2/8 - Shelly Gardner with Keller Williams Realty Louisville East.

2/8 - Shelly Gardner with Keller Williams Realty Louisville East.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Chamber Connection on Talk Radio ten eighty,
a program designed for small business owners, aspiring entrepreneurs, and
community members who are eager to learn more about the
intricacies of running a successful business, hosted each week by
the dedicated staff of the Chamber of Saint Matthews. Now
here's your host for this week, Josh Suiter, CEO.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
Good afternoon and welcome to the Chamber Connection. My name
is Josh Suitor and I will be your host today.
Today I have in the studio with me Shelley Gardner
with the Ronda Roberts team at Keller Williams Louisville East,
and she also happens to be president of the Board
of Directors for the Chambers. So Shelley, welcome in, Hi Chess. So, Shelley,
I want to start off with a easy question. Okay,

(00:47):
can you tell me a little bit about your background
and what.

Speaker 3 (00:50):
Inspired you to go into real estate.

Speaker 4 (00:53):
Well, my background is, excuse me, primarily adult training and
development in the hospitality industry, and my mother had been
a realter before she retired, and it was something that
we were going to do together. I was going to
move back to Florida work with her it didn't work
out like that, so I stayed here, and I've been

(01:16):
a realtor now I'm in my sixth year.

Speaker 3 (01:18):
We're really glad you stayed.

Speaker 2 (01:20):
Thanks, I would have had to follow you to Florida.

Speaker 3 (01:24):
So what do you love most about being a realtor?

Speaker 4 (01:27):
You know, there's all kinds of things that I love
about it. One thing I really love is working with
people who think they can't buy a house, and then
we prove them wrong and they totally can. And I
love to give them the keys, giving people keys to
their house, whether their first time home buyer, multi time,

(01:48):
multi time home buyer. But if they think they couldn't
buy the house and I give them the keys, you know,
I'm fulfilling a basic need of life, shelter, and I
don't take that lightly. It's a big deal to give
somebody the keys.

Speaker 3 (02:02):
I mean, you've given your own son a set of keys.

Speaker 4 (02:04):
Yes, I gave my son keys on December thirteenth. Then
I was okay with it. He's actually moving out next week.
I'm not okay with that part. But he has a
house that's very close to where I live, so I'm happy.
But you know, he's a young man and he's doing
great things. So it's his term for a house.

Speaker 3 (02:23):
That's cool stuff.

Speaker 5 (02:24):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:25):
So I was in a meeting just a little bit
ago and talking with a gentleman who is getting ready
to buy a house, and we were talking about the
real estate market. So my next question is what is
the current real estate market looking like in the Louisville area.

Speaker 4 (02:39):
So the real real estate market here in Louisville, louill
market is hot. It is still a seller's market, and
what that means quite simply because you hear these terms
being thrown around, but a seller's market is when the
inventory is still a little bit low and the demand
is starting to come up again. Going into the spring,

(03:00):
we should be floating between four and six thousand houses
on the market, and we're floating twenty four hundred twenty
four hundred and some change. So it's a great time, though,
to be a buyer or a seller.

Speaker 5 (03:14):
Buyers.

Speaker 4 (03:15):
There's a little more inventory now, even though it doesn't
necessarily sound like it. There's a little more inventory now
than there has been in previous springs. And it's still
a great time to be a seller because the people
are out there and they want to buy your house.

Speaker 2 (03:28):
Absolutely Now, my wife and I are fairly new homeowners,
just in the last couple of years, and we made
some mistakes in that first home buying process. But tell
me about some of the biggest mistakes you see first
time home buyers making.

Speaker 5 (03:44):
I would say the first one right out of the
gate is do you know how people? Do you know
how people buy houses?

Speaker 4 (03:51):
No, A lot of people sit on their couch, they
pick their phone up, they've got Netflix on, and they're
scrolling through real estate sites and they find the house
they like. They're like, oh, that one's pretty, and they
think that that's the house for them. You know, it's
got four bedrooms, it's got a pool, the kitchen, you know,

(04:11):
like you could make a gourmet meal. And they think
that's the house. And then they say to their sister,
their mother, their coworker, who do you like for realter?
There's fifty five hundred realtors in the Louisville market, so
everybody knows at least ten realtors. Right, somebody gives them
a realtor. So now they found their house, or so

(04:33):
they think somebody gave them a realtor. But the big
key here is they have no idea how much they
can afford. So instead of doing it that way, which
is backwards, the way they need to do it is
you need to figure out first how much you can afford.
So that's where your lender comes into play, lender realter,
then the house, because if I show you a house

(04:56):
for five hundred thousand dollars but your budget's really two fifty,
now I've just wasted your time and you're sad.

