Attracting the NextGen Homebuyer

Hey, what's up, Jeff Zimper, host of the mortgage marketing radio podcast. Thanks for tuning in whether you're a first time listener or new. Did you know we got a private community just for you podcast listeners? That's right. You want to engage. You want to have more meaningful conversations. You want to go deeper on some of the topics we talk about here. Hey, on Facebook, go to Facebook and you go in the search bar and you search for mortgage marketing radio, that is the private group. Jeff for podcast listeners, go there, request to join, answer a couple quick questions. So we make sure you're a legit human being and you get access and we continue the conversation over there on Facebook in the group at mortgage marketing radio. Hey, also, if you didn't know, we help mortgage originators move from solicitor and vendor to partner in peer in the eyes of a real estate agent. You know, it's all about when you're looking to engage with real estate agents, what's your approach? You know, I talk about there's five key reasons why most originators don't get enough referrals or engagement for real estate agents. And many times it's often your approach, it's your value proposition and it's, you're simply not talking to enough agents or the wrong agents. Like those are the biggest pieces of the puzzle right there. It's exactly what we help originators overcome breakthrough in our margin classes platform. We help you move from solicitor and vendor to partner and peer in the awareness stage of looking to drive conversations and engagement with real estate agents to that create referrals for you. It's about the right approach. It's about the right value proposition. It's about reaching the right realtors and reaching enough of the right realtors. And what is a process you have for doing that? My position is you lead with educational content, classes and resources. And that's what we do at my origin classes. Case in point, shout out to one of our longtime members, Liz LaFour down there in San Diego. What's up? I saw Liz just posted one day ago. She had another great class, 32 realtors registered for her database marketing for real estate class. Folks. By the way, Liz is doing most of her classes over Zoom. Some people do them in person, some people do them both. My question is, is what is your process top of the funnel middle of the funnel for getting agent engagement and conversations? Is it cold calling? How's that working? Is it door knocking, broker previews, happy hours? I don't know. There's a hundred different ways to do it. I've simply found the most effective way to do it is one to many leveraged activity that changes the narrative, changes the positioning of you as an originator in the real estate agents. Eyes that increases trust, lowers resistance and drives more conversion to conversations that leads to referrals. You want to know more? Maybe this is for you, maybe it's not. Only one way to find out, book a call with me, go to mortgage marketing.pro, you have a time on my calendar, you and I will have a private one-to-one chat. And we'll see if we're fit for each other, mortgage marketing.pro. Okay, my special guest this week is somebody that I have admired and followed for a long time and have learned a lot from following her and her incredible data that she puts out that is very relevant for you listening to this right now. I'm curious if you feel that first-time home buyers are a sizable segment of your addressable market for your business. Probably the answer to that is yes. Well, have you ever considered one of the struggles, issues, considerations, hesitations that the next gen population has when it comes to purchasing a home? You might be surprised to know what is the number one top social media platform used by millennials in Gen Z to search for home buying info. You're going to learn on today's episode. You might be surprised to know what is the number one fear and struggle that next gen has when it comes to buying a home. You might be surprised to discover some of the other truth about the next gen population that if you knew these facts and figures, this data, you would be more effective and efficient at establishing credibility and trust and being chosen as the mortgage professional of choice. So today's conversation is a take notes conversation. It is a share with your referral partners conversation. It's a click the links in the show notes conversation because this is a very educational for session that you need to double click on. Justin Messerley is the executive director of first home IQ and she runs next gen research and strategy for next gen home buyer.com. She has this amazing teacher curriculum education presentation materials for industry professionals like you to help young people make better decisions for their financial future. If you haven't heard of first home IQ yet, you need to go learn more. Justin is in partnership with Dave Savage, longtime friend, colleague, mentor and well-respected leader in our industry and first home IQ is doing some pretty amazing things. So sit back, listen and learn and apply what you learned from my conversation