Category: Podcast Episodes

Hasani Steele dropped by to discuss how he morphed from traditional real estate broker into niche renovator and investor with his company Steele Consulting Group. Hasani attributes part of his success to the disciplined he installed by playing college football for Northwestern University. The Chicago Association of REALTORS® has recently named Hasani “Renovator of the Year” and you’ll learn why he absolutely deserves this title by listening to this incredible interview!

Hasani Steele can be reached at 877.724.0070 or via his website.

 

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:14
Hello and Happy Holidays Welcome to keeping it real. The only podcast made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers. My name is DJ Parris. I’m your host through the show. And this is our final episode before the holidays are upon us. And we also anticipate getting at least one more episode before the end of the year. So thanks for listening during your most likely well needed break. So thank you for being listener. Whether you’re brand new to the show, or you’ve been listening from the very beginning, we really appreciate it. And the best way of course, you can always support our show is simply by telling a friend let anyone know who potentially is a might be interested in this information, wants to hear from top producers, any brokers, you know, maybe even in your own office that might benefit from this shoot this, this podcast over to them that really helps us a lot. And also, if you are a vendor for real estate brokers, right, maybe you’re a lender or a real estate attorney, or title company or anyone, photo company, for example, and you want to get in front of about 5000 Chicago brokers, you can sponsor an episode. So reach out to us, you can always do that to our website, keeping it real pod.com. Also download and stream all of our episodes right from there. If you haven’t already subscribed via iTunes or Google Play, you can do that right from our website, too. And drop us a line as well let us know who we should be talking to you have anyone that you think has a great story, or is doing things in a really particularly interesting way that would would make for a great interview. Reach out to us we’re always open to talking to new brokers. And thanks again have a great holiday season and onto our interview with renovator OF THE YEAR Hassani steel.

This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by Loftus law. I’m sorry the attorney is busy with something more important is something you will never hear when you call Patrick Loftus of Loftus law. Loftus law is a firm focused on serving real estate professionals and their clients you want your deals to close on time without headaches and Loftus law is the solution. For more information on what Loftis law can do for you and your clients and special pricing of 299 per closing call 773-632-8330 or email Patrick at Loftus hyphen law.com

Okay today on the show we have a sunny steel with over 16 years and 40 million in sales combined with a proven record of results including 45 day average market time and a 97% list to sales price ratio steel consulting group is led by Hasani steel our guest today who offers real estate consulting, sales and marketing from conception design construction pre sales through delivery. Some call him the market maker. Most are more notable accolades for assignee include 2016 renovator of the Year from car Chicago Association, realtors, and the number one Northern Illinois REMAX agent 2003 for residential sales. He received his bachelor’s from Northwestern and was a member of the 95 to 99 Northwestern University football team, where he where they were consecutive big 10 champions, and he has been to the Rose Bowl in 96. In the citrus bowl in 97. The sun he enjoys spending his time with his wife and their three daughters as well. And I find this most interesting building and flying radio control airplanes. So Sunny, thanks for being on the show. Welcome.

Hasani Steele 3:59
Wow. Thank you for having me. And that was quite an intro. Well, you

D.J. Paris 4:04
have accomplished it. So I was I was honored to read it. Thanks. Thanks for spending time with us. Tell us a little bit about how you got started in real estate. So I know you’ve been doing it for gosh, 16 years now.

Hasani Steele 4:16
Yeah, you touched on my interest and the radio control airplanes. I love airplanes. I thought I was actually going to be a pilot but from a very young age, you know, I was basically looking for opportunities to make money. So I had you know, a lady that worked with my dad that eventually kind of became my, my, my godmother, but she would rehab properties and she paid me you know district wallpaper. You know, just paint I would be glamorous work. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. And at the time, I kind of felt like a karate kid was like you know, you’re just trying to get through this stuff. But then over time you start to realize that, you know, you start to you know, I have a vision because you see all these old places and like you’re going through doing all this work, you know, like, what is going on here, you know, but eventually, you know, they were, you know, refurbished and either leased or sold. And, you know, that was just, you know, one of the experiences that now, um, I realized later, you know, that kind of played a role in establishing my vision, you know, in real estate, but I did it at a very young age. And then, you know, after middle when I started high school, I got into football, and I started to do more in sports. But when I went to Northwestern, I majored in computer engineering. So after football, I had graduated and started working for tel labs, and then 911 happened, and then like, you know, a few years into engineering, you know, I was laid off, so I started, you know, just, I’d already started buying, you know, properties and redoing them. But that’s when real estate, you know, I basically had a another round, and, and then I started working part time. And, and then, you know, one thing led to the next and, you know, I eventually started growing my business and, and, you know, helping basically people do exactly what I learned to do. And it’s just led and just constantly grown from year to year, and it, you know, kind of leads us to where we are now.

D.J. Paris 6:28
Yeah, that’s, that’s a really interesting story. Can you tell us a little, you know, I’m always so fascinated by people who played sports in college, because most of us who played sports, you know, petered out in high school. And, and obviously, you kept going, and I always think, discipline, of course, is so critical to anyone who’s who’s playing at the collegiate level, have you found that that discipline that you obviously had back then is that really helped build your real estate practice as well?

Hasani Steele 6:56
Absolutely, I use it every day, sometimes when, you know, work gets really stressful, I’ll have like dreams about football, and I’ll know, you know that, okay, you know, things are getting pretty tough. And, you know, during that time, when I played football, I was studying at the same time, I would do three a day practices, you know, on level, you’re not getting paid. And this is something you know, that you’re pretty passionate about, but you’re putting in, you know, I’ll ton of time, but one of the key, the key lessons that I took from even playing at Northwestern was being fortunate enough to watch the program, you know, the turnaround on the program, because when I was the last recruiting class for Coach Barnett, and I use so many of those same just techniques and discipline, you know, culture building type of skills, you know, in my business today, because we work in a lot of emerging markets. So, you know, we don’t really necessarily get the benefit of the doubt, you know, as we’re taking an area and we’re revitalizing it, we’re having to come in and in, you know, basically deliver something, you know, that’s greater than, than where we started. But I watched that happen to Northwestern, and it just, you know, the attitude, you know, the, the, the goal setting that you have to do, and just the the positive, you know, attitudes and just relentlessness that you need in order to be good, and especially after you win the big 10 one year and then to come back and do it again. And, you know, when when people are really, you know, preparing even more for you, those same types of disciplines and lessons, you know, I use today, you know, because this real estate industry is ever changing, you know, so absolutely, I that is probably one of the that along with my experience that I learned on the construction side early on, is definitely you know, made me you know who I am today.

D.J. Paris 9:06
Yeah, let’s talk about it because you’d have won recently this award with cars as the as the renovator of the year. Can you talk a little bit about that talk about how that relates to your business?

Hasani Steele 9:19
Yeah, so um, the Chicago Association of Realtors, the board, I think every year, gives that award and it’s based on you know, just the number of projects that you’ve worked on and the impact that you’ve had, you know, in the industry and your consistency. So that is one of the things that I’ve really tried to work on and that and that continued effort is as we grow, making sure that the product that we deliver, you know, is just as good or better than the last one because you don’t you’re only as good as you know, the last thing that you do, you know, so the Chicago Association of Realtors, you know, based off of The developments, you know, that we do the number of them, also, what those developments do to impact the market, you know, the surrounding market and the neighborhood, and how it, you know, helps the industry as a whole also is taken into consideration. So, you know, we were given the renovate OF THE YEAR very honored to receive it, you know, and, yeah, that basically summarize it,

D.J. Paris 10:26
can you tell us a little bit about those projects, and because it’s clearly something your team is passionate about?

Hasani Steele 10:31
Yeah, so we, when we’re building a market, going into an area, some of the first properties that are rehabbed are going to be single family, you know, when, you know, it’s just, it’s one property to do, when you’re looking to work with investors, you know, especially when you don’t have the national banks involved. You know, you start with, you know, single family home or, you know, lower density type of property. And those properties in those neighborhoods, you know, the scope of work, is more than just paint. And like surface level finishes, like, you have to get these properties out, like, well, if you go to our website, you’ll see, you know, the properties that we do, they’re basically completely brand new, except for the shell, the shells, like the exterior brick, and many times, even then, you know, we have to, you know, re face the property or things like that. So the properties that we do, when we say gut or rehab, our definition includes, like everything, it’s not like, you know, more surface level, so all of our properties that we do, you know, are completely gutted out. So on the single family home side, we have like a number of properties, without going through specific addresses, but basically 3500 square foot, single family homes, the finish and decor is going to resemble, you know, like a brand or discipline similar to what you might see in an Architectural Digest. So we’re going to pay attention to every detail, the cabinetry, the tile work, you know, we’re creating a spec sheet software right now that, you know, that’s going to allow us to, you know, count every screw in a house, basically, but just the detail and the paint and how you do everything the finished carpentry is really why what our buyers are looking for, you know, our purchasers are purchasing our property for the house, they’re not necessarily looking, or like, they’re not, they’re not purchasing for the surrounding neighborhood, they’re, they want the accuracy in the home, you know, so if I were to describe, you know, kind of the properties, you know, that that one, you know, they would be maybe greystones, or, you know, properties that, you know, from that that’s very accurate, and that match how they were built originally, especially on the exterior, we do a lot of historical places that that many others might shy away from, they take a little bit longer to do, but you know, they’re very accurate. And then we’ll do the finishes with you. There may be gray cabinets, you know, a mixture of that, you know, updated, still stone marble tile that might have some timeless install patterns, you know, but through and through completely gutted, you know, restored the exterior, just like artistic, amazing work.

D.J. Paris 13:36
And if you want to you really should go to Kota Saudis website, which is what a steel with an E, as last name, what is steel.com? And you can see the pictures of many of their developments. And it’s, it’s truly remarkable.

Hasani Steele 13:52
Yeah, you can, you can basically see the process from start to finish, from when the property is originally secured, all the way through demolition, and the complete restoration process to, you know, the final photos and what we started to incorporate now is a new technology that allow you, you can get those Samsung goggles. And you can virtually walk through these properties even at the demo stage and kind of experience, you know, being able to walk through a house that’s in the middle of construction.

D.J. Paris 14:27
It’s truly remarkable what you guys have done. And let me ask you so if we get to the very beginning of the development process when you’re finding these places to rehab, how are you finding them what what is I’m sure through probably lots of methods, but are they are these properties that go on the MLS? Are they typically off market?

Hasani Steele 14:49
That’s a good question. So there it’s a mixture of both the many times it’s like just driving them and doing research in the tax records to work backwards. and see who owns these properties. Sometimes properties can kind of like fall by the wayside, so to speak, if a particular bank or you know, you know owns it, or it might be in a state or something like that, when you’re reaching out to them, you might be reaching out to an attorney, because that person may have passed away, or, you know, you might be reaching out to a family member, and they just had the property for a while it might be paid off. And it’s just, you know, sitting there, so we come across those others might, we will get people that will call in, and they’ll say, Hey, I know, you know, I live in the community, you know, I know the kind of work that you guys do. You know, a friend of mine has his property, you know, you know, and it might just fall in our lap that way. And then we also work through tax buyers, and people who watched the auctions. And many times when those properties aren’t bid on, or anything like that, you know, we’re will actually take them, you know, so we don’t really cherry pick, when you’re making a market, you pretty much know, okay, I’ve got this area, this region that we’re going to be working in, and it’s, it’s quite, you know, it’s more vast than then, than others. And then when the properties pop up, you know, then you just kind of have to figure out, you know, how you’re going to, you know, raise capital or find investor or somebody that wants to come and take part, you know, and work on it. So, there’s a number of ways we get on but, you know, more, more times than not like, we’ll get people that reach out to us. And they’ll just, they’ll see us as being a buyer, and they’ll bring up

D.J. Paris 16:42
Yeah, it’s, it’s truly remarkable. I mean, you’ve done, gosh, you’ve had to have done over 100 of these, or at least right around that number of if, if that’s it, and they’re all just gorgeous, of the interiors of these properties are truly remarkable.

Hasani Steele 16:58
Yeah, we’re, we’re getting excited, because for when we first started, our average price point was probably around 200, to 250. And it’s just like that, sometimes when you’re, when you’re, you know, just trying to work with the amount of capital that you have, and the investor pool that you have now that we’re growing, you know, we are able to take on more, you know, so we’re doing properties, you know, anywhere up to, you know, a million and a half 2 million, even. But what’s nice about that is it’s like when you look on our website, we tell clients that you cannot tell the difference.

D.J. Paris 17:38
You know, that’s, that’s very, that’s I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt you. But that is absolutely true. Because I went down to one of the earlier properties that seemed to be listed in the low to hundreds, and it looked like a million dollar interior. I was about to say, Boy, that is an impressive interior for that price point. I mean, it’s beyond impressive. It’s amazing. The level of detail. Now, are you involved with a lot of the interior design of the interior architecture? Or do you leave that up to other team members?

Hasani Steele 18:08
Yeah, I, um, started as we’re growing, I’m starting to delegate that. But But yeah, for the most part, you know, it started because when you go into property, you’ve got to order trim, right? So it’s like, okay, what trim do we order, and you and you want to try to avoid having the contractors pick it, there’s nothing wrong with that, but when it’s not in the scope, to have a cohesive type of design, but what ends up happening is you end up picking it. So it’s like, I kind of fell into that role. Because I would, I’m trying to guide my clients, like if I have a developer that I’m working with, you know, I know what buyers want, because, you know, we do brokerage, you know, so, you know, I would start by, okay, well, we got to do this trim, or I would find you know, you know, an article or something, or a photo or a compilation of pictures, and I would pick, you know, the trim the doors, the door hardware, the lighting, you know, and I just turned into, you know, a designer in the sense. And then when we started doing the consulting services, you have to know construction, like you have to know how to build a place to be able to present a project to a developer or an investor, you know, and say, Hey, this is what it’s probably going to cost and this is the, you know, the look that you do, and this is your target buyer, you know, so yeah, we, I basically, you know, do a lot of the design and finish. Now we’re starting to incorporate other team members. And that process as well. And we’re starting you know, as our brand is now you know, pretty established. And so now we’ve got others taking part in participating

D.J. Paris 19:53
how many development projects do you have going on at any one given time?

Hasani Steele 20:00
I’d say involvement can range anywhere from, you know, marketing a property only. And I’d say those are very few are pretty hands on, on on many of them all the way so full, like, you know, management of a project, I say maybe about 15 to 20. And it kind of depends, because when you’re doing consulting, you don’t have to do every aspect of every different job, you kind of fill in and you offer services, in whatever category, that particular client, you know, knees, so we work with people that are just armchair investors, all the way through, you know, established developers, it’s been developing for 30 years, you know, so, you know, depending on the product that we have our involvement, you know, kind of varies in terms of the time, but yeah, I’d say about 15 to 20, at any given time, and it works out well, when you’re, you know, making markets and establishing markets, because you need a constant flow of sales comparables, you know, the buyers that buy from you, they want to know what’s coming next, they want to know, okay, well, what else you doing? Well, what’s going on with this other one across the street, or what’s, so you have to have a pipeline, you know, and it helps, and it works. And that way, by doing the volume in that regard, you don’t have to have projects that like are making like, you know, for lack of a better term hand over fist money, like, the margins are, are, are fair, I should say, you know, and, you know, if I’m talking to an end buyer, if I’m talking to a developer, you know, they’re happy, and they think it’s reasonable, it’s not like, you know, some of these crazy ratio margins that some people are making on these flips, where they’re not putting any money in the house, but they’re taking all the equity, right, you know, so by doing higher volume, and keeping that going, it works out for the buyers, and it works out for the developers and investors, because it helps with our appraisal values. And, and keeps, you know, encourages other competing developers and people in the market to showing them, you know, and providing sales, comparables and sales for them so that they can, you know, do their projects.

D.J. Paris 22:24
Yeah, we have a lot of investors or brokers who are investors who work with investors at our firm as well. And they they’ve always said almost universally, that one of the biggest misconceptions that brokers have about working with investors is finding the investors actually the easy part, it’s finding the deal, that’s the hard part, it’s, it’s getting the numbers to work. And once you get the numbers to work, the money seems to show up. And you in particular, you’ve have such an amazing product that I imagine, you know, that the investors are probably lined up ready to work with you.

Hasani Steele 22:54
The investors are lined up, you’re exactly right, getting the numbers to work. We have we, I basically started by just offering consulting services a while back, just because I would hear certain investors, you know, I’d say, hey, well, you know, we have to use this, this tile, you know, this certain tile on this project, whatever. And, you know, how are we gonna make that work for the budget, you know, and we had to go and, and create accounts, you know, with vendors, and pool a lot of our purchases for all of our investors so that we could even it, you know, save 10% or 15%, you know, and so we actively took on that role, because, you know, we don’t have products to sell, you know, we don’t either, you know, so we, you know, have preferred accounts, with every single item that you find in a house, we’re able to get for the best price, the best value, the best service. So, you know, and that, I think, is a large part in how we’re able to get these buildings built with this amount of detail and have the numbers make sense when you’re developing a market. And, and, you know, maybe there’s enough room, because you might be selling at a substantially higher price point or what have you, you may not necessarily be forced to have to shop or really try to, you know, make those day to day savings on that material. Well, the nice thing about it is when we go to like Linkin Park, but not only are we able to build for less, we can we already have we already are using, you know, top line finishes, we actually ended up coming in and we’re able to, you know, construct a property or put a project together, where, you know, many of our competitors that, you know, don’t really have a business that’s, you know, surrounded around, you know, we’re finding, you know, merchandise, purchases, things like that we’re able to compete against them. and deliver a better product. You know, so the key is making sure that you’re you’re efficiently purchasing all of your material, you can’t just always run to the local, you know, store, you know, and and just get, you know, one of these and one of these, you have to plan ahead. That’s the only way

D.J. Paris 25:19
that it works. Well, I know you, I think you’ve basically said it all. And I know you have a commitment. So we we probably should, should finish up. But I want to make sure that everyone who’s listening can see some of your work which so if you haven’t yet gone while you’re listening to me, you’re not driving go to what a steel.com, which is steel with an E, it’s Saudis last name, and take a look at some of the work they’ve done it is it is truly impressive. What is also the best way if they’re already investors, or potential buyers, or sellers who want to work with you and your group, what’s the best way they should reach out to you

Hasani Steele 25:58
just go on the About Us section on our website and click and just do a submission and just say what it is you’re looking for, if you have any particular passion or goals, and yeah, reach out to us, and then I’ll come to either myself or our manager, mark or Christian. And we’ll reach out to you and set up a call. And that’s basically how it starts. People will call us that already have properties or they might be, you know, attorneys that may want to invest and do something that might be you know, so many of them sometimes our past clients that you know, you know, may want to invest as well or established developers just go to our website, click on there. If you’ve been looking through and you’re clicking on through the site. You know, any page you go on, you can reach out to us and we’ll be in touch. All right, Sandy, well,

D.J. Paris 26:51
thank you so much for your time, and I just absolutely cannot get over how beautiful the interior and exteriors of the property is. But in particular, the interiors are just absolutely stunning. So keep up, keep up the wonderful work. And thank you for being on the show.

Hasani Steele 27:09
And thank you for having me, DJ, we appreciate it.

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Luminita Ispas is originally from Romania and her initial real estate goal was to construct the tallest building in Europe. While that’s still a future goal, for now she’s become one of Chicago’s most successful brokers! She believes educating her clients in achieving financial freedom through real estate investing. She has been teaching these seminars for 15 years and still does to this day! Lumi is also finishing up a book about this very topic coming out next year!

Luminita Ispas can be reached at 773.392.2906 and luminita.ispas@century21.com

To attend one of Lumi’s seminars…

Date: Last Saturday of every month
Location: 1161 W Madison, Chicago, IL 60607

 

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:14
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real, the only podcast made by real estate brokers in Chicago for real estate brokers in Chicago. My name is DJ Paris, I am your host through the show. What we do here is interview the top brokers real estate producers in the Chicagoland area and ask them to reveal what they do and how they built their business and how they have treated, how they treat their clients what they offer, and maybe what separates them from the rest of the pack. And today is no exception. We have Luminita Espace coming up in just a couple of minutes. And she is a wonderful, and I think you’ll really enjoy this because the way she built her business, I think, is is very different from how a lot of brokers have. And we’re nearing the end of 2017. We’re 30 some episodes in and we’re very grateful for everyone that has continued to support our show by telling another broker in their office that they should listen. In particular, I find that new brokers seem to really appreciate these interviews to learn from what the top heavy hitters are doing. Also, we have sponsors now. So if you’re someone that would like to sponsor the podcast, you can sponsor an episode, you just reach out to us, let us know. And of course, if you’re not already a subscriber to this podcast, you can do that on iTunes or on Google Play, or stream episodes live at keeping it real pod.com. Also, drop us a line, let us know if there’s anyone that you think we should be interviewing for the podcast in a future episode, or just to let us know what you like and maybe what you don’t like. Now, one thing I did want to make sure before we start this great interview with Lumi is one thing that we forgot to do is plug her she does these investor seminars every month, you’ll hear about how she did that to actually grow her business from the very beginning. She does it to this day. And we just simply forgot to explain and brokers are invited to come and learn as well not just buyers and sellers. So she wanted to make sure that that we gave information to the listeners about how they can learn about these and maybe even attend one, the name of the seminar that she does is how to become financially free in five years or less with little down by the way, she is writing a book too, that talks about this very subject but the seminars are they are available last Saturday of every month, and they are located at 1161 West Madison, Chicago, Illinois 60607 And they are from 10 to 12 o’clock, so last Saturday of every month 1161 West Madison or just reach out to Lumi and her team and they’ll give you that information. So thanks again we’re finishing up the year here with just a few final interviews. We’re going to go strong in 2018 with Carrie McCormack, which we do a monthly episode with and now we’re adding in ERIC workman to do a monthly episode around investments. So we’re really going to do some big things here and thanks again for supporting the show.

This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by Loftus law. I’m sorry the attorney is busy with something more important is something you will never hear when you call Patrick Loftus of Loftus law. Loftus law is a firm focused on serving real estate professionals and their clients you want your deals to close on time without headaches and Loftus law is the solution. For more information on what Loftus law can do for you and your clients and special pricing of 299 for closing call 773-632-8330 or email Patrick at Loftus hyphen law.com

Okay today on this show, we’re really excited because we have Luminita, otherwise known as Lumi. Looney is spus from Century 21 SG R. And normally we read this big long bio bio of our guests and Lumi certainly has one of those BIOS because she’s accomplished so much, but just a couple of the key highlights she is a top 1% producer. She’s also a top century one producer with a Gosh, dozens of awards. She’s won over the last 15 years. She’s been in the business including the Centurion award last year, which I’m assuming is about the highest award she can get as of century 21 broker. She’s also a mentor. She’s an investor, she works with investors, she teaches classes on investments and she’s also an author or almost author about to be an author. So We are so excited to have you on the show. So welcome looming.

Luminita Ispas 5:03
Thank you, TJ. Excited to be here. Well,

D.J. Paris 5:07
thank you. So you know, you do have this storied and impressive history and a series of experiences over the last 15 years. Can you tell us how you had to get involved in real estate?

Luminita Ispas 5:18
That’s a great question. I’ve always dreamed to become a realtor. Yeah, right. So, my life, I always wanted to be actually a developer to build. I wanted to build the tallest building in Europe. And when I came United States, in March 2000, I came actually with about 200 bucks in my pocket. So you’ll probably notice that not was not getting me closer to build but the tallest building in Europe. Right?

D.J. Paris 5:44
And where did you where and where were you living prior to moving to United States,

Luminita Ispas 5:48
Romania. So I was living human. Yeah.

D.J. Paris 5:51
And that’s where you were born and raised? Correct. Right,

Luminita Ispas 5:53
Eastern Europe. And I was looking, you know, for capital, their time trying to see how I can learn more about building and to build a capital and get find by partners. And of course, talking to a lot of investors, I discovered that most of the people became wealthy through real estate investing. So it was interesting how, you know, wanting to build, I realized that investing in SEO to get me there. And at that time, late night, there are these advertising for no money down real estate, creative real estate. So I started buying those type. And I became very well versed in how to finance creatively, or we cash on developments and buying properties. And I starting helping all my friends to buy real estate, as a friend, right?

D.J. Paris 6:42
So this was like, this was early 2000s, I’m guessing 2002 1002.

Luminita Ispas 6:45
And at one point in 2000, some of my friends asked me why I’m not getting paid for this, you know, why am I doing all this work and not getting paid for it? And, you know, it was a big opening, I said, Well, real estate selling real estate. That’s interesting. I don’t know if I can do that. And my friends were like, well, you’re already doing it, you are going with us at approaching properties. You are telling us how to finance them. A lot of times you know more about LLC is that our attorneys, so why don’t you start selling, and it was so interesting, because as soon as I started selling, I discovered it, it was kind of like my life calling right, you find something that you fell into it and you discover that’s exactly what you should be. Because I love people, I love real estate, I realized that as an investor on that side. I mean, as a real estate broker, you should have a book of business, you should know people, just knowing the business, it doesn’t make you successful, right, you have to have buyers and sellers. So yeah, so as soon as I got my license and start working with clients, and real, I realized that this was my dream business, actually, helping people change their life was was a big deal, especially as the beginning I was working mostly with, with immigrants, because I felt a connection with them being an immigrant, of course, and or, and, you know, they didn’t know didn’t understand credit, they didn’t understand on payments, or how buying a home will help them and being almost a little bit a mentor for them and working with some of them a half a year or more to build their credit, file tax returns and being able to buy credit A B connection. So when at the beginning, it took me a lot of open houses and networking events and talking to a lot of people to find clients. After a while my business has become mostly referrals and repeat clients. Because those people realize that I spend a lot more time with them than that other agents. And you know, I was there for them. I was not dropping them if they were not ready to buy or sell at that at the moment I met them.

D.J. Paris 8:54
Yeah, I think that’s really interesting and puts you in a very special niche where there’s a lot of brokers who maybe wouldn’t work with somebody unless they were ready to purchase, right, unless they were already pre approved. And you sort of took a different approach where you work with people that maybe didn’t even know that they could be buying or didn’t know the path to ownership. And you became their educator, their teacher, their mentor, and then not only helping them purchase, but also explaining investment opportunities as well. Would you say that that was that’s accurate as far as how you found a lot of your business?

Luminita Ispas 9:30
Oh, yes. And I have a lot of stories of people that completely change their life because of their first property or, you know, the investing couple properties.

D.J. Paris 9:40
Yeah, so so for those brokers who are thinking, Oh, you don’t work with somebody until they’re pre approved till they’re ready to buy. That’s, you would probably disagree with that. I imagine.

Luminita Ispas 9:50
Exactly. I mean, I will not take someone out to look at property if they are not ready. Right? By working with them. You know, I put him in touch with somebody who We’ll help them build credit with the lender to share with them, you know, what they have to do? If they are 1099, you know, self employed, you know, they have to explain them a little bit more about how to file taxes. Sure, accountant and, you know, it’s a lot of people that they that they need to be put in touch with. And you know, some of them, they had to learn how to save money. You know, it’s interesting, it’s one of the books that I give away the most, it’s the richest man in Babylon, because it shows you the 10%, right? Pay yourself first. And yes, it’s so it starts with small things like that, you know, teaching them to save 10%, helping them with gifts and putting them in touch with nonprofits, if that’s not an option, if they’re already otherwise. So it’s a lot of little things that people need advice on. And in time, I realized that it was not just the immigrants that didn’t know, you know, how to set the financials. But a lot of the people born in the States, they don’t understand the system. And,

D.J. Paris 11:02
you know, I apologize, I don’t mean to interrupt you. But I was I was one of those people where I did not know, really, I was, I didn’t understand what it would take to purchase a property. And this goes back about about 12 years, and I was 29 years old. And all pretty much all of my friends had already bought a place by then. But I, I was I really just didn’t understand how it worked. And quite frankly, the only reason I know is I had a friend who was a realtor who said, You shouldn’t be renting anymore, you can afford to buy a place. And I said, Oh, really, I was too embarrassed to have asked on my own. So he was nice enough to explain it to me. And quite honestly, I probably would have rented another few years before figuring it out myself. So you are so right, when you say you know that in I was somebody who you know, I was I was actually in a position at a different firm, totally unrelated to real estate, but had to do with finance, and I still didn’t understand it myself. And I was too embarrassed to reach out to people. So I think your your sort of strategy of being that educators, it would have helped somebody like me even maybe a few years before I ever did purchase. So right? I’m a perfect example. Well, congratulations

Luminita Ispas 12:10
on buying your home. It did help you right move in life. Absolutely. I mean, one thing that I mentioned to people that do not think that they can buy or they don’t see the value of buying, I share with them that at this point, the net worth between the tenant and the homeowner, it’s about 45 times larger. So you can imagine if you buy real estate, if you buy a property, your network can be for every 1000 that that a tenant has saved. A homeowner has 45,000 and net worth and equity. Yes, which is an unbelievable number. And 2013, the network was 36 times over, the net worth of a homeowner was 36 times larger. And by 2016. Hence, the number increased to 45 times based on real estate going up in value. So when you look at those number, even if you don’t understand financing, you know which side you want to be on, right? Which side of the fence sure want to be a tenant or do you want to be an owner? And if it takes you a year or two to get there? I mean, isn’t that worth it? You know, a year from now, you’ll be there no matter what, right? But what if you save some money, if you fix a little bit your credit, you pay off your debt, and you’re able to buy I mean, how far forward in your life you’ll be and how your life will change in the future. Right? If you purchase? Absolutely.

D.J. Paris 13:32
Yeah. And I think what you’re talking about to is so important, because, again, going back to me as an example, I was an educated smart person who didn’t understand homeownership, and was too embarrassed to ask anyone. And so as a result, I just I stayed a renter for probably a few years longer than I should have. And when I when I finally went when my friend finally explained to me how lending works, and all the other like the tax benefits, for example, in the interest of deduction for taxes, and everything else. I was like it was life changing for me. And quite quite frankly, there has to be a ton of people just like me, who are probably being ignored by a lot by real by a lot of realtors who just don’t think well he’s renting now. He’s when he was ready to buy he’ll call me. It’s like no, I didn’t know I was ready to buy. Well, someone told me Yeah, so I think that is it. I mean, it is life changing exactly what you said it was. It was a life changing experience. And as a result, of course, I used my friend he was the one that gave me all the information and he became my realtor.