Speaker 5 (05:06):
So we don't like to do that.

Speaker 4 (05:07):
We like to figure out where you're comfortable with your payments,
what you want to spend, and then we go find
the house that matches your needs.

Speaker 2 (05:15):
So I would say what you're telling me is before
I even start shopping, I need to go find that lender.

Speaker 4 (05:20):
You need the lender, and I work with the most
amazing lenders in this market, and I work with so
some realtors have a one size fits all kind of
for lenders.

Speaker 5 (05:31):
I talk to my clients.

Speaker 4 (05:32):
And figure out kind of what they're looking for, what
they need, what they want, and then I think about
the lenders that I have that can deliver that, and
then I go to my favorite lender that fits their needs.

Speaker 2 (05:46):
So speaking of lenders, because you know I've been in
the industry long enough now to have conversations with you all.
How important is a credit score when it comes to
buying that home.

Speaker 4 (05:57):
So credit's really important, but it's not the only So
it's like a it's kind of like a soup. Right,
you're gonna throw some credit scores in there, You're A
really big one that people don't take into consideration is DTI.
And you hear people throw that term around all the time.
DTI it stands for debt to income. How much money

(06:18):
do you have coming into your house each month and
how much money do you have going back out if
your debt is too high. So people will say, well,
my rent's two thousand dollars a month and I can
pay that, Yes you can, thankfully, But how much other
debt do you have? And that kind of is a factor.
So what's your DTI, what's your credit? How much money

(06:39):
do you make, possibly depending on the loan or the program,
how many people in the house are working, how many
people are bringing an income. So there's all kinds of
things that lenders look at, and there's other things as well,
but those are some of the biggies.

Speaker 2 (06:55):
So I've also heard you talk and this is not
a scripted question. So I'm throwing a wild but I
know you could talk about it. You talk a lot
about it, and a lot of our leads groups and
other activities about the seventy's right, And I always get
a kick out of this because some of these I
think you've crafted your own little verbiage of them, and
that's okay. But can you talk a little bit about

(07:16):
what those seventies are and why they're important to you?

Speaker 4 (07:18):
Yes, And I have to say that I did not
create these. I borrowed them.

Speaker 3 (07:25):
We call that ripoff and duplicate.

Speaker 5 (07:26):
Rip off and duplicate.

Speaker 4 (07:28):
I've heard first heard it from our from our real
estate coach, the Great Tom Fairy, so he's a fantastic
real estate guru, but Tom Fairy is where I first
heard it. So the seventies, these are life changing events
that will make people buy or sell a house even
if maybe the interest rate's not where they want it

(07:49):
to be, or they're compelling reasons to buy ourself. So
things like diapers, death, diamonds, divorce, diplomas which read which
leads to downsizing financial distress. And then everyone's favorite is

(08:10):
de relocation because you know why not? So with with diapers.
You know, babies come with all the things, and you
thought you had enough room in your house.

Speaker 5 (08:21):
And then you get a baby. You have a baby,
and then you get all.

Speaker 4 (08:24):
The stuff, the toys and the clothes and the things,
and then God love, you have another baby and you're like,
oh my gosh, we have no room in this house.
So young families are a great referral for me because
they don't have any room in their house. Truth yep.
So then death. Sometimes folks know when people are going

(08:45):
to pass away. Maybe they've had a lingering illness. Sometimes
it's sudden and we don't know. Sometimes the person who's
passed their family, friends and family may not need the house.
They may not want the house. They may need to
sell the house. And that is a burden that I
can help them navigate and some stress I hopefully can

(09:08):
take off their plate. Okay, diamonds. People getting engaged, you know,
Oh my gosh, I met. I used to do wedding
shows all the time, and I met a bride and
groom one time and the bride said, please help me
find a house because my husband to be's college roommate
still lives with us and I can't take it anymore.
And that's a thing I've.

