but I think, you know, interest rate increases, but I think people have already experienced that and have the knowledge and we’re looking at a really strong second half of the year. That’s my prediction. So if you can work with your clients, at a time, when the first half of the year, people are nervous, there are opportunities. So that’s a great time to negotiate. And there’s a great saying, date, the rate, marry the home. So if someone is, you know, nervous about interest rates, you can change your interest rate later. But if you find that home you love and you need to finance, just know that that’s a possibility. So I think you know, you just, it has to be business as usual, you have to know your market, you have to know your comps. And think about the opportunities, because you may the first half of the year, like find that there are people that are still a little bit nervous and willing to negotiate a bit more. So yeah, D.J. Paris 51:27there is negotiation, it happens now, it didn’t, didn’t happen. Leslie Singer 51:32No, I mean, there was, you know, just a year ago or whatever, you could walk around the block, and you had to make a decision. Right. So D.J. Paris 51:42do you have any buyers that are feeling remorse? That oh, gosh, when interest rates were at 3%? I should have pulled the trigger? Do you have to counsel people through that? You know, because again, yes. And rates prices were also super inflated, you were competing against many other buyers? And you’re going to probably pay more? So I’m just curious on Yeah, Leslie Singer 52:11so now that’s where that’s where you kind of have to, you know, help them understand that because you know, you’re getting that property at, you know, a better value. So yes, you may be paying more on your monthly for your mortgage, but that same property a year ago, you wouldn’t be able to negotiate on. So there’s always that and that is why kind of the date, the rate is also gives people confidence that you know what, maybe I can change it later. But historically, we are still at really low interest rates. D.J. Paris 52:47I know like really, really low and yeah, really, really low. Really, really low. It’s not freakout everybody. We’re not double digits, we’re not. Leslie Singer 52:58Exactly. And the other thing is New York, you know, not for everyone. But we’re a very cash driven city. So we have a lot of cash deals that have always happened, that will continue to happen. Bonuses may not be as strong as other years, but bonuses get paid. So you know, you have to look at Manhattan, look at the concrete things that happen. And our market continues. I’m not, I’m not concerned. D.J. Paris 53:30Good. Well, that that is very reassuring to our audience. And to me as well, because I have not been in it for 18 years, and haven’t weathered all of the cycles and storms that you have. But I’m glad to hear that you are not particularly worried about 2023. And that that will help call. Leslie Singer 53:52There’s too much discussion about recession of first half and then pulling out really fast. So in a V. Going right back. D.J. Paris 54:01Yeah, well, we’ll certainly hope for the best. Leslie, I am so happy that you spent time with us today you are a real treasure. And for anyone out there who is an agent who either has clients who moved to New York City, who would want to refer business to it, maybe you don’t practice in New York, Lesley would love the opportunity to connect with you. Of course many people have properties in the New York City area. So if you’re an agent in another part of the country, and you want to refer business out and get in touch with Lesley, she would love to chat with you. And also, if you’re an agent in New York City and you’re looking to join a really super successful team under Leslie’s leadership, you might be a good fit for her or they might be a good fit for you. So let’s see if, if another agent wants to reach out to you what’s the best way that they should do that? Leslie Singer 54:55I think email is actually really great. So I would AE l singer at BHS usa.com. And I can repeat that. It’s l singer at B H s usa.com. D.J. Paris 55:13And we’ll have a link to that in our show notes as well. Leslie is is a superstar agent in New York City. We are so excited that she spent the last hour here with us. And we want to thank her on behalf of our audience. So on behalf of the audience, Leslie, we say thank you for spending your time we know busy well and also on behalf that you’re welcome. And on behalf of Lesley and myself we also say thank you to our audience, to continuing to support and listen to our episodes. Best way that you can help us grow every one is just tell a friend think of one other realtor that needs to hear this episode this conversation with Lesley. Oh my god she gave like five incredible tips in this episode that can really help transform someone’s business. Send them a link to this episode. They need to hear it people who everyone is stressed about 2023 Leslie’s not. And she explained why and she gave a lot of great suggestions about how to handle 2023 So send this podcast episode over to another realtor that is struggling right now. And Leslie thank you so much for being on our show. We are so grateful to have you and we will see everybody on oh I’m sorry everybody go follow Lesley as well on Instagram and Tiktok singer team NYC singer team NYC and si ng er we will have links to those they are doing some really cool stuff on social definitely check them out. Leslie it was a such a pleasure having you on the show. Leslie Singer 56:48Likewise, thank you for having me.

Donald Hyun Kiolbassa is an Illinois licensed Attorney and CPA with a focus on Real Estate Law and Estate Planning talks about his newest book and why he wrote it. Donald explains how he got involved in real estate and law. Donald also discusses why he sees the primary residence as an asset and not a liability. Next, Donald talks about where is the opportunity in 2023 and where the realtors should focus on in order to keep their business rolling. Donald and D.J. discuss long-term care insurance and how it can effect the generational wealth. Last, Donald discusses the importance of the agent knowing what they’re selling in and out. Please check out Donald’s book “Discover Your Dragon” here. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! Donald Hyun Kiolbassa can be reached here. This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks and FollowUpBoss. Transcript D.J. Paris 0:00What is a top real estate attorney telling every realtor he knows what to do this year to stay productive? Or we’re going to talk about that today. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solutions so that you can easily generate more business. There agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now on to our show. Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real, the largest podcast made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris. I am your guide and host through the show and in just a moment, we’re going to be speaking with top real estate attorney Donald kielbasa. But before we get to Don, just a couple of quick reminders. Number one, please support our sponsors. We love our sponsors. They’re the reason we can keep doing the show. And we appreciate if you check out their products and services and consider supporting them because they support us. But even if you aren’t able to support our sponsors, and we hope that you do, please tell a friend about the show. That’s the other way that you can help us get in front of more Realtors is tell someone else in your office about this podcast we all we focus on is helping you by talking to top producers who say this is exactly what I’m doing right now to grow my business and let someone else in your office somebody who’s struggling and all a lot of us are struggling right now. Right? It’s a tough time in the market. So please share the love let other people know about this podcast. We appreciate it. But enough about that let’s get to the main event my conversation with Attorney Donald kielbasa. Right today on the show we have best selling author, champion athlete and real estate attorney Donald Yun kielbasa. Let me tell you more about Donald. Now Donald is an Illinois licensed attorney and CPA with a focus in real estate law and estate planning. Now over the past 14 years as an attorney, Donald has managed over 8000 commercial and residential real estate transactions. Prior to becoming an attorney, Donald worked as a CPA with big four accounting firm KPMG. And he’s also the author of two books discover your dragon and Tao of the side hustle, which is his newest book, when he’s not practicing law Donald is was a gold medalist for the 2008 United States Wushu Team, wushu translates to Chinese martial arts. Now after winning gold, he caught the attention of Warner Brothers games, and is the martial arts motion capture model in some of the biggest action video games in history, including Mortal Kombat where he was scorpion and sub zero, and also the game injustice where he played Batman and flash. So please, everyone go pick up Donald’s newest bestseller, The Tao of the side hustle, which is on Amazon, we have a link to that in our show notes. And if you’re a realtor here in the Chicagoland area. Donald would love to talk to you and work with your clients, you can visit his real estate website at Chicago real estate at t y. So, Chicago real estate AT T y.com. Donald, welcome to the show. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 4:26Hey, thank you so much for having me. I appreciate the opportunity. D.J. Paris 4:29Super excited to have you I and I I was very excited over the break to read Tao of the side hustle and actually before we get into any of your story, I normally start with your story but this because this book is so new and it’s just crushing it in the Amazon charts, you know, so that our audience doesn’t have to wait 20 minutes for us to finally get to talk about the book. Tell us what the tell us what the book is, who it’s for, and and why you wrote it. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 4:55So ultimately, if you look at if you look at a man come from a macro perspective, people hold wealth in three places, they hold their wealth in real estate retirement plans and small businesses. So the biggest part problem with people when they’re starting small businesses is that first step. So I wanted to create kind of is a modern day Art of War, where we walk, we guide the reader through a side hustle, you know, tell the side how so we go from side hustle to stabilize to scale. Right. And it’s basically a blend of Buddhism, martial arts and business to help the reader, you know, start dipping their toe in entrepreneurship. Yeah, I D.J. Paris 5:40love it. who’s best suited to for this book to make an impact on who’s the who needs to read this? Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 5:46You know, that’s a good question. Why, you know, whenever you’re creating a product for distribution, like you’re always supposed to have an intended target audience, right? Historically, I would tell you, people who have that entrepreneurial itch, right, that would be the historical answer. Today, I think that definition has broadened significantly. If you go all the way back to Adam Smith, wealth nation, so I’m a big Adam Smith guy, right? Sure. You know, there’s three ways to make money, there is salary, you have a job, there is profit, you have a business, and then there is rent, you have an appreciable property that you’re able to, you know, collect passive income in some way, shape or form. It’s so so it’s like, 123. Right. Now, historically, I would tell you, like, Oh, those who have an entrepreneurial itch, right, unfortunately, you know, necessity is the mother of all innovation, right? I have a feeling with given the economic climate that we’re about to face, right? I think a lot of people are going to kind of be pushed into entrepreneurial positions, not out of desire, but out of necessity. D.J. Paris 7:01Yeah, that makes makes a lot of sense. And, I guess one fortunate part of that the sort of nature of the economy right now is technology has sort of enabled this global gig economy. And it’s really, it brought in this or expanded the ability of the average person to get involved and produce some of the side hustle services or products at a very minimal investment in a lot of cases, you know, with the technology and infrastructure already built that does a lot of the heavy lifting. So it is kind of an exciting time to consider a side hustle, because we just have a lot more resources now that that helped make it a little bit easier. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 7:42Yeah, the barrier of entry to side hustles have definitely changed. Like, if you think about it, everybody has like a University of Google degree. Like you can look up everything. There’s two forms of knowledge, there’s knowledge of and there’s knowledge, how knowledge is where you going to go, when you learn something, right and knowledge how is where you put in your 10,000 hours and kind of cluster of something right now, from an entrepreneur perspective, like being able to break into new areas and create new solutions for problems on like, a micro local area is, I don’t think there’s ever been a better time to do so. Yeah, I D.J. Paris 8:21think you’re right. And with, especially with so many small businesses constantly being hit up for various services, that maybe somebody with a side hustle can do more inexpensively, can provides real value locally, as opposed to also doing it globally through places like Fiverr, and the sort of gig services, you know, TaskRabbit for people that are, you know, good with fixing and building. You know, it’s funny, I was I had a guy from TaskRabbit over who has a normal, full time job where he’s, like, an engineer and does something with construction, but he’s like a pretty decently high level guy in his salary. And he came over to swap out a door in our in our primary closet. And, and it was pretty difficult job and I said, Hey, I’m just curious, like, why do you do this on the side? He goes, he goes, if I just did this, this gig stuff, I would actually make more than in my salary, but he’s like, I just kind of like the stability of the of the thing. So he’s like, I’m just going to do this on the side. But I was like, Man, this guy, you know, he’s making an extra three $4,000 a month, just doing a couple of these gigs, you know, here and there outside of his normal business hours. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 9:34Yeah, you know, that’s ultimately the purpose of the side hustle, like not all businesses are meant to be scaled, right. So I like to I do like to invest in startups, startups, and side hustles. They’re not the same right? Side Hustle can become a startup. But a side hustle is not, does not have the scalability sometimes as a startup There are two different cultures, two different communities, right? The startup community, they’re really looking to, you know, 10x 20x 50x. And they’re looking for an exit or liquidity event to to, you know, for the business, right? Side Hustle is something that like, Look man, like things are getting more expensive. Like, you know, it’s funny, talking about you, you’re in real estate, you know, the Fed. And today, the Fed may may or may not raise the interest rate, I don’t know if they’re, if they’ve done it yet. But right there, there’s two types of inflation there is monetary inflation, and there’s two big money supply, and then their supply side inflation, like you’re not going to be able to fix supply side inflation with increasing the interest rates. So I don’t know if I necessarily agree with the way it’s gone. Anyway. But there those impacts are going to impact the way consumers deploy their capital right now. And I think there’s going to be a huge liquidity event where all the money is sucked out of the system. D.J. Paris 10:56That’s interesting. Yeah, it is. It is interesting. I was also thinking too, about the recent crypto exchanges, or at least the biggest crypto Exchange, which just went under FTX, which a lot of people have probably followed by the time this came out, who knows if Sam bacon fried will actually be in prison in prison or who knows. But But and then there’s other crypto exchanges binance Is is possibly facing liquidity issues. And that’s now the biggest exchange. And I’m just curious if if those if that exchange fails to I’m curious, a lot of that crypto money comes flooding back in. And somehow it gets, you know, reinvested by people in other ways. And a side hustle is a great way to invest money, and actually, you know, make some income that’s a little bit more hopefully predictable. But before before we get too far down that rabbit hole, because I could talk about that all day. I would love to first hear your origin story. Like, how did you get involved in real estate? You were an athlete, you’re now an author as well. You know, how did you get involved in law, you are an accountant, you’re an accountant as well, you do a lot of different things. So we’d love to hear about your trajectory. So walk us through. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 12:04So I was like, Chicago Public School dude, like Waynetech, lean tech guy. Like, I didn’t have two nickels to rub together. So I kind of figured that. Whenever you go to war, like, let’s say you and I weren’t going to engage in combat. In the end, when you break down a war or combat, there’s these five things that you need to control, right? You got to have a skill before you get into the other one. So let’s start with skill. So I knew upfront, I had no money broke, didn’t really have any connections or anything like that. So I had to become hyper focused and dominant in a skill. So I started with accounting, because that was like, the language of business, right? Sure. So I graduated in 2001. And immediately the Enron COLLAPSE HAPPENED wiping out Arthur Andersen, I couldn’t get a job. Right? D.J. Paris 12:56So I remember when that happened. Yes, absolutely. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 12:59So all the school guidance counselors, like after I spent all this money and got like my accounting degree and CPA and all that other stuff, they say, oh, you should go back to law, you know, go back to school, go to law school, right. So I went to law school. Graduated in 2006, only to enter into the 2008. Crash. Alright, perfect timing. Basically, it was kind of at that point where I lost all confidence in like the guidance counselor’s and a lot of the teachers because I found that most of us who were teaching never actually worked before. So I said, okay, if I’m gonna do this, I do really respect appreciate, like, the skills that I learned, but I’m gonna I’ve had very little confidence in, like, the business training that these people gave me. So I, I basically started to ignore everybody and started to do tax returns, because I felt tax returns were like a stable thing that everybody needed, right? D.J. Paris 13:47Yeah, guaranteed, guaranteed. Least everyone at least once a year is asked to either do it themselves or hire someone so it makes sense. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 13:55So the tax return business started was was amazing, because it was like annual reoccurring revenue and kept coming in. But then like, 2008, crash happens, and I’m doing wonderful, because everybody’s still just notwithstanding, like, the complete collapse of like the financial system, people still needed to file the tax returns. And like, remember, when you’re getting chased by a lion when two gazelles are getting chased by a lion, you don’t have to be the fastest Gazelle in the world. You just got to be faster than the other person. Right. So I, the firm that I was at most of the other attorneys just went belly under. And when that happened, I started gobbling up the other practice areas, one of them being real estate, right? I had no idea what real estate was at the time. Right. So fortunately, I was able to laminate for a side hustle at that point in time. 2009. So you know, with all my martial arts stuff I was able to you know, for I was lucky enough to participate in a major tournament, where wushu was a demo sport at the Olympics. I was able to win a gold medal. I’m not an official in the NBA. I never claimed to be but I was on the US team. This caught my attention Warner Brothers were in 2009. They purchase an intellectual property out of bankruptcy called Mortal Kombat nine, right? And I was one of the guys that they came in to do the motion capture, right? For a side hustle. All of a sudden, I started realizing, you know, the importance of making money, like having control of that, right? So I’m kind of taking away doing tax returns. And all of a sudden, the real estate market started a hockey stick, right? Yeah. And I happen to be like Forrest Gump. With the shrimp boat captain, I wasn’t so amazing. But I was just like one of the first guys who survived to participate in that market upswing, right. And I was never my core competency was always tax law, but it never really had. But real estate happened just because I happen to be standing in the right place. And it became a profit center. And today, I’m on board member of Delaware a real estate lawyer Association, I think I’ve done about 1000 transactions, something like that. And it was kind of over time that I realized that, you know, value propositions, you know, they go from, they go through stages, like, they go through a perceived through actual through evolving, you they start with, like, you have to have a perceived value, like what do you bring to the table, then you have to deliver actual value, it’s what you can do. And then you have to evolve as things change, right, as the market started to recover, are starting to realize that real estate is such an important percentage of like the American families portfolio, right? And that’s where I really started saying, Okay, this real estate thing is very important, because it’s part of the overall, like, part of everyone’s life. And that’s where I really got into it. D.J. Paris 16:37Gotcha. And did you find that, that real estate transactions were personally really fulfilling to you, like, versus other types of law that you may have dabbled in? Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 16:48Well, what I what I do like about real estate transactions, is I believe in becoming fabric of the community, right? Like, and the way you truly become a fabric of community is you got to shake the people’s hands that you’re, you’re serving, right. And the best way to kind of build that trust is like helping them establish their nest, right. So real estate, kind of became one of our like, lead generators, where, you know, we would meet people to do their closings, they would transfer into like, trusts in the States, and then we kind of just became their go to for everything. D.J. Paris 17:21Yeah, imagine estate planning is like maybe the real estate transactions a nice entry point to then do the estate plan. after the fact. Does that happen a lot, where a lot of your real estate clients Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 17:33be 100%. Like the thing is, actually, I know this is blasphemous, right, but from, from my perspective, I, Attorney CPA, I think we ought to offer a little bit of a broader value proposition and right, I believe that real estate is a subsidiary of estate planning, right? Sure. I believe there’s people who have this overall like estate plan, and you do their closing kind of as part of that overall plan. I just don’t know how you do a closing without knowing everybody’s overall plan. D.J. Paris 18:03We were I was just having this exact conversation with a real estate journalist. Yesterday, we actually are yesterday, and we were talking about how this is the year that realtors can really start to think of themselves more as a consultant where they actually try to take a broader, broader view of the entire financial picture. And maybe that includes having conversations with the person’s accountant, with their attorney, or with their financial adviser, and really saying, Where does this home if we’re going to call this thing an asset, which is a debatable topic to a primary residence? I know it’s an asset on the day it’s sold. But is it an asset? Really, between times I don’t know, but it’s still an important piece of the financial picture, regardless of whether it’s an asset or not. And it you’re right, it’s sort of like one of those things that, you know, when I go see a doctor, they make me fill out this massive checklist of like, what’s wrong with you? What’s your history? What’s everything going on with your physical health, energy, you know, exercise, diet, etc. And all the stats, and your head and your family history because they need to be able to make a good recommendation. And you’re right, the sort of the real estate side of, of the of someone’s financial picture is often sort of isolated and segregated from everything else. And I imagine your sort of vision is to sort of integrate everything into looking at it more holistically. Do I have that right? Yeah. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 19:29Well, I listen, like in the end, my, my intent is the preservation of the American family. And the way you do that is by you know, ultimately, you need to make sure that they’re safe safety, and that they’re secure, financially secure, right. And I don’t I believe I do just continue to believe that homeownership and real estate investing is an important part of a diversified portfolio. D.J. Paris 19:56I want to pause for a moment to talk about our episode. sponsor are one of my favorite companies out there follow up boss. Now after interviewing hundreds of top Realtors in the country for this podcast, do you know which CRM is used by more than any other by our guests. Of course it is a follow up boss. And let’s face it, following up is the key to taking your business to the next level follow up boss will help you drive more leads in less time and with less effort, do not take my word for it. Robert slack, who runs the number one team in the US uses follow up boss and he has built a one and a half billion dollar business in just six years. Follow up boss integrates with over 250 systems, so you can keep your current tools and lead sources. Also, the best part they have seven day a week support so you’ll get the help that you need when you need it and get this follow up boss is so sure that you’re going to love their CRM that for a limited time, they’re offering keeping it real listeners a 30 day free trial, which is twice as much time as they give everyone else and oh yeah, no credit card required. So you can try it risk free. But only if you use this special link visit follow up boss.com forward slash real that’s follow up boss.com forward slash real for your free 30 day trial. Follow up like a boss with follow up boss. And now back to our episode. Yeah. Do you look at primary residence? diff? I mean, obviously, it’s different from a revenue person or a Yeah, revenue perspective. Right. So so passive income, residual income through investments, obviously we understand there’s tax benefits, there’s there’s obviously cashflow benefits. Do you look how do you encourage clients to think of their primary residence? Is it an investment? Is it an asset? And this these are very debatable topics? But I think it’s important because I think there’s a there a lot of realtors that could really benefit from hearing some language from an attorney about how to how to have those conversations because personally, I I would love to look at my primary residence as an investment if it goes up. But I don’t have much control over that. That’s not the reason I bought it as much as I would love for it to double in value probably won’t. But but it is a huge chunk of you know, the money that I’ve had put into that home. So curious on how you think about primary homes versus obviously versus you know, buying, you know, a multifamily and renting it out. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 22:20Okay, so, Attorney CPA perspective, primary residence is absolutely an asset. I strongly disagree with the argument that it’s a liability. I respect and understand where the other where the argument comes from, you know, the the old school adage, like your primary residence is just a liability. I just I think it’s incorrect. I believe it’s a it’s an asset, especially when you start looking at things generationally, right. Like when you start looking at these generationally primary residence. You It’s like incurring an unrealized gain to all the CPAs out there, like we’re building up this store of value. Whereas if you’re renting, you’re not building that store of value. Now, it’s always possible that you overextend. I’m a big fan of Albert Einstein, and I love this little equation equal equals MC square. So n equals MC squared essentially means is energy equals mass times the speed of life squared, right? The thing I love about that equation is it proves to us that energy and mass are equivalent, because if you divide see, it’s an algebra, divided c squared by both sides, it shows that they can equal each other, they become much, right? They are relative to each other as money is a relative thing. The money that you make is only relative to the money you spend. So if you overspend relative, then yes, it becomes a liability, right? Like, if you don’t do that, and you are like normal, like it’s an asset, especially when you think and think generationally. D.J. Paris 24:03Well, thank you for closing the door on that, that I love that you you shut the door with some authority on that particular argument, whether primary residence and asset and you explained it very, very well. And I think that’s important. And, and historically, home prices over time generationally have historically risen, right, so we can look at historical data and say, well, we can’t you know, obviously, we can’t project that your home is going to be worth more than it is today because that would be you know, no one has the oracle at Delphi to or crystal ball but, but we can assume based on historical data that it’s likely that if trends continue that you may be here in 20 3040 years, which in case does improve the quality of that asset from you know, from a numbers perspective. So I, I am I will tell you this, I am scared about 2023 Now, there’s always opportunity when there’s fear But I think there’s I’m speaking not so much for me because truthfully, I’m not a practicing agent, I have my license, I don’t use it. I sit here at a desk all day and, and try to recruit people to join our company. But we have about 700 agents here. And they a lot of them are nervous. And a lot of my friends outside of our company who are agents are nervous about 2023. Why? Pretty obvious reasons. Of course, everyone knows we have a higher interest rate environment than we did two years ago, although I don’t think it’s that high. But it certainly in comparison to the last few years, it’s still a big bigger pill to swallow than it was double rates. You know, it was kind of where we’re at low inventory, and then dropping home prices. So curious on where’s the opportunity in 2023? What should Realtors be focused on? And what as an attorney? Do you suggest that agents start to think about to really keep their business rolling next year so that it’s not as bumpy as, as maybe the news is suggesting it might be? Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 25:58Well, it’s gonna be bumpy, it’s definitely gonna be bumpy. It’s just finding the opportunity within that bumpiness. Right. Like, from my perspective, all ships float and high tides, right? You have when times are good, everybody is like, amazing. Like, one of the things that I tell people is I’m like an all terrain vehicle. Like I work in rain, sleet, snow, sunshine, so many of these single silo like attorneys, that’s, that’s all they do. Like they don’t work when times get when there’s a hurricane, right? So, from my perspective, you have to kind of approach your business like that, like, are you prepared for the ups and the downs, we’re in a cyclical business? So if you want to survive in a cyclical business, you’d have to be able to work in both cycles, right? So from my perspective, it’s identifying the, like, the things that people are really going to need, right? Let’s start with the supply side, there’s unlimited amount of inventory out there, right. I believe, as you see the baby boomer the silver tsunami coming, you’re gonna see these guys, they’re going to have to redeploy their assets, right? D.J. Paris 27:09Huge amount of assets to I mean, trillions of dollars are going to flood in. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 27:14Yeah, so 25 trillion is going to exchange hands right now is the homes are a special asset, right? Because like, they need to figure out a way to either downsize if they’re going to pass away, and with the long term living, you know, kids are all gone. And they’re gonna have to figure out to do it. And most of those homes don’t have mortgages on them. Right? So they’re not worried about trading from three to seven or three to six or whatever. Incidentally, I haven’t I haven’t I have an ongoing, that with a couple of people have the date, I think it’s going to drop down to five, offline, I’ll enter to about with you, right, that way. I’d love that. Anyway, um, what? You know, you’re gonna have a lot of the baby boomer population population, that they have a bleeding neck, and let me restate, they don’t have a bleeding neck, they have six shotguns pointed to the back of their head, that they’re going to have to figure out what to do with that land. Right? Now. You have, you’re gonna have a motivated seller who’s gonna have to figure out what to do with that supply. Right, right. Then let’s talk about like, purchasing. Right? Number one, if the consumer doesn’t come in and buy these assets, right, you’re gonna have foreign money flooding, you know, you’re there’s so much turbulence, globalization, I just wrote an article for the State Bar, I’m shocked, it got picked up so quickly. But it was like, it’s about the collapse of globalization, I think you’re gonna see money start coming in here from other places. And, you know, listen, all the house hacking is really cool. But when you have a couple of kids, good luck doing that, you’re gonna have to find your own house to raise your family, right, your garage, would you raise your kids in their basement? Right? So you’re the supply side is going to be the baby boomers in the demand side is going to be foreign money and millennials who are are being forced kind of to, you know, as their families expand, right, now there is a segment of the population that their velocity is going to decrease dramatically, right? And that percentage of the population, they’re attracted to 3% interest rates, and they don’t want to trade out, right, I get it, right. Listen, the pie is gonna get smaller, and you really are gonna have to demonstrate and show everybody what your value proposition is. From my perspective, this is really gonna come down to who are real real estate people and who are marketers, right? A lot of people in sales that they’re great salesmen, right? Sure. If you were to go back 2030 years into the real estate market before people the sales thing like the top of the funnel, you know, everybody became great marketers, right? The real estate was a pool business. What a pool business means is you get pulled in a transaction, you have a special skill that gets you pulled in, right? You guys were never intended to be in a push business and became a push business because your commissions were so lucrative that it pushed into marketing people, right? But This is gonna force the vendors to become hyper specialized in what they do, they really got to know what they’re doing. And the consumer is canceled. goddang smart, right? That if you don’t know what they’re doing, you’re doing, they’re going to know really quick. So you really got to get back down to that core of like, man, you know what you’re doing? D.J. Paris 30:22Right. So this is the year to really hone those or sharpen those sticks, those skill set sticks or tools in the arsenal to know more than, you know, the average consumer who wants a month checks their Zestimate. And to see what their home values worth, which, of course, they don’t need you to do, because they can just pull that up. Now, whether that number is accurate or not, is irrelevant. But that’s what they’re going to do. So you need to be able to bring value in between transactions, right? So person, what buys and sells every, what, seven years, or whatever, the status. So here’s a here’s a great question. So I don’t know if it’s a great question. I shouldn’t say my own questions are great. But here’s a question that I think would be of great value to our audience, which is, and you’re not, you’re not a practicing broker, but you work with realtors, and you work with homeowners, not a practicing. Doctor, don’t do everything else. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 31:15But the broker is very important to me, I like listen, you know, it’s very hard to break this shell, right. But I will be vulnerable to tell you the importance of the broker. Right? And I want my perspective. My sole agenda is the preservation, the American wealth ecosystem for a family brand. And most people have less than $1,000 in their bank account, like at least like I think it’s like 78 or 80%, something like that have less than 1000 hours. D.J. Paris 31:50That is that is horribly depressing. Unfortunately, true. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 31:55So many people land do you do read all these articles JP Morgan and about a billion dollars in land, you know, this REIT bought a billion dollars, Blackstone bought 50 billion. Do you know why they do that? D.J. Paris 32:08You know, I actually don’t know why they do. Because it’s a good idea. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 32:11It works. D.J. Paris 32:14Right? The church does a similar thing to they buy a lot of land. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 32:18If you buy it, I’ll be more aggressive. You’re dancing, and you’re saying, oh, like you know, it might not go it’s gonna go up. It’s a store of value. Right? D.J. Paris 32:28I used to have a I had a friend who was an attorney who’s worked for the Catholic Church and her job, no joke in the US. And I’m sure they have these positions all over the world was to buy land where they could put schools Catholic schools Catholic education, which, of course has its own business and a huge business. But the big thing was not we want to we don’t want to rent space. We want to buy the land, put the school on it. And it’s and this is this was her full time job, just finding land for schools. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 32:59So the reason why they do that is the isn’t worse, it’s a really good idea, right? Like, especially American dirt and American dirt American brick and mortar is amazing, right? Like, this morning, what are the important things that you’ve done? And I asked you, what did you do when you first D.J. Paris 33:18I went to the gym? I’d say that’s for me. That’s it. That’s probably the most important thing I did you do after you went to the gym? Came back started. started thinking about recruiting more realtors. You take a shower? I took a shower this morning. Yes. Okay, so what do you need to take shower? What do i Why did I take a shower? What do I need? I need to take a shower. So you need water and electricity? Well, you don’t need electricity, but I use electricity. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 33:46You need water? Right? So we live in one of the biggest areas of fresh water. So before I was you know, I worked at a law firm called yield shine. It’s like number three in all of Asia in Seoul, South Korea, right. I thought it was a big shot, right? Anyway, I met this big big shot law firm, right? And I go to get my place my little studio right? And I find out how expensive it was. I was like, Whoa, but that’s how much it costs for this like studio. That’s crazy. It turns out if you sold South Korea, you could buy France a times that’s how expensive that land is. Right? One of the cool interesting things about South Korea, we got a river that goes right through the soul and stuff like that. Surrounded by ocean, right? And you can’t drink ocean water or Beynon. Right? So all of a sudden water becomes scarcity. So like for someone like me, I recognize like the irrelevant the relative importance of water right where people hear you take an hour long shower, and no one cares, right? But this is in the world like it’s it becomes a really big deal. So I guess what I’m trying to say is like, we ultimately the land that you purchase needs to have a value or reason why people like it right? Our soil is very abundant and natural. sources which allows you to up an acorn son grows, right? And we have water. So like, you know, so long as the resource resources remain consistent, like in theory, as long as the value of commodity goes up, so the value of land relative the value of the commodity, right? Sure. Really. It’s a good investment as when people come back home D.J. Paris 35:22this stuff. Yeah, it makes it makes perfect, perfect sense. So Realtors right now are thinking, Okay, I’ve got a lot of my clientele refinanced or purchased in the last couple of years when the interest rates were low. And obviously a lot didn’t. But the ones that did, you know, I, what do I say? First of all, do we say anything to the person who’s at a 3% rate right now? Who is feeling like, oh, I can’t move because then if I move, I’m going to a six and a half percent, right. What are what are we saying to those? What do you suggest we say to those people? If anything at all right now? So Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 36:06do you have your handy dandy computer there? I do. And you look up JP Morgan Chase buys a billion dollar of single family homes. Yeah, looking it up right now? Yeah. D.J. Paris 36:23Got it. Yep. Single Family rentals, a billion dollars earlier this November? Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 36:27Yeah. You want to know what date is that? D.J. Paris 36:31So the news articles November 16. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 36:33Okay, would you agree November 16? That’s like a month ago, right? Like, the rates are in the sixes and sevens? Yeah. Do you want to know why they’re buying that they’re doing that? D.J. Paris 36:45I want to know why Jamie diamond does anything. So yes. Tell me Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 36:49a really good idea. Because he’s D.J. Paris 36:51a really smart guy. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 36:53They saw the interest rates go up, and they eliminated all the competition. Yeah, right. Interest rates went up, they eliminated the competition, they go in and acquire, do the acquisition. So like, the first of all, I do think the mortgage interest rates are gonna go down. Right? Let me open with that. Right. So with that said, I do believe that it is probably not a smart idea, to wait until they go down to buy. Because the second day go down, you’re gonna have this huge board of competition come in, and they’re gonna bid up the prices again, D.J. Paris 37:34which is what happened when in 3% rates, same exact things happen? Yeah. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 37:38100%. Like, what you want to do is you want to try to go in there where there’s mild to medium competition, exactly what JPMorgan Chase is doing to you. Right? It’s hilarious, right? Your own bank priced you out. And now that D.J. Paris 37:51it’s my own bank, that’s funny. Your own Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 37:53bank priced you out so they can buy your land. It’s hilarious, right? Like, you know, you really got to be conscious of like, when that rate goes down, everybody’s gonna flood in. Now, you got to make that decision. But if I was a broker, if I was in your business, right, this is a dialogue that I would be having with my people. Hey, forget about the industry. Put that to the side for a second. Tell me about your needs. Are you in a one bedroom condo with one kid? And you’re about to have a second kid? Right? Yes. This ain’t gonna work. Right? Let’s go find you something that’s within your budget that meets the needs of your family. Hey, are you is your parents 65? How are they doing? Do you think that they’re going to be in a nursing home? Do they have long term coverage? If they don’t? Like you need to have these things in mind for them? Right? D.J. Paris 38:44Can we just do a public service announcement and break for just a moment? Can we talk about long term care and not get into the weeds about it? But I know you’ve been you’ve been beat you beat the drum on long term care insurance. And I’m so grateful for you to do this. Because there are so many people, so everyone listening, if your parents are elderly, can you just give the quick little 32nd on why everybody’s parents need to have long term care. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 39:07Okay, so most people don’t have long term care, which is insane. But what long term care means is if your parents are unable to function on their own, and they have to go like they get dementia, they gotta go to assisted living nursing home or something like that. Those places are really expensive. Right? So you need to have an insurance policy to cover the cost of that. Now, assuming that you don’t have that because most of you have it, right. The only way to afford that is let’s say they got a pension of 4000. Right. And let’s say you find them a nursing home that 6000 The nursing home will allow them to come in take the 4000 a month, right. And the gap the Delta they will normally get covered under Medicaid through Illinois. Now Medicaid is is provided by the state but funded by the Feds right? Now the catch of getting that free Medicaid is if your parents own a house free and clear which most baby boomers do, they paid it off, right? The state can turn around and attach a lien against the equity with a five year look back, they can go back five years, to any money that they paid on your parents behalf to live in their right. So they can essentially lose the asset that they were that they built. So if anybody’s out there thinking generational wealth, gotta have that in the back of your head. D.J. Paris 40:36Yeah, just ask ask your parents if they have long term care insurance talk to talk to a financial advisor get that done? Because it will I don’t even remember what the average cost is for facility care these days. But I want to say for a year a lot 1000 Yeah, it’s a lot. It’s 10s and 10s. of 1000s of dollars. Okay, anyway, back to back to our regularly scheduled program. But but this really ties in long term care, because you were talking about generational wealth, and nothing wipes out generational wealth faster than then managed care for elderly people. So, so I’m glad we were able to do our public service announcement of the year. But let’s talk about okay, so so back to being being a realtor. So I’m thinking about our audience, we’re realtors, we’re worried about 2023 interest rates are up, which means the average consumer thinks they’re not getting a deal right now, right? They’re not getting a deal. You said, don’t wait for it to don’t try to time the market don’t wait for the interest rates to come down. Why not? Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 41:39Because when they do come down, what’s going to happen is every single person who’s waiting on the sidelines, they’re going to jump in all at the same time. Like if I was a relative So here let’s talk damage control. If you’re a realtor, you got to right size your business right now. If you know your if you believe that your top line revenue is going to decrease 20% You got to go line item by line item and you got to decrease your expenses. 20% Real simple. Okay. Right size your company if you’re if you’re carrying too much fat right now, you’re starting to carve a fan out, right. So that’s step one, do that first. That’s something you should be doing right now. Right? Yeah. Step two, once you’ve right size your company, I would turn my attention to just educating your client on like, like real realist, no, I would turn to listening to your client on what their needs are. If you know that they’re going to have a need to like, you know, move, then step three, talk to them about the difference between the interest rate and like competition, because petition comes flooding in. Did I think it’s gonna be a big wave? D.J. Paris 42:48People get priced out? Yeah, it’s, let’s, let’s all remember what happened with the, with the sub 4% rates in the last couple of years. Remember, you know, if we had listings, it was feast or famine, right? If you had listings, you were feasting. And if you were working with buyers, it was tough. You were submitting offers sight unseen, you were getting, you know, 30 Plus offers, trying to get yours noticed. And it is remember how hard that was to start a thread that perfect needle? You know, it was it was difficult back then. So I think I think you bring up a good point. And maybe if if looking at the math, maybe the metrics are such that you would have overpaid two years ago, despite the fact that you were in a lower interest rate environment. And maybe now even though higher interest rates, lower pricing, maybe it actually evens out more than the consumer might think. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 43:41100% Yeah, if you get if you get a lowered lower. My father paid for his house, he paid 55,000 for his house, but it was like a 10% interest rate. So it’s not a lot, right. So if you get a discount on the retail price it oftentimes it ends up equaling out, I but the one thing I will say to everybody is, let’s be honest, guys, the last two years was probably the greatest rush of real estate velocity. And we’ll probably never see that again. Right? The rates are never going to get that low. You’re never going to see that again. Right. Right now you got to turn your attention to right sizing or operations and providing that value to the consumer and the consumers hypercritical right now. D.J. Paris 44:22And like you said at the very beginning, they have access to everything now. So you know, we all have access to everything. It’s in our pockets. It’s we walk around with, you know, this basically magical device that tells us anything we want to know at anytime for free, essentially. And so as an agent, so a couple things I got from what you were saying number one, a lot of agents are going to be exiting the business who work true full all in agents, the part timers, the onesie twosies they’re going to start to slowly exit the business or just become less relevant. So we’re probably going to see some sort of exit As for agents, which is a great thing for agents that are looking to scale up and grow their business, because there is going to be less competition, a lot of the maybe poor quality agents will be leaving the industry, the the stronger agents, the really savvy, value added agents will continue to thrive. But in order to get there, you have to do the heavy lifting, which is what you were talking about is sharpening the tools. This is the year 2023, where you really want to be, be better no more. What do you recommend for agents to study as far as like a daily practice? And again, I know you’re not a practicing agent, per se, but what do you wish agents knew from? From an attorney’s perspective? What do you wish agents were better at? Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 45:46You know, I always believe in marketing, like, how you consume, right? Like you should market to people the way you consumers, like a consumer, right? How is it like, as a consumer, right? My family, when we first got here from Korea, we got heavily involved in real estate because we were in the restaurant business we sold we’re number one, number one in the state and used restaurant, we had like, 200,000 square feet. Like, you know, restaurant stuff, right? So we would we needed to buy the locations to house the equipment, right. And one of the things that I think we found important from people is like, you really have to know the assets that you’re selling, you’re helping someone buy, right. The thing if you’re in the condo business, right? Dude, you really got to know that ancient way before you get your environment. Right. If you’re if you don’t have if you have no idea of the financial health of that Hoa, like you’re just hoping that the attorney catches it on the 22.1. Like, that’s what you’re doing. It’s crazy to me, like you really got to know these things here. I’ll tell I’ll give you an example from an attorney’s perspective. In 16 years, I’ve probably done 1000 transactions. When ever I catch something on the 22.1. Read the 20.1 is a financial snapshot which shows capital upcoming, unexpected or expected capital expenditures. Whenever I catch something and I tell the buyer, this is what immediately happens. I press send on the email said what are they saying? Hey, Don, thanks for catching that thing. Why in the hell did my realtor not tell me about that? Yeah. Right. 100 times 100 out of 100. That’s what happens, right? Like, if you’re gonna go into a building, you got to know what’s going on. But the building, right? So that’s if you’re in the condo business, if you’re in like the single family home business, you got to kind of have some sort of idea of the neighborhood, you’re putting people in, right? You got to say, like, I know, there’s restrictions on what you can disclose, right? But you got to talk to your client, and let them understand like, Hey, this is you know, wonderful school systems, communities and this man, and they got to know what’s going on. Like, whenever I like, for me personally, whenever I do like investing, I like when I invest in, let’s take single family homes, for example. I believe that you have to control one of three things to be a real estate investor, you got to control the dirt, the tenant of money, one of those dirt tenant money. So I like tenant control. Tenant control is the coolest to me, right? So what I like to do is I like to buy single family homes in the best school districts, and I am the cheapest rent in the best school districts. That’s my model. Right? D.J. Paris 48:44I love that because that’s what every parent, not every parent but But parents want to live in the school districts not every parent in the best school district. Every parent can afford that. So you want to make the affordable option for people to enter that that education space. Yeah. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 48:59100% I want to be the most affordable in the best school. That’s my value proposition because that’s the product that I offer right now like to me like I really know what the product that I’m buying. Right? Like surgically, right. And it can be like when your broker the client, the customer sees that you’re walking away with a big commission check, right? And they see the inspector getting paid six farebox they they see the attorney getting paid six 700 bucks, right? If, like the inspection, I get it, if there’s something that you couldn’t have found, totally get it right. But if they find out that there’s an atomic bomb there, right 999 times out of 1000 They’re mad at me, bro. They call me and they’re like, Dude, what the hell happened? How come? Nobody knew about this, right? There’s an outcome. There’s, of course we got a great deal. There’s a $70,000 special assessment coming up? Sure. Right, you know, I mean, yeah, of course, we got a great deal. This is this is going to be a deconversion. Right? Like, you know, stuff like that. D.J. Paris 50:14So, so realizing that realtors are highly compensated for, you know the transaction and not taking that responsibility lightly and really providing over providing value or providing more value than would be expected so that the consumer never calls the attorney who got paid the six or $700 it goes, How come you caught this in my my agent who just got 10 grand didn’t catch it. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 50:42Like I actually think, you know, given like your vet your role and in the transaction, top of the funnel, defending value, I don’t think you’re unfairly compensated right. But I don’t think it’s an unfair compensation. But you have to, like, if you don’t know the product that you’re selling, like really know it. And the client finds out that you’re highly compensated, and you don’t know what you’re selling, they get mad. D.J. Paris 51:12Yeah, I’ve had this fantasy in, and I don’t know if it probably will never come true. But I want I would love real estate to move away from for realtors, how they’re compensated to move away from transaction to work to more sort of a, like a financial advisory model where it’s, you know, assets under management fee based model, you know, you get a percentage. I don’t know if it’ll ever happen. I don’t know if it’s possible, but boy, that would that would really change the game, I think. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 51:41I don’t know if that. I actually, you know, I respect the counter argument. But I actually think What the I don’t think they’re unfairly compensated, right, I think what they do is legit, and here’s why. Ultimately, their job is to defend the value. Yeah, that’s ultimately their job, right to defend value. And if you do defend the value, it’s worth it. Right? You know, it’s worth it. But if you don’t defend the value, then it really becomes a problem. Right? And that’s the thing, you really are going to have to know like, I recently I did a wholesale deal, where, you know, they flipped the contract. And it was a big number. Right? Huge number. The sellers got so angry at the listing that they’d have to of course, they were like, how the hell do you get this number wrong? Right? And sorry about that. They’re like, how the hell did you get this number wrong? Right, your entire reason you’re here is to value this, right. So like, if you stand by that, like, it makes sense, because it’s your that is the most important thing was the value of the home. Right? Yeah. So I actually think the the number is fair, but the but you really have to know that you just can’t be a guy or gal who switched careers. You’re really good at marketing has a great network, don’t know the product and sells it. That’s what it got to get a little scary. D.J. Paris 53:20Yeah, so sharpen your tools, learn, learn the inventory, learn the market, learn what to look for, you know, with with respect to closings, especially condo, you were saying HOA stuff? Yeah, boy. It because all of us, you know, consumers when we’re buying something. I, I, as long as I’ve been in this industry, I’ve always thought because I’m not a practicing agent. I’m gonna be thought, doesn’t everybody just want to know, is this a good idea? That’s really kind of what we all want. Like, should I buy that? Should I not buy that? And I really think realtors say I’ll help you by that. But I really what I want a realtor to do is say you should buy that or you shouldn’t. And in order to make that distinction or that recommendation, you really do have to have some pretty sharp tools in your sharp arrows in your quiver. But this is the year to develop that because if you can become the person that gives advice, and again, depending on what state you live in, you have to obviously you want to be compliant, make sure you’re not running afoul of compliance rules, but whatever is allowed, I think the real value is in the advice. Obviously pricing advice should I buy this? Should I sell as well? How should I do it? I just I love having people giving me advice in my life, my service providers. That’s really what I want for my accountant, my attorney, my financial advisor, my trainer, I want them telling me you should do this Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 54:47100% I think that’s the direction everything’s gonna go. And I think if you do that, market goes up, market goes down. You’ll there will always be people who need help. And if they know that you can help them And whether it’s an up or down market that you can help, you’re going to be fine. D.J. Paris 55:03Well, I could talk to Don all day to all day and we certainly would love to have him back on future episodes. But for now we’re going to encourage every single person who is listening or watching right now I want you to go to Amazon. I want you to check out his book, The Tao of the side hustle, Donald. He on kielbasa I, we’re gonna promote the heck out of it. I’m gonna read it over the holiday break. By the time this is published, I will have already read it. You’re good friends with one of my other podcast friends, Lawrence Dunning. He’s like, it’s the greatest book ever. You gotta read this. And Donald was nice enough to send me a copy. So I want everybody to go and to Amazon, pick up this book. And let’s make 2023 as smooth as possible. We know there’s going to be there’s going to be a lot of dips and bumps, but let’s do what we can and let’s sharpen our skills. And yeah, let’s all have a great 2023 So Donald, thank you on behalf of our audience for everyone listening and watching really appreciate Donald spending his time he is an attorney, he bills by the hour, he is too busy to do this, and yet he did it anyway. And so we really want to support him. So also if you are a Chicago based agent, and you’re looking to work with a real estate attorney, also who by the way is a champion athlete and best selling author and a CPA and really just a wonderful human being you really should have done in your in your arsenal of attorneys to recommend to clients he would love to work with you can visit his website Chicago real estate att y.com link to that in the show notes, check out his his legal team. They can do everything from estate planning to real estate to a bunch of other specialties as well. They’re awesome. But let’s pick up the book Tao of side hustle the Tao the side hustle on amazon link in the show notes on behalf of Donald and myself to our audience who want to say thank you. We exist to help you through this tough year. We know it’s going to be a tough year. That’s okay. big deep breath in and out. We are going to provide you content and strategies and suggestions to help you get through this year. Please tell a friend that’s the only thing we ask support our sponsors. Check out Donald’s book and tell a friend that one other agent that could benefit from hearing this great interview with Donald and send this over to them it might be just what they need to help their business in 2023. Donald, thank you so much for being on the show and we will see everybody on the next episode. Donald Hyun Kiolbassa 57:30I appreciate you all go help people and I promise you everything would be fine.

Steve Shull a real estate coach talks about how and why he got into the real estate business. Steve describes how he’s spent over 60.000 hours of one-on-one coaching over his career. Next, Steve discusses what is he telling his real estate agents in order to keep them in the right mindset for 2023. Steve presents his 6 core building blocks to develop a mindset of harmony and discusses all of them. Last, Steve and D.J. discuss the importance of preparation for every aspect of your life. Please check out Steve’s book “The Full Fee Agent: How to Stack the Odds in Your Favor as a Real Estate Professional” here. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! Steve Shull can be reached at steve@performancecoaching.com. This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks and FollowUpBoss. Transcript D.J. Paris 0:00Wouldn’t you like to know what a top real estate coach is telling his clients? In other words, agents about what to focus on in 2023? We’re going to talk about that today. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solution so that you can easily generate more business. There agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interests and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now on to our show. Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the largest podcast made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Parris. I’m your guide and host through the show. And in just a moment, we’re going to be speaking with Steve Shaw, who is a real estate coach to top producers about what he is talking to his clients. In other words, agents like you about what to do and what to focus on this year to help have a successful business. Before we talk to Steve, just a couple of quick reminders, please support our sponsors, they keep the show going. And we would appreciate that you check out their services and products. They’re always the you know companies that we feel very strongly about best in class. So please check out support them because they support us. And then another way that you can help us is just by telling one other realtor about this episode. Think of one other agent that really would love to know what coaches are telling top producers and send them a link, you can send them right over to our website keeping it real pod.com Every episode can be played right in in someone’s browser or if the person listens to podcasts, they can just pull up any podcast app search for keeping it real, hit that subscribe button. So anyway, enough about all of that let’s get to the main event my conversation with Steve Shaw. Today on the show, we have real estate coach and author Steve Shaw. Now let me tell you more about Steve Now Steve has been coaching real estate agents full time since 1993. And from 1991 through the 1993. Steve sold residential real estate in the Fullerton California area. In his first year with his partner he closed 53 transactions. I mean that’s incredible in and of itself. And Steve second year, he was on pace to sell 100 homes when he came up with the idea to create a coaching program that marked the beginning of his real estate coaching career. And in 2007 Steve was one of the founding partners of TELUS properties. He helped the company open four offices Beverly Hills, Brentwood, Newport and Pasadena. Before leaving in 2012. Steve has coached hundreds of agents to help them shorten their sales cycle, make more appointments and close more contracts. We should also mention that Steve is a former Miami Dolphins linebacker. And on top of all of that Steve has a brand new book. He’s an author. His book is called the full fee agent it is it is available everywhere books are sold, especially on Amazon. And in particular right now it is number one on Amazon for real estate sales. Again, the full fee agent we will have links to the book on in our podcast show notes. And also please visit Steve’s website, which is about coaching for real estate agents, which is called performance coaching.com. Again, performance coaching.com link to that as well in the show notes. Steve, welcome to the show. Thank you very much for having me. Really excited to to speak to you. And boy, you’re really are quite a renaissance man. You’ve done a lot. And I’d love to start all the way at the beginning of your real estate journey. But let’s let’s well actually let’s go back. How did you get it or how Why did you get into real estate I guess? Steve Shull 5:03You know, it was an absolute fluke. I grew up in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, went to the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. And I was fortunate enough to make it with the Miami Dolphins 1980. I was a free agent, and played four years in the NFL for knee injury, ended my career from there, I went back and got my MBA at the University of Miami, and University of Miami one day, that was career days that they have in college. And some young kid comes in from Goldman Sachs and gave his little talk and I said, Whatever he’s doing, that’s what I want to go do. I want to be a baker. Yeah, and so didn’t didn’t make it with Goldman Sachs. I did land a job with Citibank Investment Group, and went to work on Wall Street, and spent about five years on Wall Street. And from there certain circumstances landed me out in California into the world of real estate. And then I was attending Mike ferry seminars. Sure. And I listened to this interview that Mike had done with two agents in Long Beach, California Kim and Darrell Rouse, they are in their second year of business, they are on track to sell 100 100 homes and I was listening. And I got it real estate is a progression, contacts, equal leads, leads equal appointments, appointments, equal listings, listings equals sales. And that made sense to me. And I partnered up with an agent who had been in the business 1010 years or so, you know, very capable, knew the contract. And she was doing about 10 or 12 deals a year. And we partnered up. And as you mentioned, in our first year, this was 1991. And, and for anyone listening, you’ve never been through a real estate market. Like back in the early 90s. It was terrible. I was about nine months in 40 listings, no escrows that’ll give you an idea. But the market was like a multiple offer was a buyer writing multiple offers on different properties to see where they could get the best deal. You know, if you got a listing sold in three months, that was fast, and very different environment anyway, we ended up doing closing 53 deals in that first year. I was door knocking 200 doors a day calling. D.J. Paris 7:58I’m gonna pause for a second you were door knocking to an axe NFL or is door knocking 200 doors a day. That is that is the very definition of perseverance, hard work. Discipline, and, and and humility. Right. That’s, that’s a humbling thing to do. And not an easy thing to do back then. Steve Shull 8:21But I was lucky in a way. I was given the way it was presented to me you had four options. You could knock on doors, cold call, call expired listings and for sale by owners. Those are what was presented those were your four options, right. And backup, you know, I got in real estate to make money. You know, I got real estate to sell houses. And so I was looking okay, what are people doing to sell houses and as I mentioned, Kim and Darryl Rouse, and they were knocking on doors and they were calling expired listing. So I wasn’t going to cold call that was that that wasn’t happening. For whatever reason for sale by owners. I had no interest in that. And so by default, it was knock on doors and expired listings. And be very clear. Nobody wants to knock on a door. Nobody. And however, from a sports background, it’s not about your feelings. I played football for 11 years. There’s not one single day I ever wanted to go to practice, D.J. Paris 9:36right. You didn’t want to run the bleachers, but you had to run the blockchain. Steve Shull 9:39So you know my feelings what I wanted to do had nothing to do with it. So I started with $25 a day and when I got consistent at 25 Then I bumped it up to 50 and then 50 to 75 and ultimately got up to $200 a day. Wow. And And, you know, that’s what, that’s what I did. And our second year we are on track to sell 100 homes. And I just said to myself, what I did with my partner, Cynthia, because basically she knew real estate. And in that two years, I didn’t know anything about the contract, I filled out one listing agreement once, outside of that, I had no clue. And I’m not saying that’s a good thing. I’m not encouraging you to not know the contract. I will say this though. I didn’t let anything get in my way of selling houses. I don’t mean being unethical or dishonest. Sure, I didn’t look for obstacles. So anyway, after in my second year, and we’re gonna do 100 deals. I said, I think what I did was Cynthia, I can do with other people. I went to Mike, I said, I have this idea. He said, Great. And we went and did a program in Las Vegas at a Coldwell Banker office. And we signed up nine people that day, for a program that we didn’t have. And then we went to San Francisco. And at that program, many what he called mini retreat, I think it was called, we signed up 90 People that day. And so I had to go back from that program and create, okay, what are we doing with these people? We got to deliver now, I gotta deliver. And so in the beginning, it was a 15 minute phone call every other week, $100 a month, that was the cost of the program. And I created this fax form again, back then there was you know, the cell phones were just coming into existence, and there was no email. So I recreated create a report that people would fax in every week, you know, contacts leads appointments, and I could monitor what they were doing. And I did that with with Mike for about three years from 1993 to 96. When I left, we had about 2000 coaching clients and nine people coaching underneath me and that’s where, you know, prior to this real estate coaching did not exist. The trainers out there doing programs and workshops and creating, you know, cassette programs, not even CDs yet. Sure. And so anyway, this so this was the first coaching program. And after 1996, I left I opened up my own company, performance coaching, been coaching full time, ever since I counted it up the other day, I’ve logged over 60,000 hours of one on one coaching. Wow. So if the 10,000 hour rule is in effect, I’ve got six times that going on. And you’re the Beatle The Beatles of coaching. There you go. And then 2007, myself and two partners, opened up a real estate company sells properties out here in Southern California. And I did that for five years and then went back to my coaching practice full time. So that that’s kind of my story, real estate getting in. D.J. Paris 13:17It’s one heck of a story. And one of the names you mentioned early in your story was Mike ferry and I feel like he doesn’t get as much of his do today as as maybe he should. Because he was very it and is a very important person in the coaching space for real estate. And so if anyone out there isn’t familiar with Mike ferry, you really should get familiar with his material. He’s got wonderful material. And anyway, so I have a question. So I was just at a an association event. I’m on the marketing committee and we were talking about next year 2023. There’s about 20 of us on this committee and we’re trying to create programming for the realtors here in our local market to create programming for them to be successful next year. Obviously. It’s a particularly tricky time. I think for a lot of realtors we have you know, of course interest rates are are not in their most perfect place for a lot of buyers. Of course inventory is also on short supply and a lot of markets. So I’m curious. Well, I’m sorry, backing up a moment I was talking to the members of my committee I’m on and everyone is really nervous about 2023 They have buyers that are sitting on the sidelines. They have you know this this inventory shortage curious on on what you’re telling agents today to help keep them in the right mindset. You know, for 2023 Like what, what are you talking about these days? Steve Shull 14:58The first thing I want to bring Up is no one. And I mean, no one has the ability to predict the future, nobody. And you read the headlines all day long. And you have all these people, forecasting this forecasting that I worked on Wall Street, I worked at Porter when I worked there it was I was at Salomon Brothers. And every year, every company there are economist would give their prediction for the upcoming year. And we had, we had a very renowned economist, Henry Kaufman. And what I noticed was, every year, every big shop had their prediction. And every year one guy got it right, or one person got it right, and everybody else got it wrong. Then the next year, everyone would flock to the person who got it right. And the next year, they