Fee Gentry a coach and author talks about how she got into real estate. Fee discusses what you can do today to future proof your business. Fee also discusses the importance of positive mindset and what agents can do to protect it. Last, Fee widely discusses additional streams of income for agents and how they can leverage from their actual position.
Please follow Fee on Instagram here.
If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube!
Fee Gentry can be reached at 512.766.3255 and fee@feegentry.com.
This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks.
Transcript
D.J. Paris 0:00
Are you concerned about what the future may hold for realtors stop being concerned because today we’re going to talk about how to future proof your business. 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. I’m DJ Parris, I’m your guide, and host through the Show and welcome if you’re new, welcome back, if you’re returning, and as always, please tell a friend about our show. Other Realtors need to know we we have a huge audience 10s of 1000s of you listen to every episode, there’s like 1.6 million realtors, and I’m gonna put it on you guys, you got to get me in front of all of them. I’m just teasing. But that would be awesome. Just tell one person about us that would really help us and it would make make our audience even bigger. So thank you in advance for that. Also, check out our sponsors, guys, our sponsors are awesome. They’re so sweet and nice. They keep the show rolling, check out their products and services. They have awesome stuff. So please do that too. But let’s get to my main event. Today we’re talking to fi gentry and this is a real true superstar in the industry, not just the top producer. This is somebody at the highest levels of the industry and she is now consulting with agents and teams to help them take their business to the next level. So you really want to check this out. It’s very cool, but let’s just get right to it. My conversation with V Gentry.
We have V Gentry on the show as our guest from exp in Georgetown, Texas. Let me tell you more about fee. A fee Gentry is a dynamic figure in real estate. She excels as an entrepreneur and investor a speaker, a coach and an author. She’s the visionary founder of the black exp network, a co founder of the one exp initiative and a former director on the board of EXP world holdings LLC since 2004 When she became a licensed Texas realtor. Her mission has been helping women and underserved individuals achieve financial independence through homeownership. With over two decades of entrepreneurial experience fee is the driving change both within and beyond the real estate sector. She’s currently the CEO of live better ventures running a business incubator and hosts the fellowship on YouTube. Now to for all things fee we want you actually to go to her Instagram which is at fi Gentry fi Welcome to the show. Well thank you DJ man, like when you read that I was like Who’s he? Who’s he talking about? Was that amazing? Lady really sounds like she sounds she’s a little superstar. Well, you are a superstar and I am excited to number one. You’re such a sweet person we were just chatting backstage and I’m really really excited to speak with you. But besides being just a pleasant and lovely person I really want to you have some really great things we’re going to talk about today specifically money that realtors are leaving on the table and also with the talk of AI and and just technology always you know increasing and trying to edge out Realtors what we can do to future proof our businesses. So we’re going to talk a lot about that. But before we get to, to that to that let’s talk about you and I’d love to hear about how you got into real estate because you have done a lot so tell us about that journey.
Fee Gentry 4:51
Man Real Estate DJ was like Plan F for me like I had it was nowhere on my radar. Actually I was in physical therapy school, so I had, you know, my goal was to be a physical therapist, and I, you know, so I went to PT school, you know, I did post rehabilitation. I mean, that was in fitness. That was my career. And
D.J. Paris 5:10
we should mention for anyone, I’m sorry to interrupt your your lovely story, but just to make a big deal about this. PT school is often talked about as being just as challenging to get into as pre med because there’s there’s fewer actually PT schools than there are med schools. And I don’t know if that’s still the case, but it is a big deal to get into a PT program. And so yeah, I’m sorry. So tell us tell us. Yeah,
Fee Gentry 5:32
so I was Yeah. So it was in the number one physical therapy program in the state of Texas. And I just, I just said, this is not for me, like, because I had, it was just weird. And I was, I’ve always been an entrepreneur since the age of like, 910 11 years, I’ve always had businesses. So I read this little book like a lot of people have write that book called Rich Dad, Poor Dad by keister in the in you know, that one little sentence says that 90% of people with millions of millionaires or people who have wealth are in the real estate business. I didn’t see the sales part I just saw in the real estate. So silly me, my mom was building a house in Central Texas sight unseen. And so her realtor was like, and who also happen to be the commissioner of the state of Texas was like, we I came to meet, you know, check on check on the house and meet with him. And he said, you would be really good. In real estate. He goes on to introduce you one of my friends who happen to be the, and she was there. I didn’t know who it was avis woocash happen to be the commissioner of the state of Texas made like you could be top 1%. And I was like, you know, I just didn’t even listen to them. And I blew it off. And I thought about it for a while. And I started having all these people recruit me into the real estate industry. And I promise you DDJ I did not know a, you know, a listing from a lockbox. When I got in the business, I had no clue. And so first year, I sold 39 homes, unbeknownst to me, I thought it sucked. I didn’t I was like, because I got this backup, this little bronze metal. It was it was at the Big Red company, kW. And I got this bronze medal. I was like, Oh, I don’t how do I get a silver? I
D.J. Paris 7:02
mean, how do I get a bronze, that’s the worst of all the metals. barely made it on the podium.
