Today Ben Curry interviewed Ray, a realtor from Illinois's who has been on a roll recently listing FSBOs.
Throughout the interview they went over:
Highlights:
Full Interview:
Transcript:
| Ray: |
I'm handing these out. Any time I see a for sale by owner, I'm stopping the car. I mean there's no way I'm not gonna do it. So this lady calls me on the phone. I'm driving home. This is last Tuesday. She says, "Hey, is this Ray?" I said, "Yes it is."She says, "Are you the real estate broker?" I said, "Yes." She said, "I need to sell my home. We've been trying to sell our home on our own and we're moving to Arizona." I says "Oh. Are you available tomorrow?" I went over there. She's got the book there. I listed the house. It's a $300,000 listing. So, there's another case. So there's four of them. So I would say already that's $30,000, I probably- |
| Smart Agents:
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Wow |
| Ray: | Have a $2,000 investment in you guys. But this one's gonna be another $300,000 listing. The list side of it's $10,000. |
| Smart Agents:
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It's a little over three hundred? |
| Ray: | Yeah |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay |
| Ray: | What I'm getting at is now you're talking about almost $40,000 of income just off of your little book. Within a years time I have to spend two grand and I get $30,000 to $40,000 worth of income off of. I'll take that deal all day long. I take my book with on my listings, I will tell you that. It gives you credibility is what it does. Like I said, I listed three townhouses all in one neighborhood. |
| Smart Agents:
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Each was a different owner? Or all the same owner? |
| Ray: | All different. Different owner. |
| Smart Agents:
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What did you do? How did you generate the leads? Or how do you know they want to sell? |
| Ray: | The first one I got from the book. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay |
| Ray: | I dropped it off. I handed it to her husband. |
| Smart Agents:
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Was it a FSBO? |
| Ray: | It was a FSBO. |
| Smart Agents: | Okay. |
| Ray:
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I just said, "Hey, I just listed the house down the street. I see you're selling your property. I have a book on how to get the most amount of money for your home." And he took it from me. Four or five months later his wife calls me and she says, "Hey". She actually owned two townhouses but she was selling one of them. She actually knew a lot of people there. It was a group of townhouses, a subdivision. Actually she's referred me out to four people already. Five people. |
| Smart Agents:
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Holy-moly |
| Ray:
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I actually have another guy's townhouse I have to sell. He just isn't ready yet. He has tenants in there. I was supposed to have it listed already, so I'm gonna list that probably in about two or three weeks. That's from one person, but I have to attribute that to the book, because without doing that I never would have talked to that lady. |
| Smart Agents:
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Do you think the book made them more likely to refer you to the other people? |
| Ray: | Absolutely. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay. Okay. |
| Ray: | Without a doubt. Actually this lady, she just moved to Florida. |
| Smart Agents
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Oh, wow. |
| Ray: | I'm upset because she moved because she's one of those people that refers you out. |
| Smart Agents:
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What was it that you said when you knocked on the door? How did you put it? Because you put it so well. |
| Ray: | I said, "I see you're selling your house by yourself. This book teaches you how to get the most amount of money for your house." |
| Smart Agents: | And you said, "Here's a copy of the book, would you like a copy?" |
| Ray: | Yeah. I handed it to him. |
| Smart Agents:
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And you didn't say, "I wrote this book, I'm the best." You just said, "Hey, here's a free book that shows you how to sell your house for the most money. Would you like a copy?" |
| Ray: | Right. That's it. |
| Smart Agents:
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There you go. And you didn't say, "I wrote the book. I'm so smart." Just, here's a book, I'm here to help you out. |
| Ray: | No |
| Smart Agents:
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Now whenever you're driving around and do you see a FSBO you just stop and knock on the door? See if you can give it to them or you just leave it at the door? |
| Ray:
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I've left at the door with the plastic bag with the letters before. I've sent them out. I think this is where the one I just got, she came from that lead gen off of a Facebook ad. A paid ad that I was doing. And I probably just looked. I'll look and see where the property is and if it's in the price range in the area that I would like to target, then I'll send them the book. |
| Smart Agents:
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You'll mail a copy to them. |