would get it wrong, and someone else would get it right. And, you know, so let’s be very clear. No one has the ability to predict what’s happening. And all of us think back to the pandemic, when the pandemic happened, that was the end of the world, I can remember sitting there in my seat going, the first thing that’s going to happen is everyone’s going to cut out personal coaching, because nobody has any money, and nobody can do anything, right. And every real estate agent was thinking they would never sell another home again. And the pandemic turned out to be just the biggest boon in real estate that nobody saw coming. So first of all, we do not have the ability to predict the market. More importantly, we don’t control what the market is going to do. We don’t control what buyers and sellers are going to do. The market is the market period. And no matter what kind of market there is, life is still happening. People are still being born people die, people get married, people get divorced, people get a new job, kids move in kids move out, life happens. And the things that trigger buying and selling are usually life events. What’s going on right now, in my opinion, is we’re just in a wait and see period of time. We have never experienced a market that we just came out of that was that was insanity. What was going on in it, and everyone kind of got used to, you know, that being the pace, that’s not the pace. That’s not the pace, just like interest rates, right? When I bought my first home in 1981, my mortgage was 18.6%. So and where we are right now six or 7%? What right at midpoint for the past 30 years, where where interest rates have been. So yes, compared to where we were things seem terrible. However, it’s not so bad. Anyway, we’re going to wait and see, in my opinion, a wait and see place. Real estate is not a priority for many people right now. And who knows what the new year is going to bring. So that being said, Stop worrying about the market, stop listening to what anyone says about the market and do your job, your jlb that hasn’t changed. And we can get into whenever you want what I think your job is D.J. Paris 18:40every day. Yeah, I do want to get into that. And I think I think you’re right, you know, you come from an athletic background, which is Hey, rain or shine, we got to gotta hit the hit the you know, hit the gym or hit the you know, the field. We’re practicing regardless. Right? And so there’s a certain amount of keep the blinders on, stay focused, do what you’re supposed to do. And and then, you know, hopefully the results will will fall your way. But let’s let’s talk about that. What is this? This is I’m really glad you said that what is the job of a realtor a day to day job for the for a realtor. Steve Shull 19:25And let me just say, these are my opinions that I’m sharing with everybody. I’m not saying I’m right. I’m certainly not saying I’m the only person in the world who knows anything. I’m just sharing what I think and over the 30 years of doing this, my thoughts have evolved. When I started out in this business, it was all about prospecting that that that’s how I got into it. That’s what I did. That’s what I coached forever. Where I am I’m now is now I understand this is a repeat and referral business. That’s what it is. And in my opinion, and this is what I coach to, I coach people to build a repeat and referral business. And, and what I boiled it down to a, first of all, we’re not in control of anything that goes on in the external world we don’t control and again, this may go totally against the grain in what everyone thinks, however, we have no control over how many homes we sell in the air. The only thing we control is what we do each and every day. Yeah, I was listening to an interview the other day, a young track superstar, his name is Noah Lyles, 25 years old. He’s the world champion in the 200 meters. And he was talking and he said, world records don’t get broken, when you’re ready. World Records get broken when the day is ready. And he goes on to say, a lot of things have to line up in a very specific way. And most of it has nothing to do with you. The weather’s got to be right, the wind has to be right, the track has to be right, the lane position has to be right, the crowd has to be right the energy, all these things that are not in your control. And what he was basically saying was, you got to be ready every day. Because when the moment is ready, you gotta meet the moment head on. And one of the things I say in my real estate coaching is every deal you do is a miracle. Every single deal you do is a miracle. And every single deal you do comes from left field. What does that mean? It comes from the unknown. I no longer and again, this is probably where I go away against the grain. Goal setting absolute farce business planning the way it’s taught absolute farce. And just think for a second, you go through this exercise every year, all of you who are listening, I’m sure you do your managers tapping you on the shoulder, you need to get together or there’s some program in the office being offered. Or you know, you know, everyone is being conditioned, set your goals and write out your plan. What’s reality, though? And how do I know this? Because a I taught all this nonsense forever. And be what do I find every year by January 31. You no longer paying attention to the goal. Your plan is long gone by that time. And, and then you get to the end of the year and you go back into the drawer and you pull it out and you dusted off and, you know, rinse and repeat. So what what you do control is what you do every day. Yeah. And over 30 years, I’ve boiled it down to six core building blocks. And this is what I coach to every day. And you’re in control of all six of these things. And so no matter what the markets doing, because you have no control over that you do have control of what you do every day. The core building block is developing a mindset of harmony. And I think about the word mindset. What is your mind set on that’s how I look at mindset. And where I’ve come to in a lot of this developed out of the readings of the writings of Michael singer who wrote the Untethered Soul the surrender experiment, and living untethered is we want to be in harmony with what’s happening, not fight, what’s happening, and all of you your entire life, you’ve been programmed and conditioned and brainwashed in a certain way to believe that you can make things happen, that you can make things happen. And I want to challenge each and every one of you. If you can’t change the weather, if you can’t change the weather, how do you think you’re going to change what happens in life because life is made way more bigger than just the weather? And so, when I talk about a mindset of harmony, what I’m saying is, rather than trying to make things happen every day, which is All of you are doing, and you’ve been conditioned, it’s not your fault. Learn to give your highest and best to what is happening. So again, it’s not about trying to make something happen. We go through life thinking the key to a better life is getting more of what we want, and avoiding what we don’t want. Well, again, this is complete. And this is absurdity, that we can get what we want in life, and we can avoid what we don’t want. Newsflash, what’s happening in your life, is the result of natural forces interacting for 13 point 8 billion years, right? Whatever is happening, that’s what’s happening. None of it is personal, although it feels that way. However, it’s not happening to you. It’s simply happening. And all of it is temporary. So the first building block is getting your head on straight, every single day that sets the foundation. The second building block is time blocking. And the time blocking is about prioritizing your time doing what’s most important. Agents struggle immensely with time blocking, because as an agent, and I’m sure you’ve been through this exercise, creating your ideal week or your perfect mapping out your schedule. And we’re there’s nothing wrong with that, where it goes wrong for each and every one of you. You think the way time blocking works out is the world is going to conform to your schedule. Never does. The world doesn’t conform to your schedule, then you go well, this stuff doesn’t work, you know, that I had this to do and they wanted to do this then and I had to I had to go now. No, that’s not time blocking. Time blocking is if it’s in your schedule, you do it. End of story. Yeah, end of story. So it’s about making a commitment to doing what you think is most important. For me, time blocking has been part of my life forever. In sports, you have practice, and it happens at a certain time. And you have to be there on time, whether you want to be there or not. And if you’re not on time, you get fined or you worse, you get cut from the team. And when I got into the when I got into the NFL, or let’s go back first in college, you have class schedule, and you have to be at class at a certain time. Before everything went online, obviously. And, and when I got to the NFL, we had a schedule, we had a Monday schedule, a Tuesday schedule a Wednesday, a Thursday, or Friday, a Saturday and a Sunday schedule. Every Monday to Monday was the same Tuesday to Tuesday was the same. And you had to be where you were supposed to be on that schedule. And so that is in my DNA. In my coaching practice. I am booked from five in the morning to seven that night, back to back half hour appointments. I love it and why I love time blocking so much. For me. It’s total freedom. Everyone goes what freedom? What do you mean freedom, there’s no freedom. When your time block. I look at it differently. When I wake up every day when I wake up every day, I never have to worry about what I’m going to do today. Ever. It’s right there in front of me. And remember, the more we there’s an inverse relationship between thinking and doing. And this is where Realtors get all messed up. They’re spend most of their day thinking about what they’re going to do. And because they’re thinking about what they’re going to do, they don’t do a whole heck of a lot. Right. And remember, worrying is not the same thing as work. So I’m a big believer in time blocking. And you can create your schedule any way you want. It starts with when you map out a schedule. It starts with your day off, and this is where it breaks down immediately. For all real estate agents. I’m a firm believer that you need at least one full day off if not two or more. And that’s a set day it’s every week. And a day off means you’re not checking voicemail, you’re not checking email, you’re not set checking text, and you have a message on your voicemail with your email with your text, basically saying I’m unavailable today. I’ll be returning all calls messages The following business day So in terms of mapping out your schedule, first thing is your time off. The next thing that comes out is your personal time. You have kids, you have obligations, whatever, you’ve got to map all that out. Then you set up a start time, your workday, and an end time your workday. And you don’t start work before the start time. And end time no later than six or seven, you’re done. That leaves your workspace. And I only need one appointment every day. And that is the next building block. And that is your CRM appointment. And I asked for one hour every day, five days a week. So the mindset of harmony, time blocking, the third building block is CRM. And again, over 30 plus years, I’ve come to the realization when we do an analysis of everyone’s business, at a minimum 50% or more of their business is repeat and referral. Many cases it’s 70 80%. Some some my top clients, it’s 95%. Or even higher, it’s repeat and referral. And so knowing that we’re trying to build a repeat or referral business, your CRM is your most powerful business building tool. And CRM is one of the things that’s most misunderstood and abused. In real estate. D.J. Paris 31:43It definitely it’s, it’s when I when I have conversations with agents who are thinking about joining our company, I don’t even like to use the word CRM because it’s just so loaded with with meaning, but it’s not really defined by anybody. Everybody has their own definition. Alright, I want to pause for a moment to talk about our episode sponsor are one of my favorite companies out there follow up boss. Now after interviewing hundreds of top Realtors in the country for this podcast, do you know which CRM is used by more than any other by our guests. Of course, it is a follow up boss. And let’s face it, following up is the key to taking your business to the next level follow up boss will help you drive more leads in less time and with less effort. Do not take my word for it. Robert slack, who runs the number one team in the US uses follow up boss and he has built a one and a half billion dollar business in just six years. Follow up boss integrates with over 250 systems, so you can keep your current tools and lead sources. Also, the best part they have seven day a week support. So you’ll get the help that you need when you need it and get this follow up boss is so sure that you’re going to love their CRM that for a limited time, they’re offering keeping it real listeners a 30 day free trial, which is twice as much time as they give everyone else. And oh yeah, no credit card required. So you can try it risk free. But only if you use this special link visit, follow up boss.com forward slash real, that’s follow up boss.com forward slash real for your free 30 day trial. Follow up like a boss with follow up boss. And now back to our episode. Steve Shull 33:21In the past, CRM has been a dumping ground. That’s how people have used it just dump everything in there. And then you know, send out an email, email blast to the masses and hope and pray someone responds, that is not CRM in any way shape or form. CRM is it boils down to three things. One, you have to get the right people in your CRM. And we define the right people by the people that you’re committed to being in a relationship with. And the minimum definition of a relationship is you’re willing to call call, not text, not email. Yes, I am old school and millennials, you know the heck with you anyway. You have to call at least every 90 days, every 90 days. Imagine all of you imagine if everyone in your CRM, if it got to the point where they were expecting a call from you every 90 days. And when you didn’t call, they were surprised. Imagine how that would transform your business. So the first thing is get the right people in, organized, grouped and tagged in the right way. And this is something we do in coaching. The second part of CRM is making sure everyone’s set up on a contact plan at a minimum every 90 days. And then the third part of CRM is what I call get your dashboard down to zero every day when you turn In your CRM on, it gives you a list of people to call and a list of things to do, assuming you’ve programmed it right. And getting your dashboard down to zero during your CRM time block is making the calls and doing the tasks. D.J. Paris 35:16Quick, quick question. Yeah. So we have our list we’re calling are, we’re, you know, this is a great time of year. By the time this comes out, it’ll be early January. So we’re going to be, it’s going to be a little bit slower agents are going to be thinking about their CRMs. And how what the communication policy for their business should be for 2023. You just gave a great blueprint every 90 days, pick up the phone, reach out to your, you know, the people that you want to be in relationship with. Question, what are suggest? What are some suggestions you have about content? When I when I make these phone calls? What am I saying? Steve Shull 35:58Everyone take your notebook out? Because this is really complicated. What you say is Hello. How are you doing? All it is, is no more than a checkup is no more just checking in? You are not? Again, my opinion not saying I’m right. This is what I coach to, I’m D.J. Paris 36:23going to I’m going to say everything you say is right. So you don’t have to say that any longer. I’ve deemed everything you said as gospel. So go right Steve Shull 36:29ahead, oh, we’re doing we’re not there to talk real estate, we’re there to check in human being to human being, see how they are, if they’ve got something going on in their life, if they’re thinking about buying and selling, then they’re gonna bring it up, they’re gonna go, I can’t believe it all, we’re thinking about this or thinking about that. And by the way, everyone, the technology is there. If I set my CRM, right, and based on certain CRMs, I can actually be looking at my mobile app, and watching everyone who’s in my CRM to see if anyone’s on the web. And so every day I can do this. And imagine, here I am. So I see so and so’s searching for homes on my mobile app, and they’re in my CRM, and I call them up out of the blue and you say, You know what, I happened to be thinking about you. I’m just curious how you do it. And they’re gonna go, Oh, my God, I can’t believe you called we’re actually thinking about x. That’s the technology. And this isn’t, you know, this is not complicated stuff. It’s available with with with every CRM program. So anyway, there’s there’s ways to use technology to really be on top of people getting back to the question you asked, is just simple. Hi, I’m checking in. So D.J. Paris 37:53basically demonstrating that you care about somebody else finding out what’s going on in their lives. Not Have you don’t need I if I heard you correctly, you don’t need to ask them about, Hey, are you ready to buy or sell a home because of course, they are going to be thinking of you anyway, you’re just checking in to make sure that they know that you’re thinking Steve Shull 38:14about them. Almost every real estate agent has been taught a to have a transactional orientation. Meaning what you’re doing every day is you’re chasing a deal. You’re chasing $1 bill, it’s your whole focus, instant gratification, instant gratification. You live in the world of chasing, convert, chasing, convincing, and closing that is your life. And what you don’t really realize you are turning yourself into a commodity. In fact, every force imaginable in this business is conspiring to turn you into a commodity. So when you’re in this transactional paradigm way of thinking, then it’s all based on value. And I’ve got to show my value, I’ve got to show that I have more value than someone else. And I do that by convincing with facts, logic and reason. Let’s be very clear, this is the hard way of doing business. Now some of you listening have gotten really good at doing things the hard way. That doesn’t mean you’re doing it the best way. So don’t confuse with results. Don’t confuse results, either good ones, or lack of results with what you’re actually doing. Which brings up another point. In my coaching, it’s not about how much business you do. It’s what’s more important is how you do your business. Because one of the things that I’ve seen that I’ve seen clearly and most of my My clients are doing over 100 million in sales a year, some over 250 500 million, add a couple clients last year do over 750 million. In the next couple of years, I’ll be coaching people doing over a billion dollars, the production has skyrocketed. However, what I can tell you with absolute certainty, what more equals and all of you are out there, you know, why do you get on this podcast? Why do you do anything, you want to sell more homes, you want to sell more homes? Well, let me tell you what more equals more equals more stress. That’s what it equals, based on the way you’re doing business. Now, I’m not saying more is bad. It’s how you achieve more. And when you’re in that chasing, convincing, closing, transactional, value based convincing based paradigm, what more equals is more stress. What I coach people to do is move from a transactional orientation to a relational orientation, from value driven to trust based people are choosing you because you have positioned yourself as their trusted advisor. So when we’re checking in, we’re being that trusted adviser. We’re not trying to sell anything, we’re just making sure they don’t need anything. And then and the relational orientation. This is what in the book. It’s called Tactical empathy. This is what the book is about. I wrote it with Chris Voss, it’s called the full fee agent. Chris is the best selling author of the book never split the difference. Yeah, many people, D.J. Paris 41:46famous, famous, famous book, Steve Shull 41:48right. And what happened there, one of my clients, Chris was doing a book signing out in Malibu, one of my clients went, got a copy of the book and gave me the book. And in one Saturday afternoon, I started reading the book. And I had my lightning bolt moment. I have my sports background, all about goals, all about plans, all about fact, logic and reason. I know I’ve written more script and dialogue than any human being alive in terms of real estate. And every one of my scripts was all about fact, logic and reason, leading people to an inexcusable conclusion. And in reading Chris’s book, first of all, the title is what drew me in and never split the difference. What does every realtor do in every single transaction to get a deal done? They split the difference. Slash splitting the difference is the lazy man’s way of doing your job. And when you’re splitting the difference, yes, you may close the deal. What you don’t know is you’re killing off your repeat and referral pipeline, because compromise is never equal. If I’m splitting the difference, and let’s say it’s a $20,000 difference, and I’m giving up $10,000. In my mind, I’m giving up $20,000. They’re only giving up 10. So it’s not equal. It’s not equal. So yeah, the deal closes. But guess what? I feel like I got a bad deal. I feel like my agent wasn’t my advocate. I feel like my agent sold me down the river. Right? And that’s why you have that NAR statistic with someone at the end of a deal with someone recommend you 80% Say yes, and only 20% do. You’re killing off your repeat and referral pipeline when you split the difference. Anyway, the point that came up in the book for me was in that aha moment, is the reality that you cannot overcome emotion with facts, logic and reason. Yeah, emotion, emotion drives the bus. Right? And, and specifically, the emotion that we’re talking about is fear of loss. And again, as a real estate, salesperson, your entire career, you’re selling benefits, you’re selling benefits. That’s not how people make decisions. It’s fear of loss, that drives the decision making process and tactical empathy. And again, what this was based on Chris was a former FBI hostage negotiator. In fact, he was the lead international hostage negotiator for the FBI. And they developed this methodology and, and empathy is the skill of making people feel understood. Yeah. Being able to articulate what someone is thinking, and feeling. And until someone feels understood, they can hear anything that you’re saying. And this is the missing piece in all of sales. Think about thinking about this as a hostage negotiator, as a hostage negotiator. Your job is to sell jail time, to a highly disturbed individual, Unknown Speaker 45:30right? Steve Shull 45:34When they started the day, they didn’t wake up and say, I want to go to jail today. So I’m gonna go rob a bank, and I’m going to take some hostages. That’s not what they woke up with the intention of doing. However, that’s where they ended up. And so as a hostage negotiator, I gotta sell jail time to someone who’s very emotional, that, like you said, that is a tough sell. Real Estate isn’t that tough. However, it’s not far behind. What you do as a real estate agent every day is you’ve got to sell reality to people who have hopes and dreams that are not based in reality. That’s your job. Yeah. And the way you’re equipped right now, is you’re trying to convince these people with facts, logic and reason, guess what? Right now, every seller is sitting there thinking about what they could have sold their home for six months ago, D.J. Paris 46:35or what rate they could have got by purchasing a home two years ago. Steve Shull 46:39And on the buy side, every buyer is thinking about, I could have done this. And that’s why I say we’re in a wait and see market right now. Because people, you know, again, I’ve been doing this for 30 plus years, we’ve never, never had such a sudden shift in the market. And so you know, in such a big shift in the market. So people are processing right now. That’s what they’re doing their process. And so. So, again, you’re selling reality, to people that have hopes and dreams that are not based in reality. And what we coach to is, is a framework of how to do that, and how to do that, effectively. The five parts first part of the framework, you’ve got to get your stuff out of the way, you’ve got to get your feelings, your thoughts, your desires, and put it on the back burner. It’s not about you, it’s about them. And you can’t make them feel understood when all you’re thinking about is how is this impacting me. So the first thing you have to do take you out of the equation. So you can focus exclusively on your prospect or client. Second part of the equation, you have to let them fully express themselves, you have to give them the space or room to say whatever it is they want to say. Third part of the equation, once they’ve expressed themselves, then