The salient point of our discussion with Todd Carpenter revolves around the transformative nature of social media and technological advancements within the real estate industry, particularly in relation to compliance and image management. I elucidate how Todd has significantly contributed to bridging the gap between emerging technologies and real estate practices, particularly through his current role at Styldod. We delve into the intricacies of how artificial intelligence is revolutionizing image editing processes and compliance measures within Multiple Listing Services (MLS). Furthermore, Todd shares invaluable insights from his extensive career, detailing the evolution of social media's role in real estate and the imperative of fostering genuine connections in this competitive industry. This episode serves as a profound exploration of the intersection between technology and real estate, highlighting Todd's expertise and forward-thinking perspective.
A profound exploration of Todd Carpenter's journey through the real estate landscape unfolds in this episode, revealing the intricate interplay between technology, social media, and industry dynamics. The conversation ranges from Carpenter's early influences in the real estate sector, rooted in familial connections, to his pivotal role at the National Association of Realtors, where he championed the integration of social media as a means of fostering communication and mitigating public criticism during challenging times. His anecdotal experiences highlight the evolution of the industry, especially in the face of technological advancements and shifting consumer expectations.
The dialogue further delves into Carpenter's transition to Styldod, a company leveraging artificial intelligence for compliance in real estate listings. With a keen focus on the challenges faced by Multiple Listing Services (MLS) regarding image compliance, Carpenter elucidates how Styldod's innovative solutions not only alleviate the burdens of compliance but also enhance the aesthetic representation of properties. This episode serves as a testament to the ongoing evolution of real estate practices, emphasizing the necessity for agents to adapt to emerging technologies while maintaining a strong network of professional relationships.
Listeners are offered a glimpse into Carpenter's personal philosophy regarding the importance of connections in the real estate industry, as he encourages new agents to prioritize relationship-building over mere transactional interactions. His insights illuminate the significance of leveraging one's sphere of influence to foster success, showcasing a holistic approach to real estate that transcends conventional sales tactics and underscores the human element of the profession.
Takeaways:
- In our conversation, we explored the profound impact of social media on real estate, particularly emphasizing the necessity for leadership and volunteers to effectively engage with negativity and criticism.
- Todd Carpenter elaborated on his extensive career trajectory, highlighting his unique entry into real estate, informed by his family's background in the industry.
- The discussion encompassed the evolution of technology in real estate, notably Todd's insights on how artificial intelligence is transforming compliance and image enhancement for listings.
- We delved into the intricacies of compliance challenges faced by MLSs, emphasizing how emerging technologies can preemptively address these issues before they escalate.
- Todd shared his experiences at the National Association of Realtors, focusing on the need for a cultural shift towards embracing social media as a vital communication tool within the organization.
- The episode culminated in Todd's current role at Styldod, where he is at the forefront of integrating AI technology to streamline real estate image compliance and enhance property...
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
We spent a tremendous amountof time talking about social media
and teaching people how to dosocial media, especially the leadership
team and the volunteers andhow to respond to negativity.
And I would be kind of likeput at the forefront and have to
be an example for how to dothis and take some of the hits.
(00:26):
You're listening to the RealEstate Sessions and I'm your host,
Bill risser.
With nearly 25 years in thereal estate business, I love to interview
industry leaders, up andcomers, and really anyone with a
story to tell.
It's the stories that led myguests to a career in the real estate
world that drives me in my10th year and over 400 episodes of
the podcast.
And now I hope you enjoy thenext journey.
(00:51):
Hi, everybody.
Welcome to episode 414 of theReal Estate Sessions podcast.
As always, thank you so muchfor tuning in.
Thank you much for telling a friend.
I'm happy to have a newepisode for you this week.
Even happier that it's ToddCarpenter, somebody that I've known
for a long time, going back tothe, oh, blogging days, that's how
long ago.
He's now senior vice presidentof industry relations with styledod.
(01:15):
We're gonna talk to him about that.
They're doing some really coolstuff with images and mlss and compliance.
I'll just leave it at that.
You need to listen to this.
It's really good.
And we go take a walk through,like, memory lane about some of the
things that were reallyimportant like 12 years ago that
don't matter so much today.
That's funny how that stuffworks, but it's a lot of fun.
(01:36):
Thank you so much for joining us.
Let's get this thing started.
Todd, welcome to the podcast.
It's great to be here, Bill.
It's good to see you again.
It's been a while.
It has been a while.
And boy, there were some funtimes back in the day.
I think you, you're a part ofthat original re.net that was exploding
around the country early inthe OR.
(01:56):
I'd say 2005, 6, 7.
It was pretty fun.
And I know that you spend alot of time in Chicagoland now because,
you know, you had some, acouple of different stints at nar.
But I have to be reallybrutally honest, Todd, I do not know
where you grew up.
I just always associated youwith the Midwest.
So where was home for you?
(02:17):
Where'd you grow up?
So, yeah, I grew up in thesuburbs of Denver, Colorado, which
is still my favorite state.
But my wife is from the Midwest.
And I love my wife, so we livein the Midwest.
That makes, that makes a lotof sense.
Growing up in Denver.
Did you go to high school there?
Was it.
Were you there that long?
Oh, yeah, yeah.
I started my career in Denver.
(02:40):
I briefly moved to Californiaaround 2000, but most of my life
up until Chicago was in Denver.
Okay, and a couple questions.
Does that mean you're aBroncos fan?
Oh, absolutely.
And after a very, you know,growing up, I was used to having
a football team that won allthe time, because the Broncos, from
(03:01):
the 80s until, you know, about10 years ago, they were up until
Super Bowl 50, they were oneof the winningest teams in the league
and it's been pretty rough.
But we got Bo Nicks now andthe future is looking better.
At least that's.
I was at the Broncos win overthe packers in San Diego.
So yeah, that was.
(03:21):
I think the Broncos won that one.
Yeah, they did.
I don't think of Denver aslike a sports town, but man, it's
exploded.
You got the Nuggets, you got the.
Got the Avalanche.
Now you've got the.
The.
Help me out with the other one.
The.
The Rockies.
The Purple Team.
The Rockies.
The Rockies.
Yeah, you know, it.
It was always a sports town.
He lived there.
(03:42):
It's similar to like Bostonwhere on.
My wife.
My wife, when we lived therefor a year, commented that the best
time to go shopping was Sundayat 2:00 because literally everyone
in the city watched the games.
And in fact, even it drew theAvalanche there because the minor
(04:03):
league team that was playinghad bigger audiences than like seven
NHL teams because it was so popular.
And then when the baseballexpanded, they had like the major
league baseball executiveswere in the city to interview the
people that wanted to bringthe Rockies there or start the new
(04:24):
organization.
And something like 30,000people showed up outside to chant
like, take me out to the ball game.
Just to tell people.
And then of course, the firstyear the Rockies played, they played
it at the Bronco Stadium,which seats like 70,000 people and
they were drawing 70,000people to those games.
(04:44):
They set the all time leagueattendance record for a single season
and it's doubtful that willever be eclipsed.
So it's definitely a sportstown for sure.
That's cool.
I've had a chance to go to anall star game there.
I took my son.
This was 98, I think it was in Denver.
And that Loto or downtown areais just really cool.
(05:06):
I mean, it's got some neat stuff.
Yeah.
Big fan, big fan of the city.
Not so much the teams, becauseI was in San Diego at the time, so
we'll just move on.
So you talked about, you know,you moved around a little bit for
work, out of school.
Todd was real estate the firstthing you were thinking about?
Was that where you were headedor was it something else?
Well, it wasn't, but, youknow, my mom was a real estate agent,
(05:29):
so I was.
I was born into the industry,I like to say.
My booster seat literally wasan MLS book that I would sit on when
I was a little kid.
And I knew how to change acombination on those lockboxes.
You know, when I was like 12years old or something, she got into
mortgages.
And honestly, you know, like,I know most of your audience is going
(05:50):
to recognize this.
Like, real estate's reallyhard, and there's good times and
bad times.
I mostly remember the bad times.
And I swear to myself, I wouldnever take a commission sales job
because you have those ups anddowns and it's.
It can be frustrating.
So I wanted to be an automechanic, of all things.
Okay.
While I was going to school, Igot a job at the Sears Auto center.
(06:15):
And I wanted, you know,usually you start out like busting
tires or something like that,but they didn't have any of those
positions open, and they putme on the front desk.
And so about two years in, Irealized I'm making more money than
almost anyone in the buildingselling stuff, and realized I was
actually a pretty decent salesperson.
(06:36):
And so now it's.
And I'm dating myself.
But now it's 1991, and thebiggest refi boom of all time is
happening.
You know, today peoplecomplain about the rates being in
the sevens, but in 1990, therates were in the 13s, and so we're
refinancing people down tolike eight, and it's, you know, saving
them hundreds of dollars.
(06:57):
So my.
My mom basically says, look,you should finish school.
But on the other hand, I knowyou can do this and you should come
do it.
And so I worked for her for ayear as a loan officer.
And then I didn't love workingfor my mom.
I love my mom, but I didn'tlove working for her.
So I went to work with anothercompany and originated loans for
(07:18):
several years.
Eventually I got intowholesale mortgage.
And then in 2000, I went towork for a startup in San Jose, California,
called Myers Internet, andthey were eventually bought by mgic.
They built websites for loanofficers and some real estate agents.
(07:38):
And the big thing about it isit had like an Online loan application
form.
And that was the craziestthing of all time.
Right.
We also did Internet leadswhere people would come in and they
would just fill out this.
You know, a loan applicationhas a lot of private information
on it, and they just likerandomly fill them out.
And then we'd sell Those leadsfor 50 bucks each to several mortgage
(07:59):
brokers.
It was kind of a crazy timebefore there was, you know, an understanding
of loan or, like, identityfraud or things like that.