Speaker 5 (09:29):
Met lots of couples like that.

Speaker 4 (09:30):
So they need a new house. They're sick of living
in their parents' basement. So diamonds are important. Divorce also important.
I am currently working with a client who unfortunately is
going through divorce and she's buying a condo and then
she's going to sell her house because it's a much

(09:51):
better situation for her to be in a different location.
So that's another stressor that I can help people with. Okay,
so diplomas leading to downsizing. People graduating, they might not
need to live back at home with mom and dad. Ideally,
they get out of college, they get a job, and
mom and dad are rolling around in this big house

(10:12):
with four or five bedrooms and they don't need it anymore.
And she's sick clean in that house every Saturday for
six hours. So they might need a smaller home, maybe
a patio home. So that's great financial distress. People having
a hard time with their mortgage and payments, that's something
I can help with. And then finally, de relocation. It

(10:33):
is everybody's favorite because it's just funny to say, but
people moving into the area, people moving out of the area.
I can help on both ends of that transaction.

Speaker 2 (10:41):
Yeah, And ironically, even this morning in our Leeds group,
and you know, for those of you who are listening now,
this happened a few days ago, but we heard the
story of a parent who was ready to wish their
child well and get him out of their house, right. Yes,
So I find it interesting that you've been able to
utilize the seven to teach those of us how we

(11:02):
can help prefer you more.

Speaker 4 (11:03):
So, it's just basic life things and it happens to
a lot of us at different points.

Speaker 5 (11:08):
But I'm there when it happens.

Speaker 2 (11:11):
And I think most of those have been events in
my life at some point exactly. I got that diploma, Yeah,
got married, I moved into her house and brought a
lot of junk with me in a much smaller house.
That was not a good idea. And now I have
children who take up all of my house.

Speaker 3 (11:26):
So it's right. Shelley's prepared. You know, she's going to
get a.

Speaker 2 (11:29):
Call sing, Well, we're going to take a short break
and when we come back, we're going to continue our
conversation with Shelley Gardner with Keller Williams litvel East here
on Talk Radio ten eighty.

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Speaker 1 (12:16):
You're listening to real News, Real Talk Talk Radio ten eighty.

Speaker 2 (12:24):
Welcome back to the Chamber Connection on Talk Radio ten eighty.
My name is Josh Suder. I'm your host today and
in the studio with me is Shelley Gardner with the
Rhonda Roberts team, Mkeller, Williams, level East, and Shelley.

Speaker 3 (12:35):
I'm gonna take us in a different direction.

Speaker 2 (12:37):
Now, let's talk about what are the keys to selling
your home quickly?

Speaker 4 (12:43):
Well, there are some very specific things that you can
do as a seller that will make it move a
little faster. We are going into the spring market, and
I feel like every year the spring market starts earlier
and earlier, because it's February.

Speaker 5 (12:57):
Sixth, something like that, something like that.

Speaker 4 (13:00):
It used to be it started in March and April,
and now it's hot already. So as a seller, some
things that you can do that are inexpensive. Clean your house,
you laugh, but clean your house, and if you need
help cleaning your house, get somebody to do it. Declutter
your house. And that doesn't necessarily mean like take out

(13:21):
all your pictures. There's different opinions of thought on that.
Take your pictures out, leave your pictures in, but just
get rid of stuff you don't need, because we all
have things in the house, whether it's clothes we don't
want to wear anymore, or whether it's kids toys from
ten years ago they don't play with. Whatever, Just get
rid of things you don't need. Like I said, clean

(13:42):
it up if you can paint it a neutral color.
So if your teenage son's bedroom is black, that's not
super appealing to everybody, you know. I mean it might
have looked cool for him, but maybe a neutral color, okay.

Speaker 5 (13:58):
But then the.

Speaker 4 (13:59):
Big thing is get a real estate professional. Don't try
to do it yourself. Because so Josh, for example, let's
say that I wanted to come in and run the chamber. Right,
I'm not a chamber professional. I'm the president of the board.
But that's a completely different gig than running the chamber.

(14:19):
So if I came in and said I'm going to
run the chamber, once you got done laughing.

Speaker 3 (14:24):
Yeah, you'd probably have to pick me up both you'd.

