George Doulamis with Blankenship Group talks about his unique experience and transition from property management to real estate agent. George discusses how his experience as property manager helped him to get connections. George explains the importance of being forthright and maintaining the key communications skills with the clients and shows his strategies on how to sell a home. Lastly, he emphasized that a good agent should have innovative and creative ideas for selling a home, and why you should not be pushy to the clients, just wait and listen.
If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube!
George Doulamis can be reached at (561) 402-9123 and george.doulamis@evrealestate.com
This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks.
Transcript
D.J. Paris 0:00
What’s different about selling a $300,000 property versus a $30 million property? We’re gonna find out today. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solution so that you can easily generate more business. There agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and now on to our show
Hello and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the largest podcast made by real estate agents. And for real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris I am your guide and host through the show and in just a moment we’re going to be speaking with Top Producer George dilemmas before we get to George just a couple of reminders first, actually this is a new thing we finally now have an Instagram account. I know it’s embarrassing I have had social media experts on the show for like six years and off air they were like why do you not have Instagram finally we do and not only do we have an Instagram account we’re actually doing some cool stuff with it. So I want everyone to grab their their device. Go check out Instagram and look up top agent interviews. That is our handle top agent interviews and every single day we post a short form video clip cold from one of our episodes and that has a short little take little tactic Tip of the Day. We do that every weekday although I think I missed yesterday but anyway most weekdays I have a new one there so top agent interviews on Instagram We are also on Tik Tok LinkedIn YouTube Twitter, Facebook, probably everywhere else but we post a post them everywhere so find us you can just whatever you know social media app you use search for keeping it real podcast hit that subscribe button. But the reels and the stories that we’ve been promoting the short form video clips have just gone gangbusters. I really wasn’t expecting so many people to to really be drawn to that but it seems to be scratching an itch for our listeners. We are so grateful to you. So hopefully you can find some value there. So follow us on Instagram top agent interviews but you know what, that’s the only thing I really wanted to get through today because we need to get to the main event my conversation with Georgia lamas.
Today my guest is George blomus from the Blankenship route, angle and Volkers in Destin and the 30 a corridor in Florida. Let me tell you more about George George was born in Massachusetts, 30 minutes north of Boston. Gosh, I love I love the Northeast. But aside from that he was he also he really grew up in Florida as a child but moved back to the Boston area as a teenager, parents were both blue collar and passed on their work ethic. Georgia unfortunately lost his father when he was 16. And this hurt but it helped him understand loss early in life. Soon after his father’s passing, George began to work part time for his older cousin managing his apartment buildings. And eventually, George relocated to South Florida and worked for Ritz Carlton. This was a real education in the world of service and how to apply to anything he would do in his future endeavors. From there, George would relocate to Destin, Florida, the 38 corridor, short time spent a short time as a property manager which led to the transition to being a full time realtor. Now we’re going to get into George’s story because it really doesn’t even stop there. But for everyone who is listening watching, I would like you to please right now. Go visit Instagram and follow George it’s George dilemmas are II don’t worry about spelling that. I’ll spell it right now but it will also be in our show notes but it’s George do you LAMISR e so again link to that in the show notes. Follow him on Instagram. George, such a pleasure to have you.
George Doulamis 5:05
Yeah, I’m super excited. I can’t wait to kind of tell my story, see if I can help out. Anybody will, wanting to listen, and it should be exciting.
D.J. Paris 5:13
Well, I have the only time I’ve been to your area was back in high school where many people from my hometown, which is pure Illinois, which is like Central Illinois, would go down for spring break to Panama City. So that was the closest I got. And that’s the last time I’ve actually been in that area. However, I have had several different people on our show from that area, the 38. area, the destin area, and oh my gosh, I cannot believe how much real estate transacts there, and the price points and just a whole nother world that is really down there. So I’m excited to hear about that. And how you. And also, by the way, highly competitive for anyone listening if you think your area is tough, which I’m sure is, oh, that area is because the price points are so high. There are a lot of agents who are fighting for that business. And George is one of the very successful ones down there. So we’re excited to have George you on the show. But let’s start at the very beginning. Like how did you get into real estate?
George Doulamis 6:12
Yeah, good question. So like I said, you, you were nicely to describe my background, really, when it started was the Ritz Carlton, I started learning service. And then as I was there, I think that was postcrash back in like 11 or 12 when the economy was starting to come back and South Florida. I wanted to move on and manage manage properties, manage associations. So I ended up trying I ended up finding a job in Destin. It’s funny when I got the phone call over the interview, I said with it, where the heck is Destin, Florida when I was in South Florida. We made the trip we loved it. Stay up for a weekend became property manager. Every weekend, though, I would get phone calls from agents. Hey, can you tell me everything about the association that condos? When
D.J. Paris 6:55
you were talking to agents all the time as a property manager? Sure. Well, I probably
George Doulamis 6:58
did what probably half your audience said, Oh, I
D.J. Paris 7:00
can do this. If these guys are calling me. If these morons can do it, I can do it.
George Doulamis 7:05
Exactly. So that’s how the transition started did. I’d say for the first year and a half after I got my license probably like a lot of agents that listen to this. I was part time as I did my full time job. And then I just took the leap. That’s how I got into it. I think having the experience of working a little bit real estate when I was younger, but that was more of maintenance. But collecting rent, this was the full time want to get the big listings like anyone else wanted to get the big commission checks, and just jumped into it.
