Episode 84: Pirate Ship (With State Broker Nick Coppola)

Imagine having a workspace set up with two monitors, a laptop, and a headset, communicating with agents all day long, aiming to help them close deals and achieve success. Welcome Nick Coppola, a Michigan-based broker who plays a pivotal role in a cloud-based company. Nick's typical day is anything but traditional as he juggles chats, emails, phone calls, and texts, all in the bid to support his agents. Backed by a team of support staff including agent service coordinators and settlement specialists, he's redefining what it means to be a broker in the digital age.

Ever wondered how a virtual brokerage operates? With Nick, we explore the exciting dynamics of working in a cloud-based enterprise. Hear about how this platform offers a faster service than conventional brick-and-mortar companies and discover stories of the most unusual phone calls Nick has received. We also delve into the concept of leveraging conversation, and how this platform allows Nick to step in when needed. Nick even shares his thoughts on the potential impact of AI on the future of cloud-based platforms, offering a peek into the future of the industry.

But the job of a broker isn't just about technology. There are unique dynamics that come with being a Michigan real estate broker. Learn about the challenges team leads face in checking their egos and how Nick introduces brokers to clients using the cloud-based platform. Get a glimpse of a possible hybrid real estate model and how common real estate transaction issues are addressed in the virtual world. So gear up for an enlightening conversation into the world of cloud-based brokerages with Nick Coppola and unravel the future of the real estate industry.

If you enjoy our content, please like, subscribe, and share. You can also catch the show LIVE @ facebook.com/freeforallfriday and make sure you stick around after for "the afterburner"

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
You're listening to the number one live Colin
podcast for real estate agentsand professionals all around the
world.
World-class guests, breakingnews and you with your host,
johnny, awesome and Jimmy,fantastic.
You are on free for all Friday.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
Good morning Good morning Good morning, good
morning everybody.
This is Jimmy Fantastic.

Speaker 3 (00:29):
I am, but a special my creator deposit, deposit
energy.
I'm clicking way too manybuttons at once and, jimmy, let
it be known that I will live upmy purpose to take free the
changes to play to see stuffloose the place of my mediocrity
and ask every person I meet whyI have good when you can have
awesome.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
They're buttons, buttons, buttons.
That is Johnny buttons.

Speaker 3 (00:49):
Scrabbling last minute to try to get everything
running as as we do normally onthe show, but it's an important
show for us.
That's why I'm going tocontinue to scramble here, Jimmy
, while you introduce our guest,which we are very excited to
bring in today.

Speaker 2 (01:02):
Yes, sir.
So we have Nick Coppola here,one of our brokers here in the
state of Michigan, and we'rehappy to have you here this
morning.

Speaker 4 (01:16):
Jimmy.
Thank you, mr Awesome, thankyou.

Speaker 3 (01:23):
Oh, mr Awesome, only my, only my Google assistant.
That's fun.
So we are.
We are really excited to haveyou here, and I have to tell you
and I hope that you take thisin all like just I'm just going
to start off with a banger.
I guess I mean this with alldue respect.
Sure, you are so much coolerlooking in person than in your

(01:45):
photo.
Well, thank you, I'm going tototally take that.
Like in your photo.
You look like that, totallyserious, like I can like win any
case broker.

Speaker 4 (01:53):
Yeah, like a broker lawyer, right, yeah, yeah, yeah
which is cool.

Speaker 3 (01:57):
I see where they come .
But in person, like, like youknow, I think I don't know if we
actually until the picnic I'msure that we've spoke one or
twice, once, one or twice Lookat this guy who can speak for a
living but until that picnic Idon't think we ever actually
like talk, talk.
And I was like man, I knoweverybody thinks that you're so
cool, Thank you, yeah, so I hada lot of fun.

Speaker 4 (02:17):
Thank you Appreciate that the picnic was great.

Speaker 3 (02:21):
I don't know if I can talk about that for a quick
second.
Yeah, it's all.

Speaker 4 (02:23):
free game One of the things with the XP we're trying
to do more of is more of thoseIRL, in real life events, and
that picnic is one of thosethings that we started last year
.
This was the second annual andit's just a great event, right
when the agents get together,like as a community right, where
you get to see your fellowagent.
You're right, you know.
Unfortunately, the one downsideto the broker position is is

(02:45):
that I don't get to meet.
We have 2600 agents.
I don't get to meet everybodyin person, unfortunately, right,
and I wish there was a way thatI could.
So, when we get to have thoseevents, I love just doing that
right, shaking hands, kissingbabies.

Speaker 2 (03:02):
Well, you and I had the chance to meet at the
regional event.
Yes, we did United wholesaleand again another EXP Like cool
event, right, I mean I thoughtthat that regional event was
really cool, having theopportunity to get to reward
agents and again get face toface with them and touch with
them.
So but, like that was one of myquestions is as a broker for

(03:25):
EXP, what's that Like?
I'm the broker for acloud-based company.
Like I'm the broker for acloud-based company.
What is that even?
How does that look?

Speaker 4 (03:33):
Yeah, you know it's funny because I do get asked
that question and people arealways like, well, what do you
do all day?

Speaker 2 (03:39):
Right, I say my version of the law.
By the way, we're alreadygetting questions.

Speaker 3 (03:43):
And it's kind of the first question.
So when you're done, that'swe're already hitting on it.

Speaker 4 (03:48):
Yes, what do you do all day?
Really not much.
I mean, I'm kidding.
I'm joking, I'm really joking, Idon't do anything.
Yeah, it's funny because if youcould be the fly on the wall,
literally, I have a five footdesk with, you know, two
monitors and a laptop and aheadset like this and my queue
is full and I am literallycommunicating with agents all

(04:11):
day long, whether it be onworkplace chat in EXP world or
email or actual phone calls.
So what we've tried to do moreof is as cool as EXP world is,
and I encourage every EXP agentto use it.
We're trying to meet agentswhere they are, not where we
want them to be.
So if an agent wants tocommunicate by phone, we

(04:31):
communicate by phone.
If they want email, it's email.
If it's, you know, text, we caneven do that now, which is
pretty cool technology thatwe've added.
So what I do all day isliterally communicate and help
agents Like my number one jobfunction is to help our agents
get their deals closed, helpthem be successful.

Speaker 2 (04:50):
Yeah, because that was one of the questions.
I'm like, man, I go.
So there's 2600 agents here andthere's you, christie and Kim
right are our three brokers thatwe can go to.
It's funny, even at the event,at the regional event, you guys,
is that too like?
Just give me a workplace chat.
It's probably the fastestresponse you're going to get
100%, 100%.

Speaker 4 (05:13):
Then you had agents go.

Speaker 2 (05:14):
What's workplace?
Chat True.

Speaker 4 (05:17):
Very, very true.
They do that a lot.
And then, look, I want to givecredit to the rest of the staff.
Right, there's three brokers,but we also have support staff
as well.
We have three what we call it,uh, agent service coordinators.
We have three contractcompliance specialists.
We have three transactionsettlement specialists.
So we can't do it all.
And if you think about thetraditional brick and mortar

(05:39):
broker which I was, prior tocoming to EXP, I managed for
another company, I had like ahundred and something agents,
you're everything when you'rethat broker, right?