So obviously it's a lot moresecure now.
But that was my first taste ofstartup technology.
But yeah, and so then, youknow, after a.
Worked there, I came back toDenver and got back into wholesale.
(08:21):
But the banks I worked for,they didn't really get technology
either at that point.
The Internet is still kind ofnew, and they had these really complicated
websites, and if your customerjust wanted to download like a rate
lock form or a cover letterform or something like that, some
(08:42):
simple form that doesn't haveany private information, they would
have to go to the bank websiteand log in with their ID and find
it.
And, you know, it was very complicated.
So I created this websitecalled lenderama for my 50 clients
that basically just mostlyjust had forms that they could download
that was so much easier forthem to do.
(09:04):
Right.
And that's sort of how myfirst website was ever born.
And then eventually I turnedit into a blog.
So.
So did that get you.
Did that.
That takes you up into thetime where social starts happening
as well, Right?
Because that's.
Because that's your.
It feels like that's the.
That was your entrance intoNAR, for sure.
So, yeah, actually, you know,it was 2005 when I launched that
(09:28):
blog.
That was still four yearsbefore I went to NAR.
But the.
The premise of the bloggingwas really based on how successful
some conservative bloggers hadbeen in discounting 60 minutes during
the election the year before.
(09:49):
And there was a story that 60Minutes had about George Bush not
fulfilling his National Guard duty.
And it turns out within acouple of days, these conservative
bloggers had figured out thatsome of the evidence had been.
Had been mocked up.
Like there was some letterthat was supposedly typed in the
60s or 70s, I guess, and ithad been printed with Microsoft Word,
(10:13):
so it obviously was fake.
So, you know, I wasn't reallylike, I didn't want to have a political
blog, but I was reallyimpressed that this new technology
had sort of shifted.
Because you think about 60Minutes, that's like the.
Almost like the mostauthoritative news broadcast there
is.
And here these guys, you know,I think an executive of CBS said,
(10:35):
oh, some guy in their pajamasin their basement writing, writing
a blog.
And I thought, well, I havepajamas and I have a basement.
I could start writing this.
And so I start writing thisblog for mortgage officers that's
part of my website and itbecomes my website.
And I thought, oh yeah, the,you know, I have like 50 mortgage
brokers who are my clients andif, if 20 of them read this, it'll
(10:58):
help me.
It's a one way just to stay incontact with them.
But eventually I was gettingtwo or three thousand unique visitors
a day and it was only a sitethat loan officers would read.
It's like, here's a blog postabout how to get approved for FHA
loans or to track the LIBORfor adjustable rate mortgages or
(11:19):
things like that.
So I suddenly sort of became asocial media expert just because
I was one of the very firstpeople to do.
Sounds like the Jay Thompsonstory a little bit as well, right,
Jay?
About the same time, yeah.
You know, and so one of thethings I did is I started looking
(11:40):
for other blogs.
So right when I started, onlya couple weeks later, I found loan
officer Dan Green had a blogcalled the Mortgage Reports.
And I was like, how is therealready another mortgage blog?
I thought I was the first one.
And we had started almost likeon the same day.
And I was like.
But the real estate was sortof lent itself to blogging more than
(12:02):
mortgages.
Because I feel like peoplethat get into mortgages generally
have more of like math based mind.
And people who get intoselling real estate have more of
a creative based mind.
And there's plenty of exampleswhere that's the opposite.
(12:22):
But you just have to be more creative.
I think when you're workingwith customers and showing them a
home.
And it's not just the simple math.
You'll save $250 if yourefinance at this rate, blah, blah,
blah.
And so I started looking forreal estate blogs and Jay was one
of the very first ones.
I found someone else who'sbeen on your show, Inez Higuettis
Garcia.
She was one of the earliest ones.
(12:43):
Jim Duncan, who is one of theco founders of Nest, great real estate
brokerage, he was one of theearliest ones.
So there was quite a few of us.
And that still kind ofpredated social media as we know
it.
There was just bloggers.
There were a lot of bloggersout there.
Active Rain was, it comes to mind.
(13:04):
Active Rain, that all poppedup and I met Quite a few other people
throughout through thatnetwork as well.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So it was sort of an evolutionto real estate because I had just
decided I should track whoelse is doing this.
And then in 2007, there wastwo bloggers out of New York, Joe
(13:29):
Ferreira and Rudy Bachrati.
And they had a blog called theCelsius Blog.
And they.
They were going to go to InmanConnect in San Francisco, but they
decided they were going to dothis tour across America and try
to find all the other bloggersthat were out there and meet with
them.
And they rented an RV and puta bunch of sponsorship stickers on
(13:49):
it, and they were going tocome through Denver.
So I reached out to them and Iwas like, well, what do you have
planned for Denver?
And they're like, well, whydon't you plan something?
And so I built my very firstreal estate event.
It was called Blog Fiesta.
It was in a.
Because I found a cheap spacein a Mexican restaurant in the Tech
(14:10):
center in Denver.
And we had tacos and talkedabout blogging.
And at that event, CrystalCraft, are you familiar with her?
She was a blogger in Denverand she really helped me reach out
to all the other bloggers,especially on Active Rain, that were
in the area.
And I think like 30, 40 peopleshowed up to this.
(14:31):
Joe and Rudy were kind ofblown away.
It was like the biggest eventup until San Francisco.
And then we all went to.
A lot of us went to SanFrancisco and Inman had created an
event called Beer for Bloggers.
And it was just like all the people.
This is still like beforesocial media really is hitting.
(14:52):
But there was like a lot ofthe early people at Zolo, like Drew
Myers and David Gibbons werethere, and I met Nicole Nicolay there,
and I met Dan Green in person there.
And Jim Duncan, like justmentioned Dustin Luther.
And so that sort of becamelike the beginning of that re net
(15:12):
that you talked about.
And Jay.
I met Jay.
Yeah.
And so that was sort of.
I got the taste for doingevents I still hadn't really even
thought about, like, nar.
But then I met up with anotherreal estate person, or not, sorry,
mortgage person, his name'sJason Berman.
And we decided to create ourown technology event because really,
(15:36):
like real estate tech,mortgage tech, none of that was about
social media at all.
No one knew how to address this.
This is all so new.
So we were going to have anevent in Tag along with a bigger
event called Blog World in Vegas.
And while we were planningthat event, another friend of mine,
(15:57):
Andy Kaufman, he came up withthis idea for Re Bar Camp.
And so we jumped right intothat and started helping him with
that.
And all this was 2007, 2008.
This is really cool.
I'm just sitting here just reminiscing.
And me, I actually went to aBlog World event in Vegas because
Nick Bastian was going to bethere, and Jay Thompson and Dean
(16:17):
Willett, and this was all thePhoenix guys that were, you know,
trying to do the same things.
It was very interesting times.
Do you see an opening at nar,or does NAR reach out to you?
How does that happen?
You know, it's pretty funnybecause while we were promoting Reblog
World, man, putting on eventsthat people pay for is.
(16:40):
Is very difficult, especiallywhen you're doing the very first
one.
And so literally, it was likehand to hand combat.
We were reaching out to people.
If they left a comment on theblog or mentioned Ari, Blog World
or any of that stuff, we wouldreach out.
And one of the people that had.
She had come to the site inone way or another was a lady named
Hilary Marsh.
(17:00):
And she worked at nar.
And so I connected with herand I was trying to get her to come
to the conference.
And she ran the.
At the time, it was calledrealtor.org, it was the, you know,
the main website for narrative.
So I sort of knew her, but notvery well.
And then on monster.com, nARlisted that they were looking for
(17:21):
a social media manager.
And I was like, man, who do I know?
Like, instead of applyingthrough Monster, I was like, who
do I know at nar?
I know Hilary Marsh.
So I reached out to Hillaryand I'm like, what do you know about
this job?
I'm interested.
And she's like, I'm the onehiring for it.
And so almost like from dayone, I had inside path to get that
job.
And it was very weird becauseup until then, I still saw myself
(17:45):
as a mortgage guy, mostlytalking about mortgage.
And so now, just because I hadbeen doing it longer than anyone
else, I'd become like, thissocial media expert.
But it was really, like, onlyto facilitate the mortgage side.
But at that point, I knew if Itook a job at the national association
of Realtors, I was gonna meet,like, a tremendous number of people
(18:08):
I was gonna open a lot of.
And so I campaigned reallyhard for that position, and I moved
to Chicago in order to do it.
Today's, like, remote worldwas not really existence back then.
Everyone worked in the office,and so it was just like a tremendous
opportunity.
Because one, I was there tosort of like, evangelize social media
(18:34):
to agents.
And the reason being for thatwas that the communications team
wanted more agents, moremembers to be vocal about their market.
And remember, this is like,right after the housing downturn
is really hitting 2008, 2009.
And so the press is talkingterribly about our industry, and
(19:01):
rightly so in some cases, butthey wanted more voices about what's
going on in local markets allacross the country.
And what better way than toleverage over a million people that
are passionate about this andpeople who know their markets.
And so we spent a tremendousamount of time talking about social
(19:23):
media and teaching people howto do social media, especially like
the leadership team and thevolunteers and how to respond to
negativity.
And I would be.
I would be kind of like, putat the forefront and, like, have
to be an example for, youknow, how to do this and take.
Take some of the hits.
Similar to Jay Thompson whenhe went to Zillow, and, you know,
(19:46):
you're kind of like the onegetting punched, but that was fine.
And.
But then the back end was totrain all of the staff, especially
on how to use social media,because NAR at that point was very
much like a command andcontrol type communication.
They were.
I mean, they literally werespeaking from an ivory tower at the
(20:08):
time.
There was no ability for themembers to kind of like, talk back
in public.
And suddenly this social mediathing popped up and, you know, again,
Jay Thompson had created ablog called NAR Wisdom, and it was
very critical of nar.