with Kristen and make sure once again you check the links in the show notes and follow along. Without further ado, let's get into this week's show. Justin, welcome back to the show. Thank you so much for having me. Excited to be here. I'm always thrilled to talk to you because I'm kind of a data nerd meaning I really like do a lot of research because a lot of stuff what I do with loan officers is help educate them so they can educate realtors and their other partners. And so you've got some of the best data out there. So there you go. I'm going to fanboy for a second but what for those who may not know who Kristen Messerley is, who are you? What do you do? I'm the executive director of first home IQ and nonprofit focused on solving the financial literacy crisis. So we do financial literacy curriculum and content. We also have an ambassador program where we create content and including social media content for loan officers and real estate agents. But I also do research and have surveyed at this point 6000 over 6000 millennial and Gen Z consumers. Wow. Cheers. Okay, so I would dare to say you're probably at least that I know of the foremost expert in our industry when it comes to millennials and next gen. Yeah, I think that at this point, I mean, I started out my career as a social worker but I got into this started surveying and doing interviews and in strategy in my early 20s. So it's been over 10 years now. And what category are you in as far as all these? I'm almost on the elder. I'm like in the middle of being a millennial. So yeah, I was going to ask you and we're going to put links to all your cool stuff in the show notes. We're going to talk about first home IQ and, you know, the ways people can get access to your amazing research, which helps them across the board, whether it's how to have better, more engaging, impactful conversations with your clients and prospects, with your partners. That's the first thing that I see with your content. It helps me understand like who I'm dealing with, you know. But I wanted to ask you this, there's this term next gen for there's some people who probably need to clarify what does that really mean? So we started using next gen a few years ago because we wanted to include Gen Z in this too. And so it's Gen Z and millennials for the purposes of our research, we look at the ages between 18 and 44. And then we segmented out and look at, you know, the differences between older millennials, younger millennials and Gen Z. So is that what we're calling next gen 18 to 44? That's what we're calling next gen in our next gen research. Yeah. Okay, cool. Just want to make sure so everybody knows. Yeah, that's good. And this is quite a timely conversation, considering what's happened in the last several days regarding the NAR law settlement. Yeah. I'm sure you've been getting a lot of inquiries and questions and there's still some unknowns. And so we'll impact that as well. But I want to just start with some of your, the key findings like what are the biggest headlines when you've got, you know, your 60 seconds or, you know, you got your 10 minutes at the meeting and you're like, okay, here's the key things you guys need to know about next gen. Where do you typically go with that? The three big areas, one is a trust. We've been looking at the development of distrust with millennials over the last three years. We started seeing this kind of creeping up where millennials and Gen Z are less trusting of professionals. And initially I thought this was just in the mortgage industry and it's because, you know, millennials entered adulthood during a ride after the financial crisis. So there's just, you know, that we were ingrained with this. But what we found was if you take a look outside of the industry, there's less trust in all different industries from healthcare, media, you know, across the board, government. And so that's just a new era that we live in and we can dig into that. This year's report that we released a month ago, we found that to over half say that they don't trust lenders to help them make smart decisions about their, their future. And then the second category would be around knowledge and financial literacy. There's a, we've done full research projects on that topic itself. But we find that over half say that they don't feel confident in their knowledge of personal financial or personal finance or home buying. And then the third category is brand new, but a stat that I'm starting to bring up from this year's report that we found that over half said that they don't feel confident that home ownership is accessible to the next generation. And the reason that's so important is just that, you know, we're seeing more and more, even in my news feed itself and on Instagram or TikTok, you know, people are joking about the fact that home ownership is just not accessible. It's, and people are kind of despairing over that. And so I feel like that's important for us to understand where we're starting from and then give them that knowledge and help them build trust with the pathway to accessing home ownership. Okay. I wrote those down, trust knowledge and with the knowledge is