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As a property manager, have you ever worked with foreign investors? If not, what is stopping you? Is it because you don’t know another language or because you don’t know where to find foreign investors? What if there were a service that handled that piece for you?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with the founder of HomeAbroad and Ziffy to talk about how property managers can connect with investors living outside of the United States.

You’ll Learn [01:49] Building a Platform that Helps Foreign Investors Find Properties

[08:21] Helping Investors in the U.S. Find Investment Properties

[14:46] How HomeAbroad and Ziffy Can Benefit Property Managers

[25:23] Using Real Estate Investing and Property Management to Move to the U.S.

Quotables “No one wants to be a landlord… They're looking for a good way to maximize return on their investment or return on their cash.”

“If you are a smart investor, if you are running this as a business, right, you got to have property management.”

“You can't build a portfolio of a hundred properties by managing each property yourself.”

“You grow together. It's a small industry, you know, we got to help each other and we grow as a business together.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

Transcript [00:00:00] Client finds the property through a platform. We do the mortgage financing, so we will introduce the property manager at the right time and say, "Hey, by the way, you can find the right property manager to help you manage this property, so, we'll kind of introduce you in the right point in that journey to make sure that you have a high conversion as well.

[00:00:20] All right, I'm Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. We have rebranded over 300 businesses and we run the leading property management mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry.

[00:01:06] And if you are wanting help with any of that stuff, then reach out to us at DoorGrow. So we believe at DoorGrow that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses.

[00:01:28] We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win.

[00:01:38] Now let's get into the show. All right, so my guest today, I am hanging out with Amresh Singh, welcome to the DoorGrow Show.

[00:01:46] Thanks, Jason. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.

[00:01:49] It's good to have you. So I would love to get into your background so people understand, like who are they listening to or viewing on this, and tell us a little bit about your journey into entrepreneurism and how you kind of got started and that will lead us into your business.

[00:02:04] Awesome. So my background has been at the intersection of mortgages and technology. I used to work for a leading international bank before I started HomeAbroad. And originally I'm from India, so I moved to the US 10 years back, working for this big bank who moved me from India to the US to work closer to the headquarters over here.

[00:02:25] I managed their international customer acquisition. And you know, in that journey, you know, I realized that two things that we have. Or I should say two really fascinating things about the US real estate market, which is, you know, 30 year fixed state mortgages, which we, in the US you know, we tend to ignore and we take it for granted.

[00:02:45] It does not exist in most places around the world. It's a superpower, 30 year fixed state mortgages. Right? Yeah. Plus combine that with, you know, higher rental leads in the US market. You know, you're really looking at a true wealth building too. Right? So that realization coming from, you know, an international market into the US market, seeing the superpower of the, you know, how real estate in the US can really help you build generational wealth. You know, gave me the idea to start HomeAbroad, you know, which was a company that was focused on global investors investing in USD asset market, right? You know, and taking the advantages of, you know, some of these superpowers, I will speak later in your podcast.

[00:03:24] Right? But that's how the journey started. And then, you know, as part of that journey, we realized, you know, some similar gaps exist in the domestic market as well that led to formation of Ziffy, which I'll talk about as well as we progress in the podcast. So that's kind of in nutshell, my know, my entrepreneur journey, my background, so.

[00:03:40] Very cool. I've noticed, you know, every now and then I get clients that they've got some special connection to an international market. You know, I've got a client from Israel and he's able to pull in Israeli investors and they're wanting to get into the US market, and he helps them handle all of that.

[00:03:56] I had a client that same thing with China you know, and other different foreign countries, you know, and so that's a competitive advantage that each of these property management business owners have, but it's not one that every property manager can just create because they don't know a different language.

[00:04:14] They don't have a network or connections overseas, and so that could be a challenge. But I see how that could be a competitive advantage for building up your own portfolio if you could access international investors. And I didn't really realize that, but I just grew up in this bubble of the US but 30 year fixed rate mortgages sounds so normal. You know? Yes. So, okay. So cool. So, so tell us a little bit about what you've got going on.

[00:04:40] Yeah, so, you know, as I mentioned, you know, we operate two brands. HomeAbroad is where we started, right? And that's a shop, that's a PropTech and FinTech shop that's focused on helping global investors invest in the US real estate market.

[00:04:52] Right? If you think about, you know, real estate, right? It's kind of, you know, wealth building tool or is a mode of, you know, building generational wealth around the world. People invest in real estate for stability, right? For, you know, that that ease of mind, okay my investment is going to grow, right?

[00:05:08] But you know, in most places around the world when you're investing in real estate, you're not doing that with leverage. You know, you are buying that in cash and you are, you know, mode for return on that investment is really banking on the capital appreciation on that property, right? What changes in the US market is because of 30 year fixed rate mortgages, there's no payment shock.

[00:05:28] The rate is fixed for the term of the loan. That's 30 years. Since it's amortized for a 30 year period, your monthly payments are lower, right? Rental liens are higher. So what ends up happening in the US market is rent covers mortgage in majority of the scenario.

[00:05:44] Yeah. It cash flows day one. Absolutely right. And that is something. So think about it, right? So you are generating cash flow from day one with leverage. I'll repeat that with leverage, right? So 20-25% of your money is able to help you buy a hundred percent of the property with cash flow or passive income from day one.

[00:06:05] It just does not happen in most places around the world. Now imagine this: you explain this to someone who has no idea about the US state market, right? And then you tell them, Hey, not only you know the value prop, but as a company HomeAbroad, we are going to give you mortgage financing with no US state history.

[00:06:25] Right. And we are going to underwrite you not based on your personal income or assets from your home country. We are going to look at the property's income, right? And we're going to underwrite based on that, right? Suddenly someone who has no affiliation with the US, you know, market or financial market is able to invest or buy US real estate for the obvious benefits I mentioned, right?

[00:06:49] Cash flow with leverage, but also you're putting your money in the largest economy in the world. USD is still the reserve currency, right? So you're shielding yourself from currency risk that's might exist in your home country, right? And suddenly when you explain this to a global investor, it's an aha moment for them, right?

[00:07:04] Because this is something that does not exist in their home market. You know, they want to, you know, kind of diversify their assets and dip into what US has to offer this kind of opening American dream to the world. Yeah. Without them having to live or work in the US. You can live and work in your home country and dip into what America or American dream has to offer, you know, while you sit in your home country. Right. And that's kind of what was a game changing phenomena for us. Great traction, great, you know, reserves. But what we saw, Jason, you know, these people were coming in and we're like, okay, great. I want to invest in USA asset market. But I don't know where to invest.

[00:07:40] Right. I don't know the US market, I don't know which city to invest in. Right. And my team, you know, we found ourselves going onto Zillow doing investment analysis and coming back to them and saying, "okay, this is a good place to invest." And then we said, "okay, wait a minute. Let's just build a tech platform, and that's what led the evolution of Ziffy, which is kind of, you know, Zillow for investment properties, ziffy.ai, where you know, as an investor you can kind of just say, okay, this is my investment objective.

[00:08:05] I want to generate X dollar cash flow every month. I want to generate Y percent in rental. I want to find all the rent properties. And the algorithm mines everything that is listed on MLS right now from an investment perspective gives you detailed investment analysis and helps you take the data driven recommendation.

[00:08:21] And then we realized only 8% of Americans own investment properties. If it's such a good thing that global investors want to put their money in the USA market, why Americans are not building generational wealth by investing in real estate. Right? Because people don't want to be a landlord, right?

[00:08:37] Right. But once you put this data in front of them, suddenly the perspective changes. And that's what we are right now. We are launching ziffy.ai where it's going to be the Zillow for investment properties to really help more Americans buy and invest in US real estate.

[00:08:50] Okay, great. And what's that tool called?

[00:08:52] It's Ziffy, Z-I-F-F-Y, dot A-I.

[00:08:56] ziffy.ai. Okay. And you mentioned the big other z name Zillow, you're like, you're trying to take their lunch, I guess. Right? We'll see how...

[00:09:06] not really. Thing about it, zillow is focused on primary market, right? Yeah. It's a much bigger market. Right. And, you know, investment, of course, 16% of the transactions are investment properties.

[00:09:17] Right. But having said that, it's a huge market and there's lot of, you know, scope for growth because a lot of Americans still, you know, what they don't know about is there are specialized loan products that exist, you know, that can underwrite based on the rental income of the property.

[00:09:32] So if I have a mortgage, I have a car loan, I think, okay, there's no way I can buy investment property. No one's going to give me a loan. I'm going to walk in my local bank or my local branch, and they're going to say, "okay, Jason, you know, what's your current mortgage? What's your car loan? Oh, you don't qualify based on your debt to income ratio."

[00:09:49] They don't know that this specialized loan product called DSCR loan, which is debt service coverage ratio loan, where I'm qualifying you for the mortgage based on the rental income of that property versus your personal income. Right. So suddenly now you can build portfolio of hundred of investment properties because each property qualifies based on its own merit.

[00:10:11] You buy one investment property, right? Rent covers mortgage from day one generates you cash flow. You wait three, four years, you gain equity in the property, do a cash out refinance, take that money to put down payment on other property. That property is cash positive from day one and the cycle repeats.

[00:10:27] So if you're a smart investor can really help that first investment property, help you build a portfolio of investment property over 10 to 15 year period and build that generational wealth for you and your family. And people just don't know about it. And that's what we're trying to democratize.

[00:10:41] All right.

[00:10:41] I love the idea. You know, we've leveraged a DSCR loan and it's nice because you don't have to give them all your personal info. You know, it doesn't matter how much debt you already have leveraged with properties you already have. So the rates are a little bit higher.

[00:10:55] Right. But if you're able to cash flow it effectively, then I guess it doesn't matter.

[00:11:01] It doesn't matter. But also, I'll tell you, Jason, it's not that much higher either. No. If you think about an investment property loan from Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae conventional loans the rates are going to be higher than what you're going to pay for a 30 year fix it mortgage for a primary home.

[00:11:14] Right. If you compare an investment property loan from an, from the jcs versus a DSCR loan, the rate difference you're talking about is 0.25%, or, you know, like, so it's not, it's very competitive.

[00:11:28] So. A lot of the people listening run property management companies. They've got a pool of investors.

[00:11:33] These are their clients. How do they leverage

[00:11:37] HomeAbroad or Ziffy? That's a great question. Right? So we are also opening a marketplace for property managers, right? Because think about these foreign clients that are coming over to us, right? Think about domestic clients, right? A lot of these clients, you know, no one wants to be a landlord, as I mentioned earlier, right?

[00:11:52] They're looking for a good way to maximize return on their investment or return on their cash. Right. And they don't want to take the day-to-day hassle of being a landlord. Right. Right. That's where property management comes in. Right. And if you are a smart investor, if you are running this as a business, right, you got to have property management. That's what we tell our clients. You can't build a portfolio of a hundred properties by managing each property yourself. You got to get property management in, right? Yeah. And what we are doing is we are trying to, you know, open up a marketplace where, you know, foreign investors, of course, they have no idea about whom to work at in the US so they can connect to property managers in the US through a platform.

[00:12:31] Right. But in addition. If you're a property manager and if you have clients who are looking for next investment and so forth, you can white label our Ziffy platform for your clients. Right, okay. To give them as your own tool. And if they come back to us, you know, for a mortgage, we give you a referral fee.

[00:12:50] You know X, we give up to 40 to 50 basis point on the loan amount as their referral fee. So that could be not only you're servicing your clients, you're giving them tools to help them find their next investment, which by the way, you will end up managing as well. But you're also increasing your value prop by helping your client find the next investment and adding additional revenue stream to your overall portfolio, right?

[00:13:12] So it's a win-win situation for everyone.

[00:13:15] So becomes absolutely profit center. Okay, so. And they can white label Ziffy. What about is the Ziffy and HomeAbroad databases, are these linked? Like, are these properties, because you know, I think a lot of property managers listening are like, "how can I get access to these foreign investors because I don't have that capability?"

[00:13:32] They're linked. It's just the branding, right? Because for foreign investors, you know, we go with the brand name HomeAbroad, okay? And for domestic, of course, you know, HomeAbroad will not resonate with the US based customers, right? So that's where Ziffy comes in. And we are kind of actually actively going through a rebranding exercise where HomeAbroad will become powered by ziffy.ai.

[00:13:52] You know, so at the end of the day, Ziffy is the overall umbrella brand, right? Ziffy.ai is our AI powered investment property search platform and HomeAbroad is the portion of Ziffy that's focused exclusively on foreign investors. But if you're part of our network, you get access to both clients, you get access to foreign investors, you get access to local investors.

[00:14:13] Okay, perfect. So it sounds like property managers, if they're listed in this marketplace, it sounds like 1. You might be feeding them some free business from. Absolutely. HomeAbroad brand. Yep. They wouldn't be able to access otherwise. And they're able to support boots on the ground helping with the property locally.

[00:14:32] Yep.

[00:14:33] And then they can also leverage Ziffy and do a white label thing for their existing clients and help get them and facilitate getting them into more property.

[00:14:41] Absolutely. Yep.

[00:14:42] Awesome. Okay, cool. Yeah that's very cool. So how does a property manager get into this marketplace?

[00:14:49] What are your qualifications?

[00:14:51] So we of course, want to make sure that our clients are taken care of, you know, so we do initial vetting, just to understand, you know, you have the I would say capabilities and infrastructure to help service our clients. So everyone has a good positive experience, right? And then once we kind of have that initial meeting to vet you out, you will become part of our network.

[00:15:10] We'll sign a good partnership agreement. You'll be part of the network and then, you know, you'll be listed prominently. If the customer is looking in that particular area, you know, you'll be listed prominently within that ecosystem. Now, good news is we are vertically integrated shop, right?

[00:15:24] So client finds the property through a platform. We do the mortgage financing, right? And you know, we know exactly when the customer, you know, is closing that transaction, right? So we will introduce the property manager at the right time. There's no point introducing a property manager right when they're starting their journey to find an investment property, right?

[00:15:42] But as soon as they close on that transaction, we'll introduce the property manager. We will expose our, you know, marketplace to them and say, "Hey, by the way, you can find the right property manager to help you manage this property from our vacant property management, based in say, Phoenix, Arizona, or say, you know, Dallas, Texas, like wherever the client is, you know, closing that transaction.

[00:16:03] Right. So, we'll kind of introduce you in the right you know, point in that journey to make sure that, you know, you have a high conversion as well.

[00:16:11] So how do you, at Ziffy and HomeAbroad, how do you determine which markets you want to be in and focus on?

[00:16:21] So the cool thing, Jason, you know, like as the customer decides for us, right?

[00:16:24] We are operating in 43 states, right out of 50 states in the US right now, right there are of course hot markets, right? But you know, we let our algorithm, because now, it's data, right? We know the data. We know what's the expected rent, which is our for algorithm to calculate the expected rent across every plus property listed on the MLS right now for sale. What's your monthly mortgage payment is going to be? We are the mortgage shop. So we know what the monthly mortgage payment is going to be. Yeah. Rent minus mortgage is your cashflow. Right? So you can basically punch in those numbers and you say, okay, I want to generate $500 in cashflow every month.

[00:16:59] Show me properties in entire us. Show me properties in Midwest us. Show me properties in California. Show me properties in Texas. Right? Whatever is your appetite, right? But you can kind of, you know, find that right investment property with right investment objective, you know, and I would say market agnostic.

[00:17:16] Right? Yeah. Find that property and then say, okay, yeah, this makes sense, this doesn't make sense. And what we are adding to our AI layer. You can ask AI question, show me population growth trend in this area in the last five years. Show me rent you know, growth in this area in the last five years.

[00:17:30] Show me you know, is this a landlord friendly state? You know, like our AI will help you basically California, evaluate that property.

[00:17:36] So basically, California's out. Florida and Texas are in, or?

[00:17:40] Yep. Yep. And that's what we see. That's what we see. You know, Florida and Texas are two hot markets. Yeah.

[00:17:45] Midwest is really picking up, you know, because the property prices are lower, taxes are lower, rents are higher, right? So Midwest US is the new hot market from a rental standpoint Okay. Is what we are seeing a lot of fixed and player opportunities as well. But Florida and Texas continue to be two hot states, you know, from a rental property standpoint.

[00:18:03] Got it. Okay. Now, these people that are, you know that they're global investors. They're around, you know, around the world. They're watching the news, they're seeing all this stuff that's going on in the us. I don't know what their perception is, but when they're watching all this, I'm sure that factors into their decision making in which states they want to be in.

[00:18:23] Absolutely a hundred percent.

[00:18:25] So they're like, it does, I don't want to be in California. They look like they're crazy there and they're watching the news and they're seeing these, you know, sanctuary cities with homeless people everywhere. And then they're like looking at like areas where it's more conservative and there's like more freedom and more options.

[00:18:41] Then they're like, maybe, maybe there. So perception, I would imagine affects where they're choosing to invest as well.

[00:18:49] Yeah, it totally does. Right? And what we tell our clients, you know, you got to think of real estate as a long-term investment game, right? For example, you know, the rhetoric around current administration, right?

[00:19:00] From global investor standpoint, you know, like, do I really want to put my money in the US at this point? You know, what happens if like X happens? Y happens, right? And what we tell our investor, right? The basics why US, you know, is a good market for real estate investment has not changed, will not change, right?

[00:19:15] It's going to be still remain a good market for US estate investment. The question is, where do you invest, right? And what are your objectives, right? You want to invest in a landlord friendly state, right? You want to invest in, in states with, you know, job growth, population growth, right? And you want to invest in state you know, in a market where you're getting good ROI on your cash investor, right?

[00:19:36] And that's a function of, you know, appreciation and function of cash flow, right? That you're generating. Right. So until you have those data points figured out, right, you know, in long term it's going to be a viable investment. Right. And you're going to make money, right? Is what we tell our investors, right?

[00:19:51] And when we explain them from that perspective, from that lens, you know, I have not seen someone that has said, okay, USDS investment is off my list. Right? Is something that just still motivates and drives them.

[00:20:04] Very cool. All right. I like it. And the best property managers, they're DoorGrow clients, like we help them figure out how to actually do a good job.

[00:20:10] Most property managers suck in most markets. This is... absolutely, yeah. The admission of property managers, they're like, I get a room of property managers. I'm like, how many of you believe all your competitors suck or most of them do? And everyone's hands go up. And everybody that comes to me and says, "Hey, I'm thinking of starting a property management business."

[00:20:27] I say, cool. And they tell me their story. It's they have investment properties and they tried property managers and most of them were terrible and they decided to finally start a good company. And so there's this issue. So yeah, maybe we should get all the DoorGrow clients getting into your marketplace.

[00:20:43] So

[00:20:43] A hundred percent, you know. Let's talk about that a hundred percent.

[00:20:46] Alright, cool. Have you heard a Blanket, have you heard of these guys? Not really. So I think I should connect you to Lior over at Blanket. They've got a really cool platform as well, and I think there's some synergy.

[00:20:59] They're basically like a retention platform. Okay. For property managers. They were one of our sponsors at DoorGrow live. And they've created a platform that allows their clients to see all of... they're basically a white label portal for all their clients to have their portfolios. And it allows them to keep the properties in their portfolio by helping them find and access other owners when that owner wants to sell.

[00:21:25] Awesome. Okay. I think there'd be some awesome synergy between these two tools. Yeah. And I'm always making connections. You guys don't see this, those that are watching the podcast behind the scenes, I'm always trying to connect different vendors to each other when I see some synergy. So, but I think that might be a cool connection.

[00:21:40] So, because I think what you're doing would work really nicely with that and it'd be a really cool synergistic thing. So we'll just get HomeAbroad, Ziffy, Blanket, DoorGrow, and then some other vendors, we'll just start stacking, we'll create Voltron. Yep. This ultimate, you know, superpower to help.

[00:21:57] This very exciting.

[00:21:58] Hey you grow together. You know, that's how I've always believed. You know, you grow together. It's a small industry, you know, we got to help each other and we grow as a business together.

[00:22:06] Yeah, absolutely. So, well, I like what you're doing. What's the easiest way for a property manager to reach out?

[00:22:14] Which of the websites should they go to? How do they start getting vetted so they can get into this marketplace? And is this like a free thing because they're providing value or do they pay to become part of the marketplace or how does that work?

[00:22:27] It's a free thing, right? They will be listed on a platform for free.

[00:22:31] So it's a two way street, as I mentioned here, right? So we are going to pay a referral fee to our property manager partners, when they refer clients over to us, we're going to give them free tools to help facilitate that process and vice versa. You know, we'll collect a referral fee if our existing client signs up with them as well.

[00:22:47] You know, it's a revenue stream for us too.

[00:22:48] So if let's say I have one of those clients that has, a bunch of connections in a particular country like Israel or China or something like this, would there be an advantage to them to leveraging HomeAbroad to facilitate that rather than having to figure out all this work themselves?

[00:23:05] Absolutely. Absolutely. Because we are, as I said, you know, we are one stop shop, right? So say for example, you have an Israeli client that is just thinking about investing in US real estate, right? So what we do, we start. From setting up the LLC, right? If you are US based, you know, setting up an LLC, receiving an EIN is pretty easy, straightforward process, right?

[00:23:23] If you're a foreign national who has doesn't have an SSN or an IT number, just getting an EIN number from a IRS, you know, you're talking about faxing, you're talking about mailing, you're talking about six months, six to eight weeks to get, you know, your number in mail. Now, you know, we kind of have developed that expertise in this segment so we can get an EIN and with an analysis set for a foreign national not living in the US within a week. Right. Wow. We can help them open a US bank account while they're in their home country. Right. Of course, you know, we'll need the US Bank account as part of the mortgage process, but also they will need a US bank account to manage their property, right.

[00:23:58] When they invest in the US market, right? We can, of course, financing for Foreign National, which is our bread and butter, right? So we help them with 75% LTV or 75% leverage to purchase an investment property in the US. So they only need to put 25% down payment on that investment property, as I mentioned, we don't look for any US history.

[00:24:18] We don't look for trade lines or create history from their home country as well. It's a pretty straightforward process for foreign nationals. You know, all we are looking for is, you know, they have enough assets to close, which is 25% down payment plus closing costs. Right? And if the appraisal comes in right where we want it to be, right.

[00:24:36] So whether they meet the ratio or the DSCR ratio where rent covers mortgage, right? Even if it does not, we have a sub ratio DSCR program for them. So one way or the other. You know, we'll be able to do the loan just based on the property's income versus considering their personal income or assets in their home country.

[00:24:52] Right? So we covered them right from helping setting up an LLC you know, opening US bank account mortgage financing, connecting them with a local realtor, which is not just any realtor, but a realtor with CIPS, which is certified International Property Specialty Designation by now. Right. So they have gone through specialized training to work with foreign national, global investors, right?

[00:25:13] And then property management connections, you know, through a marketplace, right? So we are kind of one stop shop for everything that foreign national would need to do to invest in the US real estate.

[00:25:23] Interesting. So here's another random idea that comes up. And I don't know if this even relates, maybe this is just completely out of left field, but occasionally I get clients that they've come from a foreign country to the US.

[00:25:36] And in order to, you know, to immigrate and to become integrated in the US, they have to start a business. And so they will buy a franchise sometimes, which usually in this industry, buying a property major franchise, I'm pretty outspoken about that. I think it's generally a bad idea. I get a lot of franchisees coming to me that have struggled like, you know, a gal that came, bought into a franchise, she's already invested $100k into this and the franchise gave her poor strategy and she only has one unit under management and she's $100k in and over half a year in invested into this. And she's like, you know, concerned and freaking out. I've got another client, he's immigrated from the uk.

[00:26:16] He's built a property management business. They both built their business in Florida, by the way. Nice. So the land of freedom and humidity. So is there some sort of advantage for some of these people that are overseas also? They're like, "you know what? I like the idea of investing in, you know, the US but I want to be in the US."

[00:26:37] Is there a way that they could build a business leveraging this and could that be something that is facilitated as well?

[00:26:45] Yeah, that's a great question, Jason. You know, and something like a lot of, you know, foreign clients ask us, right? So I'll give you a two part answer to this question, right?

[00:26:52] One, if you are part of E3D countries, right? So US has a E3D, you know, with I think UK, Japan you know, Australia, Canada, and the few other countries on that list, right? Yeah. So if you're part of one of these countries where the, where you have a E3D you know, with the US you get a visa called E2 Visa.

[00:27:12] E2 Visa, where, you know, where you can start a business in the us, get that visa to come manage the business. And a lot of our clients in from these countries would start up LLC to manage two to three properties. Show that okay, they're managing a real estate business. Right. To kind of get that E2 visa, right?

[00:27:29] And so it's a great way for them to not only build you know, a profitable business in the US right? And kind of benefit from the US estate investment, but then also, you know, try get a residency visa, you know, based on this business. Property management kind of falls under the same aspect as well.

[00:27:46] Okay? Then other countries which are not part of the E3D, where you have something called an EV5 Visa, which is you know, which were one of the key differences is that you have to show that you generate 10 employments and invested at least around a million dollars in the US to generate those employments.

[00:28:03] Now that is where, you know, it becomes a little bit trickier, right? Because you know, you have to show that you brought that money in, you putting that money in real estate qualifies. Right. But the the important aspect is creation of 10 jobs. You have to show that you've created 10 jobs through that investment, you know, for that purposes.

[00:28:21] If you buy, you know, like 10 properties or buy a multifamily unit and you know, you have a property management around it that employs 10 people to take care of it, technically it qualifies. Right. You can also you know, buy a hotel, you know, buy 2 commercial property that employs, you know, 10 people to kind of, you know, to qualify on the, that, that visa rule.

[00:28:44] Right? But again, you know, you're talking about a million dollar investment. You know, from your end, you know, which is not, you know, applicable for everyone, right? Yeah. So there are a couple of ways, right? But for E2 Visa, you know, it becomes really easy, right? Because that job requirement criteria is not there.

[00:28:59] You have to show that it's a functional business. It's an active business, which could be a real estate business, right? And it becomes, the qualification becomes a little bit easier on from that perspective.

[00:29:09] Got it. Okay. Interesting. If you run into these people, we should totally be homies and...

[00:29:15] absolutely.

[00:29:15] If you run these people one of the things we're really brilliant at DoorGrow is helping people avoid all the mistakes they make when they get their business started. We help them clean. We're like bar rescue for property managers, as I said in the intro. And for startups, we're ideal.

[00:29:29] We help them avoid all the pitfalls of the franchises. We help them come up with their own brand, their own website. We help them build out their hiring process. We help them make sure they get good people, like we help optimize the business and get the right systems and installed. And so we really are like the ultimate franchise alternative.

[00:29:46] And I've just gotten tired of seeing the franchises hurting people. And so my mission. Is to get people to sign up with DoorGrow instead of going to these franchises and set ourselves up as a franchise alternative because we can help them get going with a lot less cash involved and a lot more help.

[00:30:05] And and then we can help them give them real strategies for growing their portfolios. And it sounds like this might be a really nice addition to any of my client's strategies for growth is to leverage HomeAbroad because they would love to have people that are hands off. Yeah. In another country trusting you to just take care of stuff that, that's a easy, no-brainer type of client they would love to have.

[00:30:25] Yeah, absolutely. Jason, and we should talk after this podcast. We'll talk, you know, this. I think there's a lot of synergies.

[00:30:31] Okay. Very cool. So, well, what else should property managers or investors listen to the show know about HomeAbroad or Ziffy that we haven't covered? Or what questions do people tend to ask that they're concerned about?

[00:30:45] Yeah, I think, you know, one of the things, you know, that we also advise our clients, right? You know, it's not about, you know, property management eating into my cash flow, right? Because that's something that we see, you know, people concerned about, or people you know, like want to kind of, you know, want to do it by themselves because they want to make sure they maximize their cash flow, right?

[00:31:05] But what we tell our clients, you know, at the end of the day, you got to think of it as a business, right? And what's your net return and how do you value your time? Right. What's the hourly rate that you assign to yourself, right? And what would else you'd be doing if you're not managing five properties on your own?

[00:31:21] Right? That's an opportunity cost, right? So think about this more from an opportunity cost standpoint versus, you know, okay, it's eating into my cashflow because that opportunity cost can help you buy five more properties, right? That can, you know, overall amplify your return on your cash invested versus nickel and diming, you know, the money that you're trying to save, right?

[00:31:42] And you know, when we kind of, you know, talk to them about your, their ROI return cash, we want them to kind of consider this as an expense that goes into it. Because at the end of the day, even though we are not the property management providers, right, we partner with your clients, so to speak, Jason, right?

[00:31:58] We are trying to do what's in best interest of that client in order to build that real estate investment portfolio. Right. So that's something that, you know, just want to reiterate to you, to the listeners of your podcast. Right. Why partner with us? You know, because that's something that we inherently, you know, advise our clients, you know, and we position property management as one of the pillars, they need to really succeed to build a successful real estate investment portfolio.

[00:32:22] So you kind of insulate, because I know there's some property managers listening and they're like, man, some of these foreign investors are such cheapos. They're like so cheap and they complain about everything and they're really difficult. You kind of insulate them from that. Yep. With your organization and you know, and property management really, yeah. It is a no brainer. I mean, there's a lot of properties that a lot of these investors on their own probably wouldn't even accurately raise rent. And so if they didn't raise rent over the last two to three years, for example, they're probably 10% below market rate anyway. And so if the property manager just kept rent where it actually is in the marketplace, the property management basically is free.

[00:33:01] Yeah, it pays for itself. Hundred percent. It's a no brainer. And so, yeah, I think the biggest mistake investors can make period, if you're an investor listening to the show, is to not use a property manager, a good one. Because there are bad ones. But if you can find a good one, that is the biggest game changer because it takes all the work off your plate and you make just as much money.

[00:33:22] Absolutely. And another thing for your listeners, Jason, right. You'd be surprised how few people know about the specialized loan products for DSCA investor, right? So if your client is with you managing one property and is thinking in my head, oh, I already have a mortgage in my primary, I have another investment property here.

[00:33:38] No way in the world I can buy another investment property. It's an education gap. It's a knowledge gap, right? Yeah. So they can help educate and that's where like and HomeAbroad comes in. because we will educate them on your behalf. You know, you retain the relationship, you retain your brand, right? We'll white label it, but like not only show them properties that will give them their next cashflow investment.

[00:33:58] But also educating them, okay, for this loan to qualify, I don't need to see your debt to income ratio. I'm going to qualify based on that property's income. And you know, the only upfront cost is an appraisal cost, right? But us being the mortgage shop, you know, vetting that, okay, this property gives you cash flow, or from a conservative standpoint, it's good for you at the end of the day because you know, you won't invest if the property is not cashflow policy from day one, right?

[00:34:24] So something that people don't know, you know, and there's a gap there.

[00:34:27] Yeah, we've had some lenders on talking about DSCR loans in the past, and yeah, a lot of people just aren't aware of it as an option. Yeah. So property managers, if they can have a partner like yourself to, you know, educate them on these alternate sources of funding and methods of getting cash to invest in real estate.

[00:34:46] Yeah, it's going to open up the door. Not only that, but I like the idea of those because it kind of creates this veil of protection. So it's not an asset in your name if there ever is a liability with the rental property. Absolutely. They don't even know who the owner is. It's an entity and there's kind of a shield there of protection.

[00:35:05] And so there's some additional advantages to going that route as well.

[00:35:09] So, absolutely. And like majority of our clients request the title in an LLC. What's the reason that you just mentioned you always need to have that, you know, protection around you in a litigation rich country, so.

[00:35:21] Got it. Cool.

[00:35:22] Well, hey, I think this is a really awesome idea Amresh. It's great to have you on the DoorGrow Show. Any parting words or how can people get in touch and how can they find out more?

[00:35:32] Sure. You know, so if you're a property management company, you can get them in touch with us at partner@homeabroadinc.com or partner@ziffy.ai.

[00:35:42] You know, my personal email address is amresh.singh@homeabroadinc.com. You can shoot me an email as well. Website is HomeAbroadinc.com for HomeAbroad and Ziffy.ai for our Ziffy brand. Okay.

[00:35:56] Awesome. Alright, thanks so much for coming to the show. So those of you listening, if you've ever felt stuck or stagnant, you want to take your property management business to the next level, reach out to us at doorgrow.com.

[00:36:07] Also, be sure to join our free community just for property management business owners at doorgrowclub.com. We reject 60 to 70% of the people that apply to join that group. And if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe. Leave us a review. We'd really appreciate it. Until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it all alone, so let's grow together.

[00:36:30] Bye everyone.

View Details

If you are still doing sales the old-fashioned way in your property management business, or selling the same way you sold 5-10 years ago, you are likely struggling to add doors right now

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull shares his current model of sales and the sales strategies working for him right now.

You’ll Learn [02:26] Generating and Nurturing Leads

[09:08] The Discovery Phase

[14:39] Creating a Sense of Urgency

[20:45] The Golden Bridge Formula

Quotables “You want to be careful about the type of leads that you're getting on because it actually can limit your growth and hurt your growth.”

“There's very few people searching for property management online and the biggest companies are already spending tons of money on that.”

“So I want them to be clear on the problem because if they're not clear on the problem, and I'm not clear on the problem, then there's no point.”

“There's always a motivator that's driven them to action.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

Transcript [00:00:00] I've made millions and millions of dollars, right, doing sales. I've made millions of dollars and it's because I believe in what I do and I love being able to help people and being able to help people and get paid to do it almost feels like cheating, right?

[00:00:15] I'm Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. We are the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry.

[00:00:31] At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace entire teams. We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses, built websites for hundreds more than that, and we run the leading property management Mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry. At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:01:16] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now, let's get into the show. Alright, so what are we talking about today?

[00:01:36] This is the first day in a while that I don't have a guest and I don't have Sarah to be on the show with me. So this is just me getting to talk about whatever I want to talk about. By myself. So Sarah is actually flying right now. She has a pilot's lesson. She's working on getting her pilot's license, which is just super awesome, very proud of her, and she's just a badass.

[00:01:57] Anyone that knows her, like she just achieves, achieves, achieves. All right, so. What I wanted to talk about today is I just got done with a sales call and I was thinking, what should I talk about on today's podcast that would be really interesting? And I thought maybe some of you would like to know how does Jason sell?

[00:02:17] How would he sell to me if I actually ended up getting on a call with him? How does sales go with Jason, like how does DoorGrow do sales? So let me tell you a bit about some of our processes. Okay? So sales includes the first three functions of business, which is lead generation, nurturing those leads, and converting those leads.

[00:02:39] So let's start at the beginning and I think you're going to hopefully get some really strong value out of this. And I'll tell you how I sell, some of the things I would say. What I would ask, I'm going to give you a little bit of a quick masterclass on how does DoorGrow do sales? How do we do this?

[00:02:55] Okay? All right, so let's talk about this. Very beginning, lead generation. So how are we getting leads? Well, at DoorGrow, we're getting leads from a lot of different channels, a lot of sources. We're doing everything from paid Facebook ads to I do this podcast, and some of these are more nurture tools, like this podcast is more nurture, that second stage, it kind of warms people up, gets people familiar. We're doing short form video. We're doing long form video. We're doing lots and lots of different stuff, right? YouTube... what else are we doing for lead gen? Also, I have three setters currently that they will do about a hundred dials a day, calling colder leads, leads that are in our system.

[00:03:40] Maybe you will get a call from them at some point. And they will probably have maybe only about 10 conversations out of all those a hundred in a day, maybe even less because there's a lot of voicemails, a lot of people don't answer, you know, whatever, receptionist. So they'll have like maybe 10 or less conversations, and out of those, they'll usually get one appointment booked a day.

[00:04:04] Those are kind of their stats. If they're doing at least that, then we don't fire them. Right? That's the idea. So we've got three setters. They're really great right now. We're about to add a fourth and we may continue to just add setters because we have a lot of people that they could be reaching out to.

[00:04:19] So that's kind of the idea. So, they're just filling up my calendar right now. And in the past I've had sales teams, I've had closers, I've had people that would you know, do the calls, but right now I'm doing the sales calls, so if you know, pretty close to hearing this podcast, reach out.

[00:04:36] You may actually end up talking directly with me. I talk with basically every single client that joins our program, gets to talk with me and there's some filters. So what happens is the setters do these dials, they schedule these appointments. Some of these appointments end up being with themselves, not with me.

[00:04:51] The appointment is with the setter to qualify them, but if they're already qualified, and so this is the first stage is we do cold outreach. Then the next stage is qualification in sales. So the goal is for them to figure out: are these people that could maybe afford our program? There's the financial qualification.

[00:05:09] Are they people that maybe do they have a property management business? Is it a type of property management business that maybe we could help? because not every vertical or every type of business may need help growing. Or do they need help with systems and most any property management business, we could help with that side.

[00:05:24] So they're trying to figure out like are they qualified? Are they somebody that maybe could use us, that maybe we could help? And do they have enough revenue or just enough money set aside that they can maybe afford to do our program. Otherwise, I end up on a lot of calls with people that are broke, think our stuff's awesome, they can't afford to do anything, and they're starting a business or something like that.

[00:05:46] Right. So that's qualification. If they're qualified during that initial quick call that they'll do with one of my setters. And sometimes I call that a fit call or a qualification call or whatever it might be. If they do that call and things go well, then the goal during that call is to book them on a next call.

[00:06:06] If they just do that during their first cold interaction or cold call, they qualify the person and ask these questions. And then one of the qualifications that we do is we want to ask, what would lower your stress more as a business owner now? Would it be adding more doors? Another a hundred, 200 doors and more money? Or would it be getting your systems team and processes more dialed in so you felt comfortable adding more doors? What would help you out personally as a business owner. And so based on that answer, then my setters will send you a free training.

[00:06:38] They'll send you an email. "I would love to send you this free training," and it helps you understand something that is about lead generation or something that's about process, the process myth. Basically we're breaking down two myths people believe at these stages, the leads myth. "I just need more leads," which you might be thinking if you need to grow and it's not accurate. You might think you need more leads, but we'll explain that and we'll send you free training. Just say, "Hey team, give me the leads training" on any of my social media. I want to see it. And if you want to see that, you can just go to doorgrow.com/leads and you should be able to get to that training and watch that. And that explains why you don't just need more leads and not all leads are equal. And you want to be careful about the type of leads that you're getting on because it actually can limit your growth and hurt your growth. And some leads are really expensive and it's not worth it, or you're losing money, et cetera.

[00:07:28] Right. And I explain and break down why most marketing doesn't work, why you don't need to do SEO or pay per click or content marketing or paper lead or social media marketing or any of this kind of stuff to grow your property management business because there's very few people searching for property management online and the biggest companies are already spending tons of money on that.

[00:07:47] So I break that all down in that leads training. Otherwise, if it's systems and team, and that's usually more like 200 door plus companies. If you're growing fast, maybe you hit that a little prematurely, like around 150 or something like that, or you break a hundred. But this is where you need team, hiring, systems, processes.

[00:08:04] And most people when they get stuck in that stage of 200 to 400 doors, I call the second sand trap. The first sand trap is under a hundred doors. Right? You can't break that a hundred door barrier because you don't really know how to grow and you're taking on too many crappy doors and you get caught in the cycle of suck, et cetera. If you grow past, you get maybe into that 200 to 400 door range, usually then you're stuck because you've built a team around the business and not around yourself, which means you aren't supported. You are working harder the more people you add and the more doors you add. It takes more time and there's more questions and you're getting more stressed instead of less, which means you're doing it wrong.

[00:08:42] And so I explain in that the process myth that everybody thinks, "I just need more processes, I just need more KPIs, I need more control, I need to squeeze more blood from the stone, and that will always keep you usually below four or 500 units. I don't see people break 500, 600 units unless they get good culture.

[00:09:01] They like go through a lot of pain in figuring out hiring and we can help you collapse time on all of that significantly. Okay, so after that, we will send you one of those trainings and then usually my goal or hope is that you watch one of these trainings, you understand. It disrupts your current thinking, helps you see what the real problems and issues are, and then you make better decisions and you don't go waste a bunch of money with a bunch of marketing companies that exist out there and advertisers that are targeting property managers that people spend a lot of money on, don't get a lot of ROI on, and then come to us a year or two later saying, man, I've spent a lot of money and I haven't added lot of doors from that. Where have you gotten most of your doors? Word of mouth or other warm channels, things we focus on with clients. So you watch those trainings, you get on a call then with me, they'll get you scheduled for a call with me. And then I usually will do, it's usually an hour call, spend an hour, and I spend probably 90% of it asking questions. The last call I was on the. This lady said she had been you know, following me for like six years. I'm like, okay, why now? And so I go through a series of asking questions.

[00:10:13] There's the beginning is like, you know, first I go through kind of connecting with them. I want to figure out what their current problem is. Why were they willing to get on a call? What's happened? I want to then figure out their current situation. What are you currently doing about whatever this problem is? Like about growth or adding doors, you know, in this particular case, she said, nothing.

[00:10:32] I haven't really focused on this. I've just been getting business these other ways. So I understand the situation. How's your business set up? Sometimes people have a bad split with a broker. Like I'm always digging in. I want to understand their whole business, how it's set up so that I can figure out if I can help them because I see a lot of different problems. So I'm pretty aware of a lot of problems that are pretty common with startups. I'm pretty clear on a lot of problems at all the various stages in property management. You know, first sand trap, second sand trap, and all the other little milestones of transition in between those and everything else.

[00:11:04] So. I want to figure out what their current situation is. Where are they? Can I maybe help them? And so then I need to get them aware of their own problems. So I ask questions to help them become aware of their problem. You know? Do you like your current process or what you're doing now? Sounds like things going pretty well.

[00:11:20] Is there anything you would maybe change? Or maybe in the results you're getting or how you could, or what do you mean by this? How long has this been a problem? What's causing this problem? What impact is this having? Right? So I get into all these questions. And then the next stage I usually get into what sort of ideal future? So now they're clear on the problem. I've helped them, maybe even I'll reflect back emotionally. Like it sounds like this is really stressful, or it sounds like this is affecting your marriage negatively, or it sounds like whatever. So I reflect back emotion. So I want them to be clear on the problem because if they're not clear on the problem, and I'm not clear on the problem, then there's no point. Right? I can't help them. But I need them to be clear on the problem, so I ask questions to help them get clarity on that. Then I'll ask questions to figure out what do they want? What's the ideal outcome?

[00:12:05] What's the ideal solution? If we were to work together for a year, where would they be hopefully? Like what do they want? And so I want to see if I can help them get out of the pain they're in now, and if they're aware of it, and then I want them to become aware of their desire or their goal, some positive future state that I can maybe help them get to.

[00:12:24] And then I want to figure out, get into commitment and urgency. So I want to figure out why are you reaching out now? If you've known about this for a while or why now, is this a priority? Sounds like you've had the business for many years. There's always a motivator that's driven them to action. So I want them to be conscious of why it matters to do this now, because that creates a sense of urgency.

[00:12:46] I found for a while when I wasn't doing this that I'd talk to people and they would love what we have, and they're like, this sounds amazing, and it would really help me grow, but they didn't connect in their brain why it needed to happen now, and they weren't aware of their pain and they weren't aware of what they wanted, and so there was no urgency.

[00:13:03] They're like, yeah, maybe I'll do that in a few months. Or someday. And so I was like, but this is so like helpful and you really need this. But they didn't see it. And I assumed everyone understood their problem. Everybody understood their positive future they wanted. because I usually have pretty strong clarity around this stuff, but most people don't.

[00:13:20] So I'm going to ask you, and I'm going to help you get clear. I'm not really trying to sell you, I'm trying to help you figure out what you want and then see if maybe you want what I can maybe help you with. So I get them clear on their ideal outcomes and solution, and I create this positive alternate future with them.

[00:13:40] Then I go back to commitment urgency. Why now? You don't have to do this now, so why not put it off? And then they'll tell me they find a reason why it matters to do it now. Well, it's like, what's the main reason for doing this now? Like, you've been aware of us for a long time, six years, you know, or you've been listening to my podcast for a year.

[00:13:59] Why now are you doing this? And when I ask why now? It's a powerful sales question. I get some crazy answers. I had one client say, "my fiance passed away a month ago. He would want me to do this," right? Or I've had somebody say, "I have cancer and I need to get this business ready so my wife can take over it because I'm not going to be around much longer." I mean, serious stuff comes out that I never would've known. And I'm like, what's motivating you to do this now? Why does this matter now? And if I'm aware of that, then I can be even more empathetic. I can, you know, understand where they're coming from. And once I get clear on that, then I want to get into consequence.

[00:14:39] We've already built up positive alternate reality. Right? Now I want to get into the negative current path they're on, like what's the consequence? Because the consequence is going to be that they don't get this positive future that they're hoping for, right? If they just keep doing this on their own, they'll have more of what they've had in the past.

[00:14:58] So usually I get into questions like, what happens if you don't achieve this goal? You said you wanted to achieve X in the next 12 months. What happens if you don't make that? Or what happens if this continues? You don't end up working with us or any other coach or anyone else. And it just continues.

[00:15:14] Because if they're not willing to explore failure or a negative future, they're not going to be motivated to take action now. I asked one gentleman this on a sales call after going through all of this, he was really stressed, but he didn't see it. He probably would've continued doing it forever.

[00:15:29] You know, he was really stressed and I said, well, after getting clear on his stress and all this, I said, how much longer do you think you could deal with this? He's like, honestly, now that I'm thinking about it, I think I can handle another 30 days and then I'm going to just quit this business and I'm out.

[00:15:45] I was like, whoa, that's, that sounds really serious. He's like, yeah, I'm just burnt out. And when you help people get clarity, they can't tolerate it anymore. They're like, I'm done. I don't want this anymore. I want out now. I want to solve this now. Right? Amazon now, give me Amazon things right now, like people get impatient when they recognize there is an alternate, there is a path, there is something else, or they're clear, oh, I am dealing with a problem.

[00:16:08] I've just been so comfortable in it. It's kind of like that frog in the water that's warming up a little bit, but you could boil the frog and it won't jump out because it just gets so comfortable that eventually it's cooked, right? You've been in your business so long, you don't even maybe see it until somebody asks you or creates contrast.

[00:16:24] Says, well, where are you at now? Where will you be in the future positively if you get help? And where will you be negatively in the future? So this is where we get into the consequence, and then once they're clear on that, then I get into the presentation. Right? And so this is like 90% of the call. The last call I was on like the majority of the whole hour with like maybe the last 13 minutes or something, I got into what some would call the pitch, right? The presentation. I'm like, well, based on what you've told me so far and what challenges that you're having, what we're doing might be a good fit for you. And here's how our program works. Here's what it costs. I usually go over pricing first.

[00:17:03] I don't hold that out. I don't try and keep the price a secret. And so let me give you all the value first and then spring the price on you and hope you like it. I'm like, here's what we cost. Here's the pricing, we've got these levels. I think this would make the most sense. This level would make the most sense for you.

[00:17:18] Here's what it costs. And based on what you've told me you know, how you're dealing with this particular issue you had mentioned this problem that's stressing you out. Well, we would do this thing and this would be relevant. And so I usually pick three things. And the other thing that I will do is before I go into pricing or anything, I just throw the tug of war rope. This is not a competition where I'm trying to get something from them and they're trying to not do the sale and do the deal with me. Like most salespeople think it's like an adversarial, I got to manipulate them. I throw them the entire tug of war rope. I'm like, here's everything.

[00:17:53] And the way I do that is like we use offer documents. So I give them an offer document that has all the details of our program, it has everything. It has a video explaining the offer doc at the top. It has a commercial talking about the benefits of video on that. It has a list of all of the problems that people are dealing with related to this, so it really stings and connects with their problem. It then talks about all the benefits and it lists out all the benefits of people doing that particular level of our program, which usually is exactly what they're hoping for.

[00:18:26] Then it gets into our DoorGrow code roadmap and our testimonial videos. It has a link to that. We have more than any other coach or consultant in the industry. And then it has our DoorGrow code roadmap I mentioned, which shows the path and shows where they're at. And it shows, it's like a magic cold read where they can see where their problems are now and what they're dealing with at the door level and revenue level they're at.

[00:18:47] And so we have that DoorGrow code roadmap. Then it has a list of everything included in the program. Here's what you get. Three weekly group coaching calls, one related to our rapid revamp where we rebrand, do your website, clean up your business, change your pricing, optimize, put you into a three tier hybrid pricing model.

[00:19:04] Like we just, we clean up the whole business, like bar rescue for property managers, right? And then it goes into how we do a call and you get a website and like all the stuff that we do. Our jumpstart session where you meet with us in person at the beginning all of that. I usually start though by saying, here's the offer document, scroll to the bottom where it says investment, and this is where it has the pricing.

[00:19:27] And let me go over that real quick with you. So I go over that first, then I go through the offer document and I say, and it lists everything included in the program. There's a lot. Let me make this really simple. because anything other than what you need is a distraction. You don't need everything, especially not right now.

[00:19:45] Let's keep it simple on three things. And I focus on the three things that I think they need most to move the needle and solve whatever current challenge they're dealing with. Whether it's getting more business, more leads or getting their systems or team or doing some hiring or whatever, depending on the offer doc, depending on the challenge.

[00:20:04] So I go over three things. I'm like, these are the three things. Does that sound like what you're looking for? And do you think that might help? Right? So this is where I'm getting commitment. Does everything make sense? Do you feel like this could help you get from point A to point B where you're wanting to go? And they're like, yeah, this sounds great.

[00:20:22] If they say, well, I think so. I say, cool, what would make you a hundred percent? Like what? What do you need? What else do you need? Or what questions do you have? And so then they might bring up some objections. They might bring up some objections or some challenges. But usually at this point, because I've done all of this, there's very few objections.

[00:20:42] There's almost nothing. because the main objection is trust. One of the things that I try to do, by the way, that I teach clients to do during the sales process is what I call the Golden Bridge Formula. I explain to them why I do what I do. So my Golden Bridge formula is my personal why. I connect it to my business why. I connect that then to their why. And there's a little more detail to it than that. But in interest of time, I'm helping them understand my motive. And my motive isn't just to get their money. That's the default assumption in sales. I let them know there's a lot of ways I can make money a lot faster off property managers just selling them what they think they need, but instead.

[00:21:21] I really want to help people, and my motive is the reason I have DoorGrow. The reason I exist and live my life is I want to inspire others to love true principles. That's my personal why statement, and what that means is I love figuring out what works, sharing it with others. I would do that for free, for fun.

[00:21:38] I'm sharing with all of you for free for fun right now because I love doing this and I've made, you know, millions and millions of dollars, right, doing sales. I've made millions of dollars and it's because I believe in what I do and I love being able to help people and being able to help people and get paid to do it almost feels like cheating, right?

[00:21:59] Like, I get to benefit people and love what I get to do, and they pay me for that? But that's the way business should always work, right? So I love getting to do what I get to do and our why statement of DoorGrow is to transform property management business owners and their businesses. And so we legitimately, everyone on my team, we believe in helping our clients.

[00:22:18] We want to see them win and succeed. Like you don't see it behind the scenes, but we are celebrating. A client sends us like a telegram message saying their wins. Then we're like, yay, look at this. And we share it with each other and we're like, yay, we love that. And we're like, cool. Get a testimony video from that person.

[00:22:33] Like, we, your wins are our wins. We want you to win. Our interests are in alignment. This is our why at DoorGrow. And so DoorGrow basically is this golden bridge. That allows you, as a client of ours to get what you want and allows me as a business owner and my team members that love the role that they're in to get what they want out of life.

[00:22:53] So there's strong alignment for desires. It's a win-win, win for everybody and that you can trust. That's motive. And so we teach our clients to do that as well. So at some point, I usually share that. You'll see me share it in the leads training. You'll see it shared in our process, myth training and all the other trainings that we have.