Some of the, you know, like,NAR had sponsored a giant Rose bowl
float right during the housing downturn.
(20:29):
And, you know, there was.
There were a lot of like.
But suddenly they weren't usedto, like, this public criticism.
What do you do about it?
And now I feel like it's sortof native to everyone to understand
how online criticism happens.
But it was very new to them.
So it was a lot.
There was an internal side andan external side to that job.
(20:50):
I'll bet you some of thoseconversations were pretty rough.
I would just think internally,even right where you're trying to
say, look, we can't.
We can't attack.
We can't do this, we can't do that.
We've got to be, you know,we've got to find this.
This place where we're takingcare of those people, because those
people are members, eventhough they're criticizing, you know,
(21:11):
and.
What was interesting about itwas that there were many departments
at NAR who were wanted to usethe social media because they could
break out of whatever theofficial line of what the NAR community
communications team was saying.
Like they would be able to gettheir message out on their own without,
(21:33):
without that command and control.
And so the communicationsteam, which is where I was, was actually
like the most anti socialmedia of any department there because
they were losing control ofwhat they had always had control
of before, which is totally understandable.
So that there were a lot ofinternal politics where I luckily
(21:55):
had the endorsement of the CEODale Sitton at the time.
Like he had made clear, likewe're going to do what Todd thinks
about this stuff.
But it was kind of almostadversarial in some instances because
people just weren't used tothis new force and the two way conversation.
Luckily my boss Hillary, shegot it, she understood it, but there
(22:19):
were other folks there thatjust were totally uncomfortable with
it at that, at that point.
There's in, in your timeline,you decide to go back to Denver,
we'll call it, and, and, andwork with Trulia, which at the time,
this is still, we'll call itearly days.
Right.
I mean this is, they're not apart of Zillow at this time, are
(22:40):
they?
Yet?
No.
Yeah.
So they're doing their own thing.
Peter's trying to get Spenceror whatever, they're trying, whatever
their, the battles were.
But you, it wasn't on thesocial side, was it, was it more
data driven at this point orwas this come a little bit later?
So it was the year that theyIPO'd, so they were right there about
to become a unicorn.
(23:01):
And it was also a time whenboth Zillow and Trulia were very
unpopular for some of their,some of their practices about how
they put up listings and howthey attributed listing agents.
And there was a lot, a lot of angst.
And of course investors don'tlike angst.
So I was basically put on a team.
(23:21):
I mean literally we're likethe listing security team.
We're trying to make sure thebrokers are still giving us listings.
And I was leveraging somesocial media, but a lot of like industry
relations type work to connectwith big brokers and also a lot of
mlss and try to get them to bemore aligned.
(23:42):
And honestly like a lot of itwas because we were about to IPO
and we were trying to figurethat piece out.
And then after I left, trulywas acquired about a year after that
from Zillow.
Okay, so and then that, thatbrings you back to nar.
Now this for sure, this is A rat.
A big change.
Right.
Because generally people whoare in the communication, social
(24:05):
side of stuff.
Well, once again, you talkedabout it would be the creatives.
They're thinking about that stuff.
Right.
But you've already laid outfor us that you were more of the
math guy when you were havingsuccess as a lender.
So it kind of makes sense thenthat back back to nar, you go heavy
into the data side of thingsand really, I mean, that's what a
(24:26):
lot of people that they thinkof you as that only because they've
met you, you know, after thetruly time.
That time at ner, we got ioi.
I mean, there were somereally, really cool stuff going on
when you were back there.
Yeah.
So Trulia, you know, that justdidn't work out.
We were, I was, I was tryingto tell them about the right way
to do things in the realestate way, and they were focused
(24:49):
on the right way to do it inthe tech way.
And you know, ultimately Ithink they got what they wanted was
this acquisition from Zillow.
But when I left, I owe it toDale Stinton, the CEO, and Mark Les
Wing, who was the cto.
They reached back out to me,and while I don't have the data chops
(25:11):
or the programming chops to bea data scientist, they did know that
I was really good atexplaining technology to people who
don't understand technology.
There you go.
And so that guy in the movieOffice Space who's like, I'm the
one that talks to the engineers.
Engineers don't have goodpeople skills.
(25:32):
Yeah, that's kind of neat.
I don't want to jump toconclusions game.
But anyway, yeah, so they hadthis new initiative, and that initiative
was to learn way, way moreabout their members than they previously
did, to use Big Data datascience to figure out how they can
get people to take moreeducation classes, give more money
(25:54):
to the pac, reach out to theirsenator more often, you know, anything
that NAR is trying to do as anorganization, it's not even really
real estate related.
It was more like member organization.
And just like social media atthe time, Big Data was scary because
now we're going to collect awhole bunch of data about these members
who might feel like theirprivacy is being invaded.
(26:17):
And they needed someone tobuild that team, but they also needed
someone that could sell that.
And by sell it, I mean sell itto the leadership, the volunteer
leadership, the president, theincoming president, and explain why
it's, you know, what we'redoing is not the same as some of
the online retailers today.
(26:38):
But we are collecting this andhere's what we're going to do with
it.
And beyond, just like theactions of the association, we were
buying data about politicalpersuasion and household income.
And there was a lot of data,hundreds of thousands of dollars
worth of data to, you know,especially to make the advocacy team
more effective.
And they're right.
(26:59):
They're by far one of the mosteffective advocacy associations in,
in America.
And so it was really more of asales job.
And.
But I hired like our originaldata science team and we had to go
to each department at NAR andfigure out their systems.
A lot of them didn't connectto each other.
And we had to put all this,what's called the data lake, which
(27:23):
is how you can create machinelearning and start to build cohorts
and algorithms in order toidentify who has the highest propensity
to get their E Procertification or whatever and then
go sell them that stuff.
And again, also a difficulttransition for the staff to suddenly
(27:46):
just do things in a wholedifferent way that they hadn't thought
of before.
Being more data driven aboutall their messaging and things like
that.
So similar evangelist role,similar to social media.
What timeframe are we talkingabout here?
When did this get started?
I went back in 2013.
So that was.
(28:06):
This is over 10 years ago.
You're talking about stuffthat now everyone today kind of knows
the term machine learning.
You've heard about it throughAI and, you know, and all these other
things that are popping out there.
Yeah, that was a long time ago.
That seems like it was almostlike NAR was an early adopter of
the strategy that we gottaknow, we need data points and we
(28:27):
gotta know how to use these.
And I know, I'm sure therewere others that even earlier were
doing that, but probably inthe real estate space.
This was unheard of at that time.
I mean, outside of likeCoreLogic or Zillow, there were very
few companies with these kindof technology chops.
And of course, we were doingit on a far smaller budget.
I mean, there's only like 300employees at NAR, and half of them
(28:51):
are really more like advocacypeople and things like that.
So.
Yeah, so, but it was sort of alearning experience.
But also, you know, datingback to when I was in mortgages,
that first wholesale mortgagejob I had, they had this new technology
that they had contract.
It was called a company calledWashington Mortgage, and they had
done a deal with Fannie Mae tobe one of the beta testers for this
(29:15):
program called DesktopOriginator, which is Literally how
online.
Every online loan today isrunning on something similar to this
program.
But basically there was acomputer program that pre qualified
people figured out what theircredit risk was.
And that was sort of myselling point is that I had this
(29:38):
new program like the company Iworked for sold a lot of vanilla
type loans that there wasnothing really special about those
loans.
And so if you didn't have thelowest price, it was very hard to
get the deals.
But we had this new technologythat was getting more people approved
for conforming loans and Ireally adopted it.
And that was the point where Irealized that I was good about talking
(30:00):
about technology and prettymuch my entire career after that
was what is my tech edge.
And so when we get to this,you know, to the data science piece
I was learning on the job, butI already understood enough about
it, especially from working at Trulia.
Their AB testing of thewebsite and things like that were
(30:22):
amazing for the time.
And so it's just been, I'vealways tried to like look ahead,
see what is on the on thehorizon, determine if it is something
that is going to be impactfulor not.
And nothing is like a shinydiamond, but everything has a role.
And so, and how do youleverage that?
(30:43):
And then how do you talk tosalespeople who are more busy selling
homes or originating mortgagesthan have the time to learn about
these things?
And so yeah that was, thatrole was really like I knew that
that role was only going tolast three or four years because
eventually I will have, Ieventually trained my first hire
to know enough about theinternal workings of NAR that he
(31:06):
almost didn't need me anymore.
And that's really when, whenthe new CEO came in, that's when
I transitioned over to SecondCentury Ventures.
Which is, is that, is it asubsidiary of NAR or is it funded
by nar?
What's the exact connection?
It's a, it's a wholly ownedsubsidiary of Narrow and they originally.
So second century representsthe second century of NAR.
(31:30):
So on the 100 year anniversaryof NAR, they created a bunch of new
initiatives and one of themwas this venture capital fund and
they are the only provider offunds to that, that this, this subsidiary.
And the idea was let's we're anot for profit, let's take some of
our revenue and put it in aplace where it can hopefully make
(31:54):
more money.
But also like let's invest inthe real estate tech that's out there.
One of the very firstinvestments I love to talk about,
I get like, I just did thetiniest bit of credit for it because
Constance, who was runningSecond Century Ventures at the time,
she asked me like, what do youthink of this company called Docusign?
(32:15):
We're thinking about investingin them.
And I'm like, docusign's awesome.
You should totally invest in them.
And then they did.
And that investment wasseveral years in the making, but
turned out to be a fantastic investment.
And so Second Century Ventureshas paid back NAR the initial amount
of money that the member duesfunded it.
(32:36):
And it runs completely on its own.
It's still owned by nar, butit doesn't take any member dues.
It generates its own revenue.
It's one of the ways NARactually makes money as a, that's
not non dues related.
