A.B.C. = Always Be Connecting • Coaching Moments • Ryan D’Aprile

Welcome to another episode of Coaching Moments With Ryan D’Aprile from D’Aprile Properties! In this episode Ryan and D.J. discuss the merging of Ryan’s company with Coldwell Banker, and how this is a very big step. Ryan talks about the importance of following the “ABC” (Always Be Connecting) rule with clients by agents, and how this rule helps in earning their trust. DJ and Ryan also discuss how important communication is in the real estate business and also what needs to be improved. If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube! Ryan D’Aprile can be reached at 312.590.6416 and ryan@daprileproperties.com . This episode is brought to you by Real Geeks and FollowUpBoss . Transcript D.J. Paris 0:00 What is a top real estate coach telling his top 1% producers to do every single day this year? We’re going to talk about that 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? 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And now on to our show. Welcome to keeping it real, the largest podcasts made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Parris, and I am your guide and host through the show, and today is our monthly coaching moments with Ryan de April. Now if you’re not familiar with Ryan, or if you’re new to the show, Ryan comes on every month to give our listeners and our viewers a coaching moment and a coaching session. So let me tell you more about Ryan. Now Ryan de April is a progressive thought leader focused on providing for his agents and staff at D Pro properties. His strengths are his motivational skills, his coaching style, and his dedication to training. He has 13 offices throughout Chicagoland he’s also in Wisconsin, Indiana, and Michigan and Florida, with hundreds and hundreds of top agents. De April properties is a coaching company with eight strategic coaches who work week in and week out with every agent at the company focused on business planning, coaching and accountability. If you’ll take your career to the next level, if you’re maybe just not getting the attention that you need, check out depot properties do April properties.com. Ryan, welcome once again. Ryan D’Aprile 2:38 Thanks, DJ. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it. It’s good to be back. It’s been a it’s been a little bit since I’ve been with Yeah, D.J. Paris 2:44 it’s been a while. And we have I have some congratulations in order that you have now joined forces with with Coldwell Banker. Ryan D’Aprile 2:53 We have Yes, yeah. So I’ve been working on that with them for the past few months. And it’s been exciting. It’s a great, great group of people over there. And I’m very excited about that. And we get to take two wonderful cultures and meld them together. And, you know, work with an organization that has basically a wonderful global presence, a lot of value added to our agents. I’m incredibly excited. My wife’s an agent of the company. So I just excited from all the things that I saw that they have access to makes me very excited. And then I get to, I get to coach I actually get to even coach even more people, which makes me makes me excited about the whole opportunity as well. D.J. Paris 3:33 And it’s also I want this to be inspiring too, for anyone who’s in the process of building a team or thinking of starting a brokerage. If you don’t mind, Ryan, just sharing maybe a minute or so a minute or two of the journey from big being your own managing broker, starting a firm and now all these years later, integrating it with Coldwell Banker. Yeah, you Ryan D’Aprile 3:54 know, it’s it is it’s quite a journey starts off with anything that you do. It’s you know, you reach something that you’re very passionate about. And I started the real estate company because I was very passionate about coaching agents and helping them develop and we built our company off of that about probably, you know, you know, our company did in 2001, we did about $1.2 billion. No, yeah. 21. We did about 1.2 billion in sales in 2022, which is a down year for everybody. We did over a billion dollars, but we were down. But it’s something to be really proud of the hang our hat on and probably 85% of our agents started their career at our company, and probably a lot of them. It was only seven or eight years ago and we’re putting up some pretty, pretty big numbers which we’re really proud of. And you know, that is based on something I was very passionate about is working individually with the agents i this past Saturday, you know, the company sold and this past Saturday, I was at one of our offices with a bunch of agents and I was doing a group coaching session and it’s allowed me to get back to what I was passionate really passionate about. The company grew it grew quite well. Arjun, I started to find that my desire, my passion of coaching and training was being overshadowed by a lot of administrative stuff, as you know, running a real estate company, there’s more to it than meets the eye, I guess, let’s just say put it that way. So a lot of work. So by joining forces with Coldwell Banker, it allowed me to get what I was back to what I’m more passionate about, which is working with each individual agents, also, loan officers, I coach loan officers, I coach, a coach, title sales reps, I coach insurance agents, anybody who’s in sales, I coach them, I help them, you know, set a goal and then create a path to where they want to get to. D.J. Paris 5:43 Yeah, it’s, it’s amazing. And I just I know, you’re, you’re a very humble person. But I do want to stress that you built a company, an independent brokerage. Here in Chicago, you competed with the biggest and the best, and