[00:23:11] Every webinar I do, every podcast I go on, I am relating my Golden Bridge formula typically. And so, that's basically it. There won't be very many objections at that point. They're like, yes, this could help me, but I'll deal with whatever objections there are. And then I say, cool. What do you think the next steps might be? Are you ready to get going on this now? Would that be appropriate? And then I send them a quote with a payment agreement. They sign that. That authorizes payment, then they make the payment, initiate that it. Takes a few days to go through, which is why we do a payment agreement.

[00:23:46] There's no contract, no term limit. We don't make people stay for a year or commit to a year. We like clients that want to work with us forever, and our goal is to help support you through every stage of growth forever. But we do not force clients to stay with us.

[00:24:00] We make money If you are making money. We want it to be a win-win, and so we have people sign to authorize a payment agreement, get them started, and then we get them right away into DoorGrow Academy. And then we have an amazing onboarding process. We have them come out and hang out with us for a day in Austin doing what we call jumpstart session.

[00:24:18] Go deep in their business and usually, if they have enough doors, it's easy, we can optimize or add a maybe sometimes $10 a unit or reduce expenses by a handful of dollars per unit. And we can usually pay for the program on a monthly basis residually. It's already paid for. So we work that magic from the beginning.

[00:24:38] So that's basically our sales process. And if they don't sign the agreement right away or they're not ready during that call and they're like, I got to get funds together, then my setters will work that deal. because they set it up, they're responsible to help me move that deal forward and they get a piece of that sales commission.

[00:24:59] We'll pay them. So they're incentivized. So they're following up and doing the follow up and getting them on another follow up call with me to deal with things or meet with their spouse or their business partner or whatever it takes to move, help them feel safe, comfortable, and move the deal forward.

[00:25:12] Maybe give them trainings to watch so they know what we're all about or how we do what we do and stuff like that. So, and that's it. And we just move them forward. So that's our current process for doing what we do. We basically do coaching calls. That's really what I'm doing is I'm just asking a lot of questions to help them get clarity, which is what coaching is.

[00:25:32] And they get to experience that we care. They get to experience empathy. They get to experience clarity. We give them trainings so they get to experience some education, some learning, which poisons the well against most alternatives and most of our competitors' strategies that they're trying to sell.

[00:25:48] Because our stuff's better. And that's basically what we do. So hopefully you learn something valuable from this that you can apply to your process for sales. And if you really want to learn to get great at selling, I have training material on all of these things. We have training material on how to identify your golden bridge, how to get clarity on your personal why, how to create the right pitch.

[00:26:12] I talk about my four phases of selling. I talk about the different stages of questions to take them through during that pitch stage and like all of this stuff in detail and we have pricing secrets and branding secrets and website secrets and all these different training material in DoorGrow Academy.

[00:26:30] And so if you found this helpful or interesting and would like to just really get your business growing and are tired of doing it all on your own. Reach out to us at doorgrow.com. So if you felt stuck stagnant, you want to take your business to the next level, that's reach out to us.

[00:26:49] Also, you can join our free Facebook community. It's just for property management business owners. Everybody helps each other out in there. You know, so it's an easy place to ask questions and feel supported. It's just for business owners. We reject 60, 70% of the applicants that try to join. You have to be a property management business owner or starting one.

[00:27:07] And that's at doorgrowclub.com. And if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe. Leave us a review. Make my day. I'd appreciate it. Reciprocate. Like give something back and we would love that. Thank you so much. And until next time remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone, so let's grow together.

[00:27:30] Bye everyone.

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Recently, Sarah was working with a BDM (salesperson) who believed she was ready to hire a sales setter to help with some of the sales outreach and follow up.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss how to know when you need to hire a sales setter and things you can do to increase your sales volume without one.

You’ll Learn [00:43] The Importance of Having Sales Metrics and Data

[05:45] Setting Your Salesperson Up for Success

[07:57] More Volume = More Results

[09:47] The Two Main Components of Sales

Quotables “There are certain things that we're gauging all the time in our business, but I think sales has to be probably number one.”

“ You have a BDM and they're good at sales and you have them doing anything other than sales, you are making a very stupid mistake because that's the lifeblood of the business.”

“Just do more of the things that you should be doing and you'll get more results.”

“If something's not working, you just got to not tolerate it.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: I bet you, you can just get more results by doing more work, which means stop doing the other things that you're doing.

[00:00:05] Sarah: Just do more of the things that you should be doing and you'll get more results. And then you can probably don't even need to pay a setter.

[00:00:12] Jason: We are Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. And we're going to keep this episode a little brief, so I'm going to skip some of our intro. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses.

[00:00:31] Jason: We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change the perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now let's get into the show.

[00:00:41] Jason: Alright. What are we chatting about today?

[00:00:43] Sarah: Alright. I wanted to talk about this just because I think it happens a lot in business and we have to just kind of gauge, right? So there are certain things that we're gauging all the time in our business, but I think sales has to be probably number one. So one of our clients had asked me last week on the scale call she's a BDM, so she does all the sales and she said, "Hey, we are actually thinking about hiring an appointment setter. And they will kind of help with a lot of the outbound calls and you know, the follow up and the scheduling and you know, rescheduling any appointments and just kind of like staying on top of things and making sure that everything is being tracked and, you know, moving forward and doing a whole bunch of outbound calls."

[00:01:36] Sarah: That's really what setters do is they just sit and call all day long. Yeah. So she says, "yeah, we're thinking about hiring this sales setter, and I want to know what you think about it." So the first thing I did is I was like, okay, if you actually need a sales setter, then like, here's the Rdoc and that's great.

[00:01:56] Sarah: Like, we would hire a sales setter...

[00:01:58] Jason: which is a job description for those unfamiliar.

[00:02:00] Sarah: Yes. So we would hire a sales setter the same way that we would hire A BDM. Mm-hmm. I always recommend going through the DoorGrow Hiring process, but before we really dig into the hiring piece is we should first figure out is this actually something that you need right now?

[00:02:16] Sarah: So one of the tools that we have for our clients in our client workbook is a sales tracker, and I happened to pull up the sales tracker for them just out of curiosity. And lucky for me, she had actually filled it out. So my one recommendation is for whoever is doing sales, and if it's multiple people, then that's fine. Multiple people need to then fill out the sales tracker. So fill out the sales tracker at the end of every single day. This is like your end of day report.

[00:02:42] Sarah: If you have two BDMs, then they both need to be doing it. If you have a, BDM and a setter, they both need to be doing it. It doesn't matter.

[00:02:50] Sarah: Every single sales person needs to be filling out and submitting their own data and metrics. So I said, well, let me look through your sales tracker. Now, she did not have it filled out consistently every day. There were some days that she had it filled out. There were some days that were not filled out.

[00:03:07] Sarah: And then there were some days that had pretty solid data, and there were some days that had like, you know, "I did three to four hours," or "I did, you know, six to eight appointments." Well, is it six, is it seven or is it eight? So don't give me like the range, give me the actual raw data. So I was looking through this, and even with the data that she had in there, I was able to kind of make an assessment.

[00:03:31] Sarah: I said, "listen, if this was my business, I would not be, at this point in time, I would not be looking at hiring a sales setter. The reason being is that with the resources that we currently have, which is A BDM, what we need to do is just turn up the volume for the BDM. And once that BDM is totally maxed out, then we can look to see, hey, do we actually need some additional support?

[00:03:59] Sarah: And that might be a sales setter. So what I was noticing, and now she's a newer hire. She's been there only a few months and she's doing a great job so far. So. The early on data, she was still in training and onboarding and learning and kind of testing and figuring things out. And you could see that as you go down the list, the later the date, the better results that she was getting.

[00:04:24] Sarah: So in the very beginning, she was maybe doing like half an hour or 45 minutes a day, and later on in the list she was doing, you know, one to two hours and then she was doing three to four hours. And then she tends to do about four hours a day on average now. And then same thing with phone calls.

[00:04:41] Sarah: You know, she would do, you know, a couple of phone calls in the beginning and then later on down in the data you would see, hey, she was doing more phone calls, she was getting, doing more time. She was doing more phone calls. She was setting more appointments, and therefore some things were starting to close.

[00:04:58] Sarah: But what I could also see is that she is not fully maxed out.

[00:05:01] Jason: Right.

[00:05:01] Sarah: So if we have a BDM who is full-time, meaning at least 30, maybe even 40 hours a week, and they're doing four hours per day, that's like 20 hours a week. So that's like part-time BDM work. Yeah. So then what is happening with the rest of the time?

[00:05:18] Sarah: So I said, "first of all, anything that you are doing at all that does not have to do with sales, cut it out immediately. Stop it. If you're on like client success meetings, because the property manager was also on that call." Yeah. So, and I know that they work in tandem. They work as a team, which is really great.

[00:05:34] Sarah: Like the team culture there is fantastic. But when you're dragging the salespeople into the customer service side.

[00:05:42] Jason: Big mistake.

[00:05:43] Sarah: You're costing yourself so much money.

[00:05:45] Jason: I want to comment on that just real quick. I mean, everybody listening, if you have anybody in your organization that's good at sales, whether it's you that should be doing the sales and you don't have anyone else to do it, and you're the business owner, or you have a BDM and they're good at sales and you have them doing anything other than sales, you are making a very stupid mistake because that's the lifeblood of the business. They feed the business, they pay everybody else's salary. They're the only people that bring money, fresh money into the business. And they should not be dabbling as a property manager. They should not be dabbling as a leasing agent. They should not be dabbling or picking up slack for anybody else.

[00:06:27] Jason: No. Hire other people if you need to, but get your salesperson spending full time spending their time on sales if they're good and they will make you a lot of money. And having them do anything else is a massive waste of a resource.

[00:06:40] Sarah: Absolutely. I've said it like this before, if you have a star quarterback on a football team, do you want that quarterback doing any other, like playing any other position?

[00:06:50] Jason: I like that analogy.

[00:06:51] Sarah: Do you want them kicking? Do you want them walking? Do you want them to be a tight end?

[00:06:54] Jason: No, there'd be dumb. No.

[00:06:56] Sarah: Why? Why on earth would you do that? No. If I've got somebody who can hurl that ball with pinpoint precision and accuracy to any spot on the field at will...

[00:07:08] Jason: don't make them a kicker.

[00:07:09] Sarah: I got to preserve that resource. And then I'm like, that's literally the only thing you're going to do.

[00:07:14] Jason: The kickers, kick. That's all the kickers do. The kickers do one thing. They just kick the ball's. That's it, and they're not used very often. Like, it would be ridiculous to say, "you know what, kicker, why don't you also occasionally be our backup quarterback?"

[00:07:26] Jason: Like, you're second string now. Like, it just, it doesn't make sense. If he could be a quarterback, he would not be a kicker.

[00:07:32] Sarah: Right.

[00:07:33] Jason: Yeah.

[00:07:33] Sarah: Yeah. So I said, anything that you're doing that is not sales, stop it immediately. Like today. Don't stop it. Monday. Stop it today. Okay. That's it, period. That's number one.

[00:07:43] Sarah: Then number two, we need to just get more time out of you. So if you're doing, you know, four hours a day, what's the rest of your time being spent doing? So we just needed, we need to spend more time and then we just need to increase the number of calls. So she actually happens to be in my accountability group. So that call was Friday. Every Monday, we have a telegram group that it's real quick, it's just an accountability group. We set a personal goal and a professional goal for the upcoming week, and then we give updates on the previous week. And her goal for monday, like this past Monday was to do a minimum of 100 calls per day after our call on Friday.

[00:08:24] Sarah: Which is awesome because I said, "you have to increase the volume. Yeah. So that you can get more results. And then once we have the volume increased so much that you cannot add anymore. You are absolutely maxed out. You can't add more time without, you know, working like 80 hours a week.

[00:08:40] Sarah: We can't add more time. We can't do more calls. We can't possibly like squeeze any more, you know, blood from the stone. Now I know you're maxed out. Now it might make sense to look at either hiring another BDM or hiring a setter.

[00:08:55] Jason: Yeah.

[00:08:55] Sarah: But right now, you are not maxed out. All you need to do is just increase your volume so that you can get more results, because I bet you, you can just get more results by doing more work, which means stop doing the other things that you're doing.

[00:09:06] Sarah: Just do more of the things that you should be doing and you'll get more results. And then you can probably don't even need to pay a setter.

[00:09:14] Jason: Yeah. So we have three setters. Yesterday they made 200 calls between the three of them. And they each booked... on a Monday.... they each... yeah, on a Monday, which is hard for property manager, for property managers.

[00:09:24] Sarah: Come on.

[00:09:24] Jason: And they each booked a one appointment, which is pretty good. But that's a lot of calls. And we have a lot of other growth engines installed at DoorGrow, but we're getting almost 300 calls a day. And we'll probably add some more setters, but like, we're doing outreach and so this is the game.

[00:09:41] Jason: This is the game. And if you're not putting in the numbers, but you're like, "maybe it's not working," you don't get the game. Yeah.

[00:09:47] Sarah: So my big thing is there's two things. There are two main components of sales, and almost every single, if not every single problem that you have in sales. It all boils down to one of these two things I can almost guarantee it.

[00:10:02] Sarah: One is volume, and two is AB testing. That's all sales is, and if you fix your volume and you AB test everything to optimize for best results, you will never have a sales problem.

[00:10:15] Jason: Yeah.

[00:10:15] Sarah: So that's what we figure out here at DoorGrow, how to have people optimize, AB testing and volume. And that's why our clients can get the results that they're able to.

[00:10:26] Sarah: That's why our clients can get results that other people aren't able to. They're like, oh, I'm doing like all these calls. I'm doing all this stuff. Yeah, but you're not doing it. Either you're not doing enough or you're not AB testing the right way. And you're not using the right strategies.

[00:10:38] Sarah: Yeah. I mean everything. Like, listen, I can give you a list of, you know, a thousand people and you can call them your way and we can call them our way and we'll get better results. Why? Because we've AB tested everything. Yeah. So it's always, it's either volume or AB testing. Yeah.

[00:10:51] Sarah: Those two things. And you will never have a sales problem again.

[00:10:55] Jason: If something's not working, you just got to not tolerate it. That's the problem, is at each stage there's things that are not working if you're not getting deals, and if you don't change what's not working and you keep doing it the same way, you're going to keep getting the same result. And so this is what we coach on. We're like, cool. You need to fix that step now, this step in the pipeline, now this step. And until you get everything dialed in, it's not really working. But once you get the whole growth engine built out, it's all unclogged, the water's flowing, then you're making money.

[00:11:25] Jason: And that's why I say it's the last 10% of getting things dialed in that gives you 90% of the results. All right.

[00:11:31] Sarah: All right.

[00:11:31] Jason: Okay, so if you felt stuck or stagnant and want to take your property management business to the next level, reach out to us at doorgrow.com. You can also join our free community at doorgrowclub.com, our Facebook group.

[00:11:43] Jason: And if you found this even a little bit helpful, help us out. Don't forget to subscribe. Leave us a review. We'd really appreciate it. And until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone. So let's grow together. Bye everyone.

View Details

What if you could retain the doors you manage even when your owners decide to sell? What would that mean for you and your property management business?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Lior from Blanket to talk about how property managers can retain doors while also helping investors grow and add more to their portfolios.

You’ll Learn [02:59] Property Managers Can Become Asset Managers

[11:13] Valuable Lessons Learned from Tough Situations

[25:40] How to Move into More of an Asset Manager Role

[37:25] Reducing Client and Retaining Clients

[47:51] Helping Your Investors Grow Their Portfolios

Quotables “You have to be very robotic, very technical, and that is one of the most important skills that really allows me to face difficult, you know, decisions in life, especially in business, without taking them personally.”

“When you are rational and you're not driven by emotions, that actually allows you to be a lot more, you know, empathetic and kind and caring.”

“There are no failures in life. There are only challenges, and every challenge is an opportunity for success.”

”Why be so focused on the failure if you can be focused on the lesson that you're going to learn, even before you even know it?”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

Transcript [00:00:00] Lior: The combination of these two, this is what allows you to be that ultimate asset manager to your clients. That can help your clients, optimize their portfolio and generate more cash flow, but on the other hand, help them make more money by expanding their portfolio, buying more properties, and growing it.

[00:00:18] Jason: Welcome everybody to the DoorGrow Show. I'm Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. We are the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs.

[00:00:31] Jason: For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace teams.

[00:00:52] Jason: We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses and we run the leading property management mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry. At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate high-trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:01:17] Jason: At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now let's get into the show. All right, so today I'm hanging out with Lior.

[00:01:37] Jason: How do you say your last name? Abramovich?

[00:01:42] Jason: Abramovich.

[00:01:43] Jason: Abramovich. Man. I butchered that one. All right. So with Blanket, he's repping it on a t-shirt, if you're seeing the video version of this. And so, Lior, we've had several calls, hanging out and you're just a really cool guy and we've really enjoyed hanging out.

[00:02:01] Jason: Yeah. We've really enjoyed hanging out. He's given me a heart shape with his hand for those listening. But I haven't had you on the podcast yet, have I?

[00:02:09] Lior: True. This is the first time.

[00:02:11] Jason: Yeah. That's so odd to me. Usually people start by doing the podcast with me and so we're doing the reverse.

[00:02:17] Jason: And you're a sponsor at DoorGrow Live, our conference coming up. Thank you. And we're really excited to have you there. One of our vendors said it's the only conference he still attends now. That's it. He's like, "it's the one I get the most value from learning, and the other ones just aren't worth the, you know, paying to go be a vendor there."

[00:02:36] Jason: And I'm like, okay, cool. So hopefully you get some benefit from doing that as well. So I'm excited Lior to expose people to Blanket because I think it's very complimentary to our vision and what we do at DoorGrow in helping grow property managers. And I would call it like a client retention platform, but maybe you describe it differently.

[00:02:57] Jason: But before we get into that, why don't we give some background on you and why don't you tell everybody how you kind of got into entrepreneurism, then got into property management and give us some backstory. We need the origin story of Lior.

[00:03:11] Lior: Will do. I'll try to make it exciting and interesting.

[00:03:13] Jason: Okay.

[00:03:14] Lior: I started from real estate. I didn't start from the tech side or from, you know, the startup world. I started as an investor. I bought my first rental property in Atlanta, Georgia when I was about 18 years old. So started quite early with a lot of inspiration from my mom, which is my role model in life for pretty much everything.

[00:03:33] Lior: And at that point in time, I actually was doing that investment from Israel, thousands of miles away. This is where I was born and raised. I actually moved here to the States just about a year, yeah, exactly a year ago. Moved to Miami, Florida. After just, you know, living on the line, flying back and forth almost every month for multiple years, but in that first stage of like my, you know, real estate, I would say career, at that point I also started my active duty service in the Israeli Navy.

[00:04:05] Lior: So I'm a graduate of the Israeli Naval Academy, then served for almost nine years as a naval commander commanding hundreds of soldiers, officers, and combat soldiers in quite intense and interesting situations I would say. That's a whole topic that we can talk about for hours in another podcast.

[00:04:25] Lior: Yeah. Episode.

[00:04:26] Jason: Interesting. I didn't know that about you.

[00:04:28] Lior: Yeah. That was quite an intense nine years and definitely shaped me as a person and as an entrepreneur as well. Most of what I know, most of what I do, most of what I act upon is pretty much majority, you know, of what I learned and implemented in myself as a person in my qualities, in my values, in my worldviews through that time in the Navy.

[00:04:52] Lior: And, you know, before that, before like that step of buying that first rental property, it's not like it came from out of nowhere. You know, probably I started as most of our listeners today by reading the book Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki when I was about 13 years old. Again, my mom gave me that as a birthday gift at 13 years old.

[00:05:14] Lior: And to me it was fascinating, this whole concept that you can, you know, like make money from like a property that you actually took money from the bank to pay for it, and it pays for itself and it makes some extra money. So this whole like very, you know, conceptualized plan was very interesting to me.

[00:05:35] Lior: And I said like, this is something I would like to do at some capacity in my life. Especially because the fact that I was born for a family of immigrants, my entire family came from Ukraine to Israel. So we didn't have, you know, very good financial you know, let's say position in life as most immigrants do.

[00:05:54] Lior: And my grandparents don't have, you know, today also a pension plan that, or that's how we call it in Israel. And here we call it 401k. So they don't have that. And to me, real estate was always a way to take care of my loved ones, to take care of my grandparents, to be able to at least give them one rental property that can enable them stable, and I would say secure financial retirement, and just really retire with dignity, retire safely. And that was like the big why behind everything I'm doing. So. Quick, you know, fast forward nine years in the Navy, kept doing real estate throughout that time. Helped a lot of my fellow naval officers to buy properties in the United States.

[00:06:38] Lior: Okay. And then started working for a big investment firm in the United States that was doing build to rent before build to rent was a thing. You know, today, you know, people are talking about build to rent is with this cool name, but back then we just called it new construction you know, for investors.

[00:06:52] Lior: So we were one of the largest operators in the Southeast. We were one of the largest operators, specifically in Georgia and Alabama. And I started there as their head of acquisitions quickly promoted to vice president of business development, overseeing our entire operation from due diligence, meaning land acquisition development, and then, you know, disposition and sales and marketing.

[00:07:14] Lior: So, really had the opportunity to experience every part of the value chain of real estate investments from start to finish, seeing all the good, seeing all the bad, I had, you know, contractors that went bankrupt in the middle of a 300 property community. And I had very good stories as well. But that whole period of time of me working there for almost three years was the best school I ever got to really, you know, operate as an operator and manage an operation of hundreds of millions of dollars because in that time alone, I personally oversaw about $200 million worth of acquisitions and worked directly with over a thousand individual investors, mainly mom and pop investors, like most of you know, the clients of most of our listeners today. And the unique thing about it, and this is where Blanket sort of like starts to form up as an idea, the unique thing about my position in that company was that it had a very interesting model where.

[00:08:16] Lior: All the clients that we sold properties to, which were clients, by the way, all over the world. We worked with buyers from Israel, Canada, Russia, China, Australia, like everywhere. You know, that was one of our, you know, major, I would say efficiencies, which we were working with a lot of foreign investors and we are one of the biggest drivers of that.

[00:08:38] Lior: So we've seen pretty much everything in every one of those clients that we actually sell the property to we kept managing the relationship with them instead of the property manager. So think of that company as like an investor relations arm, right? Where you refer that client after we sell a property to a property manager partner that we worked with and we worked with a lot of folks and then that property manager is not talking with that owner.

[00:09:05] Lior: No headaches, no nothing. We are managing that owner. So every time the owner has a question, he sends that to us and if we need, we escalate that to the property manager. If the property manager wants to convey something, he escalates that. So like he gives it to us and we pass it on to the owner. But the whole notion was that we will be their asset manager and this whole thing enabled me to see all the things that work and all the things that don't work when it comes to owner relationships and how property managers manage their owner relationships, especially with the things that are missing, which is what owners expect and what property managers don't provide, which leads in many cases to churn.

[00:09:48] Lior: And that churn problem that today is pretty much the same as it has been 10 years ago, which is almost 25 to 30% annually. That's the average in the industry today in terms of how many properties we're losing today as property managers. So in that aspect, like you think to yourself, okay, what's causing that?

[00:10:09] Lior: And that was the question that always led me to ask all my property management partners. Why are you losing so many clients? Like, we know we're doing an awesome job as your asset manager and you know, but like why is this a big problem in your business today? Yeah, and a lot of it was always due to owner sales or to owner experience, which we were solving a lot for because we were taking care of those owners.

[00:10:33] Lior: So every time they wanted to sell a property, they told us and we were able to sell it inside the other, you know, the network of property owners and clients. And also when they...

[00:10:43] Jason: if somebody wanted to sell property that was a client, you would be able to turn around and sell to one of your other clients so that you continued to keep the property, which is exactly awesome, which is a no brainer.

[00:10:55] Jason: And I'm sure a lot of property managers like say that would be the ideal. That'd be great if I can do the sales, get those commissions, and still be able to keep the property in my portfolio. That would be really great. Exactly. Blanket helps do this, right?

[00:11:11] Lior: Yeah. We'll get to Blanket in a second.

[00:11:13] Jason: I have a question before we continue. You mentioned being in the military and being in the Navy and being Navy commander. I didn't know this about you. So what do you feel like that did to change you? How do you feel like you would be different if you hadn't have gone through that?

[00:11:30] Lior: It will be pretty much everything that I know and everything that I do.

[00:11:33] Lior: But if I were to pick a few, I would say main things that were changed in how I view the world and how I operate, number one is being more rational than emotional, pretty much about everything. My mom even jokes all the time. She says, I'm like a robot, like you know, I'm not driven by emotions at all.

[00:11:54] Lior: And that is one of the things that you have to sort of develop yourself into, when you're dealing with life threatening, you know, situations, you have to be rational. You have to be very robotic, very technical, and that is one of the most important skills that really allows me to face difficult, you know, decisions in life, especially in business, without taking them personally.

[00:12:16] Lior: And, you know, it's business.

[00:12:17] Jason: I love, I love that idea. One of my favorite books lately is this book by a guy named Jerr, this philosopher, and it's called, The Wall Speaks and it's all about building a masculine frame. And it's being less emotional, displaying less emotion, and how that earns you respect and how that makes people around you, especially women, feel safer and everything else.

[00:12:40] Jason: And this is something that just, if you are in very challenging situations. Like war, you know, military, whatever, like you learn this naturally. It's just, it hardwires it into you and. Yeah, exactly. Over emotionality is going to make a lot more sense. It's much more rational. So yeah, I think that's a great principle.

[00:13:03] Lior: I would say even more than that, because probably, you know. The first thing that comes to mind when you hear that is like, oh, I don't want to be, you know, a cold person or a very, you know, apethetic person, like someone who doesn't, you know, acknowledge other people's feelings, et cetera. Sure. I say on the contrary, when you are very rational and you're not clouded by emotions, you are emotionally available to express emotion, to express care, to express, you know, concern about the other person in front of you, because you're not all centered in what you are feeling right now because something is, you know, bothering you and you're like all into that.

[00:13:42] Lior: Instead, you are able to look at the other person in front of you and think how they're feeling. Think what, you know, what can help them feel better. So like when you are rational and you're not driven by emotions, that actually allows you to be a lot more, you know, empathetic and kind and caring.

[00:14:00] Lior: Because you're not centered on what you're feeling and what you're experiencing, then you can really be thinking about the other person.

[00:14:07] Jason: Yeah. I love that. I think in order to reach that space, like it talks about in the wall speaks, we have to get out of this mode of trying to please everybody and trying to please others.

[00:14:17] Jason: And so when we're so concerned about how everyone feels about us and we're too concerned about emotion, then we're trying to please everybody. So I love this idea this first point of rationale over emotion. This is super important in business.

[00:14:31] Jason: And I love the idea that it actually enables you to be a better leader, to be able to take in and take into account other people's emotions and to see things from their perspective, because that's a more rational viewpoint than getting overly, you know, steeped in your own emotion and which blinds you to what others are feeling and what others are experiencing.

[00:14:53] Jason: So you said that's number one. So I'm guessing there's a number two.

[00:14:55] Lior: There are, there are a lot. There are a lot more, but we'll keep to the I would say to the big ones. Yeah. The second thing is this very strong belief. I would say almost religious belief that there are no failures in life.

[00:15:12] Lior: There are only challenges, and every challenge is an opportunity for success. Love it. That whole perspective. Well, it takes time to really live by it, but once you live by it, you don't have stress, you don't have, you don't worry about stuff. On the contrary you're getting excited about things that don't work.

[00:15:33] Lior: You're getting excited about, you know, things that you would normally call failures because you're excited about what's on the other end of that. What's the lesson to be learned and what's the improvement that you're going to bring? So instead of. Being concerned about this thing right now, that it's not working.

[00:15:50] Lior: You are excited, positively about what is going to happen after that because it's going to make you better. It's going to make your business better. So like this whole notion of understanding that at the end of every problem, challenge, failure, that some people might call, on the other side of that, there's always a good side.

[00:16:13] Lior: Like think of it as like a coin, right? Like that's how I try to see, you know, failures in life. On one side you see the failure, you know, as some people would call it. But on the other side is the lesson, and every failure has that lesson. So why be so focused on the failure if you can be focused on the lesson that you're going to learn, even before you even know it? But you know there will be something there. You know you will be better. You know your business will be better. So let's get excited about that.

[00:16:40] Jason: Yeah, I love this idea so much. I often say I either win or I learn.

[00:16:46] Lior: Exactly.

[00:16:47] Jason: There's the only way you lose is if you quit or you give up. That's it. Like, so I either win or I learn. And I love this idea that, you know, after every struggle or failure or uncomfortable emotional experience or challenging, you know, thing in life, if we don't learn from it, then yeah, it's just trauma. It's just a problem. But if you learn from it, it becomes the bricks by which you build your character, by which you build a whole new life and a whole new self image. And if you learn from it, you're destined to not repeat it as well, which is nice. So you learn the lesson. Exactly.

[00:17:23] Jason: And I think, you know, God and the universe keeps giving us the same lessons over and over again, maybe in stronger and stronger fashion until we finally learn the lesson. And I think going along with these two points, which relates heavily is being open and willing to take feedback from others, you know?

[00:17:42] Jason: And so one of the things that I've, realized is that feedback a lot of people think is painful, and it can be really uncomfortable, but I've noticed that when I go to my mentors and I'm open and vulnerable to getting feedback. Sometimes, you know, it can cut pretty deeply, but it's good medicine and that's where I have the most growth and learning.

[00:18:00] Jason: And so I've learned to actually love and enjoy the discomfort of feedback. And so I seek it now. Then I collapsing time on my learning. Yeah, and I'm experiencing the discomfort in that and, but I know that there's benefits to that because now I can see something that I was blind to or I'm experiencing something that I didn't realize. The reason I hire these mentors is because they're at a vantage point in some sort of area that they're ahead of me. And so being willing to get feedback takes somebody that's willing to be really rational and it takes somebody that's willing to see that there's no failure. You are not bad, sick, and wrong because somebody pointed out something that you're doing that's bad, sick, and wrong. Like that means now you have an opportunity to change or improve, which is good news.

[00:18:43] Jason: It's like the best news ever. Yeah. Love this

[00:18:46] Lior: 100%.

[00:18:47] Jason: That's why we get along, Lior. You and I have just been through enough shit to learn some lessons, so. Hell yeah. So cool. Do you have a third one for us?

[00:18:55] Lior: Yeah, let's do a quick one. Leading by example. Okay. Is number one. And I'll actually give a quick story here just to explain how powerful that is.

[00:19:06] Lior: And I think that's also really important for, you know, all of our listeners for property managers. Because in my first assignment in the Navy as a commander, I was assigned as a chief engineer, meaning I was in charge of the mechanics department. These are all the folks that are working the hardest. Like, think of them as like your maintenance, you know, contractors.

[00:19:26] Lior: These are the folks who are going in fixing plumbing, fixing AC systems and like heating systems, like getting really dirty, you know, and like crawling underneath engines filled with like gasoline and stuff. It's like the hardest job in, you're doing the worst,

[00:19:44] Jason: worst job. It's like Mike Rowe's show Dirty Jobs.

[00:19:48] Lior: Yeah. I don't want to be too explicit and vivid. But you're dealing with like pipes of like things that you know Sure. We use for other things stuff and who knows.

[00:19:56] Jason: Yeah. Okay.

[00:19:57] Lior: Exactly. It's bad. It's bad. Yeah. So anyways, so on when I was first assigned as the chief engineer, so the chief engineer in the ship is like the second to the commander.

[00:20:07] Lior: Like if the, something happens to the commander of the ship. I'm taking command. So, you know, you have your respect and your sort of like, honor just with the title, you know? Yeah. It comes with it and you can walk around like, you know, like a peacock. Very proud of yourself and, you know, I'm like, I'm the boss.

[00:20:25] Lior: I'm the big man or whatever.

[00:20:27] Jason: Yeah.

[00:20:27] Lior: Or you can do some other things. And for example, what I did on the first day of me getting, you know, onboard the ship and, you know, getting the role and getting command of the ship. So the first thing that I did was like every day we have like an hour at the end of the day that we're cleaning the entire ship.

[00:20:46] Lior: And part of cleaning the ship is also for the mechanics department. Is getting below the engines that run the ship and cleaning all the oil residue that builds up there. So you have to literally, you know, take a lot of like cloths and sheets and just like, dive into the oil and just push it out.

[00:21:04] Lior: Wow. So like you get out black, like completely black. And normally the ones who are doing it are the youngest, you know, mechanics and the youngest soldiers on the ship because it's like, you know, it's a newbie. Don't have seniority.

[00:21:16] Jason: And they're new and you give them the worst job. They get the shit job.

[00:21:19] Lior: Exactly. So what I did, I went and got beneath the engines myself. Yeah. And it, it became a show. All the soldiers came to watch. Oh man, the chief got beneath the engines. He's crazy. What is he doing? It was a shock, but nobody forgot that. Like my soldiers up until today, were like best friends or like my little brothers, they remember this until today, this little thing that I never done after that again, by the way, I did it once.

[00:21:48] Lior: Yeah. But they never forget it. And that sets so many examples in terms of what I expect from them in terms of ownership, you know, and values and teamwork and not being afraid to take on, you know, jobs that, that are like beneath me or whatever. That was such a powerful message without me even saying a word.

[00:22:08] Lior: Yeah. So think of yourself as a property manager. Like what things you can do like that, that you need to do only once maybe in your life, you know, and show your employees that you're not afraid to get dirty and do the hard work and really show them that nobody should be feeling that something is beneath them or like it's not, you know, to their level or whatever.

[00:22:31] Lior: Like if you are doing that, like who am I to, you know, raise any objections of doing something? Like I'm not the company owner and if the company owner is doing that, I better do that. Right? So

[00:22:44] Jason: yeah, that's a great story. Great example. I. You know, it's a great display of leadership. There's a really good book kind of about this principle called The Motive by Patrick Lencioni.

[00:22:54] Jason: And in he talks about how there's two types of CEOs and there's the CEOs that think because of their position, everybody owes them everything. They're king, they deserve everything. And they end up having organizations that have a lack of ownership, a lack of accountability, and a lot of problems.

[00:23:10] Jason: Because they think they're superior to everybody else. And then there's the CEOs that have the right motive and they understand that they have the worst job in the company because their job is to do anything that's not working and to step in anywhere that there's a problem and they need to be willing to, like you talked about, get dirty and start, like help out at the bottom if that's what the business needs to get clarity or to fix things or to figure it out.

[00:23:38] Jason: And so being able to display that is a powerful thing. Like it reminds me the other day, I'm training some setters right now to do some cold calls for us, do some outreach to property managers. because we're like. The best kept secret in property management. Not all our people have heard of DoorGrow still, and so we're having them do some outreach and they're like, oh, it's really hard.

[00:23:56] Jason: I don't know how to deal with gatekeepers and all this. And you like the subtext says, Jason, you don't understand. This is difficult. So I'm like, cool, let me do it right now. And I picked up the phone and they were watching me on Zoom and I'm cold calling and doing it. And the second call I got first was a voicemail.

[00:24:11] Jason: I'm like, here's how to leave a voicemail to get them to call you back. And then the second call was a receptionist. And I connected with her. I made her laugh. I got info from her about the business owners, what their challenges are. Oh, there's two business owners. Okay, cool. And I got all this information about how many doors they have, everything about the business because I was nice to the receptionist and treated her like a person.

[00:24:34] Jason: And and she was helping me out. She wouldn't give me their cell phone numbers, but I got everything else I needed so we could call back. And I'm like, cool. Did you see how that went? And they were like, well, it's really cool. So yeah, when we're willing to step in and show them how to do something, it can break some of their preconceived ideas, their perceptions, and so yeah, they see a leader and they're like, oh, well the leader can do this and the leader can do this well. Be cause if everybody underneath you is like, yeah, but he's never done this hard stuff, or he hasn't done this, and they're like. There's always that story. Well, he did that worst job, like he was pushing, they're like, what? Yeah, first day? I mean, it speaks volumes of character and it, yeah, it makes your leadership much easier.

[00:25:19] Jason: That's kind of the equivalent of people say, if you get thrown in prison, go fight the biggest guy there, or something like this. Right? And that was the most challenging thing that nobody thought you would do, and you went and did it. And so, yeah, you earned respect. And you know, leadership has to be born out of respect.

[00:25:35] Jason: So these are great principles. This was valuable in the podcast alone. So let's move on to getting into Blanket. And I think this is a game changer. I think every property management business owner should be using Blanket every single one. It's an absolute no brainer. It helps them retain their clients, well retain the properties.

[00:25:58] Jason: So basically keeping their portfolio, even if the owners are leaving and it gives them access to a network of investors. And there's just so many benefits. So I'll let you tell everybody about it because you probably know a little bit more than I do, so.

[00:26:12] Lior: Sure. Thanks. Sure thing. I'll actually do I normally have, you know, the whole spiel and the features and what we provide and whatever, but I think if we already started on such a inspiring, I would say, note to the, to this episode.

[00:26:25] Lior: I'll start with the why. With why we're doing what we're doing, because I think it's important and we, and I think we're not doing a good job maybe at explaining the why enough in pretty much everywhere we go about, yeah.

[00:26:36] Jason: People don't buy what you do. Simon Sinek says they buy why you do it.

[00:26:39] Jason: So, exactly. Let's into the why behind Blanket. Why does Blanket exist? Yeah.

[00:26:44] Lior: So the overarching premise is that. Today there is a very big, I would say, failure or gap in the market in our single family rental market. When you look at other asset classes, when you look at commercial, when you look at, you know, multifamily, industrial office, any investors in those asset classes have an investment manager, a professional investment manager.

[00:27:13] Lior: That provides them, you know, quarterly, you know, reports provides them with strategy sessions about their next capital, you know, allocation about their disposition. Yes, they have someone to guide them in a very professional way to their goals and to and to match their needs. The only asset class, the only asset class that does not have the function of an investment manager is single family.

[00:27:40] Lior: Yeah. And that's especially the asset class that needs it the most because 99% of all single family rental owners are mom and pop investors. Institutional players own, roughly, depending on which source you're reading, but roughly between one to 2% of all the single family rental properties across the country.

[00:28:02] Lior: The most is owned by mom and pop investors. The people who need that guidance the most. And they don't have that, which is why they're making mistakes, which is why they have maybe sometimes, and I bet all the listeners can agree some unrealistic expectations of what a property manager should do. And that creates a big gap that the only one losing or not the only one, but like the two people that are losing from the situation is that mom and pop owner and us, the property manager, because we then lose a lot of clients.

[00:28:36] Lior: And it's sort of like this identity crisis where we as property managers are perceived as service providers, as rent collectors, as toilet fixers, but we are held accountable as if we're the investment managers. Like, you know, why am I losing so much money on this property?

[00:28:57] Lior: It's all you. It's all about you. You didn't, you know, collect the rent. You didn't rent it on time. Yeah. Why it's vacant. Like with all due respect, you are the one who bought this property. You know, you bought it in this problematic area. You bought a very old property that never replaced the roof, never replaced the ac, and it is a very bad shape in a very bad neighborhood.

[00:29:17] Lior: Like there is a limit to what I can do for you at the end of the day. But the problem is that we as property managers, we're stuck in this middle where we are held accountable. As if we're their investment manager, but we're perceived as just a service provider, which is the most difficult position to be at.

[00:29:34] Lior: Now, how does that connect to our why? When I started doing real estate again, remember that like my personal why my grandparents, right? I wanted to build a real estate portfolio that will allow me to give them at least one property from which they can live off. To act as their pension. Sort of like plan.

[00:29:53] Lior: And as, as more as I grew up in this industry as an operator, as sort of like a property manager without all the headaches of operation, you know, just acting as the owner relationship manager. I understood that if there was a platform, you know, back then when I was just dreaming about it, if there was a platform that will empower the property managers to become investment managers for their clients. I know that my parents and my loved ones can be in good hands because if those property managers that manage my grandparents' homes can tell them what to do based on, you know, what's happening with the property, when should they renovate, maybe, when should they sell, when maybe when should they refinance and cash out?

[00:30:40] Lior: Or maybe when should they buy another property or any other question that is sort of like surrounding the investment life cycle or the investment journey, right? I know that their sort of like goal of retiring financially safe can be handled because there is no one else who will take care of that. The agent who maybe, you know, sold them that property, he has no vested interest in the long term.

[00:31:05] Lior: He's doing a transaction and he's done. Out. The lender, same thing. He got the origination fees, he secured the loan, he's out the window and they're out. Nobody besides the property manager has a long-term vested interest in the wellbeing of the property owner. So for us, this is what motivates our entire team. We understand that if we'll be able to empower our partners, our property managers into investment managers, we will take care of our loved ones.

[00:31:36] Lior: We will make sure that they will be in good hands and this is the why, because there is a gap that only property managers can fill. And this is that the gap of a missing investment manager for the investors that are the least experienced, that need the guidance the most, this is what we wake up for, this is what we work for.

[00:32:00] Lior: This is everything that, you know, leads in every decision making intersection or like point in our company's life cycle. Yeah, I love it.

[00:32:08] Jason: This is why we come to leaders. This is why people come to a property manager. They're looking for leadership, they're looking for guidance. And when you're at that peak of customer satisfaction, customer service, that's where you are an advice giver, where you're giving advice, not just like the title of this episode is from Rent Collector to Asset Manager, and the idea is:

[00:32:32] Jason: if you can go from just being somebody that keeps the rent coming to helping them manage the asset, you are already head and shoulders above other management companies. So if you can present yourself as an asset manager, and I've had a podcast episode with a client who's very good at doing this, he is able to assess their property.

[00:32:51] Jason: We have this really cool tool called the ROI calculator. He'll help show them whether it's performing properly, what the long-term benefits are. What the tax benefits are, and so he can help them assess the property and they already just view him as an expert instead of wanting to work with any other management company.

[00:33:08] Jason: So a lot of you feel like you're competing with other management companies because you're doing cold lead marketing stuff that probably doesn't work very well. And if you're doing that, reach out to DoorGrow, we'll help you fix that problem. But there's plenty of business out there. There's no scarcity.

[00:33:20] Jason: But if you do feel like you're competing with other companies, one way to set yourself head and shoulders above the rest is to no longer be a property manager that just collects rent and coordinates maintenance, but to be an asset or portfolio manager for this investor. So, how does Blanket help with this?

[00:33:37] Lior: I think we nailed it. We are right on point. And I love,

[00:33:40] Jason: I love it. I mean, everyone needs to realize this is the motivator. This is the reason. Because property managers, if you want to have an easier time closing deals, you want to retain clients, keep clients trusting you, and if clients trust you as an asset manager, they're way more hands off.

[00:33:56] Jason: They don't try to manage the manager, they stop trying to micromanage you because they look at you as the advice giver and as the advisor instead of thinking, this is just somebody that works for me that I now need to manage and make sure they're not stealing from me and they do it my way.

[00:34:11] Lior: Exactly.

[00:34:11] Lior: So we are really tackling this mission from two angles and the understanding here is that. As you said, if you are acting as a trusted advisor, if you're acting as an asset manager and your clients appreciate you as one, you will have less churn and you will grow a lot faster. So when we're thinking about these two, you know, functions of your business, on the one hand churn and on the other hand, growth, these two things always go together in property management.

[00:34:47] Lior: Why? Because if we're looking at the average,

[00:34:49] Jason: and let's explain churn real quick for, because some people, this is a new term for them, they're like, what does this mean? Churning? So churn means you're losing business, you're losing clients, they're churning out. So this is the rate at which you're losing clients every year.

[00:35:03] Lior: Exactly. Exactly. It's how many doors you lost technically, again, no matter what the reason, but like you lost the door, you know that's churn. So in property management there is a very unique and frustrating thing is that you'll always have churn. You can never lower to zero. Why? Because life happens. You might have a client that's super, super happy with what you're providing.

[00:35:27] Lior: He loves you. He loves the relationship, he loves the service. He's getting everything from you, but suddenly life happens and he needs the money, he needs to sell that property, unfortunately. It has nothing to do with your performance, it's just his life. So that property is going to be sold and you're going to lose that, so you'll have churn.

[00:35:46] Lior: So in property management there always be churn and it's something we have to accept. So that means if you can't, you know, really lower churn to zero, that means you always have to have a growth strategy to offset the doors that you're still going to lose. Yeah. So growth and churn, and. Or the opposite of churn, which is retention.

[00:36:10] Lior: Okay. Growth and retention and property management have to work together always at all times. On the one hand, if we're like, imagine a bucket of water and your task is to keep in full and you have a hole at the bottom so it's leaking. Okay? Yeah. So you always have to work on closing that leak.

[00:36:31] Lior: But you always have to keep pouring more water to keep it at the same level. That's pretty much the secret. That's how Blanket is built. We have two packages, one called Retain and the other called Grow. Very simple not too complicated on that front. And each one has various features and various products to help you achieve that goal.

[00:36:53] Lior: So, for example. And by the way the combination of these two, this is what allows you to be that ultimate asset manager to your clients, right? That can help your clients, first of all, optimize their portfolio and generate more cash flow, and forget about a lot of headaches that come with property investing, but on the other hand, help them make more money by expanding their portfolio, buying more properties, and growing it.

[00:37:20] Lior: So the combination of these two packages, that's what helps you allow, you know, what helps you be an ultimate asset manager. Now, what do each one of those packages do? So the Retain package gives your clients a branded investor dashboard. So it has your logo, it has your face, nobody knows who Blanket is, and that investor dashboard gives your clients real time performance metrics.

[00:37:42] Lior: It allows them to see how their properties are really doing. Through an integration with their property management software and through pulling a lot of data from title companies, public county records, and national data providers that allow them to really see every property related transaction in real time from their mortgage payments, their property taxes, their insurance, their HOA and everything that you're tracking as well in your property management software.

[00:38:07] Lior: So that way they can see exactly what's their net cash flow every month. They can see their property's value and how much it appreciated this month. And they can also see how much equity they have in their homes so that whenever it's time for them to take the next step, they can quickly press on the cash out button and refinance and extract the equity that they have in those proceeds and buy another property with that.

[00:38:30] Lior: So that's part of the retained package that is owner facing. All the rest of the features are property manager facing, meaning your team is going to use them. But one thing I forgot to mention on that front, on the sort of like investor dashboard that your clients are getting, we also are doing what we call white labeled email communications.

[00:38:52] Lior: So remember that story of me handling owner communications for property managers? This is where it comes from, and the understanding that your clients are used to a very bad, sort of like foundation of communication, which is I'm either getting an email about me having to pay for something I need to fix right now, and you're asking, you know, my money, or I'm getting an email with the owner statement, with that accounting view that I can't really understand and I'm getting just more confused instead of actually getting value from it.

[00:39:24] Lior: Plus, it never shows me the full picture because it only shows me, you know the fees that you're charging, maintenance and like the rent, I don't see exactly how my property is doing. So it's really not a value. So like this is the foundation of the relationship. So if you are not providing your clients with additional positive touch points, how can they appreciate what you're doing for them?

[00:39:45] Lior: because that's what they get. It's like, it's very the energetic I would say, you know, frequency of, from all these emails and touch points, getting them is negative. Like that's what they get. So what we're also doing, we're doing white labeled email communications as well. Again, it's your logo, it's your profile, it's your name that sends them, for example, a monthly report or update on how much their property is appreciated in value.

[00:40:08] Lior: It sends them, you know, some like tips on how to utilize the platform and how to really be on top of things and always be in control of how your properties are really doing. A lot of these things that are just, yeah, just like, it's automated. You don't have to do anything. So like, it just gives them more transparency and feeling of, I'm in control, right?

[00:40:28] Lior: Like I'm in control. I know how things are doing, like, and if there's something I need to do,

[00:40:32] Jason: which reduces their anxiety. The number one reason owners are constantly calling you, being interruptive, trying to micromanage you, is because they are anxious. Exactly. If you can reduce their anxiety. By increasing their awareness and their trust in you, it's a no brainer.

[00:40:47] Jason: It's going to lower your operational costs dramatically.

[00:40:51] Lior: Exactly. So that's on the owner facing side of things. In the retain package, the team facing sort of like tools, they provide you two main things. There are two products within the retain package that your team is going to use. One is our portfolio manager.

[00:41:06] Lior: Think of it as like an asset management dashboard. And the other one is our AI risk manager. So this one, you know, think of it as like your churn, you know, mitigator, and each one of them provides you two aspects of the same owner. The asset management dashboard shows you the health of every owner's property.

[00:41:29] Lior: The churn manager or the risk manager shows you the risk of every property of churning. So the asset management dashboard will show you. Right.

[00:41:39] Jason: So the risk of them that like how likely they are to maybe start paying attention to maybe selling it, things like that.

[00:41:45] Lior: Just leaving, yeah. The risk of them leaving.

[00:41:47] Lior: So, okay, let's maybe start with that because that's really, you know, one of the coolest products that we have. So the AI Churn Manager technically shows you the churn risk of every owner. Okay. Pretty much the risk of every owner from leaving you with ai, which takes in a lot of data. A lot of data from the communications with that owner to the property performance of that owner, everything that goes into whatever is related to that owner is taken into account and then it shows you the risk, but it also shows you the client value of that owner, meaning how much revenue this owner is generating your company.

[00:42:25] Lior: Because we're integrated into a property management software, we know that revenue per unit of every property, so we can tell you how much every owner is worth for you. So the combination of these two elements of the churn risk and the client's value can really give you the ability to prioritize on whole, on who you are going to focus on first, and then you can really focus on the ones who are at high risk and high value.

[00:42:50] Lior: And now what are you going to do next? Next, what that AI Retention Manager does for you is it also tells you exactly what to do to retain this owner. For example, let's say you have an owner that has a property that's currently undergoing a renovation, and he also has a mortgage in place, so he's losing money every month.

[00:43:10] Lior: He's stressed. He might be thinking to himself, you know, why did I get into this whole thing? You know, I'm just losing money. I'm taking money outta my pocket every month. It's painful. So the AI will notice that and tell you something like, Hey, Jason, because A, B, C, D, what he should do is send this owner a link to his performance, which is one of like the features we have in that investor dashboard is like the forward looking performance of this property, right?

[00:43:35] Lior: Send him a link to his performance so he can see that he should hold onto this property and not sell it right, because he's going to make a lot of money and waive two months of management fees. And again, those fees wouldn't cover for the losses, right? But it would show the owner how committed you are to his financial wellbeing.

[00:43:54] Lior: So those are the things that the AI can tell you to do based on the retention policy that you will set in the beginning by answering questions that the AI will ask you to understand how you're thinking, what's your approach to retention. And lastly, when you'll see that recommendation, it will also draft you an email or a phone call script with your tone of voice.

[00:44:15] Lior: So all you have to do is like literally hit send or just call them and read the script. So that's what the ai retention manager does for you. Okay, cool. And the asset management, you know, dashboard, which is that portfolio manager, that shows you just the overall performance of all your properties. And it can show you, for example, which properties are underperforming, meaning which properties are in negative cash flow position, so that you can reach out to these owners and tell them something like, Hey Jason, I see that this property is really not doing well.

[00:44:42] Lior: We tried this, we tried that. We tried this. Why not think of 10 31, exchanging this property. Let's change it to a better property, one that wouldn't have all these headaches that we're going through. Two, it will be able to yield higher cashflow for you because we'll be able to charge a higher rent, you know, property in a better condition, so less expenses, and three, maybe even this will be a property in a better location, so more appreciation, potential, right? So like three wins for you, Mr. Owner, and to me, two wins because I'm getting the commissions maybe from both sides, right? Plus I'm getting a new door that might have a higher revenue per unit.

