Scaling to $100 Million

Hey listeners, Jeff Zimper. Welcome to this episode of the Mortgage Marketing Radio podcast. This is where we help you, the Mortgage Zone originator, move from Solicitor and vendor to partner in peer when it comes to you attracting and engaging real estate agents to have meaningful conversations that lead to long-term profitable partnerships referrals for you. And we're going to talk more about sources of business on today's episode. So if you've ever been curious what are the primary sources of a top producer and how does that break down and what are the activities that top producers do to get those pillars of business active. Well, you're going to hear that in a moment from our special guest who's doing over 100 million a year in production. Before we get there, I've got to share with you a success story from our platform over at my agent classes. This is where we every single month are equipping mortgage originators around the country with plug-and-play educational classes, materials, resources to help them attract instead of chase realtors, help them have meaningful conversations and build a personal brand that differentiates them from all the noise in their local marketplace. One of the stories I have to tell you is one of the things we do on our weekly Friday coaching calls is, and as a matter of fact, the previous episode might have been the one you heard where you had a special guest, Tom Moffett from Canada, talk about Instagram broadcast channels. So once a month, I bring in a special guest. If you haven't checked that episode, I'll go check it out. However, I'm just reading our Facebook group here, and we have people who post wins of the week. You hear me share those every single week on this podcast. And there are new ones to share almost every single week in here. One of the coaching areas we have around, if you're going to be hosting agent classes virtually or in person, is the question would be, do you call to confirm your reservations versus just text or just email? So I put this out there to my group and a couple comments were right here. I went from 13 to 19. I had 10 realtors tell me if this loan officer, Marlene, what's up, shout out to you. If Marlene would set up a separate zoom class, they would attend it. Of the 19 face to face people who attended Marlene's class, five of them, a realtor, she's never met before. And she's got 10 realtors saying, hey, if you do a zoom version of this class, we would attend that. My best members, what they do is they host one class a month in person. And then they repeat that same class virtually two or three weeks later or within the same month. Reason why you reach a wider audience, you get really good at teaching the content, you continue to perfect your process. And that's the name of the game guys. If you want to get in shape, if you want to get fit, right, you don't go to the gym once, what do you do? You repeat the process over and over again. You build momentum like a plane getting off the runway, you've got to burn some fuel, create some momentum forward momentum to get that lift. That's going to get you airborne. Once you're airborne, well, then we can use some additional advanced strategies, but for a lot of folks, we're working with right now. It's how do you get lift? How do you get engagement and attention, especially now, considering the NAR lawsuit, the noise around that? If ever there was a time to be more aligned with Rolls-Dade agents and help them become more valuable to their clients, listing and buy side, now's the time. That's exactly what we do at my gym classes. We equip you, the loan officer, with a turnkey library of classes that are sales and marketing related, social media related, how to deliver a better buyer presentation, how to get your offer accepted. Think about all the challenges, the things you're trying to learn in your business, agents are trying to learn the same thing. What I'm suggesting is you become a conduit for that information, for those resources, and you change the narrative. You shift the brand identity. You go from Solicitor and vendor to partnered here, and you get referrals. So if you're open-minded, you're coachable, and you're willing to get out there and add value, this might be for you. The only way to find out is to book a call with me. Let's have a conversation. You go to www.morgantmarketing.pro, mortgagemarketing.pro, book a call with me. We'll see if we're fit for you. Okay, this week, my special guest, longtime coming huge fan of this gentleman, very successful mortgage professional out of the Dallas, Texas market area. Brian McCauley is somebody who I've been following for some time, and he has really evolved and grown his presence, his personal brand online, and it shows if you simply go to follow him, we'll put links in the show notes. Instagram is one of his primary channels, his handle, his Dallas mortgage man, pretty much wherever you go, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, all that fun stuff. That's where you can go follow Brian. Once again, I said there'll be links in the show notes, but Brian, I think this year he said he's tracking 125 to 130 million. I think 90% of his business is purchased, 60% from agents, CPAs, 20% past clients, 10% social media. This is a journey, if you ever was curious of what's the journey for a loan officer who started, and how did they mature and evolve, what additional activities and strategies and mindsets that they take on to continue to evolve and grow? Well, this is what I think, hopefully I extract from Brian during this conversation, and we talked about attract versus chase. We talked about some of the changes that Brian had to adapt and go through and his commentary on what the market coming forward looking for the next couple three years with the NAR thing, with inflation and so forth. I think you'll find this to be a very insightful conversation that might reset some of your thoughts and mindset and strategies about your activities moving into this year and beyond to grow your business. Without further ado, let's get into this week's show. Brian, welcome to show. Appreciate you having me, man, a long time coming. I should say finally, welcome to the show. Yeah, right. Well, time. I think we've been at this for a year, but we're both very, very busy, and I'm really excited to have this conversation with you before we get into that. For those who may not know Brian McCauley, I want you to help us out. Who are you? What do you do? Yeah, appreciate it, man. Brian McCauley from Dallas, Texas, producing branch manager across country, been in the mortgage industry just started my 20th year when we first job directly at a college. That's all I know for better for water. So happy to talk about that and whatever else to one of that crazy market. Wow. First job out of college, all right. That leads me directly to people are often curious. How did you get into this thing? Because you didn't wake up or I assume go to college. So let's let's start with that kind of easy entry point. What was that transition into the industry? It's a great question, man. So I finished college December 2004. I had no idea what I wanted to do. I was a finance major and I fell backwards into basically an offer to become an LO. So I was a month or two out of college, moved home with my folks. They do what everybody else does is how you're not going to sleep in and party, go get a job, figure it out, something. So they nudged me and this recruiting firm just so it happened to have an opening for like, I think it was outside mortgage sales inside mortgage sales something at that time. I said, sure, I'll take it. It's $500 a week. I've got beer money on Fridays. My parents are up my