you built a business that really was, you know, is as as big and as powerful and as impressive as the big franchise firms. And that in and of itself, is a very difficult thing to do. And so I just want to honor you for building up a company, a healthy company, a healthy, profitable company that then caught the eye of all your competitors, and what a wonderful position. And what a wonderful testament to how you built your business so that all these other brokerages wanted, wanted, wanted to join forces with you. So glad you landed with Coldwell Banker, our company, our managing broker started at Coldwell Banker. We’re big fans, of course of them as well. So congratulations to all the agents at D APR. And you’re you’ve got a great journey ahead of you. And really exciting. Ryan D’Aprile 6:52 Thanks, thanks. Yeah, I am excited. And, you know, it is one of those things when we reflect back, I was telling my wife, I, you know, I never really pause because I was running so hard these past 11 years growing the organization. And it was, you know, after the sale, I looked back said to myself, Jesus Christ, I am probably one of the most competitive real estate markets in the country. Yeah, I mean, Chicago is Unknown Speaker 7:17 brutal, brutal, Ryan D’Aprile 7:19 it’s very competitive. And so I did have a moment of pride, where I’ve always kind of never really taken the time to do that. And I didn’t, and thank you, I appreciate you saying that. D.J. Paris 7:30 Yeah, it’s, it’s a big deal. And very few independent firms have done it. So that is a real feather in your cap. And obviously, again, really highlights your ability to grow a business and keep your agents happy and keep them productive and keep them pride keep the business profitable. So speaking of all of that, it is 2023 It’s our first coaching moments of the year. And everybody I know whether they’re a broker owner or a team leader, or just an individual producing agent, everybody I know seems to be a little scared, nervous, worried about what’s going on what’s right in front of them, what they should be focused on. So they don’t get caught up in you know, inaction or you know, just the business cycles being changed or changing at the currently. So I would love to know as a coach, what you are saying what are you are hearing out there and what you’re recommending to agents who are a little nervous or scared about where we are right now in the house insurer. Ryan D’Aprile 8:39 Yeah, absolutely. Well, so the first thing to keep in mind there’s a tremendous amount of distractions. Look, we just sold the company and I think every single recruiter in Chicagoland area his got my agents numbers on speed dial and the calling over and over and D.J. Paris 8:54 over so it is a recruiting for people like me and by the way, I have not been doing that to your agents, but because we don’t really compete in that same way but I recruiters are having a field day right now now is the time when agents are struggling so the recruiters come out and they promised the world and every agent every one of our listeners is probably getting prospected by somebody in their local markets, Ryan D’Aprile 9:18 you know and for people are listening that are real estate agents that are not on the corporate side or the reloc or on the corporate side or the recruiting side. You know, you got to listen to the message the message is overwhelmingly been coming to my agency has been messages a fair and and and majority of people will be able to be scared and it’s a shame you should be Lee should be inspiring, leading by inspiration. You should be you know, you should lead by hope you should not be you know leading by fear which is basically manipulating somebody to get what you want by scaring them and, and there’s a lot of scary things that are out there and got it really be smart and who you align yourself with. And, you know, when times are rough, I mean, again, I’ve been through this did a great recession. And here we are in another difficult market. You know, when times are rough, everybody is going to look outside of themselves first, and, and make the change. Look, a year ago, you know, you know, a year ago, before I was even thinking about selling or anything of that sort came, a number of agents left my company, they leave every year, they were all top producing agents, and unfortunately, all but one shit the bed. And the reason being, I think, is that we had such a strong culture of accountability and whatnot. And some excuses when he just said, like, well look at these tools and these technology and this and that. There’s tools, technology and gizmos, they’re going to come and they’re going to go, there is nothing that is earth shattering about what we do. Anybody could say tech and tools and technology. The truth is, are you even going to open up the computer six weeks later and use the technology that they gave you? And really what difference is it? And so what everybody does, when they’re trying to improve, right? They change everything outside first. That’s why 93% of them don’t improve. The work comes from within, if you want different results, you need to change. That doesn’t mean you need to change companies. And I’m not talking about my company, I’m talking about any industry, whatever it means you you personally have got to change. You know, it lies within what are you doing? What are your activities on Saturday, when I was with a group of agents, and I was coaching them? One of them said, Look, you know, I’m doing this, I’m doing this, and I and I and I time block, excuse me, I set up my all my social media posts for a month in advance. And, and she looked at me I’m like, and she’s like, well, I