Luminita Ispas 14:38
Exactly. And another time it taketh I wanted to share with you was after I bought my first building, I started seeing other benefits. I start seeing the extra tax deductions I was getting right the depreciation into cash flow and things that you know, when I had a single family home I wouldn’t have right plus US property was getting paid off faster, because now you know, the property was larger, right? Price wise and I was paying a bigger portion of principal every every month, plus the three, four flat buildings tend to go up in value much quicker than single families and condos. And again, this is at least in the last 10 years, that’s what has been happening, but we’ll see from that one. And when you buy a building again, you get a lot more benefits. So learning that and sharing that information with my clients, has also changed my business a lot. And the most of the buyers understood how their life will change how their family life will change. And I’ll give you a very quick example. About 10 years ago, this, this gentleman came to me and he had $100,000. I mean, 10 years ago, you know, choice actually happened? Sure, it actually was in 2010. So I’m sorry, about seven, eight years ago, because the market was down. And you know, people didn’t have a lot of money or didn’t want to spend it right if they had the money.

D.J. Paris 16:07
Or it was it was hard to get financing. So

Luminita Ispas 16:09
he said a team and his brother wanted to buy two flat two each for each to live in one unit, and rent the third, the basement, maybe and get some cash flow. So I sit down with him and ask him I said, Well, what’s your goal? So what’s your financial situation home? And what’s your goal? And he says, Well, I have my home, my wife that works as a cleaning lady. And, you know, we have a nanny that takes care of our two kids. So you know, after my wife’s income covering the nanny, you know, where she’s left with four bucks an hour, right? And no insurance? Well, I’m self employed to self employed, we have no insurance would really, really like and a little bit of extra income. And ask him what he does. And he working constructions, both him and actually and his brother worked in construction. So I said, Why don’t we take a little bit of a different approach. And we bought investment properties, we bought multiple, they fix them up? Well, long story short today, which is, let’s say eight years later, they own about 12 homes, so probably about 20, a little bit over 20 units, he the wife went back to school quit because you know, the cash flow was allowing her to do that went back to school, she became a registered nurse making over 60,000 a year with insurance and everything else, right. And then they have about, I don’t know, 25,000 a month in cash flow, because a lot of the properties that keep buying, refinancing them after they fix them up or rent them, and they pull up the cash and bought more. So they not just change their life, they change, they have a completely different lifestyle. And they were talking about the fact that they won’t need to give their money to their kids. Because now they learn how to teach their own kids do the same thing that they did. So the way I saw this thing was when you teach someone how to reach financial freedom, and how to build wealth, you teach a generation of people, because the kids will see and the kids will do the same thing. And again, you change the life of a person because they can live the life of their dreams. Like this lady that had to was able to quit being a cleaning lady staying home with the kids for a few years and just going to school. And now, you know, having a third kid and again working in the nursing industry.

D.J. Paris 18:20
That’s an incredible story. And I you know, you’re right, you’re teaching that family who teach who sees in the children to see the residual income month after month, indefinitely, you know, and wow. Yeah, that that is truly truly amazing. And I imagine they must think very highly of you for having been the educator and helping them get on that path. So let’s talk a little bit about that. Because you do teach this talk about sort of how you teach it, where you teach it, that sort of thing.

Luminita Ispas 18:51
Sure. So I teach monthly investment seminars, sometimes do the restaurant together with with a mortgage lender that’s helping financing the restaurant, sometimes in my office in the west loop. It usually does last Saturday of the month. However, I’ve been also invited to speak in front of investment groups nonprofits. So different groups now are starting inviting me more and more out to teach what I actually personally do and you know what my other clients have done, they see this financial freedom through my method. And it’s a great way to also meet more people because if you but the thing that I always tell them bring, you know, few friends that are interested in this business, bring your brothers, your sisters, and I’m starting having kids that are 14 year old in the seminars, and you know, their eyes get get so bright. You know, by the end of the seminar, they’re like, Okay, this is it. As soon as I get my first job, this what I’m doing. I mean, my 16 year old daughter that’s been sitting in the seminars to help me as strong. She’s been telling me that too as soon as she goes to college, you will buy a single family home with multiple bedrooms. Oh my god roommates Perfect, that’s right. And, you know, these kids are so bright and so quick to learn it, you know, they see therefore the parents and they learn for themselves. So it’s amazing. I mean, I get a lot of people from, you know, different backgrounds, I recently had a client that told me that he grew up, you know, in the project in the section or section eight housing, and he bought at three flat where he’s going to live for free and make 500 bucks a month in cash flow, that is a

D.J. Paris 20:26
huge victory, a huge victory to to live for free and earn income. On a property in particular, coming from a disadvantaged background is a amazing, and you know, it’s it’s so funny, because we have, there’s so often brokers and we have a GZ. But at our firm, we’ve got almost 600 brokers. And so few of them do these kinds of seminars, and I always tell them, it’s really, I mean, obviously, you have to learn enough information to be able to present this to to the public. But there, you can partner up with attorneys, with lenders with title companies, who will also share the cost of hosting these and talk about their portion of real estate transaction. So you can have these partners who will gladly help put these sorts of seminars together. And I think it’s a such a missed opportunity for so many people, so many brokers in particular. So I’m glad you’re talking about it. You’re also almost finished with your with, is it your first book? Can you talk about it, you might

Luminita Ispas 21:30
be sure. So my life dream was again to make a difference, right? One was through building Romania, the tallest building in Europe as this way attract, you know, tourism and bringing attention to my country, which I think is one of the most beautiful in the world, by the way. And that one thing that again, I’ve learned, especially when I got here was education, it’s actually the way that we can change the world. I think in capital generation, you know, if we change the way we think, and if we learn new things that will change our life and change others, you know, we can change the world. So one thing I learned was, you know, I don’t have to be someone talking to the whole globe, right, I don’t have to be a president or I have been, I have to do is change the life of one person at a time. So financial freedom, I discovered it is the first step, it’s hard to follow your dream, you know, let’s say if you’re an artist, and you can make money, it’s hard to follow that unless you put food on the table, right, and you have a roof above, above your head. So I thought if I can teach people how to become financially free by buying properties, and, and you know, they can buy from, even if they make 10 bucks an hour, right, they will be qualified for something for a little bit of a loan, and they build from there. So if I can start people, I’m sorry, if I can teach people to how to become financially free, then they will help others and they will help their own families to repeat what they did. And then go and and do what they were meant to do in life, be able to quit the job that they are not happy with, and follow the dreams, right? So in my book, I’m teaching financial freedom with using leverage using low down payments, and how to also become a millionaire. So by the time you retire, you don’t need to rely on Social Security, you don’t need to rely on anybody to help you. Right, you can support yourself from your investment properties from the cash flow. And especially if by that time the properties are paid off, you know, you’re going to be a multimillionaire and have maybe 10s of 1000s of dollars in cash flow.

D.J. Paris 23:40
Absolutely. It talk about if you don’t mind, tell us a little bit about how you go about finding investment properties for your clients is there are are most of them on the MLS, are they off market properties?

Luminita Ispas 23:55
That’s a great question. Because that’s one of my biggest challenges right now. So when we say MLS, especially in the last several years have been was easier than today. With the pricing going up, of course is getting a little bit more, a little bit harder. But in general, I do maybe three quarters MLS and core off market. So I knock on doors, if I need to, I would if I see a property I think it will match one of my clients interest. I also developed a relationship with a lot of brokers through the years so because I sell a lot of three four unit buildings, you know, when I when I’m the I’m on the buyer side of the transaction, I always tell that listing agent if you get any other three four flat please make sure you call me first because I have ready willing buyer that will pay top dollar for this property and the transaction will be seamless. And you know I’m closing on every transaction because my clients are serious and, you know, we’re not atypical. We want to close we want these homes. So you know I got the report Usually they close on my deals. So even multiple offers, sometimes I get the property, because I’m known to to be involved in the deal, you know, I have an assistant and we make it easy for the listing side, and we close. And so between that and MLS and like I said other other people that are contacting me, that’s how I get my properties. Oh, and to mention that, again, I’m an investor myself, I buy property myself, so I’m on investor list also. So I receive emails from sellers, big investors that are selling their portfolios there other properties that they might have. So this way, I get to access to properties that only investors get.

D.J. Paris 25:45
What advice would you have to a broker? Who says, you know, I really don’t do this part of the business where I’m working with, with educating the public about investing, and I need to get educated myself, you know, as a broker, what would what resources would you recommend, where they could start to learn how to, you know, be able to share this knowledge with with with their clients?

Luminita Ispas 26:08
That again, that’s another great question. Well, number one, they can always come to my seminars. That’s true. That’s open to them. And actually, side note, I do help a lot of realtors buy their own properties, just,

D.J. Paris 26:20
I bet you do. Yeah. But

Luminita Ispas 26:23
I always tell even all the new agents in my office, buy a property yourself by yourself, you cannot teach what you don’t know, you know, paper knowledge is not the same at hands on knowledge. So no matter how much I share with you how to choose a tenant, how to run the numbers for a building, they’re not going to make sense until you own your own building, and you see around, you know, rents coming in and expenses, and you have to actually pay the gas bill every month and the water bill every month. You won’t understand that until you own it. So to the brokers that want to be to work with investors, I always tell them, you have to buy first. Plus, a lot of investors actually ask you, how many properties do you have? Imagine if you have nothing to say, well, sorry, I would mean how many I have none, right? It’s just as a work. Because those brokers are going to I mean, I’m sorry, those buyers are going to lose trust in you. And the Love Actually, of the buyers I’m working with and the investment side, they have worked with multiple brokers before me. Oh, I’m sure I’m sure. And you know, we meet who knows where we start talking about real estate, not even trying to convert anyone to work with me and see my knowledge, seeing what I do, you know, I’m ready to build right now a building and I just remodeled a couple of properties this year. So it’s kind of like when they see the amount of knowledge they they just said, Hey, by the way, I was looking to buy two, can you help me? And as we start working, I always cuz I always ask, I say what do you have a broker to work with? Because if you do, you know, you should work with that person. I mean, they put the time in. And they will say, you know, I’m sorry, but I can work with them. I mean, talking to you and talking to them, it’s a big deal. They don’t understand what to send me when they send me to fly, they send them to me, because they’re beautiful. They don’t get the numbers, or they say, oh, disagree theory of it, if the half a million dollar property $2,000 Rent a month, it just doesn’t work. So, so again, my advice is guys, put your money where your mouth is buy investment property, you know, fix it up a little bit, find tenants, and then when you know, all those sides of the business, you know how numbers work, how to fix a property and where to find contractors How to Choose tenants, you know, the tenant process gets in Chicago, it’s not easy, you know, to be a landlord. I mean, there are a lot of rules. So you have to understand all the paperwork and be able to and willing to give it to your tenant to your tenant and advise them on that. You know how to set up an LLC is right if they are investors, have the attorneys at ready to send them to mortgage broker, again, you when you work with a mortgage broker that owns property, it’s easier to invest to send to an investor. Because, you know, these investors, some of them have a lot of properties. So they want a mortgage broker that understands, you know, what they’re standing and how to find finesse, right, the financials to work to make them work and to advise them. So, again, this is the biggest investment, I mean, advice, read books, go to seminars, investment seminars, everybody that comes in town, and then buy yourself properties.

D.J. Paris 29:22
Well, you I think you said it all. And I think that was so well said and succinct. If there’s any, you know, clients out there that are interested in working with you and your team directly what’s the best way they can reach out to you?

Luminita Ispas 29:38
Thank you. Oh, number my cell phone it’s 773-392-2906 My email it’s my first name dot last name@gmail.com So Luminita that especially gmail.com and I’m at Century 21 is gr

D.J. Paris 29:57
well illuminate at Lumi this was Such a pleasure. And you said it all. And you said it? Well, you know, again, just this idea of investing and learning about investing to be a better broker to your clients. And again, you know, somebody had the conversation with me initially about buying, but they didn’t take it to the next level and say, actually, instead of buying a condo, you should probably buy a three flat, right? So as a result of that I didn’t buy a three flat because I didn’t know. So had I had, you know, had somebody who was able to have that conversation with me at that time. It may have changed everything as far as how I purchased the property going forward. So I think your advice is awesome. And thank you so much for your time.

Luminita Ispas 30:42
Oh, my pleasure. Thank you.

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Karen Ranquist has been not only a top producer for the past twenty years, but an involved top producer! In addition to earning a spot in the Berkshire Hathaway Hall of Fame, she’s also served on many boards and helped shape the Chicago broker market. We’re honored she took an hour out of her schedule to talk about how she got into the business, what advice she has for brokers looking to increase production, and the importance of giving back to the community.

Karen Ranquist can be reached at 312.475.4542 and kranquist@KoenigRubloff.com

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:14
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real. The only podcast made by Chicago real estate agents for Chicago real estate agents. My name is DJ Parris. I am your host through the show. And I forgot to mention at the beginning of last episode that we have officially crossed over the 30 episode mark. And we’re so grateful and excited that people are interested to keep listening to the show, our audience keeps growing, we keep getting more people to interview. And we’re also grateful, of course, to those top producers who graciously give their time to share with you their story of how they started in real estate and have grown their business to today and in hopes that you can take something away from that and help your own real estate practice. A couple of things to mention for 2018, we see very big things for us and a couple of changes or additions rather, we’re going to continue Of course with Carrie McCormick, we do a monthly episode called the Monday market minute. It’s the first Monday of every month where Carrie talks about here’s what brokers need to know about the market. And she answers your questions if you’re ever curious, what you’d love to be able to ask questions of a top producer Kerry’s 18 years and veteran top producer. And she she does that. And then also we’re going to be doing another regular episode once a month buy from Eric workman and this is what brokers need to know about investing. And Eric is a top producer as well, exclusively really working with investors and doing his own investments. So he is going to be doing a regular episode, we’re gonna recording our first first one next week. So we’re really, really excited to bring Eric into the studio as well for that. And also, please continue to share this podcast with other brokers that you think could be interested in learning what top producers do tell a friend and also send us your questions. Right. So we’ve gotten a lot of great suggestions from our brokers, which helps when I interview brokers I ask those questions and or ask them to carry and so please continue to send those to us. You can find us on Facebook at keeping it real pod and also our website which is keeping it real pod.com We’ve got a few more episodes to go up before the end of the year. Today is a fantastic interview that we did with top producer, great person Karen Rehnquist. I’m really excited to share this with you here in just a moment. And then lastly, we’re doing we now have a sponsorship opportunity. So you’ll hear an episode or rather an advertisement here in just a moment for a one of our sponsors. And if you’d like to sponsor an episode, just let us know and we’ll tell you how that works. So thanks so much and onto our interview with Karen.

This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by Loftus law. I’m sorry the attorney is busy with something more important is something you will never hear when you call Patrick Loftus of Loftus law. Loftus law is a firm focused on serving real estate professionals and their clients you want your deals to close on time without headaches and Loftus law is the solution. For more information on what Loftis law can do for you and your clients and special pricing of 299 per closing call 773-632-8330 or email Patrick at Loftus hyphen law.com

Okay, today on the show we have Karen Rehnquist. Now Karen started her real estate career in 1997. Prior to that, she worked for five years as a licensed social worker and Chicago Public Schools. She became a full service agent in 1999 and was instantly recognized as Rookie of the Year at her initial company. In addition to being a broker with now she is with Berkshire Hathaway, a coding we should say BHHS coding ruble off Realty Group. Karen is also the primary real estate broker for a highly regarded builder of custom properties in Chicago. Karen’s expertise lies in working with contemporary single family homes, condos, row homes and new construction projects throughout the city. Karen has been an annual Top Producer over her 20 year career she is in the top 1% of producers in Chicago Association of Realtors, and her current individual production has ranked her number 73 As of September 2017. And this was pulled from the MLS and also published by Chicago real producers magazine which I happen to have a monthly column in that magazine as well. So shout out to Chicago producers magazine. She was also just recently inducted into Berkshire Hathaway’s Hall of Fame, which is a very big deal because they are I don’t know if they’re the largest real estate company in in the country, but certainly one of the top two or three care Aaron has also been featured in Crain’s Chicago, social ces interiors, curved and Chicago magazine for her real estate opinion, she has remained active in the community, including serving for over five years on cars Grievance Committee. And also she was a former vice president of the Women’s Council of realtors. So Karen, thank you so much for your time.

Karen Ranquist 5:22
Oh, TJ, thank you so much. I’m so glad to be here. And thank you for that great introduction. I really love what you guys are doing with this podcast. And I feel like it just fills a void for a place that realtors can share tips and ideas and things like that you don’t you you don’t have the opportunity to really hear from other realtors in this in this light and about their practice. Well,

D.J. Paris 5:47
that’s the intention. And it’s so funny, because just yesterday I got a, a message. I think it might have been through Facebook, but it may have been an email from a Berkshire Hathaway agent. And they, you know, just out of the blue and unsolicited message saying how much they love the show. And here we are. And I think you’re the first Berkshire broker we’ve had on the show, and I’m sure we’ll have many more, but we are so happy to have you on the show. So tell us about how you got started in real estate.

Karen Ranquist 6:15
Gosh, it was so long ago. But I would say while I was a social worker was obviously a very demanding job. But in the mean, in the summers and some evenings I was working on rink was had some projects out in the suburbs, and I started doing just some stuff out on the weekends and kind of morphed into doing some of the closings. And I really had this like natural affinity, this this, I really enjoyed doing sales and being with people helping people. And, you know, one thing led to another and the timing was just right, we had started a project in the city and I was wanting to become a full time agent, I got my license, I moved over to a large company that provided me with some great initial training, some great mentorship. And we took our you know, our first project, it was a building on in, in East Village and at 839 Hermitage, our first kind of city project, kind of the rest is history as far as building a niche for that type of property. And and, you know, growing over the years in in new construction, and the sales aspect of it was just so it was just so fun for me.

D.J. Paris 7:33
Yeah, it tell us a little bit about how, you know how you’ve changed your business over the 20 years? What have you seen change?

Karen Ranquist 7:42
And yeah, I bet. You know, I feel like, oh, go ahead.

D.J. Paris 7:48
No, tell us what you’ve seen change. And it’d be you know, well, let me give it a bigger context. So I know coaching and mentoring is really important to you. I know you mentioned you have a coach, which I love that somebody with as much experience and successes as you has a coach and what I find is almost everyone I interview who are they’re all top one percenters for the podcast, they all have coaches too. But But talk a little bit about, you know, what advice, what you’ve seen change and what you coach and mentor brokers who may be newer to the business, you know, throughout your experience that you’ve seen, you know, is more meeting more relevant today than ever.

Karen Ranquist 8:25
But definitely, I mean, all those things. I mean, I think when I started it was, you know, it was kind of before the big building, boom, and we were able to kind of get our feet wet start with some smaller buildings, really did some resale at the time had, like I said, I had some about three very strong agents that helped me guided me in the very beginning, I came in with a girlfriend who was her and her husband were buying and selling a place and she trusted me to to kind of hit the ground running. And I quickly paired up with an agent that had actually sold our first house that we had built in the city. And you know, under her kind of guidance and mentorship, I was able to really service my my first two deals very well which being at that open house led to meeting a client and so on and so on and so on. So, you know, I think initially it was just gathering information and then building that new construction arena was was so strong for me, I mean, it it’s very different than than a resale transaction because with the resale transaction you can see feel and touch and you know, you can really go in and tell people what they need to do. And you know, well, staging wasn’t as big as it is now but you know, kind of learning from the very beginning truly from the ground up and you know, a new construction project can be two, two and a half years from from start to finish. So, you know, it really is a fun full time job in itself, but also being able to fill in, you know, fill in some of that with, with the, with the resale business with the buying and selling. I think if you’re asking more like what are what is kind of happened over the years, you know, so many different things from from then and, you know, as the market continued to grow and everything was just so great. And then all of a sudden it wasn’t. So I think one of the things that really kept all of us that that are, you know, that are still around, was sticking to the basics, you know, going back to two hard knocks, sales tactics, and I think I’ve heard you on some of the podcasts talking about writing letters and working your sphere and your contacts and stuff like that. And, you know, I think you you just always have to you always have to, to, to go back to that and go back to cash, I’m kind of losing my train of thought about it. But you know, it’s hard to go from, like, the very beginning to to now but I think, yeah, I think to get through the harder times and, you know, continue to be successful in the business. It’s, it’s taking the things that you learned and, and being able to really guide your client to making the right decision. You know, it’s it’s a huge decision. And it is such an emotional transit transaction. It’s the biggest thing that most your clients will do in their lifetime. And they’re entrusting you to such a such an important thing that, you know, I find it so important and valuable to be the best resource that I can for them.

D.J. Paris 11:46
Yeah, and what advice do you have for newer brokers aside? Obviously, you know, we talked about fundamentals and always coming back to the basics of you know, okay, working your sphere of influence, meeting new people staying in touch? What advice do you have for brokers who are newer, who really want to specialize? Because I know you specialize? Let’s talk a little bit about your special because we talked about it a little bit where you do both resale and and new construction or in development? Can you talk a little bit about what the breakdown is in your business? What percentage of the time? Are you working with developers or, or the public? Can you talk a little bit more about?

Karen Ranquist 12:24
Sure, sure. So you know, in the beginning, I was as we were growing the development business, it was probably close to 5050, as which gave me a great basis and starting ground for how the real real estate, you know, a seller or buyer transaction is going to work and how to really learn the ins and outs of that aspect of the business. But at the same time, as we were growing the new construction business, it kind of naturally progressed into kind of moving from the large company, I went to a company that only worked on new construction, I kind of brought our construction there, gathered as much information from my as I could from from that broker, he was so gracious and wonderful. And then it really kind of again, naturally progressed into just working on my own with our, you know, with our rank was prior to product, I would say that for a very long period of time, though, I think I was on my own for what, nine years almost. And I did almost all of our new construction business with my resale really starting mostly to be our past clients, and then some other small developers as well. So really a long period of time of 75 to almost 90% of new construction, and always trying to get in, you know, some some resale there. But the 2008 happened 2009 happened, everything slowed down. I was able to really draw upon the relationships and people that I had been working with and keeping in contact with and having a little more resale of business at that time to kind of sustain things and was also a time where I thought I could really use some more support and that was when I moved over to Berkshire Hathaway, which was about seven years ago. So kind of last year, your main question being the advice to a new broker and all those things you know, sticking to the basics I again I’ve heard you talk a lot about that the art of even writing a letter and being in touch with people and you know, making it your own you know, everybody can can be on social media and send out eblasts and mailers but I tried to really make it personal like I will scour the internet and gosh, you know, for instance, I had these great clients, they were such such great people and I sold two houses for them and they had this incredible home one of my favorite homes in Wicker Park and they had this like, you know, kind of like in the 70s where you had like a pit in a lower pit, but it was just it was so amazing I have a couple of it on my you know, pictures of it on my, my Instagram, but I, you know I’ll find on on like dwell or something on another site, I’ll see something else I’ll see something similar and just thinking of them and just sending them a text, you know, be it like midnight going, Gosh, I can’t help myself, this just makes me think of, you know, of your place and how much I liked your place or, you know, I have somebody that lived in a building that was 100 years ago, it was a bar and I found a picture of their house as a bar and I’m like, Oh my gosh, I have to send you this so so you know, constantly touching out to those clients that do you have, it’s such a intense relationship for such a period of time with these people. I mean, you you know, you really like miss them after the transaction is over. Because you really go through so much with with these people that you you know, you they become your friends, they become people that you think about and, you know, everything like like keeping up with the year that a year that goes by and then the next year that goes by and kind of you know, birthdays, birthdays, just everything you can do on a on a general level. But I really feel like if you can find those special things about those special clients and and and think, you know, you’re really I’m thinking of them if I see something on social media, I’m like, I’ve got to send this to them or just a random article, I’ll screenshot it and I you know, I hope they appreciate it and kind of get a kick out of it. And we can have a little laugh about a you know, funny story that happened in the transaction or something like you know, like, the place that used to be a bar or something really unique like that make it make it really personal to me is something that that is more my style. Kind of transitioning to the other part of your question about advice for a new agent, there’s so much technology and I I am I’m on board it is amazing it is what we can do and find and see for our clients and and how the the market is moving. It’s just just amazing. To start back literally when there were books they used to um that old where you’d like flip through them for the for you know, I mean it was it to what we have now and it is just truly just just incredible and

D.J. Paris 17:21
now it’s moved so much from you know in what Karen’s referencing is the MLS used to not of course be online and there were books and you would have to go typically you’d go to a real estate office and look through all the homes for sale and and that’s transitioned of course to the MLS being online but now it’s even sort of beyond just being because it’s crazy don’t even need you tend to see the MLS right like clients do not need brokers to get access to the MLS but

Karen Ranquist 17:48
they’re not you know they need to get access to the right information and ended up kind of you know us the the real estate agents I think you know, there’s there’s no secret to this business, any real estate agent that’s successful works nonstop anybody that there really is no secret we all have a different style we all have a different you know strength or a reason why we hook up with the people that we hook up with but but but but but there is no secret I mean it really it is all about hard work and you know it you know a client can find something on a site but is that the most current information is it is it you know, I have an amazing client that I’ve done a bunch of transactions with that I just I like her you know, she’s just so much fun and such a great person and I you know, really enjoyed meeting her as a client and just maintaining a friendship with her. She you know, she’s like and she has a lot of she’s in a big business and very well known and you know, has a lot of contacts and when she thought of this dear friend of hers, she’s like Karen you know everything there is to know about schools you have two kids you’ve been in the city forever you have to work with this friend of mine and I just was so touched that she you know in in having so many contacts and and people that she knows that she’s like you know not only knows that I would really really really take care of her friends so well but that I can offer this insight to being a mom in the city with two kids and how to navigate and being a working professional with the ins and outs of what it’s like to you know start with your kid and 18 months out you know I’ve been in the city my kids been in the city their entire life so so something like that to me it’s just you know, the referral basis is where the majority of my businesses and to have that past client refer me to this client it just it means so much to me as an agent and just reminds us that we you know we all have our strengths and things that we can bring to the to the transaction and to our clients and I think it’s really important just to focus on what what you know the best so you can be that best that best partner for your client and and you can’t find that online and and I don’t think you’ll ever be able no matter where the internet and social media goes there’s, there’s things we know about each city block and each park and each, you know, where you can have dogs and where you can’t and where you know how many steps it is. Anyone can tell you how many steps it is to the train, but we can tell you what I can tell you what restaurants and, and how far away the Starbucks is, or the stands doughnuts. And it’s just a service that I think makes makes us kind of kind of internet proof. And in that sense,

D.J. Paris 20:25
agreed. And I think it’s nice to know that clients can access a listings without a broker, because then it’s like, Okay, now what do they do with that information? And that’s where the broker gets to come in and really shine to say, okay, true. These are, you know, it’s not under lock and key anymore to see the the database of available listings. But here’s what to do with that information. I’m here to guide you through every step of it. And I think that’s, that’s particularly useful, I’ll share this just happened in over the Thanksgiving holiday last week. So my parents are they have a home in North Myrtle Beach and they’re trying to it’s a condo, they’re trying to sell it and they’ve been trying to sell it forever. And it’s, it’s, they’ve gone through a number of Realtors, my parents are very easy clients. But for whatever reason, it’s just the markets, not very strong out there and whatever. But my dad was saying, because I was curious. And I said, Oh, who’s your realtor now? Because they’ve gone through several of them over the over the years. And, and, and he said, Oh, it’s so and so. And I don’t remember the name. But he’s I said, Oh, do you like him? Is he doing a good job. And he’s, he said, he goes, I’ll tell you the one thing. And over the years out there, my parents have used like five different realtors. And he said, The reason I like this guy, everyone is basically telling him, Okay, here’s the right price. And that’s all pretty universal with the brokers he’s worked with out there. But he said, what this guy does is whenever there’s a showing, because my parents aren’t, aren’t there, they don’t live there. So it’s this remote sort of situation. He he, the broker, the listing agent, this, this gentleman will make a really big deal to contact and continually hound, the broker representing the buyer after the showing just to get feedback. And we all know that m read, the system sort of sends that automatically a lot of times brokers don’t fill it out. And you know, it’s that information is kind of oftentimes by the wayside. But this broker makes it a point to really like keep calling and saying what’s your client think we want feedback to, to make improvements and changes. And then he relays all of that information to my dad. And I mean, it’s a simple thing that more brokers probably ought to do, but my dad thinks it’s the coolest thing ever. Because he goes, nobody ever did that. Nobody ever told me, here’s the feedback we got, we’re getting. And it’s always little cosmetic things like oh, we, you know, we noticed the paint was a little chipped in this one room. And my dad’s like, this is great, because I didn’t have this information, you notice,

Karen Ranquist 22:49
and I’ll try to be very honest with this with with show, you know, when I’m representing the buyer, because I would want you know, I appreciate that as well when I can get, you know, if I have three realtors say, you know, Karen, we, my client loves the house, but it just, it’s just priced too aggressively or, you know, it’s too open or it’s too this or it’s too, you know, it’s it’s very, it’s very important to me, I think to get we you know, we don’t have a crystal ball we can we can go through CMAs and work on past sales. And, you know, the market is, especially in today’s market, it’s so ever changing, it’s so it’s so unpredictable on some, in some senses that to get feedback, actual feedback from your, you know, your colleagues is so important. And you know, it kind of leads to the relationship we have with our colleagues and how how vital it is to me. And again, I’m also thinking of like, what advice to give to a new agent, you know, this relationship of kind of aligning yourself with other successful brokers, and what do they do in their practice that makes them successful? And, you know, what can what can we learn from from them that we’re not doing and what can we offer them as as as advice because we don’t, you know, we all don’t know everything, and each person can offer some insight that that maybe we didn’t think about or we might have overlooked or whatnot. So, you know, I feel like I have, you know, just for instance, like I so respect and admire to women, you know, they’re just your friends and for many, many years, you know, Ivana accouterment COVID and Sophia Copus. And I, you know, if I’m having a really hard time with something just to have the ability to say, you know, what, do you guys think of this price? Or what do you think of that and, and hopefully being able to reciprocate a little bit to them, and really just say, Hey, how is this working for you? I’m trying this new thing on a website and have you had success with that or, or whatnot. And I think too, you know, even with this podcast, I think it’s so great because we don’t know I mean, there’s there’s some things work better for others and some things just aren’t as successful and to hear what other you know, agents that that you respect and admire their business to be able to have them share that with you, it’s just so important and means so much to me to be able to have, you know, the relationship with with our colleagues. I mean, because that nobody in real estate knows how, how many hats we wear, and how crazy this business gets and how many different things we have to do for our clients except other realtors. So to approach a transaction, you know, not adversarially but but but but with it. Of course, it’s such a weird relationship because we represent the sellers and buyers, we’re on opposite ends, we may be at opposite even if we’re in the same company, it’s it’s, it’s such a weird variety of relationships and different, you know, lawyer personality and inspectors and no situation is the same. But, you know, if you can kind of go in with, you know, a feeling, you know, I know this agent and I know how they are going to do the best they can and, and work, you know, have that camaraderie and assurance that the agent’s going to be a professional as well. It just makes everything else so much more pleasant, because we know, in any transaction, something crazy is going to happen. And, you know, to try to remain calm and supportive. And, and and, you know, just to get along is is crucial, I think to these transactions that are never easy. They’re never easy. Well, let’s

D.J. Paris 26:20
Yeah, let’s talk about some ways people can get involved with the community because obviously, not everyone works at a large firm. And not everyone works at a firm where there’s a lot of collaboration or over

Karen Ranquist 26:33
the course, of course, I worked on my own for nine years. And I struggled I needed that, that that camaraderie I needed that and I think you’re, I have a feeling you’re gonna lead into something like WC er, or one of these other great networking organizations that that can provide that.