Fee Gentry 7:07
And, and if you don’t know this about me, but like, I’m 511, almost six foot tall. So, you know, former collegiate athlete love sports. So I’m, like, very competitive. So that’s how I got in the business of real estate. And so I just grew from there. So I went from being a solo agent that I grew that I became, like, I was in a smaller town, I was living up north. And so let’s come like this medium size fish in a in a small pond, and start growing a team of people and then wanted to start, I wanted to, you know, own a franchise. And that didn’t work out. Thank God because 2008 then happened. Oh, good. Sorry, my saved myself. But I still I mean, I still took a bloodbath like everybody else. But um, but yeah, so that’s how I ended up in business. Yeah. Wow,
D.J. Paris 7:49
that is, that’s quite a story. And your story doesn’t end there. Because from there, you went on to serve and in management capacities at the corporate level, you know, with exp in particular, and just, you know, continually coaching consulting, writing. You, you do it all, and it is, it’s it’s so impressive, and there’s so much we could talk about. And I think, you know, being that you were so connected to agents, I would love to talk about, you know, 2024. Now, this episode might not actually publish until early January, or potentially late December. But regardless of it’ll be, you know, 2024 is on everybody’s mind will no matter when this actually drops. But people had to tough 2023, or at least the eight most of the agents I knew. And every so often I talked to an agent and said, I’m having my best year ever. I was maybe 1% of agents I talked to so. So for for most of us, it was it was a tricky and difficult year. And I think, you know, for somebody like yourself who’s so disciplined, so focused, so just committed to finding solutions. I really do want to talk about what agents can do in 2024, just to help keep their keep stay in business and keep their business rolling forward. So just any advice or guidance that you might have for what agents should be focusing on right now during the winter months when we know things are slower anyway, but how they could set themselves up for possibly having a better 2024 2025? Right.
Fee Gentry 9:19
That is an amazing question. I get that question a lot. And I and I talk about that a lot. We wish we’d have started in October. So the people that I work with we say let’s start in October that 90 day window right? But since it since we can’t do anything about it, let’s start today like so what can you do today? And I always talk about what do you need to do right now to future proof your business right for 2024. So that so my goal here for your audience is just to help set them free, right, free from you know, worry about artificial intelligence taking over free from, you know, the text from these major, you know, institutional investors and I want to set them free from any other outside forces because the first part that The we have talked about is let’s sit there, let’s let’s get their mind in check, right? So I want them to I don’t want to be a victim of the economy, I want them to, you know, first of all, let’s talk about your mindset, you have to make a decision. So that’s the very first thing I talked to people about, make a decision that you should thrive in 2024. Number two is to have a plan, like and not have people keep writing business plans, but I’m talking about an action plan because we we all feel good about planning. Oh, well, I wrote my business plan for 2024. Well, what are you going to do? What are the action steps that you’re gonna take in the first 30 days, and, and I always talk about this, is keep it simple. We write these elaborate business plans, and I’m just talking to people about in 2024, we’re going to just have to keep it simple. Like and go back to the basics and the fundamentals of of everything, yes, we need to leverage artificial intelligence and learn how to use that. But we need to leverage it in and I’m calling collective capitalism is or collect, you know, or collaborative capitalism this year, that’s what people should be focusing on 2020, for who it’s not what you need to do, or how to do it, who do you need to connect with, in order to get through the next year to two years, and possibly even three years, because I believe, Mike, this is the you know, according to fee disclaimer, right? These are just my own thoughts, beliefs, I believe that real estate is going to substantially change in the next 24 to 48 months, whether it’s from the Department of Justice, you know, the court cases, or whether it’s, you know, technology, or, or the consumers who’ve just decided, we’ve just, they’ve got a different feed, and they want to, and they want to do something or the the collapse of nor I mean, I don’t know, we don’t know, I have a crystal ball. But either way, like I said, my goal is to set your audience free to, to do something different this year. Thank
D.J. Paris 11:46
you. And I think, by the way, a wonderful goal and very appreciative to you to come on here and and share some of your wisdom and knowledge. And we should, you know, I was thinking, as you were saying about keeping it simple. So I recruit agents for a living and I, our audience, a lot of them don’t do that. But I think you can pause our audience can possibly relate to this little quick story. So for years and years, every week, we’d have a management meeting, and it would they would say, DJ, how many people did you hire this week? And that was our measure of how well DJ I was doing. And I’ve been doing this 13 years. So that’s just a standard metric. It’s like, how many sales did you get, you know, that kind of thing. But it was how many people that I recruit. And then we finally realized that what we call our key performance indicators. That’s just the end result of me doing all the other tasks. And so, you know, assuming that I never get better at recruiting, what is the actual driver? It’s how many conversations do I have on a daily basis. So it reminds me of that Brian Buffini, old Brian Buffini thing that where he would say, you got to meet two to five people every day, if you’re a realtor, and just add them to your database. And and I was like, well, and there’s a lot more to it, of course, but if we’re looking at the most basic activity that a realtor should probably consider if they don’t have enough business right now is keep adding people to your database, keep having conversations, meet new people, get them into your CRM. And so for me, I don’t focus on how many people are recruited anymore. It’s how many conversations that I have this week with agents. And then you know, we track my close ratio, and all that. But really, what we’re finding out is we know DJ needs to talk to 20 different agents a week if he’s going to get, you know, five people to join or whatever. So, so I really appreciate you saying that, because we can look at the end results, sales, you know, deals closed and go. And then we can go, that’s a lot of stress. If we go back to just I gotta beat a whole bunch of people, and I go, that’s not the only thing anyone needs to do. But it’s it’s a way to think about scaling back your, you know, what do I actually need to do on a daily basis?