back. It was just a temporary thing that I fell into. So young didn't know anything about it. But it interests me enough to pay attention to it. And of course, I don't want my folks on my back. And so one month led to six, six led to 12. I started to kind of like the numbers and the finance and the relationship and problem solving stuff and then off to the races we were for a while. Like everybody else ran face first into a wall and had to figure out, you know, how do I pick myself up and dust myself off permanently? So that's 20 years old stuff in a one, but that's how it started and right now is where it's at. Was that first wall 2008 roughly? Yeah. It was a tough wall man. You don't know when you're young back then. You don't know how markets are and what to expect. And it's just what happens happens. You have no idea. And so a lot learned along the way, but I'm thankful for it all for sure. Yeah, for sure. I went through that as well because I entered in the industry in 2003, which is interesting. You said the first wall and there's a lot of brewing in my head right now in terms of before we get into this, if I can, let me take care of some of the housekeeping or logistics. I didn't have time to look this up ahead of time. But if you don't mind for the context of those listening, can you give us a sense of either annual production or units? However, you want to break that down? Yeah. I mean, it's obviously continuing to grow which I'm thankful for. But you know, and the last three to four years, I've averaged anywhere from probably a hundred million to 160 just our team. And obviously it's a pleasure to wait with rates and refine the boom stuff here and there. But we're always in the hundred million plus this year we should be projected to do probably about 125 or 130. So we've got a, you know, team of seven, eight, nine, ten people total from, you know, partners and processors and marketing people on an awesome team. But we are excited about the future and we've had a great past and we're just continuing to kind of take the mindset of, you know, strong survive. We like it when more markets change because we're able to show our value even more. So we hope to continue to put up those numbers and serve as many people as we can. I'm curious then. Let's roll back a little bit too early around in your career. You know, because you were nudged, you didn't have to make money and all that stuff and the parents are on your back. Was there a time that you couldn't recall that there was a shift that happened for you mentally when perhaps the lights went on or or maybe the ramp, the runway was like, you know, how they light up a runway and all the lights open up the future of the direction of that? Like did something like that switch for you? We were like, wait a minute. Holy shit. Like I can make a hell of a lot of money in this business. I don't think in the very beginning it was the money driven piece. I think what moved me to move forward the fastest was the pain of the crash and like realizing that subprime wasn't real. And so the little amount of money I was making at that time was still a whole lot of money to me at the person at that age and it wasn't easy to get that back. And so it was, you know, everybody settled in and sunk down and I think it was the pain that drove me more than the gain because I had to. But also like, you know, I had to make a decision. I've been working for three or four years and it's like, hey, am I going to get out of this industry and start over? And so I also picked up two part-time jobs during the major part of the crash. I had no loans. I was at a title company approving janitorials and then I was working with a friend of mine on nights and weekends doing trash outs like cleaning up for closures. And I just did three months to pay the bills and eventually I was like, I can't do this. I have to like commit myself to the mortgage business and learn all this stuff and go or it's going to beat me. And so that three jobs at one time started to tip the scale and I figured if I could learn everything and outwork the market, I could get there. And so I started there and started working open houses up and down my street for four or four years straight. And eventually it picks up the journey's long and it's tough. But that was probably the moments that I look back and say when I had three jobs cleaning out four closed homes, a lot of yuck and it's like, I don't want to stay there and I had to make a decision to get out of that mode. Interesting. Right. As the old saying goes, people are more motivated to avoid pain than the art of game pleasure. That's a perfect idea. So you said something very important there. Well, two things. One is you talked about pivoting but perhaps what came to that pivoting was you said you needed to make a decision which was to commit or not to this business. And I think that's a huge takeaway for everybody listening, especially in the current times that we're in right now. Because there's the outgo of the originators, we've always seen it. The rates go down, people come in, the rates go up, people come back, all that fun stuff. But I think you tell me are those cycles becoming less forgiving of the people coming in and out? Less of those people. There's less opportunity. Do you think you can come in and ride the low refi wave anymore like you used to be able to? No, I mean, it's not a maybe as a job for a year if you're trying to pick up some extra income or something here and there. I mean, every industry regardless of what it is is going to catch a little wave stock market, real estate mortgages or whatever. But most people, you know, they're trying to make a career out of it. It's not going to be a second job or a side job every now. And then could somebody catch a little refi boom, of course. But, you know, hoping nobody's trying to build their career off a nine month right boom, just like somebody can, you know, their cousin become a builder or something here and there. And so there's always this exception of the standard. But the standard is, hey, most of the time, like it's a tough business. That's the truth. There's a lot of regulation. It's very invasive. It's very fast. People are emotional. There's a lot of pieces moving all the time. And it's not easy to get into. The regulation is kind of like the opposite of auto. You know, you get an auto, you can pull up on a car line one day, walk around for an hour, pick the car out, talk to the finance manager, get through it by four o'clock. You're done to buy a house and get a mortgage approval is a lot of stuff. And so it's not for the faint of heart. It's not easy to pick it up quick. When somebody jumps in with the market is good. Yes, they could probably make a little extra and do well for a year or two. But it's not sustainable. Because you really have to know everything when the rates drop. And you don't have all the fish jumping in the boat. You're left to see what your skill sets actually are. And that's where most people come up short and have decided to step out of the industry. Okay. In a more normal balanced market, what would you say your balance of percentage of refive versus purchases? 