go ahead and I pre plan this stuff I’m like, and she’s like, Well, what do you mean? And I’m like, Well, that’s what moves the needle in your business. I mean, that’s not I mean, social media marketing, okay, is seen by a majority of the people that have already liked your post, probably 94% of them are your fellow real estate agents that are saying, Go ahead, friend, good for you. And they’re liking your stuff and is going to the same people over and over again. If you’re doing social media, if you’re using social media, by marketing versus researching and developing, right, then you’re going about this business relationship building business the wrong way. And when you point to some of the top top people out there, right, that have beautiful social media marketing out there, but they’re also selling 3040 50 $100 million real estate a year, you’re only seeing the tip of the iceberg real estate agent that’s out there, you’re not seeing all the other hard work that they put in there that they’re committed to their business. I mean, those people that are selling 50 to $100 million in production a year, okay. And then they have beautiful reels or whatnot. Those reels, net marketing came after all the other hard work and time and effort they put in to build the business. So D.J. Paris 13:11 that’s a that’s a really good point is that, so So if I hear you correctly, and I just want to pause you because I think you’re saying something really profound, which is utilizing social media while you’re not busy might the better way to do that might be through what Ryan has said time and time again on the show as research and development lert follow your your your sphere, pay attention to what is going on in their lives, because that will give you number one indications of possibly wanting to move but also reasons to pick up the phone and call them. Hey, just saw you got back from a trip to Mexico. How did it go just was thinking about you looked awesome, that kind of thing. Ryan D’Aprile 13:51 I’m actually going in two days with Coldwell Banker. D.J. Paris 13:56 I’m Nicole Baker, I want to go to Mexico. Ryan D’Aprile 13:59 I had I had my so we had our we had our software’s Anello, our dashboard up at this coaching session, and I was showing everybody in their network tab, right, like look at all the hyperlinks that we have in here to, you know, DJs Facebook page or DJs Instagram page or DJs LinkedIn page and, and then I opened up Facebook, and another tab. And I said here’s the right way the wrong way. You start in your dashboard first. You start there, and you go one by one with each person and you look at you click on their hyperlink and you look at what’s going on with them. If you start on Facebook first you should say alert made a something’s wrong. Because when you look at the newsfeed you are seeing what Michael Zuckerberg wants you to see isn’t a mike Zuckerberg. D.J. Paris 14:46 Mark but closer. Ryan D’Aprile 14:48 Great, Mark, you’re seeing what Mark Zuckerberg wants you to see in the newsfeed you’re seeing. You don’t have control over on Instagram as well. Right You’re you’re seeing what they want you to see, you know scroll through your newsfeed, that’s just not how it works. You have to be intentional, just like success, and anybody starts a business, you got to be intentional, and what it is that you want to do. But if you’re passive, and you’re thumbing through Facebook newsfeeds, that’s fine, but you’re just wasting your day, you’re wasting your valuable time. And your time is so much more valuable than money. Okay, your time is so valuable. But so many of us in Robin Sharma says this, I love it. Some of us are so busy being busy, very few of us are busy being productive. So there’s a right way there’s a wrong way of doing it. And in these times where it quote unquote, scary for people, look in the mirror, have a direct conversation with yourself. Okay? And ask, are you doing the proper right things to be efficient in this market? Because anybody can be successful? I think the statistics came out at home sell every minute, 11,000 homes sell a day. Right now, there’s more than enough business out there. It’s just that when business was easy, everybody, it was coming to everybody. Right now that it’s scarce, a the first to flee, or the negative mindset individuals, right? D.J. Paris 16:16 I want to ask you for a second, because I think you’re saying you’re saying something, it’s really important, I just want to put just put the cap on the social media conversation is that this so what Ryan was saying was, hey, if we were scrolling through social media, obviously, that may sometimes show us information about our sphere that we could then use to call as information and say, Hey, I saw you were just doing X, Y, and Z, I saw your kids were doing X, Y and Z. But what Ryan was saying is to be really super intentional about it is to actually, you know, specifically search for that person, look at their posts, see what they’re up to. And then that gives you possibly a reason to reach out, you can also, by the way, do that via Linked in. So in LinkedIn, a lot of times when people get job promotions, or switch companies, that information is also in their newsfeed. So you can use LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and be really, really intentional about seeing what’s going on in your clients or your sphere of influences life. And the reason why you want to do that is because it gives you a reason to pick up the phone and contact them or to send an email or a text, or however you communicate with with your sphere. This, by the way, this is so much easier than trying to create an a beautiful piece of content