Duncan Duo 12-14-25

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Happy Sunday, Tampa Bay. We're with you for another week

(00:02):
here on the Duncan Duo Real Estate Show, talking about
the Tampa Bay real estate market, like we are every
Sunday at ten right here on WFLA News for more
than a decade, keeping you updated on everything that's going
on in real estate in the Tampa Bay area when
we aren't on air, The Dunkin Duo at the Dunkin Duo, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok,

(00:22):
go to any of our social channels. Make sure to
follow us and stay up to date on all things
going on in real estate. I'm Andrew Duncan with LPT Realty,
the Duncan Duo team we're hiring. So if you're a
real estate agent, maybe you didn't have the year that
you wanted and you're listening to the show, and you
listen to my show, maybe you might wonder, why am
I not working with that guy? So we are hiring jointduo.

(00:46):
Dot com messages on any of our social channels for
a confidential consultation, you can book it on calendly, we
can do a via zoom, we can do a via phone,
or certainly we can do it in person. We also
allow agents to come in and shadow our team meeting
every week just so they can kind of get a
vibe for how we operate and our leadership style. So
if you're interested in that again, any of our social

(01:06):
channels at the Duncan Duo, just send us a DM
or go to join the Duo dot com and click
through to set an appointment directly. What I want to
get to next is what in real estate agents speak
is a holiday, and it's a holiday in the real
world too, but I want to talk about why it's
a holiday for real estate agents and it's New Year's Day.

(01:26):
The reason why New Year's Day is an extra special
holiday for real estate agents is because that is the
day where the where the most number of real estate
listing agreements expire every single year. You know, so many
home sellers when they hire their agent, they decide, okay,
I'll give you till the end of the year, whether
it's December thirty first or January first, they give them

(01:48):
till the end of the year. So on January first,
or of course sometimes home sellers are frustrated with our
agent and it didn't get sold before the holidays like
their goal was, and then they fire the real estate agent.
That's another reason a lot of listings will withdraw around
that date. So this is a time when a lot
of home sellers are wondering, why has my home sold?

(02:11):
What can I do differently? What do I need to
do differently next year? And either their agreement is expiring
or they're contemplating parting ways with their agents. So January first,
December thirty first a time for a lot of real
estate agents to stay active and busy and be prepared
for those customers that are ready to make a change.
And so today I want to talk to you home
sellers out there whose homes haven't sold. We get calls

(02:34):
from a lot of you, and generally speaking, we're limited
in terms of what we can communicate with you about.
You want to know how your marketings are, your price
or this or that, and you know there's ethics rules
that kind of mandate and regulate the real estate industry,
as well as our own internal code that prevents us
from going through too much conversation with you. So you

(02:57):
have a real estate agent that isn't doing the job clearly,
or else you wouldn't be calling other people. But you
may need to have a conversation with them first. That's
really where it starts. Have a conversation with your agent first.
If you've done all of those things and had those
conversations and then you're shopping around for other real estate agents,
you're probably looking to make a change. So the mistake

(03:20):
that a lot of sellers make is they'll go with
the agent to help them buy. That might be an
agent that's a really you know, the way I like
to describe it is, you know, the agent that helped
you buy, and then you choose to sell with them
the first that helped you buy. It's kind of like
if you look in the medical world or the legal world,
maybe someone's a really good financial attorney or negotiating attorney,

(03:43):
but not a good litigator. Or maybe someone's a good
foot surgeon, but you know, if you had a problem
with your need, they're not the right person. And that is,
unfortunately what happens a lot of times in real estate.
Someone will pick an agent because they've worked with them
in buying before, and then they're not really a good
seller's agent because they're good at that side of the business,
kind of like an attorney like I mentioned, would be
good at maybe business negotiations or a state a state planning,

(04:10):
but not necessarily a great litigator. So in the real
estate world, we see it happen a lot where an
agent that gets someone's listing does a lot of buyside transactions,
so they don't have enough at bats on the listing side.
So that's one mistake people make. Another mistake that people
make when they hire the person to sell the most
valuable asset they own is they decide to hire a

(04:31):
friend or family member, and unfortunately, when you're talking about
making a financial decision, your friend or family member isn't
always the most qualified person to sell your home and
get the most money for it. That strategy, either of
those strategies, probably works in a real estate market from
a few years ago when everything was selling, but in
a market like today where it's very challenging and you

(04:53):
have plenty of properties not selling and it's very competitive,
you know, you have to be more conscientious about picking
someone that has the ability to get exposure, that's a
great negotiator, that has a track record for selling listings,
like a massive track record like us, And certainly there's
plenty of others, But I see that mistake a lot.