[00:45:21] Lior: Or maybe there's enough faculty or which just more operational

[00:45:24] Jason: cost. Yeah, just easier to deal with. So like it's a winner. Also, maybe you could convert all the shitty properties in your portfolio and the easier properties to deal with.

[00:45:34] Lior: And that's the thing I always tell to all of our clients, think of this as like your blueprint to building the portfolio of your dreams.

[00:45:42] Lior: Because it shows you which properties are underperforming. It shows you which properties have a high maintenance income ratio. So you can see which owners are really spending a lot of money on maintenance compared to how much money they're making in rent. And by the way, if, for example, if you have a maintenance division or you're charging markups on renovation, those properties are an additional revenue stream that you cannot reach out to all those owners and tell them.

[00:46:05] Lior: Hey, Jason, like we're spending a lot of money on maintenance in the past couple of years. Let's think about, you know, reinvesting some of that cash flow and, you know, improving the property's condition, which is, you know, revenue for your company as well. So that what that, you know, asset management dashboard allows you to do is to see which properties are performing well, which properties are performing, you know, bad.

[00:46:25] Lior: And for those that are performing well, you'll see things like, you know, which owners have a lot of equity trapped in their home? So that maybe when interest rates go down a little, you can reach out to them and say, Jason, like, look at this. Remember you said you want to build, you know, to grow your portfolio?

[00:46:40] Lior: Interest rates have gone down right now and you have like $300,000 in equity. Let's step into that equity refinance, take the proceeds and buy another property in our area, which we have access to a lot of off market inventory here, which leads us to the grow package now. So that's the retain

[00:46:57] Jason: package that grow package.

[00:46:58] Jason: I'll run through it quickly. I want all of my clients listening to this to be using Blanket like I want they all should be. This just is an absolute no brainer.

[00:47:08] Lior: Yeah. We definitely, by the way, it's not like I want to also give a shout out to all of our clients and all the folks that were with us from the start.

[00:47:15] Lior: It's not like we are, you know, so smart and we had the solution for everything. This is a lot of hard work and sweat. By listening to all of our client's feedback and what they need the solutions to their like day-to-day problems and needs that they always experience and just never have the opportunity to really do it at scale.

[00:47:33] Lior: Right? So, yeah. Back to the growth package. So that was the retained package, just as a summary. Two owner facing, you know, propositions, which is the investor dashboard and the branded owner communications, and two propositions for your team, which is the asset management dashboard and the AI retention manager.

[00:47:51] Lior: On the growth package, you also have two owner facing tools. One is the investment property marketplace, which is also white labeled with your logo. And this marketplace technically shows all your clients because it's closed only to your clients or anybody you invite to it. And we'll cover that in a second. But your clients who are in that marketplace see all the properties, all the off market properties that are for sale in your area.

[00:48:16] Lior: So that way whenever they decide to buy another property, that will be a property that you're going to manage for them. So the marketplace. Acts as like this, you know, main tool for number one, capturing owners who want to sell. Remember what we started, we, you know, we want to capture the owners who are selling so we can at least, you know, get that commission or better get that commission and sell it to one of our other clients and retain the management of that unit.

[00:48:41] Lior: But it also allows your clients to buy more properties. Now you're probably asking, you know, okay, where do those properties come from? So we source inventory on a national level from the largest wholesalers, turnkey providers, home builders for sale by owner feeds, anything that's off market, we are pretty much sourcing it across the country

[00:49:03] Jason: Is Blanket using investors that they can list their properties in this as well?

[00:49:09] Lior: So your clients, whenever they list their property, they will be at the top. They are what we call the exclusive properties category. So they are at the top.

[00:49:17] Lior: We are pushing them always front face and center. They're the first ones for all your other clients to see, to increase the chances of them buying that from your clients and retaining the management of the unit. So all those properties that we have are all off market and. Yeah. Then this allows you not only to give it to your clients, but you can also invite anybody you want to it.

[00:49:37] Lior: So maybe you have a list of leads that you bought in the past, you know, some cold leads or whatever. Or maybe you have friends and family that are interested in buying a property and working with you, or maybe you're going to like a BiggerPockets, you know, meetup or conference with investors or whatever.

[00:49:51] Lior: They're always on the hunt for off market properties. So what you can do, you can invite them to the marketplace as a prospect. So like as a visitor, and once you invite them. And they log in, it appears as a prospect lead that you can then call them and say, Hey, Jason just saw you logged into our marketplace.

[00:50:07] Lior: Hope that you liked it. By the way, if you have other properties in our area, I would love to send you some, you know, special friend, you know, discount for our property management services. And now you have a different conversation that is based on, you know, what your brand can offer them. So that's the marketplace.

[00:50:24] Lior: And as you can see, the marketplace, technically what it does, it generates you leads, buyer leads, seller leads, prospect leads, et cetera. And what we provide is also sort of like a CRM feature that allows you just to keep track of all those leads, engage with them, or integrate with your existing CRM.

[00:50:40] Lior: So folks might be using different systems we can integrate and push all those leads to your system. And lastly, the last feature that is also used by your team, by your BDM, or by yourself if you're starting out, is what we call our referral management system. So this system takes in all the agents in your area and pulls in information about them from the MLS and many other sources, and shows you, for every agent in your market, how many transactions they sold in the past two years, how many years in business, what's the average price of the properties they're selling, their contact details, their website, everything you need to actually start increasing or expanding your referral network that you have already in Blanket.

[00:51:21] Lior: So what you do then. You could start reaching out to them, sending them emails from the Blanket system. And whenever they respond, you get on a call, you offer them, you know, to partner up and pay them referral fees for any client they're sending. And then you are giving them also a user in the system. And that's one of the interesting things. Today, agents are struggling, especially buyer's agents, which are normally, you know, the younger ones in every brokerage because the listing agents are normally the brokers and the most experienced ones.

[00:51:48] Lior: So like buyers agents are having a hard time today with interest rates and with everything that's happening. So you can position yourself as their exclusive off market inventory partner, which they can leverage to be winning with their potential clients. So that way whenever you invite them as a partner, you're giving them access to off market inventory that they can't find anywhere else.

[00:52:13] Lior: And that way whenever they bring on clients, they're sending them through the system and with a click of a button directly to you, you get those leads. They get paid through the system with that referral fee that you've set and agreed to with them, whether it's $500, 250, whatever. And the cool thing about it is that it has also automated updates to the agent every time one of the referrals inquired about a property they want to buy or to sell, assuming you promise them, you know, to return that lead back to them when it's selling. So that way you are making them happy. Those referrals are happy and you are able to really grow, you know, your referral network with everything within your ecosystem.

[00:52:51] Lior: And be that center of the ecosystem, be that asset manager. Nice. So that's the goal package as well.

[00:52:57] Jason: That's super awesome. So cool. This Blanket sounds like an awesome tool. You've shown it to me. I think it's really a brilliant idea. I think every property manager should be using it. It's a no-brainer.

[00:53:08] Jason: How do people get started with you? How do people get in touch?

[00:53:12] Lior: So you can either visit our website: Blankethomes.com and just schedule a quick, you know, 15 minute discovery call. You know, just listen to what we can offer so we wouldn't waste your time. And just understand if it's the right thing for you.

[00:53:26] Lior: And then you can either just, you know, send me a LinkedIn message, send me a dm, pretty much on every social media platform. I'm not really responding very fast. And we could just get on a call. And I also invite anybody that wants you to just, you know, even if they're not interested in Blanket, right?

[00:53:41] Lior: Like if you're thinking to yourself maybe it's too much for me. Maybe it's too expensive, I don't have the bandwidth right now, but you want to brainstorm about, you know, how to be more investor, you know, investment manager mindset as like guided property manager, how to be more of an asset manager.

[00:53:56] Lior: This is my passion, this is what I've been doing my entire life. Like, if you want to just brainstorm, shoot me a message. Like I can talk about this for hours, so, you know, I'll be happy to help anybody that needs that. Even if you're not a Blanket client, again, you don't have to be a partner of ours to really just, you know, get inspired and, you know, learn from other people's mistakes.

[00:54:14] Lior: And we've done quite a few.

[00:54:16] Jason: Awesome Lior, thanks for being a guest here on the DoorGrow Show podcast appreciate you hanging out with us. So, if you are watching this and you felt stuck or stagnant and want to take your property management business to the next level, reach out to us at DoorGrow, also join our free Facebook community.

[00:54:33] Jason: It's just for property management business owners at doorgrowclub.com. And if you've found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review. We'd really appreciate it. Until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone, so let's grow together. Bye everyone.

View Details

DoorGrow has been helping property management business owners transform and grow their businesses for over a decade… what’s changed?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull explore some of the things DoorGrow has been working on in the last 5 years to innovate the property management industry.

You’ll Learn [01:24] Why DoorGrow Continues to Innovate

[06:94] Helping Property Managers Avoid Common Mistakes

[13:23] Changes and Improvements to the DoorGrow Mastermind

[21:52] Innovative New Sales Strategies

Quotables “A lot of people think, ‘I just need more leads. I just need to turn that on.’ And they ignore this hose that has six major leaks in it.”

“If you ask them the right questions, people will basically sell themselves.”

“It's like when you go to a buffet, you're not going to eat everything at the buffet… You only want to eat the things that you want right now.”

“You are the sum of the five property management business owners that you're the most connected to.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: Do you have any idea how powerful it is to be connected to a coach? 24 hours a day? Like there is no time in the world that you cannot message us.

[00:00:08] Jason: All right. We are Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improved pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses and we run the leading property management mastermind for the industry with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry.

[00:00:59] Jason: At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:01:09] Jason: At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management, business owners and their businesses.

[00:01:13] Jason: We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:24] Jason: Alright, so today, what are we talking about, Sarah?

[00:01:28] Jason: We're talking about what's new.

[00:01:30] Jason: So we've helped a lot of clients in the past, and if we've helped you three, five, maybe 10 years ago, there's been a lot that's changed at DoorGrow because we innovate and make changes pretty quickly, right?

[00:01:44] Jason: And we've got systems for innovation in our business. And so, I think this is why we have the most comprehensive program in the industry and why nobody else can keep up with our pace and our level of creating and innovating and adding new stuff. And so a lot of you maybe have listened to this podcast a bit, maybe a while, maybe you're past clients. Maybe you've never worked with DoorGrow, but I'm going to talk about some of the stuff we've implemented since somebody was maybe a client in our older programs, like our seed program, or maybe did some initial marketing stuff with us back in the day. And so we're going to chat a little bit about what's new since then.

[00:02:24] Jason: And so if you are a past client, this will be a great episode for you to catch up on what is new at DoorGrow. And if you'd like us to go deeper, I have a 37 minute video I recorded with slides on this subject going into a little bit more detail, but we're going to skim through some of this and help you understand there's a lot of innovation.

[00:02:44] Jason: So if you had some connection with DoorGrow in the past, since then, we have become the world leaders at growing and scaling property management companies. And especially in the long term residential space. We've become the world leaders of property management branding. Like I said in the intro, we've rebranded over 300 companies.

[00:03:04] Jason: We have launched hundreds of websites, more than we've done rebrands. And so hundreds and hundreds of websites. And we're still the leader in building responsive mobile friendly WordPress sites for property managers, which is the world's leading content management system. And if you're past client, you might be due for a website refresh.

[00:03:24] Jason: We have over 70 different designs you can choose from, and they are clean designs, they're set up so that these sites, we call them seed sites, they're optimized for conversions, they're optimized to build trust. And so if it's, if you have an old website from us, you might be due for a refresh and we can certainly help you with that.

[00:03:46] Jason: And past clients, we'll give you a discounted rate. So we're really great at doing websites for those that aren't a past client. And so, reach out, we can help you with that. And we include websites for free in some of our programs. You still have to pay like the support costs monthly, but the design piece, which normally is thousands of dollars to get a site built, we cover and take care of that.

[00:04:09] Jason: That's included in our mastermind program. Related to that, we've also launched the world's leading mastermind for long-term residential property managers called The DoorGrow Mastermind. So, do you want to talk about this one?

[00:04:22] Sarah: Sure. I guess. Okay. All right. So one of the things that we had launched, what, like two years ago now maybe?

[00:04:29] Sarah: Yeah. Is what we call the DoorGrow code. So what we've done is we've just seen over the many years and over Jason talking with thousands of property managers. He's just amassed a whole bunch of data. And after that happens, then you start to kind of see some patterns. So. What we did is we created this whole map that lays out stage by stage and step by step.

[00:04:56] Sarah: The various different ,I'm going to call them stages, of a property management business. So all the way from, "I'm brand new, I have no doors yet, not quite sure I really want to get started, but I, you know, I don't actually have any clients yet" to, "well, now I have my first client and then I'm growing up to, you know, 50, a hundred, 200, 300, 400 doors, all the way up to a thousand plus. So we've created this whole roadmap, and then if you're in the DoorGrow Mastermind, we also have created some corresponding belt levels. So we kind of like a martial arts system, we've created different color coded built levels that corresponds to both your door count and your income because both things are important.

[00:05:43] Sarah: And what are the things that you need to do at each different stage in order to progress to the next level in your business? Meaning you are making more revenue, you're adding more doors, and hopefully you're stepping back a bit from the things that you're not loving in the business.

[00:06:02] Jason: Yeah, and we call that the DoorGrow code, like we've cracked the code on growth and this is based on talking to thousands of property managers.

[00:06:09] Jason: We started to notice a pattern. So if you'd like a copy of the DoorGrow code and see where you're at and stuck, reach out to us. We'd be happy to send you a copy. Just shoot us a DM on any social platform. Say, Hey. Just send us the word code and we'll, we can send you information about the DoorGrow code and that'll help you get some clarity on where you're at.

[00:06:28] Jason: So that's been a game changer. We used to have this old program called the Seed Program, where we would kind of clean up their business and get it ready for growth. And it used to be a six month program. Some clients would take a year to do it. We've replaced that with a 90 day Rapid Revamp program, and so our Rapid Revamp program is even faster and this is where usually I use a diagram of a hose and there's like a faucet to turn on the hose. And that faucet Or spigot, it usually says lead generation. A lot of people think, "I just need more leads. I just need to turn that on." And they ignore this hose that has six major leaks in it, and so we've identified six major leaks, and so as part of this Rapid Revamp.

[00:07:09] Jason: We spend like three months with clients, usually our newer clients that come on board, we do this first. This is like sharpening the ax before we go try to chop down trees, you know, try to do the work to grow the business, and we're optimizing it for growth and we're shoring up those six major leaks.

[00:07:24] Jason: And the big leaks are branding, reviews, website, pricing, trust, and sales, your pitch. So we call it positioning, perception, presence, pricing, purpose, and pitch. And if we can get those things really well dialed in, we find that companies without even changing their lead gen sources, can double the amount of deals that they're getting on right now.

[00:07:43] Jason: So if you feel like it's been hard and you can't see why, these are usually six major blind spots. And this is why it's been so hard. If we can get this stuff dialed in, even without changing any of the lead sources, however you're getting business right now, you could potentially double the amount of business you're getting on just by getting these leaks shored up.

[00:08:02] Jason: And do you want to talk about pricing?

[00:08:04] Sarah: Okay. Pricing is actually one of the things that we cover now in the Rapid Revamp. And what we've noticed is even companies that grow to a considerable door count, most of the times their pricing is still just not great. I think we have yet to see a business that their pricing is already optimized, so a lot of times, they're leaving money on the table, which is so awful. Because you're working so hard for your money. Yeah. And you're just not making enough of it. And there's some statistics and data from NARPM. If you ever look at the NARPM data and you look at what like the average property manager's profit margin is, it's pretty abysmal. Yeah. And this is one of the reasons why.

[00:08:48] Sarah: It's not the like the only reason, but it's one of the big ones. It's one of the factors. Pricing. So what we've figured out is, hey, a lot of property managers, they just kind of go with the flow. They do what the competition in their market is doing. You know, they just kind of, sometimes they wing it and they go, I think this is good.

[00:09:07] Sarah: And they put something together. And when we come in and take a look at it, we can find thousands of dollars more per year. So like Anthony O'Reilly Brookes just said a couple weeks ago on the pricing, he's like, oh, if I just do this one change, I don't even have to do all of these changes. He is like, if I just do this one change, then I can make myself an extra $26,000 a year.

[00:09:28] Jason: Yeah. This is one of our clients. It was great. So yeah, so we had an old training. We were the first to roll out kind of the three tier sort of pricing model to bring this to the industry. The basic idea was based around the Goldilocks principle and how it's easier to sell if you have three different types of pricing based on three types of buyers. Pricing secrets, we've rolled out 2.0.

[00:09:51] Jason: So some of our past clients, you've gone through our original pricing secrets. You've have maybe a three tier model or maybe at least three plans sort of. Some of you maybe have lease only as one of them, which we don't recommend anymore. But now we've got this three tier hybrid pricing model and I got some of the idea from Scott Brady, really brilliant property manager.

[00:10:14] Jason: He was using a hybrid model for pricing out associations. I then put my own spin on it based on what I know about pricing psychology. And I believe this is the most ethical and easiest to sell model. And it allows you to be unique and sell against all your competitors and to kind of poison the well against flat fee companies or percentage based companies.

[00:10:36] Jason: And so it gives you competitive advantage and it helps you close more deals more easily at higher price points. So we've got that. The next thing we've made some big advancements into sales. So some of you went through my old Sales secrets training and and this was old school sales, like it was based on NLP neurolinguistic programming.

[00:10:57] Jason: It was based on different formulas of communication that some would maybe calm, manipulative, but the idea, and I would present at the beginning, like, don't be evil. You know, like, these are powerful techniques. Well, a lot of the old school sort of sales tactics of high pressure closing and a lot of training you get from most salespeople and people that are known for sales really isn't working in the last three to five years.

[00:11:23] Jason: And so there's kind of this new model of selling that needs to be done. And because we're in this post trust era, like everybody's been kind of exposed and woken up a little bit that everything's kind of fake. The news is fake. The pandemic's fake. Voting's fake. Like, like nobody knows who to trust or what to trust because we realize we've just been gaslighted and lied to by everything. Especially the government and powers that are over us. And so nobody trusts anything anymore. And so there's a new model of selling that allows you to create trust that we've learned and rolled out, and we get into some cool tactics like the three dominoes to creating the ultimate pitch.

[00:12:05] Jason: I have a model of four phase selling, which is a simple framework for understanding four simple phrases to take people through when having a conversation. And then our Golden Bridge formula, which is even if you learn nothing else, is the ultimate sales hack to just creating authentic trust and connection with somebody, which is the crux of sales.

[00:12:25] Jason: You know? And so this is high trust selling, figuring out your personal golden bridge I've used for years in my own sales and in getting on clients, and it's why people trust me so much. And so we'll help you figure out your own. And then we get into this whole new model of selling, which has multiple phases that helps people get their own clarity.

[00:12:44] Jason: And what I've realized is people don't understand their problems and what they need, and until you ask them the right questions, and so if you ask them the right questions, people will basically sell themselves. You don't have to push, be pushy In sales, this is more about being empathetic, curious, asking questions, and it feels very good to be sold to in this way, if you could even call it selling. It's really coaching. And so I'm teaching you how to do that as well in this training. And then we've also added recently offer documents, sales trackers, like some really cool stuff that we use at DoorGrow to close deals and that are helping our clients increase their close rates significantly.

[00:13:23] Jason: So we made a lot of improvements to our coaching program. Maybe you could talk about some of those things.

[00:13:30] Sarah: Yeah. So there... man, I feel like since I stepped into DoorGrow, we changed everything, so.

[00:13:37] Jason: We did.

[00:13:38] Sarah: Which is great because it's like there's a lot of things that we wanted to improve, and there were a lot of things that we wanted to add. So I think one of the best things for me anyway, is I really love the Jumpstart events. So if you join the DoorGrow Mastermind as a newer client, then part of your launch package is going to be an in-person deep dive into your business with Jason and myself, you spend the whole day together with a small group of property managers.

[00:14:08] Sarah: We keep it small because I cannot do a deep dive with like 10 people or 20 people. So we do a very small group. Yeah, and we really get into the weeds. We get into the nitty gritty. You walk away with a very clear action plan. You know exactly what to be doing, and you just get so much clarity and connection with other property managers that are attending that event, which is really great because after the event, those people, they stick together for a while, you know?

[00:14:36] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:14:36] Jason: Create some nice connections. We rolled out the jumpstart sessions because we started to notice a pattern that when clients would meet us in person or come to DoorGrow Live or conference or anything in person, they would suddenly realize psychologically we were real people. There's just something psychologically about video Zoom calls video trainings in DoorGrow Academy.

[00:15:00] Jason: That's not real to our brain. And so I call it the real bubble. And we've realized if we can pop that real bubble from the beginning, clients' perception of and recognizing that we're real people, then that translates into the things that we teach are real. And the things and the results clients are getting are real.

[00:15:18] Jason: And so they start to get way better results. And so we want to give people that experience from the beginning, and we've got a much better outcome from all of our clients by getting them to do these in-person things towards the beginning of them joining DoorGrow's Mastermind and they're getting way better results.

[00:15:36] Jason: They recognize that this is all real stuff and so they absorb the content in all the information in a completely different way, which is really powerful, so.

[00:15:45] Sarah: And I would also say in addition to that too, though, if you had worked with us prior to what, four years ago? I would say probably four is the right answer.

[00:15:56] Sarah: If you worked with us anytime before that, we recognized onboarding was very hectic and it was, oh man, it's really overwhelming. Everybody was like, "oh my God, there's so much information and I don't know what to do," and then they try to take it all in and they're overwhelmed and they're focusing on the wrong things.

[00:16:13] Sarah: And then they have a bunch of questions and they're trying to like, jump on the calls to get their questions answered. So we did a few things. And the best thing that we have rolled out is. We have a really solid, streamlined onboarding process now.

[00:16:29] Jason: Yeah.

[00:16:29] Sarah: So we take you through a very proven like we have a whole course on DoorGrow Academy on onboarding to make sure that you get into all of the tools. You have access to everything. You know how to use it. Because just because you have it, doesn't mean you know how to use it. Yeah. And then that you're connected with our team. Because there are still some times that people are like, "oh, I didn't even know I could talk to Madi. Oh, I didn't know I could talk to Giselle." Or like, "oh, I didn't realize I could do that." Yeah, you absolutely can. We have a whole team to support you. So we make sure that you're connected with the right tools. We make sure you're connected with the team. You get on like a couple of 15 minute coaching calls with our like onboarding specialist right at the beginning just to make sure, like we're going to walk you through everything. We're going to check everything, we're going to explain everything to you, make sure you're on telegram, make sure you're connected to our entire team. And then they get a brand new thing that we had rolled out in addition that we added to onboarding is our client workbooks.

[00:17:26] Sarah: So one of the things that everybody says is, "oh my God, it's like drinking out of a fire hose." I hear this almost from every client.

[00:17:33] Jason: Yeah. That analogy comes up all the time. It's like drinking out of a fire hose. Like they say it all the time. Yeah. Yeah. They're like, oh my God, there's so much, there's so much available.

[00:17:41] Jason: Yes, there is. So we help them get focused.

[00:17:43] Sarah: And that's great. But it's like when you go to a buffet you're not going to eat everything at the buffet.

[00:17:48] Jason: No.

[00:17:49] Sarah: You only want to eat the things that you want right now. Yeah. And maybe you're like, oh, I'm saving room for dessert later. I know. Like, I'm going to pace myself because I want dessert later for sure. And that's great because you're not ready for dessert now. So it's not that you skip it, it's just that you don't need it right now. So we have a much better system of figuring out what do you need right now. So it's a lot more personalized, it's a lot more customized and then you're able to go through a proven roadmap that's for your business and for your stage. And a lot of that lives in our client workbooks. And that way there's like one place to refer to, you know your belt level requirements. You know your Rapid Revamp to do items. You know what the homework is that you're supposed to be doing. Your sales tracker lives in there and all of your action items and to do items, they're all in there, so you know exactly what to be doing and there's one document to refer to that makes it really easy.

[00:18:45] Jason: And when you talk to a coach, we'll map out exactly what you know, we want to figure out your goals, and then we map out tactical items for you to check off and to work on specific to you. And so, even though we've got some different, you know, paths and formulas and classes, we always tailor this to our clients.

[00:19:02] Jason: And the client workbook really helps that communication. It literally gets us on the same page, right? Yeah. Together. So, we've added client Success manager, my daughter Madi, who manages all her social media, does all our video editing. She is now also our client success manager, and she's amazing at that.

[00:19:17] Jason: So we've had a couple different client success managers over the years and that's really helped improve the connection clients have, the clarity they have, and we also have giselle on our team who can find anything for clients and help them find things.

[00:19:32] Sarah: Giselle is like ai, but she's not.

[00:19:34] Jason: Right. Yeah.

[00:19:36] Sarah: She's the best human AI I've ever seen.

[00:19:40] Jason: Yeah. So, and so we've got really good support systems for our clients. We also now leverage Telegram Messenger. We used to use Voxer. Some of my clients in the past, maybe remember Voxer. So I think we've upgraded by using Telegram Messenger for sure.

[00:19:54] Jason: And it's a lot more reliable. And so we coach clients directly through it. Walkie-talkie style. They can answer questions anytime. So that's been really effective.

[00:20:01] Sarah: And I mean, that's super powerful too because, yeah, this is the one thing that I like, especially in the Rapid Revamp. I harp on this a lot.

[00:20:08] Sarah: Do you have any idea how powerful it is to be connected to a coach? 24 hours a day? Like there is no time in the world that you cannot message us. Yeah. So you can message Jason, you can message me, you can message our whole client success team, including Madi. You can message us any time at all.

[00:20:25] Sarah: It doesn't mean we're going to get back to you immediately. Sure. But we get back to you pretty darn quickly. Yeah. And out of all the communication channels, those are the ones that we check the most. So like Jason will never check his email. So if you ever email Jason, it's a black hole, don't do it.

[00:20:41] Jason: Someone else will read it. Eventually

[00:20:42] Sarah: But Telegram, he checks Telegram a lot. And I check Telegram. I mean, I message people sometimes back at midnight, like if they send me a message at 11 and I'm still awake at midnight, I'm like, okay. I'm like messaging you in bed. I have no problem doing that.

[00:20:55] Sarah: But you're connected very easily and very quickly to a coach who can rapidly answer questions. And it's not, you know, it's not like this cumbersome thing where you're like, "oh, I have to get on a call and figure out a time that works for me." Right? Like it works for you all the time because you just send a message.

[00:21:12] Jason: Yeah. So that's been real effective. We've got three different weekly group coaching calls. We've got a Rapid Revamp class where we're optimizing the product of the business. And getting the business dialed up and ready for growth. Then we've got our Growth Accelerator class that we do. So the Rapid Revamp's on Tuesdays. Growth Accelerator is on Wednesdays, and this is where we focus on just adding doors.

[00:21:34] Jason: We work with BDMs, we work with salespeople, we work with business owners to figure out how to grow and working on different growth engines. And then we have our Friday class, which is our operations class where we get into creating scalable operations so that you can handle high paced growth without the business falling apart.

[00:21:52] Jason: So, we've also added in our Growth Accelerator, we've added a bunch of different growth engines. These are different sort of vehicles or engines you can build in your business that feed you business organically without having to pay for marketing or advertising. And it's actually more effective than any cold lead advertising we've seen to date.

[00:22:12] Jason: We just brought on a client with 6,000 doors that was spending 30 grand a month. Trying to do internet marketing and digital marketing to grow their business, and they reached out to us for help. And so we're giving them a better strategy of leveraging business development managers in each market doing organic outreach, and they're going to grow way faster.

[00:22:29] Jason: And it's going to cost them way less money. Way less. Right.

[00:22:32] Sarah: And for those of you that are doing paid marketing, do you think you can outspend someone who's spending $30,000 a month?

[00:22:38] Jason: Right. And the reality is there's very little search volume of people looking for property management on the internet, and that's what all of the companies are competing in that red bloody water. And there's tons of blue ocean of people. 60% are self-managing. There's no scarcity. And so we help you get these different growth engines dialed in and we've got great tactics like you know, product research interviews, realtor intros, which is 10 times more effective than realtor referrals, which a lot of you try and it doesn't work super well.

[00:23:05] Jason: We've got you know, some clever tactics of going direct to investors. We also launched this ROI calculator that's pretty brilliant. That goes along with our realtor intro strategy. We've got the neighbor strategy. Which helps you get business from neighboring property management companies, which is really brilliant.

[00:23:23] Jason: We've got warm review outreach, which will help you get better reviews, help you increase the lifetime value of your tenants and owners, and help you get more referrals from your existing clients. And so that can be real effective. Any one of these has helped our clients at a hundred to 200 doors a year organically, and you can install as many of these as you want.

[00:23:42] Jason: We've got outbound partner prospecting where you can go after lenders, insurance agents, attorneys, vendors, and another example is groups like one to many sales and how to, instead of walking away from a group interaction where you hope maybe you'll get a lead or a referral or something, you walk away with scheduled, booked calls and can make money.

[00:24:04] Jason: So, cool. So those are some of our growth engines. Let's talk about, this is new.

[00:24:09] Sarah: I love talking about DoorGrow Hiring. We could do a whole podcast episode on just that alone. Sure. And this is not specific just to property management businesses, this is businesses in general. Yeah. They. Really struggle with hiring.

[00:24:22] Sarah: It's hard. It is so challenging and what usually happens is you wait until you're in pain and then you hurry up to hire and then your situation gets worse than it was before. And then, now you've got, you know, some scar tissue and now you're like, oh, I don't think I want to hire. Or like, ah, there's no good people out there.

[00:24:44] Sarah: Like, I've been burned before. And it's because people approach everything pretty much the wrong way. Yeah. So we built this into entire system that's called DoorGrow Hiring. And we'll take people through it to make sure that you've got everything in line that you need ahead of time. So that you can actually be prepared to find the right person. We also give you proven processes to help you find the right people. Including things like your R Docs, which is just a fancy word for job description, your company culture. We build out your application, we put it on your website. We give you like the job postings. We give you an interview guide.

[00:25:20] Sarah: I literally give you the words to use in an interview, these are the questions you're going to ask. This is the order you're going to ask them in, and these are the words you're going to say, and then that is it. We take you like step by step. So we created this whole system in order to help people find really great team members instead of playing Russian roulette with hiring, which is really dangerous.

[00:25:45] Jason: Yeah. So, and the whole crux of it is focused on the three fits, which is finding the right culture fit, skill fit, and personality fit for the role. You cannot create those in people, you have to find them. And finding all three can be challenging and our whole hiring system's built around that. So, just three more things real quick.

[00:26:03] Jason: One, we've focused on the five levels of exit. So a lot of property managers can't figure out how to exit the frontline work of the business, so they end up then selling the business because they're miserable in it. So we help you figure out how to get to there's five levels. We help you figure out how to get to somewhere in the middle where you're happiest and you're out of that frontline work without going all the way to exit five and selling the business and having a lack of purpose or you know, not having the business anymore and then trying to start something new and getting to the same level of problem in the video game and you keep losing against the same boss and whatever. So we help you figure out how to beat that boss in the video game. We also launched DoorGrow OS, which is a really robust planning system.

[00:26:45] Jason: We have found some fundamental flaws in other planning systems, which are a step up. Just having one like EOS, Traction, Rocket Fuel, some of this kind of stuff. We've built something we believe is innovative and far better after working with some of the most brilliant operations people. And, probably in the world.

[00:27:01] Jason: And so this is DoorGrow OS and this is our secret sauce at DoorGrow. And so we're helping people roll out and implement a planning cadence and system and get operators in place that can run this for you, the visionary entrepreneurs. So that your business runs smoothly and you can handle high-paced growth and have goals and get your team focused on the strategic side of the business rather than just being micromanaged through tactical work and task management.

[00:27:29] Jason: And then this is the last item you want to talk about this one?

[00:27:33] Sarah: Well, we've got our DoorGrow Live conference coming up, so I think you did the first one in like 2018. Then we took a break and then we brought them back. So yeah. We run our DoorGrow Live conference once a year, this is our big event, we open it up to clients, past clients, people who have never even worked with us. People who are in and around the property management industry, including real estate. Because if you're in real estate, you should seriously consider getting into property management, or at least knowing a property manager. And if you need to know a great property manager, there's going to be a lot of them in the room.

[00:28:06] Sarah: So, the DoorGrow Live, it's a really powerful event. We bring in some fantastic speakers. It's always very motivational and very tactical, so no matter what it is that you're looking for from the event, you will find it there. And it's a great place to connect and meet people who are doing the same thing that you are doing.

[00:28:28] Sarah: Because that is just such a powerful tool to be able to have a network of people that you can rely on and that understand you and understand what exactly you're trying to do and what you're going through.

[00:28:40] Jason: Yeah, and we have some amazing vendors that sponsor the event. One of them told me this is the only event that they now do of all the property management events, because it's their favorite. It's the best one. Even though it's small compared to many. They love this one and they get so much value out of learning and being at it as an entrepreneur. And so that says a lot. And so, these are different property managers.

[00:29:03] Jason: These are growth-minded people that invest in their businesses. These are not the people that are just trying to have a shitty vacation and escape and go to a bar. These are people that are focused on growth. And so if you want to be around the best in the industry DoorGrow Live is the place to be around the best, and you are the sum of the five property management business owners that you're the most connected to.

[00:29:23] Jason: You know, birds of a feather flock together. So if you're growth minded, you want to be at this event. So, and by the time this airs, for a lot of you, if you're listening to this on Spotify or somewhere else. You may have already missed this year, so, but get your tickets and we've got some cool bonuses that we're giving to people if they attend.

[00:29:40] Jason: So. Cool. That's it for today. If you have felt stuck or stagnant or want to take your property management business the next level, reach out to us at DoorGrow.com. Also join our free Facebook community just for property management business owners. We reject 70% of applicants doorgrowclub.com. And if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review.

[00:30:02] Jason: We'd really appreciate it. Until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone, so let's grow together. Bye everyone.

View Details

How do you handle pests in the properties you manage? Do you have coverage if you or your residents need it? What if that coverage could boost your bottom line?

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Nick Drzayich from Cover Pest to talk about how property managers can add pest control coverage to their resident benefits package.

You’ll Learn [02:08] Insurance-Like Coverage for Pests

[08:53] Adding Pest Coverage to Your RBP

[18:48] Common Problems in Property Management

[24:13] Innovating while Reducing Costs and Boosting Profits

View Details

If you were managing a football team and you had someone with the skills to be a star quarterback, would you have them be a kicker?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss the pitfalls of having dual roles in your property management business.

You’ll Learn [01:26] How to Guarantee Your Team Will Fail

[06:19] Why Dual Roles Often Do Not Work

[09:17] Set Your Team Members Up for Success

Quotables “It's never ideal when we have a dual role, but it is possible in certain cases.”

”Most entrepreneurs, we can do this, we can shift and balance back and forth. The problem is that then we think that's normal. And we expect other people to be able to do that.”

“We make the mistake as entrepreneurs of assuming other people think the way we do.”

“You probably could wear 10 different hats in your business, but you don't enjoy doing probably half of them at least.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: If you have a star quarterback...

[00:00:02] Jason: yes.

[00:00:03] Sarah: And that quarterback...

[00:00:03] Jason: super sharp

[00:00:04] Sarah: can put that ball anywhere on the field with pinpoint precision,

[00:00:08] Jason: right?

[00:00:09] Sarah: Are you going to take that quarterback and make him the kicker?

[00:00:12] Jason: All right. We are Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profits, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 property management businesses, and we run the leading property management mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry.

[00:01:02] Jason: At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:01:12] Jason: At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now let's get into the show. Alright.

[00:01:26] Jason: Sarah, what are we talking about today?

[00:01:29] Sarah: We are going to talk about how you can almost guarantee that your team will fail.

[00:01:34] Jason: Guaranteed failure. And the method to do this- yes- we call dual role...

[00:01:40] Sarah: oh.

[00:01:41] Jason: Team members...

[00:01:41] Sarah: yes.

[00:01:42] Jason: Right? So and so, what's the scenario? What do we mean by dual role? And it's pretty common.

[00:01:48] Sarah: I see it quite a bit.

[00:01:50] Sarah: Yeah. Do you see it a lot?

[00:01:51] Jason: Yeah. I mean, do you want me to explain the idea or you want to explain what you see?

[00:01:55] Jason: No, I just want to know if you see it a lot.

[00:01:56] Jason: Yeah. I see a lot of people make this mistake when hiring. I don't see it work

[00:02:01] Sarah: Well, no.

[00:02:02] Jason: And I see people try to do it, but I see a lot of failure.

[00:02:06] Jason: I've seen companies with, I talked to one the other day with 6,000 doors, which was kind of trying to do a dual role. And I've seen lots of startups try to do more than just two roles. They're trying to get somebody that's like them. They're like, I just need to find the clone. I call that the clone myth, like that's the earliest stage of hiring, the biggest mistake.

[00:02:26] Jason: They're like, I just need somebody that can do 10 roles, 10 things. Someone just like me as an entrepreneur that would love to work for me, unlike an entrepreneur. Right. So how about you? You've helped a lot of our clients with hiring. So what what comes up?

[00:02:41] Sarah: So usually, and let's just backtrack and say, alright, by dual role.

[00:02:47] Sarah: Yeah. What we mean is, Hey, I need to hire someone and they're going to do this and that. So they're going to do, you know, sales and manage the doors. They're going to do the operations and like help me with the team and stuff and then also they're going to be a property manager or a maintenance coordinator or whatever.

[00:03:08] Sarah: Yeah. So take two roles that are not the same thing and mash them together, and this is what we mean by dual role. And this situation gets aggravated significantly if those two different roles are also two different personality types.

[00:03:26] Jason: Yeah.

[00:03:26] Sarah: So if you have someone who's going to do operations and function as an assistant.

[00:03:32] Sarah: Okay. I mean, it's not ideal, but it's possible. Yeah. It's possible. If you have someone who's going to function as like a sales appointment setter and a closer or, and a BDM. It's possible. It's never ideal when we have a dual role, but it is possible in certain cases.

[00:03:52] Sarah: Okay. Where it never works out is what all entrepreneurs think is, "oh, I'm like that. I can do that." Yeah. So somebody else should be able to do that too. Well, I can shift in and out of different roles and in and out of different personality types, and I can turn it on and off like a light switch when I need to, so then that means everybody can, and it's not true. We are very unique in that.

[00:04:17] Jason: Yeah.

[00:04:17] Sarah: So I can also turn it on and off, like light switch when I need to get into something, I'm like, okay. Like let's go. And then when I'm done, I'm like, oh, okay. Get out of that. And I kind of shift back to my natural normal state.

[00:04:30] Sarah: So if any of you guys see me ever in person. That is not my natural normal state. It's just not because it's so high energy. Especially at something like a DoorGrow Live event. Yeah. Like after DoorGrow Live, I crash for about two days, like two full days. This is true. I'm done. I am done. I sleep for like 15 hours, 16 hours straight because I've spent too much time in my opposite.

[00:04:54] Sarah: Yeah. And most entrepreneurs, we can do this, we can shift and balance back and forth. The problem is that then we think that's normal. And we expect other people to be able to do that, and most people cannot do that.

[00:05:07] Jason: Yeah. The mistake that a lot of us make, like you said, is we make the mistake as entrepreneurs of assuming other people think the way we do.

[00:05:15] Jason: Entrepreneurs do this all the time. They assume other people are money motivated, so they try to bonus them or compensate them with money. Most people are not actually. They assume that people are adaptable and can just wear lots of different hats and be entrepreneurial like that way, but that's also not generally the case.

[00:05:34] Jason: And if they are adaptable, usually they go start their own business. So they leave, and I've seen a lot of property managers steal doors from their employers, so their employer's basically just training their next replacement.

[00:05:47] Jason: I love, I think when we don't put the dogs away during a podcast, and I'm being super sarcastic right now.

[00:05:52] Sarah: Yeah. Well, I did say this was going to be a quick podcast, but the food...

[00:05:56] Sarah: so maybe this is a sign we should wrap it up. Yeah, the food that you ordered is probably...

[00:06:01] Jason: Oh yeah. I ordered some food.

[00:06:02] Sarah: ...being delivered right now because it's like six o'clock on a Monday right now. Which is great.

[00:06:07] Jason: They're protecting us from the food.

[00:06:09] Jason: So, while we've got a chorus of dogs in the background.

[00:06:12] Sarah: They're just confirming.

[00:06:13] Jason: Yeah.

[00:06:14] Sarah: They're like, definitely they agree with us. Don't try to hire two different people. So here's the idea.

[00:06:19] Jason: Let's break this down real quick and then we'll wrap up because the dogs are going insane, but. People do not have split personalities that you want to hire.

[00:06:28] Jason: They're not two different people, and so different roles have different personality types, and it's very difficult to find somebody that can jump into very different roles and personalities that would actually enjoy those. Even you as a business owner, you probably could wear 10 different hats in your business, but you don't enjoy doing probably half of them at least.

[00:06:46] Jason: If not most. Yeah. And so that's the idea. So you need to figure out what would a good property manager look like? What would a good business development person look like? They can't be both. What would a good assistant look like? What would a good operations person look like? What would a good maintenance coordinator look like?

[00:07:02] Jason: They can't be multiple things typically, and I think we got to end. Okay. It's getting louder.

[00:07:08] Sarah: They're just dropping off the order. That's all. Now we have three dogs barking.

[00:07:13] Jason: It's not stopping.

[00:07:14] Sarah: So we have a big one and a medium one and a very little one.

[00:07:19] Jason: Okay.

[00:07:19] Sarah: But you know, that's a good example though, is so we've got three very different dogs.

[00:07:25] Sarah: Like Captain is small, he's maybe 14 pounds, and Parker is pretty large. He's about 85 pounds. So would I do the same thing for the big dog that I would do for the little dog? No, I'm going to feed him differently. I'm going to, you know, get him like a different size harness, et cetera. You have to kind of think of roles in your business the same way. If you're trying to treat every role the exact same, it'll be really hard because you'll be like, I don't know, I don't understand. Like that worked with my sales guy. Why can't I just throw more money at this person and then they're going to be better? Yeah. That worked with my sales guy.

[00:07:58] Sarah: Yeah, of course it did. It's not going to work in other roles. And then if you're a dual role and you're trying to constantly bounce back and forth, like, oh, I got to do the sales and I got to like do maintenance coordination and like property management work, like, oh well, which, what am I supposed to do?

[00:08:14] Sarah: What do I prioritize? And then when you get busy, when you get overwhelmed and you get stressed, something is going to not get done. And it's really hard sometimes to choose, well, what am I going to sacrifice? Because both things are important, and I can tell you that 99% of the time, the thing that will be sacrificed is the thing that they just don't like doing.

[00:08:35] Sarah: Yeah. So if they don't like doing the property management piece. Your delivery is going to tank. And then if they don't like doing the sales piece, they're going to focus on the delivery and your sales. You're going to have none. And you'll be wondering, well, I don't understand. Like I hired you to do both and this is why this is that pitfall.

[00:08:53] Sarah: So if you want to guarantee that your team is going to fail, that your business is going to be stressed, and that your team, you are, it's almost a guaranteed like turnover of your team as well because they're not going to, they're not going to stay when they're not happy. And part of them is doing a role that they hate.

[00:09:11] Sarah: The other part of them might be doing something that they really love, but part of them, for part of their day, they're doing something that they hate.

[00:09:17] Jason: Yeah. So to drive this home, it's really important that you don't put people in a position that they're going to fail. And here's a big major tip. If you have somebody that's good at selling, and you're having them waste time doing anything else, that is a really stupid way to like waste a resource. Like if somebody can make you money and bring fresh money into the business and you have them doing stupid stuff like posting notices or talking to your existing clients. You are wasting a massively valuable resource.

[00:09:54] Jason: They would make you so much money they could pay for multiple other team members if you just let them only focus on business development. And so if they can sell, get them just doing that. If they're good at that. If they are good at property management, don't have them waste time dinking around trying to sell.

[00:10:11] Jason: Go get somebody that can sell, that can grow your business. Right. And there's other roles, but we're using these two as an example. But yeah, dual roles work. I doesn't work.

[00:10:19] Jason: I think

[00:10:19] Sarah: that's one of the most common ones. I see.

[00:10:21] Jason: Yeah. It is pretty common.

[00:10:22] Sarah: It's either sales and operations, which like never works.

[00:10:25] Sarah: Yeah. Or sales and like property management. Yeah. Those are like the two most common that I see. And the way that I explain it to people is. If you understand sports...

[00:10:37] Sarah: we're using sports analogy?

[00:10:38] Sarah: We are. We're going to use a sports analogy. Okay. So on a football team...

[00:10:43] Jason: yes.

[00:10:43] Sarah: If you have a star quarterback...

[00:10:46] Jason: yes.

[00:10:46] Sarah: And that quarterback...

[00:10:47] Jason: super sharp

[00:10:47] Sarah: can put that ball anywhere on the field with pinpoint precision,

[00:10:52] Jason: right?

[00:10:52] Sarah: Are you going to take that quarterback and make him the kicker?

[00:10:56] Jason: No, that'd be stupid.

[00:10:57] Sarah: Or the blocker...

[00:10:58] Jason: that would be really bad.

[00:10:59] Sarah: Or a defensive lineman? No way. How about the water boy?

[00:11:02] Sarah: No.

[00:11:03] Sarah: Why would you ever do any of that? Right?

[00:11:04] Sarah: So people who are like, they're like, oh my God, no. So are you going to see the star quarterback doing anything other than his job?

[00:11:13] Jason: No.

[00:11:14] Sarah: Never. Never. No.

[00:11:15] Jason: That's actually a really great analogy.

[00:11:18] Sarah: I know. I'm really smart sometimes. So there's...

[00:11:21] Jason: you're really smart all the time, and you know this.

[00:11:24] Sarah: I do know this.

[00:11:24] Jason: Don't pretend you're humble.

[00:11:26] Sarah: Well, I'm the most humble of all of the Zodiac signs.

[00:11:30] Jason: Yeah me too. I'm super humble too.

[00:11:31] Sarah: No, I'm the most humble though.

[00:11:33] Jason: You're way more humble than me.

[00:11:34] Sarah: I'm more humble than all of...

[00:11:36] Jason: you're the most humble ever.

[00:11:37] Sarah: As Scorpios, we all are. Okay, guys. Yeah. So anyway, if you're going to have your quarterback doing anything other than that, like that would just be silly. It would just be stupid. So if you were watching TV and that's what your team did while you were watching...

[00:11:52] Jason: yeah.

[00:11:52] Sarah: And it's like a playoff game. And that's what happens is you're like, why is my quarterback, what are you...? You wouldn't even believe your eyes. But then that's what you are doing in your business is you are taking your sales person, your star sales person, and you're making them do other stuff. So it works the same way. It's divide and conquer. That's like football teams do this. That's why it's not just a free for all when you get on the field, it's like, all right guys, just figure out how to, no. Yeah, they're specialists. They divide and conquer. Your business is the same thing.

[00:12:22] Jason: That's a great analogy. Cool. So it's super obvious in sports, like you've got some guy, man, he could throw it anywhere on the field. Look how accurate he is. He's not super big, but man, he can really throw it. Maybe we should have this guy just be a kicker. Yeah. That would like, that'd be crazy, but somebody's really amazing kicking the ball.

[00:12:39] Sarah: Some of you guys would lose your freaking minds if you saw that happen in a game.

[00:12:42] Jason: Right? But then you're doing it in your business!

[00:12:44] Jason: You do it in your own business. You're doing it in your business. They're like, well, they could do both and maybe it'll save money and they can kind of do two things, and you wonder why the business is struggling or not growing. So we need to make strategic hires. We need to be make careful hires.

[00:12:56] Jason: We need to get the right personality fit, skill fit, culture fit. We talked about the three fits on previous episodes, but you also want to make sure that personality fit, they are a really great personality fit for that particular role, and you're not trying to hire them for two. All right. Anything else we need to say about this?

[00:13:11] Sarah: I don't think so. We're going to go eat.

[00:13:13] Jason: Cool. So if you have felt stuck or stagnant and want to take your property management business to the next level, reach out to us at doorgrow.com. Also, join our free Facebook community just for property management business owners at doorgrowclub.com. And if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review.

[00:13:34] Jason: We'd really appreciate it. Until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone. So let's grow together. Bye everyone.

View Details

As the property management industry continues to evolve, it’s important to stay up to date on the latest innovations in technology.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with David Normand from Vendoroo to talk about AI’s role in the future of property management.

You’ll Learn [01:29] The AI Revolution

[08:47] The Importance of Empathy and Human Touch

[22:21] Decreasing the Cost of Maintenance Coordination

[32:29] New Features Coming to Vendoroo

Quotables “As any property manager believes, we know how to do it the best.”

“If you're not reading articles and studying up on this, I think that's going to catch you by surprise pretty quickly.”

“Empathy is the magic lubrication that makes everything better.”

“Empathetic reflection and empathy is a magical ingredient.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

Transcript [00:00:00] David: If you're not building AI tools from working with your partners, from being on the ground floor with them and using the data and building tools based upon the data and their pain points and their failures, buyer beware. If somebody's coming to you and saying, Hey, we figured this all out in the lab.

[00:00:14] David: Come use it. Yeah. Right. Buyer beware.

[00:00:18] Jason: All right. Welcome property management entrepreneurs to the DoorGrow Show or the Property Management Growth podcast. I'm Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive group coaching mastermind for residential property management entrepreneurs. We've been doing this for over a decade and a half.

[00:00:39] Jason: I've brought innovative strategies and optimizations to the property management industry. I have spoken to thousands of property management companies. I've coached over 600 businesses. I've rebranded over 300 companies like Bar Rescue for property managers, cleaning up their businesses, and we would love to help coach you and support you and your growth.

[00:01:01] Jason: We have innovative strategies for building out growth engines, for building out your operational challenges, for helping you figure out how to get to the next level in your business and one of the cool tools that I'm excited to showcase today with my guest here, David Norman, is Vendoroo. We've had you on the show before.

[00:01:19] Jason: Welcome back David.

[00:01:20] David: Yeah. Thank you for having me. It felt like years ago, it was only about, I think eight months ago since we did this, so much has changed over the time, so it's great to be back. Yeah, it's great to be back.

[00:01:29] Jason: Good to have you. I know you're in the middle of this AI revolution, which AI is just innovating and changing so rapidly. It probably does feel like years ago, so, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's been crazy. You guys have made a lot of changes too, so, you even changed your brand name from the last time we had you on the show. Yeah. Which was I think Tulu. Yeah. Right. And so, yeah. So why don't you get us caught up on what's going on 'cause, you know, there's been a lot.

[00:01:55] David: Yeah. Yeah. Thank you first of all for having me here today, Jason, and from the entire Vendoroo group of us, which, you know, the team has grown 10 x over the past eight months, which has been awesome. And I just also wanted to start in thanking everybody from what we call our client partners who have jumped in into this great unknown that is AI and is going to be like, how is this going to work in our industry? And so that's really what we've been focusing on the past eight months. You know, it's been a unbelievable journey of both failures, successes learnings and insights. And ultimately we're getting excited here at the NARPM broker owner which is in Denver to unveil Vendoroo. Like this is the coming out party. And so we're super excited if you're going to be there. We have a massive booth that we have set up that we have the ai alliance with other people that are working in the AI space, and I really hope that you guys come over and check it out. I promise this.

[00:02:53] David: You'll never see a booth or a display like we have set up. At the NARPM broker owner. So.