90% of purchase. Okay. And what is typically, historically, I know this is a moving number for you, but what is approximately your primary sources of business? Yeah, that's a good question. So I'm all self generated. Everything I do is like I don't do internet leads or anything like that. So it's probably 60% realtor, CPA, business financial, probably 20 to 25% past client, probably 10%, 10, 15% social and marketing. And then you got a little five of a slush right? I'll get something from a financial plan and I'll get something from a divorce attorney kind of that mix. But that's really my model. I want to stick to that model right now. It's really quality. I want to go way beyond the loan. I'm going to place in my life to where like I just don't want to get the loan done smooth and on time and make everybody happy. I'm trying to bring financial success to the buyer. I'm trying to open more doors, create more opportunities and more money for the realtors in their book of business, all the professional coaching that I've got. I want to pay it forward and give it to other people because I want to be valuable beyond the loan. And I think that comes with time and experience, but it also comes with selecting the right business partner. They have to be on the same page as you. Do they want to grow? Do they understand that cheaper is not better? What's their vision? How's their team looking model? And so I'm trying to link up with those people and as I find them, I sink deeper and get better relationships with them. So that way we can continue to grow and help each other for years. Yeah. And that's a good kind of transition point into how do you get in front of these these these partners? Because the idea with a lot of people every single week, you know, the struggle of getting in front of realtors, the co-ocalling, the door knocking open and you did four years of open houses, which is you've earned your stripes, man, you know. But like if you were, what are you? Let me just ask you this way. How what are the primary methods by which you either attract or engage? Let's take realtors to start with. It depends. Well, so it's a good question. I think it depends upon where people are adding their their their careers. So you've got, you know, beginner, middle of the road, and kind of a seasoned expert. And so depending upon who the person is and where they're at, you have to approach your realtor different. If you're young and maybe you don't know all the guidelines, you can win them over on hustle. Hey, I'm young. I'm single. I can work till midnight. Like that might be your pitch. They might be looking for someone that's a world of workaholic. Somebody in the middle might be a hybrid of like workaholic slash knowledgeable. Somebody, you know, on the season could be all three plus open doors. So it depends upon who you are, but what you want to attract. There's a million ways to go out there and attract business partners. You just got to know your target audience and I tell people that they don't know who their business partner is. Like the ideal profile and they don't know who their clients are. They don't know who they aren't. Like who they aren't. And so you can't just pitch to everybody just like you can't date everybody. So I think depending on where you're adding your your career figure out, hey, this is where I'm at. These are my strengths. This is who I'd like the mirror as a business partner. Find them, target them, but a secret to finding these partners is just asking them, hey, what are two or three things that would blow your mind or while you from a lender? Like what would make you say this person the most incredible person ever? Terms aside, character, specifics, details. Most people will tell you communicate well, be nice to my clients, speed, trust, communication, post with it on time. And if you say, if I do all these three, can I have a shot? Okay, great, but it all depends on who you're talking to, where your skill sets at and what you want to do, but there's a million lenders out there and there's a million agents out there. And so, you know, people get bored and getting cold and cold and the same stuff all the time. And so you got to add a little value. Sometimes you got to get a little uncomfortable, making some calls, but you can call listening agents from contracts. You can call title companies and ask them, hey, who do you know? Real tears you've worked with in the past friends family. I mean, there's plenty of ways to get there, but you also want to make sure that if you're fully committed, you're not reaching out to somebody that's partially committed because you may be doing everything right. And they may say, yeah, sure, I'll send you some loans or whatever, but they don't have any business. And so the reciprocity piece and identification is important. What would you say is the biggest obstacle or hurdle that originators looking to add realtors to their bus, face, whether it be internally themselves, self-imposed or externally? Oh, I mean, I think the challenge with that is it depends on where the loan offers that and their career building a team at scale that still creates a great experience and high quality is what most lenders struggle with if they start to stretch with agents because they are usually the quarterback, the receiver, the running back, and the offensive tackle all in one. And why that's good to a certain extent, your ceiling is low. So in order to grow in scale and say, hey, I can't do everything all the time, right? I can't be the owner, the manager, the cook, and the security guard. I have to get more people. The problem with our industry as we know, whether it's the realtor side or the lender side, the leadership is poor. They don't ever show you how to build and get a team and treat people and teach these skills and processes and all that. And so loan officers just kind of do it off the cuff. And what happens is their struggle is they just work 75 hours a week and they do five or 10 loans a month and they're making okay money but their quality of life sucks and they can't go go anywhere. And that's because they have the fear of losing or letting somebody down. But really that comes because they can't build and scale via a team. And so they're stuck in this like maximum one person role. And then as they try to hire and go, they either miss hire, don't do it right and they don't know how to get led and all these things. And so they breach the trust with themselves and with the agents, you can let them down. And so they hold on to it super tight. And then agents are similar in nature. You know, they're workaholics as well. They do it to do everything. And so the ability to build trust and scale takes time. But I think that's one of the hardest things for people to do, whether they're a lender or an agent is build the team and build the trust and do it over a long period of time. And then actually be a real model versus like back to one person army. Do you recall when you took it upon yourself to hire your own assistant in whatever role that was not like the, you know, processor, the people that the company give you, but out of your own pocket stuff, do you recall that? Yeah, yeah. So the first person that I actually brought onto the team that came out of my pocket was a processor. You know, you get to a point as a loan officer when you realize regardless of your skill set, being a loan officer or an agent to go big and have a good quality of life and make money and give you good experience, it is a team game, no matter what. So you get to a place that we're originating, corporate processing is okay, but we can feel the damage of, hey, you know, this person doesn't care enough, they don't see my vision, they're not calling this person back and it damages your reputation that you work hard to get. So the first person that I ever paid for out of my own pocket was a processor. I think a loan processor for a loan officer is their best friend and they're super important, they're a deep anchor to making that transaction happen because you've got to have a front-end anchor and a back-end anchor. The loan officer is usually the front-end anchor, the processor is the back-end anchor and you can build around those anchors over a long period of time and make those people leaders