How Eric Berman took 3 listings in 2 months by calling expireds and circle dialing

Aaron Wittenstein00:00

All right, so you used one word when we were briefly chatting here, fixer. And when it comes to expireds specifically, you have to be a fixer. So what does that mean to you?

Eric Berman00:11

In most of the cases, we’re gonna see things that are gonna come up that are gonna need fixing, especially when you’re dealing with an expired listing.

00:20They already have a relationship with another agent that’s probably fractured. They have goals and aspirations, and those are very likely fractured. So you have to uncover that, and then you just keep getting more and more granular trying to get to the bottom of what some folks’ problems are. I love to do that.

00:35That’s honestly one of the most gratifying things about being in this business is being able to help people out. I honestly feel that way.

Aaron Wittenstein00:42

Remember, people don’t sell for fun. They usually have a life-changing reason. I’m here to fix their problems. Don’t leave them with another weak agent. Do all you have to do to help.

01:10Hey, what’s going on, everybody? It’s Aaron Wittenstein, and we’re here with Vulcan7 Roadmap. This is where we interview agents across the country on how to take one, two, three, 567,356.7 listings a week. And today, we have a very special guest, okay? Not only does he have an amazing haircut, all right? Nice set of hair on his head, but he’s also from where… 11 years I spent at White Plains, New York.

01:36He’s from Long Island, New York. Eric Berman, will you say hello to everybody, please?

Eric Berman01:41

What’s going on everybody out there in Vulcan7 Roadmap world? Very happy to be here with my man, Aaron. It’s not every day you get to just be in the presence of greatness and baldness at the same time.

01:54What? What is this?

Aaron Wittenstein01:55

I don’t know so much about the greatness, but the baldness, I’ll stick with that, man. All right. So you used one word when we were briefly chatting here that I feel that I am, okay? There’s one word, and what you said, “I’m a fixer.” Okay? And when it comes to expireds specifically, you have to be a fixer.

02:21So what does that mean to you?

Eric Berman02:24

I mean, so basically, we have all of these scenarios, and in most of the cases, if they’re not broken already, we’re gonna see things that are gonna come up that are gonna need fixing. And I think that one of the superpowers that’s most important in this industry is to be able to have the determination to just go after all the problems.

02:46Because you’ll see a lot of people that, they’ll come up with a band-aid or something like that. But I think what sets myself and my team apart is that we really, really go deep on any of the issues that come up, especially when you’re dealing with an expired listing. They already have a relationship with another agent that’s probably fractured, so you can start there.

03:07They have goals and aspirations, and those are very likely fractured, so you have to uncover that, and then you just keep getting more and more granular trying to get to the bottom of what some folks’ problems are. And I love to do that. That’s honestly one of the most gratifying things about being in this business is being able to help people out.

03:25I honestly feel that way.

Aaron Wittenstein03:27

That’s how I feel, the same way. It’s like coming in and just fixing the problem, okay? Because what happens is, I wrote this down as I’m looking at the wall, and I think you’ll agree with me on this. I don’t have this memorized yet. “Remember, people don’t sell for fun.

03:41They usually have a life-changing reason. I’m here to fix their problems. Don’t leave them with another weak agent. Do all you have to do to help.”

Eric Berman03:51

I would definitely agree with that.

Aaron Wittenstein03:53

So give me… Everybody’s got a story. You got a good story you could share with us?

Eric Berman03:59

Mm. Specifically what about?

Aaron Wittenstein04:00

Just like an expired story where it was yada, yada, yada, and you came into this. Because when you’re doing this much business and you’re fixing things, is there one in particular, one listing that comes to mind when I mention that?

Eric Berman04:18

I had one recently. It was a pretty challenging listing. It had been on the market previously, and obviously the other agent hadn’t been able to sell. I don’t think that they were doing a particularly great job. It didn’t sound like there was much marketing going on, but the seller just was…

04:39really didn’t wanna sign with anybody. They were talking about renting it out. And this was actually, the entire thing was negotiated over the phone, because she was out in Vegas.

04:52And she was just like, “I’m gonna have a property manager come in.” And we just kinda troubleshot the whole thing through Zoom and went over what the strategy was.