D.J. Paris 7:35
It’s amazing. I you know, I was thinking as you were telling that story. I was going I’d read some of that obviously at the beginning, but hearing it you know really solidified what instinct I had, which you’ll have to correct me if I’m wrong, which often wrong. But this idea of working for such a white glove company like Ritz Carlton, I mean, this is top of the food chain, you know, right right there at the very highest level of service in the hospitality, and you know, vacation space. And I had a similar experience. When I when I graduated college, I went to work for Anheuser Busch right out of college. And again, different. Sort of I know those companies are seen differently, like Budweiser and Bud Light was predominantly the beers I worked on. And I don’t think people consider that in the same Echelon as a Ritz Carlton or Waldorf Astoria, for example. However, from a sales perspective, they are at the top of the food chain, or I don’t know if they still are, but they were. And I learned so much about perfection from Anheuser Busch. I know it’s kind of a silly thing to say, because we don’t think about those beers as being perfect beers. But there’s a reason why they got to the very top. And it’s not just because, you know, they’re the marketing was great. I mean, the marketing is great, as well as Ritz Carlton, the marketing is great, too. But there is a level of service that you must have learned there that I would almost say you must have a servant’s heart, which is I like an expression of temperament. Because you have been in the service industry for long and you’ve worked for some tough companies, meaning tough, meaning very demanding companies. And I just curious how that sort of, you know, as a property manager to like, that’s a thankless job where you’re constantly just taking an anger and trying to make everyone happy. And it’s not an easy life, or an easy job. But I’m curious, did that did those skills you developed at those places help you as a realtor, because a realtor is a surface job, too?
George Doulamis 9:29
Absolutely. And then it was the biggest thing. While you’re there, it is very tough. I mean, you actually saw people get dismissed all the time, because they couldn’t live the standard. We had certain ways certain things had to be done. You couldn’t say no, for example. And you’d have to navigate around problems because sometimes something like a property, something could be wrong. They’re paying an extreme amount of money just to stay there. They want to stay to be perfect, perfect. And you might be the first person of defense to have to hear this wasn’t ready. This wasn’t ready. How dare you I came to this property, because, but long story short, they always had a saying, we want to create a world where the consumer could not live without Ritz Carlton in that world. Wow, they had to be there. So I started thinking, as I probably it was probably internalized. But once I started going to real estate, how do we create experiences? How do I create a one on one experience where they couldn’t even imagine me not handling the transaction? So I think even from there, we started going, and then there was always whenever you went out into any of the ballrooms or the general areas, smile, you’re on stage. So right there, you’re like, Okay, it’s go time when I walked through the door, if I have a bad moment in the hallway, that’s fine. But once you walk through there, customers are, number one,
D.J. Paris 10:44
have your bad moments in private. Yeah, I, you know, you said something, I just want to say it. Again, I want to repeat something you said, because it’s simple but profound. And really, I hope our audience takes it in you said, I want to create a business where my clients literally cannot transact in real estate without me or that they, I mean, obviously, they can, but they feel that I am the guy, there’s no other option. I’m the top of the food chain as far as what their expectations are. And you learned all of that as not only a property manager because that is that is the toughest job. You know, property managers don’t get a lot of things. And by the way, if anyone is working, or sorry, if anyone is living in a condo, and you have an HOA or any you have in a property management team, the best thing you can ever do is like be super grateful and thankful. And like send the property manager like you’re awesome. Well, you know, once in a while, because that’ll get that’ll actually work well, because they don’t get a lot of that they only get the problems. And same thing with obviously anyone in the service industry, you know, tell them how special they are. But I’d love to learn about how you actually took some of those principles, you know, that you learned at as a property manager working in hospitality? And then also like, how did you actually implement that? Like, what was the plan, just to really prove to your clients that boy, they need you?
George Doulamis 12:08
I’d say from day one, like the Ritz Carlton like any major company has SOPs, right standing operating procedures. So I decided, whenever I got going, whether it was from from the point I started lead generating in the morning or taking a listing, there is going to be non negotiables that we take care of for that client. Anything from as simple as photos have to be top of the line, not the cell phones, not buying the cheapest photographer, you can find every property regardless to even when I started, had to have a video had to have some sort of video trailer and not on a camera, someone had to professionally do it. Those were non negotiables communication. Again, these are non negotiables. Because if we were going to talk to somebody who flew in on a private plane, to stay at the Ritz Carlton communication, it’d be top notch, they expect that when they walk in a property. So I started taking these for us at the time because we it was so learn, we started I started taking these values and implement them, like you just said, if it’s communication, the very best communication they’re going to get. If I was to sit down in your living room and lay out this game plan, how to sell your home and make these promises. Well, you better I told people all the time, you can fire me anytime you want if I don’t uphold these standards, because I’m so I’m so regimented in doing those. And truthfully, growing up with an Irish mother probably helps out a lot too. Because if you don’t, if you don’t follow your promises, it’s not going to be a good day for you as a kid in that house.