for you that you post on your stories, your real your you know that that’s hard to do. And as Ryan said, that comes usually after what you can do today for zero money is you can find out what’s going on in people’s lives and reach out to them and connect with them. Ryan D’Aprile 17:52 Yeah, everybody, really everybody that I observed wants to make this about marketing. And it’s it’s yes, there’s marketing is important. But that’s not I mean, that’s, that’s the easy part, right, you have to get out of your comfort zone, you have to grow a network, you have to nourish the network, you have to take care of the network. If you don’t, your business isn’t going to grow period. It just it’s just not. And the more I guess the more communal your neighborhood is, the more work it’s going to take. I mean, when I sold real estate in Chicago, the city of Chicago, it was actually easier than it would be in the suburbs, because the suburbs are so tight knit. So community where there’s larger cities like Chicago or Miami and areas where I’ve coach agents, it’s very transient, right? So because it’s transient, it’s easier to pick up an open house lead, it’s easier to get an online web lead the conversion rates higher because they don’t have those connections, right. But if you take the time to say, I’m going to take care of this building that I live in that I farm, I’m going to be a part of the social events, I’m going to get to know the people in the building, you’ll dominate, you’ll own that building, I owned the buildings, we’re now selling real estate in Chicago, that I farmed, because I got involved with them from a community and it was easier, quite honestly, because there was such a lack of community in those bigger cities, not when you’re in the suburbs, right? And you’re going to have the soccer teams and the football teams and baseball and all the stuff that comes along, you know, with, I guess, families in the suburbs, right? or whatnot, and then you’re gonna have to get even more involved in there. Now. One thing that listeners might be thinking because I brought up the family element of it that somebody said to me on Saturday, he said, Well, I don’t have a family. So is it harder for me to grow my business? So this person has been a real estate agent for five years. And I pointed to an agent of ours that doesn’t have a family doesn’t have any kids and sell 64 homes a year. And I said but look at his network. He’s got 420 people in it. Every single quarter he touches them, I said, it’s I’ve never seen anybody work this system and not be a success. I’ve seen people not work it and be successful. I’ve seen people not work it and be failures. But I’ve never seen anybody working it, and it doesn’t work for them. But it takes a commitment it takes, it takes drive, right? And it takes it takes self reliance, you got to be responsible for yourself. You’re called independent contractors for a reason. But it’s going to take even more responsibility than it is when you get a job and you have a boss telling you what to do, you are the boss. So therefore you got to be able to get plan out your day, and do what you need to do and execute it day in and day out, or it’s just not going to happen. D.J. Paris 20:47 And I think to this idea of earning business is I think there’s, well a minimum of two different places where you need to earn business. And I’m curious to get your thoughts on this. And here’s what I came up with. The first is you want, of course, your sphere and I say client, I should just say your sphere, your prospects, you want your prospects to think about you when they do need to work with a realtor. So you have to earn that position. So you first have to earn that. And then you also have to earn once they’re ready to make a decision that that you are in fact the right person. So you first want to be thought of and then you want to be selected. And I was thinking but you do have to earn that right. And you have to earn it through effort. And Ryan, you’ve said this time and time again on our show, social media is a great place to get information to allow you the to show you the steps to earn this, these deeper connection, earn these these deals through deeper connection through intimacy through understanding what’s going on in my clients lives are and that’s as simple as paying attention and reaching out and saying, Hey, I saw that you just did this, I saw that you guys just had a birthday I you know, there’s all sorts of things that social media tells us about our, our sphere of influence. And all we have to do is acknowledge it, tell them we’re watching work, and we’re proud of them, or we’re excited for them or whatever the particular instance might be. We have to do this on the regular so that we can even be thought about when it comes time for real estate. I’ll tell you. One thing I did about a year a couple years ago was I have had an assistant. And I said to my assistant, I said I don’t know any of my friends, birthdays, anniversaries, I don’t know their children’s birthdays. These are my friends. And I said I want to be the friend that knows all of his friends that doesn’t miss a birthday doesn’t miss an anniversary doesn’t miss. So I said can you reach out to all my friends and just ask them, we’re updating our database, we DJ doesn’t want to forget your birthday. And we got their, their their wedding anniversaries, we got their kids birthdays, I know the ages of their kids. Now I’m not a practicing agent. But I’m doing this just for my own my own relationships with my friends. But this is the exact same thing you can do with your sphere. And it gives you reasons to reach out to stay in communication to build