05:03And while we had it listed, there were a lot of challenges that came up, especially given the distance between myself and the seller. And we had to make sure that our communication was super, super on point because there were a bunch of moving pieces. I can’t say all the details, but it got a little funky for a little while, and the seller went dark, and somehow we still managed to pull that one together and close above the original asking price.

05:35So we got her higher than her initial price that she had previously expired at.

Aaron Wittenstein05:40

So I think one word that we pull out of that, at least that I pulled out of that, was the word communication, okay? And where there’s a big lapse, let’s say the pre… is just a lack of communication. What do your communication systems and processes look like with any person that you work with in your clientele?

Eric Berman06:01

I mean, outside of just keeping everything tracked and organized in the CRM, I just try to keep a list and keep actively looking at who’s pending, who’s active, who’s still on the market, and try to make sure that there’s at least at minimum weekly touches, whether there’s news, whether there’s no good news.

06:19Because you hear it all the time that people take a listing and then they don’t hear anything from their agent, and that’s, as an industry, we have to do better than that, right? Because sometimes it’s uncomfortable. Sometimes you have the deal that, it’s been two weeks and they just want an answer, and you don’t have an answer to give, and you can only control what you can control, right?

06:44Especially in New York, we’re an attorney state, so there’s a lot of times where there’s a lack of communication because the attorneys, they will only communicate through email, and something that could have just been a four-minute phone conversation drags out over the course of four days.

06:59So sometimes it takes the agent to kind of bridge that gap and make sure that everybody’s talking. And even if there’s absolutely no update to give the seller, “Hey, really sorry to tell you this, we still don’t have an update.” Because I think people kind of shy away from that because they don’t like delivering bad news.

07:17But one of the most uncomfortable things for anybody, let alone buyers, sellers, agents, is uncertainty, right? So if we’re not eliminating uncertainty throughout the transaction, are we really doing the best job that we can?

Aaron Wittenstein07:28

Eliminating uncertainty. I think that’s a pretty strong statement that you said right there.

07:35And I think it’s not even… I’d rather… Sometimes it’s like you have the bad news. You got the bad news. But it’s kinda sitting there with nothing, and they’re like, you know. And I think, like you hit the nail on the head, you’re staying in touch with your clients on a weekly basis.

07:54Good, bad, or indifferent, right?

Eric Berman07:56

Yeah. Because the last thing you wanna do is leave somebody to sit there and just imagine what doesn’t exist. Because we’re humans, we will just sit all day and, “It could be this, it could be that. It could be this, it could be that. It could be this.” And your brain will just come up and conjure all of these crazy ideas, and if you’re allowing that to happen to your client, how long before those crazy thoughts start being about what you’re doing or what you’re not doing or what you did wr-… Let’s make sure that we really understand what’s going on here and allow them to see the picture as we see it, because things just get a little funky when you don’t.

Aaron Wittenstein08:34

I agree. They ruminate. That’s the word we’re looking for right there, right? The word of the day is ruminate, everybody, okay? All right. So fellow New Yorker to New Yorker here, okay? I would love to do an expired role play if you would be game for that.

Eric Berman08:51

Sure.

Aaron Wittenstein08:51

He’s like, “Whatever, I got this, dog.”

Eric Berman08:53

I mean, it’s 11:59 our time. I just finished making calls about an hour ago. So still, we had our team role play. I feel like I’m still a little warmed up.

Aaron Wittenstein09:04

All right. Well, maybe let’s rock and roll here. All right. So give me a call. Ring, ring me.

Eric Berman09:09

Ring, ring.

Aaron Wittenstein09:10

Hello.

Eric Berman09:10

Hi. Is this the owner of 123 Main Street?

Aaron Wittenstein09:12

This is. You’re like the 35th realtor to call me. What do you want?

Eric Berman09:16

I might be the 35th, but I assure you, I’m also the most bald realtor that called you. So I’m giving you a call, as you probably already know. Your home was on the market. Looks like it just came off. I just wanted to know, you still thinking about putting it back on the market at some point, if it makes sense?