[00:02:58] Jason: Now I want to go attend it. Yeah. Just so I can see your booth.

[00:03:01] David: So, let me put it this way. You may see the robot from the Jetsons walking around the booth walking around the NARPM broker owner, so, okay.

[00:03:07] David: Yeah. Rosie? Yeah. You may see something like that. So she'll be vacuuming with her apron? Yeah. She'll be doing a little social engagement. It'll be cool. So, okay. Okay.

[00:03:17] Jason: Yeah. Very cool. Yeah, so catch us up on what, like, let's get into the kind of the background and the overview for people that have never heard about Vendoroo and what you guys do and how you got into this.

[00:03:29] Jason: Yeah. Give people kind of the backstory. Yeah.

[00:03:31] David: Yeah. Thank you for that. So really the backstory is that, you know, we know of this AI economy that's coming, right? And there was a few of us, you know, I've been in this industry for 18 years. You know, I've managed you know, portfolios of 40,000 doors.

[00:03:47] David: I've managed them for governments. You know, I started off with our own property management. Much like you guys. We started off with 80 doors. We grew to 550 doors in four years. So it was exciting to know that technology that was coming that promised duplication because, you know, as any property manager believes, we know how to do it the best, right.

[00:04:05] David: And so what we decided to do is to come together and say, Hey, if AI's coming, there's two things that we need to figure out. Number one is how is this going to help us show value in this new industry to this new generation of property owners that is here, that is coming, that has been raised in the technology world too, right?

[00:04:25] David: And two, can it actually duplicate our efforts? Can it actually be an employee for us? Right? And I don't care what people are promising about ai, you don't know until you get into what we call like, you know, get into the weeds, you got to get into the trenches. And so that's what we did, right? We went out and we were the guys that grabbed the torch and we said, we are going to take all the risk.

[00:04:46] David: We are going to jump into the mix. We're going to ask people to jump onto the bandwagon with us and we're going to figure this out. And oh my gosh, what an unbelievable eight months it has been in learning and insights. And I can't wait to get into all the things that we've learned about the property management industry.

[00:05:01] David: But that's really what we've been focusing on here the past eight months, right? So we started off with well hey, can the AI assist the va? Can it turn them into a super va? Is that what it's going to be? And, you know, some people were like, yay. And some people were like nay, you know? And so, and you know, because that human failure still was there, right?

[00:05:21] David: And you know, what happens if they left? There was that inconsistency. And then it was like, all right, well what can the AI own? Right? What can it do? What can it perfect? And you know, can AI actually be the last employee that I ever hire? Right. That's really, that's a really cool thing to do.

[00:05:39] David: But the property managing community had some really specific demands that they said that if this is going to be the last employee that I've had, it has to do this. And that's what I'm excited about our new technology 'cause it's doing those things. You know?

[00:05:52] Jason: Yeah. And now you guys have made some big moves. I know, like I've, I have clients that we've sent over to you and they've shared some incredible stories. Like one client, I think he had 154 units or something like under management, and he said in the first day you're of turning on Vendoroo, like it closed out like 80 something work orders.

[00:06:12] Jason: Yeah, like, it was crazy. Another client, they had a little more doors. They said it was like 50 something work orders were closed out in the first day of turning it on. And so, I mean, you're creating some dramatic stuff. Like this is a very different thing than what people are used to in maintenance.

[00:06:27] David: Yeah. Yeah. And really what the exciting part about this, Jason, is that maintenance is actually really easy. And I know people laugh when I say that it's managing communications that is extremely difficult. Okay. Okay. Right, because you have, you know what AI told us about our industry over the last eight months is when we dove in with it and it took a step back and it said, whoa, you guys don't have a data problem here.

[00:06:51] David: You guys have a emotion problem here. There's very specific categories of emotion that are in this space, right? Like, how do you build a technology that senses something? And I know this relates with property managers, 'cause I know this for myself. A property manager can walk into their office, sit down at their desk, and their spidey senses go off and they know something's wrong.

[00:07:15] David: There's no screen that's telling them anything. There's no spreadsheet. They know something's off. Right. And so the AI is like, well, the statuses really don't matter that much to me based upon the feedback that I'm seeing from the property managers. Because the status and the communication all seem to be in order, but there's a disruption somewhere.

[00:07:35] David: So I need to know about people's emotions. I need to understand about is the resident happy? Does the owner feel supported? Is the vendor being directed? And does the property manager believe that I can own the outcome for this? And it was really cool to start seeing its learning and understanding and picking up on these cues where, you know, people say that this is a data-driven industry.

[00:07:55] David: It's really in an emotion driven industry.

[00:07:57] Jason: Oh yeah. It's a relationship and emotion industry for sure. Yeah. Yeah, big time.

[00:08:01] David: And it's really cool to see, and it's really started happening over this past last 60 days, the amount of residents, I was actually just looking at one before I jumped on here, that are like thanking the system, right?

[00:08:15] David: Imagine that, like think of all of us that actually worked with the chat bot at like Verizon. I've never thanked that chatbot at Verizon for being their customer service. Right.

[00:08:25] Jason: And how do I get a representative? Representative. Representative!

[00:08:28] David: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Versus you seeing people, you know, seeing individuals saying to the, you know, saying to the Vendoroo maintenance coordinator, Hey, I really appreciate feeling supported and how fast you acted because you know, there's empathy that's inside of its law and learning. So I don't want to get too much into the details on there. But yeah, these are some of the exciting things that we're working on.

[00:08:47] Jason: I mean, empathy is the magic lubrication that makes everything better.

[00:08:52] David: Yeah,

[00:08:52] Jason: I mean they, they've done studies. Teams, even in working in warehouses, are more productive if the team has a higher level of empathy. Yeah. And doctors perform better. Yeah. If there's a higher level of empathy, there's less malpractice suits, like empathetic reflection and empathy is a magical ingredient.

[00:09:10] Jason: I coach clients to add that in during sales. Yeah. 'cause their close rate goes up dramatically. Yeah. Right. So yeah. So leveraging and like getting the AI to actually be empathetic in its communication. Yeah. When that's probably not a natural skill for a lot of maintenance coordinators to be empathetic.

[00:09:26] David: It's not, it's not a natural skill for a lot of people in the maintenance industry. Right? Yes. Especially when you talk about burnout. People begin developing views of the rental community, right? Like, oh my gosh, they're calling again, and that empathy meter goes lower and lower and lower.

[00:09:41] David: Yeah. As people have been in the industry longer. But isn't it great that you have an employee now that knows that, yeah, it's my duty, rain or shine, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 a year to always operate at the highest level of empathy? I never have a bad day. I never take a day off.

[00:09:57] David: I'm never upset. I'm never short with somebody on the phone, never tired, never like, oh my gosh, Susan is calling me again. I'm going to let the phone just ring because I'm annoyed of talking to her. And it just is constantly hitting that same level of standard. And this is what's exciting to me, is that there are people that that have played around with this and have been a part of what I call the pain phase, right?

[00:10:20] David: The pain phase is that understanding the way that agentic AI works, right? It's input in output. Input, output, right? The more that you're putting into it, the better the results are that you're going to get out of it, okay? Right. It's just like training an employee. So over the last eight months, what we've seen is that the community has trained this to be the level of a person that has now been working in the industry for five years.

[00:10:46] David: In eight months. It's got five years of learning in eight months. Okay. Wow. In the next six to 12 months, we're probably looking at somebody that has 10 to 15 years understanding in the next six to 12 months and understand the level of type of tasks that it can do, especially getting into estimates and getting some other work.

[00:11:04] David: And again, just you know, having empathy in my own life towards the people that jumped in that are like, what is this all about? Like, how does AI fail? Like, you know, there's still people that are involved and it was like this big like momentous train of like, you know, all these people were jumping on and giving ideas and people are in the loop and now it's weeding everything out and the AI stepping in and saying.

[00:11:27] David: Hey, I appreciate all the input that you've given me. Thank you for all your effort. I'm now ready to step up to the plate and to own the outcome. Right. And that's what we're seeing at the NARPM show that's coming out. There's five AI tools. There's a master agent, five AI tools. And you know, I'll give you a couple of pieces here that, you know, we had feedback from our property managers like number one across the board.

[00:11:50] David: A property manager said, if I'm hiring AI as my last employee, that has to work in my system. Yeah. Okay. Right. Like I don't want another, I don't want another technology. Yeah.

[00:11:59] Jason: I don't want a new system I got to get every vendor to use or a new system I got to get my team to use or figure out. We don't need another tool to make our lives more difficult.

[00:12:08] Jason: No. They've got to use our stuff.

[00:12:09] David: They got to use, we have our existing stack. Yeah. So now the AI is fully integrated into all the most common PMS systems. You know, you have a cool chrome extension that you can download and there's a little yellow kangaroo right right there. And it's actually reading the work order that you're working on, and you can literally just ask it a question now and just being like, Hey, did anybody express frustration or concern on this work order?

[00:12:32] David: Right? Because that's the emotion behind the status that you need to know. And it's like, yeah, two days ago Sally said that, you know, she was actually really frustrated about the multiple reschedules by this vendor. And it's like, great, that's a person I should be reaching out to and that's what I should be knowing that a status is never going to tell you.

[00:12:47] David: Right? Yeah. It's in your slack, right? So if I have, if I'm on my phone, I'm talking to my employee and I'm laying in bed and I have a panic attack as a property manager, and I'm like, oh my gosh, did we take care of John's refrigerator and the office is closed? I can't get ahold of my employee. Yeah, you can.

[00:13:03] David: Your employee works 24 7 now. Hey, can you give me an update on the refrigerator replacement at John's place? Yeah, it was scheduled this day. I contacted John. Everything's good to go. You know, go to sleep. You know, like, like that's the power. Full audit. Full syncing. So it's in your platform. That's really cool.

[00:13:21] David: The other thing, it's got to be branded, right? This is a thing that we really learned about, like how important branding is to the community of property managers, right? Yeah. So the communications that go out have to be from your area code that's done. The emails that go out have to have like, you know, your company name and your logo on it.

[00:13:39] David: The AI is doing that as well too. So that's being sent out, which is really cool. So people are feeling like, you know, that loyalty to brand is super important. And also do you know now that the AI can ask the residents to give a Google Review and we can link to the Google reviews and give you instant Google reviews to your page through the ai, which is cool, like how it's, it will know that if the success of a Google review is high on the way that the work order was done, that it's probably best to ask this person and it will send them a little thing.

[00:14:11] David: Hey, can we get a feedback from you? And we link up to your Google review. And it posts that Google review to generate those 'cause we know those are super, super valuable to property managers. So that's actually going out today. That's kind of a little teaser there. That's the emails out now.

[00:14:23] Jason: Nice. We'll have to get you to also connect it to our gather kudos links for clients 'cause then people can pick which review sites. So it diversifies the review profile.

[00:14:32] David: Love it. Love that. I'm going to hook you up with our guy Dotan. He's running that. He's one of our head of product. He's, actually out of Israel.

[00:14:39] David: He's a amazing guy. I'd love to get you connected with him. Yeah. Cool. Let's do it. Cool. And then the biggest one too is like, I need a single point of contact. Right. And we knew that before there was a lot of people were still involved. There was a lot of oversight that was going on there, having that confusion and single point of contact.

[00:14:56] David: Now it's in your phone, it's in your Slack, it's in your phone extension. It doesn't matter what's going on. You have one point of contact. It's your employee. You ask the question, get the answer, Jason, you can even ask for a change. You can even say, Hey, I want to change a vendor on a job and you'll see that the vendor gets changed for you in the system.

[00:15:17] David: You can even say to your ai, and this is the big one: hey how do you triage this work order? And I want you to do this, or I want you to do that. And you just do it right through Slack or right through your PM chat and it makes the change for you. And now you have custom triage and all property managers have the ability to train their own AI for their company.

[00:15:36] David: Think how cool that is. A person with 75 doors now, and the product that's being released has their own AI agent customized for their company, right? Yeah. Like, that's what happened over the last eight months, so you can see my excitement. There's been a lot of hard work in this.

[00:15:54] David: Yeah, that's amazing. But this has been all the effort and a huge thank you out to everybody who's tried us, you know, even said that this wasn't for them at that point in time because those learnings went into what's going to make this product the best product in the property management space and is going to help people leverage sales and leverage efficiencies and blow their owners' minds away in ways that, that we have never thought about.

[00:16:15] David: Oh yeah.

[00:16:16] Jason: Yeah. So I know like initially when you rolled this out, a lot of people were nervous about AI and you guys had kind of a human layer in between the AI and any communication Yeah, initially. Yeah. And so there was like, they had like a reps and a lot of people associated, oh, I've got this rep.

[00:16:33] Jason: Yeah. You know, Steven or whatever is my rep or Pedro and I've got Pedro and like, oh no, what if Pedro leaves? And they were associating with that while the AI is really doing the crux of the work. Right. And so you guys have shifted away from even that now the AI is directly communicating with people.

[00:16:52] Jason: Correct? Yeah.

[00:16:53] David: Yeah. So let's talk about that. So, definitely, so in the beginning there was like, we all had like lack of trust. We believed what it was going to do, but it was like we had a ton of people still trying, like, you know, using qualified VAs, training them. Like, you know, like, you know, if it fails, like, you know, you have to have a person stepped in and so let's talk about that.

[00:17:12] David: So, you know, it was definitely that human layer. And let's talk about where we're at today. It is very clear to us, and the one thing that separates us from everybody is we still believe that humans are super important in this process. Okay? Yeah. And where humans are very important in this process are going to be when the AI says, Hey, I need you to make a phone call to this person for me, right?

[00:17:35] David: Hey, I've reached out to this vendor three times and they haven't responded yet. I need you to give a phone call to see what's going on. Right? Hey, I need you to recruit a vendor for me. I need you to reach out and do a recruitment for the vendor. For me. Hey, this owner is asking questions about this estimate.

[00:17:51] David: I need you to give a call for me. So the AI is basically able, on a standard work order, the AI can handle 95% of the workflow, no problem. Work order comes in, gets assigned to the resident. It gets out to the vendor. It's under the NTE not to exceed. It's great. The work gets done, the resident uploads its photos, the AI says to the resident, are you happy?

[00:18:14] David: Everyone's good. It closes the work order out. Cool. Right. And then if a human...

[00:18:19] Jason: and how is it communicating with the tenant and with the vendor typically?

[00:18:24] David: Yep. So, it's very clear that and this isn't a surprise to anybody. Everybody loves text messages, right? Yeah. I mean, that's just, it's just what it is.

[00:18:32] David: You literally, like, people will get a phone call and they won't pick up and the text will come back and like text back. Yeah, text me. What do you need? Yeah. Text me here. But, so here's the things that people don't see behind the scenes that we'll talk about. So the complexity that went into.

[00:18:51] David: Mapping out how to allow vendors... so a vendor could have like 20 jobs, right? And we don't want to send him like a code that he has to text for every work order so that it links to the right work order. Like what guy wants to do that? Okay. Like that's not how he works. So we figured out how to allow a vendor through AI just to use his regular phone and text anything about this thing. And it's understanding it and it's mapping it, it's routing it to all those work orders because we knew that in order for this to be the last employee somebody would have to handle, it also means that the vendor has to be happy and the same for the resident.

[00:19:30] David: They can just text that they have multiple work orders. It understands what work order it's going to. If it's not quite sure, I would ask them, Hey, is this question about this work order? And they say, yeah. And so there's not like, again, codes and links and things that they have to do. It has to be seamless if they're working with a person.

[00:19:46] David: So yeah, text message is massive. Email is second, and then phone is third for sure.

[00:19:51] Jason: Got it. So is your AI system calling people yet or you or telling the property manager to make the phone call?

[00:19:58] David: Yeah. People are okay with. If they're calling in like our new front desk agent, which if a person calls in and they want to get information about a listing or if they want to get information about a work order or something like that, or, you know, they're okay with getting that type of information.

[00:20:13] David: Yeah. But they are, it is very clear that they are not okay with AI calling them when they're asking for an update on a work order like that. Like that line in the sand very clear. Yeah. And so we have people on on the team. That are constantly monitoring into ai, giving feedback, hitting improvement.

[00:20:31] David: I want everybody to know there is not a work order that is taking place that is not touched by a human at least twice.

[00:20:38] Jason: Okay.

[00:20:39] David: Okay. Right.

[00:20:40] Jason: So there's a little, there's some oversight there. There there's, you're watching this, there are humans involved

[00:20:45] David: And then the ai will when it hits certain fail points, right?

[00:20:51] David: It then escalates those things up to what we call the human in the loop, right? So there's an AI assistant, we there's people now that we're training a whole new generation of people that are no longer going to be maintenance coordinators. They're AI assistants now, right? And so when the AI says, Hey, this work order is not going down the path that I think it should go to be successful.

[00:21:12] David: I'm escalating this up to a human, and so now as a property manager, not only am I getting this AI agent workflow that's standardizing the empathy and the workflows and all the stuff that we talked about in the communications, I also now get a fractional employee that when the AI says, Hey, I need help, I already have an employee that it can reach out to that can make that phone call or call the vendor.

[00:21:36] David: But it's also monitoring the AI for me on top of it. So yes, there is, and that's one of the big thing that separates us apart is that the platform comes with what we call a human in the loop, an expert in the loop and so we're training the first generation of AI assistants in the property management industry.

[00:21:55] David: Yep.

[00:21:56] Jason: Got it. So the AI maintenance coordinator. Has human assistance. Yep. Underneath it.

[00:22:02] David: And before it was the other way around where Yeah. The AI was assisting the human right. And now the humans are assisting the ai. That's what's happened in the last...

[00:22:11] Jason: that may be the future of all of our roles.

[00:22:12] Jason: So,

[00:22:13] David: If you're not reading articles and studying up on this I think that's going to catch you by surprise pretty quickly. Yeah. Learn how to write prompts. I'll tell everybody right now. Yes.

[00:22:21] Jason: Yeah. Interesting. So, now what about this, you know, there's the uncanny, you know, sort of stage where people get a little bit nervous about AI and what do they call it? The uncanny valley or something like this, or right where it gets, it's so close to human that it becomes creepy. And there's some people that have fear about this, that are concerned. You're going to have a lot of late, you know, adopters that are like resistant. "I'll never do ai."

[00:22:49] Jason: What would you say to somebody when you get on a sales call and they're like, well, I'm really nervous about this AI stuff, you know, and they just, they don't get it.

[00:22:57] David: Yeah.

[00:22:58] Jason: I'm sure there's people listening right now. They're like, oh man, AI is going to kill us all and it's going to take over the world and it's going to take our jobs.

[00:23:05] Jason: And they think it's evil.

[00:23:06] David: Yeah. Yeah. I, and you know, I really want to hear that fear and I want to like, again, have empathy towards that. 'cause I do understand that fear of change causes people to get... Change in general. Yes. Right. It's like, whoa, I like everything the way it's going to be. Right. And we are historically in one of those phases of like, you know, the industrial revolution, the renaissance, like the automobile from horse.

[00:23:34] David: Like, this is what is taking place. This is, this will be written down in history. It's massive change. It's a massive change. Massive. So what I would say to them, and not to, not from a way of fear. But to inspire them is there are a lot of hungry entrepreneurs out there that are embracing this head on.

[00:23:57] David: Yeah. That are pushing the boundaries and the limits to be able to bring insights and customer service to their clients at a much higher level. And if you want to compete in this new AI economy. I would definitely encourage you to understand and get in and start investing in yourself now. But understand that investing in AI means having some pain threshold.

[00:24:21] David: Like you got to get in, like you, you need to be able to give the feedback. You need to understand that if it falls short, do you have to be able to give it the time and the energy and the reward and the payoff of what I'm seeing for property managers who've embraced that when they're sitting there and they're going, I don't touch maintenance at all anymore. Yeah, it's wild. Right? And those are the people that in the beginning of this relationship, and there's a few that come to my head, are the ones that were sending me emails constantly saying, David, this is failing me. I believe in this, but this is failing me. And as my technology partner, I know that you're going to help us get this better.

[00:24:58] David: And there is, you know, I have this word down that struggle equals great con conversation, right? Like, and so they had a struggle and that opened up a great conversation and because of that, their technology and the technology is getting better. So yeah, I think that from a personal point of view in this industry, one thing that I want to solve with AI is I think that we can all say that over the past 15 years, we've probably yelled at a lot of vendors or yelled at a lot of VAs or yelled at a lot of people. Let's start yelling at the ai. And then hopefully that the AI will actually eliminate the need for us to ever have to yell at anybody again because it knows us.

[00:25:36] David: Yeah. It never fails us.

[00:25:38] Jason: You know? It really is amazing. I mean, your company is creating freedom for the business owner from being involved in maintenance. Yeah. Really?

[00:25:46] David: Yeah.

[00:25:47] Jason: And it just, and they get used to that pretty quickly. Like maintenance is just running and they're like, yeah. It frees up so much head space for them to focus on growth.

[00:25:56] Jason: It gives them a whole bunch of like just greater capacity. Yeah. So they feel like, yeah, we could handle adding any number of doors now and we know we can still fulfill and do a good job.

[00:26:07] David: Yeah. Fixed cost scaling. Right? That's a term that we came up with is now that you know that I have a price per door that will cover all my maintenance. So if I went in and brought on 75 doors, I know that I don't have to go out and hire another employee. The system just grows with it and I know exactly what my margin is for all those doors. Right. And as we know previous, before fixed cost scaling a property managers is like, I have enough people.

[00:26:32] David: I don't have enough people. Someone quit, someone didn't quit. My profit margins are good. My profit margins are bad. Yeah. And now with these AI tools. You know, you have your front desk employee, you have your maintenance coordinator, you have these fixed cost scales, and now somebody calls you up and says, Hey, I want you to take on 25 doors, and you're like, I have the resource resources for maintenance, which is, we know is 80% of the workload already. I don't have to go out and hire another maintenance coordinator 'cause the system just grows with me, which is cool.

[00:27:00] Jason: So one of the things you shared at DoorGrow Live and you're our top sponsor for the upcoming... Can't wait for DoorGrow Live, can't wait to, so we're really excited to have you back so.

[00:27:10] Jason: Everybody make sure you're at DoorGrow Live if you want. Our theme this year is innovating the future of property management. And we're bringing, we're going to be showcasing, innovating pricing structures that are different than how property managers have typically historically priced, that allow you to lower your operational costs and close more deals more easily at a higher price point.

[00:27:30] Jason: We're, we'll be showcasing a three tier hybrid pricing model that we've innovated here at DoorGrow, and we've got clients using it. It's been a game changer. We're going to be sharing other cool things about the future hiring systems, et cetera. Right. So you guys will also be there showcasing the future.

[00:27:46] Jason: One of the things you shared previously that really kind of struck me as you showed, you did some research and you showed the typical cost. Per unit that most companies had just to cover and deal with maintenance. Yeah. And and then what you were able to get it down to.

[00:28:03] David: Yeah.

[00:28:04] Jason: And that alone was just like a bit of a mind blowing.

[00:28:07] Jason: Could you just share a little bit of numbers here?

[00:28:09] David: Yeah. So one of the first things that we had to do when we started way back in the day is figure out well. Like, like what's the impact of AI going to be us from like a cost perspective, right? Is it a huge change? And so we went out on a big survey mission and we were surveying property managers and asking them, what's your cost per door for managing maintenance?

[00:28:30] David: How much do you spend every door to manage maintenance? Now the first thing is less than 1% of property managers knew what that cost was. Sure.

[00:28:37] Jason: Oh, sure. Right. Because, but then they got to figure out, oh, we got a maintenance coordinator and we've got these people doing phone calls and they cost this, and yeah, it's complicated.

[00:28:45] David: It's complicated. So we built a calculator. Okay. And then people could start adding in that information out into the calculator, and the average person was around $13 and 50 cents a door.

[00:28:56] Jason: Okay. Okay.

[00:28:57] David: Wow. Right, right. So that was where the average person was, somewhere in the low twenties. Yeah.

[00:29:01] David: And others were actually pretty good. Like, I'd say like, you know, some of the good ones that we saw were maybe around like, you know, 10, $11 a door or something along that line.

[00:29:09] Jason: They probably had a large portfolio would be my guess.

[00:29:12] David: Yeah. And also I think a lot of it's just like, you know, I don't know if they were still accounting for all their software and everything that they had.

[00:29:19] David: Maybe they're not factoring everything. Yeah. No, I think if we really dug in, it'd be different. So now we know that, you know, the base package of what people are getting in. The average cost of what people are paying for 24 7 services that's emergencies around the clock is about $7 and 50 cents a door, right?

[00:29:37] David: So right off the bat in AI's first swing, it said we cut the cost in half. Yeah. Okay. Right. So 50% reduction. I mean, to me as an owner, a 50% reduction in cost. That's like. You know, alarms and celebration going off, you know? For sure. And then, yeah.

[00:29:55] Jason: And that's, if everything just stayed the same, like it was still the same level of quality, cutting in half would be a solid win right there.

[00:30:03] Jason: Yeah.

[00:30:03] David: Yeah. That's just like status quo stuff. And now what, with the release of the new Vendoroo product that, that's actually being announced here today. The email's going out to all of our existing clients of all the new features that are coming out now, we're starting to see that. You know that quality is now increasing to where if you were to go out and hire that person, you may have to be spending, you know, 55,000 or $65,000 a year.

[00:30:29] David: Right? So now it's like saying, okay, if we can get as good as what these people are using for their VAs right, and we know what that cost is, and they're saying that's, you know, that's what their factors is. Well, what happens in the next six to 12 months when this is a seasoned person that you would've to pay $85,000 a year to?

[00:30:45] David: Right. Yeah. And right, because they have knowledge of. Estimates and knowledge of vendor routing and knowledge of, you know, it can handle...

[00:30:53] Jason: you've invested so much time into them, so much attention. They know your properties and know your portfolio. They know the vendors. Like you've invested so much into this person that now they sort of have you by the balls so that they're like, Hey, I want 80 k or I walk.

[00:31:06] David: Yeah.

[00:31:06] Jason: You're like, you've got to come up with it.

[00:31:08] David: Yeah.

[00:31:09] Jason: Right. You've got to do it.

[00:31:10] David: Yeah.

[00:31:10] Jason: And you know, because that's not easy to create. And a lot of people, in order to have a good maintenance coordinator, they need a veteran of the industry. Veteran of industry.

[00:31:19] Jason: They need somebody that's been doing this a long time.

[00:31:21] David: Yeah.

[00:31:22] Jason: And that's really hard to find.

[00:31:24] David: Yes. It's extremely hard to find as we know. One of the things that I think that we're doing for this industry is we're actually preserving knowledge that I don't think is necessary getting passed down.

[00:31:33] David: Yeah. You know, there's a lot less people that I think are as handy as they once were in the Americas and so we have a lot of that knowledge. Like, you know, we know that the average age of an electrician is in the sixties, the average age of a plumber's in the sixties. And these guys, you know, they have wealth of knowledge that it can troubleshoot anything that's going on in a house.

[00:31:54] David: And so to be able to try to preserve some of that, so maybe if a person does come in, you know, maybe there's some knowledge sharing along the lines. But let's take it even in another step forward Jason that in the future, you know, the AI is going to know the location of the hot water tank in that house.

[00:32:10] David: It's going to then add it automatically to the system, like. It's going to know more knowledge than they will because it's going to have maps of every single property that's all currently sitting inside of, you know, that maintenance coordinator's head, right? And so it's going to, it's going to actually know more than them, you know.

[00:32:26] Jason: Yeah. That's wild. Yeah, it is. Absolutely. It's the future. Cool. Well, you're rolling out a bunch of new features. You're announcing these today. You've told me a little bit, but why don't you tell the listeners what's changing, what's new, what innovations have come out? What are you guys launching?

[00:32:41] David: Yeah. Exciting. Yeah. So, the biggest one I think is, which is the most exciting is, is Resiroo, which is the first one that actually handles all the communications with the resident and does the triage and troubleshooting. First one of what are you talking about? So we have our products.

[00:32:57] David: So you have these AI tools, right? These agents. Right.

[00:33:00] Jason: And so, you know, every, so think of them like different sort of people?

[00:33:04] David: Skill sets. Yeah. Different person. Okay. Exactly. And so that's when you come and see our display at the NARPM conference, you'll actually will see these five agents kind of in their work desk and in their environments, kind of cool.

[00:33:15] David: Okay. Able to see them right. So the coolest part about that one is we're doing a major product you know, update on that for not only the knowledge base, but we're actually turning that over to the company. We were talking about this a little bit before, and now they own their own AI agent and they can customize it into how they want it to ask questions or the type of questions and the mindsets when it's triaging stuff.

[00:33:41] David: Triaging work orders for their portfolio. Like super cool. So fully customizable to your company, right?

[00:33:49] Jason: So now sometimes the more humans get involved, the more they mess stuff up.

[00:33:54] David: Yes. We make sure they don't mess it up. So everyone's going to learn how to write prompts and they'll submit it into us.

[00:33:59] David: And we have a great team of AI engineers that when that knowledge base is written or what they're doing. We will ensure that it is put in so that it actually produces the desire outcome, right? Yeah. Yeah. So that's a very exciting one. The second one that I'm that I think is so cool, do you know that only 10% of all estimates get approved by the owner without one or multiple questions?

[00:34:23] David: Because owners really struggle with trust when it comes to estimates. Like 10%. Like, that's a really bad number, I felt as the industry that owners only believe us one out of 10 times. Like that's the way I took that. Yeah. Right. And so, Owneroo is what I coined inside, is the estimate of the future.

[00:34:41] David: That really was looking in understanding like what was, what questions was the owner asking when they were rejecting a bid that that we could proactively ask the answer for them to help guide them to understanding the value in this estimate that they're looking at in historical context of the property.

[00:35:00] David: How many other people have experienced this issue? Like, like there's a whole bunch of factors that should go into an estimate and an estimate should no longer be like, here's a cost from Frank. Right? Like, like that was like, like that was...

[00:35:14] Jason: here's what Frank said it is. Yeah. Like that was like from the 1940s.

[00:35:17] Jason: That's good. How do I trust that?

[00:35:18] David: How do I trust that? That was from the forties and we're still...

[00:35:21] Jason: how much went into this decision? Was this just out of the blue, like pulled out of your ass or is this like legit?

[00:35:27] David: Yeah. Yeah. What's the, you know, we live in a data-driven world, so what's the intellect behind this estimate?

[00:35:33] David: And so I'm really excited about Owneroo, which is going to be the new standard for the way the estimates are created. We have the front desk agent which is coming out. So, that one is going to handle phone calls that are coming in, be able to talk about available listings, actual general questions about leases route phone calls over to property managers for you.

[00:35:54] David: So again. Very human-like interaction, great AI voice. Actually. We feel it's going to be the best in the industry. So a person's calling in, just like they're calling your office able to handle all those front desk things. We, we have the PM chat, which is now the employee which is fully integrated into all of your systems.

[00:36:14] David: It's in Slack. That's your employee that you get to talk to. We believe that if you're going to hire somebody, they should be inside of your communication channels. You have the Google Chrome extension that it's on right inside your AppFolio or your buildium or your Rentvine software that you can ask and talk to it.

[00:36:31] David: So, yeah, so we have a lot of exciting products that have come out. And then of course the backbone of all of them in the middle is Vendoroo, which handles all the scheduling, all the communications. You know, a resident asks for an update, responds to them, an owner asks for an update, it responds to them.

[00:36:48] David: And you know, it handles actually the body of the work order. So you have those five tools, we believe are what the property management industry said. If you are going to give me an employee, this is what the employee has to be. This is what makes up that employee. So we say that these tools, these agents were actually built by the property management industry.

[00:37:08] David: And that excites me because if you're not building AI tools from working with your partners, from being on the ground floor with them and using the data and building tools based upon the data and their pain points and their failures, buyer beware. If somebody's coming to you and saying, Hey, we figured this all out in the lab.

[00:37:25] David: Come use it. Yeah. Right. Buyer beware.

[00:37:29] Jason: Yeah. So you guys connect with Slack. They can communicate through Slack, but it slack's a paid tool. Have you guys considered Telegram? I love Telegram Messenger.

[00:37:37] Jason: Alright. Could you do that? Write it down. Telegram Messenger is like the iMessage tool that works on every device.

[00:37:44] Jason: It's free. It's one of the most secure, it's not owned or controlled by Facebook. Like, WhatsApp, like, yeah. But WhatsApp might be a close second, but we use Telegram internally, so I love Telegram.

[00:37:58] David: We'll definitely take that into, into consideration for sure. Yeah, check it

[00:38:02] Jason: out. Because I, what I love is the voice message feature and I can just listen to my team and others at like high speed, but internal communications and it's free for everybody, which is great.

[00:38:12] Jason: So, yeah.

[00:38:13] David: Yeah. I think a lot, for a lot of people it was like you know, who was Vendoroo in the beginning and Vendoroo was like the team of like people that were trying to figure out like how is AI going to work in this industry?

[00:38:26] David: How is it going to solve the needs of our property management partners? And this is why I say to everybody, if you thought about Vendoroo, if you came in and the experience wasn't great with Vendoroo, if you're one of our existing clients that has been with us and you're and you're still moving forward, and we thank you so much for your dedication to this, the Vendoroo product, everything that we've done, everything that we worked at is being showcased at the NARPM broker owner. The email's going out today. This is who Vendoroo is. We are a team that is a technology partner for the property management industry that is helping building meaningful AI tools, specifically by demand, by our industry to help us show value and to preserve this great industry.

[00:39:09] David: For the future in this new AI economy, right? Like we need to step up. We have clients that are adding doors left and right because they're showing their clients that they use an AI maintenance system and their clients are like, this is what I expect from a property management in this community.

[00:39:24] David: Right? And again, Owneroo, that estimate, we believe that in the future. Like, like owners are going to say like, I'm not approving an estimate unless it's like the estimate of the future, right? Like, like that's the new standard. So you got to know what the new standards are and you got to get technology that are going to help you compete with those new standards that will be in your community and are will be in your community in the next week, the next two weeks.

[00:39:46] David: And definitely some really cool products in the next six months.

[00:39:49] Jason: All right. Well, yeah, I'm really excited to see what you guys have been able to create so far. So yeah, it's pretty awesome. Yeah. All right. Well David, it's been awesome having you on the show. Sounds like you guys are really innovating the future. Everybody come to DoorGrow Live. David, are you going to be at that one? I will be there. All right, so you can come meet David in person.

[00:40:08] Jason: We've got some amazing people that are going to be at this. We've got technology people. There's a gentleman there, one of the vendors they created another really cool tool, but he had a hundred million dollars exit, you know, in a previous business, like there's really amazing entrepreneurs and people at this event, so come to DoorGrow Live, get your tickets, and if you do, we have just decided that we're going to give out to anybody that registers.

[00:40:34] Jason: You can pick from one of our free bonuses that are well worth the price of the ticket. Or coming or anything in and of itself, including our pricing secrets training that goes over a three tier hybrid pricing model or our sales secrets training, which goes over how we're helping property managers crush it and closing more deals more easily at a higher price point.

[00:40:55] Jason: And reputation secrets, which are helping our clients get way more positive reviews by leveraging the psychology and the law of reciprocity and getting the majority of their tenants in order to give them positive feedback online. Maybe some others. So you'll be able to pick from these bonuses one of these that you might like and that's our free, most incredible free gift ever that we'll give to each person that registers for DoorGrow Live.

[00:41:19] Jason: So.

[00:41:20] David: Cool. Awesome man. Always great to see you. Looking forward to seeing you at DoorGrow Live and love that you guys are working on pricing because AI is going to make people think different about pricing. It's going to be way more efficient, so you guys are ahead of the curve on that. Great job, Jason.

[00:41:33] Jason: Awesome. All right, so how can they check out Vendoroo, David?

[00:41:36] David: Just visit, Vendoroo.ai, go to the website, request a demo with one of our great sales reps, and yeah they'd love to help you out. See all the new products, see how far it's come. And again, we thank everybody from the bottom of our hearts for all their effort, people who've tried us out.

[00:41:52] David: Come back and see what you built and yeah. Come check us out at Vendoroo.

[00:41:57] Jason: Got it. Go check out Vendoroo, it's vendor. If you know how to spell that, V-E-N-D-O-R-O-O dot A-I, go check it out. All right? And if you're a property management entrepreneur, you want to add doors, you want to make your business scalable, you want to get out of the day to day, you want to increase the capacity so your company could easily handle another 200 plus doors without having to make any significant systems changes, reach out to us at DoorGrow. We will help you figure it out. So until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

View Details

As property managers, you know how important communication is. Building solid relationships and creating trust is crucial in the industry, especially when trying to bring on new clients and doors.

In this episode of the Property Management Growth Show, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Sam Wakefield from Close it Now to talk about how you can level up your sales game to close more deals at a higher price point.

You’ll Learn [00:54] Vendor and Property Manager Relationships

[09:43] Why You Attract Cheapo Clients

[15:33] Building Trust in Sales

[21:14] Shifting Perception: It’s Not A, It’s B

[27:43] Learning to Improve Your Sales at DoorGrow Live 2025

Quotables “Truly all that sells is just communication.”

“The second you start to develop a trend in your life, look internally because you are attracting exactly who you are.”

“If we don't build the right culture, it's on us as a business owner.”

“As business owners, we want to not give up big chunks of our life for just money. We want to be able to have something scalable.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

Transcript [00:00:00] Sam: A lot of times property management companies think all the companies are the same, so they're looking for maybe cheaper, whoever's cheapest, a cheaper price.

[00:00:07] Sam: But then what they get is a company that doesn't communicate and doesn't show up when they say they're going to, and it's really the old adage, you get what you pay for.

[00:00:14] Jason: All right. I am trying a new platform today. This is Jason Hull and I am a property management growth expert. If you're not familiar with me, I help grow and scale property management companies and I am really good at that. And so our company's DoorGrow and we are the world leaders of growing and scaling property management businesses.

[00:00:35] Jason: I've helped thousands of property managers do that. And today my guest is Sam Wakefield. Hanging out here with Sam. Sam, welcome to the show.

[00:00:44] Sam: Thanks for having me on, man. I'm glad to be here.

[00:00:46] Jason: Hey, good to have you. So, I'm really excited to get into this. We had some really nice dialogue back and forth. You coach.

[00:00:54] Jason: Well, I'll let you tell. What group, category of people do you coach and you help with them with sales and closing more deals, so.

[00:01:01] Sam: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So we do sales training and basically sales systems, whole operation systems within companies, but mostly sales focused for home services. So everything from HVAC, plumbing, electrical, and then even outside of that. Garage doors, or you name it. If someone improves a home, then we help the communication side of all of those companies.

[00:01:27] Jason: Got it. So in my industry, property management people would call those vendors. That's usually what they call them. They're like, "these are the vendors." And so we thought it was fun. I went on your podcast, we had this really fun dialogue.

[00:01:39] Jason: I highly recommend you go check out Sam's episode with Jason Hull and go check that out. We were going back and forth because we had done a survey each to our audiences, like what's frustrating about HVAC companies and what's frustrating about property management companies. Right. And just seeing the disconnect that existed there.

[00:01:56] Jason: Which was interesting. So, before we get into this, I want to read a quick message from our sponsor. This episode's sponsored by KRS SmartBooks. Do you have properties manage, and zero time for bookkeeping headaches? KRS SmartBooks is your secret weapon. They specialize in finances for busy property managers like you, with 15 plus years of real estate knowhow and skills in AppFolio, Yardi, and more imagine monthly reports magically appearing, and zero accounting stress. Sound good? Head to krsbooks.com to book your free discovery call, integrity, quality, and a dash of bookkeeping brilliance, that's KRS SmartBooks, and that's K as in Kansas, R as in Rogers, S as in Sam. Sam. All right, so cool. Now let's get into this.

[00:02:45] Jason: So we're going to talk about closing deals, but why don't you give us my audience a little bit of background. How did you get into sales and then starting your own company, helping people with sales, and like, how'd you how did Close it Now come to be?

[00:03:00] Sam: Yeah, for sure. Thanks for that question. So, I've spent almost 20 years now in home services.

[00:03:05] Sam: Most of my time has been in HVAC. I've done solar. I've done a lot of different trades over the years and, you know, so I launched the Close it Now company in 2019 because I really just recognized a place where there was not a lot of modern training because truly all that sells is just communication.

[00:03:26] Sam: You know, it's how do we communicate clearer and in a way where we can educate so somebody can understand, one, what we're talking about, and two, why they should care and how it's going to make a difference in their life. So at the essence of that, so I was looking for some more modern training for my people at my company that I had at the time, and I didn't find anything out there.

[00:03:48] Sam: So I just said, well, now we have a space for, you know, I have communication skills. I can train people. So that's when I launched the company in 2019 and so much of my career built up to that point of, and specifically how it affects here and why I'm here today. You know, I've worked with so many property management companies and individuals across 20 years of doing this. Yeah. So I've definitely learned a lot of best practices and a lot of the things not to do, you know? Got it. I all own my mistakes as well as, you know, coming across maybe property managers that I wouldn't work with again. Right. Yeah. So from all of that experience, you know, I started the training company, so I work with those home service companies to communicate better.

[00:04:33] Sam: You know, a lot of it is, you know, of course, working directly with homeowners. But also there's a huge portion of all of those companies that, you know, rely on it and need property management companies to, you know, really help them stay in business and in turn they can turn around and, you know, help those property management companies to efficiently take care of properties.

[00:04:58] Sam: But there's always seems to be this kind of struggle of, you know, that back and forth. So that's obviously why we're here today is a big part of that. But that's some of my history. I've been doing it 20 years. I started Close it Now six years or in, coming up on... yeah, April this year, next month is six years anniversary.

[00:05:16] Sam: Nice. Of the company. And it's been a fun ride and we've definitely helped lots and lots of organizations to you know, to grow in a way.

[00:05:24] Jason: You're helping them close it now. All right. Yeah. Got it. All right. So you're just, you're helping these vendors close more deals, right?

[00:05:31] Jason: So, property managers, I think would love to hear. You're on the other side of this relationship between property managers and vendors. What have you seen and what's the general feedback that you're noticing of the property management industry? What's kind of the vendor's perspective?

[00:05:46] Jason: Because I know property managers, they get frustrated with vendors, right? They're like, "oh, the vendors like say you need something when you don't and like they don't like, it's difficult to reach them or this or whatever." Right. What are some of the complaints and gripes about property management companies?

[00:06:03] Sam: Yeah. Complaints and gripes about property management companies. One of the big ones is, a lot of it is kind of the same thing is lack of communication. Okay. That's always one of the biggest complaints that comes up is, you know, we will get, you know, say someone, a property manager will call in for us to go evaluate a property.

[00:06:21] Sam: We'll take an air conditioning issue or something like that, so we'll show up and then we're trying to call ahead. There's no clear information was given on who to call ahead to. Then we show up to the appointment, maybe the tenant's there, maybe not. A lot of times they're not there.

[00:06:36] Sam: Okay. Then we can get ahold of the property manager to even get in the place. So now we're like dancing around in the circle of, okay, who do we contact? You get frustrated, move on to the next call, then the property manager calls and "Well, why'd you leave? Somebody was there."

[00:06:50] Sam: Well, nobody was there. And so all of this just seems to happen very often.

[00:06:55] Sam: Too often. Yeah. So it creates a stereotype. When the stereotype is created, that means of course there's a reason for it. Yeah. And so this is one of the big ones is the lack of communication. And I know that I've heard that the other direction as well. But so that's one of the things I hear the most.

[00:07:11] Jason: Yeah. Got it. Yeah, so I'm sure when a vendor finds a property manager that does communicate effectively that there's clarity in that communication happening, and they've got good systems in place. The tenant's there, the tenant understands what's going on. Everybody's informed. Then those can be really great relationships to have.

[00:07:34] Sam: Absolutely. Yeah. Those are, you know, the last the last organization I was at, I was with them, I was a sales manager and trainer for six years there. And I went through about 18 different property management companies to find two to three that were worth working with. Wow. And that was, you know, just sadly. We were always open to when a property management company came to us and we're like, "Hey, we, you know, we need you to do some work. We're looking for a new vendor." We're like, "sure. Absolutely. We'll try you out as well as you're trying us out." Right. But sadly, you know, the two or three that we did find great relationships with. They were fantastic relationships because yeah, we, you know, part of my ethics is our team was like, we will show up on time no matter what.

[00:08:19] Sam: Right? We always do what we say. We will never, you know, recommend something that's not verifiable from our, you know, from our testing. We're not going to just guess at this because we're not guessing with anybody's, you know? Yeah. Investment. And at the same time when we, you know, say we're going to do the work, we do the work, and we show up to do the work, we say we're going to.

[00:08:43] Sam: So that was my ethics statement I always led with. And then basically I would ask the property management company, can I expect the same thing from you guys? Right? And sure enough, the second that we met in the middle and said, yes, this is how we want to do business, those relationships were always the very best ones because sure, were we a few more dollars than the other contractor down the street? Sure. Yes. But we showed up when we said we were going to and we did the right work right the first time. And so, right. That's a big part of that disconnect, I think, is it seems like so many you know, a lot of times property management companies think all the companies are the same, so they're looking for maybe cheaper, whoever's cheapest, a cheaper price.

[00:09:22] Sam: But then what they get is a company that doesn't communicate and doesn't show up when they say they're going to, and. It's really the old adage, you get what you pay for.

[00:09:30] Jason: You know, property managers have the same sort of problem is that a lot of people that are looking for a property manager are just looking for the cheapest price.

[00:09:38] Jason: And they hate that. They're like, "we're not all the same." Right. So I, yeah, I think it's really important. I think this is dictated by the morals, the ethics, and the values of the business owner. It's always a top down thing. And so if the business owner is a cheapo, they attract cheapo clients and they deal with vendors through this cheapo lens, and this is where there's going to be a lot of mess and a lot of communication issues, and a lot of times the business owner, and this goes for any business and any industry, has a blind spot to the fact that they're cheap. But they're, you know, you're a cheapo if you're the person that's always looking for the stupid coupon code every time you buy everything online, you're always like hunting for that like. I don't have time to do that.

[00:10:21] Jason: Like that's a massive waste of my time to go find, save 10% on some stupid a hundred dollars thing online, right? Right. Like, Ooh, I'm searching around. Right. Oh, I saved $10 even though I could have made a hundred thousand dollars. Like if I just like built something awesome, right? So I think there's a mindset issue is that these property managers or vendor business owners are not valuing their time enough.

[00:10:45] Jason: If you value your time, you value other people's time. You then show up on time. You then like try to make sure, like your schedule is tight, you want to make sure your schedule is full. Like you, because you value your time and you feel that it's important. And if you really value your time enough as a person, you get things like assistance.

[00:11:03] Jason: You get team members, like you get support because your time is so valuable that you want to go buy other people's time because it's less valuable than your time. Right, and this is how we scale our businesses over time is we are buying other people's time that are like they're willing to trade and give up their life chunks of their life for money.

[00:11:24] Jason: And as business owners, we want to not give up big chunks of our life for just money. We want to be able to have something scalable. And so I think there's a mindset thing that we have to not be cheap. We have to operate with integrity, and then our team members need to have these values instilled in them, and if we don't build the right culture, it's on us as a business owner.

[00:11:45] Jason: And if we don't build the right culture, we then don't have longevity in our business. We don't get return business, we don't get return clients. We don't get to have that really good vendor to continue to work with. We don't get to have that property owner continue to want to work with us, right?

[00:12:00] Jason: Because we have showcased that we are not on top of things, or that we don't have the right values or that we don't have healthy mindset. And so I feel like. At the foundation of everything. It always comes back to mindset. A lot of times

[00:12:13] Sam: I a hundred percent agree with that. It, you know, it's funny that you're kind of started this conversation going down this path.

[00:12:19] Sam: This is something that's been a very basically a soapbox for me, a big hot button. Yeah. You know, when I'm coaching...

[00:12:26] Sam: jump on that soapbox, Sam. Let's go.

[00:12:27] Sam: Yeah. When I'm coaching and training people lately, especially at this last week especially... yeah. You know, I'm training people with sales and that type of focus, and they, of course, people always come to me, "Hey, how do I overcome these sales objections?"

[00:12:43] Sam: You know, somebody says, "I want to get three bids, or somebody says, your price is too high, I want to shop around, or I need to think about it." Yeah. And instead of just going straight to, "well, here's the word track and how to handle these objections." Yeah. We always start with: anytime that you find a trend in your life,

[00:13:00] Sam: so if you're getting the same consistent objection, say somebody's getting every single time they get to the end of their appointment and the homeowner or whoever they're talking to says, "I want to think about it." It's like the second you start to develop a trend in your life, look internally because you are attracting exactly who you are.

[00:13:17] Sam: I would be willing to bet that person does the same thing when they shop. So then no wonder you're getting every single one of your clients is telling you, "I want to think about it." Or if when you shop, do you ask for say, "oh, I've got to get some three bids on this thing. I got to look around." Yeah. Well, no wonder the people you're selling to always have to get three bids because we attract who we are. Yeah. And it starts right here in the mind. And it's incredible how that works.

[00:13:43] Jason: Yeah. because if we're anxious, if we have that energetic sort of anxiety of that, like things are, it's expensive, and we go into that trying to sell it to somebody. Then they can feel that and we present it differently. And so we're like, "here's the price." And like, yeah, and it's worth it. And they can just, there's so many little subtle clues they pick up on that, Hey, this seems a little high. And because sometimes like if you're presenting to somebody and they're not what I call a cheapo, there's three types of buyers, cheapos, normals, and premiums I call them.

[00:14:16] Jason: And normals are like, you typically like 60%. They're like the majority, 61%. The smallest group are usually the premium buyers, supposedly. But the idea is this: if you're a premium buyer and I present a price and I'm not even going to like flinch telling you about it, I'm like, "yeah, we've got this and this is what it costs and this," and they're going to go, "oh, this person feels really confident."

[00:14:36] Jason: And it's just energetically how we present it. There's no like, "Hey, I'm trying to prep you for this price, you know, reveal because it's going to hurt a little bit." Right. Or if they just have the confidence and they know they're expensive, they might even just say, "Hey, we're one of the most expensive, but we're also one of the best. Let me tell you about your options." Right? So maybe they start with a pre-frame like that, but either way, they have this confidence that they know they have value and that it's worth it, and then they present it like that, then people would go, oh, okay, but if you have that anxiety deep down related to price and you know, you're this person if you're always looking for the coupon code or the discount code or you're trying to find the cheapest way to do something, then you've got a bit of that going on.

[00:15:21] Jason: Because that's your identity. And so I've noticed this. Like in order to get people to be better salespeople, I can't just give them tactics. I have to give them identity. And so, and this is why my greatest sales hack, I call the Golden Bridge Formula. It's like it's the most authentic way to sell, which is your personal why connected to the business why connected to the prospect's why. Because we always trust motives. And the default assumption in sales, if I don't know your motive and you're trying to sell to me, is you want my money.

[00:15:54] Sam: Right.

[00:15:54] Jason: And if I think that's your only motive is you want my money and you're willing to do whatever it takes to get that, then you're probably maybe even willing to be unethical in order to get that might be the assumption.

[00:16:05] Jason: Right? So that's kind of the default assumption in sales. And so to correct that, if I tell somebody, "Hey. I'm Jason Hull. My personal why is to inspire others to love true principles. And so what that means is I love sharing what works and learning what works and teaching to others. I would do that for free, for fun, and so I created DoorGrow and our why at DoorGrow is to transform property management business owners and their businesses.