you have to make them feel understood. It seems like it sounds like it feels like you’re probably thinking you’re probably feeling what you’re targeting is a that’s right response. That’s what you’re targeting. And when you begin studying this, you know, these are these are tools, these are based on science of mind. This is how the human mind actually operates. So third step make people feel understood. And when you make people feel understood, it actually causes a chemical release in the body it releases two different chemicals, oxytocin, which Bond’s people to you, and promotes truth telling, and serotonin, which makes people feel satisfied and less demanding. What more could you ask for in terms of communication? Once you make them feel understood, the fourth part of the process is make them think and make them think in a specific way. You make them think in terms of reality, in terms of reality, and again, different tools in the tactical empathy, toolbox. Know oriented questions, calibrated questions, which are what and how questions, we’re not telling people what to do. We’re not explaining one of the great things that Chris says, and everyone should hear this. When you’re explaining you’re losing. When you’re explaining you’re losing. And so you have to resist this need that all of you have to demonstrate your expertise by telling people what to do that’s going in one ear and out the other. So make them thing make them thinks in terms of reality, for example, pricing, many sellers have a high price in mind right now, you would say something like this. I am not here to tell you that your home isn’t worth what you think it’s worth. Rather, I just have one question for you. What if? What if we do everything possible, which we will to attract the best qualified buyer for your home? And what happens if that buyer is not willing to pay you what you think your home is worth? What will you do? And the answer to that question is going to show you are they willing to have a realistic conversation? Or not? And if they’re not willing to have a realistic conversation, then you have a choice to make? Do I walk away now? Do they need some more time to process and I’m going to give it a little more time. However, you need to be clear. They’re not thinking realistically right now. D.J. Paris 51:09I want to pause here for a second because that’s the really important and interesting, calm, interesting question to ask. It really lets the agent know, a lot of information about that buyer or that seller in this case, you know, throwing those hypotheticals out is a really smart way to gauge where the where the client is. And a boy, I just want to pause you for a moment because that’s really an impactful question. So this idea, Steve just mentioned was, you know, saying, hey, if we do everything correctly, somebody comes along, wants to buy the property, but they’re not willing to pay what you’d like to list it at? What what will what would be your response? That is a brilliant question. I just wanted to honor you for that. But go right ahead. Steve Shull 52:00And again, we’re listening to what the answer is because, again, we’re not telling him, you’re not going to get this price. You know, they don’t want to hear that. We’re saying, I’m not here to convince you, you’re not going to get what you want. I’m asking you what happens if the best buyer isn’t willing to pay you what you want? What will you do, and their response will tell you they’re either realistic, or they’re not. And if they’re not, which is the fifth part of the framework, you have to understand, if someone doesn’t want your help, you cannot help them. If they don’t want your help, you can’t help them. Going back to hostage negotiators. They’re successful 93% of the time. That’s not bad selling jail time. Pretty, pretty amazing. What they had to learn, though, is some of these people, they wanted to die suicide by police that texture. That’s why they came. And they had and they had to quickly recognize is this someone who wants to die by, you know, getting shot. And then they have to realize I can’t help that person and they’ve got to prepare, you know, they’ve got to take a very different path, in terms of what they’re how they’re dealing with a situation. No different in real estate. If a seller isn’t willing to price and price their home at a price where it will sell, I can’t help. And that’s where we learn to exit gracefully from the situation, not making them wrong, leaving the door open and moving on. So again, selling reality five parts. Put your stuff on the backburner. Let them fully express themselves, make them feel understood. Make them think in a specific way. And know you can help people who don’t want to be held D.J. Paris 53:56question for you. So if you have a seller who is unrealistic, meaning they have a different price point they think their property is worth you’ve done. The more objective research to determine it’s used as the agent don’t believe it’s worth X, they believe it is worth X. What does is there? How often are they able to come around? What what do you suggest? Or do do you suggest walking away at that point? Steve Shull 54:30Well, again, you have it you have a you have a decision to make. Do they just need more time to process because they might need some time to process you know that you’re making them think about something they haven’t thought about? And maybe in that moment they can’t make an answer. But in the next two weeks, no more than the next two weeks. Based on their actions you’re going to see are they open to being more willing? And if they’re not open to be more willing then you That, again, when I’m going to teach you is to exit gracefully. And you would exit gracefully by saying, look, I think we have a very different opinion concerning the value of your home. And again, I’m not here to tell you, I’m right and you’re wrong. And, you know, would it be crazy to think that you might be better served working with someone who’s more in alignment with where you think your home needs to be priced. So you’re honoring them, you’re giving them a choice, you’re not making them wrong, and you’re willing to walk away because time is our most precious asset. Time is our most precious asset, and you don’t have time to waste. D.J. Paris 55:49That’s, it’s really, it’s a really good point. And it this willingness to walk away, is is a very important move, because what it what it signals to the individual, the realtor who’s willing to give up this client without trying to convince them, you know, hey, no, you need to come, come come to my way of thinking, Is it really, is it an incredibly respectful thing to do to the client? And whether or not that client ends up working with you in this case? Maybe they wouldn’t. They will have a tremendous respect for you as a professional by giving them a professional answer, which is I think we’re, you know, we’re not seeing eye to eye here. And as a result, I’m going to, I’m going to, you know, go elsewhere. And I wish you the best, I suspect that oftentimes leads sometimes to the to the homeowner than saying, well, we’ll tell me what you think. Steve Shull 56:50And this is a great one. One of the things we coach to Don’t take the bait. When someone asks you for your opinion, they don’t want your opinion. Let me repeat this. Yeah. Because you guys love it you love. When someone says will tell me what you think, to you. That’s your the door has been open, again, to demonstrate how smart you are. When they say, What do you think? What they’re really want it what they really want to know is do you think what they think, D.J. Paris 57:28yeah, you validate they’re the right. Steve Shull 57:31And so there’s lots of ways to sidestep this. For the easy one price. Well, what do you think the price would be? The way you respond to that is, it sounds like you have a very specific number in mind. Okay, it sounds like you have a very specific number in mind. And if they go yet we do. And then you say, Well, what is that number? And if they won’t tell you what the number is right that in there, know that you are now the Fool in the game. Yeah. Now the Fool in the game, they are not doing business with you. However, I can still, you know, I still have a couple moves left, which is if I saw if I say you know, tell me what your number is, and they say, you know, we want to hear from you say great, Zillow and you have to look up the number on Zillow before you go out on the appointment. Well, Zillow has your home, listed, you know, has your home valued at 895,000. And you always say no matter what the price is, you always say, and you’re probably thinking that’s too low. You always say and you’re probably thinking that’s too low. And why do you say that? Because most they are thinking that’s probably too low, right? And they’re going to make and they’re gonna go Yeah, we do. We do think that’s on the low side. Now I want to go now, I’m gonna say, I’m not gonna say you’re probably thinking closer to 1,000,002. I’m gonna go way high, way high on purpose higher than I know what they’re thinking, okay, or higher where I’m guessing they’re thinking. And when I say you’re probably thinking closer to 1,000,002, and they’re gonna say, no, no, no, no, we weren’t thinking 1,000,002 We were thinking more like, you know, 980,000 they will reveal themselves in that moment. So when someone asked me for their opinion, I can get around it the other way about the again first, never take the bait up front, about the opinion. If they press you what you want to do, look if you’re asking me what I think what I think is x however, It’s not my home, I’m not the seller. And this is not my decision. This is your decision, and you need to make this. So you can share your opinion. And again, it’s only your opinion, you know, I’m not presenting it, you know, if it were me and I was in this situation, this is how I would do it. However, it’s not me, it’s you, and you need to make this decision. So you share your opinion, then you put it right back on them. And you have to make them make the choice. One of the chapters in the book is put the responsibility where it belongs, agents are always trying to take responsibility for decisions that aren’t theirs to make. And this is what creates tremendous stress in what you do. You’re all out there, you’re always trying to make the client or the prospect feel good. There’s something much more powerful, and much less stressful on you. Make them feel understood. Make them feel understood. Don’t be trying to make them feel good. You have no ability to make anyone feel good. The way you have to make people feel good now is you got to take their stress and take it on you. Yeah, you know, when you when, when you take an overpriced listing, and you know, it’s overpriced, and you take it because you don’t want to tell them the truth about price. You’re taking the responsibility for the price of the home. And now you’re taking all that stress on you. And now you’re not going to get this thing sold. And a month later, two months later, three months later, you know, they’re in your face, why aren’t we sold, and you’re not sold? Because you didn’t tell them the truth upfront. However, you have to be able to deliver the truth in a way that they can actually hear. You know, D.J. Paris 1:01:59Steve, what I’m picking up, and I’m sure our audience is is has been listening to you this entire time is what I’m hearing a lot of his preparation, I’m hearing that throughout your entire career, whether it was with athletics, with real estate, obviously, with banking as well. But we’re talking about taking the job so seriously, that you have answers pre ready, ready and able to, you know, you’re thinking this out ahead of time, you’re doing the homework, you’re you’re preparing, and you’re able to to really assert yourself as as the specialist, you’re not going in blind, you’re not just showing up, you are showing up prepared. And I again, I suspect this was something you learned, obviously, well, I don’t know where you first learned it, but you certainly learned it on on on the field. How important is preparation Steve Shull 1:03:06very famous football coach, the will to win is important, the will to prepare is vital. And I’ve been when I first read the book by Chris never split the difference six years ago. And I’ve been studying this every day, all day long for six years. And you do this for a living. You have a huge competitive advantage over your clients, they do this once every five years, seven years, whatever. You need to be thinking way more about what’s going on, then they’re thinking about what’s going on. And another chapter in the book is called Get the elephants out early. And what we mean by this is we always want to get in front of things. We don’t we don’t react, we anticipate. And so you know what the objections are up front, from any seller or any buyer? The first thing you do when you sit down with someone, it’s what we call the cold read and you’re reading the situation. And what you’re running through this supercomputer called your mind is okay, what are they thinking and feeling? And you’re paying attention to what they’re saying how they’re saying it what the body language is. It’s no different when I played football. Now, this was a long time that I played. And even back then, again, this is you know, early 80s 30 plus years ago, before every game we would get a scouting report of the other team and it’d be you know, a thing like this thick and you had to go in there and you had to memorize all their tendencies. He’s meaning if they came out on the left, on the left hashmark at the 20 yard line, and they came out in a brown formation, and it was third down. I, they I knew 48% of the time they were going to run this play 33% of the time they were running this play, you had to you had to commit all that. So when, when you’re actually out on the field, you’re anticipating, you see the formation, the down in distance. And so you’re not just you’re not making stuff up in the moment, you’re thinking in a certain way going in the door. So whenever you’re talking to a buyer or seller, you’re trying to get in front of everything. You want to say it before they say it. All of you, you’ve probably heard, you know, never make assumptions makes an ass out of you and make right now you’re making an educated guess. And you’re putting it out there, it seems like it sounds like it feels like you’re probably thinking you’re probably feeling. And by label, what you’re doing is again, you’re trying to make them feel understood by labeling, called labeling what they’re thinking and feeling. And labeling is way more effective than asking questions. All of you have been conditioned to ask questions. When you ask someone a question, the way the mind is structured, there’s a split second, where they can think about their answer. Meaning, when you ask someone a question, most of the time you’re getting the answer, they want you to hear that you’re getting the answer they want you to hear. When you label it, when you say you’re probably feeling X hits the brain in a different spot, and you get an immediate and honest response. Right? So open house, someone walks into the door, how are you doing? Well, they’re gonna give you whatever answer they want. They walk in the door, it looks like you’ve had a long, long day. Oh, my God, you’re so right. And then you get a different response. Now, anyone listening is to go, Well, what did we get it wrong? Even better? Even better, they’ll tell you, when you miss label when you miss label. People love to correct other people. It actually makes them feel good. When you say, you know, this is probably a tough decision for you. And they go, Oh, no, this was a no brainer. It actually makes them feel good. And in fact, you can use mislabeling when you’re not sure of what’s going on when you when you’re having a hard time, understand, use a mislabel. And you’ll get an immediate response to a mislabel. So back to your question. You got to be thinking about the situation before you get there. And most importantly, again, the bad habit that many of you have gotten into is, you’re never listening, you’re always thinking about what you’re going to say next. When the way we teach is you’re paying full attention. And only when they’re done talking, you’re allowed to take time to actually think process and think about what you want to say next. D.J. Paris 1:08:27And by the way, Steven, I’m jumping right in, I’m sort of doing the anti, only because because I know you’re you’re a train that’s moving. And I just wanted to jump in front of it for a quick second. But you’re absolutely right, this idea of taking a moment to actually take in the information after they’re done speaking, it does take time, right, we want to fill in the blank spaces, because it feels uncomfortable. So there’s a pause and a conversation. We want to immediately jump in with some information, some facts, some some whatever, because we get this anxiety that oh my gosh, there’s a lull in the conversation. But I have found it in in my experience in just being an adult in the business world is that the savviest people I know, when they hear some informations and facts. They take a moment they take a breath, they reflect and then they respond. Steve Shull 1:09:24slowing things down changes the dynamic of every conversation. And when you slow it way down, then people have to lean in and listen to what’s going on. And when they actually see you taking the time to think about what you’re going to say and again this is contrary to what you know salespeople think that you know you think you need to have an answer immediately. Are you looking foolish? It’s the complete opposite. When you slow it down and literally take 10 seconds, even longer to think about your response. They see someone who’s being thoughtful about and mindful about how they’re responding. And D.J. Paris 1:10:17I want to I want to jump in with a with an example. This just happened to me. I was, I was going to see a dermatologist here in downtown Chicago. And I’m mentioning this because it was a really significant event. And I mean, not seeing the dermatologist. I do that every year. But I was going to see a different dermatologist than I normally do for this one particular thing. And I had never seen these, these. The it was a father, son team, actually. And I went into the room. I actually went into his office, one of one of the doctors offices at the big table sitting behind it. And he says, Okay, we need to we need to talk about this the skin thing. So we start talking about it. And he’s asking me questions, much like maybe a realtor might ask a buyer or a seller some questions. And then, and he did this exactly what you’re saying he paused, almost longer than was comfortable, like, a good, maybe 20 seconds. And if you’ve never sat face to face across from somebody, of course, I’m speaking to the audience, not Steve specifically. And if you’ve never had a 22nd pause and conversation it is it is not that common. And it made me feel a little bit uncomfortable. But I also at the moment, I went, Wow, he is really thinking about this. And he was and he even said, Boy, in my 35 years of practice, this one’s got me stumped. I need another moment. And we went back to pausing. And he gave me an update halfway through his boss. And eventually he said, Okay, I got some ideas for you. And I sat patiently and I waited. And I will tell you, Steve, not only was I I’ve never had that experience with with with a physician, usually they’re just ready with the answer. Right, right then and there. And that’s fine. But boy, did I feel like, gosh, this person cares about me now, do they actually care about me? I don’t know. But it certainly felt like it. Steve Shull 1:12:21You just made my point. D.J. Paris 1:12:27Yeah, it’s, it’s it’s so important that these are these are, these are really important pieces of the real estate process of being the agent that I feel don’t get enough attention. The really the emphasis on, you know, connection, empathy, really listening preparation. You know, you’re so right at the beginning, when he said, you know, that the focus typically is on lead generation. And lead generation, of course, is so, so important. But this idea of okay, well, once you get the leads, now, what are we doing? How seriously are we taking, you know, steps, step A is or step one is getting, getting the lead steps, two through 25,000 Is all of the all of the things that that maybe we’re not taught. And I’m assuming this is what the full fee agent is all about. This is what performance coaching.com is, you have basically given us, our listeners and our viewers on this episode, about an hour and a half coaching session, which I know is providing tremendous value to to our audience. And I really want everyone to think about when’s the last time you started working on your presentation? When’s the last time you worked on? Objection? Handling? Not objection overcoming. But dealing with people’s responses. How do you respond? Steve has for the last 80 minutes has literally been talking about step by step of how to be very intentional about how to communicate, we’re really talking about communication. And, boy, Steve, this has been a masterclass in communication, but I apologize, I didn’t mean to stop your your, your flow, but I just wanted to make a point that this is all about communication and preparation, Steve Shull 1:14:24writing and getting back to your question about being prepared. And again, this is where I’m gonna differ from 99% of the coaches or trainers out there. The entire and this is going to blow your mind. So sit down and buckle up. The entire industry is based on a false premise. And that premise is that you win or lose business based on your Presentation. You win or lose business based on whether you’re the favorite, or the fool. And when you get that call, what’s the greatest call to get in real estate? Hi, we’re thinking about selling our home. And we want you to come over and give us a presentation. Every agent jumps up and down with joy. They go spend 234 hours putting their presentation together, they get all dressed up, they drive over to the appointment, they’re early, they got a big smile on their face. They go in the front door for two hours, they tell them everything. You tell them everything, you know, you’ve got your beautiful presentation, you lay it out, at the end of the two hours, they say oh my god, you gave us so much to think about thank you so much. Let us process and then we’ll get back to you. And you walk out the door and you’re gone. Oh my god, did it go? Well, that did not go well, what’s going to happen for the next one to three days a week, you’re on pins and needle waiting for the phone call. And you get the phone call. And they go oh my god, you were so wonderful. And you shared such great information. However, when I let go list with Mr. Mrs. So and so. And you’re left going What the heck just happened? What happened was you were the Fool in the game, you never had a shot to begin with. And we that my top agents no longer go on listing appointments, and they list more property than they’ve ever listed before. How can that be? Because we have a 15 to 30 minute pre list zoom call. And in that call, we determine whether we’re the favorite or the fool. And in the book, we’ll go through how you do that. And in 15 to 30 minutes, you know whether you’re the favorite of the full, if you’re the favorite, you’re gonna go out to the house, sign them up answer questions, you never give your presentation. And and you get your full fee 6%. And in the areas where you can you’re keeping three and a half and paying two and a half to the buyer’s agent. Anyway. And when you’re the fool, it doesn’t make a difference what you say and it doesn’t make a difference what you charge. And so the real estate out there, the real estate, all of you are out there thinking you got to work on your presentation. No, you’ve got to work on finding out whether you’re the favorite or the fool. This is a major game changer. One of my clients today, taking 22 listings this year been on 28 appointments 22 times he thought he was the favor 22 times they listed with him and paid him six, keeping three and a half percent in a market where everyone else is charging five or less. The other six appointments that he went on and didn’t get is because he wasn’t sure am I the favorite on that short phone call? Zoom call. He wasn’t sure. So he went out anyway. And so what we learned today is when you’re not sure, don’t go you are the fool. So he’ll save himself next year, those five or six appointments that he won’t go on. D.J. Paris 1:18:22But again, this is an this is really incredible skills. You know, I’ve been doing the show for five years. You know, what we’re talking about, in some ways is a return to be I don’t want to call them salesman tactics because they’re not sales tactics at all. They’re they’re absolutely appropriate and respectful conversation. But what you’re doing is taking the salesy part out of the equation, right, you’re not trying to sell the person, you because most people don’t want to be sold as as we all know. But what you’re really doing is you’re making them an equal. So my time is valuable, your time is valuable. Wouldn’t it be amazing. I mean, I’m a recruiter, I recruit realtors, and I can’t tell you how many times