the fact that they don't, they lack some of the knowledge, which means they don't feel confident. And then they don't see a path forward for home ownership. They don't see that necessarily as accessible. I like the fact that you also, because I've been following you long enough to remember that when that trust thing came out, yeah, the data at that time you thought was pointing towards the fact that they grew up during the whole financial meltdown and you know, parents lost their homes and all that. However, that speaks to the larger narrative what's happening in the country is that we, just the trust has eroded and continue to road, right, for the last decade or so, right? Overall, that's just the sound. Yeah. In fact, the Adelman Trust Brometer, which measures trust across the world, they found that we fell as a country below 50% in trust for the first time, just I think in 2021 and or 2022. And so, you know, trust Brometer has dropped 10 percentage points since 2017. Wow. So that's, you know, again, just trust in general. And I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing and we can talk about that, but I think what's important is for us to understand consumers today want to be empowered to make smart decisions on their own. They don't necessarily feel confident going to any expert and saying, Hey, you're the pro, you know, take me through this process. They want to know that they can trust you and that they're going to be empowered with knowledge to make smart decisions on their own. Well, I don't want to hang out on the trust thing, but for me anyways, it does speak to, you know, the greater narrative of just what's happening in our world, right? Of, and this stems back, you know, I'm, I'm a tad bit older on the scale of what, what, what, what group do I fall into? But, you know, the distrust has been eroding for some time, right? For, for all the corporate things that have happened back in the day, if you think of like the end run days and the whole, you know, any example you could give the Bernie made off stuff, the, it just, there's always some period of time where, and it's just continued to escalate. And now I think media has amplified that. So now we see all these cases of distrust like every day in our, and then we're, and then you got like, uh, what is the phrase fake news, right? Like all this narrative about you can't believe shit anymore. Right. Exactly. Bombarded with that, you know, and so of course, you're not going to feel confident in that level of trust, you know, so. So they're in though on a, on a bright note, they're in lies the opportunity, right? For us, more into real estate is that we need to understand this. And then what are some of the suggestions or advice you give, whether it's content, whether it's how they communicate, you know, where, how people show up online in terms of becoming known or establishing that base of someone's trust worthy. Yeah. So here's the thing. I went to your point in what feels like a very dark space for especially the first time home buyers who are, you know, that a lot of times they say they'll go online, they feel overwhelmed. They don't know, they don't have someone to turn to that they trust. But whenever they find someone that they do feel they could trust or they could have a conversation with, that's a bright light in what feels like a dark space. So then you end up being not only someone really important to that consumer, but you're also getting all of their referrals. So that's a, you know, a huge shift that you have the opportunity to access. But then from there, one of the, some of the interesting data we found in this last year's report was the, the importance of video. And we've been talking about video for a long time. But what I thought was interesting was that when we asked where people turn to for personal financial information at the very top, it's friends and family, no surprise. I think that was like 76% or something. But then right below it was video, it was like 72% I think, maybe 73, but right below that is video. I think it's not, you know, it's so important that you're putting out video content. And you're also being authentic with that, you're sharing information on multiple channels to help them access that information and be empowered on their own. Well, sure, because videos like the next best thing to being in person, right? And video, there's really nonverbal psychological cues that help you build trust and all that stuff. Yeah, but it's not. So scary, like a lot of people feel nervous about meeting with someone in person or even over the phone right away. But whenever they can access some of that information and personality through video content, it allows them to get a taste before they are having a conversation. Or they admit. Yeah. Yeah. The meeting, the call, the zoom, whatever. They, that's the point which, you know, we're going to continue to, you know, interweave through this thing, which is, you know, social media and your content and what are you putting out there? Because as you well know, and other people listening have heard it said multiple times, is for those that are doing video and putting