community. But but in order to build a community you have to actually build a community you have to actually want to have deeper connections with your with your spirit. Ryan D’Aprile 23:13 That’s absolutely right. That’s exactly what you have to do. And it’s it takes time. And it’s like you know, a river running through you know, you know, a canyon or whatnot, it will carve against the stone with the consistency. Day in and day out. It’s not a one and done thing. The most important part of all this is being consistent in these activities. It’s not like there’s no silver bullet out there it is it is time it’s effort if you nurture it, it will pay huge dividends to you. D.J. Paris 23:45 I want to pause for a moment to talk about our episode sponsor are one of my favorite companies out there follow up boss. Now after interviewing hundreds of top Realtors in the country for this podcast. Do you know which CRM is used by more than any other by our guests. 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So you can try it risk free but only if you use this special link visit follow up boss.com forward slash real that’s follow up boss.com forward slash real for your free 30 days. Trial follow up like a boss with follow up boss. And now back to our episode. It will but you’re right, it takes out going effort outbound efforts. So in the past, it used to be pick up the phone, we call somebody, Hey, are you thinking about selling? No, not yet. Okay, I’ll call you later. There are much better ways to do that now. And I think the best way to do that is to be entwined with, or at least aware of the happenings of your prospects lives, so that you can know and give them advice along the way. And that they go, Wow, my agent called me they, they saw that, you know, my, my partner just got a promotion they call to congratulate me. I mean, those types of things when Evers whenever somebody does something special in their life, whether it’s with their family or their profession, if somebody else comes along and says, Hey, I saw that you did that thing. Boy, that goes a heck of a long way to building a building, you know, endearment, and it does, Ryan D’Aprile 26:02 yeah, and it’s all out there for you to know what’s going on with these individuals. I mean, today, it’s it’s so easy, everybody’s living their lives publicly. So it’s easy to see what’s going on. But again, be be intentional about that research and development that you’re doing. And what you’re seeing, just don’t don’t blindly log in and go through newsfeed, you’re the you’re going to be doing what the algorithms want you to see you have to be intentional. And look up your network, see what’s going out with them. And then and then don’t, don’t do it, don’t consider writing on the wall. You know, a, like a touch, you know, you have to pick up the phone, you need to text him You gotta reach out with them and create a dialogue. And remember Ford, right, family Occupation, Recreation and dreams, ask open ended questions. Right? You know, how’s Little Billy doing right? Or? Or hey, how’s it how’s the new job at? At? Pepsi? whatnot, I just saw you got promoted to director finance? How’s it going? What, tell me about that, let them then tell them about you, you know, have learned the art of conversing with individuals, right, open ended conversations. And remember, it’s more about them than it is you, they’re gonna give you so much valuable data. And then when they have a need and 16% of your network transacts every single year, when they have a need, they’re going to think of their friend, right? And that’s you, right? And I tolerate like, I love this business, because you’re in the business of creating friends. So get to work. D.J. Paris 27:27 The other thing too, if you’re a brand new agent, I’ve never really heard anyone say this. So I’m curious, you might have a different opinion, you might say this is a terrible idea. But my first glance, my first thought is that it’s a good idea. But I could be wrong. So if I were a brand new agent, and I had a bunch of friends that owned homes that maybe weren’t even thinking of selling what every homeowner, or at least what most homeowners who aren’t in the process of selling still like to know is what’s their place worth. You know, at any given regular day, we can go to Zillow and look at the Zestimate I don’t ever think to do that. But sometimes people do but you’re a real estate professional, you can actually provide most likely a more accurate thing. So what I would do is I would call everybody I know who owns a house if I was new, and say hey, I know you’re not looking to buy or sell anytime soon. But I really want to send you a comp because I want to practice and I want to get better at sending comps, is it okay? If I send you what I think your home is currently worth? I just would love to get your review on it. It’ll help me in my skill, building my skills. If these are your closest people to you, I think they’d be like, great, send it over. We’re curious what you thought of that. Ryan D’Aprile 28:35 If they’re, if mean reaching out to them and ask them D.J. Paris 28:39 for an new agent. Hey, I don’t have any clients. I just want to get some practice, you know, running CMAs that kind of thing. Ryan D’Aprile 28:46 I would run a CMA but I wouldn’t send it to I wouldn’t send it to I don’t think I would send it to D.J. Paris 28:52 to them. You wouldn’t Okay, no, I Ryan D’Aprile 28:55 wouldn’t. I want you to focus more on the relationship building aspect of it. They’re going to find out what you’re doing through your Autoflow your direct mail, your email marketing, you know, some of the social media, they’re going to know what you’re doing. Make