So they've invested in severalhundred companies at this point.
And it's also a great way tonot have another Zillow, you know,
(33:00):
like you Zillow.
Zillow is this great companyand great technology.
But for the longest time therewas a massive adversarial relationship
between NAR and Zillow.
And I feel like Dale, who wasthe former CEO and Bob Goldberg,
who helped create SecondCentury Ventures felt like, hey,
(33:23):
we need to align ourselveswith these technology companies and
not be adversarial with them.
If we get to them early andexplain why, you'd really be better
off doing it this way, you'restill going to succeed, but you're
not going to have the, theback and forth of, you know, having
so many brokers mad at you.
And every prop tech company,startup out there now wants, wants
(33:47):
in.
They want to be a part of theioi, they want to be in the pitch
battles, they want the exposure.
I mean, it's what SecondCentury's done is impressive.
Super cool.
It's been a lot of fun towatch it.
So, yeah, so when I came ontothe team that was 2017 or 18, Bob
Goldberg had just become CEOand he wanted to have a conference
(34:09):
that was just focused on tech.
Not just like the annualconference and have a tech channel,
but a tech focused event.
And so based on all the stuffI had done with Ari Barkamp and Blog
World and all those otherthings a million years ago, they
kind of put me in charge ofcoming up with the concept and thinking
(34:30):
up like the pitch battle andall that stuff.
And then there was a huge teamof people to actually execute that
first one.
But I was really involved inthat in the first place.
And that was again to try toexpand that tent and just have as
many tech companies aspossible, who.
They don't necessarily need toget NAR's endorsement.
(34:53):
They just want to know whatare the best practices of working
with the industry and all thepolitics involved in the industry.
And so tremendous amount oftime was spent with me helping those
companies do that.
Well, now, Todd, you're withone of those kinds of companies.
You're with Style.
Dodd.
I, I know the basics of what,what the company does.
(35:14):
It's.
It's a big piece of.
It is going to be helpingrealtors really show off the property
in the best way possible.
Right, right.
I mean, that's what, that's what.
That's ultimately the end result.
Tell me about joining them.
What's going on there?
Yeah, so it's really excitingcompany for me because it again is,
you know, that, that next technology.
(35:36):
And even before I went tosecond Century, I was working for.
When I did the Data project, Iwas working for Mark Les Wing and
he had a lot of his teamtrying to write papers about emerging
technologies.
And we would publish them on.
We had a team called thecenter for Realtor Technology at
(35:57):
the time, and we would publishthese papers through them.
And I wrote up.
It was 2017 and I wrote a big report.
It was sort of, you know,you're taking like a futurist view
of how artificial intelligencewas going to affect the real estate
industry.
And my concept was kind ofcentered around 2001 A Space Odyssey
(36:19):
with the HAL 9000 being likethis omnipresent robot that is all
over this spaceship.
Just like omnipresent robotsare existing in our homes now with
your iPhone and the Nest thermostat.
And there's so many thesesmart home things are starting to
affect it.
And so it's fun to even lookback on that story because some of
(36:41):
that stuff has not actuallyhappened yet.
But a lot of it is starting toreally come to fruition, the idea
of artificial intelligencereally impacting our industry.
And when I go around to likewhen we would working for Reach in
second century, we wouldencounter a lot of companies that
said they used artificialintelligence, but not really.
But styledad, they started asan image editing company.
(37:06):
So they had, you know, forlack of a better word, like a ton
of people who knew how to usePhotoshop and they would declutter
a listing photo or they wouldadd some furniture to a listing photo.
And in fact, styledad stilldoes that, a lot of that.
But what they realized is thatartificial intelligence is the next
(37:28):
step for that, is that all ofthese things can be done with artificial
intelligence.
So they doubled down learninghow to use these models.
And a lot of them are free,you know, from like ChatGPT and Alibaba.
And so they figured out how todo a lot of that work with a robot.
You know, they.
They can declutter a picturevery easily.
(37:50):
They can look at a picture and.
And figure out what's in thepicture very easily now.
So when they got into realestate, what they realized is that,
or within the US Market isthat a lot of this could really be
helpful to an mls.
And MLS have a tremendousamount of compliance issues that
(38:12):
they deal with every day,which is why MLS data is the best
data, because it's very likelyto be accurate, because there's a
whole team of people at theMLS making sure that the data is
correct.
And then there's all the othermembers of the MLS who complain when
there is something that's notin compliance.
And about half of thecompliance issues these days are
(38:34):
in the photos.
So in some mlss, you cannothave, for instance, a license plate
on a car showing in the picture.
Right.
Because it's a personalidentification, or you can't have
a person in there.
And there's a lot of reasonsfor that, and that's pretty common.
And there's almost always aperson in the bathroom mirror when
(38:56):
they're taking pictures of the bathroom.
Right.
Anytime there's a mirror,there's a person.
Sometimes you can't haveanimals like dogs or things like
that.
The biggest one is real estatesigns out in front front.
People take a picture of thereal estate sign as a way to get
around how the listings are done.
Or they'll straight up putlike a business card or information
(39:19):
about how to get in touch withthem directly in.
The photos of that granitecountertop or something.
Yeah, yeah.
So, you know, so there was allthese compliance issues that MLs
have to deal with, and theyrealized that they could help the
MLS do that.
And so the last couple years,they've been working with CRMLs out
(39:41):
of California who invested inthem to come up with a great compliance
tool that allows when you goto upload your images into the mls,
instead of waiting for someoneto complain and getting a fine or
whatever, you know, the agentwill immediately see that these three
photos are out of compliance.
(40:02):
And at the same time, becausewe are using artificial intelligence
instead of someone withPhotoshop skills, we have fixed the
image already.
And so we show them a previewof the fixed image.
So if there was a picture ofthe house out front There was a real
estate sign.
Here's a preview of what thispicture will look like without a
(40:23):
real estate sign.
And then all you gotta do isgive a couple credits and approve
it.
And then now the complianceteam at the MLS no longer has to
deal with that.
The agent doesn't have toworry about a fine.
The broker doesn't have toworry about getting a phone call.
There's, you know, there's,you know, it just like drastically
avoids a lot of thosecompliance issues.
(40:44):
And, you know, mls, they don'twant to find their members.
No.
You know, like the last thingthey do.
No, it's not, it's.
It's weird.
The people that pay you,you're going to, you know, take some
of the, some more money.
But, but I get it.
I mean, ultimately, ifeveryone else is playing by the rules
and a few people aren't, yougot to do something, right?
And so this just sort of likeavoids all of that.
(41:06):
And then at the same time, we,because we're.
Now we have those photos, wecan make recommendations about, hey,
this room would probably looka lot better with all, all this terrible
furniture in it.
So for this many credits, youcan take the furniture out here,
you can take the rug out here,you can add hardwood floors here,
you could add modern furnitureif you wanted to.
(41:31):
But the tech is so good.
I mean, it can look at a picture.
It knows that that windowcan't move.
It knows that this countershouldn't move, but this bed can
definitely go away.
It understands what a mirror is.
You know, it understands thereflections in the mirror.
It can take a picture of likea piece of furniture online and understand
(41:52):
already what the 3D view of itis just based on pictures of thousands
of other pieces of furniture.
So it's really, at some pointit's gonna be very difficult to have
humans do this work whenrobots could be so effective at it.
Right now you get sort of amixed output.
Like this picture of the roommight have furniture in this format
(42:15):
and the next picture it mightbe slightly different.
So if you're trying to do alisting, like if you're a property
owner or like a apartmentbuildings, you probably want to still
hire a human to make sure allthe pictures are uniform and look
exactly the same.
But if you're a listing agentand you're just trying to show some
furniture in an empty house,it's awesome.
(42:36):
It works great for that already.
And it's just going to keep getting.
Just in the few months thatI've been there, it's gotten Better.
It's absolutely amazing tech.
And the thing I like about itthe most is that because we're building
it in this way, it's reallyaligned with real estate agents,
it's aligned with the mls.
It's not this controversial.
(42:57):
You know, I don't have toreally be a punching bag at this
company as opposed to, like, wow.
People like, yeah, people likewhat we do.
We don't have to worry about it.
There's probably an offshorePhotoshop person who's mad at us.
But otherwise, you know, it'svery friendly to the real estate
industry, and it just helpsreal estate agents and brokers be
(43:20):
more effective and have lesscompliance issues, which I think
99% of the agents that everhave a compliance agent issue didn't
mean it.
You know, they weren'tintending that.
So, yeah, it's great tech.
All right, Todd, I'm kind ofrunning short on time, you know,
and I know I'm taking your time.
So I did want to find out withccp, you know, where.
(43:42):
Where do you stand here?
There's some very, very big voices.
James Dwiggins, you know, hasbeen really forefront with this with
Next Home.
What's your take?
Well, my take is based 100% onanecdotal evidence.
I had a compass agent when Ipurchased a house a few years ago,
and that house was not on theMLS yet, and it was listed by a different
compass agent.
(44:02):
And turns out we got a stealon that house.
And then when we went to sellit, we talked to the compass agent,
and we talked to a differentlocal agent.
And the different local agenthad an approach that I thought was
better, that was, you know,maximum exposure, which from my Trulia
days, I believe in.
And we.
We made far more money on thathouse than I ever imagined.
(44:23):
And so it seems like CCP isvery good for a listing agent.
And if you're the rightbuyer's agent, maybe the other way
is better.
But I think overall, consumersare better served by maximum exposure.
And that's just how I see it.
I like that.
That makes sense.
I have to ask you the samefinal question I've asked every guest
since Jay Thompson, who wasthe first guest on this podcast.
(44:46):
Which is what one piece ofadvice would you give a new agent?
Just getting started?
Yeah, I guess there was a.
Tom Ferry once said, if therewas something you could go back and
know more when just startingin the industry, what would it be?