Speaker 2 (05:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (05:49):
I mean you do it all, no matter what.
You know, somebody has acommission problem, they they're
coming to you.
There's no toilet paper.
They come to you.
You know what I mean.
I, you know it doesn't matterwhat it is, they come to you.
Hey, there's no toilet paper.
I'm like could you tell Susieat the front desk, do I really
have to be the guy that hastoilet paper?
But here it's.
It's very divide and conquerand the brokers handle broker

(06:13):
specific things right.
I may direct you where to go,but it's not Nick specifically
handling that that particulartask.

Speaker 2 (06:21):
Yeah, and you don't need virtual toilet paper.

Speaker 4 (06:23):
No, no, virtual toilet paper.

Speaker 3 (06:25):
Although, although I mean, we do have a pirate ship.

Speaker 4 (06:27):
We do.

Speaker 3 (06:28):
That's the thing we have our first question in, and
here's what it is.
This is this comes from Carlo.
So you're you know, carlo.
He says what is your averageresponse time when an agent
reaches out to you for Carlo?

Speaker 4 (06:47):
specifically, carlo specifically.
I just let it wait, wait, waitwait, wait.
We try to answer every questionwithin the same day, right, but
what I would say to that is in acaveat to to agents is is that
try to let us know if it's anemergency, Like we're not mind

(07:08):
readers.
If you have a closing in twohours and you need me
immediately say in the workplace, yeah hey, urgent closing is at
two and it's 1145.
I need a call in, you know thenext 10 seconds kind of thing,
and we prioritize those.
Think of all of it, like almostlike an ER room, Like we triage
what becomes the most important.

Speaker 2 (07:30):
Yeah, and here's my question back to Carlo how many
times do you have to call thebroker?

Speaker 4 (07:35):
Oh, I talk to Carlo every day.
Don't worry, Carlo.
I remember my first week in thebusiness too.

Speaker 3 (07:44):
You'll get over it one day.

Speaker 2 (07:46):
He's actually got over that hump right.

Speaker 3 (07:48):
He said he's still waiting for directions to the
picnic last week.

Speaker 4 (07:51):
You know what, I don't remember getting that
request.

Speaker 3 (07:55):
Carlo, I think there's a reason that you didn't
get them.
So you know, jimmy hit on itearlier, and it's one of the one
of the crazy things that Iguess we all kind of wonder too
is so it's a, it's a virtualbrokerage, which is not like a
traditional right, and sobecause of that, things happen.
I'm trying to think of whichway I want to go.

(08:16):
There's so many questions Ihave.
What is the let's talking about?
People calling in withquestions or suggestions, like
what's one of the craziest callsthat you've fielded so far?

Speaker 4 (08:26):
So I had an agent.

Speaker 2 (08:28):
No names.
We'll ask you the name afterwe're off here.

Speaker 4 (08:32):
So I had this is recently too, it was just a
couple months ago had an agentcall me and she was very
distraught on the phone call andit was an urgent phone call and
I'm hey, what's?
You know what's going on?
And she's like I was just in ahouse in Detroit with the
landlord.
You show me the place, we'regoing to list the property, we

(08:54):
go down the basement stairs andas we're going down the basement
stairs, one of the tenants isstill there and they start
yelling at each other.
All of a sudden she's like Ihear a gunshot and I literally
ran up the stairs, ran out, gotmy car and I called you and I
said call 911.
Don't call me, call 911.

(09:18):
This poor landlord could bebleeding to death right, we
don't know for sure, right, Okay, okay, Call 911.
Call me right back.
She calls 911, calls me rightback.
The landlord got out of thereand texted her and said you know
I'm fine, I'm down the street.
You know I called the police,but that one was kind of
shocking, right.

Speaker 3 (09:36):
Like.

Speaker 4 (09:36):
I have to be honest with you.
All my years of doing this,like never have I had that type
of phone call.
She was clearly shaken and sheshouldn't be right, and I don't
think the guy shot at him.
I think he shot to scare him.
Yeah, this is what happened,but that's one of the ones, yeah
.

Speaker 3 (09:54):
I thought the landlord was calling to be like
all right, you're good Come back.

Speaker 4 (09:57):
No, no, no, no, You'd think right.

Speaker 2 (09:59):
I don't know that.
My first phone call would be tothe broker.

Speaker 4 (10:01):
Sorry, I mean, that's why you asked what was the
weirdest phone call.
I even sounded shocked.
Why are you calling me?
What am I going to do?

Speaker 3 (10:09):
I'm virtual, see that Right, right right.
I'm sorry I got nothing.
Was that the like?
Was that the way she had to goto a Starbucks.
Log into the world online walkaround.

Speaker 1 (10:20):
Yeah, Update this, right yeah update the world 20
minutes later, she got into youwith a room.

Speaker 3 (10:24):
That's funny.
So how is it working?
So you, you know you weresaying you came from brick and
mortar into a virtual world andwe'll talk a little bit about
that too.
But like, how is it going fromthat to, you know, sitting in a
room with a little avatar andwalking around and pirate ships
and soccer and basketball, and Imean it's yeah, you know what

(10:45):
I'm asking.

Speaker 4 (10:45):
Yeah, no, I know what you're asking.
You know it's funny, because IfI'm, if I look back on it, and
you were to ask me this before Ibecame a broker yeah, xp, I
would have laughed at you andsaid this is stupid, like I'm
not doing that.
You know what I mean like.
I don't play video games all daylike this is ridiculous.
My kid does that, you know.

(11:06):
But now that I do it, I realizethat the agents can actually
get better Service with ourplatform than they can with
brick and mortar.
Because, if you think about it,when I was a brick and mortar
broker, if I went out to lunchwith Jimmy for two hours there
was no one to service you,jimmy's pacing down the hallway
waiting for me to come backbecause I'm out to lunch and he

(11:29):
has an issue here.
What happens is is it if Nick isin that platform and I'm on a
call, I can click myself off?
That lets Christie know, or Kimknow, or the CCS is no, or
anybody else know.
Hey, I need to step in.
So it literally gives you amuch faster response time to the
agent.
Then it would if I was a brickand mortar, because, again, I'm

(11:51):
doing everything at brick andmortar, so I I can't be
everywhere and I can't doeverything.
It allows for.
That leverage conversation isreally what it does.
So it it it creates a situationwhich I would have never
thought of before I got there.
How do I leverage myself as abroker?

Speaker 2 (12:10):
Hmm, I don't know if that makes sense, yeah, it does
and it because you're right, itin the brick and mortar, like if
you think you said, if you'reout, you're out, like yeah, if
you go on vacation, I don't know, there's yeah.

Speaker 4 (12:22):
I mean I might have another broker at one of the
other offices, kind of fill infor me or somebody I don't know
who that guy, but you don't knowthat guy, yeah, so you don't
care about him, right?

Speaker 2 (12:31):
and then I'm really stuck.
So, and one of the things I doI do want to like I Appreciate
what you guys do is like when weget the email on Thursday,
friday, that as your broker oncall this weekend is yeah, right
, or Christie or whoever's gonnabe a call, so we get that email
like, alright, here's yourperson for the weekend.
If you're paying attention toyour email, Well, yeah, and

(12:52):
that's a whole thing.