friends with them. First, they’re going to ask you about real estate. If they ask you about comps, then you run some comps. Now what you should what you shouldn’t be doing you should be running comps, on homes, you know, but I wouldn’t be sending them out. You should be running and going to your manager broker and say what do you think about this? I think this home should be priced here based on the comps that I ran. You should be maybe talking to some friends and saying hey listen, why don’t you come see some open houses with me? I want to go around I want to get to know the marketplace. I love the front and come with me and also Hey, let’s go right up pretend to offer I’m not going to present it but let’s go take a purchase contract. Let’s go get a cup of coffee. I’m going to fill out a contract I’m gonna explain to you a contract. Would you mind me practicing on you that’s what you do with what really good friend of yours. That’s gonna give you some real life experience. Right? But you know, I’m of the mindset of your touches. Your outreach should all be relationship that should be all about them. Your real estate will naturally flow to you D.J. Paris 30:00 So I agree you’re right. i You’re absolutely right. i It’s funny you I was talking about putting everyone’s anniversaries and birthdays in my calendar. And so now because I that I do that, especially wedding anniversaries, I routinely get messages from my friends that go, you’re the only person outside of my immediate family that knows it’s my anniversary now. Am I such an amazing guy that I because I do that? No, I just put it in my calendar. Like I literally just did the one thing? And how does how would that make that person feel about me remembering their most special day of their life, right, or the birth of a child or whatever it might be the major life events, if you can somehow be be there after the event happens to to you know, congratulate the person. Boy, that demonstrates a tremendous, a tremendous effort Ryan D’Aprile 30:53 solely out loud, about, it’s always about them. It’s not about you. And it’s all about you showing how much you care about them through your actions, even more so than your words. And that’s being consistent and continually reaching out to them. Again, the numbers will just take care of it for you. The numbers so D.J. Paris 31:10 you’re not. So here’s a question. But rates are really high right now. I’m an agent, none of my buyers, they’re all upset about rates. So I’m just giving a devil’s advocate. What do you say to that? Ryan D’Aprile 31:24 About rates? Okay, great. And your buyer? Wonderful. Why are you buying? D.J. Paris 31:33 Because I need more space. Ryan D’Aprile 31:36 Okay, so the listeners pay close attention to this. Right? It’s the why so why do you need more space? D.J. Paris 31:43 So that I can work from home? A couple days a week, and I need a home office? Ryan D’Aprile 31:48 Why do you wanna work from home a couple days a week? So that I can? D.J. Paris 31:51 Because it’s more comfortable for me? I don’t I don’t want to commute in every day. So I you know, how long 30 minutes? Ryan D’Aprile 32:04 So is that an hour a day? Then? It’s 30 mins started our yes, they couldn’t what? You’re commuting five days a week, then if you’re not working from home? Correct? Well, that’s five hours a day. Right? Right. It’s 20 hours a month. Right? So, you know, and take that that’s 240 hours in a year? Yeah, divided by 24 hours? How many days of that? So those are the things I ask you, DJ, as my friend and my buyer. You know, what is it to you that’s more important? Is it a say a 6% interest rate on a 300,000 hour loan? Right? versus maybe dropped down to five and a quarter a year from now. So that three quarters of a point difference? What does that come out till? And then you got to ask yourself, What’s more important to you? Five days in the car 30 minutes each way, or be able to work from home? And I can’t answer that only you can. My friend, you find the home, you make that decision, you tell me if your wife’s strong enough for you to buy the home. D.J. Paris 33:08 Right. So the rates just kind of are what they are. And I think most of our listeners have heard the expression, you know, marry the home date the rate. It’s it’s not an expression. It’s an overused expression. But it’s it’s a pretty good one. Because it is actually how most people think about purchasing property. They fall in love with the home. And whatever the rate is, is and people can refinance, of course, thank goodness. So Ryan D’Aprile 33:35 most, most agents will ask these questions, TJ, but they don’t even have the buyer client yet. They asked him because they’re building up, they’re building up objections in their heads already, because they’ve yet to do the life flow that’s necessary for them to grow their business. D.J. Paris 33:48 Does that make sense? A little bit more about life flow. Ryan D’Aprile 33:51 Life flow was simply touching everybody in your database. I think we could do it once a month. Right? Personally, by you know, a text a call, right? Maybe Facebook Messenger to them about them, and checking in with them. You know, keeping keeping current with them, and keeping them in your life and you and there’s so if you have, say 300 people in your network. Okay. Do you have a calculator with you? Because I don’t know I’m pacing? Yes, I do. Okay, great. So there’s, there are 20 working days in a month. Okay, so what’s 23 divided by or what’s 300 divided by 2015? One Five. Fitting, you have to make 15 touches a day. 15 touches a day. Now do that for a full year in a row followed up with a consistent marketing campaign, not take 300 and multiply