I just go right into my presentation about why you need to join our firm versus the firm they’re already at. And they you know, and maybe they have an inkling of interest in what we do here. However, my version of that is is are they actually thinking about switching firms or are they just taking the phone call because they want to see, you know, they’re bored on a on a Wednesday afternoon. So this is what you will learn, you know, by reading full fee agent. This is also what Steve teaches agents. I mean, his you know, obviously the the value he’s been providing on this this episode is incredible, but this is what he does for his clients. He has clients that are doing 500 million in production 750 million in production a year and Steve saying and in the next year No a year or two, he has some clients that’ll probably get to a billion dollars, he gets results, which is you know why we’re having him talk to you guys today. And I can’t keep Steve on all day because he’s got other people to coach and other shows to talk to. But I want everyone who’s listening, if you got value out of this, and of course you did, I want you to go and pick up the full fee agent on Amazon. It’s the number one book right now for real estate sales, the perfect five star review. It’s written, co written by never split the difference guy, which a lot of our listeners have already read, we already know how important and impactful that book was. So I want you to go pick up the full FBI agent link to that in our show notes. And I also want you to check out to see what Steve’s coaching services are all about at performance coaching.com. Steve has been coaching, not the last five years, 10 years, he’s been coaching since 1993. This is somebody who has seen the ups and weathered the storms of the market. He knows what he’s been through these cycles, and he knows how to coach people through the cycles. That’s maybe the most important thing is 2023 going to be a difficult year. Yes, we know that we’re it’s more than likely going to be a challenging year. But does it need to be an unprofitable year? Does it need to be a down year? Not necessarily. But you need coaching? You need some skills. That’s what Steve does. He’s skill development. He’s he’s about preparation, discipline, perspiration, all of that. But real tactical skills. So I want everybody to visit performance. coaching.com see what Steve’s all about, pick up the book, the full fee agent. I mean, gosh, let’s let’s stop the race to the bottom with fees. Right. Let’s stop giving away our commission just to be competitive. Let’s let’s learn how to assert our full value. Steve’s book does that and also gives you incredible, actual tactical skills to be able to go out into the marketplace and do more business. And Steve’s clients, obviously speak for themselves with the results that that they get, Steve, I am so grateful to have had you on the show. And I know that you probably just continue going for another couple of hours. But I’m going to save you from from that on our show because we can bring you back on a future episode. But on behalf of our audience, I really want to thank Steve for coming on. Just tremendous value here really great. I love these kinds of episodes. So hopefully our audience is as appreciative as I am. I know they are. And if you want to be appreciative again, pick up full FBI agent and also visit performance coaching.com On behalf of everyone listening, want to thank Steve for coming on the show, sharing his wisdom sharing his his insight over the last 30 plus years in this business. Just truly remarkable and incredible. And also on behalf of Steve and myself. We want to thank everyone who’s watching or listening and supporting our show. Definitely again, check out the book check out Steve’s coaching program where he gets things done, and he can help you so reach out to him and see if you guys might be a good fit. Steve, thank you so much for being on our show. Really appreciate it. Steve Shull 1:23:14Thank you. Thanks everyone for listening. D.J. Paris 1:23:18And we will see everybody on the next episode. All right Transcribed by https://otter.ai

In our January episode of Monday Market Minute, Carrie McCormick from @properties discusses how being authentic and leading with kindness are the keys to having a great impact and building great relationships with people. Carrie also talks about the importance of having a business plan and the role it plays in the success of your business. Next, Carrie emphasizes the importance of listening to your client’s needs, desires and also frustrations. Last, D.J. shares his marketing tip and discusses it with Carrie. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612. Please follow Carrie on Instagram by clicking here. This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks and FollowUpBoss. Transcript D.J. Paris 0:00We all know that we’re supposed to be authentic and kind with our clients. But how does that actually translate into more business? Well, we’re going to talk about that today. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solutions so that you can easily generate more business. There agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and now on to our show. Welcome to keep it relevant largest podcast made for real estate agents and by real estate agents. My name is DJ Parris. I’m your guide and host through the show today on the show is our monthly series called The Monday market minute with Carrie McCormick from the Kara McCormick Real Estate Group with at properties here in Chicago. Now Kerry is a top 1% producer here with over 20 years of experience helping buyers sellers and investors. Fact in the past 12 months out of 46,000 real estate agents here in the Chicagoland area. Carrie is currently ranked number 13 in production, and she’s a true superstar and expert in everything from first time homebuyers, veteran investors and luxury properties. And she also works with a lot of developers and is often chosen to represent their high end developments, please visit Carrie at our website, which is Carrie McCormick r e.com. By the way, we have a link to that in the show notes. And also, most importantly, follow her on Instagram can find her at at Carey McCormick real estate. Also a link to that in the show notes. Carrie, welcome once again. Carrie McCormick 2:36Hi there. How are you? D.J. Paris 2:38I’m good. I’m good. We’re recording this in December towards like the month beginning of December. This won’t go out till January. So I guess what we can talk about is 2023. And sort of what your what you’re dealing with for 2023 What how you’re feeling about the market and any ideas that you’re you toying around with? Carrie McCormick 3:02I love that I first have to say for those who are watching, if I look orange, I am not orange. Because I feel like this, this lighting wherever I’m at is it’s kind of bad lighting. So this is not really what I look like but and I have not gotten a suntan. So that’s that’s kind of strange. So anyways, well, happy 2023 to everybody. We are recording this in December. But I’m planning and doing all of my due diligence to start the year off, right. And I wanted just to kick it off by giving a little bit of success to everybody for 2023 our markets a little funky. But I am a true believer that it’s going to be a good year, it’s going to be a good year for us. But I wanted just to say being authentic, and leading with kindness is going to be your plan for 2023. And I think that everyone should start 2023 with a game plan of having a defined business plan. I think that is key and my success. And I’ve been doing this for 22 years, so I have a good track record of success. And my success has been built on being authentic and leading with kindness. It sounds so simple. It sounds so easy. And it truly is. And I truly believe that having authentic actions in everything that you do is key to making high impact personal connections with people. And we are all in real estate, connecting with other people. Connecting with your clients, connecting with your vendors, connecting with colleagues is the core of your business and think about it again. We’re in a relationship type business, right and relationships are going to drive your sales. They’re going to generate your leads. They’re going to build your credibility but you You have to be genuine, I’ve been with people, and I’m sure you have to that. I don’t know, you know that it’s fake, you know that it’s not real. But if you are genuine, it can be extremely effective. And I’ve also done that with my brand, just like you were saying is, you know, with social media or with any type of advertising that you do, be your own brand ambassador, yes, I look at other brands, and I find inspiration in MRI, I listen to other podcasts, or I do, you know, a lot of research and I get inspired by other brands. But if you are your own brand, Ambassador, and you are truly authentic to what you do, consumers will respond to that. I think D.J. Paris 5:46you’re right, I think authenticity, really Trump’s sort of the aesthetic of what we think we should look like, or what we should present to the public, sort of the image that we want people to see us app is needs to be in alignment with who you actually are as a person. So if you’re like a female realtor, and you just are somebody that isn’t somebody that spends a lot of time, on their visual, you know, their physical appearance, like they’re not putting on a ton of makeup, or they don’t, you know, you maybe don’t wear certain types of clothing or do your hair a certain way, I would, I would lean into that and just be like, I’m the agent who doesn’t, you know, do a lot of makeup or hair, if that’s, you know, you don’t have to look differently than you are. Because you’re ultimately I mean, you should obviously look professional and all of that. But, but if you’re if you’re you know I have I have friends, I have some very good friends who are women who just have very different styles than maybe what we think of when we see a billboard with a realtors face on it. And they lean into the fact that that’s just they’re different. They have different preferences. And they’re the people that want to work with them are going to respond to that because it’s authentic, versus Hey, I look perfect. And I think I think this need to look to sort of look and appear perfect. It takes away from the authenticity, which is, you know, look, we don’t have to be perfect. We don’t have to even act perfectly. We just have to be ourselves. And I think people relate way more to imperfection than perfection anyway, Carrie McCormick 7:18I do too. And, you know, speaking of being kind, you know, sometimes kindness can be mistaken as a weakness, right. And there’s that old saying that nice guys finish last. And I think that that’s so untrue. I don’t know who started that one. But I totally disagree with that. I find that when you are authentically kind, you know, doors are gonna open, people will smile back at you, your business will just grow and to me, it’s kind of like karma, what you give out is going to come back to you. So you know, think about when you look at like I always like to focus on like, who are the successful leaders out there who are the successful managers or sales team, and you’re gonna see that they all have something very common. They’re common traits, they have the ability to understand people understand their co workers understand their clients, they listen, that’s another big thing for 2023 Everybody out there, listen to your clients listen to their needs, their desires, even their frustrations listened to that their dreams are challenges. When you really listen. You know, you’re not talking talking too much. You got to listen to them, you’re going to understand, and these successful people, they understand the drivers of change and they strive to make the people happy. And keep in mind kindness is a choice and you got to choose it. D.J. Paris 8:42I want to pause for a moment to talk about our episode sponsor are one of my favorite companies out there follow up boss. Now after interviewing hundreds of top Realtors in the country for this podcast. Do you know which CRM is used by more than any other by our guests. Of course it is a follow up boss and let’s face it following up is the key to taking your business to the next level follow up boss will help you drive more leads in less time and with less effort. Do not take my word for it. Robert slack who runs the number one team in the US uses follow up boss and he has built a one and a half billion dollar business in just six years. Follow up boss integrates with over 250 systems so you can keep your current tools and lead sources also the best part they have seven day a week support so you’ll get the help that you need when you need it and get this follow up boss is so sure that you’re going to love their CRM that for a limited time they’re offering keeping it real listeners a 30 day free trial which is twice as much time as they give everyone else and oh yeah, no credit card required. So you can try it risk free but only if you use this special link visit follow up boss.com forward slash real that’s follow up boss.com forward slash real for your free 30 day trial. Follow up like a boss with follow up boss And now back to our episode. Yeah, you do. And I think you’re right. I don’t think nice guys finish last I think. I think maybe there was a time in our culture where that was more true, but it was not in my lifetime really, I found that maybe in the 80s, it was a little different. If you were, you know of a certain age, then maybe there was a little bit more of like, just grind it out and be that be the very best and crush the competition. But I think that nice people are oftentimes just so valued by employers, they’re valued by your team. If you’re on a team, they’re valued by, you know, any, any, anytime you can help somebody, it really it really tends to come back I find in this industry, because it’s such a collaborative industry. Yeah, so I agree, I have a marketing thought that I wanted to, I’m a little nervous, because I have a feeling that I might not be thinking about this entirely fully. So I am going to lean on you a top top top producer to tell me if you think this if this value is it has any merit because I was thinking about for 2023. Right now, obviously market is challenged, the rates are up inventory still down. Yes, we all know this. So we’re probably all a little nervous about 2023. Or at least Everybody I talked to seems to be. So it’s thinking, Okay, what’s one proactive thing you can do? Well, we also know that home prices have probably fallen over the last couple of years, at least a little bit in most markets, not not in every case. But I also know that like 100 and some million people, unique people 100 And some unique, a million unique individuals every month, go to Zillow, this is just in the US. So you know a lot of the country is checking Zillow, every so often. Now, what’s the first thing that people do if they own a home and they go to Zillow, they check to see what the price of their home may be worth according to this estimate. And as Realtors I don’t I can hear the collective groans yes, these estimates are problematic. We don’t like them. They’re not always accurate. People think they’re accurate. And then you have to come in and save the day. Well, okay, so that’s sort of the situation we all know, people are checking, I even check this estimate, even though I just it’s just the quickest and easiest way for me to get an idea of what my place might be worth, even though I’m a no, not ready in any way to sell. But it’s kind of a fun little thing. It’s like checking your credit score once in a while. I don’t know how they figure it out. But it’s there. And it does feel good, whether it’s a high credit score number or high Zestimate. So but we also know as realtors, it’s not probably super accurate. And that’s where you guys come in. Because obviously Zestimates can’t take into account every possible eventuality in the market. And so whatever, it’s just a guess. So if it was me, I’m, here’s my idea, I would reach out to everybody you know, that owns a home in early 2023. And say, Hey, I was just browsing around on Zillow. And I noticed the Zestimate for your home is x. And I also know that when people see that they’re not always sure is that accurate? Is that not, I would love to have a quick conversation with you. And just to give you my update on what I actually think your home might be worth. And yeah, maybe the number will be less or higher than what I found here. But I just thought maybe you deserve to get an actual number, just so that you can keep an keep on top of what’s going on with your home. So the risk here is, of course, you know, maybe the numbers much lower than the person wants to see or maybe it’s higher. But I just liked the idea of the realtor adding value going hey, I just wanted to give you an update here it here it is. So that was my thought. What are your thoughts about that? What’s is there? Are there pros and cons to doing that? Carrie McCormick 13:33That’s interesting. You know, it’s funny that I’ve never really gone and look at these estimates. To be honest, I think any outreach to a client and giving them information is 100%. Always a great idea and educating them on what his estimate is. And I always tell people Zestimate is not even a real word. I mean, it’s an algorithm really what that is doing well, what else and sometimes it’s a good number. And sometimes it’s a bad number. But again, our jobs as professionals is to give them the true market value of the home. So I like your approach, I will give that a thumbs up because it’s doing that’s what we should do a thumbs up or thumbs down on on your ideas, but because it’s an outreach to the client, and it’s giving information to them, or at least starting that dialogue about where the market is at, I believe and I’ll have to look into this a little bit. But I do believe with Zillow, you can claim your home. Right? And you can go in there and add some of the details and facts of your home because Zillow doesn’t know Do you have a basement? Do you have a two car garage Do you have you know, whatever the features are of your home, you can go in as a homeowner, claim your home, add your features, and that will change your Zestimate of your home because Zillow now will aggregate that data to like homes with the same kind of information. So I’ll look into that and just see. D.J. Paris 14:57Yeah, it’s interesting because I was at a Zillow event earlier this year, and they claim that there’s estimate is within three percentage points of, of accuracy plus or minus three percentage points. So I can I don’t know if that’s true, but it’s certainly something that people look at. So I was just thinking, you should be looking at what your clients look at. So if they’re looking at that, you should be there to say, hey, that number actually looks really good or no, I’m going to run some, some more comps, I’m going to give you a better answer. And then you solidify yourself as the person that they can still go look at this estimate. But you’re the one that comes in to kind of verify the numbers, just like an financial advisor might call you and say I want to tell you about how the market did this year, I want to talk about how your investments did in relation to the market. So I’m just sort of thinking more along bad, it’s just a reason to pick up the phone Carrie McCormick 15:46100% It’s a reason pick up the phone, I think always I’ve done more of that to this past year, and 2022 is picking up the phone and talking to my clients and they absolutely love it. So I think that should be a strategy to for 2023 for realtors listening is is pick up the phone, give a purpose of your call, and provide value. And I think just like you’re talking about with the this estimate, it’s providing some value of where their investment is at. Yeah, I D.J. Paris 16:13would say I’m less texting this next year. I mean text when you have like easy, quick, simple, simple things. But when you’re talking to clients, I think nobody’s calling them anyway. They’re not getting calls from their friends. Probably everyone’s texting, everyone’s on social media. This is a way to go back a step and say, Hey, I was thinking about you. And I just think, you know, hey, I was wanting to just talk, touch base, see how everything’s going? I think that those are and a lot of people won’t even answer the phone anyway. So you’re gonna get a ton of voicemails, and you can leave, that’s even easier. It can leave like a voicemail. Hey, I was just thinking about you. I hope you’re doing well. It’s talk to you soon. And there’s a company Carrie McCormick 16:47that a lot of people use is called sly dial. Oh, sure. You know, and they just do their slide dial messages to people. I have not crossed over into that yet. But I hear a lot of brokers do use that that survey. D.J. Paris 17:01Yeah. So sly dial, bypasses the ring and goes right into somebody’s voicemail. And it’s pretty accurate. It’ll get it out right about 80% of the time, the rest of the time, it just won’t work. But it is a very, it’s like four cents a call. They’re really cheap three cents, maybe. So it’s absolutely a good idea. If you want to sort of blanket call everyone just be careful because those those calls can sound recorded a little bit. So you have to be really careful how you record it and listen back to making sure it doesn’t seem like a recording because then people probably wouldn’t respond well, but we I use slide dial to what do you do? Okay. Yeah, well, we sometimes we do it for our own brokers because we have like 800 agents. So one of the easy ways we text everybody, but then we also drop a voicemail and hey, this thing’s coming up. Just want to make sure you know. So but it’s a great way to reach as many people as you can very quickly and very cheaply. And if you have 1000s of past clients like you do, that’s going to be very hard to call everybody so so that’s that’s a good way to just do something or you can also do bulk texting to there is ways to do that. Even through an iPhone, there are little hacks around that. So maybe we can cover that. And another just another way the phone calls. I like those. Me too. Well, Carrie is this is the end of the year. And we wanted to keep this one short and sweet. And also, while this will be January, but we’re recording this of course in December wanted to thank Carrie She has been with us since the very, very beginning and we are so grateful to have her and her insight. We don’t we don’t get usually when we get top producers they do one episode with us and then they are off to run their business and carry still makes time for us every month. We are so honored and grateful to have her she always has amazing insight and really everybody listening she just do everything she says because she gets results. She gets results. All right. But I want everyone to visit her on her Instagram page, which is at Kerry McCormick real estate. Also if you are a buyer, a seller and investor or maybe you are another realtor who is thinking about partnering up with somebody, I don’t know if Carrie’s team is currently looking for someone else. But I know I would want to make friends with Carrie if I was thinking about exploring other options. Or if you have a client maybe that’s moving to the Chicagoland area. I know Kerry’s worked with a lot of transplants, people that come in from other cities. And you actually worked with the big big way that accompany my friend works for up in Michigan, who ended up moving to this area. So Carrie is a great person for anyone moving to Chicago if you’re a realtor in another market, and she might have somebody who’s moving to your area too. So reach out to her. Carrie what’s the best way someone should reach out if they want to work with Carrie McCormick 19:39always call me 312-961-4612 D.J. Paris 19:43Awesome. All right, Carrie. Well, thank you for another year of service to our audience. We are we’re so I mean just it’s just amazing. By the way, Carrie does. Like I won’t even go into your production but it is it is well over the hundreds of millions of dollars of production every year. So she is she is just that busy, probably closing a home every three or four days or so. So we appreciate it. And I hope you have a great 2023 I’m sure you will. And I and it’ll be great to hear how a top producer stays positive this year and stays productive. Because of course you’re dealing with the same challenges that everyone else will be dealing with. Carrie McCormick 20:22Always Be kind, be positive, and you’ll have a great year. D.J. Paris 20:27Well said All right, everyone, we’ll see you on our next episode and let’s all have a great 2023 and tell a friend about the show. That’s that’s the way you can help us grow our audience and have a great 2023 is just tell one other realtor. Look everybody knows a realtor that is depressed that is stressed that is going I don’t know what I’m gonna do. This is the time to send them a link to this episode. Our episodes are about giving people hope and understanding how to keep them on track while the markets a little tricky. So let’s let’s share this episode with as many many agents as we can. All right. Carrie, we will see you again next month. Thank you so much. Carrie McCormick 21:04All right. Thank you guys.