it out there, you know, there's that, that lag time between the content you're putting out video versus the, the contact, the DM, the whatever it is, they've been consuming your videos like prior to them reaching out to you. You must get frustrated seeing, you know, in real estate and specific and mortgage, I think it's gotten better, but still there are a lot of reluctant video people. Yeah, I mean, I totally get it. It's hard, you know, it is, and it's a muscle that you have to work. I, I kind of took a break from that myself and whenever I was going through the transition and building the nonprofit and, um, and it's, I'm like, last night I started putting together grabbing some video and I was like, ah, this is hard work, you know, and, um, it is not something that you just, it feels supernatural all the time. So. That's funny coming from somebody, you know, quote unquote, in the, on the younger of the spectrum because that's the argument that, you know, I know I've heard for some time is like, oh, it's, you know, the under 40 group, it's natural for you to pick up and talk to this phone, you know, in a main for you. Do you not agree with that? Do you think that's very situational? Maybe it's my personality. I do think it's a lot easier than younger you are, but me, I don't know, I feel like I, I think it's very easy to get on a video call and I think it's gotten so much easier for everybody to got a video call, um, and certainly watching video content, but to create something that you're putting out there, um, it seems to be so natural for someone who is like born into that, but I don't know, maybe it's because I'm on the elder millennial side, I don't know, but maybe, maybe, but it is something, and I as well have struggled with this. Matter of fact, you know, I mentioned Jordan, not a moment ago, um, I had her on the podcast and, uh, she kind of helped me make a shift in my brain because she, she put it back on me with podcasting. She said, you know, because I was, I mean, let's face it, I've had some fear and, um, like the whole judgment, I don't want to look bad. I'm going to all the usual noise. And she's like, well, if somebody came to you and asked you for advice on starting a podcast, would you feel reluctant to share that information? Mm hmm. Oh, no, I haven't thought of it like that, right? Um, so anyway, I think we just need to break through that and get, get to it. It is some, I mean, people ask me a lot about, you know, am I nervous when I speak or things like, you know, get on stage and I used to be so nervous. I would, you know, be sick before going on stage and just like shaking and now it feels very comfortable. But when I have a break from it, if I haven't been speaking for a bit, I do get a little bit more nervous when I get on stage. So it's something that has to be consistent. I'm going to do the reps. Yeah. Um, all right. So another interesting stat though, um, is YouTube is the top social media platform from millennials and Gen Z. I'm, why I was curious on if, and I hate putting people on the spot, but if you know what the spread is on that or the Delta is in terms of platforms they go to for that research, could you put YouTube? But what, you know, I mean, what is the, as compared to other platforms? So yeah, YouTube is at the very top for both millennials and Gen Z, um, for millennials then it goes into Facebook is number two, which I thought was, like, yeah, people almost here. I know you've said that multiple times. And I'm like, people must hear that and go, what? I know. I mean, I'm surprised too, but it comes up consistently. This has happened on multiple years, reports, and this one was a thousand millennial Gen Z across, you know, dispersed correctly or whatever, you know, and it's, um, yeah. And then Reddit was something that came up in the Instagram and TikTok. But yeah, for Gen Z, TikTok comes up number two, which is less surprising, you know, and then Instagram and then Facebook and Reddit. But I'm surprised Facebook shows up at all and I, I would actually, um, Amir Sayed has been coaching me on, um, you know, uh, just with launching for some of my Q and he's talking to me about my social media and creating video content and he's like, you've got to be on Facebook. This is, and I get that's where the industry is, but it's for everybody's at, you know, and, um, and I, I'm like, I don't want to check my Facebook. I don't even want to get on there. I got it. That's where the community is. So we got to be there. Yeah, you know, this is, this is, this is everything we're saying. The thread through this, the video is difficult. I don't want to check my Facebook. I don't, you know, the social media is noisy. It's, it's, it's, it's neck, you know, all the things we say about the complaints and the bitching and the moaning, um, yet it's a necessity in a requirement. I think in our industries anyway, if you want to remain relevant today, yes. So embrace suck, right? Yeah. And I think, you know, you can have, it will become more fun. I mean, just like going to the gym or something like that first, it sucks. And then it becomes kind of, you enjoy it. And because you start