(05:13):
Someone either picks the person that helped them buy or
picks the friend or family member. So the obstacle in
both of those scenarios is that you may not be
getting the most qualified person to help you get your
home sold. Another place that we see happen a lot
is you pick the person that you know, especially like
So let's say you picked somebody didn't sell your house,

(05:35):
and now you're going to go again. Well, when your
home goes off the market, you're going to get hit
with a massive amount of calls, texts, and emails from
real estate ations. And what I would caution you to
think about as those agents are calling you to solicit
you for your listing and try and get in front
of you to try and sell your house, is that
if they were really great at selling homes as a business,

(05:57):
would they need to solicit and call you to try
and get your expired or withdraw on listings. You know,
they'd probably be helping other sellers. They'd probably be really busy.
So if you are thinking about selling your home and
your agent has failed, I would encourage you to not
go the path of hiring the people that solicit you.

(06:18):
You know, they're like the ambulance chasers of real estate
after your home expires or withdrawals, so we obviously want
to audition for that job. You can hit us up
at dunkandoo dot com. We'd love the opportunity to sell
your home. We've specialized over the years and sold hundreds
of homes that failed to sell with other real estate agents,
probably thousands at this point truthfully, so it takes a
different approach when your home hasn't sold, and I want

(06:40):
to go through some of those just to kind of
give you an idea of some things that we do differently.
One of the very first and most important things is
obviously getting your price right. There are a lot of
home sellers who are still pricing their home in fantasyland,
or agents who aren't strong enough and firm enough to
explain the market, to be honest with the person about price,
and their hope is that that they will be able to,

(07:02):
you know, negotiate them down over time and get the
home sold. So they tell you what you want to
hear on price to get your listing, and then over
time they hope they hope to wear you down, you know,
they hope to wear you down like a timeshare presentation.
You know, let me list your house at five hundred.
I know it can't sell five hundred. I know it
probably can't sell four seventy five. It's probably going to
need to be four fifty or lower. So let me

(07:23):
take it and then let the market beat you up
and then hope that I can, you know, grind you
down to a number that the home will eventually sell.
For just being honest with you and saying, hey, look,
the number that you want isn't realistic. It's just not
the market for that. We're not an appreciating market. We
still have hangover from a storm. I am very bullish
about twenty six and twenty seven, but we're not there yet.

(07:44):
You know, we're not seeing sunshine and rainbows, and our
real estate market is very challenging. So an agent that's
honest with you on price. Second of the marketing strategies.
Far too often I look up properties when customers call us,
and I see, well, they might have great photos, they
might have a great description, the syndication on the listing.
It's not being featured. It's there's not ad campaigns being

(08:05):
run to it. I see that that's pretty common, and
that that's a common failure that doesn't get home sold,
or I see a track record of someone that doesn't
have a lot of listing experience. So if they don't
have a lot of listing experience, they haven't role played
and objection handled, so when they get calls on the property,
they don't know how to handle them. They're botching stuff
that you don't know about, or because they're not great

(08:28):
negotiators and they've not done a lot of listings, And
how you become a great negotiator a great listing agent
is by doing it by the bats, not the time.
I want to reiterate that the time that a real
estate agent has operated does not prove their experience. The

(08:48):
bats do the listings, the sales, the scars from those sales,
the things that they've learned. There are plenty of agents
that have been real estate agents for ten or twelve
or fifteen or twenty years and not done very much
business that some of my agents, you know, in a
month do what they've done in their career. So you
don't necessarily need someone that's been an agent a long time.