D.J. Paris 26:50
Yeah, to talk about some of the organizations that you’ve been a member of, and in the benefits you’ve received, like, for example, Women’s Council of Realtors, yeah, you

Karen Ranquist 26:57
know, especially when I worked on my own it was it’s, it’s a hard it’s a hard it’s hard to not have, you know, I just I love being at Berkshire and you don’t let me check with my managing broker. It’s just such a, it’s such a wonderful thing to, to have that I didn’t for all that time. And, you know, I really craved being with other agents and getting their knowledge and support and the networking. So I did two things I did join W CR I gosh, I can’t even remember what led me there. It was years ago, because I started as a member for a little while and then I went into a different position. I think it was with membership because we were really starting to try to you know, turn things around and get get more members this is this is a while ago, and then I kind of moved that into to Vice President and just found that the networking the relationship with the other members and and of course the programming the programming was great the people that would come in and talk about what they did with their business and bring in a lender and current trends and staging and a million different topics but and and that they were hosted in different like, you know, development offices or different offices in different places throughout the city that was like, you’re getting so much in an hour and a half or something like that, you’re getting the networking and a training, and you’re and you’re getting to view a cell center. So it was it was a great experience to be a part of it. And it’s such an important counsel to have an outlet look for us as agents to be able to, you know, to talk to one another.

D.J. Paris 28:35
Yeah, there’s there’s a lot you know, there’s a number of these types of organizations Women’s Council of Realtors, which by the way, is like $100 a year, it’s the best $100 you’ll you’ll ever spend. I agree something like that. I don’t think it’s much more than that. And then you know, there’s the there’s the YPN, which is if you’re a car member are actually they have the YPN and all the different boards, whether your main street or car, Northshore, Barrington era, they all have the Young Professionals Network, and those are amazing as well. And you don’t have to be young, I’m certainly not young. I’m part of it. And but all of these places are was so funny, as before we started recording this, Karen and we were talking about some Karen was nice enough to have listened to some of the other episodes. And probably she listened to get it to get a sense of the show. But also she’s like those are some of her friends. And I suspect it’s not just because top producers all hang out together. I suspect there’s a little of that. But Karen’s just really, you’re really, really involved. And I think just as a nature, I bet you probably know 75% of the people we’ve interviewed for this show, and it’s not because there’s a special secret club of 1% producers, where you all hang out on the weekends. But you’re just you’ve been around for for several decades and you’re really involved in the community. You’ve also been on cars. You’ve been on boards at Chicago Association of Realtors,

Karen Ranquist 29:50
yeah, I worked with the Grievance Committee for a number of years and that was just such a great board and such dedicated people and it was a tough board. You know, I got it. I learned a lot lot on that, but it it, it was really a great learning experience and the people that were involved were, were really wonderful and people that I see out you know, he Do you have a special relationship with them, I’ll see them at a showing or at an event or somewhere and you’re, you know, you kind of have a special fondness for, for the time that you spent or serve together at on a board it is a it is a really, you know, it’s an important thing to do. And I think you get a lot out of it, as well as putting, you know the little what you put in, I think you certainly get get more out of it. And, you know, certainly a great place for new agents to start and, and meet other agents, it’s so it’s so nice and in your buyers, you know, like when I when I go to showings or when when Realtors come to a showing of mine and we have a relationship or a camaraderie and a general comfort with one another when we’re doing the showing it just the buyer feels feels feel sad and can say like, if some you know, the biggest compliment is if I come with a with a buyer to a showing, and the agent says you are in great hands with Karen. I mean, it just that means so much to me that that, uh, you know, another real estate professional can can say with with, you know, hopefully sincerity in front of my client that, you know, she’s gonna take care of you and and, and I, you know, I feel the same when when I have people come to my listings, and it’s just that I’ve had a positive relationship or transaction or interaction with that agent. And, you know, it really is all about the relationship. And that’s what this business is, I mean, you know, you can have people that are in jobs, where they’re negotiating all sorts of money and all sorts of different deals and, and so many different things. And, and, and it it’s a different, it’s a different transaction, I mean, what you do in in, in other negotiations just isn’t going to kind of be the same as what you’re going to do when you’re buying and selling your own piece of property. There is absolutely an emotional component to it.

D.J. Paris 32:04
Yeah, and the other thing, too, is, and I always like to make this point about, you know, fine getting involved with the community and and really learning from realtors, obviously the show is is about talking to two top producers and asking them what they do. But I just want to make the point to the audience that I mean, aside from character who I met, I think I met you prior to this podcast even happening, I don’t think the podcast was even existed, which was you know, it’s only been around several months now. But but but when I met you is just very, very briefly, but aside from that, I think maybe only one of the other people we have about 30 episodes, one of the other people I knew the rest we just reached out to and said, Hey, would you like to be on the show? And would you be kind enough to share some time to talk about how you became successful. So if you you know, if you’re a broker out there who isn’t connected as deeply into the community, and you maybe you don’t have as supportive of an environment where your office or it’s not a big network? You know, the reason why I’m able to talk to someone like Karen, is we reached out to Karen and said, Would you be happy to? Would you be grateful enough to or we’re very grateful. But would you be generous enough to devote a few minutes to talking to the public and she cared? Obviously, it’s extraordinarily kind to do. So but so is everyone else that we’ve interviewed. And these are just people we reached out of the blue. So I just want to make a point that if you’re a broker out there, you’re like, Well, I don’t know anybody in the industry, get involved go to the Women’s Council of Realtors, even if you’re a man go to the Women’s Council. Yeah,

Karen Ranquist 33:28
it’s definitely yes, definitely, that’s a good place to

D.J. Paris 33:32
go to the YPN events reach out to these top producers. And not all of them will have time for you. But some of them will. And you’ll be absolutely surprised and shocked at how few how few times do these top producers even get asked for advice or help it is they’re they’re very busy with their own business, but they don’t get as many requests. I don’t know if Karen, you may be the exception to that. But I don’t know how often people come up and say I’m brand new, you know, would you get to give me a few minutes of advice. I’m obviously you’re doing that here on the show, but it’s um, it’s surprisingly easy. People are very kind.

Karen Ranquist 34:08
Yeah, and they are I mean, people people are I mean, there are I think that, you know, you go through so much as an agent and you you know, you go through so much as an agent and you you just if certain parts of transactions, you can just kind of go oh, well at least, you know, I know that aid, you know, this agents going to do the best that they can and that’s really all you know, it’s really all you can do. But just to have that that relationship really makes the you know, it really makes the transaction much more much much smoother, much more enjoyable and honestly at times more tolerable because sometimes things can get pretty tricky when we when we do this this business this business is is it’s tough business and it’s it’s good to have to have allies and you know, kind of going back to having, you know, colleagues that you can, can can lean on and count on for support and, and, you know, kind of going outside of your comfort zone and reaching out to other agents, like you said with these newer agents to, to, you know, approach a more experienced agent I did, when I started, I’ll never forget the people that helped me. I mean, even when I was navigating, you know, the most basic things and, and now, I mean, I, you know, I’m not the greatest on technology, and I gotta ask, you know, I have to ask people all the time for help, and it is really, it is important to, you know, to help each other out. And, you know, I think one other thing, too, you know, on the, on that new agent thing that, and we’ve talked a lot about, like, you know, how amazing the internet and technology and how much it’s changed from the very, very beginning. But, um, you know, it don’t forget, you know, not just going back to basics, but so much like, is on a text message or on a this or that, or, you know, we have to if we’re not going to meet face to face everyday, but there’s so much to be said, for just picking up the phone and talking to somebody because we all know that emails can be misconstrued. And God knows a text message is even less personal than that. And that we’re also busy, but just, you know, if we’re negotiating or finding out information, you know, just pick up the phone, let’s just talk about it. Because there’s so many more things that we can, you know, we can figure out together on the phone or in person than just a quick text back and forth. So it’s, it’s very, you know, it’s great to embrace technology, but we also can’t forget about what, you know, what, what, what really connects us. So, you know, that would kind of be my, my last piece of advice if we were talking about a new agent, and what you know, and what to do.

D.J. Paris 36:42
Yeah, I think I think you’re so right about that. And you talked at the beginning of when we were at the beginning of this conversation about really looking for those personalized connections, where are pits of information, where it’s like, oh, they had that they had that in ground tub, you know, that 70 style, sort of walk down into a bathtub. And I saw another picture of one so I’m going to send it out to my client or I know my clients, you know, their, their daughter is starting first grade and that’s probably a really stressful and hard time for you them to you know, see their daughter off to school or whatever, it might be anything personalized, where you can have that reason i i Always I’m going to I’m eventually going to have a podcast episode called nobody wants to read your newsletter. And it’s more than just a tongue in cheek but nobody wants to read your newsletter but what they do want not that you shouldn’t have one and that’s fine if you do but in addition to having a newsletter it’s like pick up the phone and call them and see how they’re doing and ask them about their lives and remember their birth

Karen Ranquist 37:48
year I mean there’s you can’t do that with with every client but there’s you know, there’s there’s clients that you will be in contact and then there’s there’s there’s different you know, different kinds of ways you can reach out to people on a broad sense to you know, tell people in a certain area that you have a new listing or to give statistics on a certain area that somebody would be interested in but but these people that have bought and sold with you and people that have referred you and people that you know that that are you know a source of business for you you you want to you know it’s fun, I mean you love it it’s a great way to connect with people and and you know, kind of think of a funny story that happened with you guys or you know, if you like to you know to work out and I’ve heard another one of your agents talk or one of the agents at talk talked about that and you know, it’s funny I going back when you and I were talking earlier I’m going to jump really far ahead and hopefully we can kind of go back a little bit more to kind of the nitty gritty with like the the marketing and other things that I just love and kind of fill in that like what might make me different as an agent but but um you know, one of the things as far as like, ways to touch out with those people that are important to you or source of referral or business or whatever I have after all these years I have been an independent realtor, I’ve had assistants I’ve worked with other agents as as as partners. But but as far as a team, I’ve really never established that and, and and boy after 20 years of you really just can’t do it all. I mean, you really can’t and to you know balance my kids and some sort of a social life and whatnot, it is you know, there is something to be said for for for bringing somebody on and you and I have a mutual friend in in in Sook who has joined my team with me. And you know, just last night we had an event for her, where she invited her her some of her closest people to kind of say, Hey, I’m in real estate now. And let’s make this fun. We had it at a gallery in the in the west loop, this amazing woman and I could give her information as well, that does jewelry design, and she was kind enough to open up her studio to us. And then we had another dear friend of souks, who is a makeup artist and hairstylist that did a presentation a small presentation for all of us on like, literally how to use the makeup that’s already in your bag. And it was just such a great fun night and such a great way to you know, get people together kind of say, hey, you know, Sook is taking this transition, she’s working with Karen, you know, I have this long history in the business, and couple it with some wine and some some food. And, and this, this just like, I learned so much about how to actually put on makeup, it was really, it was just a great night.

D.J. Paris 40:59
Yeah, those events are so wonderful. And I think, you know, are a lot of brokers, you don’t have to spend a fortune doing them either. times, a lot of times, you can, you know, you can reach out to partners like lenders or attorneys, or, you know, title companies who will actually help subsidize some of these events too. And so if you’re a new broker, and you maybe don’t have a huge budget to do client appreciation events, or you don’t know exactly how to set these up, like you have resources,

Karen Ranquist 41:30
really like use your friends. I mean, it was great for for her friend to be able to, you know, she wasn’t there to sell anything by any means, but the product was worse so and they kind of sold themselves. So same thing with the jewelry. I mean, one of the you know, women somebody bought this beautiful ring from the gallery and, and then, you know, I definitely bought some makeup last night. You know, I was definitely not her Stacy’s intention, she was really there just to kind of teach us a few tricks and how to make the stuff we already had in our purses, and in our bags, work more and it’s just, I mean, we were there were lots of questions and it was just a you know, a really small but but I’m just a great little way to kind of kick off the holidays and introduced, you know, Sook into A into this new, you know, endeavor for her with me. I

D.J. Paris 42:19
love it. Let’s talk a little bit about your team and some you know, and we’ll finish up with you know, tell us about how you’ve now you know, it’s not just you anymore, you now have you know, you now have a team I’m talking a little bit you talk a little bit about that and sort of, you know, what

Karen Ranquist 42:35
we’ve known each other you know, for for a second I’ve known each other for over you know, over 20 years and it really was through the business when I was at the small development company, she was there as well. And you know, we’ve just kept in touch and been friendly for years, but she brings years of styling and fashion and graphics to to to the table and a whole different database of people that we can hopefully you know, guide and help in their real estate transactions. So it’s really exciting for me like I have, you know, been doing so many things independently that have probably and I’m sure most likely limited. My ability to even grow further and faster. And you know, it’s so exciting that even in just such a short period of time, and getting all of our systems together and systems that I’ve kind of always had in place but never really really really organized and took advantage of to the to the full extent and you know taking all this information that I have and all these amazing you know architectural photographs of past projects and taking her creativity and graphic background to you know, really show people what we can do. I mean I’ve always been about real estate to me you know, it is a passion, the architecture and the design and I can appreciate all different kinds of styles and price points and whatnot but I I just want people to really like where they’re at you know, I want them to be really excited and you know, it’s always been like it’s not I’ve never really looked at at it as how do you say it like I don’t really look at it as just a home you know, it’s just like it’s like an extension of who the person is. And even if it’s somebody that doesn’t even realize it to you know kind of be able to get in there and and be out there with this this client and see them responding to a property and helping guide them to to what what ultimately ends up being their home and having that ability to kind of read between the lines and and help them get there is so you know is so important to me and you know on the app and on the sales and I do a lot of representation of sellers a lot of our past I mentioned our past buyers and I just love that I love getting into someone’s home and now having soup you know really helping me style a home you even you know even better than before and getting it ready for the, you know, for photos and kind of stealing a word from from Ivana, I kind of like having all these tools in my toolbox, and, you know, adding a new resource to to help us, you know, get our buyers and sellers in the best position they can be in is it’s really exciting. I mean, we’ve just, we’ve worked so hard these last few months, and I just can’t wait to see, you know, to see where we go from here. Yeah, I

D.J. Paris 45:28
think that one thing that comes through and really everything you’ve said, and this is a testament to you is that you care so deeply for your clients. And I think that it as a realtor, as a broker as our listeners who are mostly realtors, that your client should feel that way about you that they should feel that wow, my realtor cares about me and is connected and gets it and understands what I need, and takes really good care of me. And I think that really has come through and probably ever, I suspect your clients would all say that.

Karen Ranquist 46:04
Oh, I hope so. Because I really do, you know, I love that I am not good at paperwork, but I love being out in the field. And I love like, you know, helping people just find that place. It’s like fitting in the puzzle pieces and, and and, and then helping them come up with strategies and ideas for marketing their home. I mean, I you know, one of the things I love about where I’m at at Berkshire is I was afraid that after all the years of being on my own, and our marketing when I worked with the rate all of our rank was projects, our marketing and the style and the beautiful way we could present our product was so so very important to me. And I wanted to really be able to keep kind of a part of me, but get the support and encouragement from a full service brokerage, which I wish I certainly have. And, you know, I feel like just even our marketing team really gets, you know, gets me and can take these these great photos and, and things that we can bring from my resale business and my my new construction business and the marketing is, it’s so important to me to just make this person’s home as as as interested, you know, as cool and the marketing material that we put out just to really make it so unique and so specific to them, that you know, I’m just so happy that, that I have the tools that I can continue to do that, you know, to do that for my clients and really think outside the box, you know, I mean, just who are we marketing to and just just all sorts of ideas, just you know, like, who do you know, mailers and creative ideas to have a party at somebody’s house with with just this thing with Stacey with the makeup like, you know, I have a new construction house coming up and we’re gonna, you know, bring in a local restaurant, we’re gonna do a post drywall party and bring in like, have it be like a daytime thing and bring in all sorts of different you know, fun things that uh, you know, people can come by and walk through the house but, but just you know, have some pizza from the neighborhood pizza place and put in just just just do like, you know, tying in all these different things where it’s so much more than just having your listing on the MLS, it’s just having the creativity and the ability to always think about ways to get your, your clients home marketed and seen by by other eyes, I mean, having a database of tons and tons of realtors to send an E blast to in case they missed it on the MLS and, you know, using social media and using just all these, you know, creative outlets to get your client’s property seen by eyes that they may not, that may not have seen it otherwise, that that’s a really, really important part of, of what I hope I can do for my sellers. Yeah,

D.J. Paris 49:00
well, let’s talk about if there are any, any buyers, sellers, renters, or even developers who are interested in working with you and your team, what’s the best way they should reach out to you?

Karen Ranquist 49:12
Oh, they can call me on my cell phone at 77344763607734476360. Or they can touch out to me through you know, Karen rank was Realty Group on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, any way that’s easiest for them.

D.J. Paris 49:32
Well, Karen, thank you so much for your time. I think again, I hope that it’s I’m sure it’s obvious to everyone who listens, but your passion and the fact that you care so deeply for your clients. Which by the way, if you’ve been listening to this podcast, speaking to the listeners, you you’ll hear a lot of that almost everyone is so passionate and cares so deeply. And I suspect that’s not by accident. It probably makes for extraordinarily happy clients and Karen’s perfect example. She works almost exclusively by referral has built this really outstanding business over 20 years and is very well respected and liked. maybe more importantly, she’s well liked to the community. And she’s also really involved. So I think that’s really the recipe right there. It’s, if there is a recipe that might be that might be it. So thank you for sharing all of that with the listen.

Karen Ranquist 50:22
Oh, gosh, thank you so much for having me on. I really, really appreciate you guys thinking of me. Well,

D.J. Paris 50:28
you’re very welcome. And all right. Well, we’ll see you on the next episode. So thank you, Karen.

Karen Ranquist 50:33
Oh, great. Thanks again. Have a great weekend.

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Robin Phelps Hanson of The Phelps-Hanson Group has crossed over 20 million in annual production this year. However, she feels she could have done it much faster! We discuss her rise to being a top producer, challenges she faced, and what she wished she would have known back when she started. This is a perfect episode to check out if you’re interested in what a rising superstar in the real estate industry does on a daily basis to keep moving forward!

Robin Hanson can be reached at robinphelps@atproperties.com or 773.469.5423.

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:15
Hello and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcast made by Chicago real estate agents for Chicago real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris, I am your host through the show. And if this is your first time listening to the podcast this episode, what we do here is we interviewed top, actually the the very top producers in Chicago There are currently over 35,000 realtors in the Chicagoland area, we literally are only talking to the top 1%. And what we’re doing is asking them how they built their business. How did they become successful? What are they doing differently than other realtors out there and having them share that with you. So I think we’ve started this about three or four months ago, we already have about 30 episodes done and about 5000 of you are listening on a regular basis. So we’re really grateful for that. A couple of ways you can continue to support the show so we can keep providing this to you in the coming year. Tell a friend if you have any other brokers that you think could benefit from listening to these kinds of interviews, shoot shoot them our information, you can obviously subscribe on iTunes, Google Play any Podcast Directory out there, you can find us. Also send us your questions once a month, Carrie McCormack, and I do a show where an episode where we interview, or rather she talks about what’s going on in the market and answers your questions. And we’re also going to be instituting a new regular episode in the next year where we’re going to be doing an investment episode once a month. So send us your questions whether you want to hear from a top producer like Kerry McCormick, or a top investment producer, Eric workman is going to be our regular guest on that show. Send us your questions, and we will answer them live on the show you easiest way to do that you can visit our website, keeping it real pod.com Or visit us on Facebook keeping it real pot. And the other thing that’s really exciting. And I promise I’ll wrap this up in just a moment and get to our great interview with Robin Hanson is that we have our very first sponsor on this episode. So you’ll be hearing those short commercial in a moment right before we get to Robin. And if you are someone who would like to advertise on the show and get in front of 1000s of brokers, every couple, any particular episode, you can do that. So reach out to us and we will give you that information. So thank you so much. This has been really exciting 2017 We have a few more episodes before we finish out the year and we’ll go strong in 2018. And also lastly if you have any anybody that you think we should be talking to any really successful brokers out there who maybe we don’t know about or we haven’t reached out to shoot us that information. We get a lot of our interviews from you guys who give us those suggestions. So thanks so much really appreciate it and on to our interview

this episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by Loftus law. I’m sorry the attorney is busy with something more important is something you will never hear when you call Patrick Loftus of Loftus law. Loftus law is a firm focused on serving real estate professionals and their clients you want your deals to close on time without headaches and Loftus law is the solution. For more information on what Loftis law can do for you and your clients and special pricing of 299 per closing call 773-632-8330 or email Patrick at Loftus hyphen law.com

Today on the show we

have Robin Phelps Harrison and Robin is a Chicagoland native and a broker with at properties. She is the founder of The Phelps Hanson group, a top producing real estate team. Robin has found her niche within the luxury single family market as of late, but equally enjoys working with first time condo buyers and sellers as well as investors. Robin lives in the north center area with her husband, their five year old daughter and 11 year old dog. Welcome Robin to the show.

Robin Hanson 4:22
Thank you so much.

D.J. Paris 4:24
My dog is also nearing that age so but she’s mine’s a little chihuahua. What type of dog do you have?

Robin Hanson 4:30
Okay, so ours is actually part Chihuahua and part rat terrier. So Oh, not unlike yours and she doesn’t have any teeth. She only has a couple of teeth. So we have a lot of challenges in that in that arena.

D.J. Paris 4:45
I do as well. So mine is nine and a half and she has had 13 teeth polled. She has none of all the important teeth are still there as of now but we’ll probably be going away at some point. People don’t realize that chihuahuas in particular, they have too many teeth or they’re live little mouth. So

Robin Hanson 5:01
I didn’t realize that either we’re over 20 Now extracted,

D.J. Paris 5:06
quickly catching up with you. Mine is sleeping underneath the desk here at the office. Okay, so but this isn’t about me and my dog. Let’s talk about you. How did you how did you get involved in real estate? Tell us your origin story.

Robin Hanson 5:19
Okay, so about 15 years ago, I worked at a tech startup company. And I was there a little bit over a year. And then they closed their doors. And they gave all of us a severance. I was single, late 20s. And I decided to take that money and take real estate classes. And I was lucky enough to live with my best friend, Heather, who owned a beautiful condo and said, you know, you can actually even use my car while you’re starting off with clients. Because I didn’t have a car. I took the L downtown to work every day. She had a really nice BMW. So for the first two years of my career, I drove around her in her BMW and everybody thought that was my car, my clients, other agents. Heather would ask to drive her own car. And I would be like, yeah, no, I’m sorry, I need it today. So we kind of, she was very happy when I was able to afford my own car, which was, you know, literally two years into the business. So I was Rookie of the Year, the first year at the habitat company, I literally loved it from day one, loved everything about it.

D.J. Paris 6:37
That’s amazing. And not only getting rookie of the year, but just back up that you have a friend that was willing to give you not her broken down Honda Civic, from 1997. But literally her nice BMW and you got to drive it around, I hope you have done at least sent her a nice bottle of wine

Robin Hanson 6:55
I have and I paid her back for the boot that she got on it for me not paying the tickets. So it was all good. But I, I ended up joining a team that was doing a lot of condo conversions, you know, vintage buildings that they were gutting and turning into these beautiful condos, and they were very affordable for first time buyers. So I was lucky enough to join this team. And literally, I was slipping a contract under the team leader store every weekend, and we were just we were killing it, you know, is 2005 for something like that three, maybe. And it was just an awesome experience learning how to choose the finishes and negotiate. And we were open both days every weekend. So we were meeting a lot of buyers. And I thought that was so valuable. But that was really, when I worked for the habitat company that was the beginning of learning how to pick up a buyer and an open house. You know, convert them to your own client, we were actually getting a lot of sellers out of these. So it was really an awesome opportunity that I was given from the start to join a team like that. And these guys, there were my mentors, and they’re still now there with our properties. And they’re still good friends.

D.J. Paris 8:11
So yeah, it’s amazing. And I know that was a bit of a different time back when there was a lot more development. And it was kind of a feast or famine, a situation if you were a broker and you got in with some of those developments. It was amazing. And then But then But then the market crashed. And how did you like pivot your business or adjust? You know, well due to them?

Robin Hanson 8:33
Yeah, I mean, that was rough. And I feel a connection to all of the brokers that have been in the business through that period, because you’re, you know, doing it if I’m doing a deal with one of them. And maybe I haven’t done a deal before we get to talking. It’s like, oh, gosh, that was such a hard time. I mean, I did a lot of rentals. Just because, you know, it wasn’t a source of income. And a lot of those renters were then converted into buyers later, which of course, is our hope. So, you know, it wasn’t easy, I think my I was lucky enough that my sphere of influence was built up in a way that I had enough people that were still buying and selling. But you know, there were so many foreclosures and so many short sales and and it was it was tough financially and also emotionally because, you know, a client would call me over to speak with them about their home and they’re telling you there underwater, you know, they’re about to go through a short sale, that bank is calling and you’re, you’re trying to be a good advocate for them and give them good advice and you really don’t even know what to say to get them through it. So that was a tough time. It’s it’s, it’s nice to work with clients. It’s nice to be in a market again where people are borrowing money and successfully and you know, putting 20% down or whatever. And, you know, there’s there’s I’m meeting with clients who I can actually come in and say, Wow, you have $150,000 equity, you know, this is going to be fun. So that’s that’s a much, you know, happier way to do business.

D.J. Paris 10:11
Yeah. And you’ve you’ve really had tremendous amount of success recently. You I know you’re closing the year at at a record high, which is awesome.

Robin Hanson 10:20
Yes, thank you. You know, I think so I’ve been doing this, like I said, about 15 years, I’ve been with the app properties for 10. I was always, you know, very comfortable around that seven, 8 million mark. And then, you know, I was lucky enough for two things, I started working with a builder who gave me a few opportunities that were really, you know, very important that I succeeded that I did a good job for them. And I did, and they, they were happy. And we continue to have this relationship, which I’m so grateful for. But, you know, I think that I took the confidence that I built in these situations with them, and, you know, met other sellers and buyers. And I started going into listing presentations, feeling like, I really believed that I was the best person for the job. And I shouldn’t say best, there are so many amazing brokers. But I went in maybe feeling better about myself as a broker. And I, the success just started coming to me. And of course, you know, it was fun and exciting. And I think that you always feel like you could be working harder. No matter how hard you’re working, you always feel like you could be working harder. And I still feel that way. And I think that’s also what’s keeping me going I am not, you know, everybody’s exhausted in this business. But I’m not finishing the day saying, Oh, my gosh, I’m done. I’m just kind of going well, let’s see what tomorrow brings. And that has, you know, changing my own mentality, I think has has helped. So I’m very grateful.

D.J. Paris 12:04
Yeah, one of the things you mentioned before we started recording, which I think is really very honest, and and also humbling, and I like it very much when people are able to say, you know, because I know your closing the year out really, really your high numbers. And you said I really should have got there a few years before? And can you talk a little bit about you know, the shift, and maybe why you think you could have done it sooner I would have done?

Robin Hanson 12:31
Yes, I I think that I am a very strong believer that social media is our best tool. And I started using Facebook for a lot of, you know, for posting listings, and for just kind of posting Hey, everybody, I’m out here, if you need me and me and my, my partner, Amber, we do a lot of just kind of post showing who we are and what we’re up to. And I’ve had people come into my open houses that said, Oh, it’s nice to meet you in person, your face is following me around the internet, which is because I’m using ad works. And I’m purposely following them around the internet. Sure. And all of these tools that are available to us, you know, they obviously they, they grow and they get better and better every year. But I feel like I’m just now sitting down almost daily and saying what’s available? What’s out there, I just attended the national shows, excuse me, National Association of Realtors Conference and McCormick Place. And me and my friend walked around, say, oh my gosh, look at this, look at this. And there’s so many awesome tools out there to help, you know, tell the public about you. And that you’re you’re here and you’re ready to help them. And I just really don’t think I was taking advantage of those like I should. And that’s huge for our business this year.

D.J. Paris 13:52
Yeah, I absolutely agree. There’s definitely ways to do it, I think two that are more effective than than others. I see. I see a lot of realtors maybe only posting hey, here’s my new listing, which I guess is better than doing nothing. But there’s a lot more ways you can engage the the audience. And so it sounds like you’re doing a lot of that. And that’s, that’s really interesting, you know, so we have a lot of people who listen Are you know, brokers who maybe they’re stuck at at their own production level, and they wish they could break out of that whatever ceiling they feel as sort of the is there? Or maybe they’re new to the business not sure what to do. And I know you have a very specific sort of thoughts about working with friends and family and could you share some wish you what you wish you would have known dealing with friends and family?