seeing this community building and the engagement you get with, uh, that's meaningful. I think as long as you keep it meaningful and you're putting your values forward, you're leading with education. For instance, you're sharing information that it's truly helping people. For me, that's when I'm like, okay, this, this feels good. You know, it's not, I'm not wasting time on there. And I'm sure you, you need to put, you know, serious boundaries around it, um, to make sure that that's quality time spent. I think that's also another secret, uh, you said sharing information and being helpful. That's a little secret trick or hack. Um, you know, I have this saying that if you show up to serve, you can't lose because it, you know, you're coming from the right place, which means the message is going to be more authentic in the whole point being, it's like, you shouldn't be showing up to sell on social media, right? Yeah. Yeah. We're long past that time, I think where it's a selling platform like this is a, it's always been, but definitely more important than ever that you're showing up, bringing value into your community and you're showing up as yourself. You know, I mean, people see through disingenuous posts or corporate feeling posts. It's, it's all about, I want to learn from you as an individual and see who you are. Well, then can you give any quick tips on types of content you think because you see a lot of originators and, and realtors, what do you think would be some suggestions there for them? I mean, it totally depends on the person, but we do see some of the, the best content out there is stuff that, um, that is share, like, I'm trying to think some of the Min Nguyen who's, what's a mortgage, you know, he does a really great job of sharing information, but he kind of, he does it like while he's walking through whatever, you know, um, and it's talking about, you know, a new down payment assistance program or what's new in the news around the market and, you know, it could be anything that you're interested in bringing leadership around. Um, but I think there's also people who are sharing quick tips. I answer to questions, common questions. You know, that one's a really good one. Um, I think as long as you are, and people like Jordan Nutter doing skits, you know, like back and forth on, um, a scenario. So it kind of depends on what you want to get into, but I think there's, it might be a good idea actually to create, you know, some, or show a list of people doing different types of content and see what appeals to you. Um, we have some people, like, a lot of our social content we create. Um, people can customize it whatever, but what I find people are most successful with is that they use that content to create a video over it because you can very easily, you know, put yourself over a piece of content and just talk about that. Say like, Hey, I'm going to talk to you about what's in a credit report right now. And it's normally really boring, but here's what you need to know, you know, and like, if you make it like, here's a quick hit of something, that's, that's helpful. So you just gave me an idea about that. The green screen thing is cool, but you mentioned credit report, um, ideas, where do you get ideas to be to have relevant content? Oh, I'm going to tell you right now, you get ideas from this next gen homebuyer report that you guys published, which we're going to put the links into the show notes here. And you've got these multiple slides that will give you insights into the information that next gen is seeking. One of the ones that popped out for me was 70% have checked their credit in the past six months. Why? Yeah, I thought that was a very promising, you know, it's the fact that people are, are, I was shocked by that. I thought we were going to like, you get some bad numbers. And you know, what's interesting is, um, I don't think people, I think people are trying to do something, um, but they, you know, the average, we did a financial literacy report with the first home IQ quiz, which is 20 questions measuring their understanding of buying a home. And the credit question, I think 80% of millennials knew that FICO is the most commonly used credit spring model, but it was like 50% or something of Gen Z. And, um, and so people might not know what to do, but they are know what's going on, but they're trying to take a step in, in the right direction. So they are trying to save, they are trying to, you know, check their credit and, but they don't necessarily know what that means. So having some direction around like, here's what a good credit score is. Here's what you should look for on a credit report. Here, you know, that kind of stuff would go a long way. Right. And then you talk about good habits and it looks like there's some good habits from next gen in terms of expense tracking and saving and things like that. Yeah. Yeah. That was really positive. And you know, again, the average score of the first home IQ quiz with millennials, actually all ages was 57%. So it's very low. They're understanding of buying a home, but it sounds like, and I want to do, you know, the next financial literacy report I