and manage and treat people well. That's how you really draw it all in, but the processor was the first thing and of course that person helps you finish out the loans on the back end which frees a person on the front end so that they can prospect more because the number one thing anybody can do no matter what they're doing in our industry is generating and leads and then you got to get an assistant for you. So who's the person that can help me? Schedule some calls, import some credit, do some things that are important to the loan but they're not maybe client-facing or conversion pieces and then you just kind of want to, want to, want to over a period of time and so I'm still trying to get it right. I think it's a forever game but slowly but surely with trial and error, a lot of professional coaching, a lot of good conversations, we got some awesome teammates and we're doing good, we're doing good. Yeah, I heard it once said that being a business owner which is how I view originators as their own self-employed person, you've got some additional resources that perhaps you're standard, right? Solo entrepreneur does not but the point being is that being a solo entrepreneur, business owner, whatever is the greatest self-development program out there because, and I know you've done a lot of training and courses and stuff because it just, it's about, and not to sound cliche but it's more about who you become, right? And it's like to get to that next level, you've got to become like that different person. Have you experienced that? And you just, I mean, it's all part of it. I think the older you get and the more you go through these valleys and peaks and you lose some people and you get into it and it gets all part of it. So I think as you get older, you realize like nobody's had a clean path. Everybody's gotten bruises and black-eyed stuff and it's just like the faster you can fail and learn and find people that are better than you above you and just like, you know, submit and surrender to the process, it's okay. But these are things, you know, the quicker you can learn that early, the easier it'll be on you because it's not, I mean, no one works 20 hours and makes a million bucks. I mean, they got to figure out where the balance and the give is and finding that early and putting a plan around it is important. I always try, I play this little trick. It's either I try to make everything a game, right, and kind of gamify it in my head to kind of reframe it or I remind myself that I asked for this. Anytime, you know, anytime I have successful stress, I always literally just go back in my mind and close my eyes when I was 28 and all this stuff was crashing down and all kinds of problems and calling my parents for money and just feeling bad and thinking like, what would I have told myself at 28? It's like, hey, you're in your 40s now and you're doing 150 million. Like, I remind myself, perspective is a lot. It's part of the game. I've never met anyone that's at the top on their way to the top that hasn't gone through similar pains and so you absorb it, you get better and I think it shapes you. All right, that's some good stuff. Let me pivot for a second to back to the pursuing of realtors. I wrote down a tract versus chase because what you mapped out there and I think that's right is you need to evaluate like, what are the activities that a loan officer should be doing? You're right. It does depend on where they are in their career trajectory. And there's the chase activities, which is things you and I've both done, broker previews, open houses, co-calling, cocktail, you know, across the board, you name it. Those then hopefully you kind of maybe shift or adjust out of those into more attraction type strategies where you're not chasing so much. And what I've witnessed of you following you on your channels and social and all that kind of stuff or however long it's been over a year at least is it seems to me you're doing a lot of attraction type activities. Am I correct? Yeah, you know, I appreciate that. I mean in the beginning of your career, whether it's clients or partners all about acquisition as you get to the back half of their career, it's about retention. And so you have to do things to retain and keep the high quality people, clients, suppliers that you get. The social media marketing standpoint for me personally where it came into play for me is the mortgage industry, even to this day, it's flat, meaning it's behind. It's run by neon balloons and copy paper and stuff here and there. I'm like, you know, there has to be a better way. And so it probably in 2018ish. I was watching a documentary on HBO called 247 where they followed like Floyd Bayweather and Oscar De La Hoan was people behind the scenes. And I thought, you know, they always make like Wall Street look cool. Like people that are stock brokers, like they do it behind the scenes, it looks cool. Like there's really cool stuff in the mortgage business. People just don't see it. They think of a loan officer. It's like somebody's dad with a tie at a bank and a cherry desk in the corner. Like it's really not that. I was like, so how can I change the status quo and how could I how can I get a camera on me or behind the scenes at some point and kind of like change the direction that I want to go with my brand. So I can show people it's better, but also like mortgages are so regulated and so generic and so like kind of nerdy that nobody wants to hear LTV loan of value. And so if I can find a way to articulate mortgage stuff in a way that people can take it would listen to it, but they feel like it was valuable and a nugget and they could understand it. That was always my goal was to get a camera on the behavior and get the language shifted to where clients felt that it was valuable, not like bank sticky. And so watching all those documentaries, I just had the idea was like, I'm going to try it. I'm going to do it. I found Gary Vee and so did my first one, like everyone else, terrible. Yeah, my first video. So like I decided to put video out, right? It was a little series called a day in the life that came in my house and shot with a dog and then you just start, right? And like everybody else you mess up and you screw up on camera and you're nervous and you know, I just continue to do it over and over and over. And that plus implementing technology in my business early on 19-ish 20, it got me ahead of the race. It's helped me because video, what it really does, people think it cost you time. It does not. It makes you time. And then of course it's compounded in what it is now, but that's a five or six year run with a lot of help and a lot of trial and error and then obviously a lot of working things out. It really helped a lot during COVID. I realized man, the digital space is like needed. If you're in COVID and didn't have a website, didn't have social profiles, didn't have technology, you were stuck. And so it reaffirmed to me when all we knew which was like do both. Have old-school phone calls and hand shakes, plus have an IG page, plus a YouTube channel, combine it all together. That's how you be a superpower in your brand. And it's also like everybody wants to know who this person is. So if you say, hey, you know, I'm going to send you to Jeff. He's the best L.O. in town. He's my person trust trust me or say, I'm going to send you to Jeff. He's the best L.O. in town trust me. But here's a link to his social, check it out. That is your sports center highlight of you as a quarterback. Somebody can click on it and say look at this person's value, delivery, their profession. I feel like you can know them. It's a soft introduction and a highlight reel for the person where otherwise the consumer or the partner