Speaker 4 (12:53):
It's hard when you think about it, right, Like how
do we communicate with 2600agents?
Yeah, right, and there's onlyso many channels, if you think
about it right.
Email workplace you know thosekind of things, you know, maybe.
You know maybe a text messagesystem which they're checking on
and stuff like that.
But even that could get alittle old to the agents might
not like that.
So you're right about that.
But I would encourage all theagents that listen.

(13:15):
You know, check workplace youknow, keep that app on your
phone.
I know it sounds silly, buthonestly we communicate a lot of
stuff on there.

Speaker 2 (13:22):
Yeah, you see my going.

Speaker 3 (13:24):
Yeah, I mean we do.
So, let me, let me go back.
Yeah, let me go back a second,just because one of the stigmas
that that does exist around thebrokerage is the virtual world
place, and you even admittedyourself, like before, you're a
broker.
If you were looking at this,you'd be like, well, this is
silly, this little place, right?
Yeah, so like.
But once you get in it, youstarted realizing, okay, it's

(13:46):
still.
I mean, it still might be alittle silly.
There's a pirate ship, right?

Speaker 4 (13:50):
Which is fun.

Speaker 3 (13:52):
But it's also something that I never, I never
thought about before.
The functionality behind it, ohoutweighs, and the benefits
outweighs other people's Stigmasabout it.
I guess, what would you say tosomebody that still thinks that
it's a silly little broker witha video game attached to it?

Speaker 4 (14:11):
You know it's.
We get asked this questionquite often and I will tell you
that our people that areRecruiting and attracting agents
and bringing them into theplatform the best ones at it a
Curt Shewell of the world, ago-go Bethke, you know, I mean
people like this that areactually bringing a lot of
people into our brokerage.

(14:32):
They literally leverage thatand bring them in for a tour.
I can't tell you how many timesshe wells brought somebody in
just to Introduce them to thebrokers, like hey, man, I just
want to show you how easy it isto get a hold of your broker.
See what we did right here.
You know, like we just came inhere, I pulled the ticket, nick
pulled us back here we'resitting here with a broker and
it took, oh, all of about 60seconds that I didn't even 180

(14:56):
seconds or whatever it is.
So I that's what I would say topeople.
I'd say you're not realizingthe tool, that you have to be
able to leverage that tool in adifferent way.

Speaker 3 (15:07):
What, what?
Oh man, I didn't even.
I've never even thought aboutthat.
So so people are just like, hey, let me introduce myself to you
, pull a ticket and you're justavailable Whenever, what, so,
what?
Okay, so what's the mostUnutilized other than that?
Because that's got to be what'sthe most unutilized thing that
you think.
That happens with exp and expworld.

Speaker 4 (15:25):
So there's probably two things that I would say that
could be utilized more, and oneis the world, just in general.
But if you want to be morespecific about that, look, if
you have an accounting problemwith you know your AR account or
commissions or whatever you canliterally pop into the world
and go directly to accounting.
You're not calling, you're notsitting on hold, you're not

(15:45):
sending an email, you're notdoing those things.
You're not driving out of theyou're not driving out of the
office or any of that stuff.
You literally can do that.
They pull up your account, lookat everything.
So the menu system.
You have to explore it.
It's like all pieces ofsoftware, your phone, a computer
program, whatever it is.
You've got to look ateverything, click on everything.

(16:06):
You're not gonna break it right.
So go to all the differentplaces.
Yeah, the pirate ship is cooland that's fun, but also go into
the auditorium.
The other thing that is widelyUnutilized is the exp University
.
I mean we have so manysuccessful agents that teach so
much content it literally isalmost overwhelming.

(16:28):
But I would tell you I mean, ifyou're not expanding your
knowledge, you're missing out.
I mean we have people not justin Michigan but all over the
country that you can literallyaccess their content and what
they're teaching.
You want to know how to do agreat open house?
Believe me, it's there.
You want to know how togeographically farm?
Believe me when I tell you it'sthere, you just have to reach

(16:48):
out and ask for it a little bit.
Hmm.

Speaker 3 (16:50):
That's awesome.
That's All right, I want tojump into.
I want to jump into some ofthis because our whole audience
is not exp.
Yeah so I do have a but butfascinating being part of it not
not again the pull the ticketto introduce the broker.
It's something I would havenever thought about.

Speaker 2 (17:05):
Yeah, and I mean working as close as I did with
Kurt for so long.
Yeah, I know that.

Speaker 3 (17:10):
I got a share.
I'm gonna share my partnershipstory, though you want can I
share.
Can I share a story with youwithout getting in trouble?
Okay, so Exp when it firstlaunched didn't have the
greatest security measures,right.
So almost anybody could get anexp account and log in and he's
sweating, he's already.
So the two things that I didthat were really fun.

(17:30):
Now it's kw at the time, right,yeah.
And so again we're all likewhat is this?
And I remember logging in andI'm looking around and the first
thing I saw was that that shipright.
So I swim out to the ship and Iknow it sounds ridiculous to
anybody, that's not exp, but Iswim out to the ship and I get
on and there's like 16 people onthis thing and Somebody likes

(17:54):
and I don't know who it was.
I apologize if this is you, butbut I get on there.
And the guy that was talking Ijust went and stood next to him,
right, I'm totally trollingthis place and and I just
remember he stopped talking andhe's like Hi, johnny.
And I was like hey, it's likethis is a private meeting.

(18:14):
And I said, no, this is apirate ship.
All right, everybody, let's goback to our room and I watched
all these little people jump offthe ship, swim away from it and
then disappear.
And then we went back and here'shere's one of my I guess one of
my questions I had written downhere, and this goes back to my

(18:36):
Keller Williams days.
So it's 2016.
I'm big into KW.
Gary is on the stage.
He tells us that we're nolonger a training company, we're
gonna be a technology company.
Now, right, we go back afterfamily reunion and we lost our
first agent to exp and Iremember the office was like

(18:57):
what is this thing that'shappening?
Right, this is right before Igot my login for it.
And so we look everything upand I remember, like one of the
one of like computer nerd guys,the accountant dude sat down and
kind of was like all right, andhe tore the whole structure
apart and he said this model isnot sustainable.
And then he went to go and showus why.

(19:19):
And to this day, I know thatthere's a lot of people out
there still that don't believethat this model is sustainable.
So I guess one of my questionswould be like what do you say to
that that person out there thatdoesn't really look in deep
enough or thinks, for whateverreason, that this model is
unsustainable.

Speaker 4 (19:38):
You know it's funny because I've heard that comment
before.
You know we've had that commentbefore.
We probably don't get it asmuch as maybe you know someone
who's agent attracting you know,on the broker floor we're more
transactional based.
But if you think about thehistory and the evolution of
real estate and again look at,I'll be 33 years in September,

(20:01):
right, that's how long I've beendoing this.
And when I first got in it in90, remax was the new thing and
Remax was in town and they were,like you know, recruiting the
top tier agents and creatingthese offices that were set up
like law firms, right, eachagent paid a thousand bucks a
month and rent and they sharedan admin.