(09:08):
You need someone that's got to proven track record of selling,
because those conversations that they're having when they're not an
experienced negotiator. They're messing things up that you don't ever
know about. They're botching those things. So it's why the
you know, that track record of selling listing and selling
a lot of homes matters. A good training program, a
good protocol, a system, a team behind them, those are

(09:30):
all things that help ensure that that listings sell. So
another thing I think is important sometimes your hole needs
to come back off the market and get reset. Maybe
the marketing's right, maybe the photos right. Maybe the price
is right now, but you started it too high with
bad marketing, and while the time while it's been on
the market, those things have been corrected. Maybe the price
got right, maybe the agent improved the marketing. Maybe it's

(09:53):
optimal now. But the scarlet letter of real estate sales
today is days on market everyone today. I mean, look,
people want to use a filter on their videos. They
want they want to create this misperception of themselves, you know, publicly,
and it's the same thing with real estate. The days

(10:13):
on market is a vanity number that turns a lot
of people off when it gets too high. It makes
them think that people don't want their home. I mean,
there are people that can't even post something on social media.
Without getting enough likes, they delete it. So at the
same token, a house that doesn't get any likes, okay,
that's sitting on the market for months and months and months.
To a lot of consumers, it's a huge turnoff. You've

(10:33):
got to reset the you know, you've got to reset
the stigma of the home. You've got to reset the narrative.
The home's got to come off the market so it
can go back on fresh and new. It comes off
for a couple of months, you reset all the days
on market, You shoot some new photos, some new angles,
you switch up the copy. By the time it comes
back on, a lot of the buyers that were already
looking at it have moved on and bought something else

(10:55):
or aren't in the market anymore. You have a new
crop of buyers, and then you have a home that
doesn't look that you've made different enough to where it
at least passed the sniff test where maybe someone doesn't
click next, maybe they click through the photos. So price,
the strategy of the agent, the marketing getting it off
the market, the syndication and the experience of the agent

(11:18):
are all things that massively matter in today's real estate market.
So if your home hasn't sold this year, hopefully these
tips are helpful to help you get to the next
step and get your home sold in twenty six. If
you want more direct or you know, you know tips
specific to your home. Sometimes it can be a condition issue.
Sometimes there's things where we can walk through and give

(11:40):
you some advice about what to do, what to improve,
what repairs to make. Just go to Duncan Duo dot com.
Just fill out your address. You're gonna get a quick
home value estimates that's automated, Okay, like it's not a
human doing that. Real estate fortunately or unfortunately can't be
replaced with AI just yet. So we will come out though,

(12:01):
and we'll look at your house, we'll talk to you,
we'll figure out a strategy, will help you come up
with the next steps. And sometimes you know everything's right,
you just need time. So Duncan Duo dot com again,
fill out your dress and we'd love the opportunity. Same
thing goes for if you want an instant cash offer.
Maybe you're tired, maybe you're frustrated, maybe you've done everything
and you just don't even want to deal with it anymore.
You can do that at Dunkin Duo dot com. We'll

(12:21):
be back continue in this conversation after a quick break
here on the Dunkin Duo real Estate Show. So we're
back here on the Duncan Duo Show talking about the
Tampa Bay real estate market. And I talked before the
break about home sellers whose homes didn't sell this year
and either they were expiring or withdrawing by the end
of the year, they're parting ways with their agent, whatever
it is. It's a time of year where a lot

(12:42):
of people are ready to make a change. They're ready
to start the new year with a new agent, a
new strategy, or their agreement is expiring. And so I
gave some tips on that. One of the things that
I didn't go into very deep was, you know a
reason that sometimes holmes don't sell. I talked about price
and marketing and ad experience and negotiation, the syndication of

(13:03):
the real estate agent themselves, the timing of the strategy,
the timing of maybe it needed to come off the market.
We want to talk about one other thing and go
a little bit deeper, and it's the repairs or improvements
you need to make to your house. And so every
single home has two things that cause it not to sell, okay,
And they're the only two things that you can basically control,

(13:25):
and it's price and condition. You can't control the market,
you can't control what happens with interest rates, you can't
control whether the buyer can qualify, but you can control
the home's price and its condition. So I dealt. I
delved into the price strategy a little bit, but I
want to talk about the you know, the repairs and
the condition improvements. So you're making an impression on a

(13:49):
homeowner with everything about your home. So before you get
into making any massive repairs, you have to look at
your home through the eyes of a buyer. Go to
you're a home builder model home and see what it
looks like. Because what that home builder understands is the
ability to create a scene in an experience as well
as neutralize Okay, have the property very neutral okay, And

(14:17):
the purpose for that is to eliminate things that would
turn the buyer off or distract the buyer. Okay. The
more that your stuff is president the house, the more
it's branded to you with photos everywhere, it's harder for
a buyer to emotionally connect to that. So sometimes it
isn't as simple as repair. Sometimes it's decluttering. Okay. Sometimes
it's as simple as decluttering, coming up with some fresh