And I'd say I would want toknow more people.
Right.
I think the real key to beingan effective real estate agent is
(45:11):
not like whether or not theyunderstand AI or use social media
or have a great CRM.
It's really that focus on yournetwork and you have to be willing
to leverage your network, askfor referrals, go to church, maybe
not sell there, but you justend up knowing more people and people
(45:32):
will refer you.
And it's really all about yoursphere of influence and banging away
on those relationships.
People are the most importantpart about this industry.
I love that answer.
Todd, if someone wants toreach out to you, what's the best
way for them to do that?
Yeah, you can find me onLinkedIn or I'm still on Twitter.
I'm like five of us left butcar on Twitter.
(45:57):
Toddyledod.com is my email.
If anyone would like to reachout and find out more about Styled,
I'd be happy to talk to him.
Awesome.
Todd, this has been great.
I was waiting for the TCARmoment because that's first of all,
only four letters in a Twitter handle.
How did he do that?
It was awesome.
Apparently was early enough,but yeah, being early.
Yeah.
(46:17):
But yeah, this has been great.
I really appreciate it.
I hope to run into yousomewhere around the country.
I'm not doing as much backwith fnf, but it's been wonderful
chatting with you here andbest of luck for you and the family.
We have a new additionarriving shortly, so congratulations
on that.
Yeah.
And pleasure talking to you.
Thanks so much for doing this.
Absolutely.
Bill, it was great to talk to.
We spent a tremendous amountof time talking about social media
and teaching people how to dosocial media, especially the leadership
team and the volunteers andhow to respond to negativity.
And I would be kind of likeput at the forefront and have to
be an example for how to dothis and take some of the hits.
(00:26):
You're listening to the RealEstate Sessions and I'm your host,
Bill risser.
With nearly 25 years in thereal estate business, I love to interview
industry leaders, up andcomers, and really anyone with a
story to tell.
It's the stories that led myguests to a career in the real estate
world that drives me in my10th year and over 400 episodes of
the podcast.
And now I hope you enjoy thenext journey.
(00:51):
Hi, everybody.
Welcome to episode 414 of theReal Estate Sessions podcast.
As always, thank you so muchfor tuning in.
Thank you much for telling a friend.
I'm happy to have a newepisode for you this week.
Even happier that it's ToddCarpenter, somebody that I've known
for a long time, going back tothe, oh, blogging days, that's how
long ago.
He's now senior vice presidentof industry relations with styledod.
(01:15):
We're gonna talk to him about that.
They're doing some really coolstuff with images and mlss and compliance.
I'll just leave it at that.
You need to listen to this.
It's really good.
And we go take a walk through,like, memory lane about some of the
things that were reallyimportant like 12 years ago that
don't matter so much today.
That's funny how that stuffworks, but it's a lot of fun.
(01:36):
Thank you so much for joining us.
Let's get this thing started.
Todd, welcome to the podcast.
It's great to be here, Bill.
It's good to see you again.
It's been a while.
It has been a while.
And boy, there were some funtimes back in the day.
I think you, you're a part ofthat original re.net that was exploding
around the country early inthe OR.
(01:56):
I'd say 2005, 6, 7.
It was pretty fun.
And I know that you spend alot of time in Chicagoland now because,
you know, you had some, acouple of different stints at nar.
But I have to be reallybrutally honest, Todd, I do not know
where you grew up.
I just always associated youwith the Midwest.
So where was home for you?
(02:17):
Where'd you grow up?
So, yeah, I grew up in thesuburbs of Denver, Colorado, which
is still my favorite state.
But my wife is from the Midwest.
And I love my wife, so we livein the Midwest.
That makes, that makes a lotof sense.
Growing up in Denver.
Did you go to high school there?
Was it.
Were you there that long?
Oh, yeah, yeah.
I started my career in Denver.
(02:40):
I briefly moved to Californiaaround 2000, but most of my life
up until Chicago was in Denver.
Okay, and a couple questions.
Does that mean you're aBroncos fan?
Oh, absolutely.
And after a very, you know,growing up, I was used to having
a football team that won allthe time, because the Broncos, from
(03:01):
the 80s until, you know, about10 years ago, they were up until
Super Bowl 50, they were oneof the winningest teams in the league
and it's been pretty rough.
But we got Bo Nicks now andthe future is looking better.
At least that's.
I was at the Broncos win overthe packers in San Diego.
So yeah, that was.
(03:21):
I think the Broncos won that one.
Yeah, they did.
I don't think of Denver aslike a sports town, but man, it's
exploded.
You got the Nuggets, you got the.
Got the Avalanche.
Now you've got the.
The.
Help me out with the other one.
The.
The Rockies.
The Purple Team.
The Rockies.
The Rockies.
Yeah, you know, it.
It was always a sports town.
He lived there.
(03:42):
It's similar to like Bostonwhere on.
My wife.
My wife, when we lived therefor a year, commented that the best
time to go shopping was Sundayat 2:00 because literally everyone
in the city watched the games.
And in fact, even it drew theAvalanche there because the minor
(04:03):
league team that was playinghad bigger audiences than like seven
NHL teams because it was so popular.
And then when the baseballexpanded, they had like the major
league baseball executiveswere in the city to interview the
people that wanted to bringthe Rockies there or start the new
(04:24):
organization.
And something like 30,000people showed up outside to chant
like, take me out to the ball game.
Just to tell people.
And then of course, the firstyear the Rockies played, they played
it at the Bronco Stadium,which seats like 70,000 people and
they were drawing 70,000people to those games.
(04:44):
They set the all time leagueattendance record for a single season
and it's doubtful that willever be eclipsed.
So it's definitely a sportstown for sure.
That's cool.
I've had a chance to go to anall star game there.
I took my son.
This was 98, I think it was in Denver.
And that Loto or downtown areais just really cool.
(05:06):
I mean, it's got some neat stuff.
Yeah.
Big fan, big fan of the city.
Not so much the teams, becauseI was in San Diego at the time, so
we'll just move on.
So you talked about, you know,you moved around a little bit for
work, out of school.
Todd was real estate the firstthing you were thinking about?
Was that where you were headedor was it something else?
Well, it wasn't, but, youknow, my mom was a real estate agent,
(05:29):
so I was.
I was born into the industry,I like to say.
My booster seat literally wasan MLS book that I would sit on when
I was a little kid.
And I knew how to change acombination on those lockboxes.
You know, when I was like 12years old or something, she got into
mortgages.
And honestly, you know, like,I know most of your audience is going
(05:50):
to recognize this.
Like, real estate's reallyhard, and there's good times and
bad times.
I mostly remember the bad times.
And I swear to myself, I wouldnever take a commission sales job
because you have those ups anddowns and it's.
It can be frustrating.
So I wanted to be an automechanic, of all things.
Okay.
While I was going to school, Igot a job at the Sears Auto center.
(06:15):
And I wanted, you know,usually you start out like busting
tires or something like that,but they didn't have any of those
positions open, and they putme on the front desk.
And so about two years in, Irealized I'm making more money than
almost anyone in the buildingselling stuff, and realized I was
actually a pretty decent salesperson.
(06:36):
And so now it's.
And I'm dating myself.
But now it's 1991, and thebiggest refi boom of all time is
happening.
You know, today peoplecomplain about the rates being in
the sevens, but in 1990, therates were in the 13s, and so we're
refinancing people down tolike eight, and it's, you know, saving
them hundreds of dollars.
(06:57):
So my.
My mom basically says, look,you should finish school.
But on the other hand, I knowyou can do this and you should come
do it.
And so I worked for her for ayear as a loan officer.
And then I didn't love workingfor my mom.
I love my mom, but I didn'tlove working for her.
So I went to work with anothercompany and originated loans for
(07:18):
several years.
Eventually I got intowholesale mortgage.
And then in 2000, I went towork for a startup in San Jose, California,
called Myers Internet, andthey were eventually bought by mgic.
They built websites for loanofficers and some real estate agents.
(07:38):
And the big thing about it isit had like an Online loan application
form.
And that was the craziestthing of all time.
Right.
We also did Internet leadswhere people would come in and they
would just fill out this.
You know, a loan applicationhas a lot of private information
on it, and they just likerandomly fill them out.
And then we'd sell Those leadsfor 50 bucks each to several mortgage
(07:59):
brokers.
It was kind of a crazy timebefore there was, you know, an understanding
of loan or, like, identityfraud or things like that.
So obviously it's a lot moresecure now.
But that was my first taste ofstartup technology.
But yeah, and so then, youknow, after a.
Worked there, I came back toDenver and got back into wholesale.
(08:21):
But the banks I worked for,they didn't really get technology
either at that point.
The Internet is still kind ofnew, and they had these really complicated
websites, and if your customerjust wanted to download like a rate
lock form or a cover letterform or something like that, some
(08:42):
simple form that doesn't haveany private information, they would
have to go to the bank websiteand log in with their ID and find
it.
And, you know, it was very complicated.
So I created this websitecalled lenderama for my 50 clients
that basically just mostlyjust had forms that they could download
that was so much easier forthem to do.
(09:04):
Right.
And that's sort of how myfirst website was ever born.
And then eventually I turnedit into a blog.
So.
So did that get you.
Did that.
That takes you up into thetime where social starts happening
as well, Right?
Because that's.
Because that's your.
It feels like that's the.
That was your entrance intoNAR, for sure.
So, yeah, actually, you know,it was 2005 when I launched that
(09:28):
blog.
That was still four yearsbefore I went to NAR.
But the.
The premise of the bloggingwas really based on how successful
some conservative bloggers hadbeen in discounting 60 minutes during
the election the year before.
(09:49):
And there was a story that 60Minutes had about George Bush not
fulfilling his National Guard duty.
And it turns out within acouple of days, these conservative
bloggers had figured out thatsome of the evidence had been.