(20:22):
Well, that's a law firm typesetup, right, they share a
paralegal together or whateverit is.
And everybody said Remax won'tlast.
That model's unsustainable.
You know, thousand bucks amonth from 20 agents, there's
only 20 grand a month.
Nobody's gonna make any money.
Blah, blah, blah, blah.
Guess what, guys?
Even today, Remax is stillaround.

(20:43):
I mean, it's still a modelthat's working in certain
markets and different thingslike that.
So I guess what I would say isanytime that you have something
that's new and innovative andyou know that's different from
the norm, right, because it isdifferent from the norm, right.
I mean I think back even whenKeller first got and I was a

(21:05):
Keller guy for 15 years.
Right, oh, it's unsustainable.
You can't do a 70, 30 splitwith a cap, like no one will
make any money.
And same thing was said aboutKeller.
Honestly, I take it with a grainof salt and that's what I do.
I tell people those storiesbecause those stories are
history that prove that thatjust isn't true, because there's

(21:28):
always gonna be a new model.
There'll be another new model,believe it or not.
That will spin off from EXP andpeople will say that's not
sustainable.
But when we talk aboutdifferent brokerages it's never
one size fits all.
I mean, you probably still havefriends at Keller and they love
Keller and they'll probablynever leave Keller.
I still have friends that areat Remax that they'll never

(21:49):
leave Remax, no matter how manytimes I tell them about Keller.
They're just indoctrinated intothat system and they're loyal
to it.

Speaker 2 (21:56):
Yeah, I've got some friends at Keller and there's
like, unless Keller actuallygoes completely out of business,
that's the only way they'releaving 100% that's what I mean
100%.

Speaker 4 (22:06):
That's the only way they're getting out of it.
Yep, yep.
But I would say this to you wehave to do a better job, right,
and we do a great job.
But I'm just saying, if wecan't, if there's people out
there that are saying to us, heylook, this isn't sustainable,
then we're not conveying themodel correctly, right, we have
to do a better job of explaininghow the model works and show
them that it is, and we aredoing that, our actions are

(22:29):
showing that, but maybe we needto verbalize it a little bit
more.

Speaker 3 (22:33):
Very interesting.
That's good from a leadership'sperspective, looking down and
saying, all right, well, maybeit's our issue.
Not the fact that other peopleare just making stuff up.

Speaker 4 (22:41):
You gotta coach up right, and that's part of it.

Speaker 2 (22:44):
Yeah yeah, so you've been a state broker with
Michigan for how many years now?

Speaker 4 (22:49):
So it'll be two years .
In November I came to EXP Okay.

Speaker 2 (22:53):
And so one of my questions is what were your
initial thoughts and what arethey not Like?
What were your thoughts comingover and then did that?
Is that what's in your mindstill now, or has it changed?

Speaker 4 (23:05):
Sure, you know.
It's funny because you onlyknow what you know, right.
You only know what you knowComing over.
You know I'd been a broker in abrick and mortar location.
I had been a productivity coachwith KW.
I'd been a mentor, I was on theALC and I did all these things.
I asked me to be team leaderone time.

(23:27):
I turned it down.
I was too busy selling and Ijust had my daughter and so it
was all those kind of things.
But you think you're ready forthe job, right?
And when I went from Keller toanother company and became a
managing broker for them, I'mready for the job.
The truth of the matter was, isthat I wasn't really totally

(23:47):
ready for the job, right?
You're learning as you gobecause you don't know what you
don't know.
You think you have the rightskill set.
So you always revert back tobasics, which is am I good, you
know?
Am I emotionally intelligent?
Do I make logical, pragmaticdecisions, right?
Do I know the baseline of whatneeds to happen?
And then can I build on it fromthere and I tell agencies all

(24:11):
the time you're never gonna knoweverything.
Just focus on knowing thebasics.
If you've got those three basicqualities in it, then what's
going to happen is is thatyou'll make logical, rational
decisions that'll be prudent foryour business and that's really
what would have happened there.
So, to answer your question,what I thought and now where I
am, I wasn't ready.

(24:33):
I mean, I thought I was.
Did I have the experience onpaper?
Yeah, I'd been 30 years in thebusiness, right, so of course it
looks like I got it.
I did hundreds of transactions,I did all these different
positions.
I just tried to draw on everylittle piece.
But I'm thankful because if Iand this might sound

(24:54):
braggadocious, but I'm nottrying to say that there's only
three brokers in the state ofMichigan at this particular
moment in time that say thatthey've managed 2,600 agents,
and I'm one of them, that's it.
No one else has done it.
The largest KW office isn'teven close.

Speaker 2 (25:12):
Right right.

Speaker 4 (25:13):
So when I think about that, that's pretty awesome.

Speaker 2 (25:17):
Yeah, I mean it is cool.
And again, 2,600 people is alot of people.
And as a team leader, it waslike when we had the picnic over
the last weekend.
That was the first time I metChristie face to face, so it's
kind of cool.
But as a team leader, I alwaystried to filter this and then
when you and I talked, you'relike dude, why are you doing all

(25:38):
that?
Just call me yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 (25:42):
Do you think that that's a?
I have a theory about that andI just want to know if this is
right, Because I talked to teamleaders and large teams all over
the state and for me theyutilize their broker way
different than we do here inMichigan.
But Michigan, especially ourarea here in this area that
we're in, always seem to be likeodd, because you have more

(26:04):
Megas in a short period of spacethan anywhere else and, of
course, everybody has an office,which is weird because every
other exp location, like they,don't do that.
So do you think that that thisis a Michigan thing where they
don't utilize the broker as much?
Like I know, teams don't evenknow who the broker is.
They never reach out becausethey always go to the team.

(26:26):
They're treating the team as ifthey're the broker and instead
of leveraging the actual brokerwhich would, by the way,
especially if you're workingwith me, relieve a lot of stress
you should totally do that.

Speaker 2 (26:39):
Well, we're going to make sure Nick contacted.
It's out to our team that.

Speaker 3 (26:44):
I like the amount of times I tell agents that are
doing teams you're not thebroker.
Leverage the actual broker fora lot of these questions.
Yeah, You're not the broker,but yeah, do you think that this
is a unique Michigan problem?

Speaker 4 (26:57):
I do.
I know now from being involvedwith EXP and you talked about
the differences of when Istarted versus now.
This kind of goes back to that.
You know I'm now exposed tobrokers in other states, right,
because we have meetings and wetalk about different things and
we mastermind different things.
And so you're correct, it'shere, one of the things that's

(27:17):
really hard for team leads andI'm not picking on any
particular team lead, right, I'mjust saying it in general is
and Kurt Shewell talks aboutthis, I've heard him say this in
different things You've got tocheck your ego at the door, and
they have a really, really,really hard time checking the
ego at the door and letting meplay broker, because that's my

(27:40):
job and you play team leadbecause they want to project
themselves as everything toeveryone, and it's almost like a
knock on them if they can'tanswer the question, right, so
they'd rather give bad advicethan pass them over to somebody
else, and I view it as like ayou know, like a doctor, right.