D.J. Paris 13:34
Yeah, well and Ireland to just I don’t know if your mom was born in Ireland or when she came when her family came over but visiting Ireland it the whole country and again, it’s obviously there’s a big tourism economy there but but just even just meeting normal people. There’s this sort of hospital hospitable nature to the Irish Greeks are the same way. Again, I’m, I’m getting like positive stereotypes, I guess. But but the reality of it is, is this idea of, of being of service is so important. And I I’m just going to make a guess. And you’ll have to again, tell me if I’m right or wrong. I, you talked about standard operating procedures, which I think is a brilliant idea, this idea of knowing exactly. Every time somebody is a client of mine, not just I’m going to do a good job because of course, but it’s like no, here’s exactly and mate, whether you share that with them, or it’s just internal. You have that list. And I bet, my guess is that if when you have a listing, let’s just say it isn’t getting a lot of attention, there isn’t a lot of showings, you’re just not getting a lot of interest for whatever reason, maybe not even had nothing to do with you just you know, whatever reason, it’s not getting a lot of attention. I suspect you have a standard SOP, a standard operating procedure about how often you communicate with that seller to you know, make sure that they’re aware of what’s going on. I suspect you have some sort of process in place, even when nothing’s happening.
George Doulamis 14:54
Absolutely, yes. So they’re going to get a phone call, email or text whatever their preference is. It least once a week, of course, after showings, we tell them we’ll be in touch within 24 hours, we want to keep them along the process. The problem is, again, this will probably ask this later. One of the problems I saw when I first started in real estate in diagnosing listings, communication is always the biggest problem, because they have nothing to talk about when they talk to the client. I’m sorry. We had a slow week, we had no showings. Thank you. Well, what did you do from my house that week? What are you doing? What are you being innovative? How are you doing now. And those were subtle things that I knew from the Ritz, and from property management, like when someone came to show up to their condo here locally, hey, by the way, this week, while you were gone, we had all the trees trimmed, we had this done, we had this done, we had XYZ, and I started applying those whenever I dealt with a listing. So yeah, so that weekly call wasn’t, unfortunately, like 85% of the agents out there would just go, sorry, we had no traffic today. But hey, when it gets busier, I let you know, you’re gonna let the market we’re going to do everything, almost overload them, in a sense, we want them to make sure that they understand everything we’re doing, and everything going on in the marketplace to what
D.J. Paris 16:10
and how I’m gonna, I’m gonna pause you again, because you just said something else that was that was brilliant. And to you, this is like just how I operate. But I want to make make step on this point a little bit, because I want our audience to really, really hear this. So not only is George call texting or emailing once a week, right, even if there’s no activity, he’s not just saying, Sorry, no activity this week, he’s actually okay, I still have to justify my job, I still have to let them know that I am actively working on the property. And here is the information I’m going to provide to them. Aside from the fact that, you know, we it’s been it’s been light and traffic, I’m going to talk about that. Maybe, you know, maybe I’ll have an explanation for why that is happening. Maybe even a suggestion about how to fix it. But also, by the way, this is all the other things we are doing currently for you. It’s it’s a subtle thing. But it’s very important, right? Because you’re giving somebody news they don’t want to hear and you’re also giving them news, they do want to hear, here’s what I am doing for you. And here’s what I think is going to happen going forward. So having the idea of like you were saying people will avoid their clients, because maybe they’re they don’t have anything else to say they haven’t given down a reason other than I’m just going to be delivering bad news. And maybe I should just leave them alone. It’s so funny. I’ve said this before. And I’ll just I’ll just make this really quick story. It’s a very short story. But I talked to one of the top producers in Chicago a few years ago on the show. And she was very soft spoken and very humble and but literally very top of the food chain like top 10 agents out of 46,000 agents here. And I was like, What’s your secret? Like? What do you think you’ve done? That’s so different. She goes, DJ, isn’t going to be embarrassing to say this. I call every client every week. And I was like, yeah, she goes, yeah, that’s pretty much. And I said, doesn’t everybody do that? And she goes, No. So I know, it’s a lot more than that. But even if that’s a standard operating procedure, which is for you, obviously huge, but I want to switch gears because I want to spend time. Now, for anyone watching or listening, you may have an inclination to want to shut this off at the next topic, I am going to encourage you to not shut this off, because George does something that I am absolutely crazy about. But if you get a little reaction inside of you, that’s like, oh, I don’t like I don’t like what I’m hearing, fight through it, because he’s going to possibly give you an opportunity to really take your business to the next level and fight through some of the fear that you may have around this. And of course, we are talking about phone prospecting. everybody’s least favorite topic. But it’s an important one, because since almost nobody does it, there’s a huge opportunity here. And by the way, we should talk about the kinds of properties that George is working on here. These, these are huge, high net worth individual properties down in that area. These are people that like you said, George was saying when he was at Ritz Carlton, you know, sometimes guests would fly in on a private jet. This is same sort of experience George has dealing with some of his buyers and sellers now, because that’s a destination where a lot of high net worth individuals play and and there’s, you know, normal side normal price properties there too. But George plays in a very, very exclusive space. And the idea of doing phone prospecting, to me is fascinating at that space. So, George, let’s talk about this. Please tell us all about phone prospecting.