couldn't see it and be able to measure it up front. That's a good way to articulate that. The highlight reel, you're right because people are making judgments like it or not. We are being judged by what they find online. Or should I say, assessed or compared to, if that's a better use of words, you know. And then it's like, it's like people are going to look at, you've heard this said, but people look you up online. The question is, what do they find? That's correct. And our industry does not have a lot of high-level professional, sharp people that are giving value all the time and articulating it to clients and partners in a way that they can understand it. It benefits them that they know this is the right move and connects with them and builds trust. It is like phone call, my application, blah, blah, blah. And because loan officers are just busy all the time and it's tough and the world doesn't know that. There's this divide. So I try to make that connection and it takes time. But the truth of the matter is once you get it going, it compounds your time. It creates brand. I started the YouTube channel because some friends of mine, your agents, have an awesome channel called Living in Dallas and they were like, dude, you have to do one because we all know we say the same thing all the time. And there's 10 or 15 minute conversations about rates and market and doctor programs and closing costs and refinancing all these things. So I just started a channel and started to do all these topics forever and I'll send them out to realtors and send them out to pre-approved buyers and it's just helped so many people. It's like how to change a spare tire in five minutes. You just watch YouTube over and over and I'm like, I got it. So it's like, well, why can't I do the same thing for clients and business partners on these little secrets and things on the market to like compound my message but also like give people an inside look on this is how you should do it versus like a national headline that's like not accurate. Is there a primary social channel you are focused on? For me personally, I like Instagram for the social channels but I like my YouTube channel the best because it's educational. It's long form. It just gives a very deep dive and kind of shows like the specifics on how things work. I'm on them all. I think everybody can be on them all whatever you want but I like IG for my main one but I like YouTube the most when it comes to clients and when it comes to partners because it just gives them so much long info that they can like really go deep quickly and watch it a hundred times if they need to. Yeah, I'm quite honestly and transparently late, you know, late. I was going to say late to the YouTube channel. It's not that I haven't been on it. It's just it hasn't been a focus and so it's one of those things are like you know, you throw in content up throwing shorts up because that's the easy thing to do but I know I'm hugely missing out on an opportunity. So this year is my year to kind of double down on YouTube. It's super helpful. It's just and it also helps teammates like if a realtor co-calls like hey, I got a question about a 321 bot by down and you know, our people can't talk on the phone whenever like hey check out this 15 minute video for Brian in the meantime and then watch it share with your clients until we get on a phone call. So it also like connects the dot on the need when I'm not available or somebody else is not comfortable talking about it and they can share with the clients and so it's like a a cloned version of my brain online just to help people get get through it but it also builds connection because if they're talking to two LOs and wants just on the phone replication the other ones doing zoom and watching YouTube and all that people kind of help to say like I feel this person I like this person I know what they're doing that's who I want to do business with. Right exactly. I notice on YouTube channel you have a link to a survey monkey which is a questionnaire about thinking of buying. You have any data points on like and again I apologize if I'm putting you on the spot but just curious what kind of buy and you get on that. I mean we probably get 10 or 15 a week we're just trying to inquire to figure out why are people not buying. I find that most people either have bad information or lack of and that is what I'm really trying to do is get the information from the people that have it and know it to the people that need it. It's crucial. Like I was on a zoom call last night with some people who are agents with like 50 people on there like people that you got to put 20% down they can't get out of their lease they're waiting till rage drop the buy houses and they don't know it's going to be more expensive like all these things that are second nature to us society does not know them. So these surveys are doing choir to say like why aren't you buying what's keeping you from buying stuck in a lease get out don't have any money for down payment down payment system closing coming there's a million things and so I try to have all this stuff out there just to see like renting a long term is not a good way to create wealth. So let's find out the why and then help them overcome it and put together a plan. Yeah that's a good point data reminds me the saying that most people have enough information to have an opinion but not enough information to know that they're wrong and they may not even be wrong they just may not know so it's more of like I tell everybody hey in theory right figure out what it would take for you to buy out some stuck in my lease my relating piece by grand I need 10 grand for down payment bubble bought put it together go okay great is that reality can myself and your agent make it most of the time halfway always sometimes all of it but you at least want to get down the table especially how expensive the rent is it's like and Dallas specifically like things are going nowhere but up Texas is so popular the amount of people that are moving here it's like there's so many more humans than houses everything's expensive do you want to pay your own mortgage you want to pay somebody else's yeah how would you describe or what has been the impact for you on the attraction side of things since you know quote going all in on your content strategy what have you seen happen in terms of uplift or you know whatever you can articulate yeah I just think it's it's all been positive I think people just have a desire and need for quick responses at their fingertips and they want it to be accurate and they want to be able to touch it and do it kind of on their timeline and relate and so everything that I do is all like trying to do that like I never ask it's always a value or a nugget like anybody that gets done watching your video I want them to be smarter take away something they didn't have pick their interest on ex wisey something like that again so for me the feedback has been great it does attract a lot of people are gigantically both clients and partners which is great but for me it is a it's an educational platform to me for me to be the digital mayor of my town when it comes to home loans so I can get to people quicker and compound my message wider without me having to physically having to do it all yeah um okay so I'm looking at your link tree here and we're going to put links to all this in the show notes but I noticed what popped out for me was the Dallas mortgage news what can you tell me about that is that a newsletter or what is that great question man so you know all my stuff online is Dallas mortgage man um but my websites Dallas mortgage news.com so how I got that was back in 2012 um I actually hired a publicist by the name of