(28:02):
You go for a physical and youtell them, hey, my arm hurts
this, that, whatever he doesn'tchop your arm off right there
and say, yep, I'll fix you rightnow.
Well, we need to see aspecialist.
Let's send you for x-rays,let's do this, let's do that,
right, and you're perfectly finewith that.
And that doctor, he's ageneralist, he's getting you to
the right person, thatspecialist, right, and that's

(28:24):
really what it's about.
So when you need the broker forcertain things, that's where we
come in, as the specialist oncertain topics.

Speaker 2 (28:32):
Mm yeah.

Speaker 4 (28:33):
So if I had a wish, I wish the team leads would check
the egos at the door.

Speaker 2 (28:38):
So here's what I'll promise you.
Johnny and I have checked theegos and everybody on our team
is gonna call you.

Speaker 3 (28:44):
Please, please, go ahead and queue up the question
there, jimmy.

Speaker 2 (28:48):
Yeah.
So the question from Carloagain is how was it that Nick
first became exposed to EXP, andwhat was it that actually made
him want to try the concept?

Speaker 4 (28:58):
Great question.
You know, it's pretty funnybecause when you look at your
career and you do it a long time, you start looking at like, hey
, what is the next phase?
Not that I didn't enjoy sellingas much and things like that,
but it got a little stalesometimes.
Right, you do it for 25 plusyears and that's how I got into
the managing broker role tobegin with back in 2018.

(29:20):
And then I was approached tomanage another company another
model quote unquote like an EXPthat wanted to open in the state
of Michigan and they werelooking for a managing broker.
And so they I wasn't the onlyperson they approached, so I

(29:41):
don't want to make it sound likeNick was so special I ended up
on some recruiters radar becausethey needed to open the state
and they said, hey, look, youknow we need to do this, are you
interested?
So I did open the state for thatbrokerage.
I was the designated managingbroker for that brokerage.
I spent about 90 days there andrealized that it was an

(30:05):
absolute train wreck.
Right, they were trying to ripoff the EXP model, tweak some
things, but they had Nothing inplace and Nick was just running
around with his hair on fire.
Not much of it, but what I hadwas on fire and I Was really
struggling with the decisionthat I had made and I ended up

(30:26):
talking to a friend of minewho's a broker down in South
Carolina.
He's a friend and a buddy andwe talk every Friday morning at
at 7 am.
We didn't do it today becauseof this, sorry.

Speaker 2 (30:38):
Yeah, no, no, is he watching right now?

Speaker 4 (30:40):
Yeah, he told me he was going to.
So Rick is a great guy and he's.
He started out asaccountability partner.
Obviously, we became friendsand we've been talking for four
or five years every Friday andso I was talking to him about it
.
I go, man, I'm just, I'mstruggling.
I'm just, you know, I took thisand I'm regretting my decision.
And and he was like you know,you just go back and sell like

(31:01):
what's the big deal?
You know, like just go becomean agent or look for another
managing broker gig and stufflike that.
And then, and somebody elsethat I know down in Florida said
hey, have you thought aboutchecking out exp?
I mean, you'd probably be agreat managing broker for exp
and I think they're hiringanother managing broker in
Michigan.
Oh, and so that was the, theconnection and and this person

(31:26):
wasn't even with exp at the atthe time.
Right, actually, I brought itmeant after right, which is kind
of funny, that it's awfulcircle stuff, right, the way it
goes around, but it it's kind offunny.
So that's how the the dotsconnected it's.
I got exposed to a model thatwas a rip-off.
What Kershi well says it alltime once you see it, you can't

(31:48):
unsee it, yeah, saw the value init and said, man, I really need
to be with the best player thathas this type of not model, not
the copycat right.

Speaker 3 (31:58):
You're not gonna tell through the copycat is no.

Speaker 2 (32:02):
Oh, but that's like again.
That's what we're seeing too,though right Is, there's more
than exp.
Oh yeah, cloud-based brokergoes, so that it's gonna happen
and it is, and Everybody's gonnasay, well, mines the best,
mines the, but it's gonna happen.
Of course, we know ours is thebest, but yeah well, you know.

Speaker 3 (32:19):
What's interesting, though, is is it is For some,
for some people.
I'm gonna play the devil'sadvocate and go back to the
beginning of the show, which Ithink Nick Was very smart about
saying right, just like Kellercame along was a model, and
remax came around there.
The other thing that'sinteresting is now the old dogs.
They're all switching theirmodels to try to keep up hundred

(32:41):
percent, and are they?
I don't know?
I'm not getting into thatdiscussion.
You feel free if you want to.
You can, though, at 313 644 forall, but it is interesting to
watch how everybody's kind ofrunning after the cloud-based
model now, well, still trying tobe brick-and-mortar, but at
some point in time, like it'sgonna be the Amazon Walmart
thing, like it's gonna happen toeverybody.

(33:02):
I'm gonna get to that in asecond, but before we do, kind
of going off of this questionabout how you got exposed to exp
and in your life, I wrote thisdown.
I thought this was aninteresting question, so I wrote
this down.
If your life was an analogy,what would it be?
Mmm?

Speaker 4 (33:18):
That's a good one.
Wow, if my, not, if my life wasan analogy, whoo Well, I I'm
gonna answer this, but I gottaactually think about it.
But I will tell you this funnystory while I'm kind of thinking
about it just to stall.
Yeah, I just told Jimmy this.
The other day I was on a boatwith a group of friends and we

(33:38):
were talking about one famousperson that you would trade
places with if you could.
Yes, okay, yeah, yeah, andyou're gonna.
You're gonna love who I picked,because I love who I picked.
I Would trade places with JimmyBuffett.
Yeah, he's the greatest guyever.
He sings about booze,cheeseburgers, women, flip-flops

(33:59):
, the sand beaches.
I mean, like margaritas,margaritas, who has a cooler
life than him?
So there's that piece, if youwant to know my analogy for life
.
It would be that.
But in terms of a quote, wow,you know I I've always loved the
very, very simple quote withwith Henry Ford If you think you

(34:20):
can or you think you can't,you're right.
I've always loved that quote.
You know, I was a guy thatnever really thought I couldn't.
Hmm you know, I always think Ican.
I don't know if that's true,but I'm also not afraid to just
try.
You know, I don't.
I Don't.
Failure doesn't totally get medown and and, quite honestly,

(34:43):
one of the times that it reallydid was that three months Stent,
where I I jumped ship, openedthe state of Michigan for that
brokerage and thought, man, whatdid I do?
Like I had a cool life, youknow what I mean.
Like I'm, you know my wife's,like you should be on the boat
more.
Like why are you stressing outover this stuff?
You know that he kind of thing,the other genius of a
cloud-based brokerage.

Speaker 2 (35:03):
Yeah, you could totally be on the boat.

Speaker 3 (35:05):
They wouldn't know, because you're wearing pants in
the world.
I'm wearing pants.

Speaker 2 (35:12):
In the world.

Speaker 4 (35:15):
You know I love that quote.
I don't know if that'sanswering your question a
hundred percent but that's theone that I resonate with
constantly, and it's not someprofound Tony Robbins quote or
anything like that, it's justand I'm a huge Henry Ford fan.
I thought the guy was justWiredly brilliant.
You know, I read biographies onhim and stuff like that.
I just just a smart sob, youknow.

Speaker 3 (35:36):
If you really think about it, you know what's the
one thing that you admire mostabout them?

