Ep #10: Chris Lamm Getting Serious About Your Career

In today's highly competitive mortgage industry, building profitable relationships with the real estate agents is essential for success. However, finding effective ways to secure agent relationships can be a challenge. With so many mortgage loan originators vying for the attention of real estate agents, it can be difficult to stand out and establish meaningful connections. Our new case study featuring loan officer Chris Coghill is a must-read. Chris has closed a remarkable 36 million in funded loans from agent referrals. And in this case study, he shares his proven strategies for building strong relationships with real estate agents and leveraging those relationships to drive more business. To get your hands on this resource, head over to LOKestudy.com and download your free copy of the case study today. You'll find actionable insights and practical tips that Chris used to close 36 million in funded loans from agent referrals and how you can too. Don't miss out. Go check it out right now, visit LOKestudy.com and download your free copy today. Welcome to Mortgage Marketing Radio. Brought to you by the Mortgage Marketing Institute. Your number one source for truth in Mortgage Marketing. Hey, everybody. It's Jeff Zimfer. Welcome to another episode of Mortgage Marketing Radio. Without further ado, I want to get right into it because I know my special guest here today is busy and we're actually just talking before I hit the record button and talking about probably a concept that is very important for most loan officers to hear. And so let me just get right into it. My guest today is Chris Lamb. He's a personal mortgage planner with Commerce Home Mortgage up in Reading, California. Chris, welcome to the show. Hey, thanks, Jeff. It's good to hear from you again. Yeah, it's been, I think last time you and I talked what, three, four years maybe? Yeah, it's not more. It's been quite a while, man. Yeah, so I appreciate you making time and as you and I talked about before I hit record here is really just trying to update with the audience here of what's really working in today's market. So you've been out there. I think let's kind of pick up for where you and I were chatting right before I hit record, which is you told me you decided to get serious about this business in. Was it 2008? Right. Yeah. So, and I know you and I talked, at least four years ago, whatever, and you were doing back then, I think you were kind of experimental and you may have admitted to having the Bright Shiny Object Syndrome, but you've recently I think kind of focused in and really dialed into like to use your words, you learn how to become a business person. So maybe if you could just reiterate that journey that you've been on. Yeah, you know, one of the things I didn't get to tell you at all, it all kind of shifted for me in 2009. In 2009, I was engaged to be married to my wife Heather and at the time, you know, things were going well. I was probably helping four or five families a month to get into homes and making a good living compared to anybody that I knew at the time and you know, things were good. I was night, I think I was, I want to say 19 at the time and you know, I was older than that. I'm 32 now, whatever. It was 2009 and it was about that time that I realized that I had cancer. So I got diagnosed with cancer through a series of events and ended up going into chemo and you know, long story, but I ended up getting a clean bill of health after going through treatment. My business kind of shrunk down to nothing. And as I started bouncing back, health and health wise, I realized I had to get my business up and going. And so my wife and I were married at the time. We got married right when we found out I was diagnosed with cancer because we wanted to live together through that process. And when I got my clean bill of health, I was essentially broke down to zero, had lost a lot of my referral relationships or they were at least kind of, you know, on the back burner because I was sick most of the time for six months and just really didn't have much of a business to get back to. So I knew I needed an edge. I started to turn into some of these shiny objects as we talked about and went to do some conferences and you know, at the time, I realized a couple things. Number one, I realized if I was going to have a healthy marriage, I was going to have to learn how to work at nine to five schedule and I was going to have to stop doing stuff after five, six o'clock at night, I was going to have to have my weekends because my wife was a very healthy person and she just wasn't going to accept me having just being a work of holic and always looking at marketing stuff and checking email and just being really compulsive with my business. And so I knew I needed to change that. I also knew that I was kind of at a ceiling with my business. I was doing four for five loans a month in extreme cases. I'd hit eight or nine loans a month and I wasn't able to really break through that. And I knew that I needed to and I didn't know how I didn't know what that next step was. I heard rumors of people having these great businesses where they're doing more volume and they're able to kind of create some revenue to have a team and do these different things, have systems and when I would become exposed to people like that, it's almost as if they made it look easy and I'm pulling my hair out just doing four or five loans a month wondering how the heck they're doing that. So it was around this time that a really good friend of mine named Paul had turned me on to some calls that were being done with the core and I got turned on to these guys and long story longer. I went to their event and was exposed to a bunch of really, really high producing loan officers that had claimed to not only have their businesses in great places but to have great systems, great structure and a schedule that allowed them to be free at when they're at home and they even take a couple of vacations a year and I had never been exposed to that before. These guys were doing it and I kind of bought in hookline and sinker and since then my business has been, you know, it's just been different, a lot different in every way, does that make sense? Yeah, how long have you been with them? I've been exposed to them since 2009. I went to a couple of their summit