it by point one six. You know, come the 48 Yeah. 4840. That’s 40 transactions that that are living in that database of 300 people 16% of them are going to transact records Are this the market they’re gonna transact, a lot of them won’t even transact twice. Right? They might sell a transaction Yes, sell and buy. But here’s the reality is maybe 5% or less of real estate agents are actually going to do the activities they need to do. And do those 15 touches a day. Seeing the time in and time out. Right, that’s That’s it, separate you guys from the struggling real estate agent to the very few top producers that are actually out there. D.J. Paris 35:26 And plus, like, if you really think about it, and again, everybody’s personalities are different. But I would assume it’s a lot more fun to contact somebody and, you know, you look to see what they’re doing on social you, you know, you have a reason to call them, they just did something on social media that you want to acknowledge, or there’s something going on in the market that you want to make them aware of. Either way, this should all be fun, positive stuff. Right. So making 15 phone calls a day going, Hey, I was just thinking about your saw you just went on a trip. I saw your so and so just got promoted. So you guys just had an anniversary a birthday? Oh, by the way, here’s something that’s going on in the market that you might care about down the street or whatever. Those are all activities. Vijay, Ryan D’Aprile 36:09 I’ll even leave that out of it. Okay. That last part. Okay. I would even leave that part out of I would leave bringing it back to real estate out of it. Does that? D.J. Paris 36:20 Yeah, just just connect with them. Personally. Ryan D’Aprile 36:23 That’s That’s how I feel. Just connect with them. Focus on the relationship. Leave anything about your business out of it. They will ask you, here’s how you do it. Okay, DJ, we’re going to roleplay here. You’re an accountant. Okay. Okay. And say you’re an accountant at a big you know, one of the big five firms. Okay, okay. DJ, how’s business? D.J. Paris 36:44 Whoa, I’m slammed it’s it’s it’s the beginning of the year. Everyone’s working on their taxes. It’s brutal right now I’m slammed. Ryan D’Aprile 36:51 That’s crazy. What are you working on? D.J. Paris 36:53 Corporate Tax taxes are due just clients are asking for everything for just shore up their year. Ryan D’Aprile 37:00 That’s crazier, isn’t it? Yeah. Now, what are you gonna say to me eventually, D.J. Paris 37:05 I’m gonna say hey, what’s going on with you? What’s What are you up to? Ryan D’Aprile 37:08 Right? Now? Here’s my chance. Just busy running around works crazy families. Great. D.J. Paris 37:14 How’s the market? How’s it? How’s Ryan D’Aprile 37:15 it? Right? Worse, great. Finally, then you just say okay, well, how’s the market? Now, I’m not going in every call thinking that through. In fact, I tend to throw scripts away. Right? I just go and make it about the person somehow, usually, sometimes not all the time, work will pop up. But if I talk to you once a month, I text with you once a month, I send you a Facebook Messenger once a month, two years go by, I am your buddy. You know what the hell I do for a living. And when you are looking to either purchase your home or or sell a home, there’s a really strong possibility. I’m the guy you’re calling. Why? Because it did my job. I kept you close to me, I kept the relationship with you. D.J. Paris 37:58 Yeah, this is this reminds me of an old Brian Tracy expression. And we’re not really putting this in the prospecting category. But one of my favorite Brian Tracy quotes is prospecting solves all problems, or sales solve all problems. And of course, of course he’s right. And so what we’re really doing is, even though we’re not prospecting with a capital P, what we’re doing is we are prospecting because we are staying in touch with our sphere. We know people are going to choose their realtor, most people are going to choose based on who they know, like and trust, you have to earn that you have to earn know, like and trust. So the way that you earn it is exactly how Ryan is describing it here. And if you just do this this year, and you you know, you find what 15 phone calls a day, if you have 300 people in your database 15 touches a day. What is that might take what three hours a day, maybe maybe two hours a day, maybe even less. That is a remarkable low amount of effort for building intimacy and ever sorry, not not alone in a bad way. That’s, that’s a very reasonable amount of time to spend. And that will actually result in business. Ryan D’Aprile 39:08 That’s absolutely right. And Brian Tracy is right. Prospecting leads will solve all your problem. And I’ve seen agents I’m very empathetic individual. Don’t get me wrong, right. But I’ve seen agents struggle, and I’ve seen him complain about it. But then I’ve also watched him do nothing about it. Yeah, I watch him do nothing about it. Right. And I’ve watched him look around to see what’s gonna solve my problem, guys. There’s no silver bullet out there. You gotta get to work. You gotta look at every professional out there that’s successful in any industry. You know, it’s so funny. You know, again, I’ve worked with a lot of new agents and brought them up, right. And the first year is a lot of emotional intelligence. I have to work with them on right because they comment they might be coming into business in their 40s. Right? And then they’re gonna look at the front like, well, he or she’s so successful, like, we’ll leave it at their career. For 20 years, they’ve been building the career for a long time. Why are you expecting be a number one agent within 12 