[00:16:27] Jason: And so if our whole belief system is around helping people transform their businesses. So that allows me to basically feed my addiction to learning, coaches, masterminds, books, whatever, and turn around and be able to share what's working with others. And that's just fun for me. So I have a business that basically fulfills my lifestyle and allows me to have fun and do what I want to do.

[00:16:51] Jason: And you, Mr. Property management, business owner, who I'm maybe selling to, want to grow your business. And so our interests are in alignment. My business is the bridge that connects your why to my why. We both get what we want. It's the ultimate win-win, right? Everybody wins. And so I've been able to take really terrible salespeople that are really bad at selling, and I just get them clear on their own identity.

[00:17:14] Jason: Mm-hmm. Who they are, why they do what they do, and have them relate that to people and then people trust them. And sales and deals happened at the speed of trust.

[00:17:22] Sam: Oh my gosh, I love this so much. It's insanely powerful too when I'm teaching people how to do just introductions, you know? A super quick formula too for the property managers out there that are listening to that, even if you're property manager, you have to get good at sales.

[00:17:38] Sam: Yeah, you have to be good at communication to be able to bring more doors into your portfolio. And so the way you know, a really easy formula for those homeowners when you're having that conversation, first of all, they've got to know who they're talking to. Yeah. You know, this belief, identity, you know, matrix that I actually I love to call, I just did a keynote.

[00:17:59] Sam: It's funny for everybody listening. It's almost like Jason and I have read each other's notes, but we haven't. Just did a keynote, well that's maybe a month ago in Minnesota, that the entire talk was your thoughts, create your belief about yourself, your totally belief about yourself creates your identity, and then your identity creates your outcomes.

[00:18:16] Sam: Yeah. And, but we have to go back and start with those thoughts. And so, but a simple, easy formula for property managers out there having this conversation is first of all, start asking permission for things. Yes. We can't just tell, right? If we can ask it as a question, ask it as a question.

[00:18:36] Sam: So ask permission, like, "Hey, before we get started, do you mind if I take a quick minute and just introduce you to our company and myself."

[00:18:44] Sam: yeah.

[00:18:45] Sam: And so first of all, anytime a conversation starts, there's always this period of icebreaking, right? Yeah. Anytime anything new is introduced in anyone's environment, there's always stiffness until that moment of rapport happens and we relax a little bit.

[00:19:00] Sam: Yeah. So taking a couple of minutes to just. "Hey, before we get started, do you mind if I introduce the company and a little bit about myself? Would that be all right?" Yes. So permission to it and then just take a few minutes because I mean, so many times we'll go through this crazy presentation and then we're asking somebody to buy from us and they don't even know who we are.

[00:19:21] Sam: We never took the time to even introduce ourselves. Right.

[00:19:24] Jason: Yeah.

[00:19:24] Sam: Or they don't know thing about the company.

[00:19:25] Jason: Trying to immediately shove the product or service down their throat.

[00:19:28] Sam: Yeah. No wonder they need to think about it. They don't even know who you are. And so we introduce that first.

[00:19:34] Sam: It's huge. And to just getting into the things. So that's the flow. It's like, okay, now that you know a little bit about us, tell us a little bit about you. What are you looking for? Right. So then you start that discovery process, and I'm sure you trained this but the discovery process is everything.

[00:19:51] Sam: We have to understand the motive behind why they want to do things. Somebody just says, "Hey, I'm looking for a property manager." Okay, great. That's one thing. "Why do you would need a property manager? What are you trying to solve? What do we want to accomplish by having a property manager for your property?"

[00:20:09] Sam: So we find out, what are the pain points? What are the issues that they're wanting to overcome? And then from there, we can create a, you know, craft a conversation around it. But until we know that, we're just stabbing in the dark and just guessing it. Yeah. Well, hopefully this will work.

[00:20:23] Jason: Right. Yeah. If we just jump right to offering solutions when we don't even ask what they need it's not very effective.

[00:20:30] Jason: And then they're going to have a ton of objections.

[00:20:32] Sam: Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. But yeah, that's the some of the complaints we have are the communication and the other one is just not responding once we find solutions, then give them to the property manager.

[00:20:45] Sam: And then it's like ghosting for who knows how long until finally somebody gets back. And so that's the other side of the communication is not getting resolution once we actually, you know, we can do this work, but we're not going to sit around here all day to wait to get it approved. We have other appointments.

[00:21:02] Sam: So do we want to reschedule?

[00:21:03] Jason: It's treating the vendor like they're high value, they're going to treat you like you're high value and they're going to prioritize you. And so it really is a mutual respect relationship that needs to be built. So, Sam, I also want to bring up to our audience, you are going to be coming

[00:21:19] Jason: to speak at DoorGrow Live. Yeah. And you're going to be teaching some really cool stuff. Could you just touch on real quick what you're going to be sharing at this because I wanted to come bring you to expose my clients and my audience to what you're going to be sharing and maybe you can get some people pumped up for DoorGrow Live, so.

[00:21:38] Sam: Absolutely. Yeah. So thank you for the invite as well. I'm super excited to be speaking for DoorGorw Live. It's my passion, in fact to be able to help people in their daily lives, especially in conversations like this, to make it easy. I am such a firm believer that sales should be easy. If it's not easy, we're overcomplicating it. And so what we're going to be talking about at the event is I'm going to give some really simple keys to better communication so people actually not only listen, but they understand what you're saying and, more importantly, why should they care?

[00:22:18] Sam: So we're going to talk about something called, the benefit lens. We're going to talk about some easy word substitutions. We're not going to be learning scripts or anything. We're going to be, we're going to show any really easy ways to get immediate buy-in to what our conversation is. Nice. And how to recruit people to be raving fans and be on board.

[00:22:38] Sam: And how to ask and get referrals because that's huge in...

[00:22:44] Sam: absolutely.

[00:22:44] Sam: ...something like a property management. If every third door you added also added another one from a referral, what would that do to your business? Yeah, absolutely. So not just asking for referrals, but actually asking in a way where actually get them.

[00:22:57] Jason: Right. Yeah. If you're getting enough referrals, one, because you have a good reputation, you're doing a good job, but also because you have an intention and you're asking appropriately, you create this kind of virus of growth in your business where it's multiplying.

[00:23:13] Jason: Every client becomes more clients.

[00:23:16] Sam: Yep. Absolutely. In fact, we can do a quick little as an example of some of the things we're going to cover. Are you open to doing a quick little role play with me on...

[00:23:24] Sam: all right. Let's do it.

[00:23:25] Sam: Some of the conversation here. Yeah. I love role play.

[00:23:28] Sam: Let's have fun.

[00:23:29] Sam: Yeah, for sure.

[00:23:30] Sam: So I'm property manager. So before we do, give me a quick little context of what is a premium price property manager and what is like a middle range property manager. And so I'll know what I'm working with here.

[00:23:44] Jason: Oh yeah. Usually our clients have three different price points for that reason. So, perfect. But let's say like, real typical in the marketplace is 10% is pretty normal. Okay? And this is not what we recommend. because our clients close more deals more easily at a higher price point.

[00:23:59] Jason: So we have some special pricing models, but let's say 10%. Premium, maybe 12%, and the lower would maybe be like 8%.

[00:24:08] Sam: Got it. Got it. Perfect. Alright, so I'm the project manager. So I'm going to be a premium 12%. Yeah. So what we're going to do in this conversation, I'm going to ask for the business and you're going to give me a little bit of a price flinch with, "well, the other guy was only 10%."

[00:24:23] Sam: Okay. And so we'll show a quick, easy way to handle that. All right. In a way that will make sense for everybody. So, alright, Jason, so, sounds like everything that you've talked about, can you see how all the things we do will take care of the concerns that you have?

[00:24:38] Sam: Yeah, absolutely. Sounds great.

[00:24:40] Sam: Awesome. Perfect. So the next steps to get moving is you know, so we're just 12% of the monthly as for us to be able to take care of all of that. And this will just need a quick authorization on this form here and we can get started right away.

[00:24:55] Jason: Ooh, okay. Well, I was expecting, you know, I talked to a company down the street, they were like 10%, which seems to be a bit more normal.

[00:25:04] Jason: I don't know.

[00:25:04] Sam: More normal?

[00:25:07] Jason: I've talked to a couple companies and a lot of them all do it at 10%. Could, like, is it possible you could do it at 10%?

[00:25:13] Sam: Oh, gotcha. So listen, I mean, so we were just 12%, but listen, we're not 2% higher or 2% more expensive. We're 2% better. Can I explain to you why that is?

[00:25:25] Jason: Sure.

[00:25:26] Sam: Absolutely.

[00:25:27] Sam: So at that point, as a great company, you're going to have a hit list of all of the reasons why you're better than everybody else, and what makes you that premium company. I like it. So the minute we get that permission question in of, "Hey, we're not 2% more expensive, we're 2% higher, we're 2% better."

[00:25:43] Sam: Then the permission question is, "can I show you why, or can I show you how?" And they say "Yes." Then we're going to, "okay, so what we do, it's..." never talk bad about the competition. Sure. But it's always with that perspective. "So what we do is this, and what we do is this, and what we do is this. We're always going to have the availability to be in contact, you know, 24/7 or you know, whatever all of the benefits is.

[00:26:10] Sam: We're going through this huge benefit list. Yeah. And then when, once we, and it works like magic, once you get to about 10 or 12 things, especially when you know, those first 10 or 12 things are things the other companies don't do. Yeah. So many times that person will go, "you know what? You're right. You know what? You're right. Let's just go ahead and do it." Yeah.

[00:26:31] Jason: I mean, you go through those things you say, "so does that make sense why maybe we're 2% better?" And they're going to be like, "yeah."

[00:26:38] Jason: You've got agreement.

[00:26:39] Sam: Cool. Absolutely. And the other thing to do in this conversation, and this is really powerful too, so, you know, we'll take you know, what's a, what's the average rent that we'd be taking that percentage off of?

[00:26:50] Jason: Let's say 2000 bucks.

[00:26:51] Sam: So 2000 bucks. That's what I was going to use. "So we're talking about 2% difference. So we're looking at $40 a month or $10 a week. Is it worth it to you for $10 a week to potentially fight the headache of, you know, your property management company not responding when you need them to respond, your tenants being really unhappy, the tenants turning over and over, for, I mean, $10 a week. Is it worth it to you for that?"

[00:27:22] Jason: Yeah.

[00:27:23] Sam: So if, I mean, if you're willing to roll the dice and take that chance, then of course you could do what you want. But if you want it done right and done once, so you're headache free and you're not going to have to, because the reason you hire a property manager is to be hands off.

[00:27:35] Sam: Right? Yeah. Perfect. That's why what, that's what sets us apart. Next to any of the other companies around.

[00:27:43] Jason: Got it. So hypothetical property manager, Sam here, like believes. You can tell by listening to him, he believes in what he is selling. He believes he's worth that 12%. He believes he's worth that value, and I love that reframe.

[00:27:58] Jason: One of the NLP hacks I teach clients is, it's not a, it's b, and he's like, "it's not that we're expensive or higher price, it's that we're 2% better." And so you're saying this is how you are looking at it. Here's how I want you to look at it. And that's a really cool correction. I love that right there.

[00:28:16] Jason: Very powerful.

[00:28:17] Sam: The other part of that too is when you take, we're not talking about the total monthly, you know, we're talking about what's 12% or 10%? We're talking about 2% difference. Yeah. Is it worth it to you for a 2% difference to take the chance on having to deal with this, having to manage your own projects, having the headache, having the you know, the angry tenants or we don't have that problem.

[00:28:42] Sam: And here's proof: review, testimony. Other people in the area, for people that use us just like you guys.

[00:28:49] Jason: Yeah. Awesome. Perfect. And you're going to share some really cool stuff I know at DoorGrow Live. I'm excited, man. Me too.

[00:28:56] Sam: Let's just tip of the iceberg.

[00:28:57] Jason: For a salesman to be able to like build a coaching business, teaching sales like these are the best in the world at sales, and so I'm really excited to have you come. I've sold millions and millions of dollars of stuff. I love, I'm always learning more about sales, like this is something you can always continually learn more, so I love that little reframe.

[00:29:17] Jason: That's a good one. I'm excited to hear what else you have to share. This is going to be really awesome. And if you're interested, go to doorgrowlive.com and get your tickets. Get your tickets. Our theme this year is innovating the future of property management, and we are bringing future ideas.

[00:29:32] Jason: I'm going to be going over hybrid pricing, a new pricing model for property managers. This is the future. We're going to be sharing our DoorGrow hiring system. This is the future of how you're going to need to do hiring, so you're not making mistakes with hires, we're helping a lot of people replace their entire team.

[00:29:48] Jason: So anyway, DoorGrow Live is going to be really freaking cool. So, yeah, and it's a holistic conference as well. We're bringing people from outside the industry, people that are related to different things. I've got a biohacking expert. We've got different things just to optimize your life as an entrepreneur and to make you better at what you do.

[00:30:05] Jason: So this is going to be really cool. So, well, Sam anything else we should touch on?

[00:30:10] Sam: You know, there's so much we could cover.

[00:30:12] Jason: There's a lot. We'll save it for DoorGrow Live. How can people that, if they're listening, they're like, I'm a vendor, or I've got this, or I could really use Sam's help.

[00:30:21] Jason: How can they get ahold of you?

[00:30:23] Sam: Yeah, absolutely. They can go to, of course the website is closeitnow.net. That's NET so closeitnow.net. They can email me directly, sam@closeitnow.net. On an Instagram at @therealcloseitnow. Okay. Or basically search Close it Now anywhere and I pop up all over the place.

[00:30:44] Sam: All right. I'm kind of everywhere on social media and on the Googles at this point. All right.

[00:30:50] Jason: All right, well we're going to close this show now, so appreciate you coming on, Sam. It's been great having you. And for those that are watching, listening, if you could use some help from DoorGrow reach out to us.

[00:31:00] Jason: You can check us out at doorgrow.com. We are the world leaders at coaching and scaling property management companies. And so if you are dealing with operational challenges, team challenges, hiring challenges, or you just don't know the right strategies for adding doors or business development, we can help you with all of that.

[00:31:18] Jason: So reach out to us, check us out at doorgrow.com and until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

View Details

As a property manager, you’re familiar with the uncomfortable shuffle when trying to ensure utilities are set up correctly at move-in. What if you could make the whole process easier?

In this episode of the Property Management Growth Show, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with the founder of Utility Profit, Zac Maurais, to discuss wires, pipes, and signals: Everything you wish you knew about home utilities.

You’ll Learn [01:48] How Zac Built a $100 Million Business

[07:38] Solving Utility Challenges with a Streamlined Tool

[15:54] Using Utility Profit to Make Extra Profit

[23:26] Integrations and Frequently Asked Questions

[30:20] Take Action on The Things You’re Avoiding!

Quotables “I think the secret to being smart is just being willing to look stupid.”

“Done is better than perfect.”

“Have a bias for action. Get your hands dirty. Do it yourself.”

“ Whatever it is that you think that's holding you back, just start trying to do it.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

Transcript [00:00:00] Zac: It's almost like we're like taking the Yellow Pages and then putting it online or something. Yeah. I mean, it's kind of a wacky problem that we're solving there.

[00:00:08] Jason: So you're single handedly bringing the utility space into the future. So, All right.

[00:00:16] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow Property Managers to the Property Management Growth Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur and you want to add doors, you want to make a difference, you want to increase revenue, you want to help others, you want to impact lives, and you're interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager and you just don't know it. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it.

[00:00:47] Jason: You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win.

[00:01:13] Jason: I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show and I'm hanging out today with Zac Maurais. Did I say it right?

[00:01:25] Jason: That's right, yes.

[00:01:26] Jason: Hey. All right, cool. It's great to have you on the show. So Zac we're going to be chatting today about wires, pipes, and signals, everything you wish you knew about home utilities.

[00:01:38] Jason: I think this will be interesting to our listeners because, you know, we get into this stuff as property management people. So, so Zac before we get into that though, give us a little backstory on you. How'd you get into being an entrepreneur? When did you first figure that out, that you maybe were one and then we can get into why you started this business so that you've got going and tell us, tell everybody about it.

[00:01:58] Jason: Cool.

[00:02:00] Zac: Let's do it. Yeah. So, quick intro myself, I live here in Austin, Texas. I've been an entrepreneur now for better part of a decade and a half. Right out of college I started a business it was actually a food delivery business called Favor. We ended up scaling that business to having 50,000 delivery drivers in the state of Texas.

[00:02:22] Zac: So it was the second largest employer in the state. And over the course of building it up over a couple of years, we were doing over a hundred million dollars of food sales a year. So sizable company and we sold that to HEB grocery and yeah.

[00:02:38] Jason: And if people don't know, HEB I'm in the Austin area, I'm up in Round Rock.

[00:02:41] Jason: But if people don't know HEB. HEB consistently wins the best grocery store awards like in America every year. Like it's always winning.

[00:02:51] Zac: It's kind of amazing. I mean, they are an institution. There's so many small towns across Texas where the only show in town, I would kind of say it's akin to like a Walmart or something like that for a national brand that people would be more familiar with.

[00:03:04] Zac: Family run business, been around for a hundred years. So it's cool that it had joined forces with Favor. And learned a lot from doing that company. I mean, at the time that we sold it, we had over 140 corporate employees, designers and software engineers and business intelligence people and salespeople.

[00:03:24] Zac: So I'm right there with you, Jason, where I like growth. I like growing things and learning about business and learning about new categories. So as I sold it, I was looking for the next thing to do.

[00:03:35] Jason: So people are clear, Favor, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, but Favor competes with like Instacart and like some of these, it's like a delivery service.

[00:03:44] Zac: That's right. So the way that the service worked was, it was like an on demand. It was part of the on demand delivery kind of thing that was happening. The gig economy, you know, people will probably remember Lyft coming out and Uber. There wasn't one for delivery of kind of like fast casual food or groceries yet.

[00:04:02] Zac: And we brought that into the market. We had first mover.

[00:04:05] Jason: Oh yeah. So yeah, it's kind of like Uber Eats and, you know, these kind of things.

[00:04:08] Zac: Exactly. So you could tap a button, request a Favor, and then someone would go shopping for you, go pick up some tacos or yeah, run at the grocery store or something like that and bring it to you in 45 minutes or less.

[00:04:20] Jason: Got it. And is Favor just a Texas thing?

[00:04:23] Zac: At one point in time we tried to go national expansion, but it was a bit of a wartime thing that was going on. Yeah. A lot of VC dollars getting put in. And we had a very strong Texas brand. We had over a million people in Texas using it.

[00:04:37] Zac: Yes. So we said we just doubled down on home base.

[00:04:40] Jason: I mean, Texas is like its own little universe. We've got Favor, we've got HEB, we've got, you know, there's all these things that are just specifically Texas. So if y'all come to Texas, you got to like experience the whole Texas deal. You got to go to an HEB, you got to go to Bucky's, you got to go to all these things, right?

[00:04:56] Zac: So yeah, right. When you're here in town for Jason's event, go get yourself some Yeti swag.

[00:05:02] Jason: Yes.

[00:05:02] Zac: And then order yourself a Favor.

[00:05:04] Jason: Yes. There you go. Yeah. Cool. Yeah, and people get really religious about their, you know, things like Yeti. It's like Yeti Mecca. Like people, like my brother-in-law comes into town. He is like, "I got to go to the Yeti store." He's like, just like starry-eyed in there. And I'm like, "why? Why?" Coolers, thermases? I don't know. Cool drinks. Yeah. Yeah. It's a thing. So he like collects them, and then sometimes he's flipping them too. Like there's limited edition things, so. My brother-in-law's name is Jason also, so he might listen to this.

[00:05:36] Jason: So Jason, I mentioned you on my podcast, so, all right.

[00:05:39] Jason: Shout out to Jason.

[00:05:41] Jason: Shout out to Jason. So, cool. So Zac, I mean, that's a pretty impressive thing. Not many people can say they built a hundred million dollar, you know, business or had an exit or something like that. So, and then what did you do next?

[00:05:55] Jason: Like, you sell this thing, did you lose all meaning and purpose in life and decide to start a new business or what happened?

[00:06:01] Zac: I think that happens with some people, right? You sell it, you have somebody, you're like, "what am I going to do with my life now?" I'm going to take a good thing and somehow it becomes a bad thing.

[00:06:09] Zac: But I just, I really like building. And I like the process of entrepreneurship where you talk to people, you try to find a problem and you like go hit a whiteboard, you sketch, it becomes more tangible, and then all of a sudden you can partner with an engineer and make it and then bring it back to the customer.

[00:06:26] Zac: And I just like that. It kind of just scratches something in my brain, I think. And something else that's been cool for me on my entrepreneurship journey. I had mentioned that I've been doing it now for a decade and a half and the entire time that I've been working and doing startups, I've been doing it with like my best friend Ben from growing up together.

[00:06:45] Zac: We

[00:06:46] Jason: best friend Ben.

[00:06:46] Zac: wen to school in New Hampshire. And it's fun to be able to go on that journey with someone like that.

[00:06:52] Jason: Yeah. That's cool. So you and Ben are still doing stuff together then.

[00:06:55] Zac: Right.

[00:06:56] Jason: Yeah. Third company.

[00:06:57] Zac: Third company now, so.

[00:06:59] Jason: Yeah. Dynamic duo. All right. And so I imagine that you have some complimentary sort of skill sets and challenge each other a bit.

[00:07:08] Zac: Yeah, I think our brains have kind of been swapped and became more of the same brain. But the way that I explained it originally was like Ben was the left brain engineer, right? He is going to build out the backend database. He was a civil engineer, so he was just constantly doing math. And then I was more of the, you can kind of see there's some paintings behind me, like I was the artist.

[00:07:30] Jason: The right brain guy. Yeah. Got it.

[00:07:32] Zac: But now it just kind of became one, somewhere between now. He kind of went a little bit more right. I went more left, so.

[00:07:38] Jason: Cool. So bring us up towards the present day. So like, what are you and Ben, you know, getting together and working on?

[00:07:45] Zac: Yeah, so I guess the way that we got into the property management industry was we were trying to build some leasing automation tech over the last few years. We had something called Sunroom Leasing, and it was like a platform that would help. With self showings, with different things related to collecting some data from renters about the home.

[00:08:05] Zac: We had at one point in time, around 8,000 homes that were leasing across the country for some real estate investment trusts and some large scale property managers. And it kind of turned us on to this like, it had some challenges I think of that scale. And so we ended up realizing that's not what we want to do long term.

[00:08:26] Zac: And something that it was like a good ride, but I think we were onto something that could be more scalable and a more acute problem to solve.

[00:08:35] Jason: Yeah, this was like a tuition business. You're learning and paying the price of tuition. Yeah. So you got familiar with the property management industry a bit through that.

[00:08:44] Jason: That's right. Figured out kind of your target audience and you probably started to see some different problems you like started scheming with your whiteboard on, so.

[00:08:52] Zac: Yeah, and the problem that we zoomed into was around utility setup. And what we thought was kind of a silly thing was, here it is, it's 2024.

[00:09:01] Zac: This was last year that we had launched it. We realized that there wasn't like a Google Maps of utilities. We thought it was silly that you couldn't just type in an address online and then see what's the water, what's the electric, what's the gas, what's the internet? There was no transparency for that.

[00:09:20] Zac: And when we looked closer, there's like, you zoom in on water, there's over 20,000 water providers and they have really weird setups, you know, or it could be down just by the neighborhood or the zip code or the, you know, it's just wacky the way that the mapping works. And we thought if we could build out the whole mapping infrastructure, that would be a valuable thing, both for owners of the property that just want to have a more streamlined process, property managers that are doing it every day, and then renters. If you kind of think of this problem of setting up utilities while it's annoying and they have to Google around and make a bunch of phone calls, this is just one problem within a whole, you know, iceberg of other things. It's just the tip, small thing that they're doing a ton of things related to the move. We thought that if we could streamline this, then it could have a broad appeal and be something that we could do nationally and do at a big scale. So, over the last year, what we've done is we've built out that infrastructure to be able to do mapping at scale.

[00:10:21] Zac: And we have built a platform that streamlines the process of turning on utilities. We're trying to make the utility on switch and it's a cool tool because the property managers using it can get confirmation that utilities have been set up correctly. And this is helpful for them because, you know, if you don't turn on the electricity and it's the dead of winter, you're probably going to have some problems on your hands with pipes bursting, you know, and things like that.

[00:10:48] Zac: So, it's a useful tool in the process.

[00:10:51] Jason: So let's talk about this problem, right? This is super annoying. Like everybody that's moved has had to figure out this weird, you know, puzzle to like, which utility providers are available here? Which internet provider can I use? What are my options? Can I get this cool fiber, you know, thing, can I get this? Is there..? Like what's available? Then they're trying to figure out like water, electric. You're maybe trying to find out from the previous owner or somebody and you're trying to like negotiate all this and then like getting things switched and then the timelines like it's a mess.

[00:11:25] Jason: Like it's really annoying and yeah, it's like why do we just deal with this and put up with this? We're living in the age of AI and this AI revolution now and. Why isn't there a better solution to this? It seems like it's just like chaos and confusion. Yeah, so.

[00:11:45] Zac: It is chaos and confusion. Yeah. And people waste so much time doing it and oh god.

[00:11:50] Zac: Yeah. And I think as a result, like sometimes people will just make sacrifices where they'll be like, well, I was on this telecom company before. Maybe I'll just go back to them. And then I might miss out on being able to be like, well, I could have had faster internet or a better plan that's cheaper or something If they had just...

[00:12:07] Jason: sure. Yeah.

[00:12:07] Zac: ...known that they had options.

[00:12:10] Jason: Right. You're like, man, I'm still using dial up. And I didn't realize Google Fiber was available here. Yeah, right.

[00:12:15] Zac: Throwing that in an old AOL like.

[00:12:18] Jason: Yes, I remember those days. I was such a nerd. Alright, so yeah, and people may maybe get impatient and they just make some quick decisions.

[00:12:27] Jason: You know, and all these companies try to give them incentives like, Hey, if you move, like we'll move it and help you get it set up. And they try to make it seamless, but because they're trying to retain their, you know, the customer, but that might not be in the best interest of the customer.

[00:12:41] Zac: Totally. Yeah. So this we're in the spirit of trying to add transparency into the process, make it more streamlined. And and have a really lightweight tool like, you know, not another app you have to download, but just something that seamlessly fits in the move in process. Okay.

[00:12:55] Zac: Integrates really well with the tools that the property manager is already using, you know, just is able to sync, in real time, figure out what are the addresses coming up, and then give the property manager a way to both communicate what the utilities are and then check that they've been turned on.

[00:13:16] Zac: And then interestingly, there's a lot of places in the US where these telecom companies are competing. And they spent a lot of money to lay down these fiber optic lines, you know, or copper lines, and they're trying to recoup some of that cost. Yeah. And so they'll pay money for more customers.

[00:13:35] Zac: And so we're able to generate revenue and then share that with property managers as an incentive to use the tool.

[00:13:43] Jason: Okay, cool. So what's the name of the tool or this service?

[00:13:46] Zac: It's called Utility Profit.

[00:13:48] Jason: Utility profit. Okay. All right. And it's P-R-O-F-I-T I would assume? Yep, exactly. Not like you're prophesying.

[00:13:57] Jason: All right, got it. So Utility Profit, and so this really is solving that challenge to just streamline all that, and there's a financial incentive or benefit for the property manager helping to get these things connected.

[00:14:11] Zac: That's right. That's right. Yeah. And one of the...

[00:14:14] Jason: Win, win, win all the way around win.

[00:14:15] Zac: Yeah, exactly. And that's the best type of tool. You know, something that it doesn't just benefit one party, but all the people involved. Yeah. And so, you know, it's exciting there. Now there's people across the entire United States using it. We've been helping thousands of renters per month.

[00:14:32] Zac: Just in the last year there's been, I think over 750 property managers using it. Some really big ones with thousands of properties all the way down to people that just have a couple homes in the portfolio. I think the average has about 400 homes and, you know, it's really kind of empowering that we bring something to the world and that fast that many people are using it.

[00:14:55] Zac: It's cool to see.

[00:14:56] Jason: Yeah. Cool. So. And Ben's leading the nerds on the team making this all work.

[00:15:02] Zac: Yeah, we're both working closely with engineers and, I mean, it's been a big lift. I mean, we've had to do all sorts of wacky things to be able to like get this data because like I said, it didn't exist.

[00:15:12] Zac: I imagine.

[00:15:13] Zac: We have to like literally go and draw service maps, you know, that were PDFs on old websites and then, you know, turn them into a structured database. Right. I, you know, pull it up correctly. Yeah.

[00:15:26] Jason: You're just doing this ground level legwork to like get... it's almost like you're transferring old records into a digital format.

[00:15:35] Jason: You know? Yeah. So that people could play their MP3s or something. Yeah.

[00:15:38] Zac: It kind of feels like that. It's almost like we're like taking the Yellow Pages and then putting it online or something. Yeah. I mean, it's kind of a wacky problem that we're solving there.

[00:15:48] Jason: So you're single handedly bringing the utility space into the future, so.

[00:15:54] Zac: Yeah. And one thing that we've we've been doing over the last couple months that I think is pretty cool is that there's this whole industry that exists for the multifamily apartment space related to what they call as like fiber as an amenity or fiber to the home.

[00:16:11] Zac: Yeah. And so the way it would work on multifamily would be, you know, these big telecoms would say, "Hey, we'll sell you a thousand units of internet and then we'll give you a discount for doing so. And then you can either kind of keep that for yourself or you can, you know, share that with your tenants as a way to help your apartments stand out from other apartments."

[00:16:33] Zac: The apartments are i identifiable and also you know, easier for the telecoms to spot. The hard thing about homes is it's this long tail of properties and there hasn't been a good way to aggregate them. I think over the last few years there's been some, you know, real estate investment trusts that have got to scale.

[00:16:54] Zac: And so it kind of got these telecom companies thinking, "Hey, maybe I should go you know, sell into this market, see if we can apply the same principles of this program from apartments to single family." But it hasn't yet been done at any sort of significant scale. It's kind of a new concept. Now that we have hundreds of thousands of homes, that we are effectively the on switch for, we're helping to source these deals.

[00:17:20] Zac: And we're able to bring, you know, significant discount from retail pricing to property managers and consumers. So we we're adding that as a new program that we're doing. We're calling it like Fiber Ready Homes. So it's a cool thing because we can help property managers identify what portion of their portfolio has the underlying technology at the home to have, you know, hyper fast internet speeds.

[00:17:47] Zac: Yeah. And then do all of the enrollment process and the billing process to be able to offer a program like this. And and it's pretty gnarly. Like the average property manager that will turn on this program can make tens of thousands of dollars a year. It's roughly $10 per month per door.

[00:18:04] Zac: So if you're a 300 door property manager, this is about $18,000. 18,000 per year that you'd be able to generate. And just, you know, kind of free cash flows for enabling something that the renters want.

[00:18:18] Jason: Right. Just making more money and yeah, I mean, high speed internet also being able to bring that to your units.

[00:18:26] Jason: It creates a bigger incentive for people to rent it. I mean, it's definitely something I research before I buy a home or move anywhere. I'm always like, what Internet's available there because my life is going to be happening through this. And a lot of more people working from home, especially since Covid.

[00:18:41] Zac: True. Yeah, that's a good point. I mean, I think a lot of renters see internet more important than running water in some ways. I mean, it's like everyone's on Netflix and doing work from home calls. You know, it's just, it's super important for renters.

[00:18:55] Jason: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. That's interesting. And it sucks though when you like if you rent somewhere and that you only have one option and it's not the option that you really want in that area because sometimes they've negotiated like, oh, it's Comcast cable or something like this, and it's low speed or whatever.

[00:19:11] Zac: Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Sometimes you're kind of limited by what lines have been laid, and sometimes there's limited options, but it's cool because now we have these two programs. We have one, which is that one I just explained, and then we have a second one. We call it like a marketplace. So it'll truly show you everything that's available, every single company, every single speed all the details of it and help to facilitate just being able to turn it on a lot easier.

[00:19:34] Jason: Got it. How does this work? Like a property manager gets set up in your system, they've got their properties, you know, in this, and then they can figure out the tenants when they're onboarding a new tenant, they're like, "Hey, before we give you keys and move you in, we want to make sure utilities are getting moved over."

[00:19:49] Jason: So you help streamline this?

[00:19:51] Zac: That's right. Yeah. So it will connect seamlessly with property managers, property management software. Pull in the active listings that they have, and then it will have triggers around the move in date. So once someone's been approved and you have a move in date that's approaching.

[00:20:08] Zac: It will send reminders and say, Hey, you know, you're moving in end of the month, like before you move in, please show that you've turned the electric on so that there's not going to be bill back problems and things like that.

[00:20:20] Zac: So, it handles the communication and then what's pretty cool about the tool too, is it's all white labeled. Utility Profit, it's not, you know, like a tenant friendly name, you know? Yeah. It's really for the property manager. And so, okay. We're just helping to facilitate these things. So it's got the property manager's logo, you know, we're more just the underlying technology, which I think is good because like a renter in the process doesn't want to get handed off to another third party.

[00:20:48] Zac: They just want to...

[00:20:49] Jason: yeah, "Who are these guys? Why should I trust them? I trust you. I'm working with you," but yeah. Got it. No, I think that's really smart. And so your business model then, your growth strategy really is to leverage and support the property managers.

[00:21:02] Zac: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. We're trying to partner with all the property managers in the single family rental space.

[00:21:08] Zac: And you know, last I checked, you know, there's at least five to 10 million homes that are managed by third party property managers. And we want to become the main place where where people used to turn on utilities. And you know, we talked about entrepreneurs and having a big vision earlier in the call.

[00:21:26] Zac: You know, I think we're solving an important problem by building this Google Maps of Utilities and also just making a better experience. I think anytime we start a business though, you're kind of thinking about like, okay, "Well if I'm able to pull this off, how could this even be even more significant long term?"

[00:21:42] Zac: And one of the things that I've been just thinking about as I've been doing it is you know, today we are helping to connect the dots between these things, but I bet in the not too distant future, maybe a few years out, we'll be responsible for millions of homes in helping to turn on these utilities.

[00:21:59] Jason: Yeah.

[00:22:00] Zac: We'll probably want to go down the stack of utilities, you know, instead of just directing you to be going to, you know, XYZ local power source. Maybe they get directed to a company that, similar to how we're able to get discounts on internet because we have so much scale, we could buy energy contracts in deregulated markets and, you know,

[00:22:22] Jason: okay.

[00:22:22] Zac: Inch down becoming a utility.

[00:22:24] Zac: Okay.

[00:22:24] Zac: And so, I think it's a, it's an interesting thing.

[00:22:27] Jason: So you're saying maybe there's a potential the property manager could be the utility?

[00:22:32] Zac: We'll be able to help the property manager earn more money...

[00:22:35] Zac: yeah.

[00:22:35] Zac: ...on this process because we...

[00:22:38] Zac: just more margin

[00:22:38] Zac: ...want to direct them to like a utility that we own. And we're able to help them monetize these other things like natural gas and electricity.

[00:22:49] Jason: Got it. Love it. Yeah. You're passing the benefit onto the property manager. So, yeah. That gives them quite an incentive to help you grow this.

[00:22:55] Jason: Right. So I love it. So, I mean, this really gives property managers a strong competitive advantage over self-management then.

[00:23:03] Zac: Yeah, I think so. You know, I think property managers, they have so many things that they're doing and this is one of those set it and forget it types of tools. You know, it's not something you have to have mastery over and like learn another thing, this is like you get on, you set the thing up, you get the logo added and get it synced to your PM software and then you're done with it and it just kind of is happening in the background and then just notifies you.

[00:23:26] Jason: Got it. So the setup is pretty easy and then it makes it a lot easier for the property management team to make sure utilities are getting set up correctly. There's visibility into seeing what's been set up and what hasn't, it sounds like. And you mentioned integrations with property management software, and I know everybody listening's like, "but what about my software? The one I'm using?" Yeah. So what integrations do you guys have set up already?

[00:23:49] Zac: It's all the major ones. So what we find is like AppFolio is popular. Rentvine is becoming more and more popular. You know, Propertyware is another one. Buildium's one that we you know, have in the works too, but yeah, I think most people...

[00:24:04] Zac: Rent manager?

[00:24:05] Zac: Rent manager, yeah. That's one that we work with too. Yeah. I know there's a lot of options for property managers there, but yeah.

[00:24:11] Jason: Very cool. Yeah. So everybody listening there. There you go. So they're like, "oh, he mentioned mine. I'm okay."

[00:24:17] Zac: Yeah, that's right. Yeah it's cool that it, you know, just works in a broad way like that. And it's kind of interesting too that the tool even is able to work you know, even if you don't even have a property management software to figure out some ways to you know, even work in that use case.

[00:24:32] Jason: Sure.

[00:24:32] Zac: But most people have software.

[00:24:34] Jason: So as long as you can get the properties like into your system, then...?

[00:24:38] Jason: That's right.

[00:24:38] Jason: Got it. Okay, cool. But if they have those then and you have that connection, then it's, yeah, it'll just streamline things. Makes it even more turnkey.

[00:24:47] Zac: That's right.

[00:24:48] Jason: Got it. Cool. So, all right, so you, what else should people know about this?

[00:24:52] Jason: Like what are the big questions property managers have been asking you?

[00:24:55] Zac: I think one question is, you know, how much money I earn from this? You know? Okay.

[00:24:59] Jason: They like, they want to know about the money. Let's talk about the money.

[00:25:03] Zac: So the average property manager will, it's a range of 25 to $40 per move that, that happens.

[00:25:10] Zac: It ends up being about 25 to, to $30 on average is what we're seeing across the country. And so I think it's one of those things where it's like nice gravy. What we find is that the average property manager, they're like, "this is nice. I can make some extra money from it." But I think it's like, you know, not enough to go, you know, it just adds to the bottom line a little bit.

[00:25:32] Zac: Every little thing. Sure. So the main reason why people use it is the time savings, you know? Absolutely. It's just one last thing to have to worry about. So that's that's what we're seeing as we talk to people.

[00:25:44] Jason: Yeah. Yeah, because I mean, just the amount of time you're paying a team member, if they're like 25 to $35 an hour, for example you know, they might be spending an hour or two here or there just calling, trying to negotiate back and forth with the tenant, get these things set up so.

[00:25:59] Zac: Property management some days feels like death by a thousand mosquitoes.

[00:26:04] Jason: Oh yeah. I often joke it's, it can be death by a thousand cuts or it can be a really well oiled systemizable machine, but yeah.

[00:26:12] Jason: Yeah, absolutely. So, yeah, it offsets a little bit at the move in cost and then just the time savings. You're not having to pay your team to do all this communication. And you know, speed in onboarding is a real challenge for a lot of companies that are really in a high growth sort of state.

[00:26:28] Jason: Like small companies might have a hard time just onboarding 10 units in a month, you know? Yeah. And larger companies, it can be pretty hairy if things aren't well dialed in.

[00:26:36] Zac: Yeah, I think that's a good point. It's all about having the systems in place. So that they scale.

[00:26:40] Jason: Very cool.

[00:26:41] Jason: Well, is there anything else you think people should know about utility profit? And then we can get into like, how can they connect and get something like this going?

[00:26:50] Zac: Yeah. So the website's, utilityprofit.com.

[00:26:53] Jason: Okay.

[00:26:53] Zac: And it has some more information about how it works and has has some videos of the actual product.

[00:26:59] Zac: You can see what it looks like from the renter's perspective, from your perspective and the dashboard that gives transparency. And and it kind of just walks you through everything about the product. And then there's a way on the website to be able to either book a demo if you have any questions about how something works.

[00:27:17] Zac: And then, what we do is we'll just help you do like an onboarding call where we have people connect their PM software, upload a logo, invite their team members, really simple, straightforward process and then and then it's kind of good to go. So it's very streamlined thing. People typically will do it and it'll be live same day.

[00:27:38] Zac: It's not like some big heavy lift or something. You just kind of go through this 15 minute process. We help you get it all synced up and then it's good to go.

[00:27:45] Jason: So, there's competition out there, right? Like this is a new thing in the space, but previously there's all these companies that try to, you know, negotiate and be able to pull in money and by being the person that gets people on a certain internet service or gets people and they get these kickbacks from the companies and that's how they make their money.

[00:28:03] Jason: How do you feel like utility profits sort of stands out from those and I mean, my guess is you have the database, you have the data, like your ability to streamline. You're not having to go and start doing research and that you're just much faster.

[00:28:17] Zac: Yeah, I think that's exactly it. So there's been this whole category over the last couple years that's called a home concierge.

[00:28:25] Zac: Yeah. And it's historically been like a call center model. Yeah. Where a rep will get the address and they'll, on your behalf, Google around, make some calls, you know, go try to set things up. And I think that was a helpful first step, and it seems like the natural thing that, that the industry would've been doing.

[00:28:43] Zac: But this is just the natural progression of it, you know, building that database out, making it something that is like, you know, a true streamlined tool for everybody. And and just digitizing it a lot more.

[00:28:57] Jason: This is the future. This is the future. It's the next step. You're going to be a sponsor at DoorGrow Live.

[00:29:02] Jason: So make sure, you know, everybody come to DoorGrow Live this year. Our theme this year is innovating the future of property management. And so we're going to be sharing innovative stuff. Innovative new models of pricing, not doing it the same way everybody else has been doing it, like percentage or flat fee. There's a lot of innovation and that's our goal at DoorGrow. We're always trying to figure out what are the most innovative stuff? We've got AI maintenance coordinators, we've got all sorts of stuff that are going to be showcased at this event. So if you don't want to be behind the times and have your lunch eaten by competitors and startups that are savvier and more focused on the future, make sure you come to DoorGrow Live. You're going to want to be there because the people that are at DoorGrow Live are going to be the ones that are getting a head start on these really effective cost, saving new tools, these ideas, they're going to help you have more profit in your business.

[00:29:54] Jason: And so, Zac, we appreciate you being a sponsor. We're excited to showcase you and some other tools at our event, so.

[00:30:00] Zac: It's going to be fun. It'll be here right around the corner, so.

[00:30:03] Jason: Check it out at doorgrowlive.com, and make sure you get your tickets. And we're going to be talking a little bit more in the future, probably on our podcast here. And just online about some of the cool things that you will get or learn if you come to DoorGrow Live this year in May at the Kalahari Resort in Round Rock, Texas.

[00:30:20] Jason: So, cool. Well, Zac, is there anything else you want to share before you go? Parting word of wisdom for entrepreneurs out there that haven't had a hundred million dollar exits and built big giant things and they're just struggling to build their little machine, what would you say to them?

[00:30:36] Zac: I would just say like, whatever it is that you think that's holding you back, just start trying to do it.

[00:30:43] Zac: You know? I think a lot of times you build up whatever it is in your head. And you think, "well, I would do it if I had this. Or what if I have to hire this person? Or, you know, I need to have this figured out, or I don't know how this works. Like I'm going to just say no to it." I would just say, just start doing it.

[00:31:02] Zac: It doesn't have to be perfect to start. And the more you just take that first step it will become more clear and sometimes, it's harder to see the next 10 steps in front of you, but it's pretty easy to take that first step. So I'd say, have a bias for action. Get your hands dirty. Do it yourself. You have mentioned a lot of these things about AI and how the best companies are using ai.

[00:31:25] Zac: We're really leaning into that as an organization. It doesn't matter what people's role is, we're saying. You know, download, ChatGPT three and talk to it. Ask it questions like, you know, there's so many cool resources today. It's the best time to figure things out and do things and and take that first step.

[00:31:44] Jason: Yeah. GPT 4.5, we're getting clues of that's dropping and going to be out for everybody soon. And then Grok 3, I've been really geeking out on Grok 3, so it's pretty next level, so, but yeah. Cool. I love the idea. Done is better than perfect. I love the idea of rapid iteration. You know, so many times for those of you that are in the earlier stages of entrepreneurs listening to this, this is great advice because I've seen inside a lot of businesses, a lot of small businesses, and one of the biggest mistakes a lot of them make is they try to make everything perfect before they ship it, before they launch it. "I want to get all my processes dialed in," and they're trying to solve problems they don't even have yet.

[00:32:20] Jason: They're trying to solve future problems instead of their current problem. And so rapid iteration really is the secret to growing a business quickly because you learn very fast what does and doesn't work. Just start trying shit. Just do it. Break stuff and you're going to learn way faster and everything's figureoutable, so.

[00:32:39] Zac: Yeah. And in that spirit, it doesn't matter what the thing is, you can always get feedback from it, even if it's not totally built yet, like it can be on a napkin, you know, or it could be the next level of that. But go build the thing in whatever low fidelity way. Yeah.

[00:32:55] Zac: And then go talk to your customers about it. And this is going to have different applications for different types of business. because you're going to talk about different things. But you know, maybe you have a new program that you're thinking property owners might want to see, like get their feedback on it.

[00:33:10] Zac: Or maybe you want to launch a new website or a new logo or whatever it is. I would just say, it doesn't have to be perfect, bring it but you have to get feedback on it. So definitely go and partner with who it is that is going to see it, and then just talk to them about it and say, "Well, how could this be better? What is this missing? What would be the next thing to do? If you could do anything with this, what would you do?" And, you know, people love to share advice. I mean, I think that's the other thing. Yeah. It's like over the last couple years since I've been doing entrepreneurship, I've been kind of amazed at how many people have been willing to share their time and their advice.

[00:33:46] Zac: Yeah. And especially if you get an intro to someone from something. Yeah. You know, I think there's this huge thing of maybe you're afraid to ask for that intro or, you know, have that conversation because it's not perfect yet. I would say, you know, find the ideal person that you want to talk to and then figure out how to work backwards and how to get an intro to them and then have that conversation.

[00:34:08] Zac: You know, I think you have to be vulnerable in it because you are going to come across dumb sometimes. You know, people are going to say like, "how did you not know this? Everyone knows this," but like, just lose your ego in that. Be okay with not being okay. And then you're going to feel a lot better because on the other side of it, you're going to learn so much.

[00:34:27] Jason: Yeah, I think the secret to being smart is just being willing to look stupid. So, I mean, for sure. Ask the dumb question that you're afraid to ask because you're going to learn way faster. And I really think proximity is power. Like just another reason people should come to DoorGrow Live is I think we attract the most growth oriented property management, business owners in the industry and just being in proximity to all these sort of change makers and people trying new stuff and people experimenting, people willing to invest in themselves and to pay like coaches, like DoorGrow. And then I use all my clients as a mass rapid iteration sort of project.

[00:35:05] Jason: Like we're always figuring out more and more stuff and I'm gathering these ideas and so we've got systems in place to just allow us to innovate in this industry a lot faster. And so we're really excited about bringing these kind of things to DoorGrow Live and showcasing it.

[00:35:19] Jason: So if you're not part of our program, you're not one of our clients. Come check out the magic at DoorGrow Live. Connect with some of the people there and you might realize you found a home, so yeah, your family might be there. So yeah, entrepreneurs we're different breed of people. We, you know, we take risks, we're willing to try new things, and we're not focused primarily on safety and security.

[00:35:39] Jason: We're focused more on fulfillment and freedom and contribution. And so this natural offshoot, entrepreneurs are the most helpful people, especially the healthy ones. When you're in a healthy growth-minded state, you want to benefit and help everybody. You're not gatekeeping information like people are sharing stuff and so yeah, I found the same thing to be true in the high level masterminds, coaches that I work with.

[00:36:00] Jason: Like just being around the people in these programs has been probably the biggest benefit more than even learning from the guru or whoever that is sharing stuff sometimes. And so, yeah, proximity.

[00:36:11] Zac: Yeah, I think that's well said. You kind of become an average of the people that you spend most time with.

[00:36:15] Zac: So if you're around, you know, someone who's going to be pessimistic about everything, then chances are, not going to try things as much. I mean, that, that was like one of the reasons why I had originally moved from, you know, where I was growing up in New Hampshire. I remember when I was pitching Favor when I was 20 something people were like, "ah, no one's going to pay five bucks for something like that. And how do you know how? You don't know how to code. You can't figure that out. Right? Go get a job like everybody else." And then I kind of moved and found my tribe you know, and in Silicon Valley area and then in Austin, Texas. And then next thing you know, I'm actually doing the thing.

[00:36:53] Jason: I think even if people just come to DoorGrow Live to connect with somebody like you and they can create a relationship with somebody like you or any of the change makers or players that we attract at our event.

[00:37:05] Jason: I mean, you've done things that a lot of people would dream of being able to do in business, right. And so come make those connections, come to DoorGrow Live and make some connections because it's going to change your life for sure. So, well Zac, I appreciate you coming on the show. People can connect with your company at utilityprofit.com.

[00:37:22] Jason: Do a demo. And it's been great having you here.

[00:37:26] Zac: Hey, thanks so much for having me on Jason.

[00:37:28] Jason: All right, so everybody, if you are struggling to grow your business or you're struggling to deal with operations, reach out to us. Check us out at DoorGrow.com. We would love to have a conversation, see if we might be able to help you with something.

[00:37:39] Jason: And that's what we do all day long and we care about our clients. We really want to make sure that everybody succeeds. We only win if you're winning. And so until next time, everybody to our mutual growth, let's all win. Bye everyone.

View Details

The property management industry is no stranger to conferences and in-person events, but have you ever thought about creating an event yourself?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss the behind-the-scenes of putting on a live event or conference and all the pros and cons of doing so.

You’ll Learn [04:39] Learning from Past Mistakes and Failures

[15:32] Getting Back in the Saddle: DoorGrow Live

[21:07] What Goes Into Creating a Conference?

[30:31] The Magic of In-Person Events

Quotables “I think being able to just connect with people, making sure that people know who you are and what you do, I mean, it's really valuable.”

“When you've got a room full of people who are in the same sector, in the same industry, there's so much knowledge in that room.”

“When you're connecting with other people that are like you, that are growth minded and you both share an industry and a share a business model, like it really helps you grow.”

“Your business is the sum of the five property management business owners you as a business owner are most connected to.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: When you're connecting with other people that are like you, that are growth minded and you both share an industry and share a business model, like it really helps you grow.

[00:00:08] Jason: Your business is the sum of the five property management business owners you as a business owner are most connected to.

[00:00:13] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the Property Management Growth Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life. And you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it.

[00:00:42] Jason: You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win.

[00:01:06] Jason: We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show. All right.

[00:01:14] Sarah: Woo!

[00:01:15] Jason: So first, you'll have to excuse if I sound a little nasally today, because I have a cold, which doesn't happen often. And I might have given it to Sarah. I don't know.

[00:01:25] Sarah: My sinuses just feel weird.

[00:01:27] Jason: So.

[00:01:27] Sarah: So thanks.

[00:01:28] Jason: Yeah.

[00:01:29] Sarah: Thanks for that.

[00:01:30] Jason: Okay, so.

[00:01:31] Sarah: Appreciate it.

[00:01:32] Jason: You keep kissing me. I'm not kissing you. Like I'm not trying to get you sick.

[00:01:35] Sarah: He's not kissing me.

[00:01:36] Sarah: She can't resist.

[00:01:37] Sarah: Does anybody believe that? Nobody believes you. Nobody should.

[00:01:40] Jason: I'm sick. You keep coming up to me.

[00:01:42] Jason: I'm like, you want this? Obviously she does, guys. Obviously.

[00:01:46] Sarah: Oh brother.

[00:01:47] Sarah: Alright.

[00:01:48] Sarah: What a great episode. What a great kicker offered.