events for probably two or three years before I became one of their level three coaching students which is the highest coaching platform they offer. I've been doing that for a little over three years now. Wow. And so what's the, what does your business look like today? You know, you talked about four or five families helping, what does that look like now? It's a lot different. So last month, just for example, I did 34 units for about seven and a half million. Wow. I've got about 13 people in total in my branch, I've got three loan officers now that I'll do about a million or a million and a half a month. I've got my own team. I've got a call center now with two dialers. So yeah, I mean, it's completely different than it where it was. The one guy show sitting behind a little cubicle and now I have my own branch and, and you know, the biggest thing that I would say is, you know, I went on vacation a couple of weeks ago as you know, and I didn't check my email the entire time. I came back and had had had the biggest month of my career and I was on vacation for 10 days of it. And there's not one complaint, not one loan closed late. All my surveys were 9s and 10s and my team was happy and they were proud and they were working like a team and they were all really, really stoked with, with, you know, helping 34 families in one month. So, so yeah, I mean, that's, that's the biggest thing there is I actually got my life back in, you know, it's like I tell people all the time in this business, I believe you can have your cake and eat it too. I know people that do and I'm one of those people and it's been an amazing journey getting to this point. Well, hey, Kudos to you, man. You've been through a lot and, you know, I think you're coming at this from the right perspective as well, right, in terms of who you are and you're, you're helping families. So granted, you get to make a great income, but you know, you see it as doing more than that. I think that shows up as well in terms of how people experience, right, you as they go through your process. I can just tell that, you know, not even having gotten a loan from you. I know it's a good experience. So I want to cut, let's, let's, that's a great story, by the way, thanks for sharing. Let's, let's focus on just a few things that are working really well for you. Now, obviously, you know, you've got systems in place and things like that, but for kind of the, the, the mortgage loan officer who's where you were, right, back at that ceiling of four or five loans a month, what are the things that you do now that you learn, learn through the core or wherever that are consistently bringing in, you know, tangible results for you, whether it's a realtor side or consumer, what would you say? Yeah, well, you know, I, I don't want to keep bringing the core up just because I don't think that they're the only way, you know, so I want to be very clear that I don't think my path is the only path. I think one of the reasons why I love this business so much and why I think that a lot of people in real estate lending or either or love this business is because there's more than one way to skin a cat. There's people that have success with marketing the builders only and build up these real big builder accounts, there's, there's people that specialize in rehab loans and build great careers or VA loans right next door to a, you know, an air base or something like that. For me, though, what I've learned is, you know, this three very simple steps, again, this isn't, I didn't invent this, it's what I've been tied is number one, prospecting is has been key, you know, picking up the phone and putting down all these, the shiny objects and making calls, setting appointments and building relationships with real estate agents and influential people like HR managers or CPAs and financial planners and doing it a lot. So that's been very, very key for me is, is making sure that I'm always on the phone, building, nurturing and going after relationships. The second part I would say is tracking my results, you know, before I, I really started taking this serious, I, I really didn't know what my results were going to be from one month to the next and now I track everything. I track the amount of calls I make, the amount of people I talk to, I track the amount of the leads I get, the ones that are converted, where they're coming from, track everything weekly, monthly, quarterly and, you know, just like any business. If you don't track, if you don't know your numbers, you don't know your business. I mean, that's something that Marcus Limones on the, the profit always says and I think that's perfect, a perfect line for anybody is if you don't know where you've been, you don't know where you're going. So, you know, really starting to break your business down into, into numbers and tracking what you're doing is, is, is also big and, and then the second thing is, you know, since the financial crisis, it, it just, the fact of the matter is it takes five times of people to close alone. So, you know, one of the common things I see is that a lot of people are like me, under staffed and they don't start asking for help or trying to hire people or learning to delegate until they're already way too behind and, and they're already suffering. They're business is suffering, their relationships are suffering and that's when they kind of ask for help and then they're too busy at that time to learn how to delegate and actually figure out the proper way to do it because it's a learn skill and so it doesn't work and then they just say that doesn't work, you know, and that's the hard part is people have to realize that delegation is not a rocket science, anyone can do it but you have to, if to learn how to do it and in many ways it's kind of counterintuitive at first because you're spending money to hire someone and, you know, you kind of take two steps backwards at first to learn how to launch forward if that makes sense. No, it is. Yeah, yeah, it does. I like with you how you brought up Marcus Lomonas from the profit, people process, people process and technology, it's what he talks about a lot and so, you know, I think you're alluding to that through this conversation that you got, you've built a good team, it sounds like right, with other people that can help you, you've got the right processes in place to streamline to perhaps