Fee Gentry 13:45
Absolutely. That’s the one. If you do nothing else, that’s it.
D.J. Paris 13:49
You never improve your skill set. I mean, this is what I always say to like, with me, if I never become any better as, as a recruiter, if I just double the number of people I talk to, in theory, I should double the number of recruits that I have. So and of course we everything. But But yeah, so So let’s, let’s talk a little bit more so. So thinking about, yes, there’s all of these outside factors. You know, you mentioned technology. We talked about the rise of AI, the flight to teams, there’s lawsuits, there’s all these things that and I want to go back to mindset just for a moment because I I was curious of what your advices for you talked about first making a decision that I’m going to have a good next 12 months Yes. How do you protect that mindset? Because we know that it’s, it’s, you know, when things are good, it’s easy to have the mindset and when things are strong, are challenging, it’s harder. So do you have any, any any suggestions to protect that mindset and really guard it so that some of these outside influences don’t start to color it in a way that we now are? Oh my gosh, oh, this isn’t gonna happen. Yeah,
Fee Gentry 14:55
I am. 100% my own The best critic, my own best person that that number one, I always do is like, turn off the television, get off social media, and then get away from negative people in what will all those three things have people. It is kind of weird, like, we’re supposed to talk to people. So like, so like, want you to have conversations, but with the right type of people, right. But it’s so but in the other thing that I do is I have, you know, I have a lot of my friends or colleagues, we’re all learners. So we’re we’re, you know, we’re staying on top of books or reading books on money on mindset, on you know, manifestation or money, your prayer, whatever, whatever it is that you believe in, find something that you can do every single day, that takes you out of this crazy world and brings you back inward. Because we keep looking at these external forces, everything we need is already inside of us. And so that’s the number one thing that I really recommend is for people to go inward when everybody else is being crazy.
D.J. Paris 15:56
Yeah, and also we can get crazy too. And so this idea of, of having a practice of some sort of discipline, like you were saying, prayer, meditation, whatever it is, something that takes you a little bit outside of the craziness that you that we all deal with inside our own heads to this is it gives some additional space in our lives to be able to say, You know what, there’s, there’s more than just me out here, I’m somehow connecting with this, you know, greater thing, that that’s not just me. And it’s it’s a nice respite from sometimes our own struggles that that we have. So I’m a big, big fan of that and big believer in that as well. And also, I think it’s the birthplace of creativity, I think, when you can get quiet and listen to your intuition. Like you were saying that sometimes in a lot of times the answers bubble bubble up, but if you’re not quiet, I don’t if I’m not quiet, I don’t hear them mean
Fee Gentry 16:54
either. Yeah, yeah, I just, I absolutely just like, I’m, I do that twice a day, I just get quiet twice a day or something, you know, and I always recommend, I always recommend finding that piece. For me, it’s like either putting my feet in the grass, looking at water or something like that, like connecting with nature, connecting with your inner, you know, your, your source, whatever, I need to do music, but just find like, find that internal peace is really, really key. Yeah. Yeah.
D.J. Paris 17:20
And the other thing too, that I think about I’m curious to get your take on it is this. It’s an old expression. But I think it’s accurate, at least for me that the journey is really is really where it’s at the destination is nice, and it’s nice to celebrate. And, you know, when we when we have these major goals we accomplished it’s great for a day or two to sort of celebrate and, and then I don’t know, but I often watch out. For me, I often get depressed when I when I achieve a goal and I wish I didn’t know is very common. I can get really, really depressed because then it’s like, oh, now Oh, okay, now what? You know, and then it’s like, I gotta just, if I if I were to think about Yes, the goal is nice, and we should celebrate our wins. And then we should realize it’s all about chopping wood and carrying water just consistently doing the work. Yeah. Yeah, that’s,
Fee Gentry 18:10
that’s it. DJ, I’m glad you mentioned that because i It’s the mamba mentality. And there’s a lot of especially in the real estate industry, or like they just said, you know, as it being an athlete or something. So I think about Kobe Bryant is that, you know, after the championships, he goes back and he’s looking at game film and shooting 1000 shots after he’s won a championship. I’m that girl, you know, I’m that girl too. And so, the journey as I’ve gotten older, and in I’ve started learn and appreciate patients and enjoying just the little things like the just the habit of practice, we’re just practice, right? Just practice it enjoying that journey. But man, it took me three years plus, it’s taken me a long time.