Aaron Wittenstein09:32

We’re gonna sit tight for a while. I appreciate the phone call. We’re just done. We’re done.

Eric Berman09:37

Hey, look. Totally get it. If I had been on the market for six months, I would certainly be over it, too. And if you needed some space, who would blame you for that?

09:49It’s rough having the house ready for showings. Am I right?

09:54Doing it for all that time. But let me ask you, Aaron, in a perfect world, if you had sold the house yesterday, where were you guys moving off to?

Aaron Wittenstein10:02

We were gonna stay local. We were gonna move to Queens.

Eric Berman10:07

Oh, nice.

10:07You’re moving to Queens. And just logistically speaking, did you guys already have a house that you were planning on moving to, or is that something you-

Aaron Wittenstein10:14

We’re gonna be renting at this point. We just wanna get out, rent, and then we’re gonna be moving to Nebraska after, like, a year.

Eric Berman10:25

Okay. So you’re gonna rent in Queens and then move on out to Nebraska. What’s taking you out to Nebraska?

Aaron Wittenstein10:32

We really like corn.

Eric Berman10:33

Mm, corn. I’ve heard of it before. I’m not sure if I’ve ever tried it, but so let me ask you a question. You had the house on the market for six months.

10:45Did your agent give you any feedback during your weekly recaps as to why it didn’t sell?

Aaron Wittenstein10:50

No. I mean, it was actually my cousin’s brother’s uncle’s car mechanic that listed the property for us. And once we listed the house, put it up on the market, we really didn’t hear from them a lot.

11:02But yeah, we never heard from them.

Eric Berman11:06

Yeah. I mean, that’s super frustrating. You definitely deserve better than that. And look, I know you guys are fatigued right now, but if I were able to show you how we could market this property and get it sold in 30 days, show you how to get to the rental in Queens, and then show you how we could seamlessly make that transition from Queens to Nebraska, get you in the corn fields of your dream, would it be crazy for us to sit down for 15 minutes and discuss a plan for how we could get you back on track?

Aaron Wittenstein11:31

I mean, we had it up. How would you actually sell the property? We had it up for, what, six months. So I mean, what would you do differently?

Eric Berman11:41

That’s exactly what we’re gonna talk about when we sit down to meet. So I actually have another appointment tomorrow at 4:00 right near you.

11:48Would you guys be available for 4:00, or would today at 2:30 be better?

Aaron Wittenstein11:52

I mean, here’s the thing is we may wind up, when we sell it, okay, ’cause I’m not promising we’re gonna do anything right now, we may have another friend in the business and they were gonna cut us a deal on what to charge.

12:04I don’t know. I’d really have to think about it.

Eric Berman12:09

Yeah, and that makes total sense. Everybody’s got a friend in the business. I always tell people, if you don’t have at least a few realtor friends, you might be a loser, and I’m not sure that that’s the rep that you want out here.

12:26But, so look, let’s do this. I’m gonna pencil you guys in for tomorrow at 4:00. Like I said, I’m gonna be in the area anyway, and at least hear what I have to say, and if it’s not night and day different from what your other realtor friend who was a mechanic or whatever that scenario was, you could take this information, you could go ahead and work with them, but I feel very confident that once you see this, you’re definitely gonna understand that you’re making the right choice with me.

12:54So like I said, penciling you in for tomorrow at 4:00. Is that fair?

Aaron Wittenstein12:59

Sounds good.

Eric Berman12:59

All right, perfect. And what’s the best email for you?

Aaron Wittenstein13:02

eric.bermandidareallynicejob.com, @.com.

Eric Berman13:04

Oh, it’s unbelievable. That’s actually pretty similar to my name. I don’t know how you got that email, but I applaud you. So I’m gonna shoot you over a calendar invite as well as my resume, and I’ll see you tomorrow at 4:00.

Aaron Wittenstein13:20

Sounds like a plan. See you then. Thank you.

Eric Berman13:23

All right, sweet.

Aaron Wittenstein13:24

I beat you up a little bit. I hope that’s okay. You did a nice job.