(14:37):
paint and doing some simple things to make the home
seem more clean. Basic spending a little bit of sweat
equity goes a long way. The other thing that it
does when you put yourself in the shoes of the
buyer and you make these adjustments, it eliminates those objections,
but it also creates a belief from the buyer that
you're a home is well maintained. Thing that is wrong

(15:01):
that can be seen from the naked eye creates the
consumer's perspective that you might be hiding other things. For example,
if you had the roof leak fixed and you didn't
do the cosmetic cover up of the stain, you didn't
fix the drywall, okay, a consumer is going to think
what else they hide in okay? Or you know, you've

(15:22):
got a cracked window or whatever it is. If there
are things that they can see, then they're gonna assume
there's stuff they can't see that's wrong and it's gonna
spook them. So you want to address all of the
things that can be seen. Now, that doesn't mean you
need to gut the house. It just means it need.
It just means that if there are any defects. I'm
not talking about upgrades. I'm talking about defects. Things that

(15:44):
are broken, things that are a clear eye sred, things
that are sticking out. You want to address those things
so the customer has more faith and belief in all
the operating systems of the home. Also, when you're thinking
about making repairs to the home, you also want to
make those repairs that are likely number one, that are
visibly apparent okay to a regular consumer, so that they

(16:07):
don't think more is there, because you want them to
fall in love with your house. Okay. The second part
of the making improvements to the house is you want
to address the things that you know are going to
show up in a four point or an inspection report. So,
if you know the house needs a new roof, right
and you know the roof is shot, has nothing left,

(16:28):
and you have the capability of putting on a new roof,
you should Okay. If you know that you've got some
sort of ac issue, you should address it, okay. The
reason why is because buyers look for the opportunity when
they find items wrong to negotiate, or they look for
reasons to back out. Most people today are more motivated

(16:49):
by fear than they are excitement. They will cancel the
deal on a house over something as stupid as an
AC coil needing cleaned because they fear my or themselves
into thinking that the whole AC system is shot and
it needs twenty thousand dollars. They're looking for fear. You
want to eliminate the fear. Okay, So if you know
something's wrong, fix it. If not, here's what's going to happen.

(17:12):
Even if the fear of said items being found doesn't
spook them to cancel the deal, they're going to use
that as leverage and they're going to ask you for
way more than those items cost. They're going to hold
you hostage. Okay. They're going to say, I want you
to replace the whole AC system, or I want twelve
thousand dollars or what something stupid. Okay, that's what they're

(17:32):
going to do. You've you've lowered your ability to negotiate,
and you're negotiating leverage by not addressing those items, and
then you've given the leverage to the buyer to probably
cost you more than it would have cost you just
to repair the things. So strong believer in ensuring that
all of those items are taken care of, that you
make those repairs, that you eliminate any site unsightly things,
and if you have the financial capability, look and sometimes

(17:55):
you don't, but if you have the financial capability, take
care of those items, or the buyer is going to
leverage it, they are going to use it against you
and they're going to get a better deal, and it's
going to cost you more than if you to just
bit the bullet and fixed what you knew need fixed. Now,
if you don't know that it needs fixed, you can't
really control that. But if you do know of things
in your home that are an issue, you should address

(18:17):
them because they're going to cost you more in value
than the cost to take care of the item in
most situations. So one last thing I would tell you,
if you go through and you don't want to make
any of those repairs and you know your home needs
all of those things, you may not be a buyer
for the retail or a seller for the retail market.
The retail market wants a home that they can finance
and move into, and that's what's going to get you

(18:38):
the best price. If you don't want to invest the
money to do those things, and if your home is
in a condition that it won't qualify for financing, you
may be someone who wants to sell in a cash
offer situation. And if so, we've got the cash offer
situation for you. We can help you out with that
again at Dunkin Duo dot com. Just go apply for
our instant cash offer. We've got funds that we work with.
We can we can bring you a quick, clean, cash

(18:59):
net offer to sho show you exactly what you'll make.
And we are not a wholesaler. When we make an offer,
our intention is to close on the property. There are
a lot of people out there saying, oh, we'll buy
your home for cash. All they really want to do
is lock your home up into a contract and then
find somebody to flip the paper to. We are an
actual end buyer. We are not wholesale trying to flip
the paper of your home. We intend to buy it,

