This week we spoke to a new member who just started to give his books out. Fred, a veteran realtor, has replaced giving his business cards out with books.
It's paid off for him with two clients.
Here is what is talked about in this interview:
| Smart Agents:
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Okay. So tell me a little bit about you. Have a success story, gave my business- gave my book as a business card to Walkin. Had a big smile on his face, I guess it's me. Made an appointment. Showed him the CMA and then got the listing. So what was this? This was like a walk-in to the office you work at? The real estate office? |
| Fred: | Yep. I've been in this business for about 30 years and I cannot remember ever having someone walk into the office looking for an agent. And this guy, yeah, he had been trying to sell it himself, here in Virginia Beach and he actually moved to Pennsylvania. So he was coming back and forth trying to sell this house by himself. And he said the one weekend he came here to cut the grass and to just check on the house, he decided he got tired of it and wanted to talk to an agent. And we just happened to be the first company whose sign he saw on the road and he just pulled up and I just happened to be the only agent in the office, so I was there and I didn't have a business card cause I just moved to that company, so I gave him my book.I said, "I don't have a business card, but here's my book, gives you all the information you need to do to sell your property." He looked at the book, he looked up at me, I said, "Yep, that's me." He had a grin on his face and said, "Well, can we talk?" And I said, "Sure."So we sat down in the office and talked a little bit and I gave him some tips about his neighborhood, got on the computer and showed him what's going on in his neighborhood, showed him the activity. |
| Found out he was way overpriced on his property. So we set out an appointment to go out and look at the property with him and his wife, cause she was actually the decision maker, which I found out. So we sat down, nothing formal, I just went in and showed him what I had and looked at the house and walked through the house, gave them some ideas what he needed to do and by the time I was finished they were both ready to put the house on the market with me. | |
| Smart Agents:
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Oh wow. |
| Fred:
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That was really interesting to me. It was something. I was excited about it. So, that's where we are. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay, have you gotten any other business from the books besides that? |
| Fred:
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Yeah, I have given the book out to a couple guys that I play ball with up at the Y and in fact, yesterday, I gave the book to one of the guys, and he said, "Hey, man, it's funny you gave me this book cause I've been thinking about trying to buy another house, buy some investment property. That's the reason I was asking you, did you have anything about investment property. That's what he asked about. I said, I can help him, I've been doing this for a while so I can basically help you, whatever you are trying to do. I said, "Well look, just go ahead and take a look at my book and tell me what you think, I'll give you a call later on this evening." I got his phone number and said, "I'll give you a call later on this evening and you tell me what you think of my book." |
So I called him last night and he wanted to know, he said, "Did you really write this stuff, man?" I said, "Well, I had some help." I said, "I had some help." So yeah. A lot of the information, yes, it came from me, but I had a lot of help. But anyway. |
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| Smart Agents:
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Which book did you give him? |
| Fred:
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I gave him the...shoot, the buyers book. I forgot the name of it cause I think I have like two different ones. |
| Smart Agents:
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I know which one you're talking about. |
| Fred:
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Yeah, I gave him- I think I ordered two different ones of the buyers book and I gave him one of those. |
| Smart Agents:
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Oh wow. |
| Fred:
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Yeah. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay. Well you got an investment buyer out of it, that's awesome. |
| Fred:
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Yeah. He's a young guy, own his own home and he wants to buy investment property.