D.J. Paris 18:50
I was talking to my personal trainer the other week or two ago, and I was saying, I’m just going to have to throw myself in the way of pain, physical pain for the rest of my life if I want to be fit. There’s nothing pleasant to me about like lifting heavy weights, it’s painful, it hurts, it’s but he the results are pretty cool. But I have to be willing to go through the discomfort and the willing, I mean, how muscles grow. It’s how we grow as people. So this idea of like throwing ourselves into discomfort is not fun, but it seems to be the only way I know to do it. So this idea of of getting into habits, you know, and just like I don’t like working out but I do it. I don’t I don’t have to like it. I just do it.
Fee Gentry 19:33
Yeah, it’s about happier. It’s about creating habits. So when I was talking about you know, when you’re making people making plans and goals, no, you need to develop habits. That’s the number one thing James clear. His book is probably one of the books that I recommend more than anything is atomic habits. Long read. And in the way he builds that book. It’s creating a habit right I mean, whether we even lace up a book so yeah, it’s creating habits a man like you said it sucks, but you just you just do it.
D.J. Paris 19:58
And here’s here’s the good news. I was thinking about this with exercise. So I don’t like exercise some people do. I truly I know some people actually really do love it. So I’m only speaking for myself, but I never did enjoy lifting heavy weights. And, you know, even doing cardio is not my favorite thing. But if I want to, if I want to live a long life, I probably have to do those things. So I finally just said, Well, I got to do it, I don’t have to like it, I just have to do it. And so if you have parts of your business that you don’t like to do, but are critical, then you can start to think about do I have to force myself? Sometimes the answer may be yes. Or it may be I can leverage other someone else to maybe do something for me, because number one, I don’t like doing it. Or number two, I’m not good at it. And there’s all these ways now to get people to help you. We have a global economy, we have this gig economy that we can tap into and get help from people in other places that, you know, maybe charge less than what people locally would charge to do similar work. And if you’re having problems staying on top of your habits, yeah, well, maybe get some help or get an accountability partner. But let I want to talk a little bit about future proofing one’s business and this idea of having leaving money on sorry, leaving money on the table, because I think this is something that most agents don’t think about at all. They’re just focused on the next transaction, the next client, and there are a lot of opportunities I as somebody who is in management at a brokerage. You know, this is a huge focus for brokerage owners right now. But it also can be something that teams agents, they really should be thinking about additional streams of income. So let’s talk about that. Yeah,
Fee Gentry 21:38
so this is probably one of my favorite things to talk about. And I’ve been talking about it for a long period of time. So DJ, most real estate professionals are renting their careers. Let me say that again. Most real estate professionals are running their careers, they’re going from transaction to transaction. They’re doing you know, they’re there. They might be at a brokerage where they have unfavorable terms, and then the other parts of the money that they’re leaving on the table. So I want you to imagine this that I always kind of do this exercise. Put draw circles if somebody’s watching this, do this as I’m talking about it, write a circle put your name in the middle of it. What do you wrote most real estate agents do? Like how many people how many people get paid during a real estate transaction? So let’s let’s just start naming them who gets paid in real estate transaction, the realtor, the realtors, both the buyer and seller
D.J. Paris 22:28
side the buyer sellers the brokerage gets paid the title, title company gets paid, the lender gets paid video inspector home inspect the utility companies get paid if if sometimes movers,
Fee Gentry 22:43
movers, movers, yeah, you videographers stagers the sign companies state, the state the state, you know, the state records county clerk clerks. So DJ, when I do this, I have found that on one single transaction, so up to 41, people get paid off a one transaction and guess who’s in the middle of that transaction? Yeah, the agent, the agent. And that’s what I talked about leaving money on the table. We are now when you talk about that gig economy, we have the ability now, as entrepreneurs, we have to stop being self employed, I’m talking to people about be going from solo to CEO or being self employed to a real estate business owner. And a lot of people think they’re real estate business owners and they’re not they are self employed. And so the entrepreneur of the future is going to have to stop leaving money on the table in there are, you know, compliant ways for you to get paid, especially from title from a from a mortgage company and for mortgages, because you’re watching the brokers do it. I mean, our brokerages are doing it in the models of you know, so now in the future, and it’s nothing new, but it’s a different way to look at it. Look at it, if you keep saying that your lender, my lending partner, if your lending partner is not providing you a resources or an ability to get paid or something that’s not your partner. That’s just a vendor. And so we have the vendor. Yep. It’s just a vendor. And so there are so many different ways to get paid on the table. If you’re we have you know, we have real estate professionals who have you can own a vending company, we have real estate, I mean, you know, I’m sorry, staging company we have we have real estate owners who own who can become, you know, property managers, you know what, you know, yeah, check, check your little bit, but there’s so many Sure, sure. I’m looking at right now, in this country. We have 30,000 Baby Boomers retiring every day in June who wants to be a YouTube star. He doesn’t want to own a plumbing company, ah, bet company. He doesn’t care about being a property manager. But we have the ability to go ahead and buy our cashflow. We as real estate professionals can buy our cashflow. We keep creating these companies and doing these transactions. But we can create we can buy cleaning companies we can buy move out companies. I mean, there’s so many different ways right now for us to make money and we’re leaving 1050 Getting $20,000 a month on the table. So that’s what I’ve been doing lately is either buying into equity, so creating equity positions with companies who, who already serviced the real estate industry, their handyman companies or their landscaping company tile and grout company, all those get paid off of a real estate transaction, by the way. And that’s where that’s where there’s the opportunity. And so, especially those in the real estate businesses, like who are, you know, bigger teams, you’re already utilizing these services, you know, the moving services, moving trucks, I mean, moving companies, there’s, there’s so many opportunities, like we talked about the 41 ways that people up to 41 ways people get paid off with one single real estate transaction. That’s how you’re leaving money on the table.