Alexander Concepcion with Taco Street Locating describes how he landed in Austin and how he got into apartment locating. Alexander describes what does the rental market cycle look like and talks about non-MLS rentals. Alexander also talks about the process of finding rental leads and discusses the importance of knowing your inventory. Last, Alexander talks about his master class in rentals and what this course offers. Please check out Alexander’s Apartment Locating Mastery Course here. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks and FollowUpBoss. Transcript D.J. Paris 0:002023 is the year to start working with renters. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solution so that you can easily generate more business. Their agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now on to our show. Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping the real the largest podcast made by real estate agents. And for real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris. And in just a moment, we’re going to be speaking with Alex Concepcion, who is a top realtor and also a top super agent for renters. But before we get to Alex, just a couple of quick reminders one, please support our sponsors. They support us during these episodes, please check out their products and services and consider investing in them for your business. And second, tell a friend to think of one other agent that hasn’t yet listened to our podcast and send them a link to our website, which is keeping it real pod.com Every episode we’ve ever produced can be streamed right from a browser or if the person you’re sending us to is a podcast listener of other shows, just have them pull up whatever podcast app they use search for keeping it real and hit that subscribe button. All right, thank you so much and on to art my Episode Sorry, under my conversation, which is really the episode of Alex Concepcion. Today on the show is Alexander Concepcion from Darko street located serving Austin Houston and Dallas. Let me tell you more about Alexander. Now Alexander is a Cuban American born and raised in Miami, Florida, he moved to Austin to chase riches and tacos. After trying a bunch of random gigs going broke, he stumbled into apartment location services and created taco street locating. Now after more than 400 deals and 700,000 in revenue, he’s becoming one of the most successful independent apartment locators in Texas, probably in the country out not just Texas, what he’s not locating, he’s working on a book that he’s writing. He’s also being a low budget Anthony Bourdain. That’s not the book that’s a coma being a low budget Anthony Bourdain, Cooking, playing disc golf and also working out I have two websites, I want everybody to check out first, just to see what Alexander is all about taco street locating is his apartment, locating service. But he also teaches and we were just chatting about this beforehand, we believe the first and maybe only course out there for agents to learn how to do apartment locating. So the best way to learn about this course and we’re going to talk about it today, visit the website apartment locating mastery.com By the way, both of those links are in the show notes. So just scroll to the show notes. Click on in particular apartment locating mastery to see his course owl Alexander I keep wanting to call you Alex because I have a very close friend named Alex. So I apologize. I might stumble over that here. But anyway, Alexandra, welcome to the show. Alexander Concepcion 4:16Thank you. Yeah, I I used to go by Alex but I switched to Alexander this year. Because I it’s my actual full name and I just like it more. So there’s less Alexander’s. I’m like I’m going with it to mind. D.J. Paris 4:31I like it. I think there’s some names that sound better shortened. And I think Alexander is not one of those names. I like it better. It sort of works all the way through. Now I My name is a nickname so I’m sort of not one to talk but, but my name is actually it’s a Spanish name. It does. It doesn’t I’m not I’m not from any sort of Spanish speaking country. But my name is Delfin is the D and J is walking. So and I I don’t look particularly Spanish, I don’t think so I DJ is just a heck of a lot easier for people to absorb. But anyway, we’re not here to talk about my my name. But I am so excited to have you because this came at just a perfect time. So we have to give you a little background. So right now, you know, by the time you’re listening to this, it’s probably mid December. And Alexander and I are recording this late, late November, just actually a few days before Thanksgiving. And we have about well between I don’t know, set between seven and 800 agents here at our company. And we do mostly sales. And we’ve tried over the years to really introduce our brokers. By the way, in Illinois, every realtor is called a broker. So I know that’s not the way it is in every state. So I’ll just say realtor, but we tried to take to really encourage our Realtors in between sales to do some do some rentals, because specifically here in Chicago, obviously big rental market, and lots of money to be had. Most agents, however, don’t get their license to do rentals, meaning they don’t, that’s not why they got their license. And so they oftentimes just overlook it. And for me, I think it is a huge mistake, especially if you’re newer to the business, and maybe aren’t as busy as somebody who’s, you know, only doing sales, you know, full time. So I think this is so perfect for for that reason. And also just the state of the market right now with interest rates being where they’re at. Every realtor I talked to even the ones at the very top of the food chain seem to be stressed about next year. And I think this is so such perfect timing to talk to you. So let’s, let’s talk about it. So first, I’d love to find out. I’d love to hear your origin story. How did how did you get to Austin? Because there’s I know there’s a good story though. So tell us why Austin and and how you got into apartment locating? Alexander Concepcion 6:48Yeah, I graduated from college thinking I was gonna get into like finance. I spent two years getting rejected from every single job interview I ever did. Over Over 50 I can relate to that. And I tried a little bit of real estate in Miami and just wasn’t working. And I kind of just snapped. I burned my college diplomas. And I went to Austin, because it just seemed like the right place for me. I didn’t know a lot of people had like $1,500 in the bank account. Get to Austin get like an actual job job. First time I ever quit that after nine months realizing I’ve got to be on my own. And I spent the next two years doing a bunch of random gigs. I sold cricket protein bars. I did real estate photography. I traveled to Southeast Asia on like a food travel documentary. Amazing stuff. But I come back to Austin after the after the trip and I’m completely broke. Yeah. And in the middle of all about I got my real estate license. And I’m like, I really don’t want to be in real estate at all. I just want like a job have money. It’s not the broker anymore. So I get into apartment locating thinking I’m just gonna do it for a few months. And I realized that what I’m pretty good at it. Like it’s actually cool work. Getting to be someone’s like ambassador and like, yeah, building those relationships. I realized how much money I can make. And given that was Austin 2017 ish. And people were flooding them like, yeah. Okay, this is this is a serious opportunity. So that’s how this broke in desperate, the tour became a business. I’m still running five years later. D.J. Paris 9:00It’s amazing. And yeah, I don’t know if it was just, you know, perfect timing meets perfect place meets, you know, meets hard work, which obviously, you are a hard worker, I just think it’s such a smart way to enter the real estate business. Because number one, you possibly are setting yourself up for future sales, at least a certain percentage of the people you service on the rental side could or will become buyers. Also. Everyone’s got to live somewhere. So if they’re not buying or renting, right, so there’s just so much opportunity and you’re in a city that is still I mean, years years later, still one of the coolest you know as far as when you put you know what, what are the cool cities of this country? Austin’s right near the top if not right at the top out there with Charleston and Nashville and others kind of of its ilk. But let’s let’s so So what’s interesting to me is you’ve built this course apartment, locating mastery and I’m actually a little jealous because because it is such a smart idea. And I was saying to Alexander earlier, I said, I don’t, I don’t know that there’s another product like this out there, which by the way, if you flip that into sales mastery or, you know, being a realtor sales mastery, there’s about a million courses, and there’s a lot of really good ones and trying to enter that market, I think is a lot more difficult. And trying to make a name for yourself, but you’ve really created something that and Alexander said, Yeah, I think I think I’m the only one out there doing this. And I’ve really created this impressive platform and program, so I am super pumped to tell you about it. But before we get into that, maybe just for because our audiences is all over. Maybe we have listeners that have never sort of done rentals. So can you just sort of go through like what is a rental look like? As far as how quickly do rentals usually close? Meaning, you know, you meet with a person, you might show them some properties, and then they sign the lease? What’s the usual average time that you find that that sort of start to finish Alexander Concepcion 11:01ends? And I have a great answer for that. This, the cycles can be a day, it could be a year, people are just on different timelines. So someone can reach out to me today, I schedule them a tour for the afternoon. Pay close, bam, that’s it. Yeah. Or they reach out like, Hey, I’m moving in January, because I got a new job. And then oh, now it’s like February or March. And then they move into an apartment like April. So I may not see that check till like the end of summer, right. And the actual transactions themselves, if you want to get into that are really straightforward. So when I talk about apartment locating, I’m specifically referring to these big three 400 professionally managed buildings you see popping up all over the country. Those are the only buildings I work with. Because it’s effectively a bounding system. Yeah, where I bring someone to a building, and the per se they’re spending like $2,000 on a one bedroom, which and awesome, that’s pretty common. And the building pays 100% Commission. That means I’m making $2,000 for that single deal. But I’m not touching paperwork. I’m not putting my hands on the lease on the deposit. There’s no inspections. So financing. All it is and my client, putting my name down as like, Hey, this guy referred me. And then the building pays out later. D.J. Paris 13:04Yeah, I here in Chicago. So we have we call it the sort of there’s like two buckets or two into two different inventories for apartments, there are what’s on the MLS. And then they’re what I just called non MLS or maybe better said third party, third party property management companies, which again, don’t list on the MLS, these apartments, a lot of times high rises, like Alexander was saying, But who do pay usually one month’s rent, like you were saying, as a commission, or even more, sometimes, depending on times of year, and how much occupied occupied, or how many of the units are occupied. So it can be incredibly fast, it can be incredibly lucrative. And in a way, it’s kind of nice. So the downside is that you may be competing, if the building works with other agents as well. I know here in Chicago, many of the buildings, they’re like, we don’t really care who rents it just someone get this thing rented. So they’ll work oftentimes with with a lot of different firms and provide that inventory to the firm. Or they’ll only work with certain agents. My girlfriend works at a building, there’s 500 units here in Chicago, and they only work with like three to three or four agents total out of 45,000. So it all just kind of depends. But a lot of agents don’t even know that this inventory really exists because they’re focused on the MLS, when they have a rental, they don’t really think beyond that in a lot of markets. And there is a market for it in a lot of places. So my question is, how did you learn about about you know, this sort of, I don’t want to call it off market because it’s not off market but non MLS style of rentals. Alexander Concepcion 14:48I joined the first brokerage that would where I can make any kind of money that was apartment locating and They’re like, Yeah, this is how it works. We work with these buildings, they pay us this much money and like, oh, that’s kind of cool. And I liked it, because I didn’t have to do like houses. Because I never want it to be like a home, like a classic home buying and selling real estate agent. I still don’t do any of those deals. But yeah, this is kind of just the, this was my point of entry into like making money in real estate. So I’ve kind of just stayed in this niche this entire time. And I don’t plan on getting into sales. D.J. Paris 15:44What’s what’s nice is that, you know, you can get paid on those referrals. So if you do have renters that turn into buyers, and you’re like, you know, I don’t really have time for that I don’t really want to do that’s not my thing. You can still earn referral commissions, of course by you know, referring, which of course, you already know, but I’m making that point for for everyone else listening. It’s like, it’s not, you know, Alexander’s still maintaining relationships with all of these renters. So if they want to move to another apartment at the end of their lease, he’s their guy. If they want to buy a home, he’s going to connect them with someone else who can assist. But But tell us. So I want to mention one thing for anyone out there who’s like, how do I get access to this inventory? Let’s say they work at a brokerage that doesn’t care about rentals, they don’t really do rentals, and they’re like, how do I get access to this inventory? How would you suggest that people start to build this? We’ll call it non MLS inventory of apartments that, you know that that these management companies will work with you for Alexander Concepcion 16:41with? Yeah, so there is like a database specifically for apartments, called Smart Apartment data. And it’s basically the MLS for apartments. And it’s way cheaper than the MLS. I don’t use the MLS, but yeah, there is a database where you could see which buildings are in my market, work hand I send referrals to what Commission’s do they pay? And it also functions as like, at least for me, the first point of research that I could send to my clients, I kind of all happens on that platform. But yeah, that’s getting the inventory is pretty straightforward. Yeah, D.J. Paris 17:29I know, like, the way that we built ours before services like that exist is we just called a lot of buildings, and said, hey, you know, if our agents want to come rent, is that okay? And you usually have to sign some sort of agreement. And but it’s, it was shockingly easy to get access to that information. And now I’m so glad to hear that there’s a service that does that for you for a relatively low fee. That’s incredible value. I didn’t even know that existed. So I’m going to take a look at that myself. What was that called? Again? If you don’t mind me asking? Alexander Concepcion 17:59Smart Apartment data. Got it. D.J. Paris 18:02So let’s, let’s talk about apartment locating itself. We talked about like the cycle, the sales cycle, the rental cycle, could be as quickly as you said, as an afternoon could be as long as a year depending on on how you know when the person’s moving. But let’s talk about lead generation. Because that’s always, you know, on our listeners minds is, hey, this is all great. How do I get leads now in the past years and years ago, when I first started in this industry, and this is going back to like 2010, or 11, there was the the way that a lot of people did is they posted ads on Craigslist, because it was free. It’s no longer free, I believe to do that. But it’s still pretty inexpensive, I believe. But it was free at the time. And people would post hundreds of ads, because there was a software that could do this. And I think it’s maybe now transitioned more to Facebook marketplace, but we’d love to hear it. Oh, I’m sorry. And so let me just complete my thought. The reason why people would post ads on Craigslist is because that was used to be the number one place people look for apartments. And so they would reply to ads. And by the way, the buildings that Alexandria is referencing oftentimes allow it sometimes they don’t, sometimes they do but they some allow you to actually promote their listings there. They’re open apartments. And so I don’t know if that existed so much in 2017. But I’d love to hear about how you recommend people go about you know, getting there getting the name out there and, and finding some leads. Alexander Concepcion 19:29Yeah, just start. I started on Craigslist. Early on, it worked. But Craigslist is a lot to manage. But it is something you could do to start off. There are a lot of apartment rental websites where you can like yeah, you just take a building’s information, make ads with it. Get leads like that. Yeah, pretty much all buildings I know. Just let you do that. Some don’t, some will ask you to take your stuff down, then you take it down. But it’s knowing like all the channels you’d put like those ads on and get leads like that. A lot of people do that. And a lot of people just make the ads look like how everyone else has looked like. So everyone’s kind of just blending in. The ones I would make would, would stand out. Yeah, it’s my, I do a lot of creative writing a lot of silly fun stuff. And I’ve put like a business card picture on there, as me and like my alpaca selfie business card picture. So yeah, what I do stands out at all layers. But zooming out, there’s a difference between what I’ll describe as rented channels and owned channels. So our rented channel could be like Facebook, Google, any of these platforms to post ads, Craigslist, I don’t, I don’t own any of them. I don’t control any of them. And for me to survive long term in this business, I didn’t want to rely on channels, I didn’t control. If I didn’t control my channels, then I didn’t control my business. It’s good point. So that’s why early on, I would, I got my own website, like professionally done for Taco Street. It’s a brand I own, it’s a website I own and control. And I knew that had to be one of my primary lead channels, because it’s something I’ve owned and control. So these days, by more than half of the deals I closed come from my website. But that took a while to build. That’s not something that immediately started getting traffic. But I think it’s just practical to have a website day one, that in my case, I got to be the face of my own business. It was my website. I didn’t capture leads, I use really fun, like lead form software. Yeah, so I’m very pro owned channels have a rented channels. D.J. Paris 22:24That’s actually really smart. Because Craigslist, in particular, going back aways used to be you could get away with posting 100 ads an hour. And then eventually Craigslist goes well, that’s we don’t really want people doing that. And they make an algorithm change or, or, or just a change to their code. And all of a sudden now you can as easily do that. All of a sudden, you know, Zillow starts charging for rental ads. These are what what Alexander’s saying these these rented channels, you’re you’re at the mercy of how friendly they are feeling at that moment. And all of a sudden, now Craigslist is like, Oh, by the way, we’re going to start charging you now for ads that used to be free. You know, and it’s probably still reasonably priced. But it now it all of a sudden now changes your business. And so this idea of creating your own brand is so smart. And I really encourage everyone to go to Taco street locating because Alexander has done such a good job of making it fun. It’s a fun experience to browse this website, which by the way, if we contrast that with the average real estate agents website, and I guess, of course, Alexandre is a real estate agent, but I mean, somebody who’s who’s a more traditional sales agent, it’s going to it’s going to give you a different experience. I think going to your website, it’s a fun experience, you get to learn about you, you get to very easily browse through inventory. And just you know, you provide a lot of value on that website. And I think it’s it’s a and also it’s funny, like you have humor in there. And humor is oftentimes doesn’t show up anywhere in a realtor website. So I love the fact that you made it fun and funny. I think that probably goes a long way with with your clients. Alexander Concepcion 23:57Yeah, so one big. So again, I think of everything through a survival first framework. And from this, this tangent begins on why I don’t believe competition is real. Because I’m never going head to head against another locator. Even though there’s a lot of them out there. I’m never going head to head against any of them. The reality it’s the the quote unquote, trophy is a human and they get to choose. So the risk is that I don’t It’s not that I lose a competition. It’s that I don’t get chosen. So I call them I call it like replacement risk. And I have to make myself a replaceable so I start with that with brand. I’m the only talk with the real estate company the rates. But there’s a lot of content on the website, a lot of videos, a lot of blogs, a lot of guides, which means by the time I’m people get to me, they’ve gone through all this. And I become the only one they trust. Yeah. And by the time they get to me, they’re like, Hey, I’ve seen your videos, I’ve seen your content. They’re like, I’m ready to go migrate, I’ve won. It’s a good point, because D.J. Paris 25:21we’re really talking about what is also known as social proof is sort of showing somebody your expertise in a way that they now feel more connected to you as an individual as, as somebody who Oh, I feel like I know Alexandria a little bit through his writing through his videos through his fun website. But also, I don’t, I don’t have another experience to sort of compare to that because no one else has this content in this particular way. And so you’re right, you’re not competing with other agents online, because you’re like my contents better, my sites more fun. And I’m going to provide a better service. So that’s a really important point, which, which really goes, I think a lot of our agents are lost, sorry, a lot of our listeners can really sort of go gosh, wouldn’t it be great to have such an incredible experience for somebody that by the time they get to me, I’ve already been chosen, which is a pretty incredible task that you’ve that you’ve completed for them. Alexander Concepcion 26:21And it goes a long way to me preserve my energy. Yeah, before my first calls would be like 2530 minutes. And they’d be the same phone call every single time. What’s the service? How does the process works? What neighborhoods do you recommend? What buildings do you like? And I just made videos about all of that. And just put it up front. So by the time someone gets to me, they seen those videos, what would have been a 30 minute call is out like a 510 minute call. And through a survival first framework, my most important resources, my energy, yeah. And Department locating it’s a high volume business, it to make good money, you need to work with a lot of people. And there’s just a lot of mechanics, there’s a lot of doing a lot. And most people I know who make it to a certain point in this business, burnout. Yeah. Because even though one transaction isn’t hard 100 is if you don’t have the right systems and operations. So yeah, everything is something I look at through survival first, D.J. Paris 27:41that’s a really, really good point. So I recruit realtors, I was thinking about this, putting it through my own lens. And I have essentially a very similar conversation with me, which about a half an hour, like you would like your apartment, locating additional conversations. And I just realized I could be doing a better job of this as well, where I could have that 30 minute sort of monologue for lack of a pitch, I guess, for lack of a better word, the way I do it. That could be that could be a video that I could send in advance to somebody, and maybe I wouldn’t make it 30 minutes, but whatever, I would make it a certain period of time where they could get the vast majority of the information, feel like they know me a little bit. This is actually helping me in my business. So thank you for that. But I love this too. Because also, you’re branding yourself in such a way that I would assume other agents are like, who don’t want to deal with rentals. It’s just not what they do. They’re like, Oh, Alexander’s the guy. He’s got all the best content. He’s got, you know, the buildings. He knows he knows the inventory. By the way. I am curious. I’m sorry. I’m gonna interrupt myself. I am curious how important knowing the inventory is as a rental agent, because as a sales agent, inventory is always changing. For rentals. You know, there’s a finite number of buildings that you probably work with, how important is it to just know those buildings in and out and everything about it? Alexander Concepcion 29:02I want to flip this on you. Go ahead. You go to restaurants Chicago. How important is it for you that the waiter knows the menu? It’s super important. Exactly. D.J. Paris 29:13Yeah. Because Because I asked the waiter, hey, I’m looking through here. What are the best things? I always ask that? Because I don’t know. And you’re absolutely right. Amazing point. Alexander Concepcion 29:23So the way most locators get trained, is you get a few meetings with a broker. A pat on the back. Good luck here. Some leads have at it. Yeah. And these people don’t know the inventory. They’re like people that they serve food on the menu. They just don’t know what’s on the menu. And that’s why their service kinda sucks. Yeah. Whereas I did the opposite. And I teach the opposite of my course. It’s No, you need to be an expert. First. You need to go out into the market, tour buildings see what’s going on. So when you’re talking to, like prospective leads, they know you know your stuff. Yeah, I even take it a step further. I made videos where I talked about the use of the buildings in the market. I love it. And people watch the videos are like, this guy knows his stuff. Yeah, and all that something, if you’re starting, you could do pretty fast. Like, you don’t have to wait five years to do this. It took me years to figure out how maybe I should make these videos. But that’s something you could do now. D.J. Paris 30:43Yeah, it’s a really, again, it goes back to this, setting yourself up, to be able to have people know that you are the expert. And having this content at the ready is like, Oh, hey, you know, I’m thinking as your chat, you know, you’re having your initial conversation with somebody. And maybe they don’t know about you yet. Maybe it’s kind of a random introduction, they don’t know you as the support great apartment, locator. And all of a sudden, you’re like, Okay, based on what you said, there’s two places that are probably the best fit, I have videos for both, I’m gonna shoot them over to you. So you can get a sense of, of what I think about it and things to learn. And all of a sudden, I mean, that is such an amazing high level of service, I guess the idea is providing the highest level of service, right, and that is an incredibly high level of service. It’s not Well, here’s what we’re gonna do, we’re gonna go, we’re gonna go see these properties, because you’re probably going to do that too. But you’re like, before we do that, let’s just make sure that you kind of like what you see. And of course, they can go to the building websites as well, but with your own spin on it, and your own videos, your own content. Boy, you again, you’re just branding yourself as I am the guy. Alexander Concepcion 31:52And that doesn’t even get into like the actual service that I’m doing is like the research process, because I don’t know if you’ve had to find your own apartment. It takes a lot of time. It’s a pain. Yeah, Superferry apps. And most locators take people who are very like, just click a bunch of options on this database, send it over. And there’s no real value add to that anyone can do that. Yeah, I built a process I call the big fancy