| Ray: | Yeah. I send it to them. Now actually, the size of them is nice, you can throw it in an envelope for like a buck. |
| Smart Agents:
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Mm-hmm (affirmative)- that's true. So you've got four listings off of that one FSBO who referred you. Have you gotten any of the listings from the book besides those four listings? |
| Ray: | That's one, two, three, four. I'll have one. We just haven't done it. I've gotten a number of them off of when I bring the book with, but not any more than that directly tied to it. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay. But do you feel you've probably gotten a better conversion on other listing appointments you had because you brought in the book and you gave it to them right at the beginning? |
| Ray: | Without a doubt. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay. |
| Ray: | There's no doubt about it. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay. |
| Ray: | Confidence. Like you said, it changes the whole dynamic of the appointment. I go through my listing presentation. But at one point I'll say I have this book that I wrote, on how to prepare your home for sale and get the most amount of money for it. |
| Smart Agents:
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And you just said- |
| Ray: | They've already saw- |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay |
| Ray: | They've already seen the book sitting there. It's got my picture on it. They're already looking at it like, what the heck is this? |
| Smart Agents:
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So, it's like you subtly pull the book out. You don't tell them what it is. It's just sitting there. And they are like- |
| Ray: | It's just sitting there. |
| Smart Agents:
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Ah, that's genius. By just letting it sit there, it's like this question in their brain that they have to think about the whole time. Like, what is that? Is that real? Did this guy actually write it? What...and then when you- |
| Ray: | Right |
| Smart Agents:
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I bet you that builds their curiosity a lot. Because they are sitting there like, what is this book? Who is this guy? What's really going on? And then you finally- |
| Ray: | I don't say I'm an author. I don't say anything like that. I just let them look at it. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay. Let's say we're sitting there and all of a sudden I'm like, "Ray, what is that? Did you write that book?" What would you say to that? |
| Ray: | I'd say yeah. It's a great book that I wrote. It has all kinds of helpful information on how to get the most amount of money for your home. And sell it quickly. That's what they want. |
| Smart Agents:
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Yeah. That's true. |
| Ray: | They want the most amount of money and they want to sell it quickly. |
| Smart Agents:
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Yeah. |
| Ray: | "But what do you mean?" It has things in there. What to do and what not to do. What should you spend. Should we be putting new carpet in or should we be just getting the carpets cleaned. Should we paint this room or not. I said, "As part of my service, I'm gonna go through your house and we're going to go room by room and I'm gonna tell you what to get rid of- |
| Smart Agents:
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Mm-hmm (affirmative) |
| Ray: | To get ready for sale. What kind of clutter and so on and so forth. |
| Smart Agents:
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Yeah. We went back to that one thing. I've talked about this myself and I have seen it happen myself where they keep the book and they mark it up. Who was the seller who had the book and she marked it up? Was that the FSBO? The first one? |
| Ray: | The first ones. I gave it to her husband and she's about sixty-five years old. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay |
| Ray: | Very smart. She's an engineer. |
| Smart Agents:
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Wow |
| Ray:
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Great lady. And she referred me out. She referred me to this one guy. And she said, "You better go get Patrick, he's moving to Florida, and you better go get him." And I called him up and he says, "Hey, I got an appointment with so-and-so tomorrow." Now, so-and-so is this realtor in town, that approximately half a mile from their house, from Patrick's house, is a billboard with him and his beautiful wife on there saying the nine gazillion homes that they've sold. |
| Smart Agents:
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Wow. Okay. |
| Ray: | This is a Friday night. I can recalI go there, I said, "Listen. You need to listen to me anyways. You should listen to more than one realtor anyway." He goes, "Okay, you can come over." All I do is set the appointment. You know that- |
| Smart Agents:
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Yep |
| Ray: | Of all things, you want to set the appointment. I got the appointment. He said, "You can come here at 06:30." I said, "all right". I went there at 06:30. I go there. I can tell he's packing up. He's getting ready to go. He's really wanting to leave. I have the book with me. Of course, I have this book with me, right? |
| Smart Agents:
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Mm-hmm (affirmative) |
| Ray: | I tell him how much I think his home is worth. I told him I thought it was worth around $200,000. And our prices have been depressed up here, but they're starting to pick up. He's like, "Wow." He goes, "I've got an appointment with Tony." I said, "Listen, I will call and cancel that appointment for you." I actually did that. The guy was not too happy. |
| Smart Agents:
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That's awesome. |
| Ray: | ten o'clock at night. Anyhow, I listed his house. I'm leaving there and at 10:30 pm this other lady calls and said, "Hey, I want you to list my house too." |
| Smart Agents:
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Wow |
| Ray: | "Melinda told me that you were out here." I actually listed both of them in the same night- |
| Smart Agents:
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That's awesome |
| Ray: | From one referral from this other lady and I still hadn't listed her house yet. |
| Smart Agents:
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So, when you go to this engineer's house, you see the book and she's read through it and she's marked it. How did she mark it up? She highlighted it? Or underlined it? Or what? |
| Ray: | She had highlighted it and she had markers in there. |
| Smart Agents:
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Oh my god. |
| Ray: | Like the little tab. |
| Smart Agents:
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Yeah |
| Ray: |
Pages. And she was reciting pages to me and I'm thinking I better read this book now. Anyhow, it's comical but it's yeah. It's powerful. One of my best lines that I think I've gotten from you guys is where it says when they counter. When somebody gives them a really low offer. I think I got this from you guys. I think it's in the book. But we tell them, "Hey listen, my seller appreciates your offer but they ask that you would make a real offer at this time.- |
| Smart Agents:
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Mm-hmm (affirmative) |
| Ray: | And they reject your offer." Opposed to, I used to just reject them. And then they're out of the game. Because people- |
| Smart Agents:
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Get offended. Yeah, they get offended. |
| Ray: | Yeah. |
| Smart Agents:
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Yeah. |
| Ray: | So we reject it, but say that first and I'm telling you it has helped to sell a number of homes that way. You guys give tons of value. It's not just like...I can't stand like the hype guys. They had a girl in my office. She was spending like a thousand dollars a month with him. |
| Smart Agents:
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Oh wow. On coaching or something else? |
| Ray: | Yeah, it's crazy. Oh it's on coaching. I'm like, are you kidding me? Then she quit after five months. She goes, "I can't afford this stuff." You guys have great customer service, I know that. Actually, I did get another listing, now that you had me think of it, directly from the book that didn't sell. I had it listed throughout the winter. It was the first one I got and I went there and she had the book too. |
| Smart Agents:
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They sold it with you or with someone else? |
| Ray: | No, with someone else- |
| Smart Agents: | Ugh |
| Ray: | I told them, "We gotta drop the price." "We're not dropping the price." |
| Smart Agents:
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Yeah |
| Ray: | Listed it with someone else. But I should've set it a lower price to begin with but |
| Smart Agents:
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Was that an expired or FSBO or what kind of lead was that listing? |
| Ray: | That was just a...that was...I sent them that book after they went on one of my Facebook ads. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay |
| Ray: | It was a Facebook ad and they'd never had it for sale yet. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay. I see. Interesting. If you get the time, the virtual assistants in the Philippines, they're real good at basic stuff. Here's your script, here's your leads, call the leads, send me any people that you talk to that want to sell. I know people could train them on how to do closings and follow-up with your listings and all that stuff. I've never done that. It's not as leverage-able. It's not as simple to do. |
| Ray: | No, I wouldn't want that. |
| Smart Agents:
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Okay. |
| Ray: | All right. Cool. Well listen, I appreciate- |
| Smart Agents:
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I'll send you the info. If there's anything we can do to help on our end, if people give us good testimonials, good feedback. We're glad to- |
| Ray: | Yeah, You're only gonna keep a portion of that right? |
| Smart Agents:
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Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course. And I'm not gonna give out your contact information. Call me and I'm gonna send you an email and if you need help you just reply to the email and I'm here to help you out. |
| Ray: | But I'll try that more with the...cause I'm gonna order a bunch more books |
One of the best methods we use at Smart Agents to separate yourself is books. 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.