Had been mocked up.
Like there was some letterthat was supposedly typed in the
60s or 70s, I guess, and ithad been printed with Microsoft Word,
(10:13):
so it obviously was fake.
So, you know, I wasn't reallylike, I didn't want to have a political
blog, but I was reallyimpressed that this new technology
had sort of shifted.
Because you think about 60Minutes, that's like the.
Almost like the mostauthoritative news broadcast there
is.
And here these guys, you know,I think an executive of CBS said,
(10:35):
oh, some guy in their pajamasin their basement writing, writing
a blog.
And I thought, well, I havepajamas and I have a basement.
I could start writing this.
And so I start writing thisblog for mortgage officers that's
part of my website and itbecomes my website.
And I thought, oh yeah, the,you know, I have like 50 mortgage
brokers who are my clients andif, if 20 of them read this, it'll
(10:58):
help me.
It's a one way just to stay incontact with them.
But eventually I was gettingtwo or three thousand unique visitors
a day and it was only a sitethat loan officers would read.
It's like, here's a blog postabout how to get approved for FHA
loans or to track the LIBORfor adjustable rate mortgages or
(11:19):
things like that.
So I suddenly sort of became asocial media expert just because
I was one of the very firstpeople to do.
Sounds like the Jay Thompsonstory a little bit as well, right,
Jay?
About the same time, yeah.
You know, and so one of thethings I did is I started looking
(11:40):
for other blogs.
So right when I started, onlya couple weeks later, I found loan
officer Dan Green had a blogcalled the Mortgage Reports.
And I was like, how is therealready another mortgage blog?
I thought I was the first one.
And we had started almost likeon the same day.
And I was like.
But the real estate was sortof lent itself to blogging more than
(12:02):
mortgages.
Because I feel like peoplethat get into mortgages generally
have more of like math based mind.
And people who get intoselling real estate have more of
a creative based mind.
And there's plenty of exampleswhere that's the opposite.
(12:22):
But you just have to be more creative.
I think when you're workingwith customers and showing them a
home.
And it's not just the simple math.
You'll save $250 if yourefinance at this rate, blah, blah,
blah.
And so I started looking forreal estate blogs and Jay was one
of the very first ones.
I found someone else who'sbeen on your show, Inez Higuettis
Garcia.
She was one of the earliest ones.
(12:43):
Jim Duncan, who is one of theco founders of Nest, great real estate
brokerage, he was one of theearliest ones.
So there was quite a few of us.
And that still kind ofpredated social media as we know
it.
There was just bloggers.
There were a lot of bloggersout there.
Active Rain was, it comes to mind.
(13:04):
Active Rain, that all poppedup and I met Quite a few other people
throughout through thatnetwork as well.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So it was sort of an evolutionto real estate because I had just
decided I should track whoelse is doing this.
And then in 2007, there wastwo bloggers out of New York, Joe
(13:29):
Ferreira and Rudy Bachrati.
And they had a blog called theCelsius Blog.
And they.
They were going to go to InmanConnect in San Francisco, but they
decided they were going to dothis tour across America and try
to find all the other bloggersthat were out there and meet with
them.
And they rented an RV and puta bunch of sponsorship stickers on
(13:49):
it, and they were going tocome through Denver.
So I reached out to them and Iwas like, well, what do you have
planned for Denver?
And they're like, well, whydon't you plan something?
And so I built my very firstreal estate event.
It was called Blog Fiesta.
It was in a.
Because I found a cheap spacein a Mexican restaurant in the Tech
(14:10):
center in Denver.
And we had tacos and talkedabout blogging.
And at that event, CrystalCraft, are you familiar with her?
She was a blogger in Denverand she really helped me reach out
to all the other bloggers,especially on Active Rain, that were
in the area.
And I think like 30, 40 peopleshowed up to this.
(14:31):
Joe and Rudy were kind ofblown away.
It was like the biggest eventup until San Francisco.
And then we all went to.
A lot of us went to SanFrancisco and Inman had created an
event called Beer for Bloggers.
And it was just like all the people.
This is still like beforesocial media really is hitting.
(14:52):
But there was like a lot ofthe early people at Zolo, like Drew
Myers and David Gibbons werethere, and I met Nicole Nicolay there,
and I met Dan Green in person there.
And Jim Duncan, like justmentioned Dustin Luther.
And so that sort of becamelike the beginning of that re net
(15:12):
that you talked about.
And Jay.
I met Jay.
Yeah.
And so that was sort of.
I got the taste for doingevents I still hadn't really even
thought about, like, nar.
But then I met up with anotherreal estate person, or not, sorry,
mortgage person, his name'sJason Berman.
And we decided to create ourown technology event because really,
(15:36):
like real estate tech,mortgage tech, none of that was about
social media at all.
No one knew how to address this.
This is all so new.
So we were going to have anevent in Tag along with a bigger
event called Blog World in Vegas.
And while we were planningthat event, another friend of mine,
(15:57):
Andy Kaufman, he came up withthis idea for Re Bar Camp.
And so we jumped right intothat and started helping him with
that.
And all this was 2007, 2008.
This is really cool.
I'm just sitting here just reminiscing.
And me, I actually went to aBlog World event in Vegas because
Nick Bastian was going to bethere, and Jay Thompson and Dean
(16:17):
Willett, and this was all thePhoenix guys that were, you know,
trying to do the same things.
It was very interesting times.
Do you see an opening at nar,or does NAR reach out to you?
How does that happen?
You know, it's pretty funnybecause while we were promoting Reblog
World, man, putting on eventsthat people pay for is.
(16:40):
Is very difficult, especiallywhen you're doing the very first
one.
And so literally, it was likehand to hand combat.
We were reaching out to people.
If they left a comment on theblog or mentioned Ari, Blog World
or any of that stuff, we wouldreach out.
And one of the people that had.
She had come to the site inone way or another was a lady named
Hilary Marsh.
(17:00):
And she worked at nar.
And so I connected with herand I was trying to get her to come
to the conference.
And she ran the.
At the time, it was calledrealtor.org, it was the, you know,
the main website for narrative.
So I sort of knew her, but notvery well.
And then on monster.com, nARlisted that they were looking for
(17:21):
a social media manager.
And I was like, man, who do I know?
Like, instead of applyingthrough Monster, I was like, who
do I know at nar?
I know Hilary Marsh.
So I reached out to Hillaryand I'm like, what do you know about
this job?
I'm interested.
And she's like, I'm the onehiring for it.
And so almost like from dayone, I had inside path to get that
job.
And it was very weird becauseup until then, I still saw myself
(17:45):
as a mortgage guy, mostlytalking about mortgage.
And so now, just because I hadbeen doing it longer than anyone
else, I'd become like, thissocial media expert.
But it was really, like, onlyto facilitate the mortgage side.
But at that point, I knew if Itook a job at the national association
of Realtors, I was gonna meet,like, a tremendous number of people
(18:08):
I was gonna open a lot of.
And so I campaigned reallyhard for that position, and I moved
to Chicago in order to do it.
Today's, like, remote worldwas not really existence back then.
Everyone worked in the office,and so it was just like a tremendous
opportunity.
Because one, I was there tosort of like, evangelize social media
(18:34):
to agents.
And the reason being for thatwas that the communications team
wanted more agents, moremembers to be vocal about their market.
And remember, this is like,right after the housing downturn
is really hitting 2008, 2009.
And so the press is talkingterribly about our industry, and
(19:01):
rightly so in some cases, butthey wanted more voices about what's
going on in local markets allacross the country.
And what better way than toleverage over a million people that
are passionate about this andpeople who know their markets.
And so we spent a tremendousamount of time talking about social
(19:23):
media and teaching people howto do social media, especially like
the leadership team and thevolunteers and how to respond to
negativity.
And I would be.
I would be kind of like, putat the forefront and, like, have
to be an example for, youknow, how to do this and take.
Take some of the hits.
Similar to Jay Thompson whenhe went to Zillow, and, you know,
(19:46):
you're kind of like the onegetting punched, but that was fine.
And.
But then the back end was totrain all of the staff, especially
on how to use social media,because NAR at that point was very
much like a command andcontrol type communication.
They were.
I mean, they literally werespeaking from an ivory tower at the
(20:08):
time.
There was no ability for themembers to kind of like, talk back
in public.
And suddenly this social mediathing popped up and, you know, again,
Jay Thompson had created ablog called NAR Wisdom, and it was
very critical of nar.
Some of the, you know, like,NAR had sponsored a giant Rose bowl
float right during the housing downturn.
(20:29):
And, you know, there was.
There were a lot of like.
But suddenly they weren't usedto, like, this public criticism.
What do you do about it?
And now I feel like it's sortof native to everyone to understand
how online criticism happens.
But it was very new to them.
So it was a lot.
There was an internal side andan external side to that job.
(20:50):
I'll bet you some of thoseconversations were pretty rough.
I would just think internally,even right where you're trying to
say, look, we can't.
We can't attack.
We can't do this, we can't do that.
We've got to be, you know,we've got to find this.
This place where we're takingcare of those people, because those
people are members, eventhough they're criticizing, you know,
(21:11):
and.
What was interesting about itwas that there were many departments
at NAR who were wanted to usethe social media because they could
break out of whatever theofficial line of what the NAR community
communications team was saying.
Like they would be able to gettheir message out on their own without,
(21:33):
without that command and control.
And so the communicationsteam, which is where I was, was actually
like the most anti socialmedia of any department there because
they were losing control ofwhat they had always had control
of before, which is totally understandable.
So that there were a lot ofinternal politics where I luckily
(21:55):
had the endorsement of the CEODale Sitton at the time.
Like he had made clear, likewe're going to do what Todd thinks
about this stuff.
But it was kind of almostadversarial in some instances because
people just weren't used tothis new force and the two way conversation.