[00:01:51] Jason: So I might be coughing and I apologize. Alright, so what we're talking about today is we thought we'd give you a little bit of behind the scenes into us creating an event and us doing DoorGrow Live, getting prepped and prepared for this. You know, we put an entire year into getting this thing going and getting this prepared and promoting it, finding speakers.

[00:02:15] Jason: And so let's chat a little bit about some of the behind the scenes stuff.

[00:02:19] Sarah: Yeah. So one of the things that I wanted to talk about is kind of everything that really goes into it behind the scenes that when you go attend an event, you just don't notice. You just don't like realize a lot of the times, unless you're used to running events.

[00:02:35] Sarah: And once you start running an event, go run one event and then you will attend every other event differently. For example, when we go to, you know, Aaron's events, or Funnel Hacking Live, my brain is constantly going, like, operationally, this must be a nightmare. How on earth are they coordinating all of this?

[00:02:56] Sarah: It's just insane. Because I know how crazy it is with our conferences, and we don't yet have thousands of people there. We will, at one point. But, man, there's just so much that goes into it. So, If you're ever considering running events, and I think that for property managers and for anyone who's a real estate agent or investor, I really think events are something that you should at least look into. And it doesn't have to be this big crazy event where, you know, you spend 25- 30 thousand dollars like we do and that's kind of like a low budget, you know. That's like you'll blow through that real quick. It doesn't have to be anything like that and it definitely doesn't have to be this, you know, this big crazy promoted thing you can do your own version of events like in a very different way, back when I was in property management, you know, we would do some little networking events and they were nowhere near the size, but also nowhere near the cost, but they can be really beneficial for you to do. So I think if you haven't experimented with that, then maybe get some tips and pointers and check it out. Like try it, experiment and see what happens. Because for me, it was really great to just be connected. So there's that saying, "your net worth is in your network," and I think being able to just connect with people, make sure that people know who you are and what you do, I mean, it's really valuable. So if you're a property manager and you haven't done a little in person event yet, then perhaps you might want to try. And we're going to talk a little bit about, you know, what goes into like a bigger event the way that we run them. So why don't you give them some background?

[00:04:41] Sarah: When was your first? Your first DoorGrow Live was pre-Sarah, the pre-Sarah DoorGrow age, I think it was it 2018?

[00:04:49] Jason: Yeah. 2018. 2018. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:04:51] Sarah: Okay. Can you talk about you know, what was the first DoorGrow Live like?

[00:04:57] Jason: Oh man. Yeah. And if you want to get a visual of this, you can go to, I think it's photos.doorgrow.Com and we have photos of all of our different major events. You can go back to 2018 and there's a nice photo of me and Mike Michalowicz there. And so we brought in some big, you know, for me, they were big speakers. Some people that I really looked up to and that I got a lot of value from.

[00:05:22] Jason: So, coach, authors, you know, people that I had worked with. And so, it was a big deal. We spent, I think we spent about $115,000. Putting that event together because I wanted to do it, right. I didn't want my first event to be Mickey Mouse or cheap or you know, whatever So I wanted to do a really good job and I thought well, "and we'll sell tickets to make up for it." We did. We sold about a hundred and fifteen tickets at around, I think $1,000 a pop.

[00:05:53] Jason: And I have a whole podcast episode I did on this. I call it my $2 million mistake because we were growing at a pace of, we were doing about a million in revenue a year and we were growing at a pace of about 300% percent at the time we were growing really quickly. We had a lot of momentum, and I decided to do this big conference. It was a little bit of an ego thing. Like it was like kind of a dream that I wanted to feel cool and be on stage and it was super stressful. The event went really well. People liked it, but I was massively stressed during it. And then I didn't do another one for how many years? I don't know.

[00:06:29] Sarah: Yeah, that was his first and only and then like canceled it

[00:06:33] Jason: I was like, "I don't think I'll do that again."

[00:06:35] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:06:36] Jason: I mean I didn't realize everything that goes into it. I'm sure people were watching me start my first conference from the sidelines who have done events in the space were like, "good luck, bro," because they know how hard it can be.

[00:06:47] Jason: It's like starting a whole nother business but you have to recognize there's like the hotel. It's hard to do an event that's not at a hotel. So you kind of have to do it at hotels and so they have this like, sort of, they're like the mafia.

[00:07:01] Jason: They have this control over doing events. Like, and you go to them, you're like, "I want to do an event here." And they're like, "cool." And like finances become a thing and they negotiate a group rate with you, which means you have to book certain number of rooms because they want you to book rooms, and if you don't book out the group rate for the rooms in the room block, then you're responsible to pay for that.

[00:07:24] Jason: So we were on the hook for like a lot of money for rooms. I'm like, "well, how many rooms does that mean? And like how many nights?" And all this stuff. So just managing finances for an event is like managing finances for a dangerous business startup is really what it is. Because people have gone bankrupt from doing big events really big events where you have two, three thousand, five thousand. These are millions and millions of dollars in and out.

[00:07:48] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:07:49] Jason: And if they don't navigate this well, it can bankrupt companies

[00:07:53] Sarah: Russell just said that on stage. He didn't say who, but Russell Brunson said that he knew someone that was running a big event, didn't sell enough rooms in the room block, and he went bankrupt from it because it was such a large event and he was on the hook for so much money and ended up bankrupting the company.

[00:08:13] Jason: It's dangerous. And then you got to get people to buy the ticket, book the hotel, like, and then there's marketing to do this. You got to spend a lot of money to get people to do this. And then, you know, in order to attract people, sometimes people will do like big speakers. Like I got some speakers and let me tell you speakers, they're expensive.

[00:08:33] Jason: Like usually they, they want thousands and thousands of dollars. Like an

[00:08:37] Sarah: inexpensive speaker just to like put it out there, like an inexpensive speaker is still usually around like 5k

[00:08:44] Jason: Anyone you've probably heard of is that minimum 25 grand.

[00:08:47] Sarah: Well more than that.

[00:08:49] Jason: And if they're a big name It's 50k, 100k, it can be really expensive to have them come be in an event.

[00:08:58] Jason: So, Yeah, so it can be really challenging. Then there's food and beverage minimums. So the hotel, they're like, "you also have to spend a certain amount on food and beverage while you're here." Yeah, so they're like, "you have to book a certain number of rooms. You have to, like, pay for a certain number of food and beverage, and you're not allowed to bring any other food or beverage into our place."

[00:09:19] Jason: Nope.

[00:09:19] Jason: "You have to use our stuff. And our stuff is like going to the movie theater. It's overly priced, like, inflated."

[00:09:26] Sarah: Remember, we did the Game Changer event at the JW Marriott in Austin so I looked at everything afterwards and it was not a huge event. It was not a big event. We had under 20 people there.

[00:09:40] Sarah: Yeah. And that included like Jason, myself, DoorGrow staff, speakers, like under 20 people. And one lunch and we had, it was a two day event. So we did like two lunches. So one lunch, I think was somewhere around like two or 3,000 dollars. Yeah, it was insane for lunch.

[00:09:57] Jason: And my first event, we spent eight grand to provide coffee for two days. Eight grand for...

[00:10:03] Sarah: coffee. Yeah.

[00:10:05] Jason: For two days like and you know, and they have all these rules. I think the rules are made to inflate the price, but they have these food and beverage and they charge you sometimes by plate. So that hotel that we were at our first event, we didn't realize this, but they have people to go around and pick up plates.

[00:10:22] Jason: And you're paying by the number of plates people use. Like how much food they consume and by plate. So they were picking up plates.

[00:10:29] Sarah: Oh my god.

[00:10:30] Jason: It's a racket. Like if you go into this not knowing what you're doing, some hotels can take gross amounts of money. Wow. They negotiate a terrible group rate, they negotiate a horrible food and beverage minimum is really high for you, and then you go way over that minimum if they have anything to do with it.

[00:10:45] Jason: And so you're spending all this money and they're like, "well..."

[00:10:47] Sarah: you'll never have to worry about hitting your minimum in food and beverage, like, never. No, really.

[00:10:51] Jason: I mean, if you want food there, period, like,

[00:10:54] Sarah: you're going to hit it. So, I don't care. I don't even care what my minimum is because it doesn't, honestly, it doesn't even matter.

[00:11:00] Jason: Yeah. So then people think, oh, well, then I'll do the event somewhere else. Well, if you do it somewhere else, then how are they going to get from where they're staying to the venue? And so then there's a logistical challenge. So then like people aren't like coming and it's just like it's so much easier if they walk.

[00:11:17] Jason: So everything gets like complicated when you don't do it at the hotel.

[00:11:22] Sarah: Where was your first event? Where was it?

[00:11:24] Jason: It was in St. Louis at an old classic hotel. It was really beautiful.

[00:11:28] Sarah: Okay. Interesting.

[00:11:30] Jason: Yeah, we did in St. Louis. We did it at This hotel and we did it because we thought we'll make it easy because NARPM had an event around the same time.

[00:11:41] Jason: So we're like, Oh man, we want to do it at the same time. So let's just do it at the same venue. I think we did it the same venue, but we booked a nicer room on the top floor with lots of windows. It was very cool. And it was on different days. So you could attend both. We thought that would give us some cross pollination and really, it didn't.

[00:12:00] Jason: Like there were a few people that went to the NARPM one and came to ours, but yeah, it was like so small. So that didn't even really help. "We're like, yeah, it's so easy to stay a little longer and go to ours."

[00:12:08] Sarah: Interesting. Okay. Yeah.

[00:12:10] Jason: Yeah.

[00:12:11] Sarah: So after the first DoorGrow Live, he decided, I think when I came on board, he said, "I'm never doing another event again."

[00:12:18] Jason: Yeah, I just didn't want to deal with it. It was so stressful. And your whole team, that's the real part of it, is like your whole team is involved in it in different ways, unless you have someone specifically handling sales, event, marketing, planning, advertising, planning, like every role we had in our business that we needed for our business had to go towards the conference because we were now on the hook for, I can't remember, like 50, 80 grand or something with the hotel. We had to figure out how to get rooms booked. We had to figure out how to pay for speakers. It was a whole thing. It was like starting a whole nother business. And our main thing was no longer the main thing.

[00:12:58] Jason: So our business stopped growing. It actually didn't grow for several years after that, like a couple of years after that. And that's why I call it my 3 million or 2 million mistake, but it was probably a bigger multi million dollar mistake than that, because there's a lot of money I could have made over those years extra.

[00:13:14] Jason: We're not hurting by any means, but that really slowed things down. And I just chalk that up to being the price of tuition in business. I made a mistake. I didn't know. And I learned from it, right? And I didn't listen to my mentor. Alex was like, "make it a really small event. Make it really small. Do your first one, make it small." I'm like, "no way. I've been to so many events. I'm going to make this awesome. I want this. If I'm going to compete with all the other events that are out there, I want this to be the best." And I really think, like, we had the best food there. We had the best, like, everything was the best.

[00:13:46] Jason: We had audio visual team. We had a stage set up, like, we put a lot of money into this and it was pretty awesome. Like, it went pretty well. But I was massively stressed during the whole event. And yeah, but people that went, they gave us good feedback. They had a good experience. So, which I'm glad. Then you got to like ticket sales is hard too.

[00:14:06] Jason: That's a tough challenge. How do you get people to give up what they're doing to come do something else? And so, you know, we've created some really strong magic. I think at DoorGrow, like our in person events, there's just something magical about our events. There's more heart, there's more connection.

[00:14:20] Jason: It changes lives and that's very different than what has happened in the space. And I think that's more just about who we are and what we bring and the type of speakers that we bring in. It's very different than just property management.

[00:14:34] Sarah: And so that's one of the things I wanted to talk about is, so you did your first event.

[00:14:39] Sarah: It went well, but it was pretty crazy. We basically broke even. We're not doing another event. I came on to the business a couple years after this and there's still a lot of like trauma and PTSD associated with it and then we started talking. Well, what if we do another event? And he said "no. No I don't want to do another event," and I said, "well, what if we do it differently?" So we did bring DoorGrow Live back after that first conference that they did and we've done several of them since then. We have another one coming up in May. It's May 16th and 17th. It's a Friday and Saturday at the Kalahari Resorts in the North Austin, Texas area. So if you're watching this and you have not yet registered, then definitely go do that. You can go to doorgrowlive.Com. But we've done several of these events since then, and one of the reasons that we wanted to bring these events back, especially even though for Jason it was just so, so traumatic, we just needed to do them a little differently.

[00:15:43] Sarah: So, the reason that we wanted to bring them back though is because everything is just so much different when it's in person. And we know that there's so much magic that can just happen if, you know, if we can get people in a room. It's not just going to another conference. So in the industry, there's a lot of conferences, I mean, there's tech conferences and like all the big you know softwares have their own thing and there's NARPM events and there's all kinds of things like this and DoorGrow Live is just different. It's different than all of those things. We're not trying to focus on hey, you know, what are they doing and let's duplicate it. We're focused on how can we provide like such a great experience and such great value and real connection in a like large group environment? Which is hard.

[00:16:38] Sarah: Like that's a challenge. If you're like, okay, we're going to get, you know, 50 to a hundred people in a room and we want them to all be connected. That's hard. That's hard. But I think that our events do actually a really great job at that.

[00:16:49] Jason: Yeah, I think so. Yeah, we get great testimonials. It's going to we have a really cool venue We just decided to keep doing it at this Kalahari resort.

[00:16:59] Jason: It's near our house. It's in Round Rock They treat us really well there. It's a big it's like we have endless room to grow there We could have thousands and thousands of people someday if we wanted to. There's plenty of room there

[00:17:12] Sarah: But they're great to work with and the rooms are nice. When you guys book a room, the rooms are nice, everything is right on property, it's very family friendly too, so, you know, if you want to kind of bring your family and usually, I've noticed sometimes people, when they go to the conference, and then their family stays at home, there's a little bit of like, "oh, you're leaving me with the kids, like, what is this? Like, you get to go off to a conference and," well, come, like, come with us and you guys can hang out at, like the water park and the Build A Bear and the restaurants and the like arcade and there's still...

[00:17:48] Jason: America's largest indoor water park. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:17:52] Sarah: And I think when you book a room, they include a ticket.

[00:17:53] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:17:54] Jason: You get a ticket to all a bunch of cool stuff. So like you get a, like a wristband. So yeah it's a pretty fun place. Like there's a whole Facebook group just for people looking for deals and discounts to stay at this resort. Yeah. They're like always talking about it in that group. I've joined all the local groups, just see what's going on.

[00:18:15] Jason: So, yeah, so it's pretty interesting. So yeah, we've got a really cool venue. And oh, the other things places have charged us for other places we've done some of our events they charge us for electricity, they charge us for, like, just having cords put down.

[00:18:31] Sarah: They charge for internet.

[00:18:32] Jason: They find a way to charge you for everything at some venues, and so, not all venues are equal.

[00:18:38] Jason: So, yeah, so we've really appreciated the Kalahari Resort in Round Rock. It's a cool resort, and they treat us really well there, so.

[00:18:45] Sarah: Yeah, and it's a great experience for people. Because that's really frustrating when you go into any kind of hotel and you're like, "Oh. Why is this where I'm at? I guess I'll be here because the conference is here, but outside of the conference being here, I would never book here." And this is not that at all. Like people like to book here for sure. I think now let's do our little demo and then we'll get back into it.

[00:19:08] Jason: Got a little sponsor for today's episode, KRS SmartBooks.

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[00:19:35] Jason: Sound good? Head to KRS Books. At K as in Kansas, R as in Roger, S as in Sam. Books. Sarah's already dying. She's like, you didn't do the right military phonetically.

[00:19:46] Sarah: I really am dying inside.

[00:19:47] Jason: KRSbooks. com to book your free discovery call. Integrity, quality, and a dash of bookkeeping brilliance. That's KRS Smart Books.

[00:19:58] Jason: Alright, how should I phonetically do KRS?

[00:20:00] Sarah: K like Kilo, R like Romeo, S like Sierra.

[00:20:04] Jason: Alright, Sarah, by the way, is Becoming a pilot. She's taking pilot flying lessons.

[00:20:11] Sarah: I've known the military code for years

[00:20:13] Sarah: because I used to work in a casino and that's how they would communicate in slot machines.

[00:20:20] Jason: Yeah, alright.

[00:20:21] Sarah: But now it's also handy being a pilot.

[00:20:24] Jason: Okay.

[00:20:24] Sarah: Alright, so if that sounds good, I think it sounds really great. Because I know a lot of property managers struggle with bookkeeping, and that's usually not something that's fun for property managers. It's definitely necessary, but it, oh man, it's not fun, and it's really draining.

[00:20:38] Sarah: So if you can find someone that's great at what they do, and you can allow them to handle that, and just kind of check in and make sure things are going well, then, whoo, man, life gets a lot easier.

[00:20:51] Jason: Yeah if you're not paying attention to the finances or the financial health of your business or your accounting You're probably getting stolen from it's just I've seen it happen so many times.

[00:21:01] Jason: So get a great bookkeeper. Yeah have people you trust to take care of that. Okay.

[00:21:07] Sarah: So speaking of finances, let's talk a little bit about what kind of goes into an event. So for example, we have our DoorGrow Live coming up in May this year. So we have been working on this event now since, so our last one was in May, and then I think we started working on the new one in like July, June or July.

[00:21:31] Sarah: So things that have to kind of happen just to be able to have the space, obviously, you have to look into venues, you have to, you know, look at the space, make sure it's going to work for the size of your group, which means you kind of have to estimate a little bit what it's going to look like, and then make sure that the room can.

[00:21:48] Sarah: fit more or less if needed.

[00:21:51] Jason: You've got to negotiate with the hotel.

[00:21:53] Sarah: Yep. You've got to negotiate what the rates would be. You know, am I paying for the space or am I paying for the room block and the food? Because there's different ways to do it. So you've got to figure out, you know, how many rooms in the room block do I need?

[00:22:09] Sarah: Because if you overestimate that, if you go, "Hey, I think I'm going to have a thousand people come" and 100 people come, it is not going to be a good time for you because every room in the room block that is not sold, you are financially on the hook for. So you get to pay for that. And it's like, it's a certain number of nights.

[00:22:28] Sarah: So it's not even so much how many rooms it's, how many nights someone will book. So you want to track that along the way. And then you want to start looking at a lot of the tactical things that go into it, like, well, who is going to speak at the event? So you want to start looking at speakers and when you're looking at speakers, you start to think about, you know, who would our audience resonate with and what kind of value would they provide?

[00:22:55] Sarah: And, you know, is this strategic and tactical stuff or is this like mindset and empowerment stuff? Because you kind of want to get a mix of both at each event because everyone who comes to an event They're looking for a different thing. So it's really impossible to satisfy everybody make sure everybody, you know is super happy with everything sometimes people say, "oh, I wish there was more of this and oh, I wish there was more of that," but you kind of have to do like this balance and mix to make sure that everybody gets something out of it.

[00:23:25] Sarah: And that they have a great experience. You also want to build a little bit of fun into it. So that it's not just, "hey, show up to this conference, sit down, learn something, take some notes and walk out of the room." You know, we've been to events like that before. Where it's like, "okay, that was a lot. But also, man, it would have been really cool to like, do something fun and you know connect with people," so you want to you know start to build in some time so that people can connect with other people, you know, so are you going to do a mixer?

[00:23:52] Sarah: Are you going to do some sort of networking event? You know, are you going to you know go do kind of some fun event before like the night before? Are you going to, you know, send them off to lunch together? What is that going to look like? So that they can really connect with each other especially when you've got a room full of people who are in the same sector, in the same industry, there's so much knowledge in that room.

[00:24:15] Sarah: So just talking to other people in the room is really valuable and making connections. So there's got to be some room for that as well. And then you want to think about well, are we going to have any vendors or sponsors? Yeah, and are those vendors or sponsors people that have services that are valuable and that we trust? Because there have also been times where, you know, someone had wanted to sponsor us and we did not want them to be a sponsor.

[00:24:43] Sarah: Because if they don't provide a great service, you know, can you throw some money and be in the room? Yeah, but if it's not the right person to be in the room, then that matters. That matters a lot. So we have turned down money. We've turned down sponsorships. So then you also have to think about all of the tactical things.

[00:25:05] Sarah: Well, you know, am I doing round tables? Am I doing classroom style? Are we doing full circles? Are we doing semi circles? Like what is the front of the room? And what's the back of the room? And where are the vendors going to be? And what doors do people walk in and out of? And as soon as they walk in, what is the first thing that they see?

[00:25:20] Sarah: In what direction do we want to go in? And are they crossing over our equipment? Is somebody going to trip and fall on all the 10,000 chords that we have like taped down and. Then you have to also think about things like your AV. So does the room have internet? Is there power in the room? And I know that seems like a silly question to ask, but guess what?

[00:25:40] Sarah: Sometimes they charge you for power. So you would think, hey, there's power in the room, obviously, because like it's at a hotel. They obviously have electricity. Yeah, but do you have to pay for it?

[00:25:49] Jason: Yeah, AV is expensive. Like we rented it initially and it was so costly.

[00:25:54] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:25:54] Jason: For the price you could rent it for it made sense to just buy it.

[00:25:58] Sarah: To buy it.

[00:25:59] Jason: And so we eventually bought all our own equipment, but that means now we have to set it up and we have to figure it out. And so, yeah, so there's always a challenge.

[00:26:08] Sarah: Before the actual conference, like before anybody even steps foot like on property, Jason and I and several members of our team are there setting things up.

[00:26:18] Jason: Sometimes my kids. Yeah,

[00:26:19] Sarah: sometimes the kids, sometimes an assistant, sometimes Madi comes on in.

[00:26:22] Jason: We're hooking up lights, we're plugging in audio equipment.

[00:26:25] Sarah: So we like pack everything up in Jason's SUV. We drive it over, we unload it. I'm doing this in stilettos, mind you, because I'm a stubborn

[00:26:33] Jason: You do everything in stilettos.

[00:26:33] Sarah: Yeah, that's what I am. Right, so we like, we get there, we unpack it, we have to set it all up. You know, we're making sure that, like, all the lights are working, a sound system has to work, because there's no point in having a microphone if it's not going to work. There's always technical errors, and I'm horrible with technology, so Jason is our tech person, and he is the only tech person that we have.

[00:26:54] Sarah: So he gets to figure everything out. And then it's like, you know, is the screen working? And can people see it? And is the laptop connecting to the screen? And is it blurry or is it too big or too far? Like there's always these weird little issues that happen and I don't know how to solve any of them.

[00:27:10] Sarah: Yeah, so Jason knows how to do that. And then there's the other things like well. What about swag? And you know, are we doing a registration table and who's going to be there to, you know, check people in and make sure they know what to do and they know where to go? And, you know, is there like just kind of first come first serve seating?

[00:27:27] Sarah: Or is there like a separate section for, you know, special clients or VIP clients or speakers or the team? And there's also things like, "Oh, well what about name badges?" You know, are we doing, like, are we doing name badges? Are we, you know, making sure that everybody kind of knows who everybody else is? Is there anything special or is it just like a bunch of people walking into a room and then hopefully they figure out that they're in the right room? Like there's so much that goes into it and then there's the scheduling. So well, you know, who's going to go in what order, what day and time are certain speakers available? Because just because they commit to an event doesn't mean, "oh, I can speak at any point during the event."

[00:28:11] Sarah: So, you know, it's putting the agenda together and how long do you give them for lunch and where are they going for lunch? And are we doing lunch? Are we, you know, letting them facilitate it on their own? Are we doing breaks? How do we get them back from breaks? Are we, it's crazy. Like it's so, there's so much.

[00:28:28] Jason: If you give people a break at an event, it's like 30 minutes of downtime. Oh yeah. It's really hard to get people to like get to the next thing or come back right away. And they all start talking to each other, which is cool. They want to network. Yeah, so getting people back from lunch.

[00:28:43] Sarah: Yes, absolutely. Yes.

[00:28:45] Sarah: And then it's, you know, who kicks off the event? Who opens it? Who closes it? Who's going after lunch? Because we all know most people, what happens to them after lunch? They're tired. I'm fine. But a lot of people, they're tired after lunch. So you can't have a, you know, more mundane or quiet or low energy speaker after lunch.

[00:29:06] Sarah: You just can't. Because you'll lose everybody. So there's a lot that goes into the scheduling as well. And then there's things like, you know, who's going to MC it? Who's making announcements? Who's making sure that everybody knows where to be? And what time? And what to do and when to come back? And who's doing the intros for speakers?

[00:29:26] Sarah: Are you doing music for every speaker that comes up? If so, like, are they picking it? Are you picking it? What happens? Like there is so so so much that goes into it, and then after you like run the event then you got to break it all down if it's your equipment. Yeah, so then it's like pack it all up and put it away and make sure nothing gets damaged or lost and repack the car and unload it again, and like there is so much that goes Into it.

[00:29:53] Sarah: And I would say at this point, it's funny because Jason now can show up to DoorGrow Live and nine out of 10 times, he has no idea what's going to happen or when.

[00:30:05] Sarah: I love it.

[00:30:06] Sarah: I just call him up on stage and he's like, oh, okay, because, and I'm like, my team handle most of it. Talking on this go.

[00:30:12] Jason: Right now. I still just have to make sure the tech stuff all works.

[00:30:15] Jason: But yeah, other than that, yeah, I don't. I don't have to do as much which is nice, but because it's stressful enough. It's stressful enough So yeah, so it's a lot. There's a lot that goes into it, but it's been worth it to have you know to see people's lives change to see people impacted. We've noticed there's some sort of magic that happens that when people come to something in person with us even if they've been a client for years, they start to get different results.

[00:30:40] Jason: They start to see things differently. They start to absorb all of our content, our information, our training material, our ideas more effectively. Everything just magnifies. There's something about in person. You can't get the same sort of benefit in your business. If you think, "all I need to do is read books and watch videos and show up to zoom calls to grow my business.

[00:31:04] Jason: Look, there's a lot of benefits in all of those things. I do all those things, but we still go to in person things. There's something different about in person that I don't know if it's the energy of being in the same space as the people you're learning from. If it's the group energy and that group mind that makes you able to like learn and faster.

[00:31:23] Jason: There's, but there's some, I don't know if maybe there's some quantum physical magic, magical stuff, but there's something different about it in person. It's happened too many times for me to like believe otherwise or to dismiss it. I've had too many clients that I've been working with for years, go to their first in person thing with us, and then they have some breakthrough. And I'm like what? And they tell me about it, and I'm like, "I've been teaching you that for years!" Like "I know but like but it's just hit differently."

[00:31:51] Jason: Yeah, "I just got it."

[00:31:52] Sarah: It hits different. It feels different and you just absorb things.

[00:31:57] Jason: And because we've seen this pattern, we've seen this pattern, we now make it part of our onboarding of every new client to come hang out with Sarah and I in person for a one day with usually a small cohort and like, and just get some things figured out and dialed in their business.

[00:32:14] Jason: And that's been magic for our business. Like it's been magic for our clients, magic for us. So we give them that in person experience early on. And then DoorGrow Live allows them to connect with others, which is there's just something different about the people at DoorGrow. The property managers at DoorGrow are different.

[00:32:30] Jason: I've been to a lot of conferences. A lot. Like in various industries, but especially in property management. And there's something different about the people that we attract and the clients that we attract. They're growth minded, they're positive active in mentalities, which means they're not like the skeptical, negative Nancy's that are grumpy about the industry and the business.

[00:32:51] Jason: That there's this positive growth minded, healthier sort of personality that we attract at DoorGrow. And maybe that says a little bit about who we are, because that's what I tried to be. But we attract amazing people and the connections people make, when you're connecting with other people that are like you, that are growth minded and you both share an industry and a share a business model, like it really helps you grow.

[00:33:15] Jason: Your business is the sum of the five property management business owners you as a business owner are most connected to or that you're most influenced by. So look at those property managers if you've got coaches or mentors, and they're not people that you really like that maybe you think they're smart, but you don't really want to be more like them, then maybe you're around the wrong people.

[00:33:34] Jason: Maybe you have the wrong coach, and I'm not the coach for everybody. Sarah's not the coach for everybody. But you should have a coach. Otherwise, you're selling yourself short if you're not accountable to anybody, you're definitely getting less results than you could or should be so come to DoorGrow Live come check us out. This DoorGrow Live,

[00:33:52] Jason: I want to open our playbooks up if Sarah lets me. I want to just reveal some really amazing stuff that only our clients get to see because I want to show anyone that shows up that's not part of our DoorGrow ecosystem. Our clients know the magic's there. We have more case studies or testimonials than anyone else in the industry, but if you're not a DoorGrow client, and you want to come to DoorGrow Live I'm going to give you some gifts for sure, some magic. We're going to make some significant changes in your business. They're going to help you make a lot more money a lot more easily and keep a lot more of your profit and so come hang out with us.

[00:34:29] Jason: You're not going to be disappointed for sure So there you go.

[00:34:33] Sarah: Yeah. This event we've got some really awesome things planned. We can't let too much out of the bag at this point. But we always have some really great things planned and every event we do, like we always learn from it.

[00:34:46] Sarah: And we always do like a little team meeting afterwards and we get feedback from people. We're always looking to make it better and better. And this year is absolutely no exception to that. So the things that we have planned for this year, like I know that if you come to this event, it will change your business and it will change your life.

[00:35:12] Sarah: And I know that's a really bold statement and we're ready to back it.

[00:35:16] Jason: Yeah. And maybe that could be a later podcast episode as we get closer to the event. But we can tell you a little bit more about what's going to be happening there, but hopefully this was interesting to get behind the scenes at all that goes into DoorGrow Live and we meet on this you know, we're talking about it weekly, monthly in our planning meetings, like and quarterly.

[00:35:37] Jason: And so, and that's it for today's episode. So if you are interested in that, go check it out at DoorGrowLive.Com and get your tickets and get things booked and get ready to come have an amazing experience in May at DoorGrow Live. So, and until next time to our mutual growth, bye everyone.

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Why did you decide to own a property management business instead of working for someone else? Did you just want money, or was it something deeper that drove you to become an entrepreneur?

In this episode of The Property Management Growth Show, industry growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Rich Walker, Founder of Quik! Forms to discuss adaptability as an entrepreneur and embracing change.

You’ll Learn [01:55] Entrepreneurial Tendancies from a Young Age

[13:49] Reasons for Starting a Business

[20:08] Embracing Change and Facing Adversity

[30:31] The Power of In-Person Interaction

Quotables “ You build something people want, they'll pay you for it.”

“There's no value in worry.”

“We think we want more money because we think it's going to give us more freedom and fulfillment, but we actually have less fulfillment and less freedom the more money we make.”

“If everybody thinks they're right, then my beliefs can be just as right.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Rich: What do you get when you have your best work?

[00:00:01] Rich: You get joy, you get fulfillment, you get productivity, you get engagement and you get the highest possible outcome from every person on your team. That's why I'm an entrepreneur more than anything else.

[00:00:11] Jason: All right. Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the property management growth show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, impact lives, help others, and you're interested in growing your business and life and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management, growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:13] Jason: And my guest today, I'm hanging out with a local Austinite, fellow friend that I know locally, CEO and co founder of Quik! Forms Processing, Rich Walker. Welcome Rich.

[00:01:26] Rich: Hey everybody. Really an honor to be here. Jason. Thanks for having me on your show today.

[00:01:30] Jason: Yeah, glad to have you.

[00:01:31] Jason: So you're doing some really cool stuff in business. And it's been great. We're in a mastermind locally together. And and you're going to be speaking to our audience at DoorGrow Live, you know, for those listening, make sure you get your tickets to DoorGrow Live. And you've written some books, like tell everybody, give us some background on Rich and how you kind of got into entrepreneurism and like, what you do.

[00:01:55] Rich: So, well, boy, this could be a long story or I'll try to keep it brief. Look, I grew up very poor. I was the product of a broken household, if you will. And I learned very early on that if you make something people want, they'll pay you for it. It's amazing. So I started my first business at age 12. I took a $300 investment and turned it into over $1,100 in one day at an event.

[00:02:18] Rich: And I was stunned. I was just struck with all these people handing me fistfuls of cash to buy my product. And I said, "wow, this is what I'm going to be. I'm going to be an entrepreneur. I'm going to build businesses."

[00:02:29] Jason: What was the product at age 12?

[00:02:31] Rich: Oh, man. So I should show it to you. I'd have to go off screen to get it.

[00:02:35] Rich: But if you know what surgical tubing looks like stretchy latex tubing, and you know what a pen tip looks like, take the pen tip, shove it into the tube, tie a knot on the other end, and then get a garden hose with a cone shaped nozzle and it blows up a long tube of water. Like a squirt gun. Yeah, we called them water weenies.

[00:02:52] Rich: Yeah, I made those. Yeah! Yeah.

[00:02:56] Rich: So, but imagine before the super soaker came out, what were your options? You had water balloons, hand grenades, you had squirt guns that went five feet, you had the hose stuck to the house and then water weenies, which squirted 30 feet and carried gallons of water on your back.

[00:03:13] Rich: So you are the king of the water fights.

[00:03:15] Jason: Yeah, and you got a good workout.

[00:03:18] Rich: Yeah, amazing.

[00:03:19] Jason: How long were these tubes? How long would you cut them?

[00:03:23] Rich: The longest cut length would be three feet, but when it filled up, it was nine feet. So imagine, draped around your neck, down to your toes, with water.

[00:03:31] Jason: Nine feet of water filled hose.

[00:03:32] Jason: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:03:33] Rich: Yeah. So you were just a walking, like fire truck.

[00:03:36] Jason: I just got back from funnel hacking live and Russell Brunson always shares a story of starting by selling potato guns online, like how to build potato guns. This sounds very reminiscent.

[00:03:47] Rich: Yeah, very much. It was a really awesome experience. I mean, honestly, going from having nothing to having money in my hands.

[00:03:54] Rich: And actually I saved up money at age 12, just about to turn 13. I saved it until I bought my first car when I turned 16.

[00:04:01] Jason: Wow. Wow. All right. So you ever heard of the marshmallow tests they give kids? I'm not sure. It's like, it's delayed gratification versus instant gratification, right? So they put a marshmallow in front of them and they make them wait with it.

[00:04:14] Jason: And they're like, you can eat this marshmallow, but if you don't eat it by the time I get back, then I'll give you two marshmallows or something like this. I think it's how it goes. And most kids fail. They're like, "Oh, I really want that." Or they'll put cookie or whatever it is, you know, showing you saving money, when there's like, you could buy video games as a kid, like whatever, right? That's some serious delayed gratification right there, so.

[00:04:38] Rich: You know, Jason, I got to tell a bigger story here because really this is what happened at age eight, I went to my friend's house and my friend had a radio controlled car.

[00:04:46] Rich: It was a kit you had to build yourself, but it would drive 35 miles per hour off road. It was amazing. This is the eighties, right? Yeah. And I wanted that car so bad. And we were so poor. There was no way my parents were going to buy me a $300 car. And in today's money, that's like 12 to 1500 bucks. Okay. Yes.

[00:05:03] Rich: So that's not going to happen. So I started saving my money, birthday, Christmas money. I would sell candy around the neighborhood. I would rake leaves for a neighbor and make $2. Anything I could do, anything I could do to save money. It took me four years. To save up the $300. And that summer that I got introduced to water weenies was by my neighbor. He was a supplier to physicians. His son and I played all the time. And he came out and gave us these water weenies to play with, but then he took them back and all the other kids wanted one. So I was kind of observant and I said, "Hey, In your shed, I see a reel of tubing. Can I buy that from you?"

[00:05:36] Rich: It was like 25 feet of tubing. "He's like, okay, how much?" It was like 12 bucks or something. Ran home, grabbed the money out of my bank account, gave it to him, went home, started cutting links, destroyed every pen in my house and started selling. And within a day or two, I had sold $50 worth of stuff. So I went and bought another 25 feet and sold another $50 bucks.

[00:05:53] Rich: Then I went to summer camp and I rode my bike and squirted every kid I could find had 20 kids chasing me on my bike. And then I'd sell them all the water. So over that course of that summer, I got to the $300 mark and I bought the car. Now, my uncle saw all this behavior and said, "Rich next summer, I'm hosting fourth of July.

[00:06:10] Rich: You could have a booth and sell these water weenies there. Would you like to do that?" I'm like, "yeah, absolutely." Months and months go by, go through winter, go into spring, my mom reminds me of this opportunity. And I'm like, okay, so I go to my neighbor, "How much for a thousand feet of tubing?" "300 bucks."

[00:06:24] Rich: Guess what I don't have? I don't have 300 anymore.

[00:06:27] Jason: Yeah.

[00:06:27] Rich: So I said to him, "Hey, look, your son is about to have his birthday. Wouldn't it be cool if he had this RC car? He loves playing with it. Would you barter with me and trade me for the tubing?" And the guy's a saint. Honestly, I wish I could find him and say thank you because he did it.

[00:06:42] Rich: His son got a great car. I got the tubing. I wrote a letter to Scripto pen company and said, "Hey, I'm doing a project. I need some sample pen tips. Would you mind sending me some?" They sent me a box of 5,000 pen tips for free.

[00:06:52] Jason: What?

[00:06:53] Rich: No cost. And so then I had all the materials to put it together and showed up at 4th of July, started selling by 7am, sold out by 1pm.

[00:07:01] Rich: And this is why I said I had fist fulls of money. I had people at this, you know, long table. I had people out eight to 10 people deep lined up to buy these things. And it's all I could do is to take money and give them a water weenie. My pockets filled up with cash and my mom would pull the cash out of my pockets and put it in a safe box over and over again that day.

[00:07:18] Jason: What were you selling each one for

[00:07:20] Rich: Anywhere from like $1.50-4.00 or something, depending on the length.

[00:07:24] Jason: Yeah.

[00:07:25] Rich: Yeah.

[00:07:25] Jason: Okay.

[00:07:26] Rich: It was such an incredible experience. And that's why I said, man, I'm going to be an entrepreneur. So I just knew that I was bitten and I had to do this and look, I'm age 50 now, my company that I own today, Quik! Just celebrated our 23rd anniversary, and I've started 10, about 10 different business ventures and companies since age 12. So I've always just had this desire to fulfill my own sense of freedom and creativity and serve people. Yeah. So yeah, that's really the genesis of it.

[00:07:55] Rich: Like you build something people want, they'll pay you for it. And it's an amazing thing.

[00:07:59] Jason: I love it. You see a problem, you saw an opportunity. And lots of other people saw the problem. They just didn't see the opportunity. They're like, man, I would love that one of these. It's nice, you know, and you were able to fill that need.

[00:08:12] Jason: So that's a great story. Love that story. That's how you kind of got it like, you know, bit by the bug of entrepreneurism.

[00:08:19] Rich: Yeah. Now, the Quik! company started because in the nineties, I worked at other companies that worked at Arthur Anderson, for example, and I learned technology, especially from like a backend perspective of big tech. How does it all work? How does it flow together? And I decided to get out of tech consulting late in the year 2000.

[00:08:39] Jason: Yeah.

[00:08:39] Rich: And in doing that, I really went back to my degree in college, which was finance and said, "I really love finance. Let me help people with their money." So I became a financial advisor.

[00:08:47] Jason: Okay.

[00:08:48] Rich: And in doing that. You go out and get your licenses, you work really hard for all that, you work really hard to gain the trust and respect of your first client, and then they finally say, "yes, I will open an account with you," and guess what your reward is? Yeah, fine, you can make a commission that's a reward.

[00:09:01] Rich: No, you get to handwrite paperwork. And I thought, man, this sucks. I am not going to make $4 an hour handwriting paperwork for people. I used to charge $200 an hour as a consultant, so how do I fix this problem? And I decided to build software, because I was a technologist, that would fill out my forms. Jason, it was a hack.

[00:09:19] Rich: It was a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet with fields overlaid on images. It was just a hack. It just made it work, but everybody around me for six months kept saying, "Rich, give me your software. I hate filling out forms," and I was in this quandary of, "wow, I have found a need. But I want to be a financial advisor. What do I do?" And after six months, I finally said, "okay, let's build the product." So we did our first install in February 11, 2002 and never looked back. I mean, we found out people really wanted this and it's changing people's lives. It was empowering them to do their best work, which is not paperwork. And today we manage a library of over 42,000 forms.

[00:09:57] Rich: And we generate over a million forms every month across wealth management industry, serving well over a hundred thousand financial professionals.

[00:10:05] Jason: Yeah.

[00:10:05] Rich: So yeah. Yeah.

[00:10:07] Jason: That's awesome. Yeah. I had a short job. I worked for a while at Verizon, like in their business DSL tech support. Like I was an internet support guy and after every call, it was a call center, after every call that we did, we had to fill out this ridiculous form it just took so much time and we were measured on the time that we were unavailable between calls and how many calls we completed. And so I found some sort of like macro tool because there was only like three, maybe four types of tickets that we would do.

[00:10:40] Jason: It was always the same sort of challenges. But we had to fill out all of these fields of ridiculous, stupid stuff. And so I use this macro tool that basically if I type a certain thing, it would just spit out a whole bunch of other stuff and it would go tab from field and fill it all out. And so I set this up because I started to see these patterns.

[00:11:00] Jason: And so then I, similar to what you did I solved the problem for myself. So I built this thing that I could then just do this type of ticket, this type of ticket. And then there were other people on the floor and they're like, "man, I'm going to get fired. I can't do this. I can't do this fast enough."

[00:11:14] Jason: Well, so then I'm starting to help people. So now I'm like a virus on the floor and the managers didn't like me for some reason. Like my manager did not like that I was doing this. I don't know why. Because maybe he didn't come up with the idea. I don't know. Yeah. Then I'm starting to help other people so they don't get fired, and I'm showing, you know, other people on the floor, how to set this up and how to do this and giving them my formula and, you know, for the script language for how to do this. And they're able to close their tickets out like really fast. They're just like "bloop!", and it's like "vrrrrrr", and they're like, cool next.

[00:11:47] Jason: Right. And what was baffling to me at the time is that it was not seen as a positive by my superiors. It was seen as a problem and I'm like you are an idiot and this is where I kind of realized Like a lot of times, you know, you've heard of the Peter principle? Yeah. Which for those listening...

[00:12:09] Rich: You're at your highest level of mediocrity.

[00:12:12] Jason: Or incompetence.

[00:12:13] Jason: Right?

[00:12:14] Jason: And so, yeah, which means basically people get promoted because they're good at a certain level and then they get promoted again, just beyond their current capacity or ability to perform well. And now they're at a level where they are no longer able to intellectually maybe rise to the occasion or be good.

[00:12:32] Jason: And so businesses are just full or rife with all of these people that like, especially big organizations, cause I was at HP. You know, I just saw it everywhere. I always had idiots like above me is what it felt like that were telling me I couldn't do things or slowing me down and I'm like, "don't you see?"

[00:12:50] Jason: And then what would happen is months later, that idea that I was trying to push that they were fighting me on was their new idea. They're like, "I have this new idea."

[00:13:01] Rich: What you're explaining is the real truth. And it took me a while to figure this out for why I'm an entrepreneur.

[00:13:07] Jason: Yeah.

[00:13:08] Rich: I want to be able to do my best work and anytime I've worked for others, I've been limited and held back.

[00:13:14] Rich: So I really was seeking a way to empower myself to do my best work. And in my company, in our culture, it boils down to empowering others to do their best work. I want my team to do their best work. I want my vendors and my partners and my customers to all do their best work. Because what do you get when you have your best work?

[00:13:31] Rich: You get joy, you get fulfillment, you get productivity, you get engagement and you get the highest possible outcome from every person on your team. That's why I'm an entrepreneur more than anything else. I mean, yeah. Ooh, I'd like to make money. Oh, I want freedom. I want creativity, but honestly, at the core of it, how do I get to do my best?

[00:13:49] Jason: I love this. So some of you listening to this episode, you've heard me talk about my framework of the four reasons for starting a business. I call it the four reasons. And this is what makes us different than everyone else on the planet. And we're rare. Entrepreneurs are rare people. We are the minority.

[00:14:05] Jason: We feel like we're living on a planet as aliens a lot of times. We're like, "why doesn't everyone think this way?" It's super weird. So entrepreneurs, the reason we start businesses is we want four things. We think we want money, usually in the beginning. But what we really want is what money will give us.

[00:14:22] Jason: And that's these things. It's freedom. Well, first is fulfillment. The most important is fulfillment. We want to enjoy life, enjoy what we're doing, make a difference, whatever but we want fulfillment in whatever that means to us. And then second, we want freedom. We want autonomy. Usually in the beginning, we have, we start trying to start a business.

[00:14:40] Jason: We think we want more money because we think it's going to give us more freedom and fulfillment, but we actually have less fulfillment and less freedom the more money we make. And so then we start to wake up like, "Hey, this sucks. Like, how do I like be pickier about my clients or how do I change this?"

[00:14:56] Jason: You know? But fulfillment and freedom are one and two. Third, once we have those, we want contribution. We want to feel like we're making a difference, having an impact and we want to benefit other people. And that's what a business is designed to do, right? Solve real problems in the marketplace.

[00:15:10] Jason: It's contribution. If not, it's snake oil, right? It's taking people's money. So fourth, once we have fulfillment, freedom, contribution, the fourth is we need support. And that's why we build a business because we can't max out on fulfillment, freedom, contribution if we are wearing every hat and we're miserable.

[00:15:29] Jason: Yeah. Because we don't want to do everything. Not everything is fun for us. right? There's the pieces you love and there's pieces you just don't love, right? And that's true for every business owner, but we're all different. Like some of us love accounting. Some of us don't love accounting, right? Some of us love sales.

[00:15:44] Jason: Some of us don't love sales, right? Some of us love ops. Some of us are bad at ops, right? And so, there is though what I call the fifth reason. This is what makes everyone else different than us. We want this one too, but everyone else in the planet prioritizes this fifth reason over the first four.

[00:16:02] Jason: It's safety and security. Oh, right. Yeah. They want that. That's more important than freedom, fulfillment. They will give up freedom. You saw this during the pandemic. Most people were like, "forget your freedoms. I want to feel safe. Give me safety and security." Right. I remember here in, I was in North Austin. I went to Costco during the pandemic and masks were kind of optional, right? They were optional. And I'm walking around Costco without a mask and everyone else has masks on for the most part. And anyone that didn't have a mask, I was like, "Hey, do you own a business?" And they're like, "yeah." And we're looking at each other like we know like the world's gone fucking nuts. Like, what's going on? We had a knowing like, "yeah, everyone's crazy."

[00:16:42] Rich: Man, I wish I'd asked that question. I would have met a lot more entrepreneurs that way. Because I was out there, no mask, any chance I got. Right. I mean, I didn't want confrontation with people.

[00:16:51] Jason: And for those listening, there's nothing wrong with this, right? We need both, right? Not everyone can be entrepreneurial. It would be a crazy world, right? We need people that are willing to work for us, right? We need both. And they want the four reasons too. Like nobody's going to say, "Oh, I don't want freedom." But they want safety and security first and that's most people on the planet.

[00:17:11] Jason: And so psychologically, entrepreneurs, we're just wired different. We will give up safety and security in order to have freedom and fulfillment.

[00:17:20] Rich: I'll tell you how I did that, Jason.

[00:17:21] Jason: Yeah.

[00:17:22] Rich: So imagine, I'm a tech consultant charging $200 an hour. I'm making $350,000 a year. I'm age 24 or 25, driving my dream car.

[00:17:31] Rich: I have everything. Yeah. I go become a financial advisor and I make very little money. I mean, I had savings basically, and then I start the software company. I have no income. I literally say, "I'm going to start this company." I have zero income. I had no house, no wife, no kids. So, I mean, that made it easier.

[00:17:49] Rich: And for the first ...

[00:17:51] Jason: people will say "you're nuts". They're already saying he's crazy. But every entrepreneur listening is like we get it.

[00:17:55] Rich: No, that's what you do. I cashed out my 401k. I sold the dream car, cashed out any equity I had in that. I bought a cheaper car, et cetera.

[00:18:03] Rich: And then I said, "okay, I'm going to have my dream car back in a year or two." Yeah. In the first four years of my business, my income was $1,000 a month. I mean, I made $12,000 year for four years straight. And so here's the thing. A thousand dollars a month doesn't pay my rent. My rent was $1200 to $1500 during that time.

[00:18:21] Jason: Right.

[00:18:22] Rich: So here's the question that you'd ask yourself. How did you sleep at night? And I'll tell you this one thing. Every time I paid rent on the first of the month, I actually did not know how I would have the money in 30 days to pay rent again, right? So how do you sleep at night? I slept great. It never bothered me.

[00:18:39] Rich: I didn't lose one minute of sleep over that financial burden. Okay. I just looked at it as that's another tool I've got to figure out how to make money with this. And there were things that happened. It's like sometimes a big credit card bill came through when somebody bought our software or sometimes I borrowed money off the credit card to pay the bill.

[00:18:58] Rich: It was just different things happen. And you know what, in those four years? I was never late once. My wife and I contrast. She could not do that. She just cannot live that way, she could never have that kind of risk profile for me. I was just like, "yeah, whatever. I'll figure it out every single time."

[00:19:13] Jason: So you trusted. You trusted yourself and maybe God, I don't know, but you trusted your ability to create, right? You knew you had confidence you could create money.

[00:19:24] Rich: Yeah. And I learned that being poor. I mean, in college, I went to USC, one of the most expensive schools around, but I paid my own way to go there.

[00:19:33] Rich: And during college, there were so many weeks, I can't even count them, where I'd wake up on Monday with exactly $5 to my name. That's all the money I had access to. And I had to get to Friday before I got my paycheck and I had to pay for parking and food, et cetera. I was so scrappy. I would look at what ads were in the paper and I find people doing focus groups that would pay me $10 for 30 minutes of my time to go pretend to shop and pick products.

[00:19:58] Rich: So I'd go make an extra 10 bucks and now I had triple my money to get through the week. I did so many creative things. So I knew at that point, like, yeah, money is just a tool. We'll figure it out. We'll always make it work. So, you know, I want to bring this up because this is the thing, you know, you mentioned at the start of the show that I'm going to be at your event, the #DoorGrowShow, right?

[00:20:15] Rich: DoorGrow Live. Yes. Okay. Yeah. And what I'm going to talk about is one of my books and it's called, "It's My Life!". I'm going to hold it up for anybody watching. "It's My Life! I can have..." sorry, there's two books. "I can change if I want to." My other book's called "It's my life! I can have the job I want," but I'm going to talk about change. Because one of the questions inherent to this problem of how do you go through these hardships?

[00:20:38] Rich: How do you go through these struggles, which would stress most people out like crazy? Comes down to your ability to handle change.

[00:20:46] Rich: And it starts with you. Adaptability. Yeah. Now, look, I was forced into it because. I'm 50, but I've moved 33 times in my life. I had moved 29 times by the time I was 32.

[00:20:58] Rich: Wow.

[00:20:59] Rich: And I was forced to move as a kid. I had no choice about that. I was forced to make new friends. I was forced to go into new schools and new cities and new states.

[00:21:06] Jason: Military family or...?

[00:21:08] Rich: No. Divorces. Job transfers, etc.

[00:21:11] Jason: That's a lot of change, a lot of turmoil. Yeah.

[00:21:14] Rich: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, really a very challenging childhood that I don't look back on with any negativity towards, but I was forced to learn how to change and adapt to change.

[00:21:25] Rich: And out of that, around age 12, I developed a methodology for how I could change myself and the behaviors and the feelings I had. Because I started to look at the world. This actually comes from religion. I mean, you brought up God. My father was a minister in a church when I was born, but it was very extreme. It was considered a cult.

[00:21:41] Rich: My stepfather was in the Catholic church, so we attended Catholic services. I lived in Salt Lake City, Utah. I've been to plenty of Mormon events, the LDS church. I know all about that. I've been part of other types of church.