George Doulamis 19:26
Sure. Well, to give a quick backstory, when I started, I was trying to figure out what to do, right? Should I go to buy or should I write blog? Should I do this? Should I do that? Because as we all know, when you get into real estate, yes, you have to study to take a test, but it has nothing to do with how to get business, right. So what I decided to do, I started watching YouTube, there was a guy from Massachusetts where I’m from, and he speaks fast like I do. He was like a bull in a china shop. So I liked that style. And I would literally pause thing, write it down, pause, write it down. Then I would Whole people. And now I can call people very freely. But it would the phone ring, don’t answer, don’t answer, don’t answer, because I didn’t know what to say. I was probably like, half the people listen to this. I was scared, they answered, my tonality would dip, DJ, you know, now, of course, I’m more polished. I’ve done this for such a long time. But that’s what happens. That’s the transition. So I started looking at listings in stunning them. Bad photos, bad description, I would interview sellers and say, you know, I understand you’re not going to sell now. But I just have to ask what went wrong? And they would start telling me, oh, I never heard from them. Everything was below rate. And I started figuring out, okay, if they say this, I want to get on their side as quick as possible, where a lot of people who call, they want to do objection handling. If you say this, I say that if you say this, and now we’re going like this,
D.J. Paris 20:52
right? At this point when there’s objective, sorry, just to pause for that. Object. objections are great to have an answer to but you are at a logger horn, right? Or I think that’s expression, you’re butting heads, right? Because you somebody’s coming at you one way, and you’re trying to counter and it becomes a force issue. You’re kind of like each trying to force your way in whoever has the strongest argument wins, which is tough. It’s a tough thing to do.
George Doulamis 21:16
And growing up in New England, confrontation is very easy. It’s normal, right? So I would do this. But then I started practicing doing script practice with people from California, with people that had different so I would start applying and say, Wait a minute, instead of asking, with this tonality? I’m going to shift it I’m going to say like this, I’m going to have a downswing upswing. I’m going to whisper when I had to say certain things. So it’s just a transformation. So over the years, I start getting up. So you’re right, I would start calling 500,000 million dollar houses, I can get them. Right. Couple of reasons. Energy over the phone. People have to understand how important that is. I used to say things now the back and like, how the heck did I get that listing? I know what I was saying. But the energy was there in the seller who just went through a bad experience said in their subconscious, I don’t want to get too boring into this will get bored. But the subconscious is saying wait a minute, this is different. 10 People just called me but this guy is different. Because his energy is different. His tonality is different. He’s asking questions that people generally don’t ask. So throughout the process, I just every time I had something, I’d fine tune it. And I would find angles not and that’s not unethical. What I’m saying by an angle, like if I knew I called you, and what was the old scripts? When are you going to hire the right agent to sell your house? Well, I used to hear that hidden cringe. I’m like, well, if I’m talking to my friend, because that’s what I would try to set it up as I’m not going to say, hey, DJ, Sell Your House came off the market? When are you going to hire the right agent?
D.J. Paris 22:47
Like George? My friend? Yeah. Talk to me like a human being? Yeah,
George Doulamis 22:51
exactly. So I perfected a line I really like to use and it works like gold. And I’ll give it out. People can use as much as they want. I’d get to the opening the call. And the question would be TJ I’m looking at these photos on the MLS right now. The kitchens gorgeous. How in the world did this thing not sell? And what I started finding out that’s an implied compliment rather than you hired the wrong agent. What starts going on subconscious, you’re an idiot, you hired the wrong person. I’m smart, I can help you. Right? Like Wait a minute. Now it’s confrontational. Their their sales resistance will build up now. And now for the next 1015 seconds on the phone. If you don’t shift that what happens? Have a good day, or if you’re in South Florida were first sold click. So well.
D.J. Paris 23:41
What’s brilliant about that? I mean, it is brilliant. So let’s let’s let’s repeat that line because it is a brilliant line. And as soon as you said it, I was like That is brilliant. Because you said you know hey, I hate Mr. or Mrs. Seller. Hey, I was looking at at the photos of your property unbelievable. Like the kitchen insane. How did this thing not sell? Or what? What was what what happened in the world? So yeah, how in the world did this not sell. And by the way, I just want to make another point about tonality because we’ve kind of moved on from that. The best thing that anyone who deals with with, you know, phone conversations or even just in person conversations, take a class on tonality understand how your voice and your inflection, as George says, going up and going down. Understanding how things become questions become statements become demands, understanding that it’s not that hard to understand, and you can practice with people. And yes, you can change the way you talk. So if you’re going to be delivering bad news, there’s a way to do that, that will decrease someone’s anxiety. And there’s a way to do it while you’re there. It’d be really anxious. You know, you can you could do it like that. And no matter what I say you’re gonna go, right and then if you say, Hey, we’ve had a tough week, you know, but you know, here’s all the things that has a different feel to it. And so sling tonality is everything. So I just wanted to honor you for that because very few People I’ve had on the show talk about tonality and talking about the way that they’re projecting their voice and anyone can learn. But I’m sorry. But back to back to your, your your script idea. That is a brilliant question, because what you’re really going for it sounds like is you want the story. Hey, what’s the story here? What what happened?
George Doulamis 25:16
Yeah. And that’s really the connection, right? We’re going to build rapport. We’re going to go a little bit deeper, we’re going to repeat and referrals. So I say how in the world that’s not so Oh, my agents, the biggest idiot in the world, he couldn’t get it done. Which is probably not right. That was probably overpriced. But anyways, we never jump on that we never jump on the agent. Of course, we’re not going to say, oh, yeah, I agree with you. But I could say, Wow, I’m so sorry to hear that this house definitely should have sold like just just, you know, we want to give them a little compassion get on their side. And then the next part of the scripting is rapport building. So we’ve already kind of got on their side, we went from like this face to face to like, arm around them. Wow, how this happened. So we’re like getting them saying, Hey, listen, I’m different. I want to hear what’s going on. I don’t have commission breath. I’m not salesy. I’m not pushing you. It’s more of here’s the process. So tell me what happened?