Robin Hanson 14:40
Oh, definitely. So I mean, your friends and your family are going to be your best referral source. And I was very fortunate to start at, I think I was 27 or 28 and some of my friends had just gotten like the good job, you know, I mean, they had started entry level out of college and they were starting to get the better jobs. and saying, Oh, I don’t want to rent anymore. And I mean, I think I sold eight condos in the first two months to people that were good friends of mine. And, you know, as we I’ve my business has grown, and quite frankly, the dollars amount amounts have gone up. I’ve noticed that, you know, working with your friends, is difficult sometimes because, you know, they’re expecting maybe a little bit more from you than they would from another agent. And maybe you’re in I’m expecting more from them, you know, give me the benefit of the doubt. Yes, yes, I’m doing that, of course, I’m doing that. And I have to stop and think, you know, they don’t know what I’m doing, I need to tell them, I need to tell them every week what I’m doing to sell their house, just like I’m telling Mr. Jones, with the listing down the street, you know, so I think that I have to stop even now and say, okay, you know, they are equally as important. And nothing that I do for another client, you know, I should be doing everything the same for them. And, you know, if you just do that, and you can hang out on the weekends and be social and not talk about work. But when it comes to selling a home for a good friend or family, it’s just I just kind of, you know, proceed like any other client. And I wish that somebody would have told me that it was going to be hard, because, you know, I think when I first started, I thought this is going to be great. I’m going to work with all my friends. And I’m, I continue to be very, very grateful to be able to do that. But it’s, I often have to take a deep breath. Because you you want to almost be offended if they’re asking you what are you doing to sell my house? So so and so sold this and you just want to say, Come on, it’s me, you don’t trust me. But you can’t do that, because it’s professional, and you have to stay professional.

D.J. Paris 16:45
Yeah, I just, you know, you said something really, really important in there as well that are that I thought was a real good takeaway for anyone listening, who’s got clients who are, who are trying to sell a home, or you’re starting to sell their home, which is let them know, every single week what you’re doing, regardless of what happens,

Robin Hanson 17:02
you know, my goal every week is for is to email them or to call them before they call me. And I feel like if they’re calling me and checking in, and I’ve, I’ve failed in that category, because I want to give them the information that I know that they you know, have the right to get before they come to me and say How was Saturday, and I overdo it. I mean, I shouldn’t say overdo it. But when I do a listing presentation, I tell the seller, you know, we’re going to be so close that when this is over, you know, you’re going to really miss me and we’re going to have to get coffee twice a week, because I’m going to tell you, I’m going to give you a lot of feedback. Every time I have a showing and I like to do that I like to report back almost immediately. I’m I probably sent 500 text messages a day. So and I you know, they never have to wonder what’s going on. Because they always know. I’d say

D.J. Paris 17:56
that is an amazing customer service policy. And the I know when when I bought my condo, which was like 2006. And I was in technology doing marketing for technology for I knew nothing about real estate, I still really don’t know too much, even today, but but back then I knew I knew literally knew nothing. And my friend, who was my broker, who is still my friend, he had a policy that I asked him after the fact I he said I never wanted a client to have to call me first. I always thought what a great policy. So it sounds like you have that same policy. So sure. But I was laughing earlier because when when we asked you some questions, which we do to everyone that we talked to we try to get a sense of what they’re all about, so we can bring it up on the show you this one is amazing. I can you please tell us about the sculpture story?

Robin Hanson 18:51
Oh, yes, absolutely. So this was maybe 10 years ago, I did a listing presentation for a family that was selling a home on the north side. And as she was giving me a tour, my eyes kept going to a certain part of the house, this bright white thing and I didn’t know what it was. And then she kind of walked me in and said, you know, my family made this. I know it’s a little odd. But you know, we made this together. And it was a sculpture that was I mean, gosh, the size of maybe a lion. I mean, we’re talking huge and it was made entirely of feminine sanitary products.

D.J. Paris 19:33
Tampons, specifically

Robin Hanson 19:34
campaign specific. You set it up for ads. These are Yeah, yes. And, you know, it was you really couldn’t help but stare at it. And I said to her this is you know, don’t get me wrong. This is just

D.J. Paris 19:47
This is beautiful.

Robin Hanson 19:49
Yeah, I love it. Frankly. No, I mean, I just you know, but however, you know, and it was it just couldn’t be moved. It was on this big stand And so I said, Okay, well, you know, I’m not going to photograph it, but it’ll be here. So every showing I had so, and I thought about hanging Christmas lights on and just, you know, I thought maybe we should play this off, because it’s obviously not going to be missed at a showing. So anyway, any everybody who came through this house would say to me like, oh, Ken, do you mind if I take a couple pictures of the, you know, the crown molding, but I knew what they were taking pictures of show their friends. So, yeah, it was I definitely never had that one happened to me again, or, you know,

D.J. Paris 20:35
were they artists are just Oh,

Robin Hanson 20:37
yeah, they were artist. So and I’m sure at the studio, there were other things, but this was the one that they chose to bring home.

D.J. Paris 20:45
And chose it. Were they surprised when you said, you know, maybe, maybe everyone else’s sensibilities? Might Yeah,

Robin Hanson 20:53
you know, they were surprised just like a seller, if you tell them to take, you know, a picture, a nude picture down of some sort of painting of them topless or something, which of course has happened also. So

D.J. Paris 21:10
that’s, I guess, the same mind that would have that would create that sculpture is not the same mind is the same mind that would be like, What do you mean, why do it? Why would I have to move this? Right? So it’s not like, oh, yeah, we get it. It’s a little odd. Well,

Robin Hanson 21:23
and in this case, it was a hot market. And it was a really nice listing. And I knew that it was, you know, kind of this, I just kind of had a feeling that we could just make it fun. And the eventual buyers, you know, of course, joked about writing it in the contract and things like that. So luckily, we did not, you know, they were able to get to take it with them, because I’m sure they still have it to this day. Well, that’s

D.J. Paris 21:48
not something you throw in the garbage that No, I would say no, it’s it’s literally made of things you throw in the garbage. No, this is true. That’s all that is, that is amazing.

Robin Hanson 22:01
I actually have another one too. They, I had a very, very old home that I was selling. And in the attic, there was just one single rocking chair just sitting there. And it just gave me the creeps.

D.J. Paris 22:18
It was a beautiful start rocking on its own. Yes.

Robin Hanson 22:21
Every time I went up there, I pictured that. And I never ever told the seller that I was you know, creeped out by it. I you know, I never mentioned it. And, you know, he was a funny guy. And he started to kind of mess with me, and move it to different areas of the addict and what’s great. And then he would tell me, you know, I haven’t been up there in like a year. So it was in eventually I said, Okay, you’re gonna need to either come clean, or, you know, I’m not going up there anymore. So that was good.

D.J. Paris 22:54
That is funny. Um, what advice would you have have to brokers who are feeling stuck or stifled or not sure how to take their business to the next level? Is anything come to mind? Yeah,

Robin Hanson 23:07
definitely. I would advise them to get education to take advantage of what the association has to offer or you know, even at their independent brokerage at att properties, they do amazing training, I mean, you can, you can be a one year agent or a 30 year and sit in this training and walk out feeling motivated. But you know, as members of the association, you always have those options. And, I mean, I probably call my managing broker or one of my mentors, at least twice a week and say, Can I run this by you? And, you know, I would say, to try to have a meal with a new person at least three times a week, whether it’s a meal, or a cup of coffee, or something, and even if you sit down, and that person proceeds to tell you about their brother who’s a realtor, and you know, you think, oh, gosh, well I wanted to be their realtor, it really doesn’t hurt. You might learn something, they might tell you something about a piece of land that their brother is selling in their neighborhood and you go wait a minute, my my builder was looking for land over there and then suddenly you’re connecting so you know, it’s it is difficult. We all go through slow times. And the best thing to do is to just get to the office or wherever you feel comfortable working and prospect and you know, call people that you trust and say, you know, what do you do when this happens and everybody’s been through it? And I used to one of my old managing brokers used to say when things are slow go on a trip, and not an exotic trip but you know, go to Michigan or Lake Geneva or something for the weekend and and your phone will start ringing you just need to get your mind off of being slow.

D.J. Paris 24:50
Sure, yeah. Yeah, I have a suggestion for for people listening. One of the things that you can do in particular after you close A transaction with a client is that’s a good excuse a good reason to take them up to coffee or to a meal, just obviously, to thank them for their business. But what you can say, if you really enjoyed working with them, is you can say, hey, you were like the ideal client. I wish I had more clients, just like you have any suggestions for me about how I might get in front of more people just like you? Yeah. And it’s different from saying, Hey, do you know anyone else that’s looking for to buy or sell or, you know, which could be awkward or uncomfortable? Or it could be that they just don’t know anyone? But when you ask them for their advice, I’m like, gosh, if you were me, how would you get in front of more people like you? You know, people will tell you though, they’re flattered that you’re asking for their opinion, which is different from necessarily just asking for referrals, which you can do too. But I love the idea of just saying, Gosh, you know, I you know, I love to meet more buyers or sellers just like you. And if you had any suggestions of how I could, you know, get in front of more people that would really be helpful. And you’ll be shocked at how, especially if you had they had a good experience with you? Would you be the only reason to do this don’t don’t, you know, obviously Oh, for

Robin Hanson 26:06
sure. And to your point, you know, planning a meal after closing is a lot of fun. Because you can, you know, sit down and have a glass of wine. And I you know, I like to get to know, people, if I get any indication that somebody will tell me their deepest secrets than I usually go for it. I just like to really dig in. And I feel like that’s a great time to do that to say, hey, you know, your sister had stopped by that day, we were there. So like, you know, where you guys close growing up. And it’s just fun. Because we’ve closed it, we have some relief. And we can, you know, maybe go over some of the funny things that happened during negotiations, because now it’s done, and everybody knows it’s done. And that’s always a great time Exactly. Like you said, to just kind of say, it was really fun working with you. I wish all my clients were like you, you know, maybe you know some people.

D.J. Paris 26:56
And I wonder how many what percentage of buyers or sellers do not get that invitation from their broker after the transaction, even though just to have coffee, or some sort of, hey, thanks aside for maybe a gift you might send them I’ll bet you 90 Some percent of buyers and sellers do not get that invitation. So even just doing that alone will separate you from just about everyone else.

Robin Hanson 27:20
Definitely. And it doesn’t have to be a big expensive steak. You know, like you’ve said it could be a latte. And you could just say, I just wanted to, you know, say thanks. And you know, have a little time with you. So it goes a long way.

D.J. Paris 27:35
Awesome. Well, Robin, this has been a really fun conversation and not just because of your growth story. But no, but let’s talk about if there are buyers or sellers or investors or renters even who are interested in working with you, what’s the best way that someone can reach out to you?

Robin Hanson 27:53
Oh, yeah, definitely. My email is Robin Phelps. All one word pH. E. LPs, like the swimmer at@properties.com and my phone number is 773-469-5423.

D.J. Paris 28:11
Fantastic. Well, Robin, thank you so much for your time. And you know, best of luck with good and continued success. Your by the way. We should mention Robin is a top 1% producer. I forgot that I forgot. I forgot to mention that in Chicago. And so she is she’s killing it very humbly killing it. But she is she is a big deal. She wouldn’t say that but I’ll say. Anyway, thank you so much for being on the show.

Robin Hanson 28:33
Thank you. This was so fun. I appreciate it.

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Top 1% producer Mike Opyd has a bone to pick with traditional real estate firms. He feels brokers are paying WAY too much for the value they receive. At REMAX Next (the firm Mike co-founded) brokers choose their own commission structure and create their own branding. He believes in “disrupting” the established relationship of a broker to their firm, and compensating them higher at the same time. Mike is also a big believer in coaching and mentoring, and talks about how he maintains his own successful individual practice.

Mike Opyd can be reached at 312.929.8910 and mike@remaxnext.com

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:13
Hello and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real. The only podcast made by Chicago real estate agents for Chicago real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris, I am your host through the show and hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving and relaxing time, and are probably finishing out the year this month. If you’re a broker, you’re probably trying to get some final deals in for the end of the year, or maybe even thinking about what you want your 2018 year to look like. And we are gonna have a ton of episodes in our backlog. So we’ve been accumulating them and then you will we will be cranking them out here in the month of December. So we’re probably on pace to do about three a week. So be on the lookout. Best way you can support us is to telephone and if you have other agents you know that are interested, or that might be interested in learning what the top producers out there are doing. Tell them about the show they can subscribe on iTunes, Google Play or streamed directly from our website. Also send us your ideas and questions. Whether it’s for Kerry McCormick when we do our our monthly Monday market minute and she talks about what’s going on in the real estate world as all and also answers your questions. Or if it’s just hey, you got to interview this person, he or she would be great for the show. And they have an interesting story. We are always open to that. So send us a drop us a message either on our Facebook page, or on our website, which is keeping it real pod.com. Today on the show, we have Mike open, which this is one of my favorite interviews that we’ve done this year because Mike is a disruptor in the real estate industry. And he’s going to talk about how he’s doing that in his own way. So enjoy the show. Tell a friend and thanks for listening.

Today on keeping it real. We have Mike opet, Mike graduated college and after two years of corporate America he quit without having a job to move to. And after a phone call from his cousin he was hooked and started in real estate just as the market crashed perfect timing. For the first few years. He did not do a lot of business. But what he did instead is immersed himself in all the things real estate and was determined to know more than everyone else. And I personally also think that is an awesome, awesome goal. After surviving the crash and working for a few different companies, his partner, and Mike opened up his own firm which is now called REMAX next and they’re in the West Loop. Their goal is truly putting agents first and allowing them to design their business as they want without the limitations of other outdated brokerages. Thanks, Mike for being on the show.

Mike Opyd 3:03
Thank you, AJ happy to be here, man.

D.J. Paris 3:05
Awesome. Well, I would love to hear about the you getting into the business right at the probably the most challenging time in recent history, and sort of how you weathered that storm and also how you learn so much along the way.

Mike Opyd 3:20
Yeah, so you know, when I graduated college, I had a finance and then a master and a degree in management. And I wanted to jump into finance that I would take over, you know that world quickly realize sitting in a desk staring Excel spreadsheets, doing partnership, tax accounting, which is just as sexy as it sounds, was not for me. I stuck it out for two years. And then I just basically just quit without actually a job to come back to. So started looking for a job couldn’t find one. The economy was pretty much in the tanks, or getting the tanks to that point. It really was just a call to my cousin who’s been a top real inner city for a long time. And I was just really asking questions about investing in real estate. I mean, I had no money I saved up a little bit, but was in no position here to invest in it, but just was curious, you know, just from the finance standpoint, really was about a 30 minute phone call. And when I hung up, I was absolutely hooked. I just I saw real estate is something that I think I could take my energies and my inability to sit still and kind of target or focus everything I had into it. So I went out, got my license a couple of weeks later and started off with my cousin as part of her team started doing that for a number of years. Then I end up separating to go off and do my own thing. At this point, you know as part of the team we had switched from Keller Williams to dream town. So then at that point, I was on the Young Professionals Network board at the Chicago Association Realtors I met another person who was starting up a group during that time. So I worked for him for a couple years, about four years. And at that point, it’s you know, it’s always kind of been my goal, to separate and do my own thing and start my own company. And it just so happens as I was nearing the end of my time work. And there, I was kind of gearing up of how I can do that. separated from the group started actually creating my own company. I had the LLC done, the website was getting work done. So all those things were coming into place. And then my partner came up to me and and want to just grab lunch. And little did I know that he was going to introduce me to REMAX. And, you know, my mindset was always that I just when I did my research on all these companies, whether I was going to work for one, or maybe even consider buying one, I just never found one that I really thought was going to fit the profile that I really wanted at a company where we’re allowed to do our own branding or marketing and really customize it so agents can, we could center on just helping agents out, never considered REMAX my partner told me about it, I thought it was too good to be true. Went up to meet with the corporate people, they further emphasized exactly the same thing my partner told me, and a couple months later, we had a franchise and officially opened up last July in the West Loop.

D.J. Paris 6:26
Congratulations. That’s a That’s That’s fantastic. Thank you. Yeah, yeah, and let’s let’s get right into, you know, sort of what your vision is for for your firm. Because you you were you have a very specific sort of feelings about agent training and, and sort of what you’re providing. And I’d love to hear sort of, you know, the frustrations that maybe you’ve had seeing other firms out there and sort of your solution and what what you guys are doing differently because I love firms that are sort of disrupting the industry with just better offerings.

Mike Opyd 7:03
Yeah, absolutely. And that’s actually one of our favorite words to use is to disruption. You know, when I was doing my research, what I found is these brokerages were still living in the era of the 80s and 90s, where no, the Internet didn’t really exist, people would have to have a big brokerage name to work for, because that’s what the consumers want. And that’s what the sellers and buyers were looking for is, you know, the big name real estate companies, people would walk into an office and look at a book that had all the MLS listings of what was available. But you know, times have changed. And now we have the Zillow, the realtor.com, you know the MLS is online. And I think 93% of consumers start their search online. Yeah, but in my but from what I’ve seen, is that these brokers are still living in an era that defined by people walking into an office and needing that big name, to attract agents, and they’re still treating the agents like that big name is a reason why their work in there. And they’re going to they’re going to kind of pay them accordingly or allow them to market accordingly. I’ve never agreed with that. And so one of the things my brokerage is what we’re doing is we’re really giving agents an opportunity to one choose their own commission split, which we have a number of options, and an agent literally decides which one they want to go with which, you know, whatever one they’re going to be more comfortable with, which is unheard of for any brokerage that at least I know all day allows an agent to decide that.

D.J. Paris 8:42
Right? There’s firms typically have depending on your production, you may have some negotiation power, but it’s it’s Hey, we’re willing to offer you this, Hey, can you bump it up a little bit? Maybe a few percentage points here and there. But yes, it is. It is not a choose your own adventure sort of scenario.

Mike Opyd 8:59
No. And you know, what I spoke to if we never did was for 10 years, I spoke to a lot of agents that I know some really close friends and it really hit home for me when one of my good buddies has worked at a company for a while. You know, he’s a loyal guy, not a not a major producer, right? He’s probably been there for 10 years does five, 6 million, you know, pretty decent amount of business over the course of the life. He’s been there and he wants to speak to the owner and ask him like, hey, you know, I’ve been here for a while, can I bump my commission up? He got a 2% on. And I’m just like, it may like dead like, you know, pissed me off. I just I could not believe that. And I know the owner of that company, and I was just like, you gotta be kidding me. So loyal client or loyal, essentially a loyal client because that’s exactly who that person is. Right? It’s been to that owner. That’s right. So things like that had pissed me off and I just I see it over and over my partner dealt with it with his old company that he worked for, and he was he’s, you know, a major producer and he went to negotiate his commission split and you know, he’s doing 20 or 30 million they told him he was there long enough to get a higher split ever. Right? Right? Like, you gotta be kidding me, this guy is literally keeping your lights on and eating your pocket. So one of the things we designed is our business around the structure that an agent can take their own commission, something they’re comfortable with. And then they can start to build their business that way, you know, take that extra commission put it into their marketing or their advertising or whatever it is. So that was one of the main things that we focus on. And then the second thing that really ticked us off is, you know, if you drive around Chicago, and you see these signs that agents put up when they have a listing, you know, that brokerage name is plastered all over that sign.

D.J. Paris 10:46
And that’s correct, great advertising for the firm, or the firm.

Mike Opyd 10:49
But the reality is, the firm doesn’t have any relationship with that seller, zero, you know, I can go to an owner and be like, Hey, do you know my seller on 123 Main Street? And they’re gonna be like, No, I have no idea what you’re talking about. Well, then my next question is why the hell is your information all over to sign and mine isn’t? Right. So that’s one of the things that pissed us off too, is that these these brokerages are using you as an advertisement for them when they have no relationship with that seller, or even the buyer if it’s other type of marketing. So we allow these people to design their own marketing 100, like pretty much however they want it is what they do within obviously, legal boundaries. But we’d like to say that, you know, if you’re putting a sign up, you’re 95%, that sign is your face, your image, your whatever, if you’ve a group, your group logo, your information, We’re the 5%, that’s down here at the bottom left hand side, that we’re not going to really see as much as that agents information, then who do you think they’re gonna call, they’re gonna call that agent, they’re not going to call that brokerage that has the brokerages name on it. And number, they’re gonna call the agent, right? So that’s how we feel like agents should be able to grow their business, not because there’s some name behind it, because those times have passed, but I don’t feel these brokerages have really changed their model. And it’s the same over and over. And we’re just really tired of that. So we took kind of some of the pain points that we’ve experienced, and like how do we build a business around really just helping an agent grow themselves and their company, because that’s essentially what they are, they’re their own company.

D.J. Paris 12:25
Right. And boy, you just You said so, so much that that is I agree with and I work at a firm has a very similar philosophy with respect to advertising, it’s like, this is your brand. And ultimately, and ultimately, as a firm, because I’m in the back office, I’m not out there in the field. You know, we don’t want we don’t want the phone calls anyway. Right. And I because those should go directly to the to the listing agent, obviously. And also, the most important thing is, is buyers, they don’t care to see our brand, our brand logo up there either. Like it doesn’t matter to them, they just want to see who do I contact to get more information about this listing. And obviously, we don’t want those phone calls to begin with. But the broker doesn’t want us to have those phone calls either. And so I think that is such an important and well set point. And it’s so funny because the the the firm’s that we’re sort of referencing who do take what we I think we would, we would both you and I would agree or probably more of an agent’s commission than they ought to, are able to justify or one of the ways that they justify it is by saying, hey, our name is really important, and it’s out there and you can see it everywhere. I’m not so sure that I agree that that’s all that important to a consumer and I think you obviously feel the same way. As you know, you put your your company name, which you’re required to have for IDF PR, but you know, just doesn’t say how big it needs to be. And you just kind of hide it away in the corner. Because obviously it defeats the whole purpose for the broker so that I could not agree more with everything you just said, I’m so glad you know, there’s other people out there thinking the same way. Let’s and you know, it’s kind of ironic, too, because, you know, you have all these progressive thoughts and you literally joined the largest real estate company in the world, but they just happen to also be incredibly flexible, you know, with their commission structures. And you know, I know different REMAX offices are structured differently, but it’s sort of a funny thing that just happens to be the biggest one has the most flexibility.

Mike Opyd 14:26
Yeah, and that’s I mean, it was crazy when I started hearing about REMAX because like I said it wasn’t so there’s not a huge presence of REMAX in the city. They’re typically in the suburbs. So it really wasn’t even on my radar when I was looking at other companies. But what I really enjoyed about them is they is that they allow us to create our own brand, right so sure never see like a Coldwell Banker next Keller Williams next, right? They’re not allowed to do that. But we can take a REMAX name which like you said biggest real estate across the entire world. And we could put our branding our logo on it. And then we can use that to you know, brand ourselves however we see fit, you know, we, we have some pretty aspiration pretty big aspirations and goals that this isn’t just going to be a real estate company, we’re going to have multiple different companies. And we could take that next and really use it in a bunch of different ways. Like if we want to start our own janitorial company. I mean, we could just call it janitorial, you know. So those are the things that we were really looking forward to. And when we when we learned that REMAX really is independently owned and operated, and we can make all our own decisions, and, and really create a company based about our passions and our goals. And our vision, it was like a no brainer, you know, we have all that support behind us have the biggest name and all the relationships they’ve built since the 70s When I started, but we can make it our own. And so when we found out that when I found out all this stuff, it was for me is a no brainer to buy a REMAX franchise is like, Well, why would I waste all my time and trying to build relationships? And, you know, and try to find all these people to help my office out when all this stuff is set up for me already. I just gotta pay for it. You know, it’s, it was kind of it was really just like the easiest decision ever at that point.

D.J. Paris 16:21
That’s, that’s awesome. And I think a lot of firms and it must know this, but like your friend, the example you mentioned of your friend who moderate producer asking for an increase in his commission split, and having them say, No thanks. And, you know, they would have to know, and I know, his production level isn’t enough for them to care that much. However, it’s free money for them. And you would think that, obviously, they must know he could leave and go to any other firm who you know, is willing to better that commission split, and every single one of his clients is gonna go right with Him. In fact, he could go to a firm with even the world’s worst reputation, you know, and probably still bring every single client over. And I always marvel at firms. And maybe they just it’s maybe the numbers aren’t big enough to where they care. But I have always found that to be so puzzling. But, you know, I guess you’re right, there is the bit of a kool aid that is still drink today about the brand that you know, the firm that you work at is, you know, they probably think they’re a bit more important to the brokers business than maybe they actually are, at least I would I think you and I both agree that’s probably true. If you’re not getting a tremendous amount of value, you know, for paying for that for that. Can you talk a little bit about, you know, your process of how you guys bring on brokers and what you look for, and, and you know, that and sort of how you treat brokers once they’re on board.

Mike Opyd 17:50
Yeah, so we so that’s one of the things we set up from day one was kind of like an onboarding system to help them out. Because we know the transition is never easy from one brokerage to the other. So, you know, we’re out there, and we’re talking to agents, and we’re explaining to him our concept and who we are showing them our office and things like that, you know, we’re really looking for personal agents that are, can see the vision, I guess you could say, you know, so you know, really the people that I think have been in industry for 4050 years, and maybe they’re just comfortable with the company they’re at, they’re they’re a little bit older, they will get this and we’ve seen that experience, as we brought agents through who are curious about what we had to offer, kind of the older clientele, they just it was to them, they were just they just didn’t really see it as much as we saw it. So we’ve had younger agents come through and the millennial generation is a very entrepreneurial generation. You know, I am a millennial, so one of the first millennials, as you say, I’m not born early 80s. So I can’t say I’m part of the middle of that generation, but I know enough to be dangerous. And I see how we operate. And, you know, because there’s so much material agents are going to want that are joining the industry are going to want that flexibility that these companies have because that’s how our mind test them. So for us, we’re really a brokerage that is going to be really appealing for agents that are maybe a year into the business couple of years on a business doing one to 5 million in production, have kind of seen the industry a little bit learned about it learned or companies heard about other companies, and then they could use us as a comparison of how we are so different than anything that’s out there. So that’s one of the things when it comes to like you know, bringing agents on board and recruiting I guess what I think is gonna be the best for us and what we can offer the most benefits to and then when we get them in the door, we have like I said a whole onboarding system so we sit them down. We get all set up with all the REMAX stuff and everything and REMAX offers their own website, you know, applications, different things like that. So we get them all set up, we get their heads shots done, we pay for them, we get them their own business cards, we pay for that we have them then sit with our marketing director. And she will design whatever they want, whether it’s postcards, mailers, group logos, whatever they can envision, our graphic designer slash marketing director will help them out with, you know, so for us, the the idea is the first you know, let’s say, two weeks or 30 days is to really, really ramp up that business, from what they were doing before and maybe trying to correct some of the errors that are making, you know, we have a bunch of partnerships in place to that can really help them with their marketing, whether it’s sending out postcards for free or, or helping them get exposure in different ways running Facebook ads, different things like that. We’ve created those partnerships with the people that are working with our office to help our agents out. So, you know, one of the biggest focus too is, you know, how do we take these guys or girls who are erzeugen men or women who are, you know, maybe making 2 million or doing 2 million in production, how do we get down to 468 10, you know, if that’s where they want to go, and we try to put these relationships and play so they can, you know, kind of take the money that they’re making, put it back in their business, and at the same time, have all these free things, to supplement them to really grow and build upon what they want to do. top of it. I’m, I’m obsessed with helping agents, I think that’s my biggest passion really, is helping people. So I you know, I mentor a bunch of agents in the office already. And I, that’s one of the things I’m passionate about is you know, if someone needs mentoring, or just need someone to to keep me on track or keep them liable, you know, that’s the type of thing that we want to help them out with as well. So it’s kind of a mouthful, but those are some of the things we’re doing to help our agents.

D.J. Paris 21:53
Yeah, no, that all makes perfect sense. And I think it’s, it’s smart. And it’s, it’s, you know, the idea that you have a marketing. So I’m the marketing person for our firm, but I don’t, I can help people design things, but I don’t specifically do a ton of that. And I think the fact that you guys have that is so important for somebody who’s, you know, in that one to 5 million range, because they probably haven’t designed their own stuff yet. And or if they have it probably could be improved upon. And to be able to offer that as a service when somebody is on board, I think is I’ve never heard of another from doing that. Let’s just put it that way. I think that in and of itself is revolutionary, but I also think it’s a really good idea. So we need to yeah, that’s, that’s, that’s awesome. What I wanted to also ask, is I wanted to make make, just make a reference back to a point you made a few moments or minutes ago. And this is something where if you’re, you know, if you’re at a firm or if you have your own firm, or if it’s just you on your own, and you’re your own managing broker, and or you’re starting out in the industry, and you don’t have the financial resources to do some of the external marketing activities. Like for example, if you wanted to do a mailer, but couldn’t afford it, or, or flyers, or that sort of thing. You know, Mike just brought up something very important, which is, you know, relationships and his firm has built relationships where some of their partners can assist with, you know, the payment. And, you know, you can also build those relationships, some of those as well. So I always think that brokers sometimes miss the bigger picture, like you can reach out to lenders, you’ve worked with attorneys you’ve worked with and said, Hey, can we do a co marketing effort, and oftentimes those lenders and, and various ancillary services to real estate, realtors are more than happy to do that, you know, we’re in the process of getting advertisers for the show. And, you know, we have 1000s of listeners. Now, almost, we assume everyone is a broker. I don’t know, almost everyone’s a broker, for sure. But um, you know, we’re now reaching out going, Hey, do you want to advertise on our show? And, you know, we’re starting to get a good response to that. But that’s, that’s what Mike’s team sort of does for us. They reach out they have partnerships, relationships with vendors, and they’re able to assist and I think that’s, a lot of times brokers don’t need don’t in their firms certainly aren’t maybe offering that too. But brokers themselves don’t always think to do that. So I think that’s really smart. Absolutely. I wanted to ask you just because you wrote us a couple of funny things. I wanted to hear about the time you had seven Starbucks meetings in one day.

Mike Opyd 24:29
Yeah, that was probably the most caffeine and humans ever consumed in a lifetime. It was just happened to be this one day, and I didn’t realize it, but I had a bunch of different meetings set up for different things with partners, buyers, sellers, and a couple of just agent meetings set up. And I saw I didn’t realize that at the time, but I end up setting up seven meetings at Starbucks. And it just so happens that every single time I went every single meeting I had there were a different Starbucks’s. So I was all over the place but every single one I went to the person bought me a coffee there for me and I’m I love the taste of coffee. I’m obsessed with it. I have some next to me right now, for some reason, it’s just one of those things I just love. So I’m not going to turn down a free coffee. I would say by the time I got done with seven coffees that day, I was shaking. I was I realize what’s going on. Like my wife was asked me like, what’s wrong with you? I couldn’t sit still. I went out and I actually bought a fidget spinner. And I’m sitting there on our couch and I’m just sitting there shaking spinning this thing. And it got to the point my wife thought that they’re like I was having a seizure or something like that. So I was like shaking so much and spinning this thing. And my knees were bouncing and I mean, I probably got about two hours of sleep that night. I just couldn’t fall asleep. I kept getting up I kept going out and like reading and math was I don’t know it was just way way way too much caffeine for 124 hour window I highly suggest never doing that.