Luckily my boss Hillary, shegot it, she understood it, but there
(22:19):
were other folks there thatjust were totally uncomfortable with
it at that, at that point.
There's in, in your timeline,you decide to go back to Denver,
we'll call it, and, and, andwork with Trulia, which at the time,
this is still, we'll call itearly days.
Right.
I mean this is, they're not apart of Zillow at this time, are
(22:40):
they?
Yet?
No.
Yeah.
So they're doing their own thing.
Peter's trying to get Spenceror whatever, they're trying, whatever
their, the battles were.
But you, it wasn't on thesocial side, was it, was it more
data driven at this point orwas this come a little bit later?
So it was the year that theyIPO'd, so they were right there about
to become a unicorn.
(23:01):
And it was also a time whenboth Zillow and Trulia were very
unpopular for some of their,some of their practices about how
they put up listings and howthey attributed listing agents.
And there was a lot, a lot of angst.
And of course investors don'tlike angst.
So I was basically put on a team.
(23:21):
I mean literally we're likethe listing security team.
We're trying to make sure thebrokers are still giving us listings.
And I was leveraging somesocial media, but a lot of like industry
relations type work to connectwith big brokers and also a lot of
mlss and try to get them to bemore aligned.
(23:42):
And honestly like a lot of itwas because we were about to IPO
and we were trying to figurethat piece out.
And then after I left, trulywas acquired about a year after that
from Zillow.
Okay, so and then that, thatbrings you back to nar.
Now this for sure, this is A rat.
A big change.
Right.
Because generally people whoare in the communication, social
(24:05):
side of stuff.
Well, once again, you talkedabout it would be the creatives.
They're thinking about that stuff.
Right.
But you've already laid outfor us that you were more of the
math guy when you were havingsuccess as a lender.
So it kind of makes sense thenthat back back to nar, you go heavy
into the data side of thingsand really, I mean, that's what a
(24:26):
lot of people that they thinkof you as that only because they've
met you, you know, after thetruly time.
That time at ner, we got ioi.
I mean, there were somereally, really cool stuff going on
when you were back there.
Yeah.
So Trulia, you know, that justdidn't work out.
We were, I was, I was tryingto tell them about the right way
to do things in the realestate way, and they were focused
(24:49):
on the right way to do it inthe tech way.
And you know, ultimately Ithink they got what they wanted was
this acquisition from Zillow.
But when I left, I owe it toDale Stinton, the CEO, and Mark Les
Wing, who was the cto.
They reached back out to me,and while I don't have the data chops
(25:11):
or the programming chops to bea data scientist, they did know that
I was really good atexplaining technology to people who
don't understand technology.
There you go.
And so that guy in the movieOffice Space who's like, I'm the
one that talks to the engineers.
Engineers don't have goodpeople skills.
(25:32):
Yeah, that's kind of neat.
I don't want to jump toconclusions game.
But anyway, yeah, so they hadthis new initiative, and that initiative
was to learn way, way moreabout their members than they previously
did, to use Big Data datascience to figure out how they can
get people to take moreeducation classes, give more money
(25:54):
to the pac, reach out to theirsenator more often, you know, anything
that NAR is trying to do as anorganization, it's not even really
real estate related.
It was more like member organization.
And just like social media atthe time, Big Data was scary because
now we're going to collect awhole bunch of data about these members
who might feel like theirprivacy is being invaded.
(26:17):
And they needed someone tobuild that team, but they also needed
someone that could sell that.
And by sell it, I mean sell itto the leadership, the volunteer
leadership, the president, theincoming president, and explain why
it's, you know, what we'redoing is not the same as some of
the online retailers today.
(26:38):
But we are collecting this andhere's what we're going to do with
it.
And beyond, just like theactions of the association, we were
buying data about politicalpersuasion and household income.
And there was a lot of data,hundreds of thousands of dollars
worth of data to, you know,especially to make the advocacy team
more effective.
And they're right.
(26:59):
They're by far one of the mosteffective advocacy associations in,
in America.
And so it was really more of asales job.
And.
But I hired like our originaldata science team and we had to go
to each department at NAR andfigure out their systems.
A lot of them didn't connectto each other.
And we had to put all this,what's called the data lake, which
(27:23):
is how you can create machinelearning and start to build cohorts
and algorithms in order toidentify who has the highest propensity
to get their E Procertification or whatever and then
go sell them that stuff.
And again, also a difficulttransition for the staff to suddenly
(27:46):
just do things in a wholedifferent way that they hadn't thought
of before.
Being more data driven aboutall their messaging and things like
that.
So similar evangelist role,similar to social media.
What timeframe are we talkingabout here?
When did this get started?
I went back in 2013.
So that was.
(28:06):
This is over 10 years ago.
You're talking about stuffthat now everyone today kind of knows
the term machine learning.
You've heard about it throughAI and, you know, and all these other
things that are popping out there.
Yeah, that was a long time ago.
That seems like it was almostlike NAR was an early adopter of
the strategy that we gottaknow, we need data points and we
(28:27):
gotta know how to use these.
And I know, I'm sure therewere others that even earlier were
doing that, but probably inthe real estate space.
This was unheard of at that time.
I mean, outside of likeCoreLogic or Zillow, there were very
few companies with these kindof technology chops.
And of course, we were doingit on a far smaller budget.
I mean, there's only like 300employees at NAR, and half of them
(28:51):
are really more like advocacypeople and things like that.
So.
Yeah, so, but it was sort of alearning experience.
But also, you know, datingback to when I was in mortgages,
that first wholesale mortgagejob I had, they had this new technology
that they had contract.
It was called a company calledWashington Mortgage, and they had
done a deal with Fannie Mae tobe one of the beta testers for this
(29:15):
program called DesktopOriginator, which is Literally how
online.
Every online loan today isrunning on something similar to this
program.
But basically there was acomputer program that pre qualified
people figured out what theircredit risk was.
And that was sort of myselling point is that I had this
(29:38):
new program like the company Iworked for sold a lot of vanilla
type loans that there wasnothing really special about those
loans.
And so if you didn't have thelowest price, it was very hard to
get the deals.
But we had this new technologythat was getting more people approved
for conforming loans and Ireally adopted it.
And that was the point where Irealized that I was good about talking
(30:00):
about technology and prettymuch my entire career after that
was what is my tech edge.
And so when we get to this,you know, to the data science piece
I was learning on the job, butI already understood enough about
it, especially from working at Trulia.
Their AB testing of thewebsite and things like that were
(30:22):
amazing for the time.
And so it's just been, I'vealways tried to like look ahead,
see what is on the on thehorizon, determine if it is something
that is going to be impactfulor not.
And nothing is like a shinydiamond, but everything has a role.
And so, and how do youleverage that?
(30:43):
And then how do you talk tosalespeople who are more busy selling
homes or originating mortgagesthan have the time to learn about
these things?
And so yeah that was, thatrole was really like I knew that
that role was only going tolast three or four years because
eventually I will have, Ieventually trained my first hire
to know enough about theinternal workings of NAR that he
(31:06):
almost didn't need me anymore.
And that's really when, whenthe new CEO came in, that's when
I transitioned over to SecondCentury Ventures.
Which is, is that, is it asubsidiary of NAR or is it funded
by nar?
What's the exact connection?
It's a, it's a wholly ownedsubsidiary of Narrow and they originally.
So second century representsthe second century of NAR.
(31:30):
So on the 100 year anniversaryof NAR, they created a bunch of new
initiatives and one of themwas this venture capital fund and
they are the only provider offunds to that, that this, this subsidiary.
And the idea was let's we're anot for profit, let's take some of
our revenue and put it in aplace where it can hopefully make
(31:54):
more money.
But also like let's invest inthe real estate tech that's out there.
One of the very firstinvestments I love to talk about,
I get like, I just did thetiniest bit of credit for it because
Constance, who was runningSecond Century Ventures at the time,
she asked me like, what do youthink of this company called Docusign?
(32:15):
We're thinking about investingin them.
And I'm like, docusign's awesome.
You should totally invest in them.
And then they did.
And that investment wasseveral years in the making, but
turned out to be a fantastic investment.
And so Second Century Ventureshas paid back NAR the initial amount
of money that the member duesfunded it.
(32:36):
And it runs completely on its own.
It's still owned by nar, butit doesn't take any member dues.
It generates its own revenue.
It's one of the ways NARactually makes money as a, that's
not non dues related.
So they've invested in severalhundred companies at this point.
And it's also a great way tonot have another Zillow, you know,
(33:00):
like you Zillow.
Zillow is this great companyand great technology.
But for the longest time therewas a massive adversarial relationship
between NAR and Zillow.
And I feel like Dale, who wasthe former CEO and Bob Goldberg,
who helped create SecondCentury Ventures felt like, hey,
(33:23):
we need to align ourselveswith these technology companies and
not be adversarial with them.
If we get to them early andexplain why, you'd really be better
off doing it this way, you'restill going to succeed, but you're
not going to have the, theback and forth of, you know, having
so many brokers mad at you.
And every prop tech company,startup out there now wants, wants
(33:47):
in.
They want to be a part of theioi, they want to be in the pitch
battles, they want the exposure.
I mean, it's what SecondCentury's done is impressive.
Super cool.
It's been a lot of fun towatch it.
So, yeah, so when I came ontothe team that was 2017 or 18, Bob
Goldberg had just become CEOand he wanted to have a conference
(34:09):
that was just focused on tech.
Not just like the annualconference and have a tech channel,
but a tech focused event.
And so based on all the stuffI had done with Ari Barkamp and Blog
World and all those otherthings a million years ago, they
kind of put me in charge ofcoming up with the concept and thinking
(34:30):
up like the pitch battle andall that stuff.
And then there was a huge teamof people to actually execute that
first one.
But I was really involved inthat in the first place.