want to do is to measure some of their those pieces of information better on their knowledge of basic financial literacy, because I think they, it looks like they are, they know they need to budget. They know they need to save some money. They know they need to check their credit or know what their credit score is. Do they know what that means? Maybe not. They know how to buy a home, definitely not. You know, so there's some there's some pieces that are big pieces that are missing. Then as I continue to go through this content, which I don't want to give it all away, because people don't go need to get it via the links we give them. But clearly, as you reference in your in your researches, they're stressed about finances. They are, you know, riding the thin razor in terms of when it comes to savings, cost of living, their barriers, what they see as the barriers at home buy. So do you have any insights then into what percentage of these first time home buyers are getting assistance from relatives or otherwise? Oh, that's a good question. I don't know that off the top of my head. I know that information is out there. And I know a lot of, you know, anecdotally, I can say a lot of people who are buying homes are getting that down payment gift from relatives. And that's where, you know, what another, like another initiative we have going at first home IQ that we haven't released yet is want to create more awareness around down payment assistance programs for one that that's something that a lot of people don't have information about. Secondly, house hacking. I don't think people have a good understanding that of strategies to make homeownership accessible. Because, you know, again, people feel like it's out of reach. They're saving and they're like, there's no way I'm going to get even close to the amount that I need to get to. But we found 70% of people said 69% said that they thought you need a 10 or 20% down in order to buy a home. So if they're trying to save 20% on a, you know, home here in LA, they're going to be like, yeah, there's no reason for me to do that. You know, moved to Ohio. Yeah, yeah, I'm just going to a lot of vacation and forget about it. Yeah, you can you can do somewhere else. No, the house, house hacking is great. I would love to see, yeah, more attention brought to that. As a matter of fact, I had a conversation, I have a 22-year-old, and I had a conversation with him about that. And he was like, what? I'm going to move in there and, and man, I'm like, yeah, you're going to move in there, dude. And you're going to leave rent free. And this is going to be your asset later in life. Yeah. I'm going to do the down payment and all that kind of stuff. He's like, hmm, interesting. Yeah. So if we're talking about kinds of content to create, I mean, that was just focusing on strategies to get into home ownership and strategies to get to your dream home. Like a lot of people don't understand, you just got to live in that for a year. And then you can lever it, you know, have leverage and move into the next one. I think that at least having some kind of roadmap, if you could fill up your feed with that over time. 40, according to your research, trust and housing experts, they trust realtors more than lenders. They do. Is that surprising? A little bit because, you know, realtors have always been like down under attorneys and all that on the surface, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They came up more. Yeah. That we asked last year, loan officers versus real estate agents and the same thing. But Gen Z was a way less trusting. So that wasn't good. Well, really, what's the hell do they know about that? I know. Come on. You know, they're getting the problems. They're getting their news from like my 22 year old Reddit for sure. You know, not so much TikTok with him, but Instagram, but YouTube all day long for the 22 year old YouTube hands down. Yeah. I'll have to end. Of course, we get into Dave Ramsey debates because when he went to high school, he went through the Dave Ramsey program and we have the whole like, you don't need a credit card debate, right? I'm like, well, let me tell you why that might not be true. Yeah. Yeah. That's, yeah, that's interesting. Yeah, I actually, at first I was like, okay, YouTube, everybody's going to YouTube for this information. And then I started thinking about anything like as soon as my, you know, faucet or my dish little thing broke, where am I going? YouTube, like you go there for any question you have. And so yeah, I think that's a, it's something. But anyway, back to the real estate versus L.O. That tended, that was a really big gap between millennials and Gen Z in terms of that trust. And I, I would be really curious to see if the NAR news influences that in any way, just because it's bringing some awareness of how a lot of friends be like, hey, I want to talk to you about this. There was a New York Times daily episode about it. And I, you know, I don't understand what's going on. And so there's kind of more, I don't know, thirst for knowledge around that. Well, I'm glad you transitioned to that because we'd be remiss if we didn't bring that up briefly right now because that is on everybody's news feeds. And most of it, it's completely inaccurate and clickbait headlines and false. I don't know if you've read much into the documentation around the settlement. Yeah, it's like, yeah, I have. That's why I was up so early this morning, as I had to be on a bunch of calls and like, you know, conversations, plus I'm just learning and consuming. And so the NAR also has a Q&A document, which is a summary of the lawsuit instead of 108 pages, it's 12 pages. But there's just so much misinformation, misinformation going around out there. And I think to your point, that's also going to fuel some of the questions about, well, wait a minute. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Realtors are frigging overcharging people and you know, all this stuff and story, which brings back full circle to the real headline here is and how do you be seen as the trusted advisor, right? Yeah. And I think, you know, community leader is a phrase that Dave Savage and I have been using and I've been hearing him speak to that related to the settlement. And at like, how do you set yourself up as a community leader, both to consumers and to your partners, you know, whatever that that looks like, it means, you know, bringing education, bringing resources, you know, showing up. And so it's not a time to be silent, I think, on that it's a time to really everybody has questions about it. And how can you bring value and resources as a leader? Well, my immediate idea, um, my first kind of, you know, thoughtful instead of emotionally knee jerk response to the whole thing was a empathy. This is speaking to loan officers on behalf of realtors. B, this is your time to, to your point, be a community leader. I'm suggesting people in my community, what I tell them to do is host a panel where you're going to bring in a handful of agents, title, maybe attorney, if you're an attorney state, whatever. And you're going to, you're going to be the MC and you're going to host this town hall conversation. Um, and you are going to fill the room, right? And you are going to be seen as a leader in the community leading the narrative and the conversation. And out of that, I promise you will come opportunities for you. But I think that's one of the opportunities of a community leader is you need to control the narrative a little bit instead of the media controlling it. Absolutely. You need to have a narrative no matter what is going on in the news. That is the world we live in today. And so it, yeah, I think that part of being a community leader is controlling the narrative in your network, um, showing up having a voice. Yeah. And on that note, I want to get this in if I, if you don't mind, um, in this whole NAR conversation. I don't know if you're familiar with a thousand watt consulting. Yeah. I just met with them. They're right. What was that? Brian Barrero or somebody else? It was somebody else. Um, he was, you'd love them. They're great data research firm. Incredible. Yeah. Yeah. And so this is part of my post the other day where they had this and I got the printout right here in front of me. But they did, they surveyed it surveyed a thousand people who knew about the, um, lawsuit situation with the NAR and the buyer compass, buyer agent compensation. The question was a thousand people. If you're buying a home today and your budget was half a million, how much would you be willing to pay for these services of a real estate agent to guide you through the process? 37% said 10,000. Wow. That's 2% of the purchase price. Yeah. Which is roughly the standard buyer agent compensation anyways. 15% 12 said 12,500 and on and on. But the point being is and I was on a Tom Ferry webinar earlier today and there's lots of days because people start freaking out. Oh my God. How the buyer's agent is going to and that's and the buyers aren't going to be able to have the money for it and all this kind of stuff. So setting aside VA and FHA for the moment, um, people believe and people want there was a, I don't have it handy right now, but Tom Ferry's data reiterated and keeping current matters reiterated people want buyer representation as a, as a buyer and they're willing to pay for it. You know, so and then without getting into the NAR logistics of how that actually gets all worked out right now, um, for those listening and aren't aware, um, the settlement does not say buyers agents are not permitted to be compensated. It does not say that. It just says it's not allowed to be published in the MLS. Very simple layman's term of that. There are other ways, phone calls, text, your own brokerage website that has your own listings that you can publish that. But but the DOJ was really trying to do. I'm going to geek here for a second was, uh, was they were trying to bring transparency, um, and price fixing, remove price fixing because the assumption for so long was, hey, you know, your compensation is in here. It's two and a half percent. It's 50% of the listing price, whatever. Um, and the DOJ, a lot of different reasons why they got their hand in this thing, but they thought that that was not in full transparency to