So, I actually had an appointment with him this morning, showed him an apartment complex out in about 20 miles from where I live. But I explained to him why he shouldn't buy this particular property. |
| Smart Agents:
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Oh wow. |
| Fred:
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Yeah. |
| Smart Agents:
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Might actually be a good one to buy if he can get them all rented out. |
| Smart Agents:
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That's good. So you got the YMCA buyer, the guy who visited at the office and listed his house, have you gotten any other business from the books besides that? |
| Fred:
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Not directly, no. Not yet. But I'm going to do a better job of actually handing the books out especially now, so I'm going to be going out and finding owners and putting the packages together and handing those out. I'm going to be more proactive in doing that. |
| Smart Agents:
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Oh, cool. Okay. So let me ask you this, ask a little bit more cause what I'm going to do is, obviously you're an example of someone who's had success, but if someone else, and you're the first person we've talked to, we always talk to people who get results in a new area. You're the first person that we've talked to that's gotten business from their, I guess you'd call them their spear of influence from the books, so, tell me a little bit about the guy at the YMCA. Is this like a past client or just someone you know from going there? |
| Fred:
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No. Just someone I met. |
| Smart Agents:
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Oh, you just met him? |
| Fred: |
Yeah. I go to the Y Tuesday's and Thursday's. I have not been proactive in letting people know what I do at the Y.And I just decided to do it Tuesday, I had a couple books in my bag and we were in the locker room. I was just telling the guy, "Hey man, I want to give you one of my books here. I sell real estate and I want to give you one of my books."And that's when he looked at me and said, "Hey man, I've been wanting to get into investment properties." I said, "Well, this particular book doesn't talk about that but I can help you with that cause I've been doing this business for like 30 years." Yeah, so, I said, "Go ahead and just read my book and I'll call you later on tonight and we'll talk tonight."And that's basically how I did it. And I got his number, go his email address and called him last night and just happened to find a property, well actually, he had this property that he wanted to take a look at. I made an appointment to go show it to him this morning. |
| Smart Agents:
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Oh, excellent. |
| Fred:
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Yeah. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay. So you met him at the Y in the locker room. How did you, maybe I wasn't paying attention for a second, someone was emailing me. How did you know that he- or how did you start the conversation with him? |
| Fred:
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We were just talking about the game cause we play basketball every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. We were just talking about the game. And I just said, "Hey man, do you know anybody that's looking for some real estate?" |
| Smart Agents:
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There you go. Okay, so you would get- you put- I mean, it is what it is. There's so many people afraid to put themselves out there and just ask, "Hey, you know anybody that's looking to buy a house?" You don't- you probably didn't do it in a weird way, it's just a normal way and he's like, "Yeah, I am." Is that how it worked? |
| Fred: | Yeah. That's basically how it worked. Now you know, I've been- like I said, I've been an agent for so many years, you'd think it would be easy for me to do that now. It's just ridiculous that I have not been doing that on a regular basis. But, and the thing is, just handing out business cards, I've been handing out business cards for years, and you know, like you said, people just throw the cards away.They don't have no reason to hold onto them. So I decided to start handing out the books.And I've kind of been picking and choosing who I talk to, who I want to address, maybe I might be wrong in doing that but, you know these books aren't cheap, so I don't want to kind of, you know, I guess I'm prejudging the people that I hand the books to, I don't know if that's bad or good. But that's what I've been doing. And this one just happened to work out. |
| Smart Agents:
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Do you think you would of had the guts to ask him if he knew anybody who wanted to buy real estate if you hadn't had the books? I mean, did the books make you more confident to do that perhaps? |
| Fred:
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Well, just like I said, before, when I was just handing out business cards, I did not do it.
But now, I have something of value, I have something keeps. You know, you said in one of your tapes that the people are not going to throw away books, they will hold onto them, they will put them on a shelf but they will not throw them away. But they will throw away business cards.So, now I'm going to order some more books and I'm actually going to start being more proactive in handing them out. |
| Smart Agents:
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That's some good points. Okay. It's interesting. So basically it was just someone you met and you said, "hey", obviously you'd already- it wasn't like you were walking up to a stranger. You weren't out door knocking or- it wasn't a completely cold person you were talking to was someone- you're at the YMCA, you're playing basketball, you're hanging out, you're having fun. And then like, "Hey, by the way, my name is Fred. I sell real estate, do you know anybody that's looking to buy some real estate?" |
| Fred:
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Yep. |
| Smart Agents:
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Perfect. Okay. I think that a lot of people just need to figure out- and you don't want to sound real script of it, just the right way to say it get the conversation started and then you give them your book and the book does a lot of the work. So they read through it, they take it home, they read through it and then they come back and they want to do business with you. |
| Fred:
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As I said before, I'm just going to be more proactive in handing them out. |
| Smart Agents:
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I would agree, that's good. Do you think he'll- what kind of price range of property is he looking for? |
| Fred:
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Well, he has two things going on: he wants investment properties, but he also wants to buy a- he wants to move up for a house- he wants to move up in a property for him and his wife. So, the discussion I had with him today after we looked at this apartment complex, and I asked him, I said, "Now look. You said you wanted to buy investment property, but what's more important to you right now? You want to make your wife happy by upgrading what you all are living in right now? Or do you want to get into an investment property? You gotta do one or the other. Right now, you don't want to do both. You don't want to put that kind of strain on yourself and you haven't got the property you and your wife want to live in." |
| Right now, they're in a smaller home and they want to upgrade. She's pregnant, going to have a family. So I tried to have him understand that maybe you want to go ahead and upgrade your property that you're living in right now and let that investment be your next move. | |
What if you left a book that you were the author of with these owners?
Books have a huge perceived value. They don’t get thrown away.
They can get tucked away somewhere, but most people aren’t going to toss them in the trash. They’re worth something, and they’re worth something to the author’s name.
Do this and you will position yourself as the authority in your market. When you give away your book, it will separate you from your competition.
That’s how a Smart Agent thinks!
Want to get a free sample of the book that will get you more listings? Click the link below.