(19:20):
make the repairs, and put it back on the market.
So reback. We're going to continue this conversation after quick
break here on the Duncan Duo Show. So back here
on the Duncan Duo show talking about the real estate market.
The FED delivered their third straight rate cut, cutting the
Federal Reserve rate by twenty five basis points this week,
and the opposite of what most people thought would happen happened,

(19:42):
is Andrew Duncan, the Duncan Duo team at LPT Realty.
People hear the FED rate cut and they think, oh,
interest rates are dropping and short term rates will soften.
The prime rate drops, so people's home equity, lines of credit,
credit cards, and in some instances qualifying for carloons, your
payment would lower and the interest rate would be lower. However,

(20:02):
mortgage rates don't work off of the same paradigm, so
there is this expectation that if the FED cuts right,
the mortgage rates are going to drop now over a
period of time, It's very likely they will, but the
market had already priced in the FED rate cut. When
you hear of the Fed making decisions, most of the
market has already moved to the high probability of the

(20:25):
decision it's going to be made based on the data
and historical norms. So when you hear the Fed is
going to cut rates, the mortgage market moved ahead of
that and rates softened two weeks prior, when it was
eighty ninety percent locked that he was going to cut
twenty five basis points. So mortgage rates from where they
are right before the Fed to right after aren't typically

(20:46):
going down. They may come up some and that's essentially
what's happened this week. So now, over time mortgage rates
could soften a little bit more depending on treasury you know,
depending on the treasuries and what those go for and
what happens in that mark market. But the point is
is when you hear this discussion of FED rate cuts,
it does not mean that your mortgage rates are going to,

(21:07):
you know, substantially drop instantly. The mortgage market already moved
ahead of that, so just understanding that is important. But
what it does do is it still does pick up
the real estate market. When people hear that positive news
about the FED rate cut, it lowers their debt service
on other things, so for example, their credit card, all
the other debt that they have gets a little bit better. Okay,

(21:28):
And again, as the FED cuts, the eventual path is
towards it trickling and having a positive impact on mortgages.
So the market does the real estate market does respond
positively to the FED cutting rates. It's just not as
instantaneous as you might think. So it does create extra calls.

(21:51):
You know, we do get a pickup in business from
rate cuts. We do get people calling saying, oh, I
see the rates are down, and in reality they're not,
but they're heading in that direction. So it does pick
people up. People have a misconception of what it really means.
Does improve the market, it does create sales, it does
do all of those things. So there's certainly a discussion

(22:13):
in the federal government that the FED is going to
go through an overhaul next year. The President has talked
about replacing the chair with you know, I think there's
a few different candidates that are much more dubbish, much
more likely to cut rates. And again that may not
have the impact on mortgage rates that you might think. Okay,

(22:34):
so it could, but the bond of market and the
treasuries may not respond as positively to kind of that oversight.
So the point is that rates are in a trending
kind of softening direction, but it's not instantaneous and it's
not massive. We did not see mortgage rates drop by
twenty five basis points this week that is not what happened,
so pay attention to it, but also understand how it

(22:57):
works in the whole framework of real estate. That it
does improve our market. It does make things more optimistic
long term for our market. The biggest thing in our
market that has caused the biggest obstacles the last few
years it has been the hurricanes. You know, the hurricanes
that we had in twenty four. You know, really, you know,

(23:17):
really harmed our market. You know, it created a lot
of obstacles, and those are starting to clear out. So
I am optimistic about twenty six and even more so
about twenty seven, but we're working through some of the
hurricane hangover still, it's taking some time to get through that.
So again, you're listening to the Duncan Duo Real Estate
Show when we aren't on air. Follow us on all

(23:38):
of our socials at the Duncan Duo Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, Facebook,
pretty much every social media out there. At the Duncan
Duo follow us and we're always giving away cool stuff.
We've got Lightning stuff that we give away as their
official real estate agents. We've got data and information that
we're putting out there to keep you updated. So so

(24:00):
again follow us at uh the Dunkan Duo. So, I
want to talk to home buyers really quickly. I want
to give them some advice, but the things that they
can do to get ready for for real estate next year.
I teach a class in my office, we call it
Wealth Building Wednesdays, and and I teach a class to

(24:21):
my agents about things that I do to build my
wealth and to grow financially. And it's a lot of
times it's simple things that you might not realize. It's
ways to cut expenses. It's how to how to gain
credit card points and not have it cost you money.
How to look into buying private investments, how to leverage
your database, you know all of the how to buy