Speaker 4 (35:41):
tenacity and and that's why I love that
particular quote like he, he didnot back down from Anything, it
didn't matter what it was, hehad tenacity.

Speaker 2 (35:52):
I mean, he just didn't back down and I think
it's funny because the creationof the assembly line right, like
we've, we've put that in somany pieces of business now
percent, like even in realestate, all right, like all
right, we got your salesperson,they got transaction coordinator
, then you got your closingcoordinator, then you got you
know what I mean.
So it's like all these peopleare taking care of their
specific things because it'sthat back to that leverage Bees.

(36:13):
Hundred percent, it's back toleverage Bees.
How can I get more time back inmy day?
The Austin Chevron?
How can I get more time back inmy day?
What am I leveraging my timefor my money?
100% right, and I think that'sone of the biggest things and we
see it so many places now and Ieven in, like I said, in real
estate.

Speaker 4 (36:29):
I would agree a hundred percent.
I mean, when you think aboutwhat he did and I know we're
getting sidetracked here withthat but it is the leverage
piece, because People always go,oh he invented the automobile.
No, he didn't.
He could have cared less aboutinventing the automobile.
He let some guy in France dothat, or Germany or wherever it
was.
He invented the assembly line,which was far more, a Much

(36:49):
greater invention than theautomobile was.
So he really invented the bestpiece, because his piece now is
integrated into everyday life ina million different things that
we do, so that you asked me whyI'm a fan of his.
Because of that right.

Speaker 2 (37:06):
Well, it goes back to what we were talking about, too
with brokerages right, there'salways gonna be the copycat,
sure, and there's gonna besomebody that comes along and
says my idea is better, 100%,and and again we're seeing it
with cloud based, there's othercloud based companies.
Now it's coming, it's it'scoming down the line, and I
think one of the things thatKurt leans on this you know,
talks about this all the timetoo is like the.
The cloud based companies arewhere everybody's going.

(37:29):
Couldn't agree right like that'sjust technology, that's where
we're going, I mean, with theadvancements in AI and all the
things that are happening in ourworld right now.
It's like well, how are you notjust doing everything on your
computer, johnny?
You do.
That's Johnny's like.
Why doesn't everybody's doeverything on their computer?

Speaker 3 (37:45):
when.
So I used to work for the bluecircle company, right, who I
believe is one of the three thatyou're talking about, and I
remember when I, when I startedthere, there was I hate
paperwork, so being cloud basedfor me is like the best thing
ever and I was always against it.
Back then, you used to be ableto get that green certification,
and the only reason I even wentto get that was so that I could

(38:09):
go to my broker and be like,hey, as I'm green certified and
so I can't really do paper, butI have a tablet.
At the time, people could signdirectly on right, like I'd
rather do that.
And this is a time when, youknow, it's like 2010, 2011 we
had two computers in our office.
We had just gotten Wi-Fi rightfor all the agents, because they

(38:30):
were always behind time.
Yeah, and so it was.
It was something.
And so come me coming in thereand finding that designation as
an excuse because paperwork andyou know it's really fun,
because technology.
You know real estate agents wehave.
We have a lot of similaritiesand when you group us all

(38:53):
together, paperwork and keepingtrack where everything is is one
of the things that we don't dothe best, we're correct.
So if we can do that virtually,where we can submit stuff and
it's just always there, itreally it really helps and that
was something that I learned onreally early on.
But you, I got a reallyinteresting question for you
based on what you just answeredfrom Jimmy there about About us

(39:15):
being cloud-based.
Do you see any of these bigbrick and like can you see a day
where Keller Williams says youknow what?
We're going all cloud-based, orany of these other big guys, or
do you think they're stuck intheir ways?

Speaker 4 (39:26):
you know One of the things.
It's funny because I actuallyhad this conversation Similar
with somebody else and theyasked me hey, like where do you
think this is going?
Like, what's your opinion?
I don't think it's a hundredpercent one way or the other.
And we touched on this earlierbecause you said, hey, we're in
southeastern Michigan and youknow we have all these offices.

(39:48):
Yeah, so even though we're avirtual cloud-based brokerage,
we have team leads that are likeI need brick and mortar, I need
an office, I need an office.
I Ultimately see this.
This is Nick's opinion.

Speaker 2 (39:59):
Let me preface it by saying that you are the master
of your own opinion.

Speaker 4 (40:02):
Yes, I am the man.
I'm a legend in my own mind.
So I am definitely like so myopinion is is that it's
somewhere in the middle, because, again, remember, it's not one
size fits all.
So the beauty of our particularmodel is is that we allow for
that 100% cloud base.
If you want to work off yourboat, we could care less, go

(40:23):
right ahead.
But if you also have the thestones to open up a brick and
mortar shop somewhere, we'regonna work with you to do that
as well.
So I think there's a middleground there.
I don't think it's gonna be ahundred percent one way or a
hundred percent the other way,because you've got Human
personality is involved in it,right, and not everybody is

(40:44):
gonna feel as comfortable Justcloud based, or not everyone is
gonna feel as comfortable Justbrick and mortar base, and I
think it's one of the thingsthat it allows us to do is,
again, we keep talking aboutleverage.
It keeps coming up.
It keeps coming up EXP.
That model allows us to do both, and that's I said earlier too.
We're gonna meet agents wherethey are.

(41:05):
You want to communicate byphone?
I'll call you.
You want to do workplace chat?
Great.
You want to send me an email?
No problem.
And you want to come into theworld and be an avatar with me.
Great love to have you there.
Right, if you want to go to thepirate ship will go.
So that's that.
Hopefully that answers yourquestion.
I think it's gonna be acombination of both.

Speaker 3 (41:25):
Do you think that there's any of the big?
Well, I mean, we are the bignow, but do you think that
there's any moves that one ofthe big, you know brick and
mortars could make when if they,if they brought this piece on
that, it would be like oh, oh,or are we too far ahead?

Speaker 4 (41:44):
the only.
Again, merely an opinion.

Speaker 3 (41:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (41:48):
I'm saying, yeah, the only one that I personally see
in my opinion that that itpotentially could make that kind
of a shift a little bit isKeller.
Yeah just just because of theirsize and scope, and if you think
about what I'm proposing andsaying that it's gonna be a
hybrid of both, I Think thatthey've got that brick and

(42:10):
mortar network set up, yeah, soif they could overlay it with
some sort of virtual platform,they may have a shot right to.
I don't, I don't think they'regonna stop us.
Quote unquote.
That's not what I'm saying.
They would have a shot tocompete because you still have a
large contingency of people.
And look, 15 years at Keller.

(42:32):
I have an affinity for that.
I learned a ton in the Kellersystem.
I crafted my skill set in theKeller system, like, I'm so glad
that I went there when I did,because it gave me a skill set
that, honestly, I wouldn't haveif I didn't.
If that makes sense.
So they're the ones I thinkcould do it.

(42:52):
The problem they have, though,is is that they can't emulate
our stock unless they decided togo public, and Gary's got too
big of an ego for that.
I don't know if they couldemulate any revenue share,
because it's profit share model.

Speaker 3 (43:06):
I mean, that's a completely different Well, then
with the brokers, what are youdoing?