D.J. Paris 26:07
Yes, it’s funny I don’t drink coffee. So whenever I I mean I do I do a regular episode once a month with Carrie McCormack who’s a properties broker and we do a fun a fun episode and she she and I have met at Starbucks because she prefers to meet there and I don’t drink coffee but she’ll buy me a coffee or I figured while I’m there I might as well get one and I don’t drink a ton of caffeine and so that I always end up the same way and I gosh, I can’t imagine doing seven of those in one in one day. Yeah, and I want I want to make sure we we plug your your office and so if there are brokers out there listing that are interested in learning more about REMAX next, I know they can visit their website which is REMAX next.com What can they Is there a way they can get in touch with you directly?

Mike Opyd 26:58
Yeah, I’m always available. So easiest, probably either shoot me an email Mike at REMAX next.com Or just give me a shout on my cell phone or text me whatever is easiest. 312-929-8910 Of course, also Facebook, I’m all over social media. So reach out to me, you know, if you have questions, happy to answer anything, explain more of what we’re trying to do here. Very, very easy to get a hold of though. Well,

D.J. Paris 27:27
yeah. And definitely, you know, reach out to Mike because I really love firms like Mike’s who are, you know, disrupting the industry and and really providing it, which I what I hear and what Mike has been saying, from the beginning is just offering more value, you know, and, and offering a the commission structure that makes sense for the broker. But you know, what I what I don’t hear Mike saying in any any sense of the word is, you know how much he wants to earn, off off of his brokers he wants to help he wants to provide for them and let them you know, take the lion’s share, which I think is is commendable. Certainly I’m on board with with those sorts of values. And I think as you’re right, as far as who this appeals do, I think it appeals to a lot of people in particular, you know, younger brokers who aren’t so much sold on the fact that the brand is worth 50% of someone’s income, right? Or maybe it is, but I don’t know, I think a lot of people would would challenge that. So firms like Mike are out there to say, Yeah, let’s challenge that.

Mike Opyd 28:30
To further emphasize really quick, what you were just saying, so my partner and I just throw it out there, we don’t take a dime out of this company. And we’re not planning to for a while. So, you know, for us, we’re putting every single thing, every single dime the company makes back into the company and into our agents until at some point, we could step away and start, you know, earning an income off it. But we’re talking two years down the line before we ever do that. So we’re still gonna sell in the meantime to pay our own bills. But, you know, we’re not taking a dime out of this company at all for a while. Well,

D.J. Paris 29:03
I don’t know how many firms can say that they’re doing that. And I would say that is a really important point is would you like to work for a firm who says we’re going to reinvest everything in better off better offerings to our brokers and being able to provide better and better services. So well, well done. I think that is quite commendable and, and very forward thinking. So congrats there. All right, Mike. Well, we appreciate you taking time out of your busy day to be on the show. So Mike, by the way, I would like to mention since we Mike is a very humble person. He is also a top producer. So this is he is also on top of this, you know, doing his own production and he’s incredibly successful there too. So the fact that you’re doing both of this and had time to be on our show is is really something so we appreciate it.

Mike Opyd 29:44
Alright man. Thanks for having me.

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Mike McElroy is a top producer that attributes much of his efficiency to systems. He believes in empowering his brokers with these processes to help them grow their own practices. In our conversation, Mike deep dives into his favorite systems, tools, and technology that drive his business. We discuss the importance of mentorship, coaching and how his firm, Center Coast Realty, stresses culture to create an environment for his brokers to thrive.

Mike McElroy can be reached at mike@centercoastrealty.com and 312-561-4095

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:14
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real. The only podcast made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers. My name is DJ Parris. I am your host to the show. And we are back. So we took a week off to celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday, and appreciate all of the feedback that we’ve been getting recently. And just yesterday, we got two or three really wonderful messages from listeners with really great ideas of future episode topics. One in particular, just give you an idea of what people are writing us. And maybe that’ll spurn some additional thoughts for our listeners on what we should, you know, work on in 2018 for episode ideas. So we said, hey, I’m really good at doing open houses, but I’m not really sure how to convert those leads from once I they come into the open house, they get their information into actual clients. So I’m going to be talking to Carrie McCormack about that, hopefully this weekend for our next episode. But if you have ideas, please do not be shy, you can reach us on our Facebook page, which is search for keeping it real pod, or on our website, we have a contact form keeping it real pod.com. And today on the show, we have Mike McElroy, and it’s one of my favorite episodes we’ve done because Mike and I are huge tech and systems nerds and we just geeked out for almost an hour about all the systems he used a lot utilizes with his own business and also the brokers that he mentors and coaches. So I think you guys are going to love it. And also remember to tell a friend, if you have other brokers in your office that you think would like to hear what top heavy hitter producers are doing piece, please pass this along to them. And then lastly, if you’re somebody who wants to advertise on our show, and get in front of about 5000 brokers every time we do a podcast, reach out to us and you can you can you can sponsor a show. So thanks so much. We’re glad to be back hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and into the holiday season here. We’ve got so many episodes, we’re gonna try to get through all of them before the end of December. I think I have five that are waiting to be produced. So we’re gonna get those out to you shortly. I’m glad you guys are liking them so much. It really means a lot to us. And again, thanks and undo our interview with Mike.

Today on the show, we have Mike McElroy. Mike is the founder and managing broker of center Coast Realty. He believes real estate is the most accessible and rewarding pathway to personal and financial freedom. And his mission is to help Realtors build rewarding profitable careers. Graduate of Indiana University Mike has served on the Chicago Association of Realtors finance committee, as chair of the association’s award winning Young Professionals Network and on the board of the Indiana University’s Alumni Association, charter chapter. Thanks, Mike for being on the show. Welcome. Thanks, TJ. Good to be here. Well, you were on our very first list of people to interview and in fact, when I saw you at a YPN event on a technology panel that I think you moderated if I remember correctly. You were one of the impetus is actually for me to get this podcast going because for years I had told my boss like that would be really fun to do as a way to give back to the community and certainly even to our own brokers who are always interested in hearing what top producers are doing. And I said, I wrote your name down, you might have been the first or second name I wrote down if people I wanted to talk to you, in particular because of your love of systems and sort of what you’ve done at your firm and, and just how you’ve built your business. So I’m really excited to finally get you on the show here. So thank you so much for your time.

Mike McElroy 3:55
Absolutely. I had no idea and I’m at that’s very gratifying to hear that I was able to be a small bit of inspiration for this awesome podcast

D.J. Paris 4:04
that you’ve put together. Thank you actually say that to everybody.

I was just gonna say

it really is the truth. I was sitting there in the audience and I go, I gotta get I literally was talking about this doing this for years. And then when you started getting specific with with systems, I was like, Oh, this is exactly the kind of information I want to put out there. So anyway, I would love to hear about how you got into real estate and can you tell us that? You know that story? Yeah, absolutely.

Mike McElroy 4:31
So I guess my real estate story really starts back in college when I was lucky enough to get a great taste of entrepreneurship back then. Where I was able to run a franchise. It was actually a franchise painting company where I got to do sales and marketing and recruit and hire and train and basically run an entire company from scratch. So I got the entrepreneurship bug back then, you know, I didn’t make a ton of money, but I learned a lot. And I knew I always wanted to run my own business. But for some reason, after college, I decided to try to work for somebody else. And, you know, that went okay for about two years. But after that, I just, you know, is was actually the middle of the recession. And I was working, this is kind of a dumb story. But for some reason that’s always stuck with me. I was working at a radio station selling advertising in Chicago. It’s a tough job. It’s a tough job. And I had a guarantee, but it’s 100%. Commission to and it’s just, it’s it’s like real estate when it comes to 100% Commission, but with way more oversight. So by the end of it, our station wasn’t doing well, because not a lot of people been advertising in 2008. And I think they had us, you know, signing out on a whiteboard to go on calls just to you know, make sure they knew where we were at at all times. So I remember one time, there was a Starbucks and I was in the AON center. So Starbucks downstairs, was going down for probably my third cup of coffee at 1030 in the morning, because that was sleepy. And I saw these people who are working at Starbucks. And what struck me about those people was, they had been there for my second cup of Starbucks, and my first cup of Starbucks. So they were just hanging out in Starbucks all day. And I was, I thought, Who Who are these people, they’re just they don’t have to go back upstairs to their boss. They’re totally free. This sounds amazing. I want that. But I didn’t know how to get it until a couple of months later, when out of the blue, a friend of mine, from a previous job called me and said his company was growing really quickly, and they were hiring. And they were looking for people to be leasing agents. And I didn’t really know anything about that or real estate at all. But he told me that he set his own hours worked from home sometimes, and made really good money, just meeting people, and probably the least salesy sales job he’d ever had. And I said, Okay, that’s interesting. So I checked it out. It was a really great entrepreneurial company, with a lot of very forward thinking, and they really wanted to change the industry. Or a few, you know, structural things that didn’t quite work for me. And funny enough, back then you didn’t need two years of experience in the business to get your managing broker’s license, which you right? Absolutely, should, absolutely should, but you didn’t really expect them. And I said, even then I was like, You should probably, I need a little more experience. But what the heck, if you’re gonna let me get it, I’ll just get that one. So I did, and after about 10 months in the business, I just struck out on my own. And that’s kind of how I got started.

D.J. Paris 7:50
That’s yeah, that’s really interesting. I think, you know, leasing is a great way to cut your teeth, and just get a lot of sort of face time with with clients. Obviously, it’s a different type of transaction much faster, less, in some ways, less complicated, of course, but what, what so when you when you started your own company, or as as your own managing broker, how old were you? I was 24. That’s amazing.

Mike McElroy 8:16
Still 24 I was 24 when I turned 20, for the week before I got into real estate, and I was still 24 When I started off on my own. So I learned how I learned how to I’m trying to think, you know, I learned all the requirements that the IDF PR has for a real estate office, before I learned, you know how a loan is underwritten, learn things kind of backwards.

D.J. Paris 8:43
In I imagined at 24. Most of your friends weren’t running around buying homes. So are you originally from Chicago or from I

Mike McElroy 8:52
grew up in the west suburbs? Yeah, I grew up out in Naperville.

D.J. Paris 8:55
Gotcha. So how did you know I mean, being 100% on your own? How did you you know, grow your business in the early years? What were some of the ways that you, you know, got in front of prospects?

Mike McElroy 9:06
Yeah, so I did everything. It was kind of, I was kind of wandering around in the real estate, wilderness, just kind of trying all kinds of stuff. So I definitely, I worked with a lot of renters and you know, you can have non exclusive listing agreements with apartment buildings in Chicago, and market those properties and meet renters that way. I also approached a lot of individual landlords who I saw who had their signs up or just had ads on Craigslist, and I said, Hey, you know, you’re doing this all wrong. Probably not getting a lot of exposure, because you’re not on the MLS and you’re not also following a whole bunch of rules that you’re going to need to Why don’t you let me take this for you? And all those people ended up buying or selling or both, eventually, so it was kind of a great way to build a base for my business. Back when, frankly, you know, homes weren’t selling too terribly well, in Oh 920 10 2011. Anyway, so when things finally turned around in 2012, I was in a great position.

D.J. Paris 10:13
I want to I want to back up just a moment, because I think this is an important point that maybe some of the brokers who are listening aren’t as familiar with with respect to leasing. And we get this question a lot in our firm as well, when a new broker comes on board, maybe is younger, or, you know, doesn’t have a lot of sales immediately to close, which would be pretty common to to not have. But what we always tell them is, a lot of times, they’ll go, oh, well, maybe I’ll do some leasing as a way as a stopgap solution before the sales really pick up which I think it makes a lot of sense what I tell them, and I suspect you would likely have have similar thoughts would be about going out and getting your own listings. And so you know, what Mike talked about, you actually said a lot in that previous part, which he basically told you how to go out and get rental listings, which was, you know, and this is something that is largely ignored by the broker community with rental listings in particular, there’s property management companies that will work with many different firms, you mentioned that. But then there’s the ability to go out as a leasing agent or licensed leasing agent or as a broker and getting your own rental listings. And it’s could be as simple as you see a for sale, or for rent sign, and you call them and say, hey, you know, I’m a broker? Are you currently working with a broker to help you get this place rented, I can do that for you. And I charge you know, one month’s rent or whatever it might be, you can also look at Craigslist ads, as Mike said, and start calling and saying, hey, I can help you, you know, with your exposure and get this place rented, it could be on a non exclusive basis, as well. So I apologize for getting a bit off track. But I think what you said was so incredibly valuable right there. For people who do want to do leasing, getting their own listings is I think the way to go, yeah,

Mike McElroy 11:49
absolutely. And just being educated, if you’re gonna go with leasing, and I get it, there’s a times it can be kind of a driver, you just got to look at it as getting paid, you know, if you don’t have money to invest in your business right up front, because we’re just getting started, it’s a great way to get paid, I’ll be at not a ton to network, look at it as networking. And so if you’re gonna do that, make sure you educate yourself on the not just a lot of brokers, especially at what I guess I’ll call traditional firms are familiar with what’s on the MLS, and that that’s kind of all they really have access to a whole universe of luxury residential property for rent out there. And I get it can be a little intimidating if you don’t know exactly what you’re doing. So hopefully, your broker or someone in the office can kind of help you out with that. But, you know, it’s actually a little bit more profitable. And more importantly, it’s the other half of the picture for your clients. And when I got started back in 2010, that’s really what I was offering is just, hey, listen, you know, you can go with one of these kind of leasing agencies, and they’re just going to take on the electric department circuit, or you can go with a traditional broker, and they’re going to show you what’s on the MLS, but I got both. So I was able to kind of niche myself that way.

D.J. Paris 13:05
Boy, that couldn’t have been better said that is absolutely the case. So if you’re, if you’re a broker who works at a firm, where you’re only looking at the MLS, for rentals, there is a world of a non MLS apartments that are available to you and vice versa. And the ability to offer both is is you know, obviously the, you’re just you’re just providing a better service at that point as well.

Mike McElroy 13:26
And, of course, they pay better to, like,

D.J. Paris 13:29
Well, yeah, that’s, that’s very true. And so and then you also said something at the very end of that, that was also critical, which was a lot of those people ended up becoming buyers down the road. So you know, it’s a wonderful way to jumpstart the career to get paid more quickly than waiting for your first sale to close not to say that everyone should should do leasing, but it’s certainly not the worst idea, everyone who will not everyone, but almost everyone who’s bought a place was a renter first. So I think that is a very, very smart, smart, smart plan.

Mike McElroy 13:59
And you got to stay in touch to not to keep going down the rabbit hole. But there I always tell people ask, you know, what should I do to get started in real estate and I always say, meet people and stay in touch with them. Or to get a little more specific make real estate connections, that’s I call a real estate connection, the contact information of someone who knows you’re a realtor and what that means. And then you got to organize that in a database CRM, whatever you’re using, and you’ve got to systematically nurture those contacts because that you know, everything you just said, the turning into buyers and sellers, you know, some of it would have happened just because people had a great experience and they remembered me but a lot of it wouldn’t have if I hadn’t stayed in touch with those

D.J. Paris 14:41
people. Well, I am guessing based on my understanding of your love of systems that you never let somebody go to the end of their leasing term without calling them prior going Hey, your leasing your your your lease is coming to in the next two months or you know, are you thinking about what you may want to do is this fact it’s a lot of it’s as simple as that. And I would bet you Most brokers sadly, don’t think to make that call.

Mike McElroy 15:05
Yeah, no, you’re absolutely right. And let’s

D.J. Paris 15:09
so that’s a great segue into into systems because I, you know, that’s that’s obviously something that’s really important to you. Can you talk a little bit about how you’ve systemized your business, and then how you even use it in your coaching when you when you work with your brokers in your own office?

Mike McElroy 15:23
Sure. So we’ve gone, I’d say we’ve had three major innovations in this in this realm. And I guess I sort of have this, maybe a little bit of an engineering mindset is a nice way to put it obsessive compulsive as another way to put it. So anytime I do something more than once, it should be a system. And it helps me go faster, and actually provide a better and more and actually more personal service to my clients, because I’m focused on them while my my system is running in the background. So the three big things for us, the first one was a system to automate service for clients. And I guess before I talk, I always like to clarify, a system should not be confused with technology. A system is just a term for a repeatable process that you follow that delivers a desired result. Hopefully that makes you work faster, or delivers a better product to your clients. So a system doesn’t have to be a piece of technology, it’s just a process that you follow. Technology helps you follow that process, it helps you organize that process and make it go faster. But those, those two terms get kind of interchanged a lot, and they’re definitely different. So the first, the first thing we did was really document exactly how we go about representing a buyer and a seller and also a renter and a landlord, although we focus mostly on on how to represent a buyer and a seller. And this is something that everyone from Michael Gerber and the E Myth to Gary Keller and Millionaire Real Estate Agent will tell you or Gino Wickman. And traction, all great books, by the way to read is you’ve got to document your systems. And so what we did was we started with just kind of a loose skeleton of here are the steps in a process. Whether you’re working with a buyer or seller starts with the moment you start talking to him, and how you prepare for that present first presentation, how you prepare for your showings, etc. And what we did was we just broke that down into it’s literally hundreds of sub component parts over time. So what would happen is I would get it really took off when I hired an assistant. Because I would say, Alright, I want someone to set up these showings. And my sister would say how would I set up these showings. And rather than explain something to someone five times we just document it. And we write down the exact process for setting up showings to make sure that everything’s confirmed, and I’m show up in the wrong place. And I have all the information that I need when I get there. And having that framework allowed us to build on that. So you know, eventually I had this client and she said I need to live within a half mile of a gym and a grocery store. And I said, Oh, wow, that’s so we started doing all this Google mapping, right? And you’re creating these little Venn diagrams in your brain. Like, I remember where the thing you just searched was and I was like, we need to build this. There’s this thing called Google mind maps, that’s a piece of technology, assist, right technology, and allows you to plot and save a whole bunch of different plots on a map. So we realized that a lot of people had the same issues. And we started doing that before every round of showings. So once we came up with this idea, like a lot of brokers, I think they have these cool ideas like oh, this would this would really improve my service, I should do this. And they do it once. But then they don’t they forget to do it the next time. They don’t execute on it every single time. But once you have a process that you follow, every time that you come up with something new and add it to your process, you just you end up following that every single time you execute, and you learn so much faster and allows you to iterate and really quickly improve the speed and effectiveness of your service.

D.J. Paris 19:28
Yeah, I’m just I’m sorry to jump in the middle. I was we did an interview early on in the in the show’s history, which is still early on in our history, but it was one of our first episodes. I think it was Kim Curtis could have been in a psychologist. Oh, yes.

Mike McElroy 19:42
Right. Yeah, great systems. Okay, good. So I’m pretty

D.J. Paris 19:45
sure it was Kim and one of the things she does and I hope that I’m attributing this to the right person because I have the world’s most horrible memory, which is why I have systems. But she talked about when she works with buyers and sellers. She asks them literally I believe it’s over two 100 questions, and she does it on paper, I suspect if she sits down with them for an hour or two before she ever does anything else. That’s what it is. That’s her system. Right. And I thought, boy, that’s that’s, you know, that’s a very low tech approach to a system but an incredibly effective technique.

Mike McElroy 20:21
Oh, totally. And I’ve done a deal with Kim, I want to say about a year and a half ago, she worked with Jonathan self in our office, but I oversaw it. And you can tell when you’re working with someone else who’s following a process, it goes much, much smoother. And I just like to go ahead, give a shout out. Thank Kim for the awesome contract sheet with all the information on it that she sent out at the beginning, that we now have created a template from us. Oh,

D.J. Paris 20:47
there you go. Wow. That’s amazing. Well, great. Yeah, I’m sorry, but you weren’t you are saying?

Mike McElroy 20:55
Oh, um, yeah. So I guess I’ll throw some technology in there too, because I know, that’s what the people want. So we use a tool, technology tool called Asana as a CNA, just kind of like yoga. And basically what it is, is it’s a really light, flexible, powerful task management system. So a lot of realtors know that they, especially if you’ve been around for a while you have a checklist for certain parts of your process, like you have a new listing checklist or you have a new contract checklist. So what Asana does is it organizes all of your checklists into one place into a project that you simply duplicate every time, you have a new version of one of those projects. So like we have a buyer template. And every time we work with a new buyer, we duplicate it the same thing for sellers, and workflows, you step by step through the entire process from start to finish. It organizes it. So it’s not overwhelming. And it but it goes down to an incredible level of detail. Because every time we make a mistake, or every time you learn something, it gets documented in there. So like, hey, if your buyers buying new construction, make sure that you’re not the first one to close or your underwriting process will be a huge pain. Like that’s a massive value add for our clients to avoid that, that underwriting quagmire. And experienced agents will remember that, you know, most of the time, but when you get busy and you got four or five deals that you’re negotiating at the same time, you know, sometimes you miss stuff like that. So just even me having it written down, I go through it every single time to make sure I don’t miss something, even though I’ve done it over and over again. And for new agents, it’s it’s invaluable. They can kind of just color by numbers, their first couple of real estate transactions with support of course. And for teams. You can assign tasks to people with due dates, keep track everything. So it allows you to scale really quickly and, and bring an assistant up to speed quickly as well.

D.J. Paris 23:04
Yeah, and so just to reiterate, Mike is referring to Asana, which is as a as a add a, it’s free until you start getting into the more premium features. And then it’s a very nominal cost. It’s a very well respected system. For our own workflow, I use a different tool, which is Trello. Mike and I were talking offline. And for certain types of things. Trello is great as well, some project management workflows, it’s okay for, and we use that. But if we if we didn’t have a system, and initially when we started this podcast, we really didn’t. And it just became a huge mess. And with and so it’s it’s really revolutionized our ability to stay on top of things, what other what other pieces of technology are you using to systematize your business.

Mike McElroy 23:48
So the next thing we implemented was a really great CRM, and I couldn’t find a real estate specific sarin that I liked. I feel like the problem with a lot of those is, and I get why they try to just work off the shelf. And the truth is, you need to set a CRM up, you need to spend a lot of time kind of mapping your business to the CRM to make it work. That’s why people pay consultants, you know 10s of 1000s of dollars to implement Salesforce in their business. And so there’s a lot of real estate CRMs are kind of trying to, you know, bridge that gap by just working off out of the shelf, but what they they lose a ton of functionality in that process and they lose a ton of flexibility. So we use HubSpot which is the big the big advantage of HubSpot is it’s integrated and it’s automatic. So it allows you to do a ton of different automations like if you flat if you categorize a certain contact as a buyer, it can sign them opt for a sequence of drip emails that goes out every two weeks that kind of nurtures them with advice about the market buying a home. It can, it can if people click a certain link in a certain email, it can trigger another email or it can say it can send an email to a owner of that contact and say hey, so and so has really taken a good look at your market update yet you just sent out it might be time to follow up. So we love we love HubSpot around here too.

D.J. Paris 25:29
That’s good HubSpot also directly integrates with Asana if I’m if I’m thinking correctly,

Mike McElroy 25:35
I’m not directly. You could do some things with Zapier. Zapier. I

D.J. Paris 25:40
see or if this than that, you know, either Zapier Yeah, yeah, so So that’s also really interesting, too. But what Mike is talking about with HubSpot is is what’s called if this than that, not not the actual system if this than that, but but this idea that when x happens when x event happens, you know why results. So you know, you’re dropping somebody in a very specific marketing track, or you’re dropping them into a particular group, which then receives a different level type of communication. We’re talking about systematizing. You know, the way you you communicate with your clients, your prospects, your closed, you know, contacts as well. Privates previous relationships. If you would, I apologize. I know where I might be getting you off track, you’d mentioned three major things. Were the first to the CRM and Asana or were there other

Mike McElroy 26:28
Yeah, Asana, CRM, and then the last one. So, you know, we started with taking great care of our clients with Asana. The next one was finding more clients with a CRM. And then our most recent one that I’m really excited about right now is planning your business. So a lot of realtors struggle, especially when they’re starting. But even when they’ve got a level of experience, or kind of just running on pure talent, they don’t have a great plan. And by plan, I mean, a sales plan. So if you want to close this many deals this year, exactly how many people do you need to put under contract? Go on showings with meet with? And how many prospects do you need of each of those types of business? And, and you really need to kind of plan that out. So you know, how to approach your year. And from there, you need to track how you’re actually doing? Are your conversion rates, you know, are is the same number of people that you meet with closing that you thought would you know, is that lining up? Or do you need to adjust something. So we built and it’s still kind of in minimum viable product status, but it’s pretty powerful already. It’s just, it’s just a series of spreadsheets, that syncs with our CRM, but what it allows you to do is input a few variables, and it spits out your entire sales plan for the year. So every single month, you know exactly what you’ve got to get out of your chair and go do in order to make yeah, that’s,

D.J. Paris 28:06
that is so so important. And well said I’ll give you a colorable example which speaks to this. I early on in the podcast interview, Josh Weinberg of the of the mutual Jeff’s Weinberg group, which I’m sure you know, those guys. And I asked, and I don’t know if this made it onto the podcast or not, I think it did. But if it didn’t, I’ll just repeat it or share it for the first time. But I asked Tommy what his team’s goals were for the, you know, the rest of the year. And it was interesting, because he’s He says, Yeah, we don’t really think like that. He says, what what we do know is, if Tommy meets 365 new people within the next 365 days, that’s literally that’s our goal is that he goes out and meets 365 new people that we’ve never talked to, basically one a day or, you know, however many that that is, when the AC works. We know we’re going to hit our actual financial goals, we don’t even worry about it because they’ve they’ve systemized systematize that down to he’s got to meet one person today. And if he does that, everything else falls into place because they know their conversions, right. And they trust that everything else has already been figured out. But it all boils down to just one basic activity, which then sets everything else in motion.

Mike McElroy 29:19
Yeah, I love those guys, because they make it so simple. Right? Now, there’s a lot of work that goes into figuring that, of course. But once you’ve got it, that’s the goal. That’s exactly the goal. So once you’ve figured out how many prospects How are you going to meet those people, you know, is it open houses? Is it going to networking events? Is it calling your sphere, and then figuring out exactly what you need to do every day? And that’s perfect. I just need to meet one person. Awesome. Like if that’s something you can just do. Right,

D.J. Paris 29:51
right, that that becomes something that that yeah, it’s right. It’s very, very doable, and I’ve tried to do that in my business as well. And I wanted to luck, you know what we’re what we’re really talking about a lot of this aside from the specifics of Cisco Systems, and also potentially using technology to, to assist those systems. We’re talking about coaching, right, ultimately, and I know that’s really important to you in the, into the culture of your firm and what you’ve built. So can you talk a little bit about the importance of coaching and how you do that with with your own brokers? Yeah, absolutely.

Mike McElroy 30:21
I mean, when you’re out there, just writing contracts and meeting clients every single day, I think brokers, very smart and talented people, they forget to just take a step back and take a look at their business, and actually plan. So I think that’s what coaching really helps with. So I still meet with even our experienced brokers, we meet once a month, and we say, alright, what were your goals from last month? What were the results? What roadblocks Did you run into? What else do you want to workshop, let’s set some goals for next month, and just being forced to take that hour and take that bigger picture view of their business helps them kind of get their head out of the trenches for a second, make sure they’re not not, you know, that they know, they’re running really fast, we just got to make sure they’re running in the right direction. So that’s, I think that’s really valuable. And the other part of it is just accountability. You know, you need even before when it was just me out there, I collected, I organized five or six different people that I just respected. Like my parents, a buddy of mine who is in business, one of my best friend’s dad’s. And I said, Alright, guys, I’m gonna put together a plan, and a whole list of goals, I’m gonna send it to you every month, you don’t need to respond, I just need to send it to you. And if you have anything to say, by all means, let me know. But I just need, I need that accountability. And so I had kind of this advisory council, my first couple years in business, before I got an actual coach myself, because I couldn’t afford one back then. And I think having that accountability is really valuable. So just the perspective, the sounding board, and also the accountability is something I really, I would encourage every broker to go and get.

D.J. Paris 32:15
Yeah, and I’d like to add to that, too. And I’ll tell you what I do, which is probably sounds pretty unusual and silly. But I went to a presentation by a gentleman named Marshall Goldsmith, which people can google him if they’d like, but he’s, he’s one of the foremost experts on leadership. And he’s in the world, he may be the foremost expert. He’s written, like, 60 books, and he’s definitely the guide. And one of the things he said is, is he had said to, to our this group that I went to, he said, The most important thing I’ve learned after, I think, 50 years teaching this in universities, and also to the public was that you need an accountability partner. And also, like Mike had just mentioned, maybe not one that necessarily rewards or or punishes you, but just one that you can report to. And so I got this idea from him. And he showed all this data, he’s a statistician, really, and he showed all this data that says, if you do this, you are way more likely to get more done. And and so what it is, is I have a series of habits, daily habits that are really important to me, like back to the Josh Weinberg story, you know, like, maybe it’s meeting one person a day, that’s not my particular habit, but I have other ones similar to that might be like, Did I eat correctly? Did I go to the gym? Did I, you know, it was nice to the people closest to me, or did I reach out and it was like, good to my clients, etc. There’s a number of habits, you know, and I get eight hours of sleep, you know, that sort of like, and so I pay somebody and just to show you how inexpensive it can be, if you’re not the ability to you know, to hire a really expensive real estate coach, but if you know the habits that you want to take, I pay somebody literally it’s $8 a week, this person lives in Istanbul, Turkey, this is what he quoted me as his price. He calls me every morning at 830. We have a 92nd phone call, he asks me 17 questions that I have written for him. He does not judge whether I did something or not like one of my questions is did you have to chop sugar? Which is one of my questions. Do you have sugar? Well, today I had to say I had sugar yesterday not that big of a deal. I don’t I’m not but you know, most days I tried to say I didn’t have sugar. So he asked me those questions. He report records in a Google spreadsheet and that is literally the extent of our of our relationship. You’ve never met this guy before. I’ve never met him never met him. I’ve been doing it for six months. $8 a week eight using and and so the point is, and I found him just by going to website where you say here’s what I’m looking for. People can bid on the business and he’s was it. Okay, yeah, there’s gonna be we’re gonna say Upwork I’m assuming you upwork.com is a great place. Fortunately, guru.com there’s there’s a lot of places so you can find these and it’s not necessarily an accountability partner, who I mean he doesn’t have any opinion whether I do something or not. He doesn’t care if I walked my dog or I didn’t. But it’s important for For him to ask, it’s important for me to have him asked me to keep it in the front of my mind. So I’ve, I’ve distilled the most important things to my business, and also just my personal life down to a series of habits. And Mike’s talking about this a lot as well. And so if you don’t have somebody who, like Mike did it probably in a more effective way, we found people in the industry who can help them, at least hold them accountable. But if you don’t have that, you know, you can hire somebody for next to nothing. To ask you this. It’s pretty great.