Michelle Lamont shut up the Michelle um and at the time before brands were a thing and I didn't know anything about brands and she got me on tv she was like you know the newspaper here in Dallas is called Dallas Morning News so she said hey you should be Dallas mortgage news and you should be the Dallas mortgage man of Dallas mortgage news so a while back you know we got a couple handles and it's stuck here in there and then when I decide I want to do video and get everything all along to get it all squared away no one had that I'm like I already have that and so I kind of you know got all the handles it got the domains and got it all squared away and done and that's what it's been ever since but it ties in really well with the you know who's the who's the man of the woman in town oh here's a mortgage man mortgage woman mortgage news and so they're all one in the same so Dallas mortgage news is obviously the home site and I'm Dallas mortgage man of it um but that all comes from my old publicist Michelle I wouldn't have been if it weren't for yeah okay very cool um okay so I'm keeping online with this attraction strategy thing I noticed you also I see one event you're hosting right now with Rick Ruby but I know you've done events to store or for the last several years is that part of your attraction strategy to hosting events it is I like to do one big of any year I think if people in a room and just say like the best thing that I can do is try to provide value and people on stage they can help people make more money and smarter and grow when it's fun and so you know again it's like breaking the status quo and hello like what can I do outside of the mortgage whether it be courses whether it be podcasts whether it be being on stage whether it's helping people overcome objections whatever it is and so this growth model that I'm doing is changing the dynamic of what a mortgage partner looks like and what they can do for consumers what they can do for partners and so I just continue to build every year and I started that just you know two years ago a surhand and last year Gary V um we're working on one at the end of this year um so again it's just a it's just a broadened our brand but obviously give more value to as many people as we can't do different channels which includes events I like what you just said right there and I think that's a double clicking point um you said something to the effect of changing essentially my what my brain heard was you're changing the the perception or the identity or brand of what a loan officer is right you said something to that effect yeah I'm just changing the status quo in the mindset of what a mortgage partner actually is versus what's people perceive them to be now which is like a parasitic one-sided partnership where they just begging for leads they only give this person this for a loan you know it's not there's no reciprocity and I don't like that I don't like how our industry is one-sided like give us leads got any leads it's like oh they just it's one way so it needs to be two way and you need to make sure and be valuable and so that's why again for me leadership standpoint the way society's good good going it's like the loans are one thing I get it that's home base we got to do well and get it all done but there are so many other layers to it um and I've just been helped by so many people over a long period of time to build the layers out now we're just building thicker and stronger and more every year and teaching other people how to do it yeah I have this saying this thing that I take people through it's this pyramid of realtor prospecting and at the bottom is solicitor the next level is vendor and then the next levels partner and then the next levels mentor um what you just kind of articulated there is you know the reciprocation has usually been one-sided the loan officer receiving and not giving much back and the holy grail is let's let's provide lead to the realtors and that would be all great and well if and when we can do that fantastic it's easier said than done one easier way for you to become more of a mentor or a partner you just said which is you know how do you give back right events courses training education um you think about the problems that realtors have and then you become the solution to help them overcome some of those problems yeah and there's a million problems that agents have and there's a million problems that understand but to your point those five things are five of a hundred I mean if you tell an agent I am going to close with it on time and my goals they get one client from every client and everyone that close you say hey this is an amazing transaction thank you so much skill of one to ten it being the world do you know anybody friends or family that are renting that I should have a conversation with and that's how I mean if you just ask and get a referral from every person to the agent like that's enough in itself probably but there's 50 other things that you mentioned and so as you know these things and you grow and you figure out how to become more valuable it's not you don't get commoditized it's not just cheapest rate here's some paperwork and do what I say it starts that way but it sure a sec doesn't have to end that way and we are trying to change that too so you know people find us and see is more valuable and understand that we are successful business partners together and neither side could be as good as they are without the other yeah yeah exactly which is there's probably a good transition into what's been happening over the last week which is the NAR settlement so I'm curious how you're responding or yeah how are you going to show up what are you doing in this in response to this whole NAR thing yeah I mean it's early um so I think all of us are kind of patiently waiting and the dark and having our conversations with other colleagues and people on what we think is going to happen and what the options are out there but nothing set in stone I mean this is a big deal even though people say oh it's not a big deal it is it's big in the mind set shifts it's big in the structure it's big on the uh psychology of it um you know the closest biggest thing to this I think probably is Dodd-Frank the feeling of it and the ripple effect um so we're putting together a few things over the next month or so uh but we need some guidance we're waiting on the agencies when here live a moment they go to put it together so we don't jump the shark but as always we will stay ahead of it be a valuable partner the minute we get valuable good information we will put it into a process and a strategy and give it to all our partners and our clients and we will make sure that they fully understand it and they maximize it as much as they can hmm that's a very very safe answer for the time being because it's too early it's too early I can project and say I think they're gonna let us roll into the oil and I think they're gonna give a credit and then the credit gets passed on I think you know we're not really sure and there's so many pieces so it's like the lone person says okay then the realtor has to and the title has to and the law has to in the state and so because it's so early you've got to align these stars um they're gonna get aligned just a matter of how fast and what's the friction but uh we're still waiting on more information because there's so many um yeah brains that have to say yes and align that we don't want to get ahead of it but we will get there quickly as we all get more information but it's a little too too soon to say this is what to do versus I think it's gonna be a version of that well I get what you're saying on a psychology standpoint it is a quote-unquote big thing I think for