months? It makes no sense. And then why after seven years of you not doing what you really need to do, are you upset that you’re you’ve plateaued and you’re really not where you should be? Well, that’s because you just gone through time like anybody is going to be, I think it was Gary Keller wrote in his book, The Millionaire, Millionaire Real Estate Agent, the Methuselah effect, you know who Methuselah is, right? Yes. All right. And so you’re going to be in this business for 20 years, eventually, you’re gonna have enough business, just you just want to go through 20 years of being in real estate to finally hit your stride. Right. And there are a lot of agents I know, that had been in the business for 789 years that are finally hitting their stride. That’s just because we’ve been in it for 789 years. Right. You know, it’s, they’re not where they probably should be. D.J. Paris 40:56 Yeah, it’s, it’s a really, it’s a really good point. It’s it. Also, it’s what’s nice about having sort of, you know, your life flow, like you were saying, would live flow equals connection with your, your sphere. What is so amazing about that is it has nothing to do with the market has nothing to do with the conditions of the economy. It’s just interpersonal communication, this is something that that you can do. On your best day, your worst day, whatever’s going on in your life, you can always pick up the phone, reach out to somebody, and do this, regardless of the market conditions or what’s going on in your business. So what’s what’s wonderful is if you can put the blinders on, it does, it doesn’t matter if rates are up or down. I mean, of course, that affects your clients ability to buy or sell certain things, but you want to always demonstrate care, compassion, you know, and connection. Ryan D’Aprile 41:49 Absolutely. It’s always it’s, I say ABC, always be connecting. People say it’s always be closing, always be connecting, always keep in contact with people, and then the sales will just follow you. D.J. Paris 42:05 That’s a great, great thing to end on. And a great reminder for all of us that are noticing all of the job cuts that are going on in the real estate world and all of the just the noise with with of course economists predicting by the way, I just went to Nar conference or saw the NAR Chief Economist speak Dr. Lawrence Yun a couple of days last week and, and by the way, he thinks that the housing market is going to be just fine. He does not think this will repeat back to 2008 2009 10, etc. So he was he’s very excited that things will be returning to normal in the next year or two. But in the meantime, and you should be doing this regardless of whether it’s up down up market down market rental market, you know, buy or sell or market connect with your your spear, there’s always going to be people like Ryan said 16% of the people you know, are going to transact in the next 24 months. That’s just a fact. So how much I’m sorry, in the next 12 months 16% Will transact in the next 12 months, some of those will have two transactions, some will have one. So you have a huge opportunity here. But you have to earn it. And the way that you earn it is through as Ryan just said, ABC always be connecting, find out these things. And guys, this is the fun part of the job. The hard parts actually working with the client. That’s actually the tough part. This is the fun part where you actually get to demonstrate that you care that you you know, this is the stuff that you should get excited about because it doesn’t require a whole lot of knowledge or skill just requires a little bit of effort. And and it requires that you do care about your clients. And if you do care about them, demonstrate it and they will they will be with you forever. Well, Ryan Well I think it’s a great place to pause we are again congratulations on the merger with with Coldwell Banker That is incredible. We’re so so excited and proud of you. And all of your agents I’m sure are thrilled about that. And also want to remind everybody to continue to follow us and sponsz Follow our sponsors and pit tape pay attention to what they are providing because our sponsors are the reason we can keep our show going. So please take a look at their products and services. We appreciate it and last please tell a friend about this show. We really want to blow this out of the water and 2023 We just crossed over 2.1 million downloads a few days ago. So please continue to tell other agents about it especially agents that are struggling and most agents are struggling right now they need a little pick me up if they listen to this episode from Ryan that’ll help get their their mindset back in order and they can start producing or make this 2023 a great year. So and also for anyone out there that is in the Chicagoland area or in Wisconsin, Indiana, Florida. Are you in Iowa Well, Ryan, I forgot if Ryan D’Aprile 45:01 no Florida in the Eric Schmidt, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Illinois, D.J. Paris 45:05 got it in Florida, Illinois, Florida. So Ryan D’Aprile 45:09 we’re just not Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan. D.J. Paris 45:12 If you are if you’re if you’re looking to work with a firm that has this kind of leadership, Ryan and his team would love to chat with EG APR properties.com. There’s a link to that in our show notes. That’s the place to go amazing company. And they are amazing, so amazing that they just got picked up by Coldwell Banker. So definitely check them out. It’s going to be going to be a great year guys. Let’s make it a good year. Ryan, thank you as always for continuing to support our show, and we will see everybody on the next episode. Thanks CJ.