Mike McElroy 35:25
Just to kind of I mean, you know, it’s, it’s those a little bit I love that he just doesn’t care at all. It does. Well, I

D.J. Paris 35:31
have told I have told him not to care, because I said, I told him, I said, I don’t need your judgment. And 30 agree every day, and in a day can never be perfect anyway. So there’s always there’s only 17 questions, he asks me, and I’m going to have not completed one of those tasks. And that’s okay. I don’t beat myself up about it. I just think, okay, I didn’t do that yesterday, I’ll try to do it today. Right. But the point is, it’s just keeping that constant accountability of, you know, of just remembering your daily task, because I think and I’d like to get your thoughts on this. I think oftentimes, not always, but oftentimes brokers, they sort of know what they probably should be doing to grow their business, they know they should write personal notes, they know they should reach out to their friends and family, they should know should they should meet more people and stay in touch, but they oftentimes just find themselves not doing it, they get caught up in the whatever’s coming at them. And by doing by systematizing, you know, okay, every month, I’m writing a personal note to so and so or whatever those habits might be. I imagine your life is a series of habits as well.

Mike McElroy 36:33
Yeah, habits, habits pick you up when your motivation levels drop, because they’re going to your motivation that have fluctuate over time. And your habits are what keeps you going through that. I’m just I’m sorry, I’m still glad my mind is kind of running

D.J. Paris 36:47
reeling from the $8.

Mike McElroy 36:50
Like the data you could get from that, too. You said he puts it in a spreadsheet? Yeah, asked you to rate every day the day before and then can be up all the other. Oh, my God, you’re gonna have so much fun with this. Sorry. Yeah.

D.J. Paris 37:03
I do. And it’s again, it’s never the goal is not to even have a perfect date back the goal that I could have a day where I miss every single one of those. And the goal is not to like, beat myself up, right? The goal is just to this and go, Oh, okay, well, I didn’t quite get things done. And that’s also a nice opportunity to, to have days where you really fall short and to not, you know, beat yourself up and destroy your self esteem. But, um, so that’s a nice opportunity to, but it’s, it’s literally just to remind me because, like, this is embarrassing. I’ll give you one of them. I literally have them asked me did you clean the cat box, I have a cat. And, and I cleaned the cat box twice a day now. And I used to do it like once every three days, which I apologize for anyone listening. They are probably completely disgusted by that. I wouldn’t be too but that’s what I was doing. I wasn’t adding it. And I knew I was supposed to clean it at least once a day. But I wasn’t. And I went. Now I know if I have to if I have to report to somebody, it’s like, I’m 41 This is embarrassing. But if I had to like literally report it every day, I’d probably do it. And so he asks me every day, even though now I do it twice a day, and I’ve never missed. I still will never take that off the list because it gets got me to do things.

Mike McElroy 38:12
Oh, I love that. Okay, stealing.

D.J. Paris 38:15
All right, well, this isn’t about me, this is back to you. Let’s I want to let’s talk about the culture of your office. Because, you know, I’ve always been impressed by sort of the way you you conduct yourself the way you carry yourself how you present. You know your thoughts and ideas. Can you talk a little bit about how you’ve built that into your into center coast?

Mike McElroy 38:33
Yeah, absolutely. And I’ll give you one right off the bat. So we have a team meeting every Tuesday at Two on Team Tuesday. And the first thing we do is we go around the room, we all share one win from the past week. And we share one thing that we learned. And I’m excited because I’ve got my thing for next week already, which is this phone call thing. But yeah, so I actually, I owe a lot to the Young Professionals Network and the Chicago Association of Realtors. Where, you know, we first were, you saw me talk, that’s all got started. And it’s this culture of really forward thinking, growth oriented, just fun people. And I was really lucky to be chosen. I don’t even know how this happened. But they chose me to to be the chair of the Young Professionals Network, say 2014. So after that, I said, Man, I need need, like this. How do I stay? How do I? What can I do with this? And I thought, you know, let’s start a real estate office. That’s exactly the same way. So we really I look for people who are genuine, who are passionate, who are good problem solvers, and most importantly, who are open minded. I find that’s one of the most valuable traits just in a human being in general. And it’s really important to us here at center coast.

D.J. Paris 40:00
Yeah, I and yeah, and I think also the ability for their leader in this case you to have systems to be able to teach, I think is incredibly valuable. I can’t tell you how often and I’m curious to get your opinion on this. And I know everyone does things differently. And there’s certainly no specifically right way to necessarily run your systems. But I’ve heard people say, Well, you go to a listing appointment with a blank sheet of paper. You know, and you listen, and then yes, I agree. That’s part of it. But I think, Boy, I it’s not the way I would do it. Yeah, I’m curious on your thoughts on on that, because I’ve heard that a lot.

Mike McElroy 40:37
Interesting. I haven’t heard that one. No, I show up with a whole bunch of questions. I’ve written out the same questions every time plus the other. Right. I thought that that was prepping.

D.J. Paris 40:49
That’s right. Yeah. But

Mike McElroy 40:51
I think the point is, is you do need to list here’s where I think maybe they’re going with that. And I think this is really valuable. It is easy to show up at that sheet of paper unlisted questions, and just ask them and then wait for the answer, and write down the answer and go. Okay, thanks. And move on to the next one. But that’s not right. I really coach people that you got to dig, and you got to find the why. to these questions. To really figure out what your client’s motivations are, and what’s going to be important to them in the process. Like, I want to find out if a buyer craves a lot of control in their life. You know, because if that’s the case, then we need to talk about some things. Right started. And we will and that will really help the rest of the process. So don’t just ask the questions. Listen, I think is the takeaway there and ask it another question.

D.J. Paris 41:47
Boy, well said, Well, I have kept you long enough. And I could keep talking to you for a while. But you are. You’re a busy person. And so I will, we will let you go. But, Mike, if if there are any? Well, there’s really two things. If there are brokers out there that are interested in learning about your firm, what’s the best way they can reach out to you

Mike McElroy 42:05
drop me an email? My email is Mike at center coast. realty.com. And yeah, I’m always I love you know, I just love this conversation. So I love talking to people who are, like I said, growth oriented and forward thinking. So I’m always happy to talk shop, let somebody pick my brain and vice versa.

D.J. Paris 42:27
Yeah. And also, if you are a buyer seller or a renter, or our landlord, for example, that’s interested in having Mike represent you. You can contact him the same way. Do you also provide your phone number or do you not typically, yeah,

Mike McElroy 42:41
email is probably going to be the best way to get me just in case I’m what I always tell my clients when I’m with them, I’m with them. So email is probably best, but my number is also 773-828-9467.

D.J. Paris 42:55
And also, Mike’s website is center coast realty.com. It’s well built it’s it’s an excellent one of the better sites I’ve seen for for an office. So check that out as well. Well, Mike, thank you so much for being a part of the show. Really appreciate your time.

Mike McElroy 43:10
Thanks, DJ. This was a blast.

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Top 1% producers Grace Goro and Julia Brenner have been best friends since 6th grade. In this episode they get specific on how they started their real estate business, why personal notes and pop-byes have been paramount to their success, and why professionalism helps differentiate them from the other 35k real estate brokers in Chicago.

Grace Goro can be reached at Grace@GoroBrennerGroup.com and 312.720.7589
Julia Brenner can be reached at Julia@GoroBrennerGroup.com and 312.720.7589

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:15
Welcome to another episode of Keeping it real. The only podcast made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers. My name is DJ Paris, I am your host through the show. And coming up in just a moment, we have the interview with the Goro Brenner team, which is Grace Goro. And a Julia Brenner. And first time we ever have had two people are being interviewed at the same time and their best friends and teammates, and it came out really well. In particular, I think you’ll find a lot of really practical ways to grow your business. And they gave a number of examples of how to do that this is also the week of Thanksgiving. So in the spirit of giving thanks, we want to thank everyone who’s listening, we are again, going to finish up the month here at a record high about 33% more listeners this month, and last month. I know you don’t care about those numbers, but it’s very exciting. And I hope it means we’re doing something right. And it’s our way of just giving back to the industry and hopefully helping brokers out there who are looking to hear what the top producers are doing so that they themselves can grow their business, like some of these big hitters. So if you have any one else, one way you can get back to us aside from listening is drop us a line, let us know what you like. And if you have anyone that you we need to interview that maybe isn’t on our radar, let us know you can find us at keeping it real pod.com. And you can also find us on Facebook at keeping it real pod. And please continue to share this podcast if everyone out there just share this podcast with one other broker that they think could benefit from this information, it would double our numbers and we’d appreciate that as well. And lastly, if you’re a company that works with real estate agents, and would like to get in front of about 5000 of them every time we do an interview, you can sponsor an episode. So please reach out to us if you’re interested in getting a lot of people to hear about what you do. So do that as well. And now have everyone have a wonderful Thanksgiving. And now on to our interview with grace and Juliet.

All right, today on the show we have grace Goro and Julia Brenner linquist. Grace is a high end residential real estate specialist out of app properties, their largest office, which is the Goose Island office, and in early years she helped her first team secure a record 42 million in volume before branching out to found her own boutique real estate team the Goro Brenner group today Grace’s business is based on referrals. And although she has experienced across Chicagoland she specializes in high end residential real estate and Chicago’s North Side including Lincoln Park, Old Town River North Lakeview to name a few, and some of the suburbs including her hometown of Park Ridge. Grace serves as the Vice Chair for the 2017 2018 Chicago Association of Realtors YPN. The Young Professionals Network is also a member of our PAC which is Realtors political action committee workgroup. She is also the founder of the prostate cancer league a 501 C three charitable organization dedicated to raising funds and awareness to prevent and treat prostate cancer. Julia Brenner linquist is a Top Producing real estate agent. Also with that properties. She knows that her clients come first values their needs, puts an emphasis on an open and honest business understands the power of proactive marketing. Julio lives and works in the Chicagoland area and keen to the trends of the windy city and its ever changing real estate landscape. Julia works side by side with with Grace at the Goro Brenner group. And it is through this cohesive partnership that the gore Brenner group has been able to double its volume over the last year Julius specializes in Chicago’s near north side, including places similar to Grace like Lincoln Park River, North Old Town, etc. But as well as some suburbs including Park Ridge, her hometown, Glenview, which was my technically my hometown, Evanston, Skokie, Wilmette Deerfield, Highland Park. Julie is an enthusiastic member of her community and a die hard Cubs fan. She’s a member of the YPN as well, I’m sorry, the YPN board. She’s not only a member of the YPN. She’s also on the board forever site Illinois, which is an organization dedicated to preservation and restoration of site. When Julie isn’t working. You can find her biking on Lakeshore trying new restaurants with family and friends or consistently constantly redecorating her home. You are always welcome to redecorate my home as well. So thank you guys, we really really appreciate both of your times and so let’s let’s first identify who’s who can Grace Can you say hello?

Grace Goro 4:48
Yeah, hi, DJ. Thank you for that intro. Sorry. It was a little bit long. I’m sorry that my I sound a little bit nasally right now I’m a little I’m getting over a cold but this is great. So the One who sounds a little nasally it’s great.

D.J. Paris 5:02
Hi. And Juliet,

Julia Brenner 5:03
thank you for the intro to DJ, we appreciate it.

D.J. Paris 5:08
No, and I know how busy you guys are, in particular, not just with your real estate practice, but some of your other charities and organizations that you’re involved in. So believe me, I really, it’s me that appreciates it. More prob. So thank you guys. I’m Grace, I want to start with something that I’m a huge fan of, which is the Young Professionals Network YPN. And I just yesterday gave you guys like a 15 minute commercial to a broker who was in my office. And she had, she was with another firm, and she had started I think, in August. And so it’s just been, what a few months in the business and she feels lost. And I think the office she’s at, not at properties, of course, the I don’t even know where it was, but it was some smaller office where they didn’t have training. And she was taking advantage of she’s a member of car. And so she’s taking advantage of some of the cars training, which is excellent. And she was also saying, what else should I be getting involved in? And I said, Oh, are you familiar being a car member? Are you familiar with the YPN? Or at least you know, the city YPN. And she was not familiar. So I spent like 10 or 15 minutes saying you need to go to all of the events, you know, and so grace, you’re the co chair. So can you talk just real briefly about why everybody should be a YPN member who’s a member of car?

Grace Goro 6:18
Sure, I’d be happy to. So I’m the 2018 Vice Chair, Mo Dodd will be the chair this year. And I’m just so excited when I started. In real estate, I didn’t know anybody else in the industry, except for my dad and his friends and they were on their 60s and 70s. They’re not really somebody you can hang out with and learn from quite so much. So I felt very much alone. And I was introduced to why piano and I started going to their breakfasts. And I realized what a family I could have in this group of people. And so just spend the first couple of years meeting people through there, then I got involved in the board. And this is my third year now coming on as vice chair. And I just think it’s really an amazing place for not for every agent, not just new agents, it’s not necessarily an age specific thing or an experience specific. It’s just for people who want a sense of community and want to be able to learn more about what other people in their industry are doing through whether it’s the you know, the monthly breakfasts or the parties, we throw we do a kickoff mixer and another mid year event, let the last two years it’s been a fabulous boat with open bar, it’s a lot of fun. And just, you know, a lot more several more outings, it’s a way to really get to know your peers in the industry. I love it.

Julia Brenner 7:39
And to echo Grace, I’m on the board this year with her. And congratulations, thank you. This is really it’s a really great way to like she was saying to really get to know people and have more of a sense of family and colleagues and industry that can be really isolating. And on top of it. I think all it does is really benefit the industry by having Realtors know each other and support each other and raise each other up and help each other out. At the end of the day. It just makes the industry a better industry. It helps get deals done. And overall, it’s just a great benefit to get out there and meet people.

D.J. Paris 8:15
Yeah, 100%. And you know, so by the way, what how they can find information about the YPN is you could go to cars website, which is Chicago realtor.com. It’s I think it’s right on the homepage. If not just go to Google type in YPN. Chicago, it’ll come right up. And they also car sends out their schedule. I think once a month or so they’ll send out here’s the next upcoming event. Is there any other way that they can get on a mailing list or is it all through car,

Grace Goro 8:45
it’s mostly through the car website. And once you sign up there to become a it doesn’t cost anything to become a member. And then you can you’ll get notifications about all of the member events that are coming up via email. And then the more you attend to we always give shout outs for our next event. And every year it’s something different our our chair last year, she did this amazing brainchild of this amazing IKEA build out event where we had a warehouse. And we built Ikea furniture for all Chicago, which is an organization that helps people experiencing homelessness. And just had so many new people coming there and that’s something that we really pushed to be at the website too. So that’s probably the best place to learn about it.

Julia Brenner 9:25
Yeah, and there’s a ton of charity involved which is really great because as a whole again, giving back to the community only benefits us as realtors and our community and the areas we live in and work in. And every the last Wednesday of every month, correct? Yep, starting starting in February. Every year we do it at Manny’s Deli in the South Loop. So the last Wednesday of every month 9am to 1030. That schedule should be posted online. You do have to sign up for it but just as an update to people adds up. So let’s

D.J. Paris 10:01
come in, we’ll put a link to the website, this specific link in the in the comments, or in the in the description. And I can’t yet I can’t stress it enough too. So this woman that was in my, I was just meeting with her and she and I was saying, you will learn so much. And also, you know, hey, you get a free Manny’s breakfast. And that’s that might that alone is worth going. But in addition, because I used to waste our office was right next to Manny. So in addition to being awesome, because it’s Manny’s, you, there’s just a lot of great information. I know you guys have did panels last year at some of those meetings where it was like technology focused and people just learn, you learn so much. And you get to connect with other brokers who are all about sharing information. So anyway, okay, so I just wanted

Grace Goro 10:45
to about YPN. Amazing.

D.J. Paris 10:48
I know I well, I should I should offer to, to, you know, assist more like there’s a way to I don’t know, when the board stuff is, but maybe in the next year or so I’ll offer some services, you know what I should? Actually, yeah, we’re gonna, you know, what I? Well, you know, what I would like to do is actually build you guys out your own website, if that’s possible, that I think would be really cool. Because it’s car is just such a big website. But maybe that would be neat to have your own specific site, you know, just for that. But anyway, let’s talk about you guys, because I think this is such a cool story that you guys have been friends, basically, since sixth grade, I’m guessing or sixth grade. Yeah. And let’s talk about the origin story of how you guys met and how you’ve grown your business, you know, all the way from when you got together in business.

Grace Goro 11:36
Today, you want to start this.

Julia Brenner 11:38
So we met on a traveling basketball team in our hometown in Park Ridge, we were the two tallest type of girls. So we really stood out to each other because other than that our friends tended to be shorter girls that we had to like bend down to feed to hear them talk. So we became friends playing traveling basketball, we played on our feeder team in Park Ridge. And then we played for our high school until senior year. And our individual groups of friends became one big group of friends. So we’ve been best friends since sixth grade. And it’s really fun because we played on a team for so much of our lives. And it’s really cool that we are on a team again now. And

Grace Goro 12:27
the only thing that’s kind of confusing for people is I think, over the years with friends used to just kind of start to pick up similar mannerisms and wear similar outfits and all that and on a daily basis. If we had a nickel for every time somebody called us the other person, we wouldn’t even need to work anymore. Oh,

Julia Brenner 12:45
I mean, our own family members do it. Our own family members do it. One time her mom took pictures of me playing volleyball that she thought were great. And then my mom got a whole full photo album with pictures of me. You’re welcome. So

D.J. Paris 12:59
yeah, that’s, that’s awesome.

Julia Brenner 13:02
So yeah, we do dress like a lot. We talk like we say the same things a lot. So we do kind of confuse people. But it’s kind of what makes us unique in our team. So

D.J. Paris 13:14
so yeah. And so grace you you got into did you get into real estate first? Because I know you come from like everybody in your family who’s in real estate.

Grace Goro 13:23
Right? You should hear dinner conversations. Yeah, so I I was licensed in 2011. I actually was licensed while I was graduating at the University of Arizona. So I graduated with a degree in broadcast journalism and I went on to work for not very long, just about a half a year at Comcast SportsNet. Downtown while I had my license, and my dad who was at the time the managing broker of Coldwell bankers office in Lincoln Park was pretty insistent that I actually don’t get into the family business. He wanted me to do what my degree was for right and and not waste all that money going to school. Sure, no, I the hours that were brutal in broadcast journalism, I’d be up at two in the morning to get to the studio by four done by like 11am. And then you’re home and you’re sleeping by six, so it just was never going to work. So I ended up convincing him to let me hang my license him him being my Dad, let me hang my license at the Linkin Park office. And I started on a team. And I was there for I think it was maybe three or four years and I was talking to Julia at the time because you know, we see each other on a regular basis anyway. And she was an a nine to five and not all that happy and I was telling her how much I loved it. And I just thought that she had such the personality for it and had enough experience at that point to potentially branch off and start our own thing. And yeah, I was by some miracle she she trusted to make the job.

Julia Brenner 14:53
But no, I was doing marketing. And I also was a broadcast journalism major. And I just found myself In a job that wasn’t really what I even set out to be in, and what I love to do was talk to people and interview people and work with them and help them. And I was telling that to grace. She’s like, well, that’s a lot of what real estate is like. It sounds like you’re talking about something that’s right up your alley. So like she said, she took very little convincing and I got my license and joined the Coldwell Banker office to under Grace’s dad. And right off the bat, we started our own team and we haven’t looked back since.

D.J. Paris 15:31
That that’s amazing. And it’s that Linkin Park Coldwell Banker offices is such a such a history to it as well. I mean, it’s just been around forever. It’s this big behemoth. My, my boss, Nick Patterson started there a million years ago, before he went off on his own. And there’s just been so many great, great people that have funneled through that office and are still obviously at that office. And so, but let you know, and I think that so, first of all, I would like to point out that you guys were both broadcast journalism majors that is this incredibly like, did. Were you guys, how did that happen? That you were both did you guys go to the same college as well? Or

Grace Goro 16:07
I swear, we’re not each other’s only

Julia Brenner 16:10
other friends with other girls

Grace Goro 16:13
with other Yeah, no. But I think that’s a lot of why we gravitated towards each other to be in the same career because we have very similar personalities and interests. Julia went to Wisconsin.

Julia Brenner 16:23
Yeah, I went to University Wisconsin Madison, my mom’s reporter, my dad’s a publicist. So I was kind of make sense. Sure. I don’t know how she got started. She copied you clearly.

Grace Goro 16:34
stumbled my way. I really liked the broadcasting aspect of it at the time and I wanted to do sports specifically. I’m so sorry. I lost my train of thought you asked me where I went. I was at the University of Arizona not too pleased with our terrible rivals ASU.

D.J. Paris 16:56
You Yes. You were in Tempe? Arizona. Have you been to Tucson? Yeah, not? Yeah, not Tempe. That’s the other one. Yes, I so I but I think that’s that’s particularly interesting, because I do think so much of being a good realtor is about and maybe the most important part of it is being a good communicator. Some would say it’s being a good listener, I would say and being a good listener is maybe the most important way of being a good communicator. But but certainly communication is so important. And it’s always, whenever there’s studies that are done on serve service businesses, like financial advisors, or realtors, it’s always you know, what our clients want. It’s, you know, they want somebody who communicates effectively. So I think that’s a really important point. And I also want to, I want to talk a little bit about how you guys complement each other. Because, obviously, you’ve been friends for a long time. And I just interviewed and it may have been Amy Diamond, I can’t recall who who, who told me this. But I interview a lot of of brokers who are on teams, and I think it was Amy. But she she had said, the reason why she built a team was that she knew an 80 hour work week just wasn’t sustainable. And at a certain amount of time. On our own. She was still like, I need some help. So I can, you know, have a reasonably act some boundaries in my life, right? And so I wonder if you guys are complementing each other is one of you more focused in a particular area of the business? are you both doing sort of the same tasks or?

Grace Goro 18:22
So one of the interesting things that I find about our pairing that I noticed right off the bat, we started because we wanted accountability partners, right, and we’re both pretty competitive. So the better Giulia does, the more I want to continue to push myself and vice versa. And our personalities as similar as we seem, when it comes to our careers. And you know, what we’re focused on, we’re actually completely opposite. So we actually recently didn’t and we do the disc test. Yeah, this test and Oh, sure. Opposite. Yeah, I am. And I knew this about myself, I’m a very strong D, with a little bit of eye and you’re like, whatever, the opposite of that as

Julia Brenner 19:05
well. So when we go into listing appointments together, it’s like, Good cop, bad cop.

Grace Goro 19:09
I’m always the bad cop. She’s.

Julia Brenner 19:13
But she can put her foot down about things. And I really, really admire that. And I’m a little bit more of,

Grace Goro 19:18
Oh, okay. You’re the bright side.

Julia Brenner 19:20
But yeah, so I’m the I’m the positive bright side, and she’s the one who’s like, nope, these are the numbers. So we that’s a that’s a way we one way we really complement each other and it works out to our advantage. And then, like Grace is saying, just the way that we push each other. I mean, we’ve been on a team together before for a long time. So we know how to work together as a team and we know how to push each other. So that was really cool having that experience because that came so naturally.

Grace Goro 19:48
I don’t like I find that a lot of people especially when I listened to things similar to this podcasts or interviews, panels, presentations, a lot of times you catch people When they’re, you know very much in the height of where they’ve come from. And I feel like Julia and I are still on that trajectory very much so of where we want to go. So we only recently, maybe three or four months ago hired our first recruit being our Operations Manager, which has helped tremendously. And it’s really helping to shape our idea of team building and where we want to go next and who our next hires are, what when we hire our buyer’s agent, and how it kind of trickles down. So it’s just been interesting being in flux, especially since we moved from Coldwell Banker to our properties, kind of learning, team building time management, structuring, it’s it’s been an adventure.

Julia Brenner 20:39
Yeah, we’ve learned a lot. Over the last couple of years of what works and doesn’t work, we’re still always learning more working with our managing broker, Kevin Banach, and we worked with Grace’s dead Chuck, just to really help us formulate what team is best for us, and how we can work side by side and bring more people on. But like Chris mentioned earlier, it can be such an isolating career and being able to work on a team. I mean, that just makes it 10 times better, and be able to bounce ideas off each other, which we do a lot to run pricing off each other. Of course, the backup is a huge help. And just to be able to have that accountability, and that that, that help in that reference, when necessary, has been awesome.

D.J. Paris 21:26
Agreed. We do get a lot of listener feedback and questions. The most common question we get is from brokers who are feeling stuck either because they’re new and not totally sure what to do to sort of most important things to do in order to grow their business. And I wanted to ask you both what your recommendation would be as as not under not knowing these individual know, these people who have written in anything about their business? Is there anything that you think universally, that everyone could and should be doing to help elevate, you know, increase their production? Or if in particular, if they’re newer?

Grace Goro 22:08
So when I was new, I really started off, I don’t know if you’re familiar, but listening to Brian Buffini? Sure. And, you know, the Tom ferries, Brian Buffini is that these kind of all these people instilled in me the processes that I do today, and I think it’s scary when you’re new, because you really don’t know anybody. And especially if you’re new and young, you a don’t really know anyone, and you be maybe don’t have the confidence in yourself to be like, Okay, why is my parents friends? Why would they trust me to sell my home. So it’s important to just get as educated as you possibly can, and start reaching out to those people regularly, right? Like, we’re all in the relationship as this the better of a relationship you have with somebody, the more honest you can be with them. And the stronger your feedbacks going to be. And the more that they can learn to trust you. Like we we are constantly sending out handwritten notes, making phone calls, doing those lunches, and those lunches are the most painful things that we spot, you know, everybody has theirs and ours are getting those coffees, but you have to do it.

Julia Brenner 23:11
And yeah, and to add to that, I mean, just building your your database was, that was my biggest thing off the bat. I luckily, a lot of my college friends live in Chicago, and all of our high school friends live in Chicago. So it was really nice to be able to have that big database and just grow it and reach out and you start with your first newsletter, and you do it every month. And it might take them three years to come around. But they do come around, especially if you can to continually reach out, remind them you’re in the business, show them your value, show them what you can do for them. And I also think a huge thing that I know some people shy away from, but our rentals my first year, I think I did like 35 rentals, and it added up in income. And it was a lot of work. And it was a lot of grinding for something that might not have turned out it’s a great place to make mistakes too. And exactly that really taught me how to work with buyers. And like I said, it’s a great place to make mistakes. And it’s mistakes that yeah, that aren’t that big of a deal. You learn a lot, you meet a lot of agents, you see a lot of buildings all go into buildings with renters a couple of years back, and then I’m back in them again with my buyers. But I know the building because I’ve been there before so

Grace Goro 24:21
and another thing I would just wanted to add to that little shameless, live YPN plug. But I’ve heard so many times from different agents that you don’t get any business by hanging out with other agents. And I just so strongly disagree with that. And it’s another reason to get involved not just with wipin But just in any car board or any organization that’s going to promote networking within because it’s so great to have your peers know you and promote you and say nice things about you and get you involved in different aspects of the industry. And if you’re new I think that’s a really great place to start. Like I’ll never forget one of my very first listings I had my seller laughed while I was doing an open house and just kind of cased the neighborhood. And he walked into a neighbor’s listing, they were having an open and Aaron Mandel, who’s been on your show, she was doing the listing, she was doing the open house, and he introduced himself and said, Oh, you know, Grace aura was my agent. And she’s like, crazy score, oh, she’s great. You know, we’re great friends, you’re in really good hands. And he came back. And he told me that and I have never been happier, I was so glad to hear a positive comment from somebody and made my client feel really good to to know that, you know, somebody else knew me and had a nice thing to say about me and industry.

Julia Brenner 25:35
And to add to that, to it really helps in multiple offer situations, if you’re you have a buyer. And there are multiple offers. It’s, it just helps just in generally, in general, in situations, it helps to know the other agent, because it makes the process a lot smoother. And if they know you when they know you want to a professional level, and they know they can trust you. And it really puts you in better hands and it puts your buyers and sellers in better hands as well.

D.J. Paris 26:04
I couldn’t agree more with with all of that, you guys just I want to unpack a little bit of what you said, because you said so many great things in the last few moments, few minutes there. And I want to sort of backtrack a bit back to the you mentioned Brian Buffini he if you’re not familiar, and you’re listening, he is basically the largest real estate training platform or system in the industry. He’s been around forever and he has his one of his big things in grace, I believe it was Grace was talked about. Talked about this was some like really good habits like I picked the and you still maintain those habits today. And Buffini had a couple of habits that you clearly you even just mentioned by name, one of which is I know he has a whole thing is called like when the day how do you win the day? Well, one of the ways that one of the ways he says is you meet two to five new people every day, tell them what you do. gather their contact information, write them a handwritten note, and then stay in touch, send out those items of value every month, or get together from to do pop buys and all of the Buffini isms, but all really really good stuff to build relationships. And I wish I wish I got a nickel for every time I promoted Brian Buffini because I I’d probably be wealthier. But the the reality of it is, is that you guys were accountability partners too. And I think that, and I want to talk about that for just a moment. So I apologize, I’m gonna go off on a little bit of a tangent. But you know, Brian Buffini also started one of when he started developing, as a realtor. He he and Joe NIGO, who’s from Chicago became accountability partners, and Brian is in San San Diego or wherever, but Joe’s here, and they were daily accountability partners. And so I have an accountability partner in a different arena. But for habits, I have somebody that calls me every morning at 830 actually pay this person to do this. And we spend a minute or actually about 90 seconds every morning, I pay them very little, it’s very inexpensive thing. But they asked me did you do X, Y and Z and they’re like daily habits, I’m trying to cultivate having an accountability partner you can likely find in your own office. Or if you go to go to places like the Women’s Council of realtors or YPN events, or many of the other types of events that car puts together or different organizations where Realtors congregate, you can find a an accountability partner there as well. And I think that’s really, really important for a lot of brokers who, you know, are struggling to sort of try to figure out how to spend their day it’s get an accountability partner, you know, it’s it’s too hard to do it entirely by yourself. And I think you guys are living proof that working together, you achieve a lot more. Let’s let’s talk a little bit about your your group that the girl Brenner Group. Tell us sort of, you know, you’ve now brought on some additional team members, you know, how is how are you growing your practice at this time?