(24:44):
rental properties, how to flip real estate. All of these
things are things I teach in my class and in
my in my company. And so this week I was
thinking about this and I realized that there's a there's
a massive misunderstanding about how credit and credit profile work.
And I want to talk about this because there's people
out there listening right now. Or you've got friends or

(25:06):
family members or children. They're going to buy a home
next year, and their plan is to buy a home
next year, and I want to give some tips on
how they can position themselves to be best prepared to
make the right decision and get the best financial outcome possible. So,
first and foremost, you've got to know what's in your
credit profile. You've got to look up your score. You've

(25:26):
got to be willing to dispute those things that aren't accurate.
You've got to be willing to make adjustments. Maybe it's
as simple as qualifying for more credit so you have
more open lines before you qualify for a mortgage. Maybe
it's that you need to pay some things down, but
you need to know what's going on in your credit
profile because this is a major determining factor. The second
thing you need to figure out as you think about

(25:49):
buying next year is the down payment. If you have it, great, okay,
and then you can strategize with your loan officer. We
obviously recommend Citywide Home Mortgage had Melissa Rodriguez on the
show many times. Citywide Tampa dot com for your own consultation.
If you want to get a consultation about your mortgage situation,

(26:12):
whether that's a purchase or a refinance, she can help
you again at Citywide Tampa dot Com. But you need
to be thinking about how to position yourself for the
down payment, how much you want to put down if
you have cash, how much you don't, and kind of
how to navigate through the process of using your down
money to make the best financial decision for yourself. Because

(26:33):
everyone's risk tolerance is different, everyone's cash situation, their income,
every single person is different. So we had a human element,
a human touch to it, and again you can get
that with the Melissa Citywide Tampa dot Com. That being said,
if you have the downpay, if you don't have the
downpayment money, you have to figure out how to get that.
Can you save it in time? Can you borrow it

(26:54):
from a friend or family member. Can you get a
gift yes? Can you buy a home with a low
down payment requirement? Yes? Those are things that a great
real estate agent can guide you on and help you
understand where are the areas or what are things you
need to look for. New home buyers a lot of
times don't understand the all the nuances of qualify, So

(27:17):
make sure you're working on your credit, make sure that
you figure out where your down money is coming. The
next thing that you need to do is a home
buyer in today's day and age, you need to drive
by and figure out where you want to be. We
get a lot of home buyers that come to us
and they say, oh, I don't really know where I
want to be. Okay. When you're working with a real
estate agent and you're buying your own home, there's going

(27:38):
to be a certain responsibility that's on you. Okay. Your
real estate agent's goal is to help you find the
right home, but they can't. They can't help you if
you don't narrow your focus a little bit. So I
would encourage you to kind of really really figure out
where you want to live. Okay. Once you find out
where you want to live, then you can work on
finding the right house. Okay, So how far do you

(27:58):
want to be from work? How are you want to
be from certain areas? Drive through some neighborhoods when you
start looking at listings before you go look at the
house in person, drive by it at night. Don't hesitate
to go look at it ding during off hours when
you know when things may not be as busy, or
certainly during rush hours, so you can understand how busy

(28:20):
is traffic going to be a lot of buyers make
that mistake. They fall in love with the house and
then find out the location doesn't really work for them.
So pay attention to location first, then work on because
you can look, you can make improvements to the house. Okay,
if you buy a house and you don't like the layout,
you don't like the paint, you don't like the carpet,
you don't like the kitchen, you don't like the windows

(28:41):
or land, whatever it is, you can change it. You
can't pick the house up and move it somewhere else.
So do your best, do your due diligence, Do the
best due diligence you can to dial in your location
and know where you really want to be, including limiting
it to just simply neighborhoods or a certain radius or
a certain group of neighborhoods. All of those things can matter. Well.

(29:01):
Sometimes have people say like, well, here's where my work is,
and I can either be in Riverview here or Brandon here,
and that's okay. But while have customers come to us
and say, well, I don't care where it is, I
just need a three two of the pool under three hundred,
and then it's like a shotgun approach. We're not going
to be able to help you. You've got to do
some of your own due diligence to help narrow the
focus on where you want to live. The next thing

(29:24):
that I would encourage you to understand is maintenance as
a first time home buyer. Way too many first time
home buyers get into trouble in their first couple of
years of ownership because they don't understand that they're not
living in an apartment anymore. When you buy a home,
it's your responsibility to make those repairs. Always do a
home inspection. Let me repeat that, Always do a home inspection.