offload as well from you so you can focus on core activities and then, right, technology to build a better manage kind of all the moving parts and the growth in your business as well, it sounds like you've got kind of all those pieces running simultaneously. Yeah, yeah, I mean that's, it's never, it's never in a sweet spot, I mean as soon as you think you got it rolling, one of the wheels goes flat and you got to turn back to that and give it attention, but, you know, you can sequentially learn in this business how to build a team, you know, starting with one person and if you do that and you do it well, the end result is it's going to free up bandwidth for you to go out and nurture your relationship, build more relationships, pick up that one extra refi call that you never had time for before that ends up calling your competitor and locking that rate. I mean, the business is there. Most of us just don't have the time to catch it because we're so busy putting out fires and, you know, just doing things that aren't high level activities, we're not selling. So we're not able to get those few extra deals and what I've learned is, you know, whether someone really wants to be a huge producer or not doing volume in this business is the safest way in my opinion to have a great business that lasts for years to come because if you have the revenue there and you can hire the people and it's just a much better way to do business in my opinion. Yeah. Agreed. So doing volume. Let's talk about that. It's funny. I have multiple thoughts flowing through my head here because I'm remembering back to when you and I originally connected, I might have came about because of my book and you doing events and that's a large part of what my book was about, but I remember you back then doing something called like a headshot happy hour. You remember that? Yeah. I do remember that. Yeah. Yeah, I thought it was a great idea because you were doing, you know, how many realtors need to update their, you know, their photo, right, and get their more, more modern picture going. So that was a great idea. But in terms of volume, let's, what I was getting at was this is, I'm surprised at the number of mortgage professionals that cross my path, like I just had one the other day. This gentleman's been in the business 25 years and didn't do, let's say, isn't where he's at or wants to be when it comes to having that stable base of realtor referral relationships. Yeah. So I'm thinking after 25 years, man, if that guy still having a tough time with it, why, right? What's the problem? And so, and I'm just kind of throwing that out there, what would you advise or let me, what are you doing to, to fill your realtor bucket and continue to, you know, build your, your team there? Yeah. You know, that's a really good question. It's, it's not easy to manage your pipeline, close your loans on time and nurture the relationships that you have at the same time, let alone go out and try to build new ones. So to be honest with you, that's all rooted in the two things that I said. Number one, you got to prospect and build new relationships. Number two, you got to make sure you have the team, the cater to your clients so that when you do catch a realtor and they send you the first, second, and third referral and you, it needs to go off without a hitch and they need to be impressed. And I would say the third thing is, is you got to bring value to these realtors, man, because they're just, you know, when rates go up, which, you know, they, they have a couple times in the last five years and, and these, these other lenders that are right now sitting behind their desk doing refires, get out from their desk and go chase realtors, everyone can close loans on time, everyone gives good rates and everyone has the same product. So you have to find a way to give more value than that and it doesn't have to be this big grandiose thing. What I found is you just got to have the time to build a relationship and if you can build value with these realtors and there's hundreds and thousands of way to do that and be consistent with what you're doing, then that's the key there. And so, so, you know, again, without picking up the phone and calling these realtors and building new relationships because you got to do that. Some realtors have a great year and the next year they got a business and some realtors die and some realtors, you know, they, whatever, there's just, there's things to happen. So you always got to be building new relationships all the time and then the second part is you got to be able to execute and have transactional execution at a high level. I mean, that's just a must in this world. You can't have excuses. Oh, the CD went out late. We're working on it. That stuff just doesn't work anymore. And so you've got to own your business, you've got to own your team and you can't have excuses. You've got to close your loans. You've got to have a really well oiled machine and then you got to bring value to your realtors. And if you do that, you're going to, you're not going to have those problems because the realtors you have will stick with you. The ones you call will be happy you're calling and want to work with you because you've got a good reputation and that has been my experience. And I think that that's probably what this guy in some fashion probably needs to look at. So great, great points. So let's get specific. What would your suggestions be on how you would add value or what have you had done historically to add value? I mentioned obviously, headshot happy hour, I've done multiple types of events, but anything kind of stand out for you that really you think resonates with agents in adding value. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, for me, the level that I'm at now being in this for 12, 13 years in a very small town, 96,000 people, there's not a lot of agents here that don't know who I am. And we probably only have 250 agents in our county and there's probably only about 50 or 60 to the do 80% of the business. So it's a really small market. And if they're not currently referring to me, they've been listing agents that I've done deals with. So it helps that I have a consistent, you know, record of closing loans, you know, with little to no problems and usually always on time. And one of the things I've learned though is that's not enough. You still have to be in a relationship and, you know, in the last couple of years, I've noticed that there's eight, there's lenders in my town who have a really bad reputation with closing loans on time and, you know, just other things. And there's still agents that refer to these guys and, you know, I've kind of looked at it and investigated it and the reason why is because they know them and they like them. You know, that's just the oldest sales thing is that people do business with people they know and people they like. And so what I think that the key is for me with that in value, it's not necessarily that I have the next greatest and latest shiny tool to bring to them. It's that I'm available to them and that I actually take the time to spend with them and sometimes, you know, some agents I try to break something down that's just so rudimentary that, you know, you would think that any realtor knows it but they don't know it and I paid attention to them and listen and, you know, instead of trying to sell them on this ten-point marketing program, maybe they just need to learn how to create some email rules so they can stop having 200 emails in their inbox. And so I think the key is really trying to understand your realtor and find out where their pain is and bring in a solution to that exact pain because for every realtor, it's different and you can do these lunch and learns and present these great things. But at the end of the day, if a realtor doesn't have a CRM and doesn't categorize their leads, they probably shouldn't be worried about getting new leads because they're not taking care of the leads I have. So it's really simple stuff most of the time. It's nothing new and it's just basic sales 101 stuff that a lot of these agents need help with or need reminders of or in some cases, I'll pay some of my staff members to do it for them to help them automate it and get the ball rolling. So that's how I do it. I really try. I've learned how to listen. I used to talk a lot and I'm getting better at taking the cotton out of my mouth and rad them out of my ears and putting in my mouth and trying to listen and pay attention to people. Does that make sense? Yeah, it does. Very good. Thank you. So it sounds like then you're actually when you meet with agents, you have some type of a question error needs assessment. You go through to identify those areas of opportunity. Yeah, I do. I do. And it's not written out and it used to be, for me now, it's just, it's usually three simple questions. You know, the first question is, is where do you want to be? Where is this all going? And you know, that could be a whole hour conversation because most of them haven't thought past that. It just got their license and they hung it with the broker and they're out trying to be a realtor and they haven't thought about retirement or, you know, how much volume they want to do or what kind of business they want to have. Do they want to do more listings? Do they want to do more buyers? Do they want to eventually grow their business? Do they want to become a broker? And so a lot of them, they haven't even thought that far ahead. So, you know, we'll stop there and then we'll have a follow up meeting. You know, the second question is usually, what is your plan to accomplish whatever goal you have? And a lot, they rarely have a plan for it. It's, if it happens, it's going to be by accident. It's not going to be by design because there is no plan in place. And then the third question is, is can I help you with this? And if I can do these things, would you consider making me your business partner? And that's kind of how I do it. And, you know, I've learned how to do the two-step close from the core and basically what that means is I don't try to diagnose a problem and solve it in the first meeting. I try to find a way to find out what the problem is, listen, pay attention, then tell them I'm going to get back to them and then have a follow up meeting where I bring some solutions to the table. Yeah, no, this is very, it's kind of like a doctor patient thing, right? You're like a diagnosis there. And then what's great about that is it gives you a chance to sincerely think about, right? What solutions could you bring to the table to help them? And how do you find that in terms of like, you know, you said, you know, your numbers and all that, not to put you on the spot, but conversion-wise, that process, how does that work? Is that a pretty good conversion? You know, it can be. I mean, the hard part with agents are with any relationship is that they take time to get off the ground. You know, you just, it's just tough. I would say my conversion ratio, and that's something I actually need to track better. You know, this last year, my goal was to, it wasn't really to grow as much as just to take better care of the relationships I have, but I would say if I, if I meet an agent and I go through this process, there's about an 80% chance that they will become my partner. All right. That's really good conversion, man, 80%. So the, go ahead. I was going to say, well, they stay my partner is a whole other story, you know, because I do, I have a team and my business is different than a lot of people. So, you know, there is, I do occasionally have agents that they get sold that using the one, one shot, one person loan offshore down in some offices the way to go, and so working with a team sometimes has cost me and in relationships. And though I feel that it gives better service, some agents just are ignorant to that and the relationship doesn't work. Hey, guys, what's up? Real quick. You've heard about the mortgage marketing pro membership before, and I just want to quickly remind you of that you're in a place in your business where you simply need more purchased loans. You need to fill your pipeline with purchase business. Let's just face it, agents are still a solid pillar of business and sources of purchase business for you. Well, good news. Our mortgage marketing pro membership helps loan officers like you close more loans without the hassle of chasing agents or cold calling done for you agent classes, expert training videos, a marketing automation platform that automates the entire process for you. Everything you need to build your personal brand in your local market, attract and convert agents into referral partners. 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