D.J. Paris 26:10
Well, it’s very much like, similar to what a consultant might do at a company, a consultant who’s brought in to rescue a company or fix a problem the company’s having, they might walk in and go, This place seems great. Like, what’s the problem here? Like what, like what’s going on here. And really, what you’re wanting to do is, is you’re out you want, you want the story, you want the person to tell you without feeling pressure, or stress or your right, or that, that they may feel stupid, that they hired somebody that maybe they feel didn’t do a good job, they could be angry at that person, that agent, they could also feel stupid, you mentioned that. And that’s important thing for people to realize, when you ask questions about, you know, the previous agent, you know, it’s kind of like when when people are in a bad relationship, and they break up and you say to the person Oh, I’m so sorry, that happened to you. And they go, I feel so stupid. I was in this relationship. And you’re like, you shouldn’t feel stupid, but people do sometimes. So that’s an important thing to realize. And the other thing that that you said that that was so so smart, or sorry, the other implication is that you have a solution. But you haven’t yet told them you’re like, how did this not sell this should be selling this should have sold, which means you know, something that they don’t know yet, which is also a very subtle way to project yourself as a leader, as somebody who knows a little bit more than they do. And they’re gonna be like, I know if my home didn’t sell, and I had hired an agent and somebody called me and goes, how did your place not sell? And I said, I don’t know. They just maybe they didn’t do a good job. I don’t know. And you’re like, This place should have sold, I would have been like, great. Tell me, tell me what you’re gonna do. Because that’s all I want. So brilliant, George, I really it’s not. Here’s what I’m gonna do for you. It’s this should sell and a lot of times, they’d be like, Oh, great. Let’s talk. I want to hear what you’re gonna tell me. So anyway, I’m just, I’m just honoring you for all of this. Sorry for stopping so often when it’s so important.
George Doulamis 27:54
Sometimes, you know, most of the time calling gets such a bad name, right? They’ll say cold calling doesn’t work. They’ll call it cold calling. Some people call it prospecting. Keep in mind what I just asked that question How in the world does not sell? Recently, I got a $7.69 million listing out of that. And when I when I sat down with him, after we signed everything I said, quick question. I’m always wondering, what led you to, you know, list with us? When you asked me a question, no one ever asked me how in the world in my home, not so. And they remembered it? Yeah, they remembered it right away. So I know it works. I probably said that question now. 25,000 times.
D.J. Paris 28:33
By the way, by the way, George is being authentic. He’s not saying it because it’s it’s part of the script. I mean, it is part of the script. But George is legitimately curious, what why did this place not sell? And that comes through? Right? If you say it, and it’s part of your sales tactic, maybe it’ll work. Maybe it won’t. But when you’re authentic, and George is like, genuinely interested, like, what happened here? I can’t figure out what happened here, George, like, it’s probably the price. We all know that. But I want to hear it from their perspective. I want to know what they think went wrong. So brilliant, George,
George Doulamis 29:05
and I will say this really came from this part of my growth to where I’m at now came from an agent. He probably doesn’t remember I listen to a podcast. His name is Michael Ferraro, Ferro in Connecticut luxury agent. I was probably like a lot of agents listening to this or watching it. He would say, I’m getting $5 million listings by expired calls. I was like, how the heck nobody sits down I called him told me he’s like, Hey, listen, I’ll coach you for two months. I don’t have the time but I’ll coach you for two months. He actually turned me on. He got trained by Jordan Belfort The Wolf of Wall Wow.
D.J. Paris 29:40
Well, yeah. That’s that’s like the tonality.
George Doulamis 29:43
It was like on steroids. And, like there’s the scene from Wolf of Wall Street when he sells the penny stock, right. Jordan I because I took Jordan Belfort training after they paid for it. And he talks about he trained Leo on the whole sales thing. Sure, and he comes up and he As the fists down when you elongate words, so there really is such a profound skill set to this, if you want to do it. Now, you may get kicked in the teeth a few times on the calls, you’re like, Oh, it doesn’t work, which is fine with me, especially if you’re in my area don’t call. But you know. So.
D.J. Paris 30:18
Yeah, it’s it’s interesting. I’ve actually, you know, when I watched Wolf of Wall Street, I was I was obviously I was turned off to the way he conducted business. But I was fascinated by his sales techniques. And he still teaches I think he’s in Australia now, but he still teaches this stuff. You know, I don’t know how good you know, I don’t know what he’s training people on these days. I’m sure it’s great. But, but the idea of paying attention, not so much to as much of the words that we’re saying is how we’re saying things is really I mean, the, the the research is really clear that how we say things is infinite, almost infinitely more important than what we’re actually saying.
George Doulamis 30:55
And you know, part two, where he talks about it during his training, like, if you do what I did, in the 80s, this stuff is so good. It’s so easy to manipulate, you can get yourself in a lot of trouble. It goes, I’m evidence number one. And that’s why when I come back and coach and tell everybody, you we want to be truthful, we want to be very careful we do because I’m not calling to manipulate. Yes, I can call it tonalities to get you to open up because at the back of aminos. If I can get you to list with me, I’m your number one option. I’m better than everybody else, because I know how exactly why this house didn’t sell. Now, if you have that here, right? If you have the inside, you can get it. If you’re going with falsehoods and everything else, you’ll be exposed eventually, because you can answer the questions the detailed. So what’s going on my listing what’s happening? What’s this? What’s that? Well, eventually, competition who’s going to beat you?