Speaker 4 (43:09):
They're all franchisees, yeah so I don't
know how they could pull thatoff.
The only part they could pulloff is here's a virtual world
that you could get into.
Potentially, That'd take a lotof money and we're way ahead of
them.

Speaker 2 (43:23):
Well, that, and then the KW command is working so
well.

Speaker 4 (43:26):
Oh yeah, it's beautiful.

Speaker 2 (43:29):
But you know, the funny thing is, all three of us
were at Keller at some point andwe were all productivity
coaches.
Yeah, yeah, funny, but no, andagain it's, again it's.
There's a I think to your point, there's a model for everybody,
100%.
You know what I mean.
And Keller's stuff is fantastic.
I mean they're trainingmaterial, but now, diana, and

(43:50):
those moves are all being madetoo right.
So you know the K cause.
Johnny, you were a KW mapscoach.

Speaker 3 (43:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (43:57):
And I mean their stuff is great, it's.

Speaker 3 (44:00):
I had access to the yeah, the entire catalog.
But you know it's it's it'sit's different because you know
I've told people this a lot.
You know I was also like you.
We could family reunions, likeyou know I was.
There's no way that I neverleave, leave Keller Williams,
and it was because of thecamaraderie that you had, the,
the friendships that you hadwith one another, the coworkers,

(44:21):
and we'd go out and celebrate.
But it's really interesting andI don't know.
I don't know exactly how EXPpulled this off, but it went
from the camaraderie offriendships and coworkers to EXP
, as we're family and it reallydoes.
And people say that at Kellertoo, and I get that.
They're in their niches andsome of them might feel like

(44:42):
that, but for the majority ofeverybody I've never talked to a
switched over to here we allresonate with that it's just a
completely different.
It's just a completelydifferent feeling.
You know, like going to familyreunion is really cool and it's,
it's good for instant and, likeI said, it's like you're
hanging out.
You go into a party with abunch of friends and you know
you guys are out of that.
You know, go into the club andwatching Gary play bass, which

(45:03):
is fun, really is fun.
However, you go to an EXP eventor even one of the private
events that, like, brent Groveputs on, or even like the picnic
where you get a chance to youknow, see Justin Ford, and you
get a hug from these guys andit's like a wow, it's been a
while but we missed you.
And like it's, it's real familyfeel, like the family barbecue
that you're going to and it'seven.

(45:25):
It's it's a little bit like notas produced either.
You know which I even I evenlike like it.
Like I said, it's more a familybarbecue, backyard, all, let's
all get together and bring ourown stuff, and I don't know.
It's just a different feel.

Speaker 4 (45:37):
Well, truth of the matter is on the picnic.
It really was okay.
Hey, us brokers and teamssitting down and saying what do
we do for the picnic, you knowokay?
Well, blah, blah, blah.
And the taco truck that's oneof our agents.

Speaker 2 (45:49):
Oh, no kidding.
Yeah, that was great, by theway.
Yeah, fantastic.

Speaker 4 (45:53):
Ricardo is one of our agents out of the Lansing area.
I mean, we hired him becausehe's one of our agents.
That's exactly what we said.
We go well, hey, agents aren'tjust agents.
A lot of times they have otherbusinesses and they do other
things and their husband doessomething or their wife does
something.
Who can we get?
Well, we figured out thatRicardo had a taco truck and we

(46:14):
were like hey, do you want to dothis?
You know, I mean, and we'regoing to pay you.
Like, we didn't ask for freebieand none of that, he got paid
for doing it.
But that's what we tried to do,so it wasn't like some big
produce, right, right, you knowwhat I mean?
It was just supposed to be toget people together.

Speaker 2 (46:29):
Yeah, that was it Now next year.
So you know for next year.
Now you know, randy owns icecream trucks.

Speaker 4 (46:34):
That I heard, so he's on.
It's so funny.
You told me that I'm like nextyear we're getting Randy
involved.
We need an ice cream truck.

Speaker 3 (46:41):
You know I just want to throw this out.
Yeah, Because I know youprobably heard this too, but
somebody's got to own a bar.

Speaker 4 (46:46):
Yeah, somebody has to own a bar.
If you own a bar and you're anagent with EXP, call me.
They weren't putting a lot onyou.

Speaker 2 (46:58):
All our agents are going to call you your bar
owners.

Speaker 4 (47:00):
You guys ever seen the show?
Hi, I met your mother.

Speaker 3 (47:06):
I saw a clip online once, but it wasn't the real
show.
It was a lady fell forward.
Did you see this as a meme onon on line?
This lady falls forward andgoes to.
There's a guy standing in frontof her and she goes to try to
grab herself because she'sfalling over and she pulls his
pants completely down and hefalls backwards into a pool and
then at the end of it it saysthis is how you explain it.

(47:26):
Got it, got it.

Speaker 4 (47:27):
That's the only version I've ever seen.
The only reason I brought it upis there's an episode that that
they're drunk and they're atthe bar and they're like we
should open a bar, and I thinkevery drunk guy has said that.

Speaker 2 (47:38):
Oh, yeah, yeah we should open a bar.

Speaker 4 (47:39):
You know what I mean.
That's what it reminded me of.

Speaker 3 (47:43):
That's funny.
Al jumps in, he says thatyou're, you are always there, of
course.
His signature Al, always with.

Speaker 4 (47:50):
Al ways, you're always there.

Speaker 3 (47:53):
When you need them.
Great broker for our brokerage.
Thank you.

Speaker 4 (47:56):
Al.

Speaker 3 (47:57):
Let me open this up and ask an industry wide
question.
Sure, what do you think aresome of the biggest challenges
that real estate agents aregoing to be facing in the next
couple of years?

Speaker 4 (48:08):
That's a great question.
The best way for me to answerthat question is to tell you the
majority of the issues that wesee on the broker team, because
I can actually pinpoint it downto about three different issues.
And here's what I would say toagents If you can find a way to
become more proficient atcertain things, your life gets

(48:31):
easier.
Here's what they are, and we dotraining on this constantly.
I can recite the speech.
I've been saying it for 25 plusyears in my sleep.
My wife calls me a brokenrecord.
My kids can recite this.
Okay, one you've got to do abetter job of explaining earnest
money deposits to people.
Okay, interesting, becausehere's the thing, guys EMD

(48:51):
disputes are between a buyer anda seller and there's only three
ways to get the thing releasedSuccessful closing, fully
ratified mutual release,interpedence of a court.
I don't care how many times youcall the broker, I can do
nothing for you and you can donothing as an agent.
So if you do a better job ofexplaining that upfront to a

(49:12):
seller and a buyer, I don't carewhat side of the equation
you're on.
Okay, that's number one.
You've got to do a better jobwith that.
Number two is that you have todo a better job explaining buyer
agency, because with the DOJruling guess what guys?
You're not getting thecommission from the seller
anymore.
You have got to get on boardwith that.

(49:32):
If you need training on that,maybe take ABR.
Get ABR certified.
If you're going to play in thebuyer agency game, you got to be
able to show your worth andyour value and be able to get
them to understand that they'repaying you, the commission.
That is going to change.
We're already seeing it andit's coming and you fast forward
.
A year or two later it's goingto be even more so Very

(49:55):
interesting.