[00:21:53] Rich: I grew up Mormon actually. So I was exposed to all these different religions. And what I saw was everybody said they're right.

[00:22:01] Rich: And I'm not taking issue with that. I'm not trying to say one's better than the other, but just as an observation, if everybody thinks they're right, then my beliefs can be just as right. And that empowered me to say, "what do I want to believe about the world?" How do I want to choose beliefs that will help me be the best I can be?

[00:22:18] Rich: And simultaneously at age 12, my mom was going through a huge awakening in herself. She was reading books by Dr. Wayne Dyer and all sorts of self improvement books, because she wanted to get better. And she was sharing those lessons with my brother and I. So I was learning through osmosis. I was learning through observing my mom go through these changes, but I was also observing the world around me, and I realized I can make changes to myself and become better, which means I could have lower stress. So let's go all the way back to the story of how do I start a company with no money? How do I believe I don't have to be stressed out about the money? And it comes down to your core beliefs of what you actually believe about your ability to go figure it out or your ability to let it stress you out or what even stress means in your life.

[00:23:02] Rich: I'm sure you've talked about this with your group here. There's no value in worry. Like worrying about a problem, what does that actually get you? It gets you anxiety and stress. It doesn't solve the problem. It doesn't add value into your life. So therefore I looked at it and said, how do you not worry?

[00:23:19] Rich: How do you not stress out about things? So what I'm excited to share with your audience when I get up on stage is how to use my methodology to become more resilient, to accept change for what it is, to learn how to control the change so that you can be the person you want to become. And therefore you can go through the hardships, the challenges, the biggest potential failures or actual failures that you're going through in your business and in your life and win on the other side, because you become a better person through the whole thing.

[00:23:47] Jason: Love it. Yeah. I mean, running a business can be tough. It can be very hard. Entrepreneurs go through a lot of challenges. I often joke DoorGrow was built on thousands of failures, you know? But we have that hope and we keep moving forward. And so being resilient is essential.

[00:24:06] Jason: Being adaptable is essential. Otherwise it's just takes a toll. It takes a toll on our body. It takes a toll on our health. We don't make progress. We don't have as effective of decision making and there's like, if we're not in a state of worry, not in a state of stress, we make infinitely better decisions.

[00:24:24] Jason: Like decisions made from fear, decisions made from stress generally are almost never good decisions. So, and if you think about all the decisions we make on a daily basis in our own business, If you just have a healthy mindset, you will be at a very different place, even in a short period of time. And I've had periods of stagnancy.

[00:24:43] Jason: I've had periods of hardship and I've had periods of like dramatic growth.

[00:24:47] Rich: Yeah. And transition. I love the graphic and I'm sure everybody's seen it where two guys are digging and one guy is giving up and the other guy keeps going and the diamonds are right there. The gold is right there. Okay. Right. The guy who gives up is one foot away from the gold and the guy who keeps digging hits it because he just went that one extra foot.

[00:25:07] Rich: And to me, that is that point of exasperation where you're saying, "Oh my gosh, this is the worst day of my life. The worst month of my life. This is so challenging. It's, everything's wrong. And you embrace the change and suddenly things change faster." Now you may not strike the gold that you want. You may not win the biggest account you want, but I mean, look, you can read the biography on Elon Musk with his story of SpaceX and Tesla, and he was betting the farm on both of them. He was down to two weeks of payroll, I think when NASA came in with a one and a half billion dollar check to fund the rocket boosters they wanted. Like he is at the absolute lowest point and boom, the greatest thing happens.

[00:25:42] Jason: You know, when we take these risks, they create great stories. And even if it doesn't work out, the risk, it still makes a great story. It does. Because we're going to figure it out. The one thing is if we're committed, if we're committed to getting the result, it's inevitable.

[00:25:56] Jason: It will eventually come. It might take a little longer, but yeah, if we're committed and man, like, yeah, he took some big risks. He was committed.

[00:26:04] Rich: Yeah, but it comes back to you. I've met so many entrepreneurs who do stress out. They lose sleep. In fact, one of the most common things I hear from entrepreneurs is, "Hey, what makes you lose sleep at night?" Nothing. Honestly, my three year old makes me lose sleep, but losing business, man, it doesn't bother me in the same way that I think a lot of other people do. And that's because I know who I am. I know what my beliefs are and I've challenged myself to change the ones that don't work.

[00:26:31] Rich: I'll give you one other example here, Jason, to think about, and again, this is not a judgment towards anybody.

[00:26:36] Rich: I was in an audience of entrepreneurs, man, I don't know, 12, 15 years ago. And the guy on stage said, "okay, everybody here, raise your hand. If you have ADHD," I was maybe one of two people who didn't raise their hands. I've never been diagnosed with ADHD and I refuse to accept the label of ADHD for whatever purpose the label means.

[00:26:55] Rich: What if though, what if ADHD is your superpower? And what if the label of ADHD of treating it with drugs and you can't stay focused and still is a negative by all the other aliens on this planet? Because you said as entrepreneurs, we feel alien. What if it's everybody else's assessment of you versus your own?

[00:27:12] Rich: What if your own assessment was your ADHD is actually your superpower?

[00:27:16] Rich: Sure. You've got the ability to hyper focus. You've got the ability to like do something unique or exceptional. Yeah.

[00:27:22] Rich: Or switch gears on 10 conversations in a day, because that's what happens during your day as an entrepreneur.

[00:27:28] Jason: Yeah.

[00:27:28] Rich: Right. And adaptability. So I look at that again, going back to how I view your belief systems and my book on change, is that you can take something that a lot of people look at as, "Oh, that's harmful for our relationship or whatever. I say, no, I'm going to turn it into my superpower."

[00:27:44] Rich: And take a different view of it because it's you. It's not me. It's not my judgment of you. It's your own judgment of you. How do you want to be? Yeah, I'm excited to share this with everybody when we get up there.

[00:27:55] Jason: Yeah, it'll be awesome to have you there. You know, the reason I'm having you come and other speakers that have nothing to do with property management, by the way, for the property managers, is I find that it's never really a business issue that's holding people back in business.

[00:28:09] Jason: And I mean, I've talked to thousands of property managers, I've coached hundreds. And when I dig in it's never that they're focusing too little time on their business that's the problem. It's always related to mindset, self belief. You know, that's really what's holding them back. And so I think this, this'll, this'll be really awesome.

[00:28:31] Jason: I'm really excited for you to benefit our clients that'll be at this event. And those of you that are not yet clients that are coming to DoorGrow Live, I think this'll be a game changer for them to just kind of shift their mindset a little bit and increase their resiliency. So, yeah, I'm excited for that.

[00:28:46] Rich: Yeah. I am equally excited because you said one of the four pillars is contribution. And I didn't write this book for my business. It has nothing to do with software and efficiency. I wrote this book because my sister and her husband at the time were at the beginning of a divorce and they were both coming to me independently to ask me questions and I'm helping them.

[00:29:04] Rich: And they both independently said, "Rich, you should write a book about this someday." And it was on Thanksgiving that year when they both tried to use me as a conduit to each other, where I said, "I'm fed up, I'm done." And honestly, Jason, I just spent the next whatever days until the 23rd of December writing the book.

[00:29:20] Rich: I stopped watching TV and it just flooded out of me. I never thought I'd write a book. I don't even like reading books. I listen. So I wrote the book before Christmas and then I hand bound it and gave it to them as a gift and it went nowhere. It was lost on them.

[00:29:32] Jason: Yeah.

[00:29:33] Rich: And then I realized, man, I've got this thing.

[00:29:35] Rich: I've got to get it out there to the world and help other people, because this is one of the ways I get to contribute in the world. Yeah. My business contributes too, and I love that, but at the core of who I am personally, I want to empower people to be their best version of themselves. Yeah. I can do that with the book.

[00:29:50] Rich: I can do that with the podcast I have. I can do that with the software that we generate. There's a lot of ways to have that effect. And that is my lightning rod. So when you ask me to come speak, it's an easy yes, because this is an opportunity for me to help others become their best version of themselves.

[00:30:06] Rich: Maybe by giving them a tool set that they can then use to implement for themselves and create the person they've always wanted to be, or they know is inside of them that's afraid to come out or just maybe just one behavioral change. I don't know. It's up to them.

[00:30:19] Jason: I love books. I think books are awesome.

[00:30:21] Jason: I read lots and lots of books. I'm reading books all the time. Like I usually have like three or four books I'm reading at a time because maybe I am ADHD, but you know, I get bored of something and I then focus on something else or whatever. I love books. What I've noticed though, because I've gotten to be around a lot of the people that have written some of these books... I pay a lot of money to go to masterminds or events. Like I just got to see Tony Robbins at Funnel Hacking Live. It was really great. I learned some awesome stuff. Right. And I think there's some magic in being able to be around and be in the energy space of the person that is giving you this idea.

[00:30:58] Jason: It's not the same. Like being in person and doing stuff, I've noticed this weird thing that people absorb information different. They perceive it different. It's not the same as being on video like this. I've taught lots of people through video and over again, when they would come show up to DoorGrow Live or come in person, things would just click in a different way.

[00:31:16] Jason: And I started to call it, mentally I called it the 'real bubble.' I have to pierce this bubble that it's not real. I think our unconscious mind doesn't perceive this as real.

[00:31:26] Rich: Right.

[00:31:27] Jason: Right. But you and I met in person, so we know we're real people. So our unconscious mind is like, "Oh Rich and Jason. We're real people." So we know this, our brain knows this, but until I meet somebody, fist bump them, high five, give them a hug, whatever, like, and they see me in person, my clients don't get as big of results.

[00:31:45] Rich: Yeah.

[00:31:45] Jason: Their unconscious mind is somehow like "Oh, this is that digital universe or TV universe. That's not real. I don't know." So if they come and like experience this... even if you get his book, like get his book, but I'm excited for people to be in your energy field to experience you and for you to teach this and there's something you could say the same words that are exactly in your book, but people will absorb it differently.

[00:32:08] Jason: I've seen this over and over again, and they will get so much more out of this. That's why I'm excited to have you come present this. So.

[00:32:14] Rich: Yeah, there's no replacing face to face. There's absolutely no replacement for the energy and the connection that's made when you're face to face. I 100 percent agree and I wish we could do more of it. So i'm glad for the event and the opportunity to do it in my hometown.

[00:32:29] Rich: It's great.

[00:32:30] Jason: Yeah, it'd be an easy drive not too far. So yeah All right. So, cool. I'm really excited about this. So for those of you that are listening go to DoorGrowLive.Com get your tickets. This is different than other property management events. Property management events, usually people go to these conferences and they're really there to like hang out at the bar and escape their life and their problems.

[00:32:52] Jason: DoorGrow Live's different and you can go to the bar. There's bars at the Kalahari resort. You can do that and you can hang out with people. But people come to our event because they want to be around other people in that space of other people that are really growth minded. And that's who I attract in the industry.

[00:33:08] Jason: We have the most growth minded property management business owners. Like these are people that are focused on being a better person, a better husband, a better father, better wife, better parent, you know, whatever. Like, and they're focused on you know, taking care of their team, making a difference in the industry.

[00:33:24] Jason: And I really believe good property managers can change the world. They can have a massive ripple effect. They affect all their clients, the investors' lives. They positively impact the tenants' lives. They can have a big ripple effect. They can affect a lot of people. And that's exciting is inspiring for me to be able to, you know, Help benefit them and bring that to the table.

[00:33:44] Jason: So these are leaders. These are people that affect families. And so, you know, by you coming and presenting, I think there's definitely a ripple effect and a positive impact that can happen. So if you're a property manager listening and you don't care about any of that stuff, then just don't go to DoorGrow Live, because we don't want you there anyway.

[00:34:00] Jason: All right. So Rich, any quick tip that you could give to people before we wrap up our conversation and then how can people, you know, get ahold of you and, or you know, or whatever you want to plug. Floor's yours

[00:34:12] Rich: I'm going to leave everybody with one of my core beliefs. That is an empowering one.

[00:34:17] Rich: And it's this: confidence is knowledge of yourself. We all want more confidence, right?

[00:34:22] Rich: And the reason I call it knowledge of yourself is because you should be able to take confidence and apply it to any given situation. It's not a hundred percent confident all the time. It's confident about something you're doing.

[00:34:33] Rich: My typing speed's near a hundred words per minute. I have absolute confidence in my ability to type, for example, right?

[00:34:39] Jason: Yeah.

[00:34:40] Rich: My, my other skills may not be the same. So how do you build confidence? It's you build knowledge of yourself and it's a lot of what we've been talking about is your own personal growth and who you are and all that's going to lead to more confidence.

[00:34:53] Rich: So that's just one of the things I'll share. Best way to find me probably LinkedIn. I'm the Quik! Forms CEO and that's Q U I K. There is no C in the word 'quick' for my company. You could try to email me as well. rwalker@quikforms.Com. You could spell it with a C because we own both domains, but yeah, if you reach out to me on LinkedIn, there's one thing you should do, send me a personalized note, tell me why you want to meet me because I'm very happy to meet you and share my network with you. But if you're trying to sell me and spam me, I don't answer those. So just give me a personal note and I'm very happy to talk to you.

[00:35:23] Jason: Just say, "Hey, I heard about you on the DoorGrow podcast and you know, the property management growth podcast like..."

[00:35:30] Rich: Yeah. And I'll look, I'll plug one little thing. I don't know how relevant it is to your audience, but my podcast is called The Customer Wins. And I talked to business leaders about how they help their customers win, how they overcome challenges of growth, how they create a really excellent customer experience.

[00:35:45] Rich: And about 20 percent of my guests come in with totally different perspectives. I had a custom suit broker on, I had a golf pro, I had a magician and the majority of people in the financial services space. But I'm telling you, there's a lot you can learn about building a better customer experience from listening to people talk about it and hear about it.

[00:36:03] Rich: So I've studied that a lot for several years. Like that's, it's a big deal to me. I mean, you have to, if you're running a coaching business, coaching businesses are generally high churn. Education businesses are really like a low engagement. Yeah. So I've had to figure a lot of things out to make this go really well,

[00:36:19] Rich: so, yeah.

[00:36:20] Rich: Yeah. Well, I mean, I really don't care about how many subscribers or listens I get on my podcast. That's not what I care about. I want people to get value. Yeah. So if you get value from it, awesome. Let me know. Awesome. Very cool.

[00:36:32] Jason: 110 words per minute. It's pretty fast. Do you type on QWERTY or did you change your keyboard?

[00:36:37] Rich: No, I type on a normal keyboard. At one point I was at 115. Right now I'm around 100. I bought a device called a Kara quarter, which is a totally different configuration where you can type about 300 words per minute, but I've yet to learn it new skill. I'm just not picking on yet.

[00:36:51] Jason: So. I hear a lot of world typing speed records are set in Dvorak and I switched to Dvorak simply because my wrist started hurting when I was going through college.

[00:37:02] Jason: So I actually pop all the keys off all my keyboards and rearrange them into Dvorak. So I know I'm a nerd. So, and you just change the setting. On Mac books and Mac keyboards, it's like doing brain surgery. It'd be really careful, but for the geeks out there. Maybe you'd appreciate this, but it has the most commonly used vowels on the home row of the left hand and the most commonly used consonants on the home row of the right hand.

[00:37:27] Jason: Oh, that makes sense. And so world speed record. So, and it took me like a month to just get used to it. Like you would pick it up really fast. So how fast are you? I'm not that fast. I just did it because my wrists were hurting. I actually don't type that much. Honestly, you know, I'm like talking and drawing a lot more than I'm typing, but I'm probably faster than I would be with QWERTY.

[00:37:50] Jason: So I don't know. I've never really like done a speed test or, you know, typing test to see, but I don't think I'd beat you. That's my guess, your QWERTY handicap. So, cause QWERTY was designed to slow down typewriters.

[00:38:04] Rich: Like the hammer strike colliding. Yeah. Of the old type that, yeah. So I'll leave you with a fun fact.

[00:38:11] Rich: The average typing speed in my company is about 85 words per minute.

[00:38:14] Jason: Nice. Okay. It's pretty good.

[00:38:15] Rich: Tell you there's people faster than me here. Yes.

[00:38:18] Jason: Yeah. Cool. Well, Hey Rich, great to have you on here. Appreciate you hanging out with me and I'm excited to have you at DoorGrow Live.

[00:38:25] Jason: My pleasure. And thank you for having me today, Jason.

[00:38:27] Jason: All right. So for those that are, you know, struggling with growth, you're wanting to figure out how to grow your property management business, or you're just getting stuck in the operational challenges. You're tired of telling your team all the time, thinking, "why won't they just think for themselves" and frustrated and you're dealing with operational systems challenges to get to that next level, reach out to us at DoorGrow.

[00:38:49] Jason: We might be able to change your life. So, go to DoorGrow. com. And if you'd like to join our free community and Facebook group and, you know, learn about us get access to you know, some free stuff, go to doorgrowclub.Com to join our community. And of course, go check out DoorGrowLive.Com, get your tickets.

[00:39:08] Jason: It's going to be in May and we would love to see there in person. And a little bit of that DoorGrow magic is going to change your life. We'll see you there. Bye everyone.

View Details

After working with property management business owners for over a decade, I’ve realized that the problems they are experiencing tend to be deeper than issues in the business…

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Sam Womack to discuss entrepreneurship, health, and how the two intertwine.

You’ll Learn [01:57] How stress affects your health

[13:48] The impact of oxygen and proper relaxation

[17:40] The importance of being able to calm your nervous system

[26:10] More health expert insights

Tweetables “Everybody's doing the best they can with their current limited access to knowledge and resources.” “Don't beat yourself up for when you feel stressed out. Just make sure that before you continue that stress rollercoaster, like find some space to find some peace.” “You don't have to like beat all your competitors in a lot of instances, you just need to outlive them. You just need to outlast them.” “High performance isn't just how hard you push. It's about how well you recover and regulate.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Sam: If you don't find time to balance your nervous system or don't work on implementing tools to balance your nervous system, then you are limiting yourself to lower performance in the short term and decreasing performance in the long term.

[00:00:15] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the Property Management Growth Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you're interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:37] Jason: So DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:21] Jason: Now let's get into the show. Cool.

[00:01:24] Jason: And I'm hanging out here with sam Womack. Sam, welcome to the show.

[00:01:29] Sam: Thanks for having me on. I'm excited to be here.

[00:01:31] Jason: Cool. So Sam we met at a local mastermind here in the Austin area, which is really cool. And for those that know that I run a mastermind for property managers, I also eat my own dog food and believe in getting coaching and learning and growth and everything else.

[00:01:52] Jason: And wanted to connect with some people locally and make some friends as well. So, Sam's one of those friends. So, Sam, welcome to the show. And why don't you give people a little bit of background on yourself and what you do and how you kind of. Got into running businesses and doing cool stuff.

[00:02:10] Sam: Yeah, no, thank you. First off, I don't do anything near as difficult as you guys. Managing property and tenants, I think is a feat to be held. And so props to all you guys out there crushing it in real estate. I cut my teeth in entrepreneurship starting at a young age. I was charging like 30 bucks an hour to teach old people how to use their computers, you know, tell their life story.

[00:02:29] Sam: They'd pay me 30 bucks an hour while they sat there and henpecked. It was pretty ingenious. Fast forward into later on in life when the pandemic hit the business that I was launching just disappeared overnight. The retail died, everything that I've been working on, all the investors pulled out.

[00:02:44] Sam: I was left with a few grand in my name and a baby on the way, living in a studio apartment with my wife. Had to figure something out, went into supply distribution, and a couple years later, fast forward, I did about 20 million in revenue as a solopreneur distributing gloves, masks, COVID test kits, etc.

[00:03:01] Sam: But throughout that time, I dealt with like a really serious health issue. Stress had kind of overwhelmed me and I ended up with an autoimmune condition in my brain and through the journey of healing that autoimmune condition that was presenting as like early onset Alzheimer's, it was kind of a mystery.

[00:03:16] Sam: They didn't know what was happening. I developed a deep passion for finding the root of health and the root of optimization and root of performance. A lot of that came through working with my mom, who's a preeminent physician focusing on anti aging and regenerative science here in Austin.

[00:03:31] Sam: And so I typed her handwritten notes for a couple years and followed the patient journeys of the elite because she has a concierge practice for the elite here in Austin. And as I saw what drove change in their lives, I learned a lot about the human psyche and I learned a lot about how each of our individual unique biologies are very different when it comes to what we choose to do to find optimization or find optimal health. And so now I have a passion for bringing that to the masses. And as the pandemic waned, and as I healed, I became passionate about different physics based modalities and the different systems in the body and how to reach optimal performance.

[00:04:07] Sam: And now I have a wellness center here in Austin that focuses on performance optimization, as well as maximizing human potential and transitioning the human experience as well as a research Institute called Human Beaming Research Institute, where we present the stories of the truth about health and where we help bring true health science to light so that people understand what's actually true, not truth that's manufactured by special interests, but truth that's founded in science.

[00:04:36] Jason: Got it. Yeah. I mean, there's kind of a battle right now, right? We're like seeing it all play out live real time. Oh yeah. Got this whole make America healthy movement. We've got RFK, Bobby like and it seems like there's some major disruptions that are kind of happening right now and there's a battle and we're waking up.

[00:04:58] Jason: A lot of people are waking up that hey, you know, big food, big pharma, you know, big government are not in favor of us being healthy for some reason, which is kind of scary. So yes, yeah kind of waking up to this and I don't know, maybe we're all biohackers now. I don't know.

[00:05:17] Sam: Yeah. No, I you're absolutely right I think that humanity as a whole is kind of done drinking the Kool Aid when it comes to what we've been told is the truth.

[00:05:27] Sam: And, you know —

[00:05:29] Jason: Yeah. Cause the Kool Aid has like glyphosate in it and like, also like molds and mycotoxins, like it's got bad stuff all over it. And I'm not saying actual Kool Aid. This is metaphorical people. Metaphorically.

[00:05:42] Sam: Yes. And when you look at like where, you know, just briefly to when you follow the money and you see that, like, from a business standpoint, one of the largest mergers and acquisitions in history, if you bring it to current dollar value was when big tobacco bought the food industry and you look at when that transition happened and you see what happened to our food supply and you know, we're fish in a barrel that they're just taking their pick of right now when it comes to what we have that's societally acceptable to put in our bodies and societally acceptable to engage in, in terms of social interaction, et cetera.

[00:06:15] Sam: And it, yeah. Kind of funnels us down this path of high stress, which kind of takes us to today's topic with the nervous system. But yeah, I don't don't know if you have anything else you want to discuss before we dive in.

[00:06:25] Jason: Well, I want to point out. So Sam really sharp guy, as you can tell already, Sam's going to be a speaker at our DoorGrow Live conference.

[00:06:35] Jason: And he's going to talk about some really cool stuff that we're very holistic at DoorGrow. And so I know that in coaching entrepreneurs and having talked to thousands of property management business owners and coaching hundreds of clients that it's never really the business or that they're spending too little time in their business that's keeping them from succeeding in business. It's everything else, especially health, especially their relationships, especially their marriage. Like these things create a lot of friction for entrepreneurs And they've got a lot going on. You're not really talking about property management when you come to DoorGrow Live, but I do believe it will be a game changer for them to be able to perform more, be able to get more out of their business, be able to get more out of life, which is the goal of having a business, right?

[00:07:20] Jason: That's more freedom and more fulfillment. So, yeah. So if you have not yet gone to doorgrowlive.Com and gotten your tickets. Go do that right now. Go get your tickets and make sure you're at that event. Come hang out with us in North Austin at round rock at the Kalahari resort. It's going to be awesome.

[00:07:36] Jason: All right. Shameless plug completed. Now, Sam, let's get into talking about the topic at hand.

[00:07:43] Sam: Yeah, I know. And thank you. And I'm really excited to get on stage and speak and I'm going to save some nuggets for the stage. Won't give it all the way here. So I'm really excited about that and helping you guys understand what the true root of your full potential actually is and not from some woo woo space, but actually understanding like the fundamental simple science beneath high performance and beneath fulfillment in life because it really does break down to a very simple equation. One of the key factors is a molecule, and that molecule is actually oxygen.

[00:08:13] Sam: And when your brain is in a high stress state you would think that your body would give it more oxygen under high stress, right? But under high stress, you actually have vasoconstriction. Your blood pressure rises, blood gets pumped to your extremities, you got to get away from that proverbial bear, right?

[00:08:29] Sam: But for y'all, that bear is the constant wave of tenant complaints, the constant wave of, you know, economic factors interest rate shifting stuff like that And so you have this like constant bear chasing you and if you're always in that state of fight or flight your brain is patterned to operate on survival mechanisms and a lower amount of oxygen and so And then we get this like male, sometimes male and female, but we get this, like this almost masculine energy of like, let's go conquer and do this high stress, high action push, push, push coffee, stimulant.

[00:09:03] Sam: And we're really performing with our hands tied behind our back at that point, because our brain has less oxygen in it. And when you look at the other side of the nervous system, which is our parasympathetic nervous system you have this increase of oxygen in the brain. which actually raises serotonin instead of relying on that dopamine cortisol roller coaster, right?

[00:09:24] Sam: And so, at the base of this is oxygen, which is bringing us life, which is creating ATP, cellular energy. And, to put it simply, If you don't find time to balance your nervous system or don't work on implementing tools to balance your nervous system, then you are limiting yourself to lower performance in the short term and decreasing performance in the long term.

[00:09:48] Sam: Higher relying on stimulants, higher amounts of of just stress and cortisol and dopamine reliance in the long term, which takes away from your ability to connect with others, to find community, to find that real fulfillment that comes in life.

[00:10:02] Jason: And so what you're saying is we shouldn't just overdose on coffee that here in the U. S. probably has mold in it and makes you not feel good and have to pee way too much. And then not, you know, take care of ourselves in breathing effectively and getting too little sleep, too much hustle, too much stress.

[00:10:23] Sam: Yeah.

[00:10:24] Jason: Okay.

[00:10:24] Sam: Yeah, we can get addicted to that pattern because stress actually can feel really good.

[00:10:30] Sam: When you have dopamine augmenting that cortisol, right? Without dopamine, cortisol feels really crappy. You know, you look at high anxiety. You look at that restlessness feeling where you don't feel good. You're on edge. That's when your cortisol's high and your dopamine is kind of low because you've been exhausting the dopamine stores by just pushing it.

[00:10:50] Sam: Dopamine is supposed to be a short term reward to get us out of the stress back into a parasympathetic state. Dopamine was never meant to be the consistent ongoing reward. Because, like, think about it for survival, right? If you're, you know, trying to get away from the bear, and you're running, that needs to somewhat feel good, in order to get you through that stress.

[00:11:11] Sam: So dopamine kicks in when oxygen lowers in the brain. And then, when you get out of the stress, you find that parasympathetic state again, you calm down, oxygen rises in the brain, serotonin rises, which is that more deeper, long term fulfilling chemical, that actually leads to creativity as well. But our society tells us that love is dopamine. It tells us that success is dopamine. It tells us achievement is dopamine. It gives us these dopamine triggers for all of the cultural hierarchy and the cultural validation, that external validation when you do something to succeed and you show it off, that's a dopamine trigger. Social media is a trigger. So all of these things, society is structured in a way that says, "dopamine's the reward. Now go buy shit, right?" Like almost all the financial economy is driven surrounding dopamine, which is a ultimate losing game because you guys all know that it doesn't really provide that end fulfillment, but since it feels good, we're kind of stuck in that loop. And so. What I want to help illuminate is where true fulfillment can be found and help with some kind of practical tools and a practical understanding of this foundational science so that when you're looking to perform at your best, you can give yourself a break and allow yourself to relax.

[00:12:22] Sam: You know, before you have that next cup of coffee to keep yourself going, take some deep breaths, find some space to relax. Don't worry that your brain doesn't feel a hundred percent on. And give yourself some space to allow that peace in knowing that you're raising oxygen in the brain. You're opening oxygenation to areas that are going to drive creativity, that are going to allow for connection, that are going to allow for more presence in your body.

[00:12:44] Sam: You'll be a different person in the home. You'll be a different person towards yourself. And so these are critical components of understanding the power of the nervous system when it relates to performance. Because high performance isn't just how hard you push. It's about how well you recover and regulate, and it's about how you create that balance that pushes for longevity and pushes for long term endurance and strength.

[00:13:09] Sam: Because if you want to succeed and grow your business 5x, 10x, 100x, you need endurance. Sympathetic, nervous system tone, high stress does not create endurance. It's short term bursts, you crash out or you keep hitting the stimulants. And it keeps you in this narrow window of potential. You find that parasympathetic, you find that relaxation, you get creativity going in your brain, you get higher oxygenation in your brain, you're shifting gene expression towards longevity.

[00:13:33] Sam: So it's a pretty powerful tool. And most people think, "oh, I don't want to meditate, you know, or I don't want to relax", or they don't feel safe when they're calm. And it's something to just work on shifting your perspective on because there's true power in that state of peace.

[00:13:48] Jason: A while back, I read this book.

[00:13:50] Jason: I don't know if you heard of this. It's called the Oxygen Advantage. It's by a guy named Patrick Mckeown and it's got a forward by Dr. Joseph Mercola, but it's interesting because basically the book is about how he trains athletes to breathe through their nose while working out instead of their mouth, which like exercises the lungs and increases lung capacity.

[00:14:15] Jason: But if they're, if we're constantly operating with our mouth open and working with our mouth open, we actually decrease our lung capacity. And so, athletes are just burning out really quickly and they don't have the ability or the capacity to, you know, absorb as much oxygen. So like working out those muscles, like breathing through your nose, you know, is something that talks about, but that's interesting that when we're not calm, we're not getting enough oxygen that we're not recovering, we're not regulating our stress, our body probably starts to eat itself a little bit and, you know, and then we get addicted to dopamine and you know, in business, most businesses fail and really you don't have to like beat all your competitors in a lot of instances, you just need to outlive them. You just need to outlast them. And that, that endurance aspect. And so I think, you know, I think we're going to go through some financial turmoil in the marketplace. Things are probably going to get worse before it gets better as we're cleaning up all this mess financially that is going on in the government.

[00:15:18] Jason: And the U S dollar is like, I think it's been going down from its original value down and down as they've been stripping value out of it through inflation and giving that money to who knows who. And so. I think there's going to be a big transition. It's going to get really stressful.

[00:15:33] Jason: And I think the businesses that are just able to last through this transition and endure and they're focused on the long game are the ones that are going to win.

[00:15:43] Sam: Absolutely.

[00:15:44] Jason: And there's going to be a lot just eaten up.

[00:15:46] Sam: Yeah. And if you don't allow that perspective of what you just explained about business to apply to your own self and your health, you know, what got you here won't get you there.

[00:15:54] Sam: And if you want to sustain and succeed through the turmoil, then you need to adapt. And when you have a high stress state, you actually lose BDNF expression in the brain brain neurotropic factor and brain derived neurotropic factor. And that is our adaptability aspect and factor in our brain. And it literally decreases its efficiency, the higher, the more chronically stressed we are.

[00:16:18] Sam: And so it's super important. You guys can look up BDNF and understand its role with oxygenation in the brain. And so fundamentally, you know, the more oxygenated your brain is, the greater your access to intuition, memory, and high level thinking. And those are key components to succeeding in business.

[00:16:33] Sam: And when you are in a state of constant survival mode, constant reactivity, constant push, hustle, you lose that space to develop creative longterm solutions. You lose that space to be able to get that spark of inspiration on how to pivot around the corner and see around that corner or do something a little differently than what other people are doing.

[00:16:55] Sam: And that's why even you look at like Thomas Edison, Benjamin Franklin, like they would love to access that like state estate, the theta state just akin to sleep. They would put like a lead ball in their hand over a metal plate. And then as they were falling asleep. It would drop and the ball would hit the metal plate wake them up and they'd have their pen and their quill and ink on the table with a candle and then they'd have their formula or problems they were trying to solve and then they'd go to solving it because that was deep parasympathetic state where that creativity was opened up brain oxygenation was opened up. And me, just like so many of y'all out there, like, I'm like, man, I do not like meditating, I do not like calming down, like slowing down.

[00:17:31] Jason: I mean, especially if we're addicted to dopamine and adrenaline, like slowing down feels like a waste of time.

[00:17:39] Sam: Oh yeah, it does. And so you, most of you have heard of dopamine, serotonin, and adrenaline slash norepinephrine, right? That's only 20 percent of our neurotransmitters.

[00:17:51] Sam: Okay. What's the other 80 percent glutamate and GABA, right? Glutamate is the exitory neurotransmitter. So that's what animates our body. Think glutamate animate, but then GABA is what balances that. So GABA helps slow things down, shut things down. And it's kind of interesting that popular culture slash society, like you don't hear much about GABA.

[00:18:13] Sam: And the reason why is because they're selling us GABA in the form of alcohol. Alcohol is a huge GABA receptor connector, so it just hits the GABA and you feel kind of calm and relaxed. And so people love alcohol to be social because you want to be in a slight more parasympathetic state to be social, right?

[00:18:30] Sam: Because high stress doesn't lead to—

[00:18:32] Jason: What about scrolling on social media?

[00:18:33] Sam: Social media is going to be hitting dopamine, not so much the GABA. But scrolling social media is going to be giving dopamine, new information. Ooh, new information. I learned something new, like boom, like that constant external input stimulus.

[00:18:45] Sam: But when you look at the importance of GABA and you understand that a lot of us aren't making it on our own, which is why we're staying in such a high stress state all day. Yeah. And then we take a GABAergic, like GABA or a benzo or some weed or something that, that can hit that, that GABA receptor instead of making our own endogenous GABA.

[00:19:02] Sam: And that's what happens when you're in a parasympathetic state is your body is creating its own GABA to balance out the brain. And that's what drove me to developing a suite of tools called Peace on Demand that I have at my wellness center that are physics based modalities that drop you into that parasympathetic state without sitting there fighting against your brain and trying to force yourself to meditate.

[00:19:21] Sam: And then also with hyperbaric oxygen therapy, that's another tool that induces a parasympathetic state over the course of the treatment. And so I found tools because my brain, I had a hard time controlling with the autoimmune disease that I had and how stressed and on fire my brain was, I had a lot of difficulty finding that space, but without those tools, you can still utilize things like breath work, even if it's just longer exhale than the time you're inhaling or like four seconds in, you know, hold for a little bit and then eight seconds out or seven seconds out.

[00:19:48] Sam: That, that's just like the simplest form of breath work to kind of activate the vagus nerve and slow down that that nervous system and get you into a more parasympathetic state but it's really interesting when you see that some of the most creative people and the most successful people, they're not super high strung. At a certain point, you'll see a lot of successful people that are high strung. Push, push hustle.

[00:20:10] Sam: But then you go to that next level. You look at like the Elon's of the world, or, you know, so these people are on that next level. You watch them speak. They're calm. They have this, you know, they go hype on at times to like reach certain goal. But then they also have that balance. So the key is balance.

[00:20:26] Sam: Don't beat yourself up for when you feel stressed out. Just make sure that before you continue that stress rollercoaster, like find some space to find some peace, do some breathing, take a pause, give yourself that chance to take a break. That'll start developing some resiliency in your nervous system so that you don't burn out.

[00:20:42] Jason: Yeah, it does seem like really high performers are highly adaptable to, you know, situations. So they move and adapt quickly. It seems like they are able to maintain some calm, but they also are really quick thinkers, like their thinking seems to be faster than normal. I notice for me, I get really frustrated with team members when they're not—

[00:21:05] Jason: I'm like, "come on, this is super quick. Like, look how fast I can do this." And I'm like, "keep up." And so that becomes a little bit of a frustration. I'm like, why is everybody slow? I saw this really interesting thing. My son sent me this and he's really into football. And I guess there's some quarterbacks that are now training with VR.

[00:21:23] Jason: Playing the game in VR and but they're doing it at 1. 5 speed. And so they're getting used to everything being fast and they've adapted to that. So then when they go and play, it feels like everything's in slow motion. And I was like, wait a sec. I listen to telegram messages at two speed. I listened to audio books at two, between 1.8 to two speed. Like, so my brain is probably more adapted to speed.

[00:21:49] Sam: Yes.

[00:21:50] Jason: And and so I'm able to process, I was just hanging out with somebody who has a lot more money than me, who runs, who's the CEO of Real, Sharran Srivatsaa. And he talks really fast and he thinks really fast. Like this guy is sharp.

[00:22:03] Jason: And I'm like, how does he move so fast? You know? But also and he doesn't seem like stressed out or anything. One of the things I've noticed, maybe like sparks this GABA sort of thing is just for me, reading? Just reading, actually reading not like high speed audiobooks, but sitting down with a book and processing information, my body's in a calm state. I feel a really deep calm where I'm in a flow sort of state reading and absorbing and processing information. So I found that can be a really good tool for me.

[00:22:34] Jason: Sarah and I go do your peace on demand thing, which is just awesome. And a game changer. It's really been helpful for Sarah. It's kind of, I compare it to doing a float session, having a really good float session which doesn't happen every time you do a float session, but it happens every time you do Peace on Demand and you don't have to get wet and naked, and nothing gets in your eyes or ears on accident sometimes and stings.

[00:22:54] Jason: So that's nice. The other thing I've noticed is just walking. So I went and did EMDR therapy for a while, for like a year with a therapist, bilateral stimulation, both sides of the brain is the concept. And then I noticed like, well, walking is bilateral stimulation. And so that's like a free, very cheap version of EMDR therapy is just to go on walks.

[00:23:14] Jason: And rather than running, which is like, Hey, stress response. I found walking is very calming, especially if I'm really stressed. If I go for a walk, it kind of signals to my body, "Hey, you're okay. You're not being chased by a saber tooth tiger right now." So your fight or flight, calm down. So those are the things that work for me.

[00:23:32] Jason: I don't know, but those are great tools. I don't know.

[00:23:35] Sam: Yeah. So what those are doing are like, you mentioned a keyword there and that's safe, right? And so you're creating these environments. One, you're reading a book, gaining new knowledge, and you're not cramming the book in a stressed out state to try to memorize it for a test, right? Which so much of us get programmed in school at an early age, that like reading means like, focus hard and stress out over what you're reading.

[00:23:56] Sam: But if you allow yourself to relax into that flow state, and you mentioned flow state as well, flow doesn't happen when you're in super high stress state. Some people We'll try to say, "Oh yeah, I'm in flow" because they've got like dopamine coursing and cortisol coursing and

[00:24:10] Jason: they're like manic and going crazy.

[00:24:12] Sam: Yeah, exactly.

[00:24:13] Jason: They're busy, but they're not productive.

[00:24:15] Sam: Yeah. And when you get productive and when you feel like you're going fast and your team isn't responding fast enough, like you have that adaptability, you have that BDNF that's really efficient in your brain because you practice going in and out of these states and you spend a lot of time in this flow and in this GABA balanced state Where you're not hyper stressed out and one one thing that also on a biochemistry level explains some of this is: in a sympathetic nervous system response, your body is trying to find as much glucose as possible to burn glucose for fast quick energy, which creates oxidative stress on the body, which creates inflammation. And then your body has to like go clear out all the junk but it doesn't care that it's creating a bunch of junk to clear out, because it's trying to help you survive short term.

[00:24:59] Sam: When you're in a parasympathetic state, you're looking at a—

[00:25:02] Jason: Does it make you crave sugar then?

[00:25:03] Sam: Yeah, so high stress makes you crave sugar. Whereas parasympathetic state, you're on a more fat burning metabolism. You're not creating as much oxidative stress. You're like expressing longevity genes. You're expressing anti inflammatory genes.

[00:25:16] Sam: Your body literally shifts into almost a different state, not just mentally, but biophysically and biochemistry wise all throughout your body. You adapt based on the nervous system state that you allow. And that's where it does come down to personal responsibility to make the choice to start practicing finding this state that will empower so much more potential for your life than that narrow band of, you know, survival programming and high stress thinking.

[00:25:46] Sam: And then it's better for your health longterm too, because you're not just compounding oxidative stress nonstop and then needing those negative inflammatory inputs to make your dopamine stay high. And you can just find that peace. And then you'll find a much higher level of performance and that flow state will start just happening naturally constantly, which is what's been happening for Jason as he's been practicing these things as well.

[00:26:08] Jason: Got it. Okay. Very cool. So little teaser, what are you going to talk about a little bit at DoorGrow Live that will be revelatory or helpful for people that might be a little bit stressed in their business or are wanting to take their performance to the next level? And I just, I want to point out, the difference I've noticed just in clients doing time studies and things like this.

[00:26:32] Jason: Some of my clients will, we can see in their time study that they, it takes them in the latter half of the day, like the afternoon, an hour to do stuff that takes them 10 minutes in the morning. They're just, they're running out of brain chemicals. They're running out of like, what are neurotransmitter chemicals that they produce while sleeping?

[00:26:51] Jason: They're now no longer productive and efficient, even though they're working really hard and they're really busy. And so, so yeah, maybe you could tease a little bit. What could we talk about there that might optimize their productivity so that they could actually feel superhuman and get two to three times the amount of output with the same amount of work or stress or effort?

[00:27:14] Sam: Yeah, so we're going to go into a little bit more detail on some other aspects of the foundations of performance. So today we focused on nervous system, which is key. But. Controlling our nervous system isn't just as easy as thinking about it. There's some environmental factors. There's some lifestyle choices we can make. Often, we have a really hard time making those changes due to the, those well worn grooves, like, you know, skis on a slope that are really hard to get out of. And so I'm going to help with some simple truths that you'll understand and make it a lot easier to start making small shifts that will create massive change and that don't have to be stressful or induce anxiety or feel hard. It'll actually feel easy. So I'm going to help you understand some fundamental truths about your biology and That will unlock unlimited potential.

[00:28:03] Jason: Yeah, because I think every entrepreneur listening, myself included, I'm sure you as well, have been in those time periods where you feel like you're working so hard and you're investing so much time and energy, and you're going nowhere like it feels like you're just treading water and you're burning yourself out and you're like, "why am I not adding hundreds of doors? Why am I not growing my business? Why am I not getting ahead? Why am I seeing idiots get further along than me?" You know, like, " why is this not working for me?" And and I think that all plays into that like that. Everything you're talking about plays into that.

[00:28:41] Sam: You'll find yourself having permission to make some changes and the permission is a key aspect of that courage and that bravery to choose something different to focus on something different.

[00:28:56] Sam: I mean, we all hear where you, where your attention goes, your focus grows, you know, and what you focus on is what you create, you know, all these things. What does that fundamentally and literally mean when it comes to the way we choose our life experience? And what can we create when our choices change and how can we be empowered to make those choices?

[00:29:16] Sam: Those are some of the more intricate topics that we'll discuss.

[00:29:19] Jason: Got it. Almost like shifting from feeling like, "Hey, I'm giving up something or sacrificing in some way that in actuality, you're getting more."

[00:29:30] Sam: Oh, so much more. Exactly. So much more. Yeah. Cool.

[00:29:34] Jason: So. Those of you listening, I'm guessing you're growth oriented, growth minded.

[00:29:39] Jason: You want to get more. Come to DoorGrow Live. Come hear Sam talk. So cool. Sam, appreciate you coming here on the #DoorGrowShow. If people are hanging out in Austin or curious about what you're up to, how can they find you? Peace on Demand. Tell them about your stuff and how people might be able to follow you or get in touch.

[00:29:58] Sam: Yeah. So we have a small wellness center here. It's a private, you know, high touch concierge space, very comfortable here in Austin. And it's open for business by appointment only but just go to beamhyperbarics.Com and you can book an appointment. If you want to reach out to me I am Sam Womack.

[00:30:15] Sam: On Instagram or you can send a message through the website. Easier website to remember is beam.do B E A M dot D O. And yeah, just reach out, come hang out. You don't even have to buy something to come in. Just hit me up. We'll make sure that I'm around and we can sit on the couch in the back and talk life.

[00:30:34] Jason: All right. Awesome, Sam. Appreciate you coming on and excited to have you at DoorGrow Live.

[00:30:40] Sam: Yeah. I'm excited as well. Looking forward to it. I love what you're doing. And I think the steps that you're taking to help empower people beyond just showing them tactics and strategies, but helping them live a more fulfilled and empowered life.

[00:30:50] Sam: That's what it's all about. So thank you for that work you're doing.

[00:30:53] Jason: Yeah, absolutely. We've just noticed like we can give them all the right tactics and strategies, but if they don't incorporate the other things, it's kind of like you're trying to run a race up the mountain with rocks in your backpack, like boulders, you know, it's just, it's so much more efficient if we get everything else in alignment and usually it's never the business piece that's really what's holding them back. It's not the tactics it's mindset. It's their mental health. It's like everything else, their family. Yeah. So we're excited to bring you and some others that are going to just unlock a lot of things for our clients and for non clients that are coming to DoorGrow Live.

[00:31:32] Jason: So appreciate you.

[00:31:34] Sam: Yeah, you bet. Thank you. And just one last thing is you guys are all doing such a great job too. Like, don't think of this as any type of a criticism or, "Oh, you're not doing good enough." Like you're doing such an excellent job with the tools that you were programmed with the upbringings you had with the environment you're in.

[00:31:48] Sam: So like, just look at it as a chance to learn something new and be empowered by it. But you guys are all doing such a great job. And so keep it up.

[00:31:56] Jason: Yeah, everybody's doing the best they can with their current limited access to knowledge and resources that they put out. Whatever. All right, cool. Awesome, Sam. I'll let you go. All right. So, if you are a property management entrepreneur and you're wanting to add doors or increase your profit or lower your stress, reach out to us at DoorGrow we would love to help you grow and scale your business. You can check us out at DoorGrow. com. And if you're wanting to join our free community, get a little bit more info about us, hang out with some other property managers, go to DoorGrow club. com to join our free community and connect with other property managers and get some cool free stuff. And until next time to our mutual growth, everybody. Hope you all crush it. Bye everyone.

[00:32:38] Jason: You just listened to the DoorGrowShow We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com Listen everyone is doing the same stuff SEO PPC pay-per-lead content social direct mail and they still struggle to grow at DoorGrow We solve your biggest challenge getting deals and growing your business Find out more at doorgrow.com Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe until next time take what you learn and start DoorGrow hacking your business and your life.

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As a property management business owner, how do you find the best people to build an effective sales team?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow Podcast, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Bob Lachance, founder of REVA Global, to talk about how you can utilize virtual assistants for lead generation and growth.

You’ll Learn [01:22] Identifying a Need in the Real Estate Industry

[08:53] How to Utilize VAs in Your Business

[14:35] Creating a Hiring System in Your Business

[19:30] Using VAs for Lead Generation

Tweetables “When marketing consistently goes out, what we find is all those leads end up piling up.” “Over 70% of all sales never happen on the first touch.” “People want to do business with people they see, feel, touch, and like.” “Property management can definitely be death by a thousand cuts.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Bob: Virtual assistants are a big part of anyone's business. In my opinion today, I think you got to start looking at that because small businesses, a lot of times, especially when we start, we are on a tight budget.

[00:00:12] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities daily variety unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:10] Jason: Now let's get into the show. And today's guest is Bob. Do you say Lachance?

[00:01:18] Jason: Lachance. Yep. Lachance.

[00:01:20] Jason: I nailed it. All right. So Bob, great to have you on the show. And, Bob, you are helping people discover the top marketing channels that can maximize lead generation when working with VAs. And so we're going to chat a bit about that today before we get into that, tell everybody a little bit about you, how you got into entrepreneurism and what led you to what you're doing now.

[00:01:43] Bob: Yeah. So right now I'll just start right now. I have a real estate investment company as well. And I have a virtual assistant staffing company, so I use my VAs in my own business. So I have a rental portfolio as well as a buy sell fix flip company here in Connecticut, doing a couple of different states, but I started back about 20, 21 years ago now back in 2004.

[00:02:06] Bob: I played professional hockey prior to that for eight years and then got into real estate. And you know, from real estate, helped start an education program while I was, you know, working on properties. I did a lot of, you know, fixed flip wholesaling, all that kind of good stuff. This is, again, I'm dating myself, but this is back in 2004.

[00:02:25] Bob: And through the process, when I helped start this education company there was a huge need in the industry, just like you, right? You see a need out there. And I'm a lot like you on that side of it, helping people and figuring out, you know, where they could. Create passive income or income in general.

[00:02:42] Bob: So, during the coaching program, while I was in it, I realized there was a huge need. Majority of the students that I coached didn't have the time to actually put into their real estate business because they were either working part time or full time. They just needed to, you know, they needed help. And for years, upon years, I was looking for a solution for that.

[00:03:01] Bob: Whether it was a product I didn't know back then, again, this is going back from 2007 to 2013. I didn't know there was any services out there, like what virtual assistants were. And then I got introduced back in 2013 what a virtual assistant was. You know what this could help my business So I hired my first one and then light bulb went on like, you know what we could turn this into a business I could take the back end of what it helps create which is the real estate education company And our students could use it to help them grow their business help scale help, you know, get your time and freedom back. So launched it in 2014 and then fast forward today you know 10 years later i've been in business for a while and I also have like I said my real estate investment company

[00:03:45] Jason: Nice.

[00:03:46] Jason: Nice. All right. And so let's get into the topic at hand. So, we're going to talk a little bit about leveraging virtual assistants. And so how did you kind of start doing this yourself?

[00:03:58] Bob: Yeah well, when I first got into this, like I said I door knocked first, we didn't have the opportunity to have, you know, virtual assistants do some outbound stuff.

[00:04:07] Bob: And I didn't understand, you know, I didn't understand what outsourcing was when I first started. It was just me. I had an individual who was my business partner back in the day, but first year I door knocked. I went from door to door, individuals that were behind on payments. So it wasn't the easiest job in the world, but it allowed you to understand how to build a business from ground up.

[00:04:29] Bob: I think that was very important back then. So nowadays you can have virtual assistants do that, whether it's you know, cold calling, whether it's responding to direct mail, whether it's text messaging, whether it's social media, whether it's going out to, you know, Facebook marketplace and going right direct to seller, you also have rarely used now Craigslist, of course, but there's different ways to acquire and use your virtual assistant to do that. So that's just, again, a long and short.

[00:04:54] Jason: So go ahead and tell people a little bit about your company and what you help people do. And I'm really curious because this is usually a difficult thing for business owners to outsource.

[00:05:05] Jason: Usually they'll outsource some of the lowest level stuff, and it's usually not towards growth, lead generation, outreach, stuff like that. Those pieces can be really difficult to get dialed in or to do effectively. And so, tell us a little bit about REVA global? Okay. Yeah.

[00:05:22] Bob: So, you know, like I said, we started back in 2014.

[00:05:26] Bob: Like I said, I've been doing this for a long time and just to fast forward to what that looks like today and working with property managers, because obviously the individuals that are on your podcast here, I'll speak to them. And I know, you know, many people that also buy and hold also probably do fix and flip or also may wholesale, but it's kind of the same concept, but there's a lot of different tasks within it that virtual assistants can do.

[00:05:50] Bob: So what I did is I broke up all the stuff that our VA is doing in my own business because you know, many individuals that are listening to this will relate to a company like ours because like I said, we have a real estate investment company, but we also use our VA's which I think is pretty cool. I think Nowadays, it's very important as a service provider like myself to use it to make sure it works so I think that's a pretty unique thing that we actually have. But what we do, we have virtual assistants that acquire, we call them like a department of acquisition. So if you're looking for leads, you could do cold calling, you do text blasting, you could do lead management. You know, lead management, a lot of us, I'm just like, you will have all these leads in your database, but if you don't get ahold of them the first time, your marketing is going to consistently go out. So when marketing consistently goes out, what we find is all those leads end up piling up. And if you try to reach out to them the first time, you know you have a very small percentage that are actually going to pick up the phone. Right? So you need somebody then that will continue to follow up on those leads.