Eric Berman13:27

You did a nice job. It’s all right. It’s all right. I tried to stay in the pocket with the corn issue.

Aaron Wittenstein13:32

Well, it’s the Cornhuskers. It was the first state that popped in my mind for some odd reason.

13:35Don’t ask me why Nebraska was the first state that popped in my mind.

13:39The one thing that I always… It’s always a sign of someone who’s been doing this for a long time, is when you, “What are you gonna do differently? That’s the exact reason we need to get together to sit down and have a conversation.

13:51I’ll be in your neighborhood tomorrow at 3:00. Would you be offended if I stop by to take a quick peek?” Something to that extent, in effect, you know? So yeah, you did a really, really nice job. How did that feel?

Eric Berman14:02

Thank you. It felt all right. I’ve done better, I’ve done worse.

Aaron Wittenstein14:06

It never feels as good as you think it’s going to.

14:09It never… But no, like I said, from doing it myself, you did a very, very nice job on that. So, appreciate it.

Eric Berman14:17

I liked the two-point moving plan, though. That’s one I don’t get all the time, that we’re gonna rent here and then we’re gonna move to Nebraska.

14:26So that was good. I haven’t heard something like that in a while. Gotta throw all the new stuff. So you role play with your team on a daily basis? A few times a week, as a team. I’ve made them all get their own role play partners, as I have my own role play partners for both expireds and for recruiting as well, which is probably underrated, doing role play for that.

14:47But it’s good. I feel like what can’t you role play, you know?

Aaron Wittenstein14:50

I agree. How many times a week are you doing, five days a week right now?

Eric Berman14:55

Personally, I’m doing three.

14:57I have my expired role play partner, my recruiting role play partner, then the team role play.

15:04And then, yeah, just making the calls.

Aaron Wittenstein15:08

Oh, it’s always-

Eric Berman15:09

As a team, we role play a little bit more than that sometimes, depending on what’s going on. We’ve been role-playing the NAR settlement-

15:17a lot, about what we’re gonna be talking to sellers on at the listing appointment, just because with all this going on, I think we would be doing everybody a disservice if we weren’t practicing what we were gonna say around that.

15:27Because I don’t even wanna make this a subject about that. But if you’re going on these appointments, whether it’s expireds, not expireds, if you’re not bringing up the settlement, I think you’re making a mistake, because you don’t wanna walk out of there and have them, you sign the listing and all of a sudden they’re like, “Oh wait, my friend just told me that I don’t have to pay a commission anymore.”

15:48Knowledge is power.

Aaron Wittenstein15:50

I agree.

Eric Berman15:50

You wanna-

Aaron Wittenstein15:51

No-

Eric Berman15:51

You wanna empower people.

Aaron Wittenstein15:52

And it’s knowing enough about everything, that’s just enough, right? So I mean, ’cause it’s enough, not to make yourself the… the sound I’m trying to say here, it’s knowing what is, and keeping yourself current is the best way to put it.

16:07Because otherwise you’re not doing yourself or your clients a dis-… you’re doing everybody a service is the best way to put it, so. So how long have you been calling expireds for?

Eric Berman16:18

I have been calling expireds for four years. I think, yeah, like four. Probably four.

Aaron Wittenstein16:23

How… I would like to say how do you like it?

16:28But you seem to be liking it pretty good, so.

Eric Berman16:30

This is gonna sound bad. I really do enjoy it. And it’s funny because I used to be in an office where I was the only person there all day, and I used to call four hours a day, and I would just sit and watch South Park with my feet up and just bang out the calls.

16:45It’s great having the team around now ’cause we can bounce off each other’s energy. But I do legitimately enjoy it. It always reminds me of being a kid and making prank phone calls. I always say this because you get into character and you can’t break character, no matter how crazy…

17:04‘Cause we’re in New York, so sometimes the people that we’re calling, they’re just, “Oof, ooh, woo, woo.” Some of these people, they’ll let you have it. But I think what’s really important, especially for role modeling it to the team, is that we stay in the pocket. It doesn’t matter how wild the conversation can get, as long as we are in the pocket, we’re the one that’s guiding the conversation.