And that was again to try toexpand that tent and just have as
many tech companies aspossible, who.
They don't necessarily need toget NAR's endorsement.
(34:53):
They just want to know whatare the best practices of working
with the industry and all thepolitics involved in the industry.
And so tremendous amount oftime was spent with me helping those
companies do that.
Well, now, Todd, you're withone of those kinds of companies.
You're with Style.
Dodd.
I, I know the basics of what,what the company does.
(35:14):
It's.
It's a big piece of.
It is going to be helpingrealtors really show off the property
in the best way possible.
Right, right.
I mean, that's what, that's what.
That's ultimately the end result.
Tell me about joining them.
What's going on there?
Yeah, so it's really excitingcompany for me because it again is,
you know, that, that next technology.
(35:36):
And even before I went tosecond Century, I was working for.
When I did the Data project, Iwas working for Mark Les Wing and
he had a lot of his teamtrying to write papers about emerging
technologies.
And we would publish them on.
We had a team called thecenter for Realtor Technology at
(35:57):
the time, and we would publishthese papers through them.
And I wrote up.
It was 2017 and I wrote a big report.
It was sort of, you know,you're taking like a futurist view
of how artificial intelligencewas going to affect the real estate
industry.
And my concept was kind ofcentered around 2001 A Space Odyssey
(36:19):
with the HAL 9000 being likethis omnipresent robot that is all
over this spaceship.
Just like omnipresent robotsare existing in our homes now with
your iPhone and the Nest thermostat.
And there's so many thesesmart home things are starting to
affect it.
And so it's fun to even lookback on that story because some of
(36:41):
that stuff has not actuallyhappened yet.
But a lot of it is starting toreally come to fruition, the idea
of artificial intelligencereally impacting our industry.
And when I go around to likewhen we would working for Reach in
second century, we wouldencounter a lot of companies that
said they used artificialintelligence, but not really.
But styledad, they started asan image editing company.
(37:06):
So they had, you know, forlack of a better word, like a ton
of people who knew how to usePhotoshop and they would declutter
a listing photo or they wouldadd some furniture to a listing photo.
And in fact, styledad stilldoes that, a lot of that.
But what they realized is thatartificial intelligence is the next
(37:28):
step for that, is that all ofthese things can be done with artificial
intelligence.
So they doubled down learninghow to use these models.
And a lot of them are free,you know, from like ChatGPT and Alibaba.
And so they figured out how todo a lot of that work with a robot.
You know, they.
They can declutter a picturevery easily.
(37:50):
They can look at a picture and.
And figure out what's in thepicture very easily now.
So when they got into realestate, what they realized is that,
or within the US Market isthat a lot of this could really be
helpful to an mls.
And MLS have a tremendousamount of compliance issues that
(38:12):
they deal with every day,which is why MLS data is the best
data, because it's very likelyto be accurate, because there's a
whole team of people at theMLS making sure that the data is
correct.
And then there's all the othermembers of the MLS who complain when
there is something that's notin compliance.
And about half of thecompliance issues these days are
(38:34):
in the photos.
So in some mlss, you cannothave, for instance, a license plate
on a car showing in the picture.
Right.
Because it's a personalidentification, or you can't have
a person in there.
And there's a lot of reasonsfor that, and that's pretty common.
And there's almost always aperson in the bathroom mirror when
(38:56):
they're taking pictures of the bathroom.
Right.
Anytime there's a mirror,there's a person.
Sometimes you can't haveanimals like dogs or things like
that.
The biggest one is real estatesigns out in front front.
People take a picture of thereal estate sign as a way to get
around how the listings are done.
Or they'll straight up putlike a business card or information
(39:19):
about how to get in touch withthem directly in.
The photos of that granitecountertop or something.
Yeah, yeah.
So, you know, so there was allthese compliance issues that MLs
have to deal with, and theyrealized that they could help the
MLS do that.
And so the last couple years,they've been working with CRMLs out
(39:41):
of California who invested inthem to come up with a great compliance
tool that allows when you goto upload your images into the mls,
instead of waiting for someoneto complain and getting a fine or
whatever, you know, the agentwill immediately see that these three
photos are out of compliance.
(40:02):
And at the same time, becausewe are using artificial intelligence
instead of someone withPhotoshop skills, we have fixed the
image already.
And so we show them a previewof the fixed image.
So if there was a picture ofthe house out front There was a real
estate sign.
Here's a preview of what thispicture will look like without a
(40:23):
real estate sign.
And then all you gotta do isgive a couple credits and approve
it.
And then now the complianceteam at the MLS no longer has to
deal with that.
The agent doesn't have toworry about a fine.
The broker doesn't have toworry about getting a phone call.
There's, you know, there's,you know, it just like drastically
avoids a lot of thosecompliance issues.
(40:44):
And, you know, mls, they don'twant to find their members.
No.
You know, like the last thingthey do.
No, it's not, it's.
It's weird.
The people that pay you,you're going to, you know, take some
of the, some more money.
But, but I get it.
I mean, ultimately, ifeveryone else is playing by the rules
and a few people aren't, yougot to do something, right?
And so this just sort of likeavoids all of that.
(41:06):
And then at the same time, we,because we're.
Now we have those photos, wecan make recommendations about, hey,
this room would probably looka lot better with all, all this terrible
furniture in it.
So for this many credits, youcan take the furniture out here,
you can take the rug out here,you can add hardwood floors here,
you could add modern furnitureif you wanted to.
(41:31):
But the tech is so good.
I mean, it can look at a picture.
It knows that that windowcan't move.
It knows that this countershouldn't move, but this bed can
definitely go away.
It understands what a mirror is.
You know, it understands thereflections in the mirror.
It can take a picture of likea piece of furniture online and understand
(41:52):
already what the 3D view of itis just based on pictures of thousands
of other pieces of furniture.
So it's really, at some pointit's gonna be very difficult to have
humans do this work whenrobots could be so effective at it.
Right now you get sort of amixed output.
Like this picture of the roommight have furniture in this format
(42:15):
and the next picture it mightbe slightly different.
So if you're trying to do alisting, like if you're a property
owner or like a apartmentbuildings, you probably want to still
hire a human to make sure allthe pictures are uniform and look
exactly the same.
But if you're a listing agentand you're just trying to show some
furniture in an empty house,it's awesome.
(42:36):
It works great for that already.
And it's just going to keep getting.
Just in the few months thatI've been there, it's gotten Better.
It's absolutely amazing tech.
And the thing I like about itthe most is that because we're building
it in this way, it's reallyaligned with real estate agents,
it's aligned with the mls.
It's not this controversial.
(42:57):
You know, I don't have toreally be a punching bag at this
company as opposed to, like, wow.
People like, yeah, people likewhat we do.
We don't have to worry about it.
There's probably an offshorePhotoshop person who's mad at us.
But otherwise, you know, it'svery friendly to the real estate
industry, and it just helpsreal estate agents and brokers be
(43:20):
more effective and have lesscompliance issues, which I think
99% of the agents that everhave a compliance agent issue didn't
mean it.
You know, they weren'tintending that.
So, yeah, it's great tech.
All right, Todd, I'm kind ofrunning short on time, you know,
and I know I'm taking your time.
So I did want to find out withccp, you know, where.
(43:42):
Where do you stand here?
There's some very, very big voices.
James Dwiggins, you know, hasbeen really forefront with this with
Next Home.
What's your take?
Well, my take is based 100% onanecdotal evidence.
I had a compass agent when Ipurchased a house a few years ago,
and that house was not on theMLS yet, and it was listed by a different
compass agent.
(44:02):
And turns out we got a stealon that house.
And then when we went to sellit, we talked to the compass agent,
and we talked to a differentlocal agent.
And the different local agenthad an approach that I thought was
better, that was, you know,maximum exposure, which from my Trulia
days, I believe in.
And we.
We made far more money on thathouse than I ever imagined.
(44:23):
And so it seems like CCP isvery good for a listing agent.
And if you're the rightbuyer's agent, maybe the other way
is better.
But I think overall, consumersare better served by maximum exposure.
And that's just how I see it.
I like that.
That makes sense.
I have to ask you the samefinal question I've asked every guest
since Jay Thompson, who wasthe first guest on this podcast.
(44:46):
Which is what one piece ofadvice would you give a new agent?
Just getting started?
Yeah, I guess there was a.
Tom Ferry once said, if therewas something you could go back and
know more when just startingin the industry, what would it be?
And I'd say I would want toknow more people.
Right.
I think the real key to beingan effective real estate agent is
(45:11):
not like whether or not theyunderstand AI or use social media
or have a great CRM.
It's really that focus on yournetwork and you have to be willing
to leverage your network, askfor referrals, go to church, maybe
not sell there, but you justend up knowing more people and people
(45:32):
will refer you.
And it's really all about yoursphere of influence and banging away
on those relationships.
People are the most importantpart about this industry.
I love that answer.
Todd, if someone wants toreach out to you, what's the best
way for them to do that?
Yeah, you can find me onLinkedIn or I'm still on Twitter.
I'm like five of us left butcar on Twitter.
(45:57):
Toddyledod.com is my email.
If anyone would like to reachout and find out more about Styled,
I'd be happy to talk to him.
Awesome.
Todd, this has been great.
I was waiting for the TCARmoment because that's first of all,
only four letters in a Twitter handle.
How did he do that?
It was awesome.
Apparently was early enough,but yeah, being early.
Yeah.
(46:17):
But yeah, this has been great.
I really appreciate it.
I hope to run into yousomewhere around the country.
I'm not doing as much backwith fnf, but it's been wonderful
chatting with you here andbest of luck for you and the family.
We have a new additionarriving shortly, so congratulations
on that.
Yeah.
And pleasure talking to you.
Thanks so much for doing this.
Absolutely.
Bill, it was great to talk to.
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