spreadsheet, which is exactly what it sounds like. It’s exactly what it sounds like. It’s just a really big detailed spreadsheet. But that takes inventory where I was like, not me, my, my freelancers do this for me. But they will like call every single building you’re interested in, tell you what’s available, put all in one place, and organize it. And just it condenses your research process by so much. Yeah. I don’t know a single located that does anything close to that. So I know when I send that spreadsheet to someone, they’re like, Oh, this guy’s on messing around. Because the biggest waste of time is to tour an apartment that doesn’t have what you want. Yeah. D.J. Paris 33:08And both for both parties for the agent. And for that tenant. Yeah, Alexander Concepcion 33:12it goes back to like survival first, if I if I’m touring, if I’m spending all my day touring places that don’t have the right availability, that’s wasting my time is wasted their time. So if I do all this research ahead of time, then we’re not wasting any. Yeah. D.J. Paris 33:32Yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s a, it’s a great, it’s a great point. And, you know, as you were talking about touring the building, I want to just to mention something he said at the very beginning, that I just want to make sure everyone understands. So it’s like, Okay, once somebody’s ready to make the decision. And the way that Alexandre works with with his, his prospective clients, is by the time they’re going to see a building you he they already know, this is probably the place maybe there’s one other place, but it’s going to be a short list. And here’s the beauty when the person lands on the property they want. Alexander walks them down to the to the office, where if there’s an onsite office where there usually is for these big buildings, and says I’ve got somebody and I mean that you’ve already been introduced to them at this point. But they you’re right, they do the paperwork, they have their own process. And you’re maybe you’re there to be present as they do it. But but your job is basically done at that point. You’re just handing the person off to the building, internal leasing agents, or whatever they may have, or the property management team. And they do a lot of the heavy lifting for you. Alexander Concepcion 34:36Oh, yeah, I don’t touch contracts. I’m not doing any of that. It’s huge payment. Yes, I don’t want to do it. So I don’t and that’s just not part of relocating. There’s the stuff there’s still stuff. There’s like invoicing actually getting the money. That’s a pain in the ass down the line. D.J. Paris 34:58i We have, we have 700 plus agents here we we know that pain. So what we’re talking about just for anyone to know, and this is important, one of the and I don’t want to call it a con, I just want to call it something to know that if you’re getting into apartment locating to be aware of and be aware of is how you get paid from these third party management companies, which not like in MLS transaction where a closing agent gets the check, everyone’s happy, everyone’s paid. No, often some firms will do that. Some apartment locating, sorry, some apartment companies will pay you that way. Most in my experience. As Alexander mentioned, you have to invoice and so you have to send them an invoice saying, Hey, you’re basically sending them a bill, hey, you owe me one month’s rent or whatever the the agreement is, and then they’re going to take their time to pay the bill some pay faster than others. Some I know some in Chicago can pay as quick as a couple of weeks. Others take a couple of months. So that’s the thing to know is that getting paid? There may be a little bit of a delay, because they’re not obligated to pay you the moment. The person signs the lease. Alexander Concepcion 36:07Yeah, and if you’re not careful, and go through the proper steps, a building is going to find a way to not pay you. Yeah, I’ve lost a lot of money from thinking I was gonna get paid on a deal to the buildings. I actually you didn’t do this small little step. So we’re not going to pay you that $2,500 that you thought you were getting. And yeah, I that’s that’s part of the course that I teach is how do you do the upfront work to make sure that you do get paid? Yeah, it’s getting paid is a huge pain in the ass. hugeness notice my Freelancer does that for me. So I don’t I don’t do when you have because it’s okay. Survival first. Yeah, D.J. Paris 36:58you don’t you don’t want to be chasing you don’t want to be chasing the check. Yeah. And we have a whole department here at our company that chases those checks because and again some management companies are wonderful and easy and others are more challenging and and I like some even will have rules that like well if the person walked into our office before they met you Mr. or Mrs. Agent and you brought them in maybe they walked in we’ll turn around and walked out but somehow their name got put in the system and then you now walk them in and maybe the your person doesn’t even tell you that they’ve already been there that could that can sometimes be a thing where advantages like well we’re not going to pay you because this person already knew about us so there’s there’s these are important things to know about each building so that you’re not you know, wasting time or or not getting paid. Yeah, another Alexander Concepcion 37:45really important thing is the send an escort policies of a building. So in apartment locating, there’s either escorting a person to a building or you like go with them in person do the tour. That’s called escort buildings always passports. Like they’re always pay their maximum on escorts. But then there’s a second, where you don’t tour in person with the client, for whatever reason. Some buildings actually pay the exact same. Both escort and send some buildings, pay a lesser percentage, maybe like we’re in where they normally pay one month’s rent, maybe on a send, they pay 50%. Sometimes they don’t pay anything. So that’s one way to lose money is sending someone to a building that doesn’t pay commission on sending tenants who lost a lot of money that way. But that’s something you should research ahead of time. By but it also makes us a more depending on where you live. Different cities are have different blends. Austin is a blend of sending square buildings, Dallas and Houston on mostly you could send an escort at the same price, same commission, and it’s great. It’s a big reason I’m able to do business in those markets also. Sure. So that fact makes locating really interesting as remote operable business. So I don’t know how most buildings are in Chicago. But with if you have if you operate in or near market with a lot of buildings, you could send people live so get paid a good amount of money. You don’t like if you’re based in Austin, you could do business in Dallas in Houston. It’s incredible. Yeah, so it’s a really interesting market for that reason. And on the lead gen side If you can generate a lot of home buyer leads with apartments because people who rent apartments eventually buy houses. So if you’re even starting off this business apartment locating is a really good long term high quality lead source. Because you’ve already built a relationship with the client, you don’t have to sell yourself again. D.J. Paris 40:24I want to pause for a moment to talk about our episode sponsor are one of my favorite companies out there follow up boss. Now after interviewing hundreds of top Realtors in the country for this podcast, do you know which CRM is used by more than any other by our guests. Of course, it is a follow up boss. And let’s face it, following up is the key to taking your business to the next level follow up boss will help you drive more leads in less time and with less effort. Do not take my word for it. Robert slack, who runs the number one team in the US uses follow up boss and he has built a one and a half billion dollar business in just six years. Follow up boss integrates with over 250 systems, so you can keep your current tools and lead sources. Also, the best part they have seven day a week support. So you’ll get the help that you need when you need it and get this follow up boss is so sure that you’re going to love their CRM that for a limited time, they’re offering keeping it real listeners a 30 day free trial, which is twice as much time as they give everyone else. And oh yeah, no credit card required. So you can try it risk free. But only if you use this special link visit follow up boss.com forward slash real that’s follow up boss.com forward slash real for your free 30 day trial. Follow up like a boss with follow up boss. And now back to our episode. Yeah, that’s true. And you know, you just have to remember to stay in touch after after the rental. And that’s something that also there’s not that much competition for because we all know all of the listeners here know, most most agents maybe don’t do such a great job of staying in touch after a rental after a sale. I mean, there’s always those statistics and I never know which ones to believe. But it’s a certain percentage of people like three years after they buy or sell something, forget the name of their realtor. So it’s not, this is something that a lot of agents struggle with. So if you’re if you’re working in the rental space, and you want to eventually get those people who transition to become buyers, you better you better do a good job of staying in touch because you’re right, you’ve worked so hard to establish yourself as the apartment locator. And you don’t want that all that goodwill to be sort of forgotten about after after the rental. Alexander Concepcion 42:40Yeah, another benefit a lot of people don’t think about is because of carbon locating as a higher volume business, you get more contact more people. Or as in traditional sales you may do I don’t know what the average amount is like it doesn’t maybe. But it’s not a lot of like human to human contact. So yeah, we’re, I could do 510 1520 deals in a month. Which means I have that number of people who know me. Which means more referrals means more word of mouth. It means more repeat clients in the future. I’ve had people lease with me to be four or five times. It’s incredible. They get them they send their friends to me. So there’s a survivor’s bias. And kind of like in any in all real estate, where the longer you make it, the more likely you are to going to continue to make it. Right. But yeah, I think there’s a lot of benefit to having higher volume client exposure. D.J. Paris 43:53Especially if you’re brand new. Yeah. Yeah. Especially. I mean, it’s it’s such a, you made such a this is such an important point for everyone out there who is going nobody wants to buy right now it’s you know, rates are at 7%. Or, I guess they just did drop. So maybe now they’re in the sixes, but it’s still higher than a lot of consumers would like. And you know, but if people aren’t buying or renting, and yeah, you’re right, it’s a high touch business. And you just your reach just goes really far because the transactions are typically shorter in nature. So you just get to reach a lot of people. And you’re right more opportunity for referrals for, you know, for repeat business or for conversion to sales. Let’s talk I’m going to talk about apartment locating mastery your course because by now, I hope we’ve made the case that you could easily depending on the market. Now if you live in rural, I don’t know rural Iowa, maybe this would be more of a challenge. So that’s not going to fit every particular market. But I guess it could fit probably just about any market because there’s always apartment or there’s always rental opportunities but it. What LM center does is he teaches you exactly how he started the systems he’s put in place, you know, all of the best advice he has about how to run this business, even how to select brokerage, because not every brokerage is super friendly to their agents doing rentals. So some brokerages are kinda like they dissuade agents to do that. But tell us about apartment locating mastery, which by the way, website apartment locating mastery.com, but tell us about the course. Alexander Concepcion 45:29Yes. So before there’s been an unlimited number of options, to just learn how to do the business. Usually, the first option is to join an apartment locating specific brokerage, that’s going to realistically do like two or three meetings with you. And here’s some leads. They’re not really going to train you. I know people, I didn’t one of those quote unquote, programs. And I know dozens of agents who’ve gone through similar programs. It’s really up to you to learn about yourself to just figure things out the hard way. And the main reason I started this course was I think you don’t need to do that. You don’t need to go through one of these apartment locating brokerages who are going to take most of your money. I effectively paid $27,000 my quote unquote, training. Wow. Yeah, cuz it was it was the leads I generated on my own. That was the money I paid to my broker. Right. So he got a great deal out of me. Yeah. But yeah, I’ve spent just five years really fine tuning apartment locating. And I hit a point where I realized I don’t want to be located forever. But I do want to transition into training and coaching. Because for me, it’s been such an amazing vehicle to become an entrepreneur, something I never imagined being to making a good living for myself more than I ever imagined. And it’s given me this sense of confidence, I never imagined for myself, given given where I was where I started. So it’s given me so much sovereignty and freedom, where, in the last five years, I’ve probably traveled the world for about one of them. And I can’t imagine having freedom in any other like way. And I wanted, and I want to teach other people how to use this business to become their own solver and entrepreneurs. D.J. Paris 48:05Yeah, it’s, it’s great, because it gives you a lot of leverage when you are negotiating with your brokerage or when or maybe you want to open your own brokerage because I can just run it myself. But this idea of what what what Alexander was saying is really common here in Chicago is that they have these apartment locating companies who really, they’ve already curated the inventory. So they already have the inventory that you don’t have to go out and kind of build on your own and, and figure out that database. They’ve also figured out some sort of lead generation source where they’re usually providing you leads the trade off is that your commission splits, I’ve seen commission splits as low as like 30 35%. And it’s usually, you know, people would find that shocking, but but because they can, they have the inventory and the leads, and they know that you can’t do that on your own. I mean, they you could do it on your own, but they’re not going to teach you how to do it on your own. So they’re going to take the lion’s share of the income, and they’re probably not going to train you well, because you’re not probably going to make a lot of money at 35%, which means they’re going to leave at a certain point, which means they’ll just keep that machine rolling with people coming and going at all times. Alexander Concepcion 49:19Right. Which means if you’re an independent thinking, you don’t want to go down that route. Yeah. You don’t have to, quote unquote, compete against those people because they’re not going to be there for that long. Yeah. And so you have these agencies, or like they’re big and kind of scary on the surface I caught like compete against them. You’re not You’re on your own, building your own brand, building your own reputation. And you get to choose what brokerage you can go with. For me once I once I figured out, I could do all of it on my own. I joined One of the one of the zero commission brokerages smart, and that they’re, they’re basically a bring your own everything brokerage, where it’s on me to bring my own training, my own education, my own lead source all that stuff. But I could affect I’m effectively running my own business inside of another brokerage. And it let me do whatever I wanted to do. And no one was there to stop me. So, yes, D.J. Paris 50:33we’re talking and again, we’re keep continue talking about sovereignty, or now people use the word agency, this idea of is not to talk about working at an agency, but this idea of having really so much control over your own brand, your business, your destiny, that even even in the brokerage that you select, we’re 100% firm as well, we have a similar model to the firm suspect that you work at. And, and so it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s really nice. And I love the fact that if you’re an agent out there, and you’re worried about 20, even if you’re not worried about 2023, if you want to add just another revenue stream, and you’re like, well, not a lot of buyers these days, the sellers, you know, a lot of the homes are sitting sitting on the market for longer than I’d like. So even you know, just having listings isn’t a guaranteed sort of quick, quick money as it as it was before. So things might just be sitting a lot longer add rentals in because number one, like Alexander was saying high touch business, you’re going to expand your reach, you’re going to just talk to a lot of people, you’re going to probably have more opportunities to you know, get more referrals that way and just reach more. And also, again, people become buyers down the road too or or I always like to say the other way instead of some renters become buyers ago, pretty much everyone that owns used to rent. So I always like love that expression. Because it’s so true. And I’m shocked that brokerages who do take on newly licensed agents, most of them don’t really touch on rentals that much. And it’s a little surprising because I you know, by the time by the time I was ready to buy a home, I had never worked with an agent, because I found my own apartment. And I nobody, I just didn’t know that there were even people who could help you find apartments. So I was always finding my own apartments. And by the time I needed a realtor, I didn’t have one. I didn’t have one in my back pocket. Meaning I didn’t know anybody. And I had to go Wait, do I know someone who’s a realtor? And then I had to find one. And thankfully it was my friend. I was like, oh, yeah, my friends, a realtor. But had my friend helped me and it wasn’t his he wasn’t an apartment guy. But had he had somebody else helped me along the way, I probably wouldn’t have gone with my friend not because I don’t like him. But because I would have felt obligated to work with the person who I already knew, like and trusted as my agent. So you’re absolutely right, you’re building that confidence and trust early on, and hoping that you know that person stays with you your whole life, but you’re gonna learn all of this stuff. By investing in apartment locating mastery, again, the website, apartment locating mastery.com, and Alexander This isn’t or Alexander does not just teach, here’s how to show apartments, here’s how to convert he does that too. But it’s really everything. It’s like how to deal with inventory lead gen, you know, converting leads into clients, picking the market learn it, just just professionalism. And that’s another thing in the apartment space is the people that are apartment locators, sometimes professionalism is not at the top of, of everyone’s, you know, sort of value lists. So that’s another way to separate yourself is to be this highly professional, and person who’s helping people with apartments. And the best way to do that is through knowledge and experience. And Alexander’s going to teach you how to do that, you know, basically his, his goal is zero to 10,000 a month and apartment locating. So if you wanted to add anywhere from, you know, a couple of deals a couple rentals a month to, you know, gosh, 100 plus a year, he’s going to show you how to do it because he’s done it and he is doing it. So Alexander, if everyone if anyone wants to learn about this, and of course you do and of course you should. Apartment locating mastery.com is the place. And you have some bonuses to that, that exist with the with the course not just how to build successful practice. Can you tell us a little bit about the bonuses? Alexander Concepcion 54:25Yeah, so I’m still working on content for the course that gets more gets deeper into systems and operations, especially like how to use a CRM because it’s closing one deal is easy. And getting the basics down is fairly straightforward. But taking that next step into closing like 100 deals a year requires a lot more kind of operational muscle. So that is going to be part of the course. And so the the course is already launched, but this is going to be supplemental bonus material that’s going in there. And yeah, it’s a it’s a lot I spent months building this course. It’s extremely detailed, comprehensive. And yeah, it’s, it’s good. D.J. Paris 55:23Yeah. Well, I encourage everyone listening, look, let’s make 2023 the year you add another stream of income to your real estate business. I mean, this is a way I’ve always thought, you know, real estate’s transactional, of course, in nature. And we want to try to smooth out the in betweens as much as we can in between clients in between deals, rentals are a great way to say I service everyone, I service, the buyers, the sellers, the renters, or partnering with somebody who does that like and Alexander like, if you, if you, for example, for everyone listening, if you have a client that’s moving to Austin and wants to you know, find an apartment for per se, you’re going to refer Alexander, he’s the guy he is the guy. You want to be, if you if you want to take your business to that particular level, you can be that person in your local market. And I would bet there’s not as much competition as there is at the top of the I want to be the top, you know, sales agent of you know, everyone’s vying for that spot rentals are often kind of forgotten about and I think it’s a good thing for anyone listening because it means there’s less competition. And again, I Alexander was right, and saying there really isn’t competition, but there’s fewer players in the space, I guess we could say. And, you know, I mean, Alexander’s made almost a million dollars doing rentals, like, this is an incredibly lucrative business. And so you can make great money, you can help people that a lot of agents would just discard Oh, you don’t want to buy Call me when you’re ready to buy, right? I mean, I bet you have stories of renters that come to you going, I reached out to an agent, they basically told me to get lost. They don’t do rentals. I mean, it happens, which is so shocking to me, but it does happen. Alexander Concepcion 57:08Yeah, I get it. I get a lot of other real estate agents are like, I don’t know what to do with rentals. I’m like, I’ll take them. And then I can make like two $3,000 from their referral. And the agent just didn’t know how much money they just lost by like referring. That’s me. Yeah. And they wouldn’t have been like a lot of work for them if they only knew how to do very basic foundational things. Yeah. There is another really interesting point with locating that I think makes it really compelling in any market. So you probably saw a lot of market squeeze when it was got really hot, or there just wasn’t inventory. Yeah. That doesn’t happen with apartment locating. I mean, if you’re like in San Francisco, New York City, this doesn’t work in those markets, because there just isn’t inventory. But in your normal city. All of which only out on the website. A single building as three 400 units, and you have hundreds of buildings. You’re not running out of inventory. The inventory is gonna be there, as always turnover every month as well. Yeah, so the there’s always going to be inventory, you’re never gonna get market squeezed out of the business, where you could be the world’s best real estate agent. But if you’re in a market where there’s nothing to buy or sell, then it’s not going to work out well for you. D.J. Paris 58:43Yeah, this is just a great way to to work with, you know, a changing market when maybe sales are down. Rentals tend to tend to go up. So this is the time to invest in a course like this apartment locating mastery. And I’ll just end with this. So I was mentioning my girlfriend works at one of these types of buildings where there’s 500 units, it’s like a super high end luxury building. Some of their three bedrooms Now, not every market is going to have this of course, but some of their three bedrooms are like $7,000 They pay a $7,000 commission if you bring them now they only work with a couple of agents. It’s kind of a goofy building. And that’s a really extreme example not not every market has things like that. But imagine if you walked somebody into a building and you let the like my girlfriend the way that it works in her building as the agent walks in, they know the agents because they only work with a handful of them. My girlfriend does all the work she takes the tour the agent kind of hangs back kind of chimes in when need be but my girlfriend’s job is to sell the building. So she’s leading the tour the agents kind of piping in from time to time and then she goes down and she wants to close the sale to so are the rentals so she you know she does the hard heavy lifting. You know, they have quotas to hit a lot of these apartment. Internal leasing agents for these buildings. And and then a $7,000 check gets written to the agent. It’s in. There’s incredible money in this. Alexander Concepcion 1:00:08Yeah, for me, I would say the average check is about 1500 to 2000. But I did have a deal recently where I get a call the morning, scheduled tour with a client the afternoon. And he signs a $4,400 unit lease at a building paying 150%. Commission. Ah, D.J. Paris 1:00:38it’s an amazing, it’s about like a $6,000 check or so. Yeah, more. That’s a good day’s work. Yeah. So how would everyone out there like to learn to do that. So you know, Alexander is not just saying it’s possible, he’s like, I’m going to show you how to do it. So check out apartment locating mastery.com, why not learn from the the guy, he’s the guy. And also check out his website to get hooked on him. Because what I really want you to do, whether you invest in his course or not, I encourage you to invest in it. But even if you don’t, I want you to look at how he branded himself. His his B to C website business to consumer website is Taco street locating that’s think about how go to the website, let’s look at how fun it is. He made a really arduous process, stressful process, traditionally, not a super fun process, he made it fun. And that in and of itself is brilliant. He’s going to teach you how to do these kinds of things and build this side business. Maybe by the way, maybe you’re still like, I don’t want to be an apartment, look, I don’t want to do rentals, well, maybe you could bring on a team member and they could be the apartment, or the rental person and you be the salesperson. So it’s not like even if this doesn’t affect you, or maybe you’re a team, you don’t really have somebody doing rentals. Oh my gosh, there’s so much opportunity here. So 2023 we know it’s going to be tough on the sales side, we just know that I wish it wasn’t but it’s going to be rentals are where it’s at. So apartment, locating mastery.com is where you can learn about the course taco street locating is Alexander’s website to see how he services his clients the content he provides so that by the time they actually get to him, they’re like, he’s my guy, and he hasn’t even met them yet. That’s an amazing thing to have happen. And, Alexander, we’re so grateful that you came on the show to talk about this. So on behalf of the audience who want to thank you for coming on, we know you’re probably racing to your next apartment locating client or appointment. So thank you for taking time out of your day to tell us about the course and how you built your business. And also, on behalf of Alexander and myself, we want to thank our audience for what you know, listening or watching all the way to the end, the best way that you can help us grow is by telling a friend think of one other agent. Everybody knows a struggling agent. They need to hear this episode, send them a link to this episode. The best way you can do that, while they listen to podcasts. Just have a pull up keeping it real on any podcast app or just go to our website keeping it real pod.com every single episode we’ve ever done can be streamed right from a browser. You don’t even need a podcast app to do that. So anyway, Alexandre, on behalf of everyone. Thank you. This has been a fun conversation, and we will see everybody on the next episode. Thanks, Alexander. Thank you