17:30And there’s been times where you see somebody, they hang up on you, they’re going crazy, and you’re able to reel it back in just by staying in character. Not saying that I’m being fake, but there is Eric that you see at a party and there’s Eric that you see making a cold call to somebody who’s gone through a really bad experience and possibly hired the wrong agent or had the wrong strategy, and you just stay there and help guide them to the promised land.

Aaron Wittenstein18:00

So, all right. So how do you… ‘Cause I mean, I think there’s a lot of people that, they said they’re doing it themselves, you know what I mean? And I think it’s tough whenever you sit here and do this, and it’s not easy every day is the best way to put it.

18:12So what do you do to keep yourself, like, oomphie, if you know what I mean? What do you do to keep yourself excited, is the word I’m looking for.

Eric Berman18:23

So, in all honesty, I wake up excited every day. It sounds so cliché, but sometimes I’m just like, I wish I could sleep more, but I’m not going to.

18:34But I just love this. Before real estate, my life was kind of crazy, and the fact that I have these opportunities in front of me every day, it’s motivation in itself. However, in addition to that, I’m one of those people with the miracle morning. I wake up, I go to the gym, I eat breakfast, I meditate, I say my affirmations, I read, I write in my journal.

19:00So the journal I think is one of the big things. Whenever things are tough, I look back at old entries and I’m like, “Oh my God, that’s what I was worried about back then?” Like, today’s gonna be a blast. But in addition to all that stuff, I actually have an accountability call that I’ve been on for, I think it’s been two and a half years of us, five days a week usually, that there’s three of us on the call and we literally…

19:26It was people from coaching who some of them aren’t even in coaching anymore, but we still just keep doing this. And it’s one of those things, we’re on Zoom from 9:00 to 11:00 and we make our calls. I’m usually off camera. And then at the end of the hour, we reconvene and we talk about how our calls went, and it’s so helpful because we’re all human, right?

19:49We all wanna say, “Oh, all I do is work and all I do is this,” but there’s temptations. You wanna sleep in sometimes. You’re just not feeling it. But with this call, I just know how much smack they’re gonna talk if I’m ever not on, and I’m the one who runs it, so I have no choice. My team comes into the office to make calls.

20:11I have no choice. There’s so much accountability. I have no option. I just have to be here. And I wouldn’t have it any other way, because I like talking smack back too if they ever miss any time. If somebody goes to get coffee in the office for too long, they’re gonna hear about it, as I want them to, you know…

20:32We respond well to smack talk over here. It’s something that we like. So that, for a short answer long, that’s my answer.

Aaron Wittenstein20:38

No, that’s perfect, man, because you just exude, you’re just a happy person, you know what I mean?

20:47You can just tell that. And I think that’s appreciated, especially in this world that we’re in right now. And all right, so let me ask you this then. So you have your entire morning that you commit to. Number one, what time do you typically wake up?

21:02This is me being curious myself.

Eric Berman21:04

So either 4:45 or 5:00 in the morning.

Aaron Wittenstein21:06

Okay, 4:45, 5:00 in the morning. Out of your entire routine that you have in the morning, it sounds like you have a… What’s the most important part of that routine?

Eric Berman21:21

I mean, breakfast is probably pretty important. The rest of the day would be hard without that. But I don’t know that… I guess reading.

21:31But if I had to give up one of them, I feel like the affirmations, it’s one of those things that just gets programmed into your mind, and it’s not always something that comes up, but then certain things, like one of them is I always spend time with loved ones, ’cause I remember when things first started getting busy in my life, I felt like this cool guy and I was like, “Oh, I’m busy.

21:52Oh, I have appointments I’m not gonna be able to do.” So reminding myself, because this could all end tomorrow, and if you didn’t spend time with your loved ones… So I don’t know if the affirmations are so important. Writing in the journal, I think it’s so underrated, and I hate writing.

22:07I’m not a good writer. I just write bullet points of what happened. The reading, reading an actual book, I can’t put any of these things above the other. The exercise-

Aaron Wittenstein22:18

That’s a good answer. It’s a sum of all the parts, and I think that is extremely important, and it sounds like, like you said, it’s all working well for you.