D.J. Paris 25:42
I love that. And this idea of investing in, you know, taking some of your capital, your, you know, commission money, for example, and reinvesting it into another business where you have an equity position. And, yes, there are all sorts of ways that agents can align themselves and get paid in, you know, legal, legally compliant ways. RESPA compliant,
Fee Gentry 26:04
right, was right. But DJ, most of it most of the ways I can teach you, I mean, I’m teaching, I’m doing it with like, sometimes you’re doing with no money down, because real estate, we’re real estate professionals. So like, we’re we’re they may suffer and don’t know how to market, or they don’t have a CRM, they don’t understand, we already got to do that as real estate agents. That’s what our that’s what our job is. We know how to connect people we know, we know how to do social media, I mean, all think about all the tools that we have in our tracks as real estate professionals, it makes total sense for us to, like you said, we can just we can, like I said, do some earned equity with within those positions. Yeah, in revenue share. That’s what I know. Yes, it’s revenue share.
D.J. Paris 26:45
Yeah. So for every vendor that an agent has, they absolutely should reach out again, making sure it’s, you know, violating license law. Disclaimer, disclaimer, disclaimer, find out, find out what what the rules are in your local market and state, and then reach out to, you know, the, the attorneys reach out to, and some people are able to help you in certain ways, and some aren’t. But if you’re sending business to somebody, you should be asking them to do the same at the very least, or saying, how could I help you, for example, if you’re very good, if you’re strong, like you were saying, at social media, if that’s your thing, as an agent, you’re really good. Well guess what most business owners aren’t. So you have, you know, relationships with inspectors, you know, all these ancillary sort of services, you then can go to those and say, I can help you with that, or let me at least just fire some business off to you. And then let’s work out an arrangement where, you know, where we can both party, you know, both participate in the profit. So I love that. Yeah,
Fee Gentry 27:47
that’s, that’s, that’s the new way way of doing real estate businesses, you know, how do you make money in between the Commission’s that’s this is what it looks like, looks like right? Because unless, you know, unless you as a solo agent, or even as teams figure out a way to earn multiple streams of revenue, it’s going to get tough, it’s going to continue to get tough in terms of gaining market share. These are blue ocean strategies that are out there and like I said, one out of every 12 business owners are just going out of business and we’ve seen that in COVID in so that’s why we’re having a hard time finding a handyman reliable handyman that’s where we’re having a hard time finding that Christians H back you know, plumbers videographers you know, we’re having a hard time finding those people so
D.J. Paris 28:30
be really encourage everybody to watch South Park just did a in the last month or so they did a special called enter the pan diverse and I one of the plots one of the subplots of it was that we are so used to having things done for us that these trade positions, these skilled skilled labor positions, handyman plumbers, etc painters, you know, people don’t assume a lot of younger people don’t aspire to those positions. They weren’t like you were saying want to be you know, more and more involved in technology be on YouTube or whatever. They’re not necessarily wanting seeing that as a viable you know, sort of career even though it is a viable career. And so as a result those those trades are really suffering and but the need is still there. So you’re absolutely right, like if you think handymen are going out of business oh my gosh they’re probably having their they are going to do better and better and better and better because less people are learning those skills and we all need a handyman so So you’re absolutely right these these trade jobs are off they’re so critical. Yeah,
Fee Gentry 29:34
yeah, they are so critical especially for us in like said in our industry because like yeah, it’s and I talk you know so I get to talk to these you know these handy guys and these trade men and it’s it’s been it’s been really really fun talking to them and working with their businesses Yeah, yeah.
