What 12 top listing agents do every day to produce more

Ren Jones 00:00

It’s that time. Welcome to Roadmap, how to take three listings a week until you’re ready for more. Each week we interview a great agent who’s consistently taking two, three, four listings each week, and we have an exciting dozen guests today. This is the Highlights Show, our second Highlights Show. We encourage you to take notes, apply as much of the knowledge as quickly as you can, and then use the copycat principle.

00:34If you’re watching on Vulcan7 or on the Lead Gen Facebook group, you’ll have an opportunity to ask questions during the broadcast. They have 50,000 members now, so we have a large audience there as well. Let me first introduce my co-host here. Again, to do the Highlights Show, we brought back Sarah Close. Sarah owns several market centers in the Cincinnati area, covering Northern Kentucky and Dayton, Ohio. How many agents collectively?

Sarah Close 01:19

We’re about 530.

Ren Jones 01:23

And then she runs a team like a lot of the ones we’re interviewing. You did 136 units last year?

Sarah Close 01:35

Better this year, yeah.

Ren Jones 01:37

Which is why we’re here. And you follow a schedule similar to some of the ones we’re interviewing?

Sarah Close 01:40

Very similar. I’ve learned most of what I’ve learned from you and from the people you’ve interviewed.

Ren Jones 01:53

Let’s jump in. Who’s first?

Sarah Close 01:56

Mike Darda is first.

Mike Darda 02:02

It’s a pretty basic morning routine. Start at 7:30 with roleplay. We’re on the phones by 8:00, and we prospect straight through about 10:00 for a quick mindset break, 15-minute team meeting, back on the phones until noon. That is like clockwork every morning.

02:27I prospect side by side with my son Andrew, and we call the same people back to back and just keep tabs on who’s talking to who and double our chances of certain appointments that way.

02:49Individually, I take about 15 to 20 a month myself. As a team, we’re probably 25 to 30, I’d say, a typical month.

Ren Jones 03:06

What I get from this is he’s been doing it a while. He’s been doing the same thing for a long time consistently. Huge piece.

Sarah Close 03:40

I think it’s interesting that he and his son are calling the same parties back to back. It makes total sense. Hearing him say it sounds so simple. It’s like, “That’s a great idea. Why am I not doing that?”

Ren Jones 04:53

We’re going to have some fun. He’s going to do a roleplay. Michael, this is Carley.

Michael Kaim 05:03

Hi, Carley. This is Michael Kaim with Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices. I’m calling about the home for sale over on Smith Street. I’m sure you figured out that your house came up as an expired listing, and I was calling to see when you planned on interviewing the right agent for the job of selling your home.

Carley Hathaway 05:17

You’re like the ninth person that has called. I’m just not interested. I really need you guys to stop calling me.

Michael Kaim 05:25

I completely understand. These people, it’s crazy. How do you think I feel every day? If you sold this home, Carley, where would you move to next?

Carley Hathaway 05:36

I’m planning to move to New York.

Michael Kaim 05:40

Okay, that’s exciting. How soon do you have to be there?

Carley Hathaway 05:43

As soon as possible, to be honest with you. We thought this home would have sold. My house is gorgeous. I just don’t understand why it wouldn’t sell. I customized everything. It’s beautiful. I put shocking pink walls. It’s gorgeous.

Michael Kaim 05:57

I saw that. That’s one of the things I’d like to talk about. I pulled it up on my computer. It looks like a fantastic home. What do you think stopped the home from selling?

Carley Hathaway 06:10

Honestly, I couldn’t tell you. I don’t know. This is not my area of expertise.

Michael Kaim 06:16

Sure. I think that’s something that you need to find out. How did you happen to pick the last agent you listed with?

Carley Hathaway 06:26

It was a friend of a friend. I got referred.

Michael Kaim 06:30

Okay. What did that agent do best?

Carley Hathaway 06:36

Obviously nothing.

Michael Kaim 06:45

What would you expect from the next agent that you choose?

Carley Hathaway 06:53

Sell my house. It’s not that hard. Your guys’ job is not even hard. I don’t even get it.