D.J. Paris 31:48
Right? That’s a you know, you settle you said things that are that are really quite brilliant, too. Because this idea of studying listings, and going through and trying to figure out maybe an expired or Fizbo? What’s what’s going on here? Why is this thing not selling? And yes, we could always come down to price because everything is always price. However, there’s a story that leads you to price that usually is a lot more intricate. And this idea of getting curious about that is is fun, it must be really fun for you, because you’re like, I want to figure out what is going on with this property. Is the seller crazy, and they just are never going to lower their price. Is the the agent not do a good job. What are the photos look like the video, you know, what was the marketing efforts that were done. But I also want to talk about your area is somewhat unique, because a lot of times that my understanding of your area and correct me if I’m wrong, is that, you know, getting listings is great. But when you’re having, you know, a $7 million listing, there aren’t a lot of buyers just walking around going, Hey, when’s the next $7 million listing going to hit the market? You have to sometimes go out and find those buyers even as the listing agent, right? And so I’m curious on what that process looks like. Like once you get one of these, these mega, you know, high high net worth listings. What are you doing to to find the buyer or do you not really have to because they come to you
George Doulamis 33:07
12 months ago, I wouldn’t have to do much looking right at the song in the ground, even if I mean, I didn’t sell it on the team. But the team, the gentleman who runs the team sold a $24 million listing sign in the ground. You know, amazing when a normal market, which probably a lot of your viewers and listeners are used to, especially here what we’ll have to do is we met we’re going to identify who’s going to buy the house right, we’ll do a buyer profile. For us, for example, we know it’s 90% chance and artist stain owner who may use it two weeks out of the year. Now some may use it a full month or two months. So we know okay, they’re probably not going to use it. They may even decide to rent it because we have such a short term rental market here. homes get rented per week, some on the weekends. So okay, we know that now we know what four or five states are our feeder states, right? Just Alabama, Tennessee, Texas is now big. Georgia has always been there. Not so much parts of Florida, maybe parts down the other Panhandle that want to upgrade, maybe they bought something in Panama City Beach. And so you know what, that doesn’t get the luxury feel that 38 does. So maybe I’ll trade my condo and want to get on the sand. So first we have to do is identify the buyer. And then we can go out different ways to market. We can’t call a neighborhood like we just do in West Palm Beach or Jupiter, Florida where we’d say hey, I know you live in a neighborhood now that has this, this and this, we just listed here and you could trade up. So we had to identify like Nashville. We obviously have companies there. But more importantly, we can market who directly buys from Nashville here. We can do zip codes, we can search that we can send marketing material, and we go along those roads and of course networking with other agents in those areas. We can call them Yep.
D.J. Paris 34:53
I was gonna say how important is it to have a network of agents in those feeder areas like whether it’s in New York City Eddie, you know, Boston, Nashville, you know, Charleston, maybe you know, I don’t I’m just making these these up maybe Chicago. But But how important is it for you to have like a dedicated network, so you can call and say, I’ve got a new listing, you got to tell your clients about this kind of thing.
George Doulamis 35:16
Certainly, it’s critical. I mean, especially if you want to stand out here, the last two years, we’ve been the number one team here. Last year, we beat the competition by 100 million the year before a little bit closer. And a lot of times, which is funny, the higher end agents in Nashville, Aspen, they’ll actually call us and say, Hey, I know you guys have some of the better listings. Do you have anything market right now? Or do you have anything that I have a client looking up to, like 18 million? Can you send Can you send whatever you have right now. Now, of course, having those other relationships where you can get on the phone, say, Hey, listen, we just listed X, Y, and Z. If you have anybody looking, oh, by the way, I’ll send you the video right now the video trailer, you can send it out to them. So yes, I mean, if you have that, it’s almost like a cheat code. Because then when you’re selling the listing presentation, part of it is our network second to none. I mean, there’s a reason we sell, you know, 445 million a year. You know, so there’s, there’s definitely value in that where I think if, if you haven’t sold that, or if you haven’t been part of a team and got to see how the machine works, you don’t really value having that network that strong.
D.J. Paris 36:27
Right? Right. So this idea of, of working on some of these higher priced listings, requires a different sort of skill set than maybe a price point that you don’t have to necessarily go out and secure the buyer, you just have to price it correctly. Make sure it’s the site is in the ground, and and that it’s visible online somewhere. So in the other thing, too, let’s talk about working with the sellers or buyers, really, it doesn’t matter. Because you’re you’re dealing with a lot of high net worth individuals, some of these people this is their third, fourth, fifth home, like you said, maybe they use it a few weeks a year, maybe they rent it, maybe they don’t. But regardless, you are often I’m guessing, dealing with teams, right? So a lot of these people have a manager or maybe an accountant or an attorney or some sort of financial planner, somebody that probably if not more than one or two people, they a lot of times you’re probably dealing with not just the buyer or seller, but also their their business team.