Speaker 4 (14:26):
Say good luck. And I don't know the first thing
about running the chamber. I could muddle my way through
a few things, but I don't really know. It's the
same thing when people try to sell the house. They
think they're going to save money by not paying compensation
to their realter or other realtors.

Speaker 5 (14:45):
There is a statistic though.

Speaker 4 (14:46):
That says sellers who use a realter gain seventeen percent
more money than if they did it themselves. Because we
know how to price things, folks, things that folks think
they can look gone other sites that start with Z,
and you know, figure out the comps that have sold

(15:08):
in the area, so comparable sales. You has talked about
comps other things that have sold in the area, But
you can't really, you don't have access to the MLS,
which is what I mean. We pay to have access
to that. So we can go on and we can
figure out really what we think the price of your
home should be, and we're going to price it competitively
because we want it to sell. And I hear over

(15:28):
and over again every year, Well, my neighbor's house sold
last year for three hundred thousand dollars. That's what I
want to price my house at. Well, maybe the neighbor's
house had an extra bedroom, maybe it had an extra
garage space, Maybe it had an extra bathroom, maybe it
has a finished basement. It may be comparing apples and oranges,

(15:48):
and it's not fair for you as a seller. So
first of all, get yourself a good realtor. Second of all,
let them competitively price your house for you. And that's
the best way to go about it.

Speaker 2 (16:00):
I would totally agree with that statement. All right, So
let's let's have something fun here. What's the most interesting
or unusual home you have ever sold?

Speaker 4 (16:11):
Okay, So I've been thinking about this and I didn't
sell it, but I showed it to some clients. Okay,
So if any of my friends are listening, they all
know I'm five foot one.

Speaker 5 (16:25):
I'm a shorty girl, right yep?

Speaker 4 (16:27):
Okay, So I'm in this house and I if I
am dying, I'm lying, and vice versa. The house was
made for giants. The bathroom vanities, the kitchen counters. I
could have walked up and sat my chin on the
edge of the kitchen counter.

Speaker 3 (16:45):
Oh my gosh.

Speaker 4 (16:46):
If I wanted to get into the cabinets, a step
stool wasn't going to do it. I would have needed
a paint ladder. I couldn't reach the microwave. I felt
like a three year old there was. It was the
most bizarre house I was ever in. So everything the
lights we were face height on the wall for me,
the outlets were as tall as my knee.

Speaker 5 (17:07):
Who lives in this house?

Speaker 3 (17:08):
I was thinking the same thing. Who told them to
do this?

Speaker 4 (17:12):
Giants and my my clients were just like normal sized people.
And then in the one bedroom there was a bookcase
that was empty. Did everything in it, and then there's
a trap door below it you could climb. The bookcase
was like some kind of funky ladder. You could climb
the bookcase down to the bedroom below through the trap

(17:32):
door and back up again.

Speaker 5 (17:33):
If you wanted. It was a series of bookcases that
you could climb it. I don't even know. It was
a very very strange and eclectic house.

Speaker 3 (17:42):
But if you all could see my face right now.

Speaker 4 (17:47):
If you could have seen me trying to put my
face on the counter, you would have been cracking up
because that counter had to be at least five feet high.

Speaker 2 (17:54):
Unreal, nuts, totally unreal. So let's talk about your dream home.
What does your dream home look like?

Speaker 4 (18:04):
So I am a Florida native and I'm a beach girl.

Speaker 3 (18:08):
Go gators, one.

Speaker 4 (18:09):
Hundred percent Gators. Yes, if there is any wildcat fans
out there, don't be med. Sorry, but I'm a beach girl.
There's no place I'd rather be. I'm just so happy
to be at the beach. So if I could have
a dream home and be at the beach, and it
would have a wrap around porch where I could sit
outside with friends and family, So like, picture it right,

(18:32):
big Florida ceiling windows, gauzy curtains, sheer gauzy curtains. You
know you can have the windows open, a nice breeze,
a kitchen that you can cook in without people bumping
into you, which drives me nuts. But just very open
and I can look at the I can look at the.

Speaker 5 (18:50):
Water all day long.

Speaker 2 (18:52):
Spoken like someone who won you spend time in Florida
and two has seen a lot of houses, y'all.

Speaker 5 (18:58):
I mean, does that that sound amazing?