D.J. Paris 29:50
What at the end of the South Park episode the handyman and the these the trade positions, they become the celebrities now because they become the wealthy people. So it’s great Very cute story but but it’s got a very strong point is, is, you know, we there are opportunities here to think about, you know, sort of services that are not going out of business that are not you know, a handyman is basically future proof at least for a long time until robots come in and do it all that’s a long ways away so yeah and maybe it maybe it will never happen and there’s always going to you know, in Realtors too, you know realtors are worth their weight in gold if their skill set is high enough if their skill set is actually valuable about Zillow or or any of the other, you know, tech providers coming in Redfin. Redfin is a better example. Not just slight Redfin, I like Redfin, they’re great, but they have not really disrupted the market as much as we thought maybe they could. And it’s not because of anything, you know, negative towards them. It’s just people want to talk to agents who, you know, and again, they have agents, but we understand it’s a little bit of a different relationship there. So, yes, so So what you can do, if I understand is, you can help agents identify these opportunities, and then help create a plan to actually generate, you know, some of these relationships, is that, is that right? That is
Fee Gentry 31:15
correct. So I help real estate professionals, mostly teams, brokerages, you know, title companies, lenders, especially those of us who are getting up who either who are getting up in age, and they don’t have a transition plan to how to get out of their business, and, or those who are growing and want to add multiple streams of revenue to them. And so I have partnerships and jayvees. And so I, I help these companies create the plans, I help them acquire, acquire either these new businesses, or I help them where I help them put in relationships, so we can create up create the financial streams for them. So that’s what I’ve been doing for like this last year, is just because of the price like, well, let me use the buy relationships with, you know, some of the top lenders, title companies and doing it in a RESPA compliant way. And it has been amazing, especially for people just like I said, who have been running their careers, and just, you know, most real estate, people think they’re gonna be able to sell their businesses and they’re not right. They’re just, you’re just not going to. And so I teach them how to transition out of it and keep that keep that income stream coming in. And that happened. Started from exp I learned that from you know, it’s just a different business model. Yeah, yeah.
D.J. Paris 32:22
Yeah, it’s funny. So one of the things I started, we started doing here as a recruiting tool. And for any of those, any of those who are listening who are either brokerage owners, or team owners who are looking to expand their team and hire, I’ve got a great tip for you, that you could start doing this in your local market is offer free headshots, and invite the agents from other firms that you’re looking to recruit or bring on your team or whatever. And here’s how we do it. So because this is exactly to your point, basically, what you’re doing. So here’s how we do this, we hire, we get hire this photographer, and then I said, Well, I don’t want to pay for all that myself, because it’s quite expensive. So instead, so now we have an insurance agent that hangs out during the party. We have like a PA headshot party, we have an insurance agent, we have an attorney, we have a lender, we have an inspector, and we have a financial advisor. So we have everybody that would love to talk to all of these people, we all share the cost. This is a strategic partnership. This is exactly you know, basically what you’re saying is yes, these they’re not paying me but we’re all paying the photographer and I only have to pay the photographer a little tiny amount now because and I get to do this event that is pretty cool. People get free headshots. So my point is is is this is a way to do a version of that like you were saying is building these these partnerships where you know you’re getting in front of the people you want and then hopefully, you know either sharing the cost or having somebody even compensate you for some of those efforts and you absolutely could do this just to talk about title for one second and I know every state’s a little different so I don’t want to throw numbers out there that because they wouldn’t be applicable to any anyone unless they were in our situation but I will tell you as a brokerage owner at least in the state of Illinois, it is major major revenue for a title deal and other states it’s less but regardless it’s still something and you if you’re not figuring out a way to beat to participate in that way you are absolutely leaving money on the table here in Illinois it’s big big money and in other states it’s not as big but it’s still money on the table
Fee Gentry 34:24
right and it’s in his for doing the things that you already do anyways and that’s what I keep you know people like well I don’t want another job but I don’t want to go run a handyman service business No, I’m gonna teach you I’m teaching you how to do this without you’re not going to go pick up hammers you’re not gonna you’re not gonna you’re not gonna go you know, have to become a virtual assistant yourself or anything. This is like these are ways that you can do this with with up you know, with operate operations, Operation line operationalize control, right like, like, it’s just people put butts in seats to to make sure that work gets done because that’s what your job is to do is, you know that if you’re a team leader, just it’s your job is to make sure the work gets done. Yeah, it’s quarterback. And
D.J. Paris 35:01
so as an agent to, you know, you should be cultivating these relationships with your vendors anyway and talk about saying, Hey, I would like us to be a more strategic partner and figure out how we can help each other next year. So yeah, I’m happy to continue to send you business, Mr. Mrs. vendor, and I’d like you to be more part of the team as opposed to just a vendor for me. So what can we do together, where, you know, we can both participate in, in the success of this, and I’m going to refer every single person who comes my way to you, and I’d love to hear about, you know, maybe what you can do on your end to help facilitate more deals for me, or maybe some marketing dollars or whatever, again, is RESPA compliant and you know, licensed law compliant. But there are ways to do this. And agents are oftentimes not as confident to to ask, they don’t know exactly what to ask for, you know, I think most agents understand well, I can ask my lender to help me with like a seminar or webinar signs are, we understand that because we, we’ve been taught how to do that, but we haven’t been taught how to do the other stuff. And this is where you come in, because this is what you teach. Yeah. Yeah, it’s critical, because this is why you would go to fi because you don’t try to reinvent the wheel. Don’t try to learn it all yourself, go to somebody who’s already figured it out, like fee and have have her help consult with you and give you some suggestions. Because she already knows how to do it.