George Doulamis 37:25
Oh, absolutely, yeah. And you had to find out who the decision maker is. You know, even though some of these people are extremely wealthy, and they do have layers to them. Sometimes they still want to know everything. They want to be the person, I think where that part really comes in, is finding that person who’s a gatekeeper to get to that seller initially. But most of the people in this area, I would say, a lot of them are. They’re not old money, a lot of them. So they’ve worked for it. They’ve sold the businesses. Heck, I know, somebody who has one of the biggest houses on the beach, I think he owns every McDonald’s in Alabama. So he really worked up and now he has and he’s one phone call away where you can connect with him. So it’s a case by case thing, but you know, obviously, they have different layers, that is going to make it harder. But then you have again, it goes back to tonality and leading to that ego so that you know the person who is in charge of the property who you have to intermingle with. And they have a strong ego, well, how do I play up to the ego? How do I make sure they understand the number one option for them without getting them angry without being this or that. And I think that’s a crucial thing I think a lot of agents don’t think about, because let’s be honest, we’re just selling houses, right? We’re trying to make a dream happen for them, or in this case, sell their biggest asset. But a lot of times, I think agents get a little too full of themselves right there, we think that we’re more special than we are. And I think that can really hurt you too, when you’re talking to some of these managers or accountants or financial planners. So I think understanding who we’re talking to who the audience is, and how to handle that.
D.J. Paris 38:57
And it’s probably also that you come across as somebody with a very mild to non existent ego. And I think when you’re dealing with, with some people who may have an inflated sense of self because of their success, obviously, you’ve had a ton of success too. So you should, you know, anyone should have it, it should be you but obviously understanding you’re in the service business, you have to tamp that down, or and you just don’t seem to be the kind of person that that has much of that, which is awesome. But I imagine that that leaves room for the buyer or the seller to be able to express their ego if they want to and they’re not in competition with you, you are there to support them. And and you’re also analyzing every part of that person, right? You’re constantly thinking, you know, how do I best communicate with them? What’s the best way to say or do a certain thing so that it fits in with their worldview? You’re constantly analyzing and strategizing in order to meet that client’s need.
George Doulamis 39:56
Absolutely. And that’s really the biggest thing. Like do I have an ego When I need to coerce, but with most people, I’m here to, I’m there to serve them, right? And we know like, I know sellers who need more attention versus some that are like, Hey, give me a call when I get an offer. It’s all I care about, please don’t bother me during the week. I’m very busy. And then there’s others, every four days, hey, what’s going on? How’s this going? What’s with that? So, I think dialing into that personality, knowing exactly who you’re dealing with. At the end of the day, I don’t take it personal. I’ve actually had sellers complain about other agents, oh, they take me so personal. When I do this, when I do that, they start crying to me, I don’t want that in the next person. So that’s fine. If we want to have no feelings, I’m good at that, too. Because a lot of times I get accused of well, you don’t seem that happy when you first meet people. I’m like, Well, I’m just trying to look at the circumstances, how do we how can I help you as fast as possible. And I think some agents, they take everything so personal that guides, we’re really here for the clientele. Our feelings are secondary. Now you don’t want anybody screaming at you get that part. But sometimes, these are high stakes for them. These are high, high, high emotions, you get the gist of it, we’re about to close. Oh, by the way, they didn’t disclose there was a $50,000 assessment do? Well, now the seller has to pay for because he didn’t, you know, but the emotions are so high, and you’re the person in the middle, that has to take this abuse. While that’s happening. Yeah, so you just have to internalize it, hey, this isn’t me personally, I’m here to do a job. When it comes to that, and maybe a few cocktails after the transaction, you laugh it off, but you just try your best not to get take it personal.
D.J. Paris 41:35
Well, I think I think one of the easiest ways to overcome that feeling of something being personal, because I think anyone listening who has had a disappointment in a transaction, or maybe their best friend shows another agent, as opposed to them, you know, those kinds of situations can feel very personal. I, you know, when you were talking about, you know, making cold calls, that is a really easy way to understand. It’s a very intense way. But a quick way to understand that things aren’t very personal. Because when you’re calling for sale by owners expired listings, you are going to take a little bit of abuse, sometimes because people are angry, they’re, you know, I don’t want to talk to an agent, or I just hired one, and they screwed me over or whatever the reasoning is. And they by the way, they probably had gotten 10, other phone calls that day as well, because a lot of these, there’s a lot of services where you can pay for those leads to come in every day. And they sell them to many, many people. So the idea is you’re not even usually the first phone call. So it’s a tough, it’s a tough phone calls my point, the challenge. Or what happens though is is you really quickly realize, oh, I survived, you know, the guy told me to eff off, because I couldn’t even get my name out before he slammed the phone down. It wasn’t even your fault. But But and you’re like, Oh, well, obviously, that’s not me, that’s just that person was having a bad day. So I think all the cold calls you’ve made have probably helped make you a little bit have a little bit more of a Teflon. Because you’re like, it just happens, it’s not the end of the world.
George Doulamis 43:00
In the way I look at it too. If I’m making all these calls, when I’m talking to somebody, like in my earlier part of my career, when I’m doing a lot more opens, or I’m doing a lot more this, I want that interaction to be great. So the cold calls prepare you for that. So I’ll talk to people, I can’t call anybody, I can’t do it, I’m only good when I meet them in person. Well, what if you’re proficient with a stranger? How good you think you’re going to be when you’re with somebody who you meet face to face, you’re gonna even better. That’s all the way I looked at it. If I can get you There’s nothing. There’s no greater feeling in the world. When I call you in Nashville, I convince you to sign a listing agreement over the phone, I never meet you, I sell house, you get your wire. And we’ve never met to do that. It’s just, it’s just a great feeling. Because you convince somebody you’ve never met.