Michael Kaim 07:00

You might say it’s not that hard, but the home didn’t sell. I have to ask you, have you already chosen an agent to work with?

Carley Hathaway 07:10

No.

Michael Kaim 07:14

You haven’t? You’re kidding. I’d like to apply for the job of selling your home. Are you familiar with the techniques that we use to sell houses, Carley?

Carley Hathaway 07:20

No. What are they?

Michael Kaim 07:23

That’s a fantastic question. What would be the best time where I could come out, look at the property and show you how we can sell your property? Would Monday or Tuesday at 4:00 work?

Carley Hathaway 07:35

I just don’t understand what you would do differently than my last agent.

Michael Kaim 07:38

That’s a great question. We have a whole tool belt of things we do differently.

Carley Hathaway 07:43

Like what?

Michael Kaim 07:45

I’d like to talk to you about that when I come out and meet with you. I first want to evaluate the property and determine what methods we can use this time around to get it sold and market it differently. What would be the best time, Monday or Tuesday?

Carley Hathaway 07:58

How about 9:00 at night?

Michael Kaim 08:01

I have a time in my schedule for 9:00 Monday night.

Carley Hathaway 08:03

I’m not painting the pink walls either.

Michael Kaim 08:05

That’s okay. That’s something we’ll discuss when I meet with you. I’ll look forward to seeing you Monday at 9:00 p.m. Before I come out, do you have any questions for me?

Carley Hathaway 08:16

No. You seem like a nice guy. I’m willing to meet with you, but I’m not making any promises.

Michael Kaim 08:22

Okay. I’ve got the appointment. I go into my pre-qual script. She threw the curve that usually a lot of agents get: “You do things very differently? Like what?” Then they do the presentation right over the phone. They never get the appointment. It happens a lot.

Sarah Close 08:41

What’s interesting is that script never changes and those objections never change. They’re timeless. It gets down to not the words but all the skills in the delivery. Having that script internalized, he’s able to actually listen to what she’s saying and respond instead of thinking about his next comment.

Josh Barker 09:27

Our company’s broken down into two main segments. One is our sales team. Last year, in 2017, it comprised a total of eight salespeople, me being one of those. The other part of the company is the administrative staff. We do our very best to keep the salespeople, including myself, focused on buying and selling or representing buyers and sellers, and keep our administrative staff focused on the administrative activities related to that.

10:06We as a company listed 450 listings last year. Of that, 325 I listed personally. We closed 325 of those listings, of which I personally handled 250 of them. We closed 270 buyer transactions, of which I did zero. I don’t represent any buyers in the market. We’ll have our agents take care of that. The company grossed about $3.85 million.

10:53The imperfect part of the model that we have is that I still represent a very large portion of the transactions for the company. Long term, we want to scale this company to 1,000 transactions, which obviously means I’m going to need more people doing more transactions to get there.

Sarah Close 11:52

The leadership that he’s demonstrating is going to become duplicatable without him having to do anything extra to train anyone. He’s just saying, “This is how I do it. You do it the way I do it,” and everyone stays in their lane.

12:11The piece you don’t see behind the scenes is a lot of the business he gets is because the customer service they have is so exemplary that people recommend them over and over. That’s a piece that a lot of large teams are taking a hard look at right now.

Jeff Quintin 12:58

We’re prospecting-based. Our basic schedule for accountability is everyone’s required to be on the huddle call at 8:15 in the morning. We talk about three things on the huddle call. Everyone dials in from remote locations. We’re going to state what our goal is for the month, where are we in relation to that goal, and what are our commitments for the day. We’re going to state it out loud to the team and do it all the way around the horn. Somebody might say, “My goal today is 30 contacts, set two appointments, work on two deals I’ve got to get wrapped up, and get three reductions.”

13:33Then at 8:30, part of our standards and requirements is that everyone must be roleplaying 30 minutes a day for five days. That’s standard across the board.

13:59If you’re late to the huddle call, it’s tracked. If you’re late to the call, you have to buy lunch for the whole entire team.

14:13By the end of the day, if you don’t report your numbers, I get a report every morning and I send it to the entire team so we can see who did what. If they don’t report their numbers, then the agent doesn’t have admin access for the following day. Each week, we’re discussing their one-week goals, one-month and one-year goals and keeping them on track.