22:28You know what I mean? Is the best way to put it. And I can just tell that if you pulled anything out of it, then it’s just not gonna work. And it’s very nice to see that.

Eric Berman22:42

Yeah. And it’s one of those things, even if I did everything poorly and I did half of what I was supposed to, it’s one of those things, mindset-wise, where you wanna do your best.

22:56I always try my best. That’s the last of my affirmations, is I always try my best. So just the fact, and this sounds cliché, but whatever, maybe it is, just the fact that I woke up and did those things, even if I did them on a one out of 10 level, at least I got up and I did it. At least I feel good that by 7:00 in the morning, I’ve accomplished more than a large percentage of people on this planet would accomplish with their day, the entirety of their day.

23:24So it makes me feel good. And whether it’s, I don’t know. It’s something that makes me feel like I’m in the game and I’m trying.

Aaron Wittenstein23:34

Beautiful. All right, man. A brand new agent comes and knocks on your door and says, “Eric, I need one piece of advice.” What’s that piece of advice?

Eric Berman23:45

I would go with the journal. It’s something I was actually gonna make a video. I do a lot of Instagram content, ericberman_re on Instagram, if people wanna check it out. We actually just started a team account. I had an intern that was taking care of that for us too, so that’s just the Eric Berman team.

24:05And we’re doing a lot of content. Actually, one video I was gonna shoot probably today is about journaling, because it’s one of those things that I wish I had started doing so much earlier, and it’s not like the piece of advice of, make 1,000 calls every day. It’s something so much more simplistic that, for me, helps me through the hard times, because no matter how good you’re doing, you’re gonna go through hot streaks, you’re gonna go through cold streaks, and those cold streaks can be really brutal in this business.

24:38We’ve all… You go on social media and everybody’s just crushing it all the time. Everybody’s so good. Everybody’s so great. But we go through hard times as entrepreneurs, and we go through really scary times, like scary financial times. And for me, whenever I’m in those really hard times, going back into my journal and going back a year, two years is so helpful to look at what I was worried about then.

25:03Look at the deal that was falling apart that, oh, it ended up working out. So far, I never see anything like, oh, that was worth worrying about. Never. So one of my biggest wishes is that I had started doing it sooner, because I think I’ve only been doing the journal for maybe three years.

25:20I wish that before I was in real estate, when I went through some really, really difficult times, I wish I had that documented, because that’s the thing that fuels me, and I don’t ever wanna lose those really, really hard times I was in. I’m gonna forget the details at one point, and that to me was one of the most empowering and special things that I had, was being able to feed off of all that pain and use that as kindle in my fire.

25:49So I would definitely say, new agent, keep a journal. Just write down bullet points of what happened in your day. You don’t have to do it every single day, but you’re gonna be glad you did it.

Aaron Wittenstein26:00

Okay. Well, let’s tie this up in a bow here, my friend. What are your last words for Vulcan7 Nation here?

Eric Berman26:07

Make your calls. Make your calls. I just got three crazy listings in the last two months from calling expireds and from circle dialing using Vulcan. So, and to be honest with you, I call expireds a lot. The circle dialing, I’m not doing as much as I should, but it was a $3.1 million listing and a $1.3 million knockdown from these…

26:34And the other one was just a normal house, but from the circle dialing. So just make the calls. You’ve got all these tools in your hands. Just make your calls. Just calls. And write in your journal, maybe.

Aaron Wittenstein26:45

There we go, baby. All right. So, Eric, someone’s moving to Long Island from Nebraska by way of-

Eric Berman26:51

Nebraska.

Aaron Wittenstein26:52

By way of Queens, okay. How does one get in touch with you? What’s the best way to get in touch with you?

Eric Berman27:00

So you can always call me 917-225-8596. And other than that, I would say ericberman_re on Instagram. I’m on literally every social platform with the same handle, but Instagram is where I live.

Aaron Wittenstein27:13

All right, my friend, I want to say thank you so much for being here.

27:15And do me a favor, don’t forget to trust the process, all right? All right, guys, everyone take care. We will see you next time around. Take care. Bye.