Grace Goro 28:57
So sorry, we were just looking at this one. So we are big fans of setting really big goals. So this was this past year was a great year for us. We went past our goal, which made us think okay, maybe we’re not shooting high enough. And now we’ve set a new one that for us, you know, basically a two woman team. 50 million is a very big goal for us at the place that we are at right now. But that’s what we’re trying to achieve. So we’re currently putting systems in place. With all of our metrics of you know what we need to do at our price point, we need 155 units. How many is that going to be a month and how are we going to get there? So our first hire four months ago with our operations manager, and she has been unbelievable. Kevin Vanek, our managing broker said to us, you don’t want to touch paper, your job your your time is better spent out talking to people talking to your clients. Prospecting bringing them in. So we hired on Glenn to help us to do all of that. So the paperwork, the back end, the brochures, a lot of I’m systemizing, our prospecting. So once this is all going, hopefully after the winter season, our next step is going to be to hire a buyer’s agent to help us, you know, deal with the incoming traffic that we’re planning for. And sometimes we get a little overwhelmed. It sounds lofty, at least to us, I know there’s probably people listening who are thinking, well, 50 million isn’t that much to them. But for us, for two people, it’s a lot and we need to really prepare and dream it and achieve it and plan it in order to make it successful.

Julia Brenner 30:32
And like Grace was saying, it’s just amazing. It’s just a huge thing that we’ve we’ve been tried and then edited and then scrapped and then tried again, oh, my gosh, so many good ideas and bad ideas, agents out there agents, forming new teams, try to get that system in place and get a good one in place. Right off the bat, talk to your managing brokers ask for some time from some older or seasoned agents. To really get those systems in place off the bat. I watched we watch Tom Ferry videos, like we said, we do Brian Buffini, which isn’t really systems but like the Millionaire Real Estate agent, a real real estate agent. Yeah, books on that. But that’s just what we’re really trying to do is get get in a system where everything, everything has the start middle and end to it so that we can make sure nothing falls through the cracks with our clients, and then we can increase our clientele?

D.J. Paris 31:25
Well, I think that is very well said. Yeah, I would say everybody should read the Millionaire Real Estate Agent, it’s by the gentleman that founded Keller Williams probably knows a thing or two, it’s widely considered one of the one of the basically, it’s the Bible for how to be a real estate agent, or rather, rather not real estate broker. It’s excellent. Gary Keller wrote that, and, and yeah, I mean, you guys just said a lot of great things. And we were talking a little bit offline too, about some, you know, best practices, and maybe some bad habits you’ve seen out in the field, and we were talking about, you know, sometimes listings are maybe not presented as well as they could be on the MLS, maybe people are have bad photography, or no photography, or, you know, the descriptions are goofy. And, you know, I always say, like, you should be talking to, if your own whoever you’re working, if you if your support team or training team, if there isn’t a support team or train team or if they’re not very strong. You know, you can go to some of these events and different organizations and talk to other realtors who, from other firms and they can, they can assist you as well. But you really want to immerse yourself and in, you know, just doing the, to the very best you can. And I think a lot of that information is not always intuitive. And it’s stuff that needs to be taught. And, you know, there’s good news is there’s a lot of people like you guys who are very graciously giving your time even just to this podcast, and I’ll just do a quick plug, if anyone’s listening for the first time to our show. Basically, I only I think I’ve only interviewed top one percenters in the Chicagoland area, most of which have built teams. So if people are like, Well, how do I do that? We have interviews we’ve done with other with other teams who have talked about exactly how they’ve built teams and, and you know, you guys are talking about that as well. So there’s a lot of resources out there to learn best practices. And people like Grayson, Julie, I’m sorry, I was gonna say people like Grace and Julia are obviously very generous with their time. And so there’s lots of people you can talk to.

Julia Brenner 33:29
TJ, I was just gonna say, to add to that, one thing that grace really taught me and her dad taught us is just to really invest in your clients and how they’re your number one priority and your number one. Their happiness, it should be your goal at the end of the day. And so like you were saying, even with like bad practices and things like that, we really want to make sure our clients feel like we care about their home, or homes, like their own homes, and we get professional photography, we take a lot of time writing detailed descriptions, we make sure we have room numbers measured, right and the floors are cracked and things like that. And we have the marketing and whatnot done, because they’re going to be your number one referrer. So if you make your clients happy, that’s the best way to get more clients.

Grace Goro 34:15
Well, no. And also, like, in our industry, we see a wide range of commissions, right so it sure can 5% Some people say a standard I’ve seen people take lower, I’ve seen people take higher and we really push for 6% listings because I think that there is so much value to what we do when it’s done right. And I think that’s a big misconception that a lot of people have in general about our industry I hate that you know you hear people think a realtor sometimes as shady used car salesman, I hate that we provide or we can provide if done right, such a great service. And it doesn’t just have to be you know, your basic photo package. You can go Above and Beyond that, and do all of these wonderful things that I’m seeing all of my peers doing that we try to implement as well the matter ports and the drone videos and the high high end photography, the 3d Digital floorplans on top of it, that it’s just this world that we’re getting into with technology. There’s so many ways to show your craft and show your skill that I’d like to see more of that I if I see one more cell phone picture of somebody’s listing, I’m gonna lose it. It makes us all look bad.

Julia Brenner 35:29
Yeah, it didn’t it brings down our profession. And one thing we also really try to make sure we do is, is handle everything for our clients. So I mean, just the other day grace hired a a a painter to come in to paint her clients

Grace Goro 35:45
and exterminator because there were centipedes in the basement, the basement we always have about that. But yeah, right. We we always offer complimentary cleaning with our cleaning comes with our services, we bring a bottle of wine to the listing appointment, like why would you show up empty handed the somebody’s home when they’ve invited you.

Julia Brenner 36:04
Just things like that, so that the process is easy for the seller. But also because the home shows better and it becomes easier for the buyer, it becomes easier for the buyer’s agent, it becomes easier for the attorneys, I mean, just to have these things done ahead of time just makes the whole deal smoother, and it makes our industry as a whole more professional.

D.J. Paris 36:23
And these are the reasons why you’re able to charge you know, your your clients, what you think you’re worth, and you guys are able to back that up with service that is likely above and beyond maybe what they would get from another broker. And I think that’s incredible. You know, I met a I met a broker just as a as another story a few years ago who met with me, and I think she ended up joining I want to say dream town, but I’m not I don’t remember exactly. But she met with me. Oh, no, I think she was at Berkshire Hathaway well, it doesn’t matter. But anyway, she said, you know, what, can I What can I charge my sellers. And at our firm, we said, well, you charge whatever you want, that’s up to you. And she goes good, because I charged 7%. And she goes in two years, I’m gonna get to 10% when I was like, Whoa, I just was sort of shocked. I hadn’t heard commissions that high and, and she wasn’t laughing at all. And I wasn’t laughing at her. I was just sort of like, whoa, like, sort of shocked. And she looked at me like, why are you looking shocked, I know what I’m worth, here’s what I provide. Here’s why I do I said, Hey, you know, whatever, whatever you decide to do, that’s up to you. But I thought that was in some ways, I was really impressed because she wasn’t crazy. And she but she really had a a very logical and rational explanation for why she charges as much as she does. And she goes, my my clients are thrilled because I go way above and beyond what, you know, the broker down the street might do. So.

Grace Goro 37:45
That’s awesome. I love to hear that she’s pushing 10 Yeah, yeah. That’s great.

D.J. Paris 37:50
I think so too. And, you know, I just, I just love that, you know, it’s, I think, people brokers always need to be able to justify their, their their cost. And you know, if you’re a broker, and you don’t know how to do that you can learn, and you can learn to say, here’s what I offer, here’s why I offer it, here’s why I’m worth what I’m worth, here’s what I do, that’s maybe a bit different. You guys rattled off five or six things, you do that I’m guessing most brokers don’t. So I think that’s pretty, pretty amazing. And I also want to not gloss over something we mentioned the very beginning, which is you guys work largely by referral. So, you know, I think that’s the ultimate result of doing a great job is they tell of course, tell everybody they know. And you know that, obviously, oh, and I want to go back to something real quickly to Juliet mentioned about rentals that, you know, we are sometimes easy to forget, in particular, if you’ve been in the business a while but if you’re newer, it’s easy to sort of gloss over that rentals because not only is it a great place to cut your teeth like Grace mentioned, and make some mistakes, but also it these are people that may and likely will become future buyers right and everyone who’s bought a home almost everyone started out renting right. So this is a great way to build those relationships.

Julia Brenner 39:01
Yeah, I just did a rental in July for my friend’s brother and his girlfriend they got engaged and we’re closing on Friday on their new big single family home in Park Ridge and they’re just going to get a sublet so even just that I mean the turnaround on them right huge. And the thing about that is about everything and about what we Grayson I do with all of our clients is just follow up follow up follow up. How are you doing? How’s your place? Here’s a pop by gift for you enjoy this bottle of wine or sunscreen. You know, whatever season it is. That’s the biggest Yeah,

D.J. Paris 39:35
can you guys give an example of a pop by gift I know you mentioned wine but I know Brian Buffini always has like cute little ones. Have you guys ever done anything sort of on the on the cute side or on the funny side?

Grace Goro 39:46
That’s like our favorite thing to do. We’ve had some big pie fails as well. Yes. Whenever we tried to do like salts and then we tried to make candles and they ended up looking like we were sending bath salts. Yeah,

Julia Brenner 39:58
one time we tried to do This lavender bath salts sent in a mason jar with like a candle and we tied tweed with a key on it. And it was like some little slogan it was so cute. It was no it was a disaster. And it was like the weirdest gifts to give people were like, Why are we yeah to give to people? Oh, some say of three pounds of Bath Salts on my Yeah, we’ve,

Grace Goro 40:20
we’ve since come quite a ways we’re actually trying something new this year that we’re excited about. So for your listeners who don’t know a Popeye is when you pop by somebody’s house with a gift. And you usually just let them know that you’re in the neighborhood you try not to go inside because then they feel like maybe you’re intruding on their time even though they don’t realize it. Just like two minutes Hi thinking about you, here’s a gift. But this year for Christmas, we’re thinking about renting out space at Alliance bakery over in like the Wicker Park area sure inviting all of our past clients to come out. And we’ll probably do a couple of different dates to pick up a pie from us and they can you know, RSVP with the kind that they want. Come out and visit, it’s a great way for us to get face time in the pies cost like, what 15 bucks a pie. And then we’ll give it to them. If they can’t make it, then we’ll drive out and we will see them it’s a nice like excuse for us to stop by. We’re really excited about that. We’re really excited about that. And your bar, your bar ideas good one too.

Julia Brenner 41:17
Oh, we’re also going to do yes, good runner, we’re also doing a bar code class, doing one in the city and one in the suburbs. in Park Ridge, we’re going to invite our friends and family and client list from those areas to come and do a bar class with us. Which is a which is a really popular workout class right now. And that one is actually pretty affordable. And just for people that you know, I know it can be a lot. Zika can be something little you can get a little tough a little tube of sunscreen and drop it off in the summer with a little note that said, you know, I’ve got your back, I’ve got you covered, I

think is what we did. Yeah. And we

sent out umbrellas with our logo on them recently. So you can you can really personalize them as well.

Grace Goro 42:01
That’s really $6 each. Yeah, the umbrellas.

Julia Brenner 42:03
So there’s, there’s things you can do to not have to spend a ton of money. But Brian Buffini really says it doesn’t have to cost anything, you just need to show your face and show that you care. We like to give out some nicer things, especially to our big referrers and our big clients. And so there’s a lot to choose from.

D.J. Paris 42:22
There are and I’ve always thought to for people that are on like really small budgets, you know, you could just and you should keep a list of your clients, their children, you know, relatively their ages. And if you know schools coming up and it’s August or late July, that’s an a great opportunity. If you know if the budget small, just drop off notebooks for your for your clients say hey, that, you know, I know your kids are nearing school. And I just thought that they might find this helpful, right? Like things like that. I mean, again, it doesn’t, you’re right, it doesn’t really matter how much you spend or what the gift is just something thoughtful is

Julia Brenner 42:57
even like dog treats if they have a dog. Don’t bury

me. I mean this. I don’t know if everyone agrees with this. But I know people who do homemade cookies and they wrap them up and they bring them in a tin or in a bag or something like that. I love it. If somebody gave me I would. Yeah, I would do. I like to keep just like $1 $10 bottles of wine from Trader Joe’s in my car. And when I buy a client’s house because we drive by them so often, you know, just run up there with a little note and drop it off and just say, Hey, I was in the neighborhood and I was thinking of you and have a bottle of wine.

D.J. Paris 43:28
Awesome. Well, you guys have said so much and you have generously given your time. So I would like to specifically talk you know if there are buyers, sellers or renters that are out there that are interested in working with the Goro Brenner group, what is the best way? Well, first of all, let’s they can always hit your website, which is girl breader group.com. But what’s another? Can they reach you by telephone by email? You guys plug your your contact? Yeah.

Julia Brenner 43:55
Yeah, definitely. Our emails are both its grace and gorell Brenner group.com and Giulia at Goro Brenner group.com, which we realize is a really long email. But yeah, through that our names are Goro runner group.com is our website. So our stuff is everywhere. We have a business page with some of our recent listings and closings on there. And we are happy to help even just answer questions give advice one of the things we really like to provide our clients especially those who don’t live in town or who are from out of town I mean, is you know if you need a doctor to go to if you need to know where to get where the nearest Lululemon is or something like that we are from here and we know the city really well. We know the suburbs really well. And we’re happy to just answer any kind of questions.

D.J. Paris 44:42
Awesome. Well, thank you guys so much. And in particular grace, I know you’re not 100% feeling well so I really appreciate both of

Grace Goro 44:51
you for for putting up with me my my voice this whole time I did not have a coughing fit. I know we talked about that earlier. I was I was afraid but we made it through.

D.J. Paris 44:59
I was hoping there’d be a coughing fit it would it would have been fun to hear you struggle on the air but but you didn’t use it. You guys were wonderful. And so I really thank you for being part of the show and hope you guys hit your $50 million goal next year. That’s really exciting.

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Kati Spaniak has a goal for each of her Spaniak Team members – to help them become a top 1% producer like her. In our in-depth conversation, Kati discusses the importance of specializing geographically and how starting a Northbrook roundtable meetup group helped supercharge her practice. Kati also talks about how building a team took her business to the next level and freed up time for friends and family!

Kati can be reached at kati@spaniakteam.com or 847-379-8813.

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:16
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real. My name is TJ Parris, I’m your host. This is the only podcast made by Chicago real estate agents for Chicago real estate agents. Today, we have an interview coming up in just a moment with Katie Spana. Before we get started, I wanted to, first of all, thank you, again, for continuing to send this podcast to other people in the real estate community, other brokers in your office, or you meet out in the field, telling them about it, sharing it on social media, really appreciate it. It’s why we do this, we do this to help the broker community become more successful by interviewing the people who are already incredibly successful. And we will continue to do this on through the end of the year and into the future. So we’re very, very excited to keep going and really, we’re very thrilled that the reception has been so warm, we weren’t sure that people would be as interested but I guess people are. So also we do need your help to help make this podcast even better. So if you if you’re a broker or realtor and thinking about, well, gosh, I really wish I had more skills around X, Y, or Z. Maybe you want to learn how to do an open house, maybe you want to run a better CMA or market yourself more effectively or get more referrals Right. Or even negotiate more, you know, more and more strongly. We can find people who are already doing this well in the industry, let us know what you would like to hear on the show. And we’ll make it a reality. So the easiest way to let us know is you can always email us or rather these even easier than that, go to our website, keeping it real pod.com There’s a contact form. Or you can email Jen, our producer Jen at keeping it real pod.com. But like us on Facebook, we’re at keeping it real pod. So find us, we publish every one of our episodes there, and you can share it with other brokers there too. So thank you so much for your continued support. As we wrap up the year, we have a few more episodes to go before the end of this 2017. And we’re going to make 2018 even more fun with the show. So more Carrie McCormick by the way she comes on once a month. And if you have any questions for a amazing top producer who’s been in the business for 18 years, she answers your question, so let us know what those are too. All right, gang. Thanks so much for being so supportive, and on to our interview with Katie span.

Today on the show, we have Katie spatty EQ of spinning a team. Katie’s vision is what drives her team. She has a marketing background and is excellent and understanding how to specifically position every listing that she takes her ability to be understanding and compassionate with her clients is one of her greatest strengths. She’s also able to see the bigger picture and recognizes what it takes to run a successful business. It is her marketing knowledge and expertise as well as her connections throughout that make her one of the top 12 agents on the North Shore. And I want to give a few more statistics. Katie is extremely humble, but I want to brag about it for a moment. Katie and her team have grown to be one of the we mentioned the top 12 agents and teams in the North Shore, which is an insanely impressive accomplishment. Also, she has grown to one of the top 120 agents in all of Chicago that puts her if I do the math right at about the top half of 1%. Or slightly better than that. So that’s that’s pretty amazing. And she’s completed over 175 transactions sold over 120 million. So we are thrilled to have

her on the show. Welcome to you very much for having me.

We are excited to have you. First question I typically always ask ask our interviewees is how did you get started in the business? You

Kati Spaniak 4:00
know, so I actually I did get started a while ago. Right? So I had a marketing design firm in the late 90s. And doing great was really successful. And then 911 happened and completely destroyed the business basically. So I ended up shutting that down. And my mom was a real estate agent in Northbrook. And so she said, Well, why don’t you come over and help me with my business? So I kind of took the route of Oh, sure. Let me go get my license. You know, I know how to sell I can do this. And so we partnered up for a few years. And then in about 2007 2008 I decided that it was just too much for me. I had three little little kids, and I couldn’t just could not do it. So I ended up letting my license expire and then actually decided to get back into the business in 2012. So my business really started again in 2012.

D.J. Paris 5:01
That’s impressive what you’ve done since 2012, only really five years back, I guess. So what do you think you did differently? Maybe versus other people that started back then that’s that’s Do you have any ideas of what you think propelled your success?

Kati Spaniak 5:19
Yeah, actually, you know what, I was super motivated. I decided that I was going to treat it like a real business. I wrote a business plan. I decided that I was going to be in the office every Monday, Wednesday, Friday after I dropped off my kids at school. And so I go into the office and I’d sit there and I’d open my computer and I’d think, Okay, what am I going to do today? You know, and I really thought about starting very small with the people I knew because I live in Northbrook grew up in Northbrook. And, you know, I decided that if I could sell 5% Of all the homes in Northbrook, it would be an incredibly high amount of homes. And I thought then why would I go anywhere else? So I started basically, with the 300 people that I knew, started writing them letters, I’d call them I’d see them out. I mean, I was probably maybe everybody knew that I was back in real estate. I mean, really, they knew. And so I would just connect with people. And then what I do is I’d actually see the houses that were coming on the market, and I would see a house on the street that came on the market that I knew somebody lived on. So I would just start proactively emailing those new listings to people that lived on those streets. And then I’d start to do just like market evaluations for people without them really asking.

D.J. Paris 6:42
I love that. So basically, someone’s home goes goes on the market and you email somebody you know, and say, Hey, FYI, so and so’s homes on the market. Yeah. Awesome.

Kati Spaniak 6:51
Yeah. And, you know, I sat open houses. I mean, I was an I, really my first listing. I went knocked on their door. It was an expired listing. And I did I knocked on their door.

D.J. Paris 7:03
Hold the cold mount. I’m expired. Oh, that is a tough knock.

Kati Spaniak 7:08
It was it was and I took the overpriced listing. I ended up I ended up losing the listing. But I did get a couple of great leads through the open houses. And so in my first year, I think I closed like, 4 million in my first year. Yeah, great first year. Yeah. And then my second year was 11, and then 24, and then 30. And so now I’m sort of building my team. So we’re, we’ve stayed 30. This year, we’re going to be about hopefully about 38.

D.J. Paris 7:41
Unbelievable. And by the way, my mother is also a Northbrook, born and bred and went to Glenbrook north and just went to her 50th wedding anniversary 15 high school anniversary. Oh,

Kati Spaniak 7:52
neat. I probably know

D.J. Paris 7:54
what she they don’t live there now. But but about 30 years ago, they moved but my mom you know is that’s where she grew up. And but it’s let’s talk about about the idea of of specializing in a geographic area, because clearly that work for you. How did you at any you’ve already given us some examples, but you know, how did you specifically get to know the Northbrook market where you just start? Were you studying the I know you went to open houses etc. and held open houses also. But were there were aside from studying the MLS. Are there other things you were doing to get active in the community?

Kati Spaniak 8:27
Yeah, I don’t I mean, definitely i i go to broker opens Of course. I spent a lot of time I basically what I did is I built my list around my kids school. So the parents the school and that was actually through St. Norbert church. My kids went to St. Norbert, so I got really involved in a lot of activities. I had served on the village board in Northbrook. So I knew a lot of people as well. And I just I really went on just a communication campaign with these people. I wouldn’t say it was a formalized, 33 touch I was sending them, you know, postcards every every month. But they just started to see me around. Oh, and the other thing that I did, which I love this idea, and I’d love to re integrate it is I did a roundtable I didn’t Northbrook roundtable every month. And so what I’d say is, hey, I’m going to be at Caribou Coffee on such and such day at 830 in the morning, and we’re just going to hang out and talk about Northbrook. And it really I mean, I got some really good leads from that. But it also made me start to really look like the Northbrook ask experts. All of my promotion was free. So I do like in the patch or just send out emails or invite people. And that was really great. I buy them some coffee, but most people didn’t even want me to they just wanted to come and connect. And it was really great. I mean, I you know, there were some pros and cons about it. If you get too many people, it’s hard to kind of have that small intimate conversation. So now I’d like to step in To kind of the next level have more like a discussion a monthly discussion about the real estate market in Northbrook or anything really in Northbrook, you know,

D.J. Paris 10:09
I love that. That’s that’s so brilliant. I just interviewed the episode isn’t up yet. I don’t know if you know, Amy Diamond, who specializes not in Northbrook, but in a in a different suburb, and then in northwest suburbs, and which, and sort of like your hyper focuses, and I think it’s Burr Ridge, but, or I can’t remember exactly, but what she did, and she did a little bit of a different version of what you mentioned, which I think was so smart. And this is many years ago, she was in a new mom. And so she put together I think if it was Burr Ridge, she put together a Facebook group that was like Burbridge mom news. And over time, now she has like 1800 people who have liked or have subscribed to that page. She doesn’t even know anyone who’s subscribed because it’s just, and she doesn’t even really promote her real estate as much. But she’s like, oh, yeah, this year, I got six deals just from people that were like, Oh, you’re the admin of that page. Right? I love the fact that you were doing an in person version of that book. It’s brilliant. Thank you. Thanks. And so I want to talk, I want to also talk about you building a team because that’s, that’s been in the what, in the most last couple of years, you’ve started that or more. Yeah,

Kati Spaniak 11:14
so I started, I got my first admin about right about the 24 million mark. And I love I mean, it, like changed my life, because she helped me with my emails, and, you know, doing contracts, you know, earnest money, keeping track of things like that, which I’m not really super good at the detail work. So I love that. And then I decided, you know, I’m going to, I’m going to start a team because I value my time. And I don’t think that a life as a real estate agent who’s going 24/7, sustainable. You know, when I really felt like, gosh, I need some time, because I was working a lot and wanted to start building my team. So I did start building my team in about 2015. And it’s been a I mean, it’s, it’s a long road, it’s a road to build a team. But I started with a couple of buyer’s agents. And I ended up moving brokerages at that time, and kind of stepped it up a little bit for myself started doing having a lot more goals, a lot more accountability for myself and those on my team. And so we’ve been through some iterations on the team, I feel like I’m in a really great spot right now. Because I have a very strong core admin group, which is super important. And now I really have a fantastic lead buyer specialist as well. And it, it allows me to have a real life. I mean, it’s, that’s really what it is, is that, you know, weekends and evenings, I’m very specific. And when I work on weekends, so like, I’ll only work until about noon on Saturdays. And I don’t work on Sundays. So I mean, it’s once in a while I’ll set an open house, and I do check my computer and things like that. And then weeknights, it’s very rare that I’ll go out during the week at night.

D.J. Paris 13:05
That That sounds like a really a really nice benefit of building the team that you want. And it clearly is working gives you better boundaries, I guess around this around this job we I was we always joke with oftentimes with people I interview who, who will say it’s been said many times on the show from many people is this is one of the least flexible jobs there is even though you’re technically an independent contractor for exactly those reasons, you know, your clients are not necessarily interested in what time you go to bed. And there’s always things things to do. So the fact that you have a team that’s been enabled you to better structure or not better, so much, but just more effectively structure. You know, your free time, I think is huge. What What lessons have you learned as building the team? I imagine?

Kati Spaniak 13:54
Oh, my gosh. It’s hard work. First of all, it’s hard work to build a team, you know, you have to have that vision. But I think I think what I’d say is probably the biggest thing that I did not do is you know, I’ve had people on the team that haven’t worked out and everybody that I’ve hired I’ve really liked, like personality wise. But what didn’t work out clearly was that our expectations were not on the same page. And our expectations were not on the same page, because I did not put them on the same page. I did not put them out in front. You know, I did not say this is what I expect you to do. And a lot of what was happening is I was giving away leads and people weren’t following up with them. Sure. And and so I really felt like I was actually literally losing money because I was paying for these leads and you know, cultivating these relationships and they weren’t closing but they their motivation was different than mine. They didn’t want to work full time. You know, they they were like, Oh yeah, they didn’t understand the significance of a lead. I it was I mean the reason why most of the people haven’t are not on my team anymore is really truly because my My expectations were not clear upfront. So I’ve got, that’s where I’ve gotten to another stage of my team where, you know, I can talk to somebody now about being on my team and say, you know, this is not easy, this isn’t, this is not easy, this is hard work, if I want my buyer’s agents to make at least $150,000, at least, like, if you’re not making $150,000, I don’t think it’s probably a benefit for them to be with me, you know, for me to have them or them to be here. And I know how people can do it, I know what they need to do in order to be able to get that kind of money. And all they have to do is do it. Some people just don’t do it. So my accountability has gotten higher, and my expectations has gotten higher. And it’s made it a better working environment, because everybody understands what those expectations truly are.

D.J. Paris 15:45
Well, I think that is so well said. And I also love something that’s very subtle that you said at the beginning of of talking about lessons you’ve learned, which was, we talked about team members that that haven’t worked out, and by the way, that is extraordinarily common, as you know, and that’s not it, probably any reflection of you, however, you made that really about a something that you feel you you didn’t do a great job of which was expectations versus saying, Ally really just maybe didn’t work as hard as they should have, which may may be the case, too. But I love that the responsibility there of you know, I probably could have been a better done a better job as a leader, which I always think is probably the sign of a really strong leader is taking that responsibility.

Kati Spaniak 16:27
It’s absolutely true. Because if we had had the conversation in the beginning, you know that I expect you to lead generate for two hours every morning. And they would say, oh, you know what, I’m not up for that. I would have said, okay, then we’re not a fit.

D.J. Paris 16:40
Right? Right. And I love the fact that you’re like I, I can get you to a minimum of 150,000. If you please follow these follow the steps in, you know, that’s a pretty simple proposition that I would think Most brokers would be pretty excited to hear,

Kati Spaniak 16:57
Well, it’s hard to actually find any agents is actually hard, you know, the people who are willing to work to put in the time to, because you know, this job really does allow for a lot of part time people, which is fine. But again, my expectations are full time and 150 is probably the minimum I’d like my agents to make, I really want them making 250. And based on the fact that we are in a higher price point, being on the North Shore, that is totally doable. And I don’t want my clients working 80 hours a week, or I don’t want my buyer agents working 80 hours a week.

D.J. Paris 17:29
Right? Because in your opinion, you don’t you feel that’s not sustainable over

Kati Spaniak 17:32
time. It’s not it’s it’s absolutely not. So So I

D.J. Paris 17:36
want to pause for a second because I think this is so important. If you are on a team, and or if you’re not on a team. But let’s just say someone who’s listening, we have 1000s of listeners who are many of which are on teams, you should ask yourself, does your team leader have goals for you for what they would like your production to be? Have they have they communicated that that is a great conversation to have with whoever is in charge of your team and to say, hey, what do we think is reasonable here? And then? And then the that’s that’s the one part then the second part is? Are you willing to do the work to get of course to get there it is that that team leader going to at least give you the guidance, and you have to do 99.9% of it. But are they going to give you that point zero 1%? Which is that here’s what to do, here’s how to do it now please go do it. And we will all come out ahead. I think that is that is really not not to be could not be overstated, and I suspect that most people have never had those kinds of conversations with their team leaders. So I think that’s

Kati Spaniak 18:37
huge. Definitely not. I really think that that needs if you shouldn’t be on a team, there’s no reason to be on a team unless you’re getting a ton of value from that team. Like, why would somebody want to be on my team, if I’m not providing them value, and early in the days, I did not provide a ton of value. You know, I we work together, they got my knowledge, I gave them some leads. But now I can absolutely say that being on on my team specifically is that there is a ton of value that’s given. And if you do, I always say in order to be successful, you have to do the activities and you have to do the education. If you’ve only got one, you’re not going to succeed. So you have to do both. And I can tell if somebody’s doing both, and if they’re doing both, they are going to succeed and we are providing so much value to our agents. That that that’s why I think that teams are the future of real estate is I don’t think there are many, you know, as we get more functioning higher, you know, sales and volume and number of transactions. It’s going to be hard for single agents who are running around dropping off listing paperwork dropping off booties to compete with somebody like me and I have a full time runner who can be it to a house and half an hour.

D.J. Paris 19:50
Right and and also I’m sorry I didn’t I didn’t mean to stop you but it’s like you’re so right and also, just even in a listing presentation. Let’s say you’re up against three other For brokers who maybe don’t have teams, and you’re saying, well, for the exact same commission, you’re gonna pay, you know, someone else who maybe doesn’t have a team behind them. I’ve got 789 people, however big your team is at that point. And here’s what they do. Here’s how each one of them is can possibly can potentially assist you. I think it’s a pretty compelling conversation.

Kati Spaniak 20:19
Yeah, absolutely.