Fee Gentry 36:27
Yeah, yeah. It’s, it’s, it’s been amazing. Yeah. People think of it outside. Yeah, yeah, there’s some, you know, there’s some nuances and intricacies. But we’ve now done it, you know, done it across the country. And now, and it’s, it’s Yeah, and you’re right, it varies from lot a lot, you know, from state to state. They’re different laws about different things. But yeah, love to help anybody who’s, who would live, you know, open to talking to anybody who’s interested in in, in looking down that path. Yeah. Yeah.
D.J. Paris 36:50
And there is really, even if the, for example, even like, even with utility companies like cable phone for people that still use cable and phone will still do and they do. Yeah. And you know, this is an opportunity to reach out to the cable company and be like, Hey, can I get a spiff on every time I send someone over to you? And, again, whatever the rules are in your area, fine. But most most of them be like, Sure, I’d be happy to solar is another one. There’s lots of of, you know, for home, renovators, staging companies, etc, have so many opportunities,
Fee Gentry 37:27
I’ve got a price list of the average of those. And so the ones that you’d be just most shocked on was like utilities. It’s the average household for utility, and I don’t even have to here but I think if I remember off the top of my head, and like the state of Texas, is is $1,300. Well, you get a referral of that they’ll give up give you up to 30 or 40% referral on that. Think about that. I mean, you don’t mean just like, yeah, people weren’t paying utilities. I mean, there’s so many, like you said solar, oh, my gosh, if you know if they have solar in your in your state, but it’s it’s being compliant, right. It’s the RESPA compliant ways and and how you build it? Yeah, it’s it’s, it’s, it can be very, very, it’s very, very lucrative. And attorneys
D.J. Paris 38:03
have been doing this for years and years and years. Attorneys have referral relationships with other attorneys who are in different specialties. Obviously, realtors do this, all my clients moving to Florida, and I live in Illinois. So I need to find someone in Florida and I’m going to take x percentage of the commission by handing you know, you an agent down there the deal. And yes, you can do similar versions of this. And I love the thing you were saying to about this hyperlocal where you could go to businesses in your local market and say, Look, I have I have a following on online of people that you know, know, like, and trust me, they listen to my suggestions, and I’m happy to sort of drive business to you, Mr. or Mrs. Business Owner? Would that be okay? Of course the answer is going to be yes. And then. And then the question is great. Can we either workout a relationship where maybe, you know, I, maybe there’s a revenue share, like you were saying, or maybe we can reciprocally send each other business. But I think, you know, business owners love this idea of, oh, you’re gonna help me grow my business? Awesome. Let’s, you know, they understand the nature of the the reciprocity.
Fee Gentry 39:13
Yep, exactly. Yeah. And there’s, and there’s so there’s three ways that people can generate business that way. So I call it like one being an affiliate, right, like we talked about, like you could possibly get income to being we call just a connector connector, like where you you, as the real estate professional look really good by being able to offer that higher level tier of services on it, and you may get a discount yourself. And then three is like absolutely, you know, you’re going to when you become a professional you are sharing and revenues or you might own or you do performance guarantees, you get some performance bonuses on stuff and in the revenue share. So those are three different tiers. And I’ve got about four other tiers of way you can ways you can, you can do that. Yeah, I
D.J. Paris 39:54
mean, we’re in what are we talking about sort of bottom line on a transaction if Have a and again, I, you know numbers are gonna vary wildly. But we’re talking about possibly adding 1000 or more dollars in revenue in profit to even a transaction? Possibly, possibly, or more. So, or more or more. Yes, yes, I was being very conservative, because I know, I know even what title gives us per deal here in Illinois, but which is which is 1000s. Right?
Fee Gentry 40:27
Something that title, just just, yeah, just just just a title mortgage. If you just think about we talked about when we set up to 41 different ways you can get paid on a transaction. Okay, let’s just say you got paid on three more. Just just mentioned, you got just paid on those, just three, the basic, the basic core three, let’s just say it’s mortgage, handyman services or housekeeping services? I don’t know. I mean, you know, you pick three, it’s way more than you did before, and it’s doing the exact same.