Speaker 2 (19:00):
Sound amazing? And I'm not even one for playing in
the water in the ocean, right. I could live on
the beach for sure. Yeah, and work from my front porch.
That sounds highly enticing.

Speaker 5 (19:10):
Get you some Internet, I know who to call, that's right.

Speaker 2 (19:14):
So let's talk a little bit about social media because
I know from having watched you and the team that
you work with, social media is a big part of
what you all do. So can you talk about how
that's impacted your business or how it's helped your business?

Speaker 4 (19:29):
Social media is one of those things like it or
love it. It's here. I particularly mostly like social media.
I'm a Facebook girl. I'm a gen x er, so
I'm a Facebook girl.

Speaker 5 (19:41):
I really like it.

Speaker 4 (19:42):
It keeps me in touch with my friends and family
who aren't here. I'm also a linked In girl, a
little bit of Instagram and you know TikTok. You know,
it's all fun. So social media gives you a chance
to put your message out there, put your branding out there.

(20:03):
And I was visiting a friend of mine this morning
where she works, and I was touring her facility, and
I did a Facebook live and I saw people just
popping into the video just to watch and see what
were we talking about. We were at a senior community
ever Lona, Louisville, and I you know, maybe these people

(20:23):
listening to us needed senior care.

Speaker 5 (20:27):
Maybe they just were being.

Speaker 4 (20:28):
Nosy and wanted to see what I was talking about.
But it allows you to share that piece of your
business life, that piece of your personal life. It allows
you to share with other people. And you never know
what is going to resonate with someone. You don't know
what's going to help someone, And you know, social media
can be a lot of fun.

Speaker 3 (20:47):
Totally agree.

Speaker 2 (20:49):
It's probably one of my favorite spaces to kill time.
So I'm somebody who's maybe considering a change in career
and going into real life.

Speaker 3 (20:59):
State advice do you have for me?

Speaker 4 (21:01):
So people think I think from watching these TV shows
right that it's super easy to be a realtor and
we get buckets of money, buckets of money. So it's
not super easy and there aren't buckets of money we

(21:23):
get paid normal money like everybody else does.

Speaker 5 (21:27):
Do you know how commission marks.

Speaker 2 (21:29):
I know a little. I know enough to be dangerous,
but not enough to know foolish.

Speaker 4 (21:32):
Okay, So here's here's the bucket of money myth that
I'm going to debunk. So a seller is going to
sell his or her house, and they meet with their agent,
their listing agent, and then they decide how much compensation
they want to offer to their agent. Then they decide
if they want to offer compensation to the buyer's agent.

(21:56):
And that's all done, you know, prior to listing. Okay,
So then everybody knows how much the compensation is. And
people think that the agent gets all that money. Well, no,
because if there's compensation offered to both sides, for example,
one side gets well, let's say, for easy math, let's

(22:18):
say one side gets half, the other side gets half.
But I don't get all that money. My brokerage gets
some of it, my team leader gets some of it.
So like you have to share as a realtor, frequently
you have to share that compensation with other people. So
the bucket gets a little smaller, but at the end
of the day, you know it's a good gig. It's

(22:39):
not easy. If you want to make giant buckets of money,
you kind of have to work a lot. If you
like being off on the weekends, there's none of that
because that's when people buy houses. And when you start out,
you should have another source of income, whether you've got

(23:01):
a second job, because if I put you under contract today,
it's four to six weeks before I get paid when
we close. So you have to be prepared for those
ups and downs and have another financial source. That's very helpful.

Speaker 3 (23:17):
Absolutely well.

Speaker 2 (23:18):
And here's the thing, folks, I will tell you that
I work with all types of realtors and Shelley's always
one of my go to because she thinks about it,
she cares, and she's hustling. That's the one thing I'll
say about Shelley and about a couple others in our chamber.

Speaker 3 (23:33):
They're out there working it.

Speaker 2 (23:34):
So if you have a need, I hope you'll keep
my friend famous Shelley with the Keller Reeiams Little East
in mind. And I want to thank Shelley for being
in the studio with me today. If you want to
learn more about the Chamber of Saint Matthew's, make sure
you check out our website Stmatthewschamber dot com, or find
us on Facebook or LinkedIn, and and make sure you
tune in next week because we're gonna hear from Jessica

(23:57):
Fink with Work Well Industries on Talk radio ten eighty. Everybody,
have a great day.