15:15We’re always talking about practice. One of our agents is a newer agent and she has an appointment Thursday to go on a listing appointment. She’s kind of nervous. I said, “You’ve got to practice your appointment right now every single day for a few hours. Get in front of someone, have it staged, have it mocked, husband and wife. You need to study like that.”

Sarah Close 16:57

What I like about that is he has an immediate response or consequence if things don’t get done. In his organization, there’s no opportunity for a behavior to go on for an indeterminate amount of time without the result of that showing up.

John Ames 17:32

We are a phone-centric team. I have my own call center, and as I pan around you’ll see my team. Right now I’ve got one, two, three, four people in here prospecting. This is what we do. We’re either at an appointment or here in the call center.

18:25This is a mirror. It says, “Meet the person who decides how much you make today.”

Ren Jones 19:00

You really built your entire business on calling, it seems.

John Ames 19:02

Absolutely. It is the only thing that we know where you can run your real estate business and have a predictable, repeatable income every single month.

Sarah Close 19:15

They’ve got culture there. They work their butts off, but they have fun, and the two go hand in hand. You’ll work harder if you’re having fun along the way. Everything in that visual view was all about productivity and mindset.

Callie Chardy 19:56

I typically work just Monday through Thursday. I get to the office for 7:30 roleplay. I roleplay from 7:30 until 8:00, and then I’m usually on the phones by about 8:15. One of the things I really try hard to do is shut off my email and shut off my cell phone. As a matter of fact, my assistant takes my cell phone so I’m not interrupted. Then I prospect until 11:30.

20:31I do 150 sales basically myself. I meet with the admins at 11:30, and then usually 12:00 to 12:30 I do admin things, maybe look at some CMAs and what have you. Then I go out on appointments from 1:00 until I try to be home by 6:00 Monday through Thursday.

20:48On the weekends I periodically have to do a counteroffer or present an offer or something like that, but I try hard to avoid actually meeting with people on the weekends and Fridays. It’s a weekday business pretty much.

Ren Jones 21:20

She’s got it down tight. 150 sales, one-woman show pretty much, just in four days a week, home in the evenings. She’s got three boys and her husband Joe, and they like to have a good life. It can be a weekday business, folks. It doesn’t have to be complicated.

Zack Behr 21:58

The gym starts at 6:00. It’s one hour. I CrossFit, so it’s a one-hour schedule. At 7:00 I go right home, shower, change and get to the office.

22:22Having a structured morning has helped me significantly because I don’t have to think about what to do. For me, the less I have to think and the simpler I make this thing, the easier it is for me to produce.

22:41Routines pull you. A lot of times you get somewhere and you’re like, “How did I get here?” If you do it long enough, it pulls you. I love the morning schedule. The afternoon is something I’m striving to have as much quality as the morning.

Sarah Close 23:05

He nailed it. He said the routine pulls you, and that’s the key to the whole thing. If you have so much of your day that you don’t have to put any brainpower against, you just execute. That’s efficiency.

23:18Every last person that we’ve interviewed so far has a routine that drives their morning. Monday looks exactly like Tuesday, like Wednesday, like Thursday and Friday. The afternoons can vary, but in the morning, you know exactly where you’re going without thinking about it.

Brian Casella 24:20

For everybody watching, I challenge you to go look in the mirror. Think to yourself, what do you think immediately when you look into the mirror? Are you pointing out your flaws, or can you actually look at what’s in front of you in the mirror, smile and appreciate what’s in front of you? Something so simple permeates into every other area of your life.

25:03It starts and ends with you, with self, all the time. That is why I can pick up a camera and record myself without a problem and put it out to the world, because I appreciate the person in front of the mirror and behind the camera. I know who that individual is. I know what he’s doing every single day. He’s earning his keep. He’s working hard.

25:44You have to accept where you are first and foremost. I think a lot of people want to avoid the mindset stuff. I truly believe it’s the foundation for you to really have success, and it requires people to confront their insecurities, which is probably one of the biggest fears and struggles for a lot of people.