those of us like yourself who've been through Dodd Frank and the trade and all that stuff that was crazy and chaotic and there was similar emotions flowing around but you know we got through those as well um however when I look at the actual mechanics of what's really changed I mean that's kind of where I'm hanging out right now at the moment is it's to me I try and simplify everything and break it down to the simplest form and also one of the key things is like as I'm sure you know like you can't put the cooperative composition in the MLS anymore and a lot of people are confusing the hell out of that making it say like the seller can't pay the buyer's agent commission and things like that and that can't be that's not true at all um and you know I've been digging deeper into this whole hundred made 180 page document whatever it is so because I want to have a intelligent response as well that's that's that's based on fact and we know this isn't settled yet but a lot of people are thinking it's gonna go down pretty much as is um but I'm talking to brokers real estate brokers across the country where they're taking contracts this week that the seller's agent is paying the BAC like and it's it's working fine not any huge disruption that's not going to be the case for everybody but the smart agents the professional agents will adapt and pivot and yes we need to get better at our skill set presentation skit value skill set probably value proposition like all those things right and so that I see this as a good just like it was with dot frank and all that kind of stuff a good leveling up a professionalism in the industry it is and I mean it's it's okay it's just you know there are adjustments and so most of them are psychological and emotional that we know yeah the real estate side hasn't had an adjustment in a long time letters get a lot treated and done for ink and all that and so because our sides are a little more regulated we're used to getting like yanked every now and then but this is a big statement for all and so it will change some stuff I agree I don't think it'll change as much as people think they'll find ways to navigate it and negotiate and get it all done but at the end of the day like this industry cannot survive without all stars they're going to find a way to make it work for everybody it's just you know how quickly can everybody get it on the table and agree um but it's okay tough times don't last tough people do right okay so maybe a different question then how or what types of conversations like a lot of people are seeing this as you know an opportunity to better align to better partner with real estate agents perhaps there's some and the way I see it is this is like you know how we used to talk about the loan officers an extension of the realtor's team for client experience etc do you think this amplifies that even more I think it amplifies it and conjunction with financial literacy that is what I've been preaching for a long time which is hey people have to know paperwork and numbers and literacy and highest investment use of the money and negotiate contracts and what can it can't be done and so the problem is during a covid boom when everything is 3% the rates sell themselves you don't have to be that intelligent it's just how many fish can jump in the boat now it's changed people don't know about buy downs and strategies and closing costs and highest investment you can buy all that because people care about affordability they care about stability and they compare they care about competition those are the three things right now that you care about the most you throw this new nor change in there and it's like who can actually help me navigate this quickly correctly and I think you capture market share and come out the backside even stronger as long as you and your partners know it all get it all and how to look together yeah 100% okay so stay tuned we'll circle back with you on that to check in to see what else 30 days from now although it's interesting the settlement I mean July like they're expecting all this stuff to be in place by July that's pretty fast as fast we we will see it'll be business usually for a while so we'll have to walk and shoot go at the same time which is normal stuff press prepare for the future stuff and get the message out and move all the pieces around but you know it is what it is you do it or you don't right okay let's pivot to the last thing I wrote down for our conversation here today you and I talked about this before we hit record have it pulled up on my phone oops where did it go the fed meeting today are you surprised by what they've what they did or their positioning statements no not necessarily I never thought rates were going to come down as fast as we'd hope inflation stuff you know they follow inflation it's it's tough to get it down but it's also tough to get it down and there's a lot of money being printed and a lot of things that are just I'm adding to it so you know do I want rates to come down for consumers in the business yeah but deep down the right thing to do is probably still hold the line of time because if they cut it too too quick it'll I think it'll double back to where it was and I think it needs to cool a little bit longer I think it's a smart play hey look if they got to get ahead of it they can always cut deeper um but I think it's probably the right move I do think there's going to be some cuts back half of the year heading to election but I think it's seen a little bit more time to make sure it is the right time to reverse the engines because we don't remember I think it was like right after Christmas or right around there whatever reached up in the six and I'm telling you it was just like a mob came off the sideline for like three weeks and we were locking people in the low sixes or whatever until it makes you think like this is what's going to happen when it goes for good and then what happened is it pushes prices up everything else and so they contribute to inflation so I don't think the I don't think it's cooled off quite enough um it will happen it's just going to be delayed um hmm who are you seeing then are the active buyers in the market or you know I would call them to truly motivated but who are you seeing yeah it's a good question I mean I tell everybody you know real estate is local what happens in my backyard in yours like they're not the same it's like saying what's the national average of gas like in La Jolla and Dallas it's not the same as New Jersey so don't worry about if it's ice cold and you know Kansas and it's hot and Dallas like they're not the same um Dallas and Texas is hot just because of the growth right so it's the people population the politics the sports the people I mean everything here keeps it going so it's all the growth specifically from the state but the people that are buying are the ones that have money um they're in a pretty good position they understand that hey you know buying now maybe a little bit better than buying when rates are lower because obviously it's going to push the prices to the house up and they may not be able to get their hands on a house and so getting a house that they wanted a price that they want might be a nice buy they can always re-finance later at some point whether the rates get better in six months or 18 months but it puts them in a position of where people are kind of like tired of wasting money the market didn't crash like they thought and they understand that you know it's still a good time to get a house you may overpay a tad for on the interest rate on the payment but what you're going to make up in the long run after the rates drop and things go boom on demand you can re-finance you'll probably make more on