D.J. Paris 43:48
It’s kind of like the ultimate sale because also you’re dealing at a high net worth sort of transactions, not not that any transaction is better or worse than another. But certainly, you know, the stakes could be considered higher at at a higher price point. And and the idea of being able to do that sight unseen. Is is is an incredible, really victory. And and I don’t think it’s lucky, I don’t think it’s well, you just called somebody who didn’t need to meet with you in person. It’s like, no, no, George is extremely strategic about the way he communicates. And communication is is obviously the name of the game. I also before we get close to wrapping up here, I want to mention that I forgot to mention this earlier. So if anyone out there would love to be trained and George isn’t taking on everybody. He’s only going to take on one or maybe two people. But he is wanting to share some of his knowledge that he has learned from all the trainers he’s worked with and all of his own expertise and experience to possibly work with agents to teach them what he knows. By the way, guys, let’s just go back to this one fact that wasn’t even in George’s bio. That is like really crazy. His team outsold the next biggest team by $100 million in a year’s time like that’s pretty Press have. So if you ever were like, I wish my coach was actually out there producing, you know, George got got his, you know, he had a mentor who was successful and, and helped him and he wants to do the same. So if there is anyone who’s like, I want to learn what George knows, George, what’s the best way somebody could reach out? And again, you’re not taking everybody might only be one to one person. But you know, what are you looking for? And how should they reach out to you?
George Doulamis 45:23
Sure they can, you know, for now they go through Instagram, I think it’s probably the easiest. What we’re looking at really do. Like I said, I’m not trying to take on 1000 people, we’re trying to get people who may be either stuck, maybe they’re getting in. And I know the feeling you’re getting your teeth kicked on the phone, you don’t know what to say you don’t know how to say you don’t know how to go out and get business. That’s the really the worst thing about this business. What is the old saying 90% of people come into real estate with no sales training. 90% of people leave with no sales training. That’s true. We get into a brokerage. The brokers like hey, best of luck, go out there, go kill it. How do I do that? So we’re looking to help those and we’re also looking to help those that I used to do I could get to the $5 million tree, I could get to the door, I get the appointment. But then I don’t even know what saying the appointment to get it. Like when they ask a simple question. Why should we choose you over this and you start just verbal diarrhea, but I can do this, we can find I can fine tune that I’ve set before big time sellers. And we can help people get to that level they want. So I’d say if you’d like go through Instagram message kind of what you’re looking to do, we’ll connect we’ll see if we can be a value because we may not I may not be the best value for somebody. Right. But at the same time it was a connection, they want to talk further, I’d love to see why can help out?
D.J. Paris 46:39
Well, for anyone who is interested in learning from what George the knowledge torch has, and everybody should be interested in this, go to Instagram and follow him. George dilemmas are ie George like George D OULAMISRE, by the way, link to that in the show notes. So you don’t have to type it in or just search for George dilemmas, easy to find, and reach out to him and say I would love to learn what you learn. And possibly you guys could connect. And also by the way, George has clients buy and sell homes, not just in their area, the Destin 38 area, all over the country. These are high net worth individuals. So George also wants to keep expanding his network as well of agents. So maybe you guys could trade clients. Maybe somebody’s moving to Destin and George has people that are looking for properties and other areas that he doesn’t service. So if you would like to connect with George possibly for on a referral basis, George, what’s the best way? So is that the best way Instagram, they say?
George Doulamis 47:40
My name is so long, and then you start going George de la missa Blank, blank blank. Easiest way.
D.J. Paris 47:47
Awesome. So George dilemmas are E again, link to that in the show notes on Instagram, find George George, this was incredible. And you know, I know you’re just talking about your process. But for somebody that’s done almost 500 episodes of the show this this was an incredible episode. So I am so grateful to you, our audience is grateful to you. So on behalf of the audience, thank you for coming on the show, we really appreciate it, you gave so much value, that I suspect this will be one of our most downloaded episodes ever. So thank you in advance for all of the great traffic we’re gonna get because of you. And hopefully we can help you as well. On behalf of Georgia and myself, we want to thank the audience for sticking around to the very end. We appreciate you, we love you, we are here for you. And we are grateful that you tell a friend about our show. So think of one other Realtor in your office or somebody you know, in the industry, who’s maybe struggling right now it’s 2023. This is a tough year to be in real estate. Let’s help other agents so that, you know we get some good karma sent our way, send them over to our website, keeping it real pod.com Or just tell them to pull up any podcast app search for keeping it real, hit that subscribe button. And one last thing guys, we just started clipping our episodes. And by the way, we’re going to have a lot of clips of this one. But we are now posting those short form video clips just in case you don’t want to sit through a full hour of me, which I don’t know why anybody wouldn’t want to sit through the I don’t want to I don’t even want to sit there will pull out of me. But for anyone that wants to see some of our bite size content, which by the way, super easy and super fast, digestible, go to Instagram or on actually all the social platforms. But Instagram is our big push right now. So top agent interviews is our Instagram handle every single day, we post a short form 62nd clip from one of our episodes, and we will have a lot of them from this one. So be on the lookout for that. So go go to top agent interviews. And also while you’re on Instagram, go visit George George dilemmas, ar e send him a message tell them how awesome he was on the show because he is and was and maybe he’ll want to work with you and maybe you guys could train together. So George, thank you so much. This was a pleasure. And we will see everybody on the next episode. Thanks, George.
George Doulamis 49:57
Thanks so much. Really appreciate it.
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