Speaker 2 (49:56):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (49:58):
The next one I would say to you is is that you've got
occupancy issues, damagedeposits, things like that.
And here's what I would say toall agents, and I say it
constantly right, Stop draftinglanguage, Stop.
This is what happens withagents.
They grab a blank addendum andthe first thing they do is start
writing, and I'm here to tellyou.

(50:20):
You write like crap.
Okay, Use AI.
An occupancy addendum isn't justbuyer agency.
Buyer agrees to give seller 60days worth of free occupancy.
You've covered nothing in there.
You've put your seller at risk.
You've put your buyer at risk.
Who's paying in case there's afire?
The insurance?

(50:41):
Who's holding the insurance?
Is there a damage deposit?
How does it get released?
What's a holdover provision?
If the seller tells you topound sand and doesn't get out
in 60 days, it's and guess what?
We as brokers, again buyerseller dispute, right, we can do
nothing to help you get thatreleased.
And here's the last piece of itthat agents need to understand

(51:03):
that they really, truly don't.
I don't care if you have thebest lawyer on the planet
drafting the best contract onthe planet.
The only enforcement mechanismfor a contract is the court
system.
Doesn't matter, because I haveagents come in all the time.
Well, you know what?

(51:23):
Next time, I want an addendumthat locks down this and locks
down that and, da-da-da-da-da, Iwant to write a better.
Okay, great.
How do you enforce it?

Speaker 2 (51:33):
You gotta record.

Speaker 4 (51:34):
What's the enforcement mechanism?
Yeah, and even arbitration hasto be agreed to, right, by all
parties.
You can't have one party agreeto arbitration and the other
party tells you to go pound sand.
You have no binding arbitrationclause at that point, right?
And this is contract law stuff,right?
So what I'm trying to say toagencies is stop drafting.
And here's why you're creatinga defensible position for

(51:55):
yourself when you don't draft.
Because if you're deposed in alawsuit at some point in time
and you pulled out an occupancyaddendum that was written by
your board and a lawyer says didyou draft this document?
No, sir, I did not.
Oh, you didn't prepare thisdocument?
No, I filled in the blanks.
But look at the bottom it saysyou know, michigan Association

(52:16):
of Realtors or GreaterMetropolitan Association of
Realtors, get away from blankaddendums.
Your first go to should be adocument with blanks that you
fill in and then, if you have todraft something from scratch,
come and see the brokers.
Don't just do it.
Add lib, yeah, on the fly,because you're bad at it, right?

(52:37):
It's like oh, I'm not anattorney, but I play one on
Thursday night on television.
Really, you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (52:42):
Like yeah, I just got off of the pirate ship.
I'm going to try.

Speaker 2 (52:46):
I think that the big thing is the knowing, the
importance of your broker.
And again I think to Johnny'spoint, to like in this area, in
our metropolitan area, like yourteam leader is not your broker,
correct, you know what I mean?
And I think that so many agentsget used to that that, well,
I'm just going to go see my teamleader.
And then, and then to yourpoint too, nick, is the team
leaders like oh, just write thisin an addendum.

(53:08):
And the team leader writes theaddendum and then makes it even
worse because then the teamleaders are right in the
addendum 100%, that's, I'll tellyou.

Speaker 3 (53:16):
I that is a surprise.
Those those things that youjust pointed out, nowhere near
where I thought you're going togo?

Speaker 4 (53:22):
Where did you think I was going?

Speaker 3 (53:23):
to.
I had no clue but to go downthe addendum route, cause I'll
tell you.
I'll tell you right now, myfavorite addendum is the blank
addendum, not because I writegood, but cause I write crazy
stuff in there.
That's where I write the lawncare thing, or one time staying
glass, or the you shouldn't.
I had my mom sign a blankaddendum stating that she
shouldn't use me as her agentbecause I wanted to make sure

(53:44):
that a family came down later onwhich happened and said why
forced her to buy that.
I was like no, I'm telling younot to use me, and by using me
you're stupid and I like the onetime you got to call your mom
an idiot and she still used me.
So when, when I was accused ofthat, I pulled that out and I
uh-uh, there's like threeparagraphs of how not to use me

(54:05):
and she was choosing to herself.
But that's that's a veryinteresting so.
So you think that that's goingto be one of the continue to be
an issue going forward, and theother thing is the DOJ thing in
the next couple of years that'sgoing to be a huge shoot.
We should we got to read, weshould redo the show, jimmy,
johnny we talked about that twoyears ago.
Two, two, three years ago.

Speaker 4 (54:25):
I'll make this offer right.
I'm inviting myself, but if youguys would love to do another
episode, we could come back andjust circle around that.
You could probably spend awhole hour.

Speaker 2 (54:35):
Oh yeah, I'll be honest with you guys.
Yeah, and if you, guys want meto.

Speaker 4 (54:38):
I'm totally it.

Speaker 3 (54:39):
Oh yeah, 100%, 100%.
So let me ask you this, causewe only got a few minutes left
and I want to jump this in onthe end.
So off the same question whatdo you think is going to be the
biggest challenges coming up forEXP as a brokerage in the
future?

Speaker 4 (54:53):
So I think what's going to be a little more of a
challenge for us going forwardis is that we're continuing to
grow right, and as you continueto grow, you have some growing
pains and that takes patienceand unfortunately, sometimes in
our industry let's face it,agents, brokers, whoever we

(55:13):
don't always have the mostpatience right.
Let's be honest, we have thepatience of a nat.
That's what we have.
Welcome to real estate.
Yeah, welcome to real estate.
So I think that is going tocontinue to be a challenge for
us.
We need all of us to have alittle more patience with this
stuff.
We're building this thing aswe're growing.

(55:35):
We're changing thingsconstantly and that's one of the
things I love about EXP they'renot stuck with.
Well, we've always done it thisway, so we're always going to
do it this way.
You're familiar with abrokerage that did that.
Right, they won't changeanything because they've always
done it this way.
When EXP doesn't do that, theyallow us to make these changes
on the fly and say, look,there's a better way, this

(55:56):
really isn't working, can we trysomething else?
And they're willing to do thoseshifts.
But with those shifts comesuncomfortableness sometimes
right, and people get a littleupset with that.
So if we can smooth out thosebumps, I think that might be a
challenge for us and a brokerteam I can tell you.
Sometimes that's a challengefor us, but it's not something
we can't work around.

Speaker 3 (56:18):
I love it.
I love it.
That's great.
That's again somewheredifferent than where I thought
we were going to go, but it's aperfect way to end the show.
It is so, hey, at the end ofthe day, your broker's your
broker, call your broker.
And number two, especially ifyou own a bar, call this broker.

(56:39):
Those are, those are our twoclosing points.
Hey, everybody, thank you forlistening.
We do an afterburn afterwards.
I keep seeing you.
Well, look at your clock.
Are you going to stick?
around Cool so again, if you'relistening to us after the fact,
make sure you join us liveafterwards.
There's always an afterburner.
It's live only streamingFacebook and on YouTube, soon to

(56:59):
be Twitch so keep us stay tunedfor that.
Jimmy, you've been fantastic.
Johnny, you've been awesome.
Thank you very much to ourguests and we'll talk to all of
you next Friday.