D.J. Paris 20:22
Yeah, you know, it’s funny, I interviewed somebody from Redfin, on the show, Alex harried who’s, who’s a really wonderful producer. And he talked a lot about this. And he’s like, this is the reason why firms like Redfin, who really have this T model down to a completely different sort of science. But he goes, when I talk to my, to my buyers or sellers, he goes, I explained this, you know, you get me for everything important. I’ve got 10 other people that are going to be walking you through every other step of it. And, you know, obviously, they they’ve had a tremendous amount of success recently, with a similar sort of idea. And you you think you have a very strong opinion, you really think teams are? I mean, you’ve already said it, but you really think teams are the almost a necessity going forward?

Kati Spaniak 21:08
I absolutely do. You know, I think that, especially as the millennials get older, and they are maybe doing their second sale, they really are going to expect an extremely high amount of service. And I don’t think they expect their agent to do everything, I think they expect that there would be a team supporting them. I also think that to get into the industry within the next five to 10 years, if you’re not on a team learning, you’re kind of floundering around and you might get some friends and relatives who are going to list their houses with you. But to make it a sustaining career that year over year, you know, you’re going to make at least 100,000. It’s very hard in this industry. And I think that teams are going to offer that structure and that ability for people that do want to get into real estate and maybe who aren’t awesome at paperwork, or who aren’t awesome as cold calling, you know, but they’re awesome at showing homes. And they’re awesome at negotiating deals. So I think everybody’s going to fall into kind of where their lane is in real estate over the next five to 10 years or so.

D.J. Paris 22:08
Yeah, I think that’s right. And I know that even all the top producers I talked to will mention like, Oh, I’m not really very good at x, y or z. So I just try not I have someone on my team that can assist there because I just don’t do a good job of that. So if somebody’s out there who is thinking of maybe trying to find a team, what how would you recommend they go about looking for that?

Kati Spaniak 22:34
Um, gosh, that’s a good question. You know, you can always start with some of the ads. Because the bigger teams are going to be running ads weekly all the time. You know, the bigger the bigger teams, I would just say, make sure you know what you’re kind of getting probably on the big teams, I think they can be absolutely awesome. It’s not as much of a smaller culture, maybe, you know, it all team can be any size, it can really be three people, I think, really, it’s know what you are looking for in your team, and make it very clear. Are you looking for more free time? Are you looking for more money? Are you looking for opportunity, and then go to that team and see if that’s a good fit, you know, it’s super important that I get people especially now when I’ve grown, I want my goals and their goals to be the same. And I have gotten people who I’ve interviewed who I’ve really liked. And I’ve said you know what, I just don’t think our goals are quite the same. And it’s not that they’re bad, or I’m bad or they’re not going to make it. It’s just that make sure that cultural fit is there for you.

D.J. Paris 23:42
I think that is really, really well said and I think a great place to sort of wrap up and and you know if there are buyers or sellers, you know who are interested in working with you and your team, what’s the best way they should reach out to you.

Kati Spaniak 23:58
So you can go to our website, which is spinning ACC team.com. We have a completely searchable website there which is great. And we connect with you pretty pretty quick you sign in, we’re going to be to within at least 15 minutes. You can also call us at 847-379-8813 or you can email me directly which is just Katie K T i at spammy ACC team.com

D.J. Paris 24:25
Katie, thank you so much for your time today. I think this is really really valuable. This team conversation I think is so important. And I really appreciate your your your thoughts on it.

Kati Spaniak 24:35
Well, thank you. This is really exciting. Glad I did it.

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Nick Libert wants every broker to ask themselves this question – “What is my brokerage doing for me?” Nick coaches and mentors every agent in their Exit Realty office to help them exceed their sales goals. He also believes in the importance of giving back and currently serves on multiple real estate boards. Over the years Nick has grown his office into the third most successful Exit firm in the country. In addition to all of this, Nick is also a Top 1% Chicago broker!

Nick Libert can be reached at 312.493.0920 and nick@nicklibert.com.

 

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:16
Hello and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcast made by Chicago real estate agents for Chicago real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris, I am your host, and we have a really fantastic interview with Nick Liburd coming up in just a few. Before we do I wanted to, as I always do when I start the show, say thank you, our numbers continue to grow. We are now going to cross over 5000 subscribers here by the end of the month. So thank you in advance for passing this show along to other brokers in your office or that you meet out in the field that you think could benefit from listening to top producers share their secrets of how they built their business. Also, if you are a lender or an attorney, or have a business that promotes to realtors, you can advertise on our show and sponsor an episode. So if you’re interested in getting in front of 5000 Realtor ears for an episode, you can do that you can reach out to us at our website, keeping it real pod.com or on Facebook. And lastly, what questions would you like to have answered by top producers send us your questions in addition to the people you feel we should be talking to and interviewing for future episodes, but let us know exactly what you want to hear. Maybe it’s a specific topic. If so we can go out and find somebody who’s a specialist in that area and bring them into the show so definitely don’t be shy send us your requests on how to make the show even better and more useful for you and now on to our interview with Nick Libin.

Okay, today on the show we have Nick Liburd. Nick has dedicated his real estate career to empowering lives through real estate his passion for finding his clients. The ideal home or investment property has manifested itself in a rave reviews from his many hundreds of past clients. His depth of nearly two decades of industry experience has made him a sought after sales coach speaking in front of 1000s of real estate agents. I’ve seen him speak He’s great. He has also appeared on nearly every major TV network including multiple stints on HGTV staple House Hunters. Nick owns and operates Exit Realty is a third largest office in America and is the franchise’s number two agent here in Illinois, Nick’s learning base philosophy led to an undergraduate and law degrees from Valparaiso. He Nick is also a Certified International Property specialist and certified Luxury Home Marketing Specialist Onyx personal real estate success. sales success lands him on the Chicago Association of Realtors top producer list basically every single year, and for the past six years in a row, he’s been named a five star real estate agent by Chicago agent magazine. He’s also started a second company, Nick library development which is focused on revitalizing urban properties and beautifying neighborhoods. based in part on these ventures. CS magazine recently named a nick to their real estate visionaries list for the third year in a row. Nick is honored to be currently serving on the Illinois Realtors board of directors and is always ready to engage new connections and mutual growth opportunities. Welcome, Nick, we’re so excited to have

Nick Libert 3:33
you. Well, it’s awesome to be here. I thank you guys for the opportunity. And I think this this is a podcast idea for realtors is amazing. Just kind of bringing everybody together and getting ideas of best practices and stuff. So kudos on the idea.

D.J. Paris 3:47
Oh, well, I it’s funny. I had the idea of five years ago, and I just never did it. So finally, I decided it was it was worth trying. And I was just talking to interviewed someone else earlier this morning. And I said, you know our first episode, and we only got about 50 listens that first week or two and I thought oh, maybe people aren’t interested. And thankfully it’s grown from there, but seems to seems to be resonating. But I always say it’s not because of my sparkling shining personality. It’s of course because we feature people like you. So can you tell us a little bit about how you how you started in real estate?

Nick Libert 4:23
Absolutely. So I started real estate. First of all, this is basically all I’ve ever done as an adult. I was in high school. And my mom and my grandfather both had always said it was a good thing to buy real estate. I would not call them professional real estate investors by any means. But they did own property and from time to time they would sell it. You know, again, by no means on a huge scale but my mom had a little rental house. I remember there was a real estate agent that drove a big car put a sign in the yard. Bout three weeks later the property sold. My mom said do you want to go to the closing with me saw this lady Again, she rolls on with a huge coat, big car again gets a check. And I’m like, wow, that seems really easy. Little did I know that, you know, obviously real estate is not easy at all. And, you know, while the ceiling is there is no ceiling, there’s also very concrete floors, I say no money, if you’re not doing the right thing. So that’s, you know, I got my start in college. Having this idea that I was going to make a ton of money, it would be a great thing to do part time, and that when I was done with college, I’d be actually a TV reporter. And I wouldn’t forget about this whole real estate thing flash forward, almost 20 years later, and I’m still doing it. And it’s my passion. And I love it. And I’ve seen, you know, the great highs of a wonderful year. And I’ve seen the very low lows about no money too. So it’s been an interesting ride. And I know a lot of the listeners can appreciate that, that I’ve also seen the highs and lows.

D.J. Paris 5:50
Absolutely. I I’m a huge, huge fan of yours. And I want to give you a compliment of something I saw that you did. Recently, it was in the last maybe six months, I went to a YPN event down at Manny’s the monthly meetings that they have. And I know you’re very, very present. And I know you’ve served at YPN, which is Young Professionals Network. If anyone isn’t a member, you don’t have to be young to join, of course, but it is it’s an awesome organization. I know you do a lot with them. But next stood up. And I don’t know if you were sponsoring the meeting, or if you were just talking. But I thought you did something that I’ve I’ve never really seen anyone else do and maybe other people do it. But you were the first person I’ve seen to do it in any I’ve never seen anyone do it sends mixed up and talked about his training program for his brokers and he he got specific for a few minutes about what they do. And he said, By the way, you don’t have to be a member of our team to take advantage of our training like anyone is welcome. And I thought you know what an awesome example of giving back and I know that is really important to you how much you’ve given, you know, you serve on boards, you’re very involved in the community. But I just wanted to say like, that is really impressive that you’re you know, I don’t think most firms would, would have a lot of that same policy. And I just thought that was really a cool thing to offer.

Nick Libert 7:05
Thank you know, that’s I think education and coaching, not just training, but coaching has really been the hallmark of, of what we’re trying to build an exit strategy. And what I’ve noticed is that it seems like in the industry, there’s such a closed minded attitude about well, if you’re not at my brokerage, I’m not going to show you what I’m doing. And sometimes even within a brokerage, if you’re not sitting at my desk or on my team, I’m not going to show you what I’m doing. And I’m kind of like my attitude is the more the merrier. It’s the law of attraction, I think if you see people winning and doing well, and sharing, you want to be a part of that, if you see people closed off, and you know, this is my cheese get away from it, you’re not going to want to be a part of that either. And that formula for us has been really successful. We’ve, when I started my office, we had eight agents, and really, quite frankly, not a lot to offer those agents that were there. And every year now, you know, we have over 170 agents and our big thing is, is you know, I just want to share what I know and have a top agent share what they know. And for me myself, I’m a student of the industry. I love listening to other people as much as I love sharing what I know, think I know and don’t know. And it’s just again, that formula has really been successful for us. So you know if there’s anybody out there that has no interest in joining exit doesn’t like the logo or the colors or doesn’t like me feel free to stop come to our stuff, we’re not going to bother you to join and, you know, harass you to you know, be a drink our Kool Aid, so to speak, that’s not the way we work. I want everybody in the industry industry to do well. And you know, we all lift each other up and what, regardless of whether we’re on the same boat or, you know, across the sea from each other.

D.J. Paris 8:36
Yes, and that really seems to be a common theme. I mean, we really only interview the top 1% of producers. In all of Chicagoland for this podcast, maybe one day we’ll run out but so far, that’s, you know, not to, in any way diminish Nick’s individuality because I think this is a hallmark of, of Nick of who you are. But it’s very common sort of theme with top producers, they tend to be extraordinarily generous with their time. And so anyway, I just thought that was really cool. For you to stand up at the meeting and say anyone is welcome. And that is not a common occurrence, you know, a common message maybe by other firms. And and you’re right, there also aren’t any real secrets anymore, either. I mean, it’s, it’s, you know, it all is welcome. So I think that’s really cool. But I do want to talk about, you know, when you got started or rather not so much when you got started. But, you know, when it wasn’t always in particular maybe at the beginning when the market or rather when you were struggling just like any new broker. Can you talk about, you know, that struggle and how you maybe overcame that?

Nick Libert 9:40
Absolutely as a new broker and it was interesting. I started out with Coldwell Banker, again nearly 20 years ago in Northwest Indiana and I had a wonderful managing broker, and just a really cool fun office environment. I still saw my party’s office parties. I want to be like hers. She’s now passed away but um Just an amazing first managing broker. When I started though, I instantly got a kind of almost a sense of panic and dread that I’m like, Oh, I just dropped $800 on this course and signing up. And now obviously, it’s well over $1,200 to sign up and join the board. But I noticed there were some some ladies and gentlemen that had been there a couple of months, and they had, you know, an office that they had a space and a phone and a desk. And I’m like, okay, that doesn’t seem to be like going on at this desk. And it was very obvious that these were people sitting and waiting for the company to do something for them. Sure. And I just had a, you know, again, the sense of dread them like, Oh, I’m gonna make something happen, because it doesn’t look like these people that have been here a couple months, have anything going on from them through the company. And it that’s when I first became, you know, a very independent independent contractor was, as I figured out, wow, no brand, I don’t care who what company it is, you know, the REMAX balloon, Keller Williams exit, no company is gonna make you your money, you’re gonna have to go out there and get it for yourself. And particularly in a day and age where Zillow, Trulia and realtor.com, have the vast majority of traffic, you’re not going to build a website today to beat them. And if you do, God bless you, but I haven’t figured it out, I tried it, it didn’t work. So you know, you gotta go out there and network with the people, you’ve got to go out there and either build relationships that are stronger than these big websites, or play with the big websites and pay them you know, for leads either way, your company, your brand is not going to do enough for you, except maybe give you some dessert, your main course is always going to be what you go out there and catch for yourself. And that sitting in that room filled with people that had been there three to six months and had not had a deal and looked very hungry. And then looking at the top producers and realizing some of them weren’t even really in the office. And it didn’t look like they sat floor time. And I would see these piles of mail going out. So direct mail, and I’d see them at parties and networking events. But again, not sitting at their desk waiting for lead from the company that struck me and that was one of the best things that I could do was to sit there and watch and observe and realize that the company wasn’t gonna do anything for these guys. It was all up to the agents. And again, I was at a great office. I love my office, it was super fun. But the office wasn’t putting food on people’s tables, the agents individual actions were.

D.J. Paris 12:17
Yeah, you’re you’re so right. And anyone who’s who’s had, you know, some amount of time in the industry figures that out, of course, but I you know, I suspect you share this similar grievance to mine, or is that there are a lot of firms that the way they market themselves is like, hey, we do it all for you. And, you know, and then of course, the reality tends to be much different once once you’re on board. So I think you’re right. And that actually leads into a really great question, which or maybe it’s not a great question, but I think it’s an interesting question, which is, so you know, what should somebody look for in a broker, a brokerage firm, you know, what are some of the things you think brokerage firms can do for their brokers?

Nick Libert 12:56
Well, first of all, you’ve got to look at, you know, what that company is going to do with coaching and training. And, you know, I sit there and I go, Okay, guys, first and foremost, a lot of agents run for the best commission split. And you know, here’s the issue 100% of nothing is nothing. And you’ve got to look for a company that is going to provide you with coaching and training. And when I say training, I don’t mean here’s how to fill out a contract. I mean, here’s how to make your phone ring, you’re opening up a business, when you get your real estate license. And as you continue to build your career, your business is going to expand and what is that company’s message? Are they showing new agent how to generate leads? Are they showing experienced agent how to build their business and build a team? Beyond that, then the next thing I tell the people to look for, okay, what’s the training? What’s the technology? What is going to help me in my business, you know, we give out not only a website, but a CRM product and a dot loop account, everything that you’re going to need to do to get that technology out there to the consumer, and work with consumers? What is the message? What’s the marketing of the company? You know, at our at our office, one of our last hires, was one of our best hires, and that was a graphic designer, is that, you know, we had marketing templates and things like that. But we really want to customize the message to the consumer for each individual agent. What’s in that? What’s in that package? And then finally, the last question should be, and again, it’s normally what the first question is that if the agents valid, what’s the commission split? And again, I’m not going to quote our commission splits, you can look up online and follow me on social media to find out what excess commission splits are. That’s not what this you know, podcast is about. But that’s the last conversation you should have. And then at that point, absolutely figure out what’s the best overall deal, but agents jump for odd reasons. And I think the first thing that you should be thinking about is what can this company do to help build my business if you’re just jumping for a commission split that says to me, that you may not have the right business mindset and you may not be generating enough leads because if you’re looking to save money versus build more business, that’s a concern for me.

D.J. Paris 14:57
Absolutely, I couldn’t I couldn’t agree More I think that and then also, I think if firms are promising leads, which, you know, I don’t don’t hear as much anymore. And I’m grateful for that, because I think there was a lot of that going on over, over a long period of time. And I think finally firms have have started telling, you know, telling the truth and more about, about their ability to generate leads for brokers. And, and, you know, but I think Nick’s absolutely right is, is if you know, if you’re going to join a firm that question should be, how are you gonna help me grow my business? What training? What coaching? Or what support? What marketing? Are you going to help me do to build my business? And I think you said that so well, it’s how are you going to help me grow my business? Right. But that which is great, so well said. And, you know, I want to step back just a little bit and ask you about because I know you had some some experience in the past and had some interesting thoughts about when back when you represented asset management companies that were dealing with foreclosures? Can you talk a little bit more about about that experience?

Nick Libert 15:59
Oh, yeah, this was interesting. So you know, when I got in the market, it was a what we call a balanced market, there were buyers, there were sellers, it wasn’t a crazy height, then we get into the, you know, rising up to the bubble, when it seemed like everybody had the real estate license, you could, you know, read into a mirror and get a loan or 10, loans, you know, 0% down, and it was crazy. When the market crashed to be completely frank, I crashed right along with it. I was not prepared. I was in my late 20s, I’d had a real fun time, made a six figure income every year as a real estate agent in my 20s. And really did not fundamentally truly understand the business. And when the market crashed, I’m like, Oh, my gosh, I just turned 30. I just left Keller Williams for Exit Realty, to kind of get into a different business model. And I’m going, Oh, where am I? And I was lucky enough to trip on to a contact for an asset management company. And I knew that, you know, people were losing their homes, people couldn’t, the economy was bad. It wasn’t just real estate. And so I contacted this asset management company, and I said, Hey, I will take anything, do you have any listings? And they’re like, well, give me give us your experience. And luckily, because at the beginning of my career, I’ve represented a lot of investors, I dealt with REO, I just had dealt with REO as a listing agent, they gave me a couple of really interesting properties. I mean, yes, you know, tarps over the roof, people shooting up drugs inside. I mean, I got run out of houses by drug dealers, drug users, it just, it was incredible, some of the stuff we saw, but I sold them, and I sold every single one of them. And then all of a sudden, they started giving me nicer stuff. And that really taught me the value of a hustle. It wasn’t about just driving up at a nice car anymore, because quite frankly, I couldn’t afford my payments on my BMW anymore. I was driving up or whatever car would get me there and to get me safely in and out of that, that property and get the property photos and inspections and things sold. And at really re taught me work ethic that I think I’ve lost in the good years, the golden years, so to speak up 2005 to 2007 Eight. I think a lot of us just got bad attitudes and bad work ethic. And that snapped me right back into waking up at six getting my workout in and going out when there was light out to do to business. Obviously. Now, that’s not the way we you know, we’re not having to do that as much anymore as far as going out and taking pictures and sealing up properties all day. But those of us that are hustling and you know you’ve had some amazing talent on here already, Kate Dolan and I worked together before she was at exit for a number of years, she is just a hustler. And Kate, you know, Kate Nolan with all the money and all the numbers that she’s doing now still is getting up and getting out there early in the morning and getting things done. And you know, now what we’re doing is it’s pounding the pavement, online on the phone, lead generation for two to three hours a day in the morning, and not none of this, like Oh, I’m an independent contractor and I my own boss, so I’ll wake up at 11 or noon. Those Those are the people that probably a are not going to tune into this podcast B are going to execute anything in the in the podcast that we tell them and see what they get in the business. And it’s just sad. You know, if you look at the statistics that are lucky enough to be on the board a car and IR at the same time. And it’s interesting, because we see so many statistics between those two boards, and it’s like, yeah, there’s people making a million dollars. We have, you know, a couple people in our office making 500,000 and up. We also have some people in every brand in this industry that are truly not making a living wage. And a lot of it unfortunately not because it’s a bad business to be in it is because they are not running their business.

D.J. Paris 19:39
Yeah. 100% I don’t know if I’ve shared this story I think I have in a previous episode, but it’s worth repeating because I think you’ll get a kick out of it. I interviewed Josh Weinberg a little bit ago and he’s partnered Tommy Troy who I’m sure you know both those guys. Tommy wasn’t on the call. But I was asking Josh about his goals. I said what are your goals because Josh is a very Goal sort of centric and value centric kind of person. And I, and I wasn’t necessarily interested in what his production goals were, but I sort of probably phrased the question incorrectly. Because he said, Well, we don’t really have those kinds of goals. He said, I’ll tell you what Tommy’s goal is, though. And you know, you know, there are top producers, they’ve been in the business for a while they are not new to the business. And he goes, Tommy’s goal is to meet 365 new people in the next year. And he goes, because we know that if he does that, we will hit every other goal that we have set, you know, so it’s, it really points to the fundamentals of growing your business, treating it like a business, how do I get in front of more people, tell them my story, convince them that I’m the guy to choose when they have a real estate transaction? And I just thought that was what a great message for somebody who’s already doing so well to say, oh, yeah, we just, you know, it’s like, oh, yeah, we do push ups, just like anyone else who’s trying to get fit, you know?

Nick Libert 20:49
Yeah, there’s nothing, there’s nothing different about a top producer. You know, what I found in my office is we always talk, I’ve got a LinkedIn blog, and I say, there’s three different funnels of business. And, you know, there’s my top producers work in one, two, or all three of them, but they’re not doing anything really that different. They’re just consistent with the execution. And that’s, you know, I love Tommy and Josh and, and I think that, you know, their numbers are friggin amazing, and it’s discipline these guys. Yes, we all take vacations, but these guys are machines, Kate’s a machine, I’d like to think of myself as a machine, maybe squeaking sometimes. But that’s, that’s the that’s it. I was just talking with somebody this morning. And they’re like, you know, oh, my gosh, are, you know, you’re always working. I’m like, you know, what, we’re not always working technology allows us to work for some from some pretty cool places. But we’re consistent. And we, you know, we’re on message we’re on point. And we do a good job for our clients. And that’s none of these people that you’ve interviewed or brought up or that I would interview or bring up. I have bad work ethics, they also just don’t have bad ethics in general. You know, there’s some people that have made these top 10 lists, and these top producer lists a timer to, and then they disappear. And the reason why they disappear is yeah, they figured out a way to make their phone ring, but would you ever call them again, you know, that’s the other thing is that as in this wonderful age of technology, it’s still about client service. Because if you do a terrible job, word will get out quicker than ever.

D.J. Paris 22:11
Yeah, 100%. Agree. Speaking of you know, you talked about discipline and you know, making hay while the sun shines. attitude. And obviously, you have this, you live that as well as you know, the other the other people we’ve been fortunate enough to speak to talk a little in really you You are such a, you know, such a well known trainer, tell it can you talk a little bit more about what else you think is really critical for a broker who either is new to the business wants to, you know, really dive in or just wants to take their real estate practice to the next level?

Nick Libert 22:46
Absolutely, you know, I’ll give you a couple of things real quick. First of all, time block calendar, it is so hard as an agent to, you know, figure out what you want to do when and how to do it. And to kind of tune out the noise. So a time block calendar that allows you to do that. Secondly, I use something called a greatness tracker to track that two to three hours a day of lead generation, you have got to get in. I can sit at a desk for two hours. But did I really lead generate for two hours, you got to track that? The third thing is a lead tracker. Okay, I’ve done a good job on my greatness tracker, my lead tracker, what am I actually bringing in a lot of the agents when I sit down and I coach with them from all brands, they actually do bring in they create a lot of leads, but they don’t convert the leads. So they got an issue in their lead funnels, then where we kind of drop off at that point, most people are talking about production. Oh, I did 12 million and 20 million blah, blah, blah, what do you actually take home, I have seen very few agents that pop out of a profit and loss statement to me, you know, they really kind of stopped. They don’t even source their deals, a lot of them so they don’t know where their deals are coming from. They just do a lot of deals. They can’t articulate to me 70% came from referral. 10% came from farming and 20% came from realtor.com and Zillow. I don’t hear those numbers. And you definitely don’t hear I’m spending XYZ to get or not. That is absolutely you know, those are the really big things. And then the final thing I would say to agents to encourage them is once you’re done at the end of the day, you take home your pay, figure out a way to turn around and invest in real estate. You know, I’ve got my little development company on the side. You know, I’ve learned a lot that was kind of a learning curve the same way that my real estate brokerage business has been. But you know, if you’re not turning around and actively investing in real estate, how are you promoting this is such an amazing thing to the consumer. Real estate agents have some of the worst savings rates they have some of the worst financial practices I’ve seen because quite frankly, there is no retirement plan. There is no you know, safety net. There’s no health insurance. It’s like wow, we have got some right at the top of our our financial day. We’re not having taxes withheld. We don’t get insurance. And we don’t have a retirement account. There’s some really big roadblocks that as an industry, which is why I’m trying to promote, you know, especially through these educational seminars and things like that, you’ll hear me right at the end, go. Okay, guys, this is all cool. Now you know how to make your phone ring more? Once you make your phone ring, could you please put something in your bank account? Because the saddest thing I’ve ever seen as an agent that makes, you know, a six figure income and has nothing in their bank account? And quite frankly, I’ve been there, I’ve been that agent. And that is is not a cool place to be. And there’s, there’s no reason for it.

D.J. Paris 25:27
Yeah, you know, it is. It’s so so true. We, I know, I am shocked at how many brokers who are making a substantial living doing real estate. And when I say hey, have you ever talked to your accountant about potentially incorporating and obviously, I can’t give tax advice. But you know, you may want to look at either developing an S corp or, or a C Corp and just explore those opportunities, because it might actually save you, you know, and they just go Yeah, I should do that I never thought to do and I’m like, how have you made to think to do that. And even whether it’s a good idea or not, your accountant will give you some advice there. But I’m, I am shocked about the financial management part not shocked. I mean, I understand it’s, it’s, you have to do it on your own. And it’s a lot of work. But oh my gosh, you can you can save yourself a tremendous headache down the road, if you start to look into different options.

Nick Libert 26:18
You really absolutely can. And I think that that’s so interesting that, you know, a lot of us as brokerages are not sending that message out. We just don’t. And I’m trying to do that in my office. I’m trying to switch to that mindset to say, hey, you know, you’re an entrepreneur, put some money away in the bank. And I think that hopefully the dialogue changes as an industry.

D.J. Paris 26:38
Yeah. And at least know your deductions. And maybe at the end of the year, like you had mentioned, create a p&l statement, but but also Yeah, what what were your expenses? How much does it cost you per deal? What are you actually spending? And in addition to Hey, where did your revenue come from? Was it referral? Was it you know, leads you purchased? Was it through your sphere of influence, you know, but knowing how much do I spend per deal is really, really important. Because like you swats running a business and then obviously, you know, not all of us are good at every aspect of running a business. But boy, those are really important skills to develop. And I appreciate you bringing that up. Can you talk a little bit more about your investment business? I’d like to hear more about that.

Nick Libert 27:20
Yeah, absolutely. So you know, obviously, my primary business is is x at our office, and we love it. And I’m excited by it. I did start to see over the last couple of years, some really great investing opportunities. I had, you know, as I said before, taking kind of a really big financial hit when the market crashed. But through the exit residual bonus program, I started saving up and I’m like, hey, I want to invest in some real estate, not just my primary residence, but some more and I saved up enough of our residual bonuses to turn around and start my second company, which is my development company. What I’m focused on right now is taking some bungalows on the northwest side and some really cool neighborhoods like Portage Park and basically modernizing them keeping the best of the structure. So the vintage details, the you know, the beautiful brickwork the facade on the outside, and turning around and making the second floor truly modern living. So that means a beautiful master suite with a huge master bath and walk in closet. And two extra large special bedrooms that you just can’t get on a regular bungalow with, you know, those smaller dormer windows and things like that, that just doesn’t work the same. So we’re trying to bring some modernization and yet keep that beautiful bungalow historic bungalow that we love so much in Chicago at the same time, it’s been really successful. contractors have been my main issue, you’ll, you’ll a lot of you guys that are investors in the audience, listening will also appreciate that contractors have been the worst of my experience with that, but I found a couple good ones. And we have actually our investors club in our office, we put together an investor’s club because so many of us as agents have tried to dabble in our own and I’m like, Hey, guys, you know, everybody’s kind of making their own mistakes. Let’s learn as a group. And so our investors club kind of puts people together and collaborates, we’ve got a coach, that helps us out and teaches a little bit more about the contracting side. And it’s really cool. And again, it’s another aspect of the business. I don’t ever want to branch out into 20 different businesses, but I think there’s some basic commonalities, obviously, between, you know, a real estate agent, and a real estate agent that may pick up some assets for themselves once in a while, whether it’s buy and hold a property to flip.

D.J. Paris 29:30
Yeah, our owner, Nick, also named Nick, is he’s an active investor and he is always shocked at that everyone who has a broker license is not out purchasing properties, or at least you know, what investment properties like I am, you know, absolutely what a huge opportunity to learn that business, whether it becomes a full time part of your business or just something ancillary. But, Nick, we have had this has been great, great conversation, if if so, I want to give you two different plots. So one of which, of course, is if there’s any buyers and sellers or investors or even renters out there that you know, that are looking for to be represented. What’s the best way they can get in touch with you?

Nick Libert 30:11
Oh, it’s very easy. Actually, we are living in a text based world. So if you just text my last name, l i, B as in boy, e RT. So that’s li B, E, RT 285377. That’s 85377, you will get my digital business card online. Every exit agent has one of those that you actually get it on your cell phone. So just text me second way super easy social media connect with me on social media. I’m on almost every platform, LinkedIn, I’ve got a blog, Instagram, I got some fun pictures, everywhere. Whatever you want to do to connect. I’m at Nick library everywhere. So and I see K li ve as in boy, er T on all social media.

D.J. Paris 30:56
And also if you’re a broker out there wanting to explore exits, what they offer or some of the trading opportunities to the same way should they reach out to you

Nick Libert 31:04
reach out to me directly on again on social media or just download my business card and we will talk to you and see if we can do something for your business. If it’s not a good fit. No worries, but we got some really cool stuff going on. And I’d love to talk. I always love talking real estate with agents.

D.J. Paris 31:19
Awesome. Well, Nick, thank you so much. i You are an incredibly busy person. You serve on a million boards, you run an office, you have an investment business on the side, and we really appreciate your time. And this was this was one of the more fun conversations I’ve had doing the show. So thank you so much.

Nick Libert 31:35
Hey, thank you for having me. I appreciate it. You have a good day.

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