D.J. Paris 40:56
You’re all right. You know, we all like it’s funny. I, I have a how do we find are the people that, you know, we hired to clean our homes on a regular basis? Well, yes, we could go online and try to find, but we usually ask our friends, right, we go, Hey, who’s your cleaning person? Are they good? Okay. Yeah, right, yeah. But those people are worth their weight in gold, when you can find a good cleaning. Anyone, any vendor. That’s, that’s excellent. We’re like, oh, my gosh, and and, you know, people just freely sort of give out those referrals. And that’s awesome. And you should do that. And you should also say, Gosh, I want to help build your business, you are such an excellent vendor, I want to help you. And that’s where you start is how can we help each other? And agents are just not used to asking that question. And this is the question and fees going to help you not only identify all these opportunities, and possibly becoming an equity partner in some of their businesses, or some sort of, you know, affiliate or referral relationship, whatever, there’s ways to do it. And whether you’re getting paid, maybe you’re getting paid in sweat equity, maybe you’re getting paid that in physical dollars, but services for your business that can be you know, maybe there’s a by the way, accountants, those are pretty important people. Right. So accountants is another opportunity, you and I know they’re on your list. You’ve identified everyone. So this is exactly guys, I think this is a perfect place for us to stop because if you haven’t built some of these strategic partnerships and relationships to earn more than just a commission on a sale, and yes, that’s we understand that’s how agents get paid. But there are other avenues and fee is going to help you figure out how to do that, how to identify and how to approach those businesses and what to offer them and what to expect in return. And guys, like he was saying you’re already referring people to other vendors anyway, you might as well see if there’s an opportunity to work together. And you know, it’s you just you’ve opened my eyes actually because we’re I’m kind of a business owner myself. So I now have to start looking at our strategic partnerships and realize oh yeah, maybe I’m I’m leaving some things on the table. In fact, I know I’m leaving. In fact, I’m going to ask for you to take a look at my podcast and tell me how I’m leaving things on the table because I totally 1,000,000,000,000% and leaving money on the table. So I’m doing it guys you’re doing it. We’re all doing it Fi is here to save us all so find for all things fi just find her on Instagram she’s she’s she’s easy to find search fi Gentry online, there’s not there’s one fee gentry and that is her. Which is one of the cool things about having a name like V Gentry is a name that you certainly remember and is unique. And fee is really the real deal again but on the board of directors and exp she she’s she’s that she’s the real thing. Author coach, athletes and a top producer and brokerage owner just everything she’s done it all so please reach out to her because she knows where this business is headed. Because she has been at those upper levels and Management at really the highest levels of some of the biggest companies out there. So guys, she she knows she knows what’s coming and she wants to help you future proof. So find her on Instagram at fi Gentry Fe GE and try and we’ll have links to all of these ways to get in contact with us in our show notes. But I would just want to thank fee for spending an hour with us we so much appreciate you You’re such a wonderful guest and you have such a passion for helping agents which is exactly what the show is all about. So on behalf of the audience, thank you thank you to fi This is a wonderful way for me this is my last interview before the before I go on holiday break. So what a what a fun interview for me to have. So selfishly thank you for you. But our audience also thanks to you and then on behalf of Fi and myself. We want to thank the audience do you stuck around to the very end we appreciate you we honor you This is for you. So thank you. Tell us how we can improve the show number one leave us a review let us know Good, bad, indifferent, let us know what what we want more of less of tell me to shut up, whatever. Let me know how to make the show better, but also support our sponsors. They’re the ones that pay the bills. So please check out their products and services. I promise you we I do not allow vendors to come on and be advertisers. Unless they have unbelievable services for agents, and telephones. Please tell a friend about our show. Another agent in your office, they need to hear this by the way, you’re owner of if you’re an agent and you work for a brokerage, instead of being the brokerage owner, send this to the owner because the owner needs to know about this as well. The owner needs to know or the team leader needs to understand there is opportunities and they already know it. They just don’t have the strategy about how to get there Fi is going to help them do that. So reach out to fi she’s awesome. We’ll have her contact information in the show notes. Find her on Instagram at fi Gentry fi have a wonderful I’m just gonna say have a wonderful holiday season and you’re here.
Fee Gentry 45:55
I know I can’t wait I don’t have anything good plan. I plan on traveling but I’m gonna be actually just focusing down and rebranding and doing some new stuff. So yeah,
D.J. Paris 46:03
well, by the way, too, like fi has I was we were joking about this before I the fi is the best voice ever. She was just the self soothing voice. So I said if you’re going to hire a consultant, you’re going to have somebody work with you. Wouldn’t it be cool to have somebody with a voice like fee? Well, you might be directly so in fact I need a strategic partnership with FIFA. I’m only teasing. But I am happy to promote fi because she She’s wonderful and very, very skilled. But she also has a wonderful voice and she hosts shows and she does it all. So reach out to her she will get you on the right track fee. Thank you so much. We will see everybody on the next episode.
Fee Gentry 46:39
Thank you so much.
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