Sarah Close 26:40

I see this with agents two, three, four or five years in the business. Still, they don’t have the confidence they need. How do they get there? I think it’s what he’s talking about, which is spending that time really getting clear about who you are and being comfortable with that and owning it, and then being able to move forward from there and internalize a few scripts. That brings a lot of confidence if you don’t have to think about what to say.

Kerry Ellis 27:25

Right now we do Photos with Santa. The first weekend in December we have a Santa Claus here at the office, and we always tie it to a food bank donation or the Humane Society for the animals. We hire a professional photographer and bring in Santa Claus, and then of course we do prizes.

28:01I’ll tell you the best thing we did last year. We did a survey. We moved databases, and we called and did a survey. We asked them five questions, and the last question was, “Who do you know that needs to buy or sell real estate in the next six months that we can call today?” We’ve got 1,300 people, give or take, in our database. We reached about 250 on a phone call, and out of that we picked up 96 referrals.

28:44We also gave away a $2,500 travel voucher where somebody could go wherever they want on a cruise, airline tickets, any of the above.

29:33We’re going to offer it again. It was such great success for $2,500, it’s a no-brainer. We’re going to do it at our client party and then we’re going to follow it up again in the fall.

30:01The funny thing was some of these people were people we had talked to the week before or friends of ours we had run into two weeks before. They never said a word, yet when you ask those magic words, “Who do you know that needs to buy or sell that I can call?” it’s amazing what response you get from that ask.

Greg Harrelson 30:57

Brand-new agent, how do I become a great listing agent? How do I take more listings? You’ve got to go to undergrad. Here’s what I mean by that. My first three years in real estate, I had the good fortune of working with Greg Harrelson for many years. We prospected side by side for many years, and for three straight years I made 60 contacts minimum per day. That was without a dialer. We double-dialed, two phones, double headset. I’d call 90%. Maybe 40 to 50 were cold calls, and the rest were for sale by owners.

31:33When you have 60 real estate conversations every single day calling neighbors, you’re in the mode of having the real estate conversation. You do that for three years, you’ve got an undergrad. You’ve heard it all. You’ve heard all the same responses. It’s natural for you and you know your scripts until you become that comfortable where, wake me up at 2:00 in the morning, I can make a cold call or an expired. It has to be that ingrained and internalized.

Sarah Close 32:20

A lot of people are struggling. You’re not going to go there and think they need 60 contacts. What he’s doing with that is it’s becoming such an ingrained part of who he is that it’s going to be as much a part of him as brushing his teeth.

Steven Futch 33:29

Give me a call. Ring, ring.

Carley Hathaway 33:29

Hello?

Steven Futch 33:33

Hi, this is Steve with Keller Williams calling about the home for sale. Is this the owner?

Carley Hathaway 33:38

It is. Do you have a buyer for me?

Steven Futch 33:40

Actually, I work with a number of buyers at all times, and I’m really excited about getting your home sold. Let me ask you, when I sell your home, where are you moving to next?

Carley Hathaway 33:48

We’re okay staying here, but we would like to move to New York.

Steven Futch 33:56

New York, that’s exciting. How soon would you like to be there?

Carley Hathaway 34:03

We’re not in a rush. I just want to get the right price for my home. If you have a buyer, feel free to bring them, but I really have to get going now.

Steven Futch 34:11

That’s exactly what I intend to do, bring you a continuous stream of qualified buyers seeking to buy in the immediate future. That’s what you want, right?

Carley Hathaway 34:24

Yeah. The price that I want.

Steven Futch 34:28

Fantastic. I’d like to come by and preview your home this afternoon, three to five minutes, so you can show me the features and benefits. I’m available at 3:00 or again at 5:00. Which is better for you?

Carley Hathaway 34:40

Are you going to be bringing one of your buyers?

Steven Futch 34:43

No. I can’t show anything to a buyer until I know what I’m showing.

35:03If I’m able to articulate the features and benefits of your home to a number of buyers, that makes sense. Fantastic. Which is better for you, 3:00 or 5:00?

Carley Hathaway 35:11

Five would work.

Steven Futch 35:13

Great. Before I come out, there are a number of questions I need to ask you, and I can run my pre-qualifying script.