(29:44):
And when I say always do a home inspection, I
don't mean like your dad who used to be a
contractor and a builder, or your uncle's brothers cousin's friend
that's bought a bunch of houses and he walks through
it and says, Yep, it looks good. I can't tell
you how many times we've seen buyers, oftentimes not presented
by us because we're doing what we can to ensure
our buyers work with a qualified home inspector. They show

(30:05):
up with somebody that's not really qualified to be a
home inspector. Or they show up with somebody that's bought
a bunch of houses or doesn't really have the credibility
or certifications to be inspecting homes and then come to
find out there's a bunch of issues at the home.
Later on, hire a home inspector that does home inspecting
for a living. If you want your builder, your cousin,
your uncle's brother's friend to show up and ask the

(30:26):
home inspector questions, fine, But unless they're crawling in the
attic and they really have the proper equipment and tools,
the person that you think knows what they're doing is
not going to do a half day home inspection and
find out all the things that you're going to need
to pay attention to in your first few years of maintenance.
When you become a homeowner, you're going to have to
address those items. You're gonna have to pay for those

(30:47):
things strongly, strongly recommend a home inspection, and then a
lot of times the home inspection isn't necessarily for you
to get money from the seller or repairs, because a
lot of the contracts are as is, and any of
the sellers are just going to give you money. Say
I'm not going to make those repairs, especially if They're
not like a four point item or something major wrong.

(31:08):
It's your blueprint. It's your blueprint for what you need
to do in your years of home ownership. Okay, when
you're a homeowner, the repairs become your responsibility and if
you don't get in front of those things that it
can cause you a lot of financial problems. So so
do the home inspection use a home inspection report as
the blueprint for what you need to do for any
repairs that you can't get addressed by the seller or

(31:31):
that you don't personally address yourself. You then know you
have some maintenance items that you need to take care
of because when you were living with your parents or
written in an apartment or you know where wherever else
you lived before, maybe you were in the military and
you were you know, you had a cot, you know,
you you didn't have to deal with those things. Well,
now you do. It's your asset, you own it, and

(31:51):
it's your responsibility to take care of those things, and
if you don't, that can be something that causes financial
ruin to a new homeowner. So we'll be back where
we can continue this conversation when we wrap up with
our last segment again, when we aren't on air, hit
us up at the Duncan Duo. Send us a DM
if you're thinking about selling your house, if you have questions,
or if you're a real estate agent thinking about making
a change and improving your career at the Duncan Duo.

(32:12):
We'll be back after a quick break here on the
Duncan Duo Show. So we're back here on the Duncan
Duo Show talking about the Tampa Bay real estate market.
I want to wrap the last segment of the show
talking about luxury real estate in Tampa Bay. And the
luxury real estate market in Tampa Bay was was actually
really strong in twenty five. It's it definitely picked up
as the year went on. It it took a little

(32:33):
bit of a hit from the storms, but but you know,
fortunately the luxury market doesn't get hit as bad because
you're you're you're dealing more with a capable homeowner that
can make those repairs and not have to fight insurance
and and and they're they're able to make things happen.
So our luxury market kind of took the hit and
bounced back a little bit quicker. So I had someone

(32:54):
tell me the other day that said Andrew. You know,
look I see the Duncan Duo stuff. I see your billboards,
and you know, I see you sell a lot of
four hundred, five hundred thousand dollars houses. But you know
I've got a four million dollar house. And so the
one thing that I want to reiterate is yes, my
real estate company, with you know, my forty people, we
serve all price levels. I have agents that sell a

(33:16):
lot of five hundred thousand dollars houses, and then I
have agents that sell a lot of million dollar houses.
For example, I think we've got three in December above
a million. We've got a seven million, in January a
two million. So on my team, my more experienced agents
or luxury niche agents are the ones that work with
our customers as well as some oversight with me. You know,

(33:39):
I'll certainly work with a lot of our high end
customers or partner with one of my agents for showings
and and give that guidance and feedback and be personally involved.
So if you're if you're selling a higher end home,
understand that my company does serve all price points. But
the agent that you get if you come in or
inquire about selling a higher end property is going to
be one of a few agents of mine that have

(33:59):
considerable experience selling multimillion dollar properties. So again, you know,
for someone that looks at it and says, oh, I
don't want to hire someone to sell my seven million
dollar house because they sell a lot of five hundred
thousand dollar houses, well we sell a lot of those too.
The difference is it's a completely different marketing strategy, different structure,
and a different agent, a different experience level, a different negotiation.