all people in transactions. So there you go. Any comments about that? Yeah, no, I mean, I think that while people say that they don't trust the expert, you know, and so that's going to be leading into this, they also don't trust themselves. So that lack of confidence in their own knowledge of the home buying process was very clear and has been continually evident through all of our research. And I think, you know, they are starving for someone to help to represent them. They want that. They just want to know that there's transparency. They want to know that it's fair. Um, and so I think, you know, putting some structure and language around that is going to be important. And again, like showing up as a leader to be, um, to show them that you're on their side is going to be really important. Yeah. Okay, let's for the few minutes we've got left. Let's talk about this cool thing you're doing called first home IQ. Uh, what do you want to tell us about that? Because you are looking for some people to help carry the message, right? Yeah. Yeah. So first of all, first home IQ is again, focus on increasing financial literacy with the next generation. Um, the ways that we're doing that are one through supporting educators. So we have a curriculum designed for schools, we have online courses, um, and with the schools we have like lesson plans, all that kind of stuff. The second way is through industry professionals. So that is by empowering industry professionals to bring education into your communities, whether that be a presentation at a school or a community organization or a hospital or whatever, um, or sharing on social media. And so in the third way is through media content, but we are, um, you know, for the industry professional, we have a free community that's available to anybody. We have some free resources in there, few social posts. We have a free presentation you can use. Um, and then tons of like, you know, interviews, our research report is in there. So if you're interested in just like participating in the conversation and leveraging some of that content, um, you can go to our website first home IQ.com and click on the tab. Elows and realtors join the community. Um, but then the, the other thing that if you are really committed to this, you're someone who already is like, you know, delivering education, um, doing, maybe doing some presentations or want to support that initiative. We are a 501c3, um, and we have an ambassador program. And so that's where you're donating time and money to support the initiative. Um, we, for our ambassadors, we have a huge library of a presentation materials. We have, um, lots of, you know, social media content, huge library of social media content with captions that are all customizable. We have a bunch of branding and playbooks and, and all of that for, for ambassadors. Um, and then our ambassadors donate a minimum of 200 a month, um, to be, to participate and support the initiative. Cool. Awesome. That's a lot of resources. You give them. So for those who want to go down either of those roads, we're going to link that up in the show notes. First home IQ.com will also, uh, link up if you'd like your website, which has some of your additional research and all that, uh, next gen home buyer.com. Would that be okay? Yeah, that'd be awesome. Okay. Cool. Um, then let's, let's put a cherry on top of this thing. What is, even with all the challenges in the headwinds, right, affordability, trust, uh, confusion in the marketplace. Um, what, what do you want to give us for any kind of a guiding light moving forward because we're largely serving first time home buyers? Yeah, I think, I mean, the biggest thing, I guess I've already said, but, you know, leading with education really supports all of those areas. I mean, when on from the accessibility standpoint, there's a just general, like feeling that, you know, all the media content we digest as consumers is telling us we can't buy a home. So we need you coming in giving us real strategies around how we can buy a home, you know, and, and I mean, I live in LA and, and it really, affordability is a real challenge. And, but there are pathways to getting there. And I think, um, we need to hear more of that. So, um, and then of course, there's that helps with our knowledge and builds trust as well. Awesome. Well, once again, this has been an inspiring conversation. I love your data. I love how you're educating the community out there. So thank you for making time. Great. Thank you so much for having me. You bet. Listen, there's, do you know what to do? If you like this episode, hey, first and foremost, go learn about being a first, first home IQ ambassador. Check the links in the show notes. Go do it. You know what to do. And if you like this episode, share it with somebody. Appreciate you tuning in. We'll see you on the next one. Bye for now. All right. Well, thanks for tuning in to today's episode. Hey, you got a question for you. Are you struggling to get engagement and referrals from real estate agents and feeling like you're constantly fighting for business in a crowded market? 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