35:35Pricing primarily. I can get any home sold if it’s competitively priced. What we need to understand, and what I hopefully will cause them to understand, is that no buyer is going to pay more than market value for anything, and that goes for homes also.

35:58I want you for one moment to step out of your shoes and step into the shoes of the buyer. Would you pay what you want to price this home at if you were buying a home today, or would you pay less for one down the street that’s very similar?

Carley Hathaway 36:13

I would pay less for one down the street.

Steven Futch 36:15

And so would all the other buyers. Do you see that we have a choice here? We can price competitively and get showings and offers, or we can price above the market, get very few showings, no offers, and we’ll just be helping everyone else get their home shown and sold. Do you want to get yours sold or do you want to help everyone else get theirs sold?

Carley Hathaway 36:39

I want to sell mine.

Steven Futch 36:43

Fantastic. Sign the contract.

37:25I can appreciate that you don’t want to pay a commission. If you could get more money at closing by hiring a professional and paying the commission than you’ll get by selling it yourself without a commission, would you want that additional money at closing?

Carley Hathaway 37:40

Yes.

Steven Futch 37:44

I think you deserve that money, and that’s why you and I need to meet immediately. I specialize in getting homes shown and getting them sold for the most a buyer is willing to pay. Moreover, I’m going to protect your equity through the negotiations and maximize your net proceeds at closing.

38:04If I can’t bring you an offer that nets you more after the commission than you’ll get on your own, I’m not going to expect you to accept it. Therefore, you’re in a win-win, no-lose situation. I’m going to spend my time, my money, committing resources of my entire company to find you the highest and best offer in this market. Isn’t that what you really want?

Carley Hathaway 38:30

Definitely. Honestly, I do.

Steven Futch 38:35

That’s exactly why people like you hire me. I’ll see you at 3:00.

Guest 39:41

There’s probably a lot of agents that are more skilled than I am, better looking, but my biggest strength is the consistency. I do it every day.

39:57You could go two or three days and make all these contacts and nothing, and then you come in that fourth day and the first five people you talk to, you set two appointments.

40:19The biggest thing I’m doing too is I’m talking to people, going through my leads. If I’m trying to take 10 listings a month, I’m not worried about number 10 at the beginning of the month. Let’s say I’ve taken two. That’s all I’m looking for: what’s number three? Where’s number three?

40:36There’s so much in this business you can focus on, but really, if you just focus on what you’ve got to do that day, here and now, where’s that next listing at?

40:55One thing Mike teaches is how the higher-producing agents define a lead. A lot of people say, “This is someone who’s going to sell in six months.” That’s not really a lead for a top-producing agent. It’s going to be someone who’s going to sign a contract within the next seven to 10 days. If they’re motivated, I’m going to call them daily, maybe even twice a day.

Ren Jones 41:24

And you’re just going to stay on them until you can get into their house and get that listing appointment?

Guest 41:26

Mike teaches that how often do we lose a lead from calling them too much? Usually the opposite.

Sarah Close 41:33

Because you’re demonstrating what they’re trying to hire anyway. The more persistent you are, the more passionate you are, the more they’re like, “That’s who we want.”

Guest 41:45

Sometimes I’ll tell the seller I’m going to be the same way with buyers.

Sarah Close 41:53

Interesting. Your interactions, you’ve already started the interview process before you even know it.

Guest 41:59

We’re demonstrating what we’re supposed to be doing by closing them hard. That’s what I want.

Ren Jones 42:10

All of these individuals have the message of consistency in their programs.

Sarah Close 42:12

They do. And practice.

Ren Jones 42:17

And focus, and shrugging off three days and looking for that fourth day. This would be one to watch over and over again.

42:31If you’re watching on Vulcan7 and you want to get involved with the Lead Gen Facebook group, you can find them there. Finally, if you’re watching on Facebook and you’re not yet involved with Vulcan7, make sure to sign up.

43:01The most important thing, and this is a secret that wasn’t shared, is these 12 guests work hard all morning looking for business, and they take a little break.

43:27We’ll see you next time. Next week will be another guest, and we’ll have another Highlights Show in a few months.