(34:19):
So you know, my agents to sell five, six, seven
million dollar houses, that's what they focus on. You know,
they're not the ones of mine focusing on the person
that calls in and says, I want to sell my
four or five hundred thousand our house or two hundred
thousand or one hundred thousand dollars trailer or whatever it is.
So we really do serve all you know, we serve
all price points, but depending on your specific need is

(34:42):
going to be dependent on the agent that we assigned
to you. That being said, selling luxury real estate not
only does it require a different agent, but it's a
completely different strategy. It is more of an experienced sale.
When someone walks into a seven million dollar house. They
want to feel a certain way, they want it to
look a certain way, and the corners that you can
cut and the ways that you can impress a five

(35:04):
hundred thousand dollars buyer are not the same as the
things that you do when you're working with a seven
million dollar client. What I will say is our clients
that we've worked with that are higher end, they're look,
they're just wealthy. They're they're normal people just like us.
Or they're humble, they're nice, you know, they're they're they're
good people. They just got an extra zero at the
end of their price. The difference is is that they

(35:26):
have an expectation. They have a luxury expectation. They're they're
someone who's going to you know, they're going to be
saying at the Saint Regis or the walled dwarf, you know,
so when they walk into a home, that's the kind
of vibe that they want if they're going to spend
that kind of money. They're so so nonetheless, when you're
selling high end real estate, you know, your your presentation,
your approach, all those things need to be on point

(35:48):
with what the consumer expects. The consumer that's that you're
helping buy a four hundred thousand Doar house may not
have those same expectations. They they're looking at it from
a different place. And while real estate is always still
an emotional and experience sale, the clientele that you're working
with depend on the approach that you take in marketing

(36:09):
or helping them buy. So hopefully that makes sense and
hopefully that answers the client of ours that had said that,
that then worked with this and is super happy working
with us helping them, you know, buy multimillion dollar real estate.
The last thing I want to get to I want
to talk about this because I've got two minutes left,
and I thought about it the other day because I
had somebody ask me this and it made me realize

(36:31):
how emotional a real estate transaction is. So most real
estate buyers are not looking at the facts of your property.
So home sellers or agents that represent the seller that
are present for showings. Now again, in the really high end,
it's a security thing and a protection of belongings in

(36:53):
the home, and it's understood and kind of accepted. But
if you're a home seller and you're selling, you know,
a normal priced home in the market at average price,
even above slightly below whatever the range is, and you're
present for showings or present for the open house. You
are basically like the third wheel. You're like the parents
to sit behind the kids on the first date at
the movie theater, you know, and kind of spy on them. Okay,

(37:16):
the customer doesn't feel comfortable. They don't care about all
the stuff that you've done to the house. They don't
care about all the facts. They don't care that you
replace the roof in twenty nineteen. The first showing is
about them falling in love with the house. It's an
emotional thing, and you're killing the vibe. Okay, you're absolutely
killing the vibe. So if you want someone to buy
your house, please stop following them around at open houses. Please,

(37:38):
as the seller, stop spewing out facts as you walk
people through the house. The customer doesn't care until the
second showing or the third then maybe or after the
first showing, and they fall in love in love. So
if you're married, you have a spouse, you're in love
right now. I'm pretty certain that you didn't fall in
love with them by reading their resume. But a lot
of home sellers make the mistake of walking through the

(38:00):
house trying to speak the resume of the house. We
did this in twenty twenty one and this in twenty
twenty four. These people are trying to fall in love. Dude,
you're just walking through the house spewing out facts that
they don't care about yet. They don't care about those
things until they're ready to take the next step. They're
still in discovery mode and you're spewing out facts. So
home sellers, please don't be present. Don't be spewing facts.

(38:21):
Don't show up at the open house. Don't walk people
from room to room telling them all these things that
they don't care about. They want to experience the house.
They want to walk through, they want to feel comfortable.
They want to take their time. If they're taking up
your time, they're going to rush through the house because
now they feel like they're on someone else's schedule. You
want them in there. The longer that they're in your house,
the more likely they are to buy it. The more

(38:41):
people that are there, the less likely they're going to
stay because they're not going to be comfortable. So that's last,
my last pitch for this Sunday. I hope you have
an awesome rest of your Sunday and Thanks for tuning
in to The Dunk and dou a real estate show.