the ROI on the appreciation than you lose on the payment um annoying you're all about financial literacy it makes me curious which tools of our that we've all got out there more to go to MBS highway for more intelligent buyer conversations are you using either of those both okay and you feel that's really critical to be able to get people through the logics that side of things yeah and I just think it's easy I mean you know human beings are kind of paint by numbers elementary eyeballs and so it's easy to just like put it there side but by side and say hey you know instead of putting $20,000 down the house why don't you pay off $20,000 on the car it's this payments that here and there and so what it does it puts it in a visual and articulates it in a way that your everyday person can car food keep it make sure they're doing the right right thing and you guys are kind of using this as a cheat sheet because there are a lot of moving pieces and it's hard to hard to know all that and do do all that unless you make it sticky and I think the visual rules and the alerts and the technology helps that yeah um interesting makes me think of our conversation earlier in terms of percentage of business and purchase versus refi I would I should have asked this earlier but I'm curious I I was interviewing somebody and they were talking about a company they were working with and that they said they're they're having a banner year um duck flies uh and that I forget the percentages but the predominant percentage of their business was actually refi but it was that consolidation restructuring refi yeah I think I think there's a lot of that out there I also think like people that are still in the business that are self-gen people they're gonna do well a lot of people have fallen off they've gotten out of the industry the mortgage business and stuff a lot of people just don't want to take that call and work that deal or work that house to get it all done so there's less people left that are qualified and know what they're doing so they're getting the market share and they're expanding whether they're doing debt consolidation whether they're doing bank statement loans whether now they're recording with a divorce attorney I mean there's less players on the field so the players that are still left are getting a lot of balls tossed their way we're feeling that I mean in March alone the most I've ever done at the peak of our career during COVID at the peak was 22 million and that was almost all refi in this month we're just under 20 um and that comes from diversity on book of business but also less people out there to think phone calls get it all done so I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing for the industry to kind of flush itself out from it um we will see all the people that are left uh to probably help the consumer and the partner at a higher level you just kind of kind of knock a little bit of the low level down yeah exactly and like you said at the beginning uh you've got to make a decision to commit to this business who are you going to be well what's your identity as a mortgage advisor professional and you've got to be something more than just a loan officer yeah and do I mean which business model do you want you want to be transaction-based or relationship-based figure out what path one is lower my bills.com internet leads whatever you know the one is people one of these is harder to do than the other one but it's a much longer better cycle when I'm easier but it's short-term and so this is where you have to find your people find your path so that way you know it's direction you want to go that's the same thing I did I had to make that decision many years ago 2003 where I was working in a subprime shop and uh I don't know if you remember mortgage originator magazine of course yeah so I used to read that and all the people Tom Bass and like all these people were in there right and I remember bringing that to my friend who got me the job at that subprime shop and I'm like dude look at these people they're making like 50 million a year do and he's like no those are branches those aren't individuals I'm like right I don't think so and they're all real relationship-based not leads online right all that stuff that's correct and they had longevity too because as you said a moment ago yes one's harder but you get to a point where hopefully that's becomes a little bit it's like the oil well concept right once you tap that oil well it continues to produce oil over time I agree all right man before we wrap up any last uh projects or things coming up on your radar you are excited about you want to share with the listeners yeah you know obviously just uh the journey of 24 helping a lot of people uh get out of the event race and we have a start teams here to have conversations and planning sessions all the time working on an event in April April 5th of rick it's about referrals for realtors and lenders just had to generate warm leads and kind of push things up when the more markets down and then uh put together a big event back half a year in October so I will announce that here in the next month or two and I encourage everybody to follow for that yeah congrats on uh getting rick there that's a feather in your cap I assume but I when I see that that tells me that you're probably or have been a member of the Corps for some time I am I love the Corps it's I couldn't be where I'm at with Adam and I'm glad to be on stage with him opening and uh what he does and special he is uh he belongs on the Mount rush more of all time so thankful to be a part of it they think we put on the event with the Corps fantastic bye man well listen uh I appreciate your time because I know your time is extremely valuable we're gonna link up everything you have in the show notes for people who can follow you which I'm sure some people will reach out you'll get a bunch of new followers which is cool um Brian man thank you so much appreciate you man thank you for having me you bet listeners you know what to do if like this episode leave us a review share it with somebody care about see on the next one bye for now all right well thanks for tuning into 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 what if I told you there's a way to attract agents to a provide unique value that helps them grow their business and generate referrals on demand helping you become the dominant loan officer in your local market look I've was an originator for over 10 years I understand the frustration of feeling like you're just another player and a sea of competitors and you're struggling to stand out and get noticed by the agents that you want to attract and engage with what if I told you this way to flip the script and position yourself as the go-to lender in your market attracting agents not chasing not paying for leads not co-calling but actually generating referrals on demand and the best part you don't have to ever make a co-calling chase leads again you don't have to work with weenie head agents if you don't want to this is what we help the originators do at the my agent classes membership what do you get you get exclusive access to our private community of like-minded loan officers where you can network share best practices get ongoing support to grow your business and you get a turnkey platform that helps you build your personal brand that moves you from solicitor and vendor to partner in peer you attract agents you increase conversations and you increase your referrals all without chasing without begging playing the game paying for leads you just by doing what you love to do which is help other people solve problems so how do you learn more go to 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