[00:06:57] Bob: And a national statistic is over 70% of all sales never happen on the first touch, right? So you have to continue. And I think that's probably 90 or 95 percent nowadays. So that's what we find in our office. And I know a lot of our clients say the same thing. So that number could change a little bit depending on what you read, but our experience in our office is over 90%.

[00:07:21] Bob: So what I mean by that is the first touch, whether it's direct mail call or a cold call, whatever you do for direct mail or whatever you do for marketing, that first touch will not equate to a contract, so you're going to have somebody that's continuing to follow up with those individuals. Very important.

[00:07:39] Bob: I wish I would have understood that stat when I first started real estate. But again, you know, you learn over time. Another stuff. If you look at other tasks as well, that works very well is marketing. Right social media management because you look at any type of business if you don't have marketing It's very difficult brand awareness, right people want to do business with people they see, feel, touch, and like so you need to make sure that you're out there You're out in the public's eye.

[00:08:05] Bob: I think that's very important. I know you guys do a great job of that Jason on the marketing side of always being out there because I see in a lot of different places everywhere I'm looking online. So whoever's doing your stuff man, great job. So you're doing a fantastic job on that side of it. And then you go into leasing so if we look at property management you know driving leads is one thing, but you also have to, you know, close them.

[00:08:27] Bob: So if it's you, me, or whoever's the one on the phone locking up those deals, it then goes to once you own them, you got leasing, you got move in, move out, you have collection, you have evictions, you have maintenance, you have accounts receivable, you have accounts payable, bookkeeping, accounting etc that fall underneath that property management umbrella, that virtual assistants are phenomenal to actually take on those tasks for you.

[00:08:52] Jason: Got it. Yeah. Yeah. So what's the typical process for somebody that could use some help from a company like yours? How do you engage them?

[00:09:01] Jason: What's onboarding like? How does that work?

[00:09:03] Bob: I think for anybody who's looking to scale or looking to just get help in their business. You know, here in Connecticut, it's pretty interesting because if you're looking to hire someone in house, you start looking at what's going on with the world and what's going on with the economy in state of Connecticut, minimum wage is up to $15.69.

[00:09:24] Bob: So when you start looking at that I know in my area, if I try to hire someone at minimum wage, they don't have a four year college degree. That's just not the highest level individual that you'd want working in your office. And so now you start looking at those things and what's happening around the country.

[00:09:42] Bob: Virtual assistants are very are a big part of anyone's business. In my opinion today, I think you got to start looking at that because small businesses, a lot of times, especially when we start, we are on a tight budget. Right. And so for us to start to scale or start to grow or start to hire, we really need to look at what's going out, meaning out of our pocket.

[00:10:04] Bob: So it's very important. So they first look at number one, what can we afford as small business owners? If we look at that number, now we start looking at what tasks in our business do not put money in our pocket. Right? And if you look in your world, meaning the property management world, it is a lot of the tasks like leasing, like taking calls from tenants, move in, move outs, eviction process when you're calling attorneys back and forth. What does that look like? There's just a lot of back and forth, right? Maintenance concerns. You get those all the time and those are the things that burn up your time. Your phone doesn't stop ringing.

[00:10:44] Bob: So if your husband or wife wants to go on vacation with you and your phone doesn't stop ringing. That's going to put a lot of stress and a lot of challenges in your personal life to where, especially when you continue to grow. You have to put more systems and processes in your business. You know, if you had one house, that's one headache.

[00:11:02] Bob: You had two, that's two headaches. You have a hundred, you have a hundred potential headaches that if you don't want to take those headaches on yourself, it's always good to have somebody else take those headaches before it gets to you.

[00:11:15] Jason: Yeah. Property management can definitely be death by a thousand cuts.

[00:11:18] Bob: Yep.

[00:11:18] Jason: Yep. And if you get it really well dialed in though, yeah, it can be a really great residual income business model.

[00:11:25] Bob: So Very good. Very good. Well, two sides of it, right? You buy, right? You have an equity play there, right? And if you don't have to deal with the headache, you get the positive income, you get tax advantages, things like that.

[00:11:36] Bob: So, I mean, I'm a huge advocate of buying and holding and property management because over time, the more, like you said, the more properties you actually hold, the bigger your income grows.

[00:11:48] Jason: Nice. Yeah. Cool. So, so I love this. There's lots of low level tasks. It does get really expensive trying to afford staff and team members and you don't want the cheapest or lowest level or worst people.

[00:12:02] Jason: You know, in the United States representing your business. And so, sometimes you can get people at a fraction of the price point that have a lot more education that are a lot better. And so when you, any of the roles that are able to be done virtually, you open yourself up to a global marketplace rather than just your local city.

[00:12:22] Jason: And so, yeah, so there's definitely advantages. So my entire team are virtual and I've got team members in various areas, Canada, Philippines. Egypt gosh, I don't know where else like all over the place and I've hired people over the past and just about everywhere. So yeah. And so, and so I'm not limited, so I'm able to just go find the best and I'm able to figure out, okay what can kind of fit into our budget and what can we afford in order to do that.

[00:12:49] Bob: Right. And to your point, to get back to what that looks like, I mean, anyone in this world could go out and go source for their own candidates. You know, we set up a very unique system process. We have a whole sourcing and recruiting team. All my virtual assistants are in the Philippines. We set up a sourcing and recruiting team out of the Philippines, so they're Looking through, you know, thousands of resumes every single month sifting through and we're getting the best of those Resumes that come in as soon as they pass then they go through an interview process.

[00:13:22] Bob: They pass the interview process They go to our training team and they train for about a month on various tasks property management tasks lead generation tasks, etc And then once they actually get to the end of that stage, they do another test and a lot of individuals do not pass our testing phase. And that's a positive thing because, you know, that's a way to kind of weed out the individuals that wouldn't make it, yeah, very good.

[00:13:48] Bob: So, after that goes to our placements team and our placements team, it's kind of like match. com. They look at exactly what you're, you know, what the tasks are. And we do DISC profiling, things like that, and predictive index. And we look at the tasks that they're good at, and we match them exactly up with the client and the tasks that they're looking for.

[00:14:05] Bob: So for instance, if someone's looking for a bookkeeper, you're not going to give them a profile that's a sales profile, right? You're going to, you're going to give them the correct profile. You put them together, they go through an interview process, and they pick the best candidate that fits within them so after that, it goes to our operations team. We have what we call a client service manager that helps manage the relationship between you and your va, so it's very streamlined.

[00:14:27] Bob: You know, we tried every different business model there is out there and the model that we have right now seems to be the best model.

[00:14:34] Jason: Nice. Yeah, I always recommend if you're a property manager like watching this or listening if you don't have a really solid hiring process you have not like tested embedded and experimented with, then the best initial way to do hiring is to leverage other companies' hiring processes. Go and work with a company and there's lots of different companies I've worked with over the years to get people on my team, and then eventually we've built a really good process internally, but In the beginning, I do think every business eventually needs their own hiring system, but if you don't have a great robust hiring system that you can get candidates consistently, that you know are a good culture fit, a good skill fit for the role, a good personality fit for the role then you need to go leverage somebody else's hiring system.

[00:15:20] Jason: So I would highly recommend, especially if you're going to dabble with VAs, especially in the Philippines or any other area, that you want to not be dealing with all the riff raff and the challenges and everything else. You want to have some help with this. So I highly recommend you leverage somebody else's hiring system. And they're going to help you not waste as much time and money for sure.

[00:15:46] Bob: And that's one of the things that's a great very great point because when you're first starting out or you're smaller. The best thing to do is learn off of others, right?

[00:15:55] Bob: It's you'll walk through a company like mine. You say, "wow, what a great system." You know what? Document what we do and then implement it in your own business if you start growing. I think that is a fantastic idea, Jason, for that. Because, you know, you look at the biggest companies in the world.

[00:16:09] Bob: They didn't just, you know, start being the biggest companies in the world or that, you know, it doesn't, you don't have to be the biggest, but they learned from somebody and they started implementing and they tested, you don't always get it right the first time. But after a while you will hone in and get that right.

[00:16:24] Bob: So I 100 percent agree whether it's with our company or anybody else. Like I said, anyone could do anything themselves. It all depends on what you need help with at the beginning.

[00:16:34] Jason: Yeah. And it also depends on how long do you want to suck until you figure it out.

[00:16:40] Bob: That's true.

[00:16:41] Jason: Like so if you want to collapse time, I highly recommend. Because I know when I started experimenting with hiring in the Philippines. Like there's just things you don't even think to ask like we had to ask like where are you accessing the internet?

[00:16:53] Jason: Is this like at a cafe at your home? Is it reliable? What kind of computer do you have? You know, we needed to be able to you know there's just so many little quality controls we had to implement in order to figure out if they would be a good candidate, I mean, I've had team members in the Philippines with chickens going off constantly in the background and roosters crowing and like all sorts of stuff and their internet going up and down and so you know, there's there's a lot of quality controls that I think need to be put in place because it's not America. We have a little bit more stability in our infrastructure and in our internet connections and everything else.

[00:17:29] Jason: And so, and then, you know, it helps to have somebody that manages the relationship like your company, because a lot of times, in that culture, they can be a little bit shy, I think at times, or a little bit nervous about displeasing their employer or giving honest feedback. And so they tend to ghost or disappear.

[00:17:49] Jason: People have talked about people in the Philippines doing this. And so having somebody manage that relationship as a liaison can help improve the results that you're getting from team members. And but the cost savings are awesome. I mean, it's like a third to a half of what you would get and you can get college educated people, you get people that have like lots and lots of experience and skill, and they are able to be paid very well for their area.

[00:18:14] Jason: And for you, it's seems like a steal. So.

[00:18:17] Bob: And that's one of the things that we pride ourselves on. I mean, you nailed it. You touched upon all of that. You know, we make sure there's backup. We make sure there's the right internet connection, the right computer system, etc. So to your point that is definitely something for everyone listening to this to look at because the vetting process, that's what I found the most tiring. When I first hired my first VA, I got it wrong a lot, to be honest with you. And I didn't ask any of those questions. And then it's kind of funny to talk about the rooster. That happened to me. And that was before I actually owned the company. And then I started my company. That's one of the things I'm like, all right, we have to listen for, right?

[00:18:52] Bob: What's your background, what's your surrounding, right to your point. And then you start learning over time. And then the more interviews you go on, the more stuff you learn, right? Like you said, you don't learn or you don't know all this stuff until you actually go through the process. And I think it's important for you to understand if you're going to do this, know that you're going to have a lot of pain up front when you hire at the beginning, right? And then you work with a company like mine and you'll realize you didn't go through that pain, but then you want to go hire someone. And then you decide to then throw your hat in the ring and do this yourself.

[00:19:25] Bob: 100%. The questions to ask, just like Jason said up front, those are some of the things to look at.

[00:19:30] Jason: You know, based on the stuff that you said, I there's a lot of. Property management targeted, you know, VA companies leveraging talent in the Philippines, but it seems like one of the things you brought up that seems to be unique to what you guys do that's different than most of the others, or maybe all of them is the focus on client acquisition, lead gen, and on the sales side of things.

[00:19:53] Jason: Most are usually focused on trying to find VAs that are more like executive assistants or that are going to do tasks and be told what to do rather than people that you can trust to be the initial connection and face of your business.

[00:20:08] Bob: You know what it's interesting, again, it's interesting you say that because I've been in this business for about 21 years, real estate investing.

[00:20:14] Bob: And we realized over time that If you don't have, you talk about acquisition and lead generation, if you don't have leads for any of our businesses, we are going to struggle to make ends meet, right? So you have to figure out a way that's going to drive in leads to your business. I mean, I know for me, I'll just give you a perfect example.

[00:20:32] Bob: When I door knocked, I went door to door to door every day from 10 a. m. to 3 p. m. But when I go home, I'd get that list and I would skip trace it back in the day You'd use 401. com white pages, and I would look for the best possible phone number for that individual then I would call. So when I got home, I would skip trace then I'll call until seven at night until I had to eat dinner with the family. But over time, I was beat up.

[00:20:55] Bob: I don't recommend doing that anymore. You don't have to do that anymore because you can hand over those tasks over to a virtual assistant. And they're the ones that are going to be doing the outreach for you. And again, I do recommend you should try it because you'll realize you know, open your mind and understand that outsourcing that task will really give your energy back and bring your success up.

[00:21:16] Bob: You may feel, well, I don't think anyone could do that task better than me. We all said, I know you said it before, Jason, I've said it. We all feel that way. And if you think about it, if they do 80 percent as good as you, that's a huge win. Now you get to do other tasks. That's going to drive business and revenue to your business.

[00:21:36] Jason: Even if they do it half as well as you, but they're getting. You know, half the result and you're able to hire two or three of them and not do that work. Like it's easily time and money well spent. So it's consistency, right?

[00:21:48] Bob: It's all the consistency. If you have something, a task that gets on a consistent manner, consistent basis every single day, you will get results by the end of the week.

[00:21:58] Jason: Yeah. So what are kind of SLA you know, you know, what do you sort of think are the metrics or KPIs for as an appointment setter or somebody trying to help, you know, maybe reaching out directly to owners or maybe reaching out to schedule, I don't know, appointments with real estate agents to build referral relationships.

[00:22:17] Jason: How many calls should they make a day? If this is their full time gig and how many appointments do you think they should be booking?

[00:22:22] Bob: Well, it depends. So if you have, so for instance, if you have a, you know, triple line dialer, as an example, it depends if you're, you know, calling just on a, you know, on your phone and just dial like this, but there's a lot of very good technology out there.

[00:22:36] Bob: You got mojo dialer, you have things like that actually are very good. You may have a company that you refer, Jason, that you could tell everyone but you're probably calling if you're full time, anywhere between 400 and 600 dials using that dialer, not manual dialing. You're probably going to hit about a hundred, 150 if you're manually dialing.

[00:22:57] Bob: And that's a day. Yeah. But if you have a triple line dialer, you're going to hit on average 400 to 600 and this is just what I've seen through the years that I've been doing this. You may have a technology that burns through a thousand calls and then you're going to be listening to me saying, well, Bob, you're a hundred percent wrong.

[00:23:13] Bob: I'm just telling you what I see on a daily basis and what comes out of, you know, mine and my client's offices.

[00:23:19] Jason: I think yeah, even if they're doing it manually, if they can get a hundred to two hundred calls a day and get two appointments booked a day, like, so they're getting roughly about 10 a week.

[00:23:27] Jason: Like that's a solid result for an appointment setter.

[00:23:31] Bob: That's a win. That's a win. You're looking at, if you're looking for, so we call them ITS's in our office, interested to sell. I know other people call it different, but that's what we look for. Same exact thing. One to two per day per VA.

[00:23:44] Jason: Nice. Yeah, very cool. And those listening, I'm sure all of you would love to have one or two appointments booked for you per day, and that would fill up a nice little chunk of your time and help you close some deals. So, yeah.

[00:23:57] Bob: Especially on the buy and hold side Jason. It's a lot easier to look at your numbers.

[00:24:03] Bob: And I know you have a formula that you guys look at to make sure the rent and you know, what the interest rates are today, et cetera, et cetera, whatever financing you have, but it is easier on the buy and hold side to fit within your buy box, right? Rather than having to go at, you know, 30 or 40 or 50 or 60 percent of the value.

[00:24:20] Bob: When you fund it out and then try to resell it. So it's a different kind of mindset. So you're very fortunate if you're going to buy and hold your buy box is usually different than somebody who's either trying to wholesale or fix and flip.

[00:24:32] Jason: Got it. So we've probably got some property management business owners listening to this.

[00:24:37] Jason: And for some reason, maybe they're just crazy and they have not yet worked with DoorGrow yet, but they're like, Hey, I would like to grow, add some doors and maybe have somebody do some calls and reach out to Bob. How could they get in touch with you and how can they initiate a conversation?

[00:24:54] Bob: Well, you can check us out on our all of our social, of course, but REVA Global. R-E-V-A Global. com. If you have any specific questions, obviously for you, you could just reach me direct at bob@revaglobal.com.

[00:25:07] Jason: Awesome. Hey Bob, thanks for coming on the show. Any parting words for entrepreneurs that are struggling, they've never hired an assistant yet they, even if they've built out part of their team or an entire team already, which is ludicrous to me, but what would you say to them?

[00:25:22] Bob: Well, I would say number one, get started, of course, but number two, I would say you got to set up your processes and systems and get them done consistently because if you just get success here. And then you stop doing it. Real estate's a long game. You know, like I said, I started this 21 years ago and I wish I knew what I knew now back then.

[00:25:43] Bob: I would start buying properties back then because right now I'd be retired with thousands of doors and rental income of a thousand doors. But I started a little bit later.

[00:25:54] Jason: Hey, Bob, we appreciate you coming and hanging out with me on the DoorGrow show today. And I'm excited to see if you helped maybe some of our clients listening or some of the people let me know what results they get and maybe we'll have you come back on.

[00:26:07] Bob: Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.

[00:26:08] Jason: All right. So if you are a property management entrepreneur, you're struggling to add doors, you're struggling to figure out how to grow your business. We want to help you. We want to support you. Reach out to us at DoorGrow. com. You can also join our free community at DoorGrow club. com. Go there. Answer the questions. We reject 60 to 70 percent of applicants. It's just for property management business owners And if you get inside, we'll give you some free stuff that'll help you out and help out your business. So that's it for today until next time to our mutual growth I'm, Jason Hull, and I hope you crush it.

[00:26:40] Jason: Bye, everybody.

[00:26:40] Jason: You just listened to the DoorGrowShow We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com Listen everyone is doing the same stuff SEO PPC pay-per-lead content social direct mail and they still struggle to grow at DoorGrow We solve your biggest challenge getting deals and growing your business Find out more at doorgrow.com Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe until next time take what you learn and start DoorGrow hacking your business and your life.

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In a world where your potential clients are constantly inundated with marketing content, how do you create trust and ensure your property management business sticks out?

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management expert Jason Hull sits down with Dan Lievens, Founder of Share One, to talk about the benefits of collecting and utilizing client testimonial videos.

You’ll Learn [01:56] Getting Started as an Entrepreneur

[08:41] The Impact of Social Poof and Positive Reviews

[15:39] How to Ask Your Clients for Video Testimonials

[24:53] Handling Objections and Retaining Clients

Tweetables “Marketing is always evolving as well. Like it's not like you learn to do it once and then you're done forever.” “If I say it, no one believes it because it's my business, but if my clients say it, that's the ultimate social proof.” “The ability to be able to create human connection in any marketing or any business, I think is absolutely critical today.” “A lot of people think, "Well I have a skill in doing something. Maybe I could start a business doing that thing," but the skill is the technician-level work.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Dan: Even if you have a solid business model, like property management, for example, which is obviously needed you know, how do you communicate that?

[00:00:06] Dan: How do you attract the right people? And so it's a constant exercise of being able to put yourself in a position of your customers.

[00:00:15] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management, growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show. All right. My guest today is Dan Lievens. Dan, welcome to the show.

[00:01:23] Dan: So glad to be here and looking forward to meeting your amazing community here. Thank you.

[00:01:29] Jason: Awesome. So Dan and I, we met at a local mastermind in the Austin area, which is really cool because I need more friends and I was like, how can I meet some? I'm in all these different masterminds, but I'm like you're traveling all over the US I'm like, I don't get to hang out with any of these people that often. So yeah, so I joined a local one and there's some really cool people in that group, which is really awesome.

[00:01:53] Jason: So Dan's one of them and Dan, why don't you give us a little bit of background on yourself as an entrepreneur and then we'll get into what you do.

[00:02:02] Dan: Yeah, absolutely. So, this is actually my 12th business and in a variety of different industries from technology to health and wellness.

[00:02:12] Dan: And my last big venture was opening up coworking facilities in the Philadelphia area. So I was one of the first people to open coworking facilities there and basically catering to startups and small businesses. And we very quickly became a business incubator and a business accelerator and supporting, you know, small startups and getting going right?

[00:02:35] Dan: And what I noticed pretty quickly was there is a pretty high rate of failure, and the rate of failure was primarily due to not necessarily the idea of being bad but more the lack of the ability to communicate the value proposition. So that's when I kind of pivoted and said, "Hey, how can I continue growing my impact and helping these folks?"

[00:02:56] Dan: That's when I started getting into marketing, really helping them be able to communicate a little bit better in terms of why they do what they do and really meeting the clients where they're at. And so we started getting into video production and pre pandemic, we had a huge video studio with audience, live audiences and all sorts of recording stuff.

[00:03:18] Dan: And then the pandemic hit and that's when we kind of realized that, "Hey, at the end of the day, yes, fancy videos are good to have, but what's really going to help people move the needle is social proof. So how can we create a service for businesses to be able to leverage social proof, in other words, video or testimonials basically, to give consumers exactly what they're looking for?"

[00:03:42] Dan: So if you're in a market to, you know, rent an apartment or to buy something somewhere, the first thing you do is you look at reviews and So that's how Share One began is really being able to help businesses capture legitimate social proof to grow their businesses.

[00:04:00] Jason: Yeah, awesome. Business can be tough. And like you're saying, there's a lot of good ideas out there, or there's a lot of people that think they have good ideas and you know, I've noticed not everybody tests those ideas. They just, they think the idea is so good, they're like, "everybody else has to love it." And they're surprised when nobody else has the same taste as them. You know? Other people don't love it. Or there's so many pieces that go into it kind of like the book The E Myth Revisited, a lot of people think, "Well I have a skill in doing something. Maybe I could start a business doing that thing," but the skill is the technician level work. Usually like "I can bake a cake, so maybe I should start a bakery business," you know? And then they're like, "Oh, accounting, marketing, sales, prospecting, like all the details, inventory, all the stuff besides baking a cake is where they get hung up on and they get frustrated.

[00:04:59] Jason: And then there's just people that are just really bad marketers. They just don't know how to get the message across. Sometimes you run into the opposite problem though, right? Like I've had coaches and people I've worked with that were really great marketers, but their stuff wasn't super great.

[00:05:14] Jason: I've had that situation happen as well. But even if they were great marketers and their stuff wasn't great, they still were making money... unfortunately.

[00:05:25] Dan: Yeah, absolutely. You know, most entrepreneurs, you know, me included, we find a passion, we find a purpose and we come up with some kind of a amazing technology or whatever that may be.

[00:05:35] Dan: And then, you know, our personality is just jump in and do it, you know. And it's so valuable now to really kind of take a step back and understand, you know, what the consumer wants and it goes beyond that. I think it really goes into, you know, even if you have a solid business model, like property management, for example, which is obviously needed you know, how do you communicate that?

[00:05:58] Dan: How do you attract the right people? And so it's a constant exercise of being able to put yourself in a position of your customers. Right. And then even as time changes as AI comes in, which hopefully we can talk about a little bit today the landscape changes and consumer behavior patterns changes and what people are looking for changes as well.

[00:06:18] Dan: So to, to have that finger on the pulse of, "Hey, what are my prospects actually thinking? What's going through their head?" Is a constant exercise that I think every single entrepreneur needs to do. And then from that perspective, it's like, okay, how do I reverse engineer what's in their mind?

[00:06:34] Dan: How do I meet them where they are? Create the language and then slowly kind of invite them into the product and service that you're offering.

[00:06:41] Jason: Yeah. Marketing is always evolving as well. Like it's not like you learn to do it once and then you're done forever. Right? Like what I did to grow DoorGrow in the beginning doesn't work anymore.

[00:06:53] Jason: Right? Some of the things that we were doing, like I had LinkedIn automation that was able to generate profile views. And then people would look at the profile view and go, "Oh!" And it's like "somebody viewed your profile." So they go look at mine, which I had set up like a sales page and then I was getting messages and then I would message them, "Hey..." I was getting friend requests or whatever you call it, connections on LinkedIn.

[00:07:16] Jason: And then I would send them a message. "What prompted you to reach out?" And then they started clamping down on how many views you could generate a day. And like, then the automation, like, and eventually that whole mechanism pretty much died, you know, and then it was Facebook groups for a while. For a while, the Facebook algorithm was heavily aligned towards Facebook groups.

[00:07:34] Jason: So that went crazy for us there was a time where it was like, you know It was just, you know, organic Google was doing its thing. We still get business through that, but you know, it's always evolving as well, which is a challenge. Now, one thing that has always worked well, always, is testimonials that has always worked well for us.

[00:07:56] Jason: And so we have more testimonials. I realized this early on. If I say it, no one believes it because it's my business, but if my clients say it, that's the ultimate social proof. That's the ultimate evidence. And so gathering testimonials has always been a like a focus of us at DoorGrow and we have more video testimonials than any other coach or consultant in the property management space.

[00:08:24] Jason: I mean, we've been doing this a long time, but we're also really good. But the challenge is how do you show that you're really good in a way that people believe it? Well, I just capture other people's results. So we're always having clients share their wins on our calls and then we're recording it and stuff like that.

[00:08:41] Jason: So what, what prompted you to start to focus on testimonials as a business idea?

[00:08:48] Dan: So I do have, you know, pretty strong tech background. So being able to leverage the technology and human resources to be able to give businesses truly what they need. Just as an example we'll take care of the entire invitation interview process with the real producer and edit everything down for less than 200 a piece, right?

[00:09:09] Dan: So our next competitors to do the same thing. are $3,000 to $5,000. So we've really, you know, grown this entire business to be able to scale and give businesses exactly what it is that they need. And as I mentioned before, over the years, it's like, yes, you can get super fancy with different things. But video testimonials today by far are the strongest piece of marketing content that you can use as you just mentioned. There's research that says there's an up to 62 percent increase in conversions. So the conversion could be a schedule, a call or schedule, a visit, or, you know, fill in the form. An increase of 62 percent if you start showing video testimonials on pages.

[00:09:51] Dan: And today, recent research also shows that 82 percent of consumers have some level of suspicion towards written reviews. That includes Google, Yelp. Amazon today employs 12,000 full time employees just to track down fake reviews. So, you know, talking about market change, right? So that is definitely something that's changing.

[00:10:10] Dan: And so being able to capture somebody in the comfort of their homes or their offices, truly speaking from their heart and sharing where they were before and how they met you and what your lives look like today and sharing that transformation is, you know, ultimately the most powerful thing you can do because it's believable, right?

[00:10:29] Jason: Yeah, it's reality. It's not AI. It's not you know, even text testimonials, like on Amazon, there's lots of fake reviews. Like, you can have fake text. Somebody could type out anything. You got to chat GPT. "Type out a fake review that sounds credible," you know, or something like this.

[00:10:46] Jason: Yeah.

[00:10:47] Dan: So be super careful with that. If anybody out there is, you know, starting out and you're looking for some kind of social proof on your website or anything, the FTC had a new bill in October really cracking down on people that are using fake reviews, $27,000 fine, and just some really crazy stuff.

[00:11:05] Dan: That's, you know, consumer protection.

[00:11:07] Jason: You have to be able to back it up. So, yeah, you put some text on something with a testimonial, if you have the video original of that, you're good, right?

[00:11:15] Dan: Yeah, absolutely. So yeah, in my company, we take a lot of care in terms of certifying that every single video that we conduct is a true human transformation.

[00:11:24] Dan: So it's a critical component, but at the end of the day, it's like, you know, any listeners today. What's the first thing that you do when you go on Amazon? You look at the number of reviews, look at the number of stars. Is that like four? Is it four and a half? Or is it five? Right?

[00:11:36] Dan: And then we scroll down and say, does anybody have any videos? And do these things look legitimate? Right? It's, that's the first thing that we, that anybody does when purchasing something new. And that's part of human nature, right? Dr. Robert Cialdini has a really famous bestseller book called Influence.

[00:11:52] Dan: I don't know if you've read that. It's all about the psychology of persuasion. And in there, he mentions that, you know, out of 95 percent of all consumers are what they call imitators and only 5 percent are initiator. So what that means is only 5 percent of people will be open and willing to go be that first person to try something, right?

[00:12:15] Dan: Yeah. 95 percent of consumers are waiting for some kind of social proof. They're imitating somebody else's results.

[00:12:22] Jason: That's why the bandwagon approach is so effective. Most people on the planet want safety and security. It's more important to them than freedom or fulfillment in life.

[00:12:35] Jason: They want safety and security first. Those people are not entrepreneurs They work for entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs are a small percentage of people and they value freedom and fulfillment over safety and security. We want that too, but our priority is in a different order.

[00:12:50] Dan: Yeah, absolutely. And I think, you know, even attracting tenants or you know, bigger decisions to there's especially with the age of AI.

[00:13:01] Dan: So I personally believe that we're going into next six months to a year. I mean, things are moving so quickly right now is that there is going to be a revolution or direct kind of already is of like humans against bots, right? So the ability to be able to create human connection in any marketing or any business, I think is absolutely critical today.

[00:13:22] Jason: And

[00:13:22] Dan: most people aren't doing it. So you can definitely be ahead of your competition if you start leveraging and building that human connection into your marketing. And one of the easiest way of doing that is allowing your happy clients to tell a story.

[00:13:35] Jason: Yeah, I totally believe that. I think, you know, that all the interactions that AI can do are going to put a premium on humanity. Human connection and human conversation and human relationship is going to be a premium luxury product in some way. And so that's one way to set yourself apart always is to go deeper and to show care

[00:14:03] Dan: Yeah.

[00:14:04] Jason: Most companies are going to leverage ai and people are going to leverage ai to go wider but it's not going to have the same depth AI doesn't have that soul. Might get there.

[00:14:14] Jason: Yeah, I can see that. And that'll be important. The other challenge I've noticed though, with gathering testimonials is that if I do it, It feels a little awkward and it feels a little forced. Hey, what do you think about my business, you know? And so I think there's an advantage in what you're doing. And then like I know what it takes. Like we have somebody on my team that can edit video and can reach out and like do interviews. And like this is a difficult thing for the typical business owner to like go and do. It's like almost a whole nother thing, a whole nother business or something that we've had to incorporate over the years. And our best testimonials are the unprompted things that we randomly captured during our calls, which we do three, one hour calls weekly coaching clients, group calls. And we just. Have the whole thing recorded. So we capture stuff constantly, just unsolicited, unprompted, great things.

[00:15:14] Jason: But when I have to go ask the client, "Hey, how did you like this event?" It just gets awkward and it's not as effective and they can't think of what to say. And they're like, oh yeah, it's really good. And I'm like, "no, tell me about all the problems you had and tell me about all the success we've helped you create."

[00:15:31] Jason: But in that moment, they're like, "oh my gosh, I'm taking a test right now in front of a camera. I don't know what to say." And then I don't get something good. So.

[00:15:39] Dan: Yeah, there's quite an art to doing that. And the word awkward definitely sticks out like a sore thumb from the invitation, like asking your people, "Hey, would you record a video testimonial?" All the way to interviewing them as well.

[00:15:53] Dan: So we take a slightly different approach. And the invitation, we have a 47 percent success rate in getting your clients to show up for an interview. And that's all about the way our white glove invitation process works.

[00:16:06] Jason: This is like all of their clients that they give you their information, you reach out and you can get about half to give you a full testimonial.

[00:16:16] Dan: Yeah.

[00:16:17] Jason: It's an amazing stat that I'm just saying, by the way, everybody, imagine if you got half of all of your clients to give you testimonials, you would look like an amazing business.

[00:16:27] Dan: So whether you're doing it yourself or somebody else, let me just give you a couple of pointers. We never use the words "video testimonial."

[00:16:34] Dan: So it's always something along the lines of, "Hey, I realized that, you know, you've been living here for a month and you seem really happy." Or, you know, "you've recently had a transformation...

[00:16:44] Jason: We've managed your property for a while.

[00:16:45] Dan: Yep. So think something along those lines and say, "Hey you know, there are a couple of really cool individuals that we're trying to bring into our community, and they're on the fence about moving here, if they could hear firsthand what it's like living here from somebody like you, I think you'd have, you know, great neighbors, right?" Something along those lines. "Would you be open to meeting with one of our producers just for a quick 15 minute chat over video, just to ask you a few questions about your stay here? And you know, your story can be truly inspiring to others. And maybe you'll meet some new neighbors," something along those lines, right? So really getting creative and the invitation don't ask for video testimonials, really about, hey, how can you as the client contribute to somebody else's wellbeing, right? That's another human nature thing that's important. And then being able to pass it off to say, "Hey, when you meet with my producer," so it becomes less of you know, it's almost like if I said, "Jason, I'm going to send a news crew to your house tomorrow to interview you.""

[00:17:41] Dan: You'd be like, "Oh my God, great!" Like you feel honored. Right? So that's the kind of invitation that we're trying to create here too.

[00:17:46] Jason: Yeah.

[00:17:47] Dan: And then honoring their time, honoring their stories and being a super, super easy, you know, real human being kind of conducting the interview and our 15 minute interview, it gets edited down to, you know, sometimes 60 seconds, maybe two minutes tops just for the golden sound bites that you need to help your your free marketing conversions.

[00:18:04] Dan: So yeah, don't go out and ask for video testimonials. That's not going to go over very well. Just get creative with the invitation.

[00:18:10] Jason: Yeah. Good tip. So explain how your service works and what it is and what it's called. And like, so that people can understand the advantage that this can give them.

[00:18:21] Dan: Yeah, absolutely.

[00:18:22] Dan: So we're a membership model. We are currently $189 per month to be a client of Share One. And we take care, as I mentioned before, the invitation. So we'll invite your clients. We'll remind them, answer any questions, scheduling and all that. And then basically schedule a call with one of our producers.

[00:18:39] Dan: All of our producers are going to be highly trained on the specifics of what you're looking for. So your branding you know, what locations you're trying to fill, whatever that may be our producers already know going into the interview, what the soundbites are you looking for? And we'll basically coach them into answering questions.

[00:18:55] Dan: So we'll help them with their cameras a little bit, their lighting. And say, Hey, why don't you finish this sentence and, you know, make sure it doesn't ramble on and on. So we're literally producers looking for these soundbites. So we'll coach them into basically saying the things that we need them to say.

[00:19:09] Dan: And that 15 minute interview gets edited down. We add captions and then we deliver that back to you. And from inside of our portal, you can easily say, "Hey, this is a cool testimonial. I want to run it as an Instagram Reel or Facebook ad or anything like that. And we'll recut and reedit everything for you.

[00:19:27] Dan: So we're basically completely done for you video testimonial service. Yeah, so we're affordable. We're white glove and we're extremely effective at what we do.

[00:19:38] Jason: Yeah, I mean at 189 a month, it's an absolute no brainer. Just the cost of getting people to do this stuff, or trying to go out and get cheap places to do it, like to edit some video that you capture yourself, the quality's just not going to be there.

[00:19:53] Jason: I think the magic is probably in the coaching and in the right questions and in the process and then the editing, putting it together is going to make it all work.

[00:20:02] Dan: And then once you have the video testimonial, we have a couple of really cool new piece of technology that we can automatically push testimonials to certain parts of your marketing assets.

[00:20:13] Dan: So we have a, like a floating widget that can sit in any corner of your website that says video testimony. As soon as you click on it, it pops up and people can start watching mobile friendly. You know, when consumers are about to take action. So whether it's a book a tour or schedule a call, there's this anxiety inside of them when they click that. So we have this really cool inline widget that can sit underneath the buy button or schedule button that basically it's just a whole bunch of videos that they can watch some quick social proof in terms of that they're making the right decision.

[00:20:44] Dan: Send them over the edge.

[00:20:45] Dan: Absolutely. So as a member of Share One and we'll push all those videos automatically as we collect them onto the different parts of your marketing assets.

[00:20:54] Jason: Yeah, nice. So this can be it like there's a code snippets that you can embed on your website stuff like that. Very cool Yeah, we found that conversion rates increase... we'll do on our websites that we do for clients, I call it a testimonial sandwich. So basically we have the main call to action form that's lower on the page and we'll put like maybe two testimonials above it could be videos most of the time It's like a face image and text and then below that we'll have testimonies that have been gathered from their review websites, but videos would maximize if you just had two or three videos that somebody watched before signing up with you, there's a scripture in the Bible that says "in the mouth of two or three words shall every word be established."

[00:21:41] Jason: There's this thing that happens in people, if they watch two or three videos of testimonies, or even just see that you have two or three, and there's some sort of headline below them that, like, sums up what it's about, they'll just believe it. They think that this is how everything happens at your business.

[00:21:56] Jason: And so the power of just having even two or three videos, now if you have a lot, and you're able to continually gather these from clients, and then maybe leverage getting them to give you positive reviews on review sites, as well, then maybe after they leave the video, there's this other thing, I think Cialdini talks about this as well, that once somebody takes a certain action, they're more likely to believe in that like a positive action towards a business are more likely to want to continue to do that.

[00:22:27] Dan: Validates their decision, right?

[00:22:29] Jason: Right. And so once somebody gives you a positive review like if a tenant gives you a positive review or an owner gives you positive review, what happens is they tend to have a longer lifetime value. They stay longer and then when you have a problem because something inevitably comes up. The tenant gets frustrated, or the owner gets frustrated about something.

[00:22:51] Jason: They're more likely to give you the benefit of the doubt, because previously they acknowledged they had a good experience with you, and they're more likely to say, "Oh, they'll figure it out. And so, it just makes business easier. What we coach our clients on is the best time to get a testimonial or a review is at peak happiness. And for most tenants and owners, that's usually around tenant placement. That's once the tenants in place, the tenant's happiest and the owner is now happy. "Hey, I've got a tenant and they're paying rent," and that's when everybody's happiest. And so during their and owner, new client onboarding processes.

[00:23:29] Jason: They could build in this connection with you guys to give you their info and you reach out and ask about their experience. And our usual script for clients when we're coaching them to do this directly is that they reach out, point out the good that they've done for them so far, and then ask them the loaded question, like how do you feel we've done so far?

[00:23:51] Jason: And then they're like, "Oh, well, you just told me you did all this you took care of that leaky toilet. You did this and property is ready for me And yeah, it's been great." " What's your experience been like with ABC property management so far?" "Oh, yeah It's been great." Because you just pointed out all the good. For the owner, you're like we got a tenant in place. We got the rent collected should be hitting your bank account in the next couple days. Like how do you feel ABC property management's done so far?"

[00:24:15] Jason: "Oh, yeah. You guys are great." "Awesome We love hearing that would you be willing to share that feedback with us online? Or would you be willing to share that feedback with somebody else? That would really help us out." "Oh, yeah." So, it's called the Law of Reciprocity. They want to reciprocate, because you pointed out that you did something for them.

[00:24:35] Jason: Yeah, there's kind of this debt or this leverage and they're like, "yeah, sure. I'd be happy to. Awesome. I'm going to have our producers-" you say right? "Our producer reach out and they'll do a little interview with you and I think you'll really enjoy it, and we're really good at making you look good."

[00:24:51] Dan: Yeah, so great point.

[00:24:53] Dan: I mean, testimonials build trust ultimately, right? And trust lasts a very long time. So even being able to send testimonials to existing tenants or existing owners as a reassurance, like, you know, if an owner has been with you for years, it's like, "Hey, If they're ever doubting about leaving us, let's send them like a case study or something, you know, once every six months or so, just to kind of reaffirm that you guys are really good.

[00:25:15] Dan: So, so we actually have technology. We actually have technology that can build into the CRM process to know exactly when to reach out. So that can be automated. And we also upon completion of the video testimonial, we automate the whole Google or Yelp or any other types of site reviews. Automatically for the people that we interview and then one more thing I want to touch on Jason is objections, right?

[00:25:37] Dan: So video testimonials are super powerful to use to address all objections before they even come up. So if you know right off the bat that nine times out of 10 people are going to say, well, you're, you know, such and such place is cheaper or other property managers or, you know, only charge 8 percent or whatever."

[00:25:55] Dan: Then using the video testimonials and you can cue your producers into collecting that as like, "Hey, initially I thought that going with X was going to be a little bit more expensive, but little did I know they took care of X, Y, Z." Right. So being able to have those little seeds or saying, "Hey, you know, yes, this apartment building is probably not the cheapest around, but I'm so glad I chose this because of XYZ. So being able to take those objections and understanding how to reverse engineer these interviews to be able to get those soundbites that are going to help you with your closing.

[00:26:24] Jason: So this is something that your producers are trained on. That is in part of your onboarding process with new clients, then it's probably to identify what actions or challenges do they tend to deal with?

[00:26:36] Jason: And then as you're gathering testimonials, it becomes a goal to offset those.

[00:26:41] Dan: Absolutely. So every new client that comes on board, we do a deep dive really understanding. who their audiences are going to be, who they're trying to attract, where these video testimonials are going to be displayed where these people are coming from, essentially trying to understand like what's in that prospect's mind frame, like what are they looking at when they're watching this? So that we can really kind of, you know, hit a home run for them.

[00:27:03] Jason: Yeah, I love this. I think good testimonials are more important than most companies' marketing. They're more important than most companies' websites. They're more important than most everything that a company does to try and get new business. They don't understand the impact. And if you have negative reviews, which is like the opposite, it's like a clamp on anything that you could potentially do in your entire sales pipeline, any marketing you do, anything else, if you have negative reviews. People will check you out. People want to know, can they trust you? So they're looking for indicators. Even if they heard about you word of mouth or whatever, they might still go check and they're like, "well, they have a bunch of bad reviews. Maybe we should do some more research and find another company." And so the impact of that, I think is often underestimated. You can have the ugliest website. You can have the worst branding. You can have all the other leaks that exist in businesses, but if you have great testimonials and great reviews online, people will still work with you and those will be warm leads.

[00:28:08] Jason: Like they'll trust you. There's stats that suggest that people trust online reviews or testimonials as much as word of mouth from a trusted friend or advisor if the reviews are credible, unlike some on Amazon. And then, so like the conversion rate or the close rate then is really high and you don't have to have as good of a website, you don't have to be as good at sales. You don't have to be as good at marketing. Good testimonials and good feedback really solves a myriad of marketing sins.

[00:28:37] Dan: Yeah, absolutely. And then it's reputation management too. So if you do have some bad reviews on Google, you can easily upload videos onto your Google business profile and you can upload positive video reviews.

[00:28:49] Dan: And when somebody reads something that's written that's negative and they go to your website and there's what we call wall of love, which is basically a whole bunch of videos saying how great, you know, you are, that's a game changer.

[00:29:00] Jason: That's an outlier. That negative review is now an outlier. You know, owners know that there's going to be upset and negative tenants.

[00:29:06] Jason: And that's a given in property management. But they want to know that you know how to deal with those situations and that you're making changes or improvements or whatever. So having good responses is also can be important on those reviews. So having a whole wall of proof, yeah, that overcomes a lot of challenges.

[00:29:24] Jason: So well cool, Dan. I appreciate you coming on the show. I wanted to announce Dan, you're coming to DoorGrow Live. You're going to be talking at our event in May about some of this stuff, but going even deeper into how people can have an impact in a way that I think would help grow and scale their business, which was what we're all about at DoorGrow.

[00:29:45] Jason: And so everybody, make sure and go and check out the details at doorgrowlive.Com. And we were bringing in some really cool experts that are going to be talking about a variety of different things. And Dan is going to be one of those. So really excited to have you at that, Dan.

[00:30:02] Jason: Super excited. Can't wait for it.

[00:30:05] Jason: Yeah, that's going to be really cool. And so if you want to take things to the next level and grow your business, this is the place to be. And can you give them a teaser of what you might be sharing at this?

[00:30:15] Dan: Yeah, absolutely. So, being able to present actual case studies in terms of property management and give solid advice and examples on how you can immediately start using video testimonials and leveraging social proof to be able to increase your conversions and also teaching you how to collect them.

[00:30:33] Dan: And everything to do with social proof. So I'm super excited about that.

[00:30:37] Jason: This will be really cool. So make sure to get your tickets to DoorGrow Live. Go to doorgrowlive.Com. Dan, I appreciate you coming on the show. How can people learn more about Share One and get connected with what you're doing?

[00:30:51] Dan: Absolutely. So our website is www.share.one O N E. And I think, Jason, we might put something nice together for your listeners and we'll add that to the show notes.

[00:31:01] Jason: Awesome. All right, appreciate you coming and hanging out with us here on the DoorGrow show and excited to do more stuff with you in the future.

[00:31:08] Jason: All right. So, if you are a property management entrepreneur and you're wanting to grow your business, add doors, reach out to us at DoorGrow. We can help you with that. So until next time, everybody to our mutual growth. Bye, everyone.

[00:31:19] Jason: you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:31:46] Jason: At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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Things don’t always go as planned in life and in business. It’s important for property management entrepreneurs to be able to roll with the punches.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss a recent experience where they were forced to pivot and adapt over and over again.

You’ll Learn [01:58] The Original Plan

[05:31] How a Winter Storm Distrupted a Business and Family Trip

[08:52] Moral of the Story: Be Prepared

[11:08] Your Plan is Not Always the Right Plan for You

Tweetables “Moral of the story is be prepared.” “This is how businesses work. Your best plan is sometimes going to fail and you're going to have to come up with a new way of doing it and you're going to have to adapt.” “There may be a reason that things are not going the way that you wanted them to go right now.” “ The only time that you won't have your breakthrough is if you quit.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: There is a bigger plan out there for you, and there may be a reason that things are not going the way that you wanted them to go right now.

[00:00:09] Sarah: There may be a reason that you're not experiencing the results that you thought that you would at this stage in the game.

[00:00:17] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:35] Jason: DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:54] Jason: At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason Hull and Sarah Hull. Now let's get into the show. Alright.

[00:01:16] Jason: So, today we are recording this episode at, what time is it now?

[00:01:22] Sarah: It is almost midnight.

[00:01:23] Jason: It is late. On Monday. And this will go live or be streamed later. And so if you're watching this, thanks for watching. And we're not actually like real time live at this moment, but it's because we had to change things up and make different plans.

[00:01:42] Sarah: Live in the moment, we're probably still in the car.

[00:01:45] Jason: Yeah, so we will be driving tomorrow during our podcast episode. So we wanted to record this episode real quick so we can get one out. And in today's topic, we're just going to share a little bit of our adventure. And, you know, the moral of the story will be things don't always go according to plan.

[00:02:03] Jason: So.

[00:02:04] Sarah: Sure don't.

[00:02:05] Jason: Alright, so, where do we start?

[00:02:08] Sarah: Alright, well, let's do quick synopsis. Where are we right now? Ohio, I think? I'm pretty sure we're in Ohio.

[00:02:15] Jason: I think so.

[00:02:16] Sarah: I think it's Ohio is the right answer. So, we've been to, in the last few days, we left on Friday, we've been to Texas, we've been to two days in Tennessee, we accidentally went to Kentucky, now we're in Ohio, tomorrow we're going to Pennsylvania.

[00:02:30] Sarah: So, I think that's five states. Five states in five days. It's a great time. So, we're driving from Texas to Pennsylvania. It's supposed to be a straight shot, up like this. And it's this crazy record breaking winter storm, and we're driving through some of that. We're missing the big part of it.

[00:02:51] Sarah: So we had to adjust our route. So our plan, this was our plan, was to leave on Friday. We're going from Texas to Memphis, Tennessee. Then the next morning, we were going to go to Graceland. We did do that, and then we spent some time in Nashville that evening. And then from Nashville, we were going to go to Morganstown, West Virginia, and then from there, drive into Dallas, Pennsylvania.

[00:03:18] Sarah: So, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, we were supposed to get to Pennsylvania on Monday, which is tonight, we are not in Pennsylvania. We are, I'm pretty sure, somewhere in Ohio, past Akron. And where, what's the name of this?

[00:03:32] Jason: Youngstown.

[00:03:33] Sarah: Youngstown, near Youngstown. That's where we are, right now. And so that was our plan. And then because of this crazy storm, we were leaving Nashville. We left Nashville. Roads were fine. Then all of a sudden, a little bit of rain. That was okay. Then, snow. And that was awful. And we were trying to get from Nashville, Tennessee up to Morgantown, West Virginia. Did not happen. Not even close. So we were going to stop in Lexington, Kentucky for lunch around like 3 o'clock or 3:30. That was not the plan. We ended up staying in Kentucky because it took us so long to get to Kentucky because of the crazy storm that we then had to stay overnight in Lexington and then reroute. So we were going this way and now we're going that way.

[00:04:31] Jason: So do you want to share why we're doing a road trip?

[00:04:34] Jason: Which is crazy to do.

[00:04:36] Sarah: It's crazy to do. I know, right? I could have flown there in a day. So we're driving my car that I've owned for a couple years now. I'm driving to Pennsylvania, and I'm giving the car to my mom as a gift. She has absolutely no idea.

[00:04:52] Jason: It's a surprise.

[00:04:53] Sarah: That this is happening.

[00:04:54] Sarah: I don't think she watches the podcast.

[00:04:56] Jason: No. Probably not.

[00:04:56] Sarah: Hopefully it's safe. But I'm gifting the car to my mom. I want her to have a nice car, and a reliable car, and not have to worry about things. So, I'm gifting her the car. She has absolutely no idea. Coincidentally, it's also in a couple of days, my brother Jason's birthday.

[00:05:14] Sarah: So, shout out to Jason. Happy early birthday. We love you. And we're going to do this little trip. We're going to see my family for a little bit. We're going to go out to dinner for my brother Jason's birthday. Give my mom a car, and then fly back home and we are running an event. So that's why we're doing all of this in the first place.

[00:05:31] Sarah: The whole crazy part of the story here is when we left Nashville, we were trying to get to Morganstown. It was insane on the road. Just wildly insane. Like snow, ice, there was a mix, there was sleet. We were going like 40 miles an hour. I was just happy to be moving. We saw multiple cars that had run off the road.

[00:05:58] Sarah: We saw a couple of tractor trailers that we're in accidents. We saw a few accidents. We were almost in a few accidents ourselves. And this trip is not at all going as planned. We had to move our flight, and then move our flight again, and then move our flight a third time. So then we, last night we almost gave up on this whole thing.

[00:06:18] Sarah: I was going to quit and just leave my car in Cincinnati, fly home. back to Texas and then come back and finish the second leg of this trip a second time. Jason woke up this morning and he said, "I think we can do it, babe. I think we can do it." So here we are, but this is not...

[00:06:35] Jason: We were not prepared for this storm.

[00:06:37] Jason: This car had pretty bald tires, which was... we were not ready.

[00:06:43] Sarah: No.

[00:06:43] Jason: Yeah. So after sliding off the road a little bit, twice, yeah, on a freeway.

[00:06:50] Sarah: On a freeway.

[00:06:51] Jason: On a highway. Yeah.

[00:06:52] Sarah: And car is supposed to be heading in this direction, and then it turned in.

[00:06:57] Jason: And we were just off to the side, so we were able to get back on the road safely both times.

[00:07:02] Jason: Thank goodness. Yeah. And not get hit by a tractor trailer.

[00:07:05] Sarah: Yeah, we didn't get hit by anything. The car didn't get damaged. We are safe. And to that I can only thank God. The whole time I was praying, our fathers, I was saying Hail Mary's, our fathers, the whole time. I was just praying to God and God took care of us made sure that we were safe made sure the car is safe, made sure that we got where we were going, made sure we didn't get stranded in the car because we saw a couple people stranded.

[00:07:30] Jason: Yeah.

[00:07:31] Sarah: It was scary.

[00:07:31] Sarah: It was really scary.

[00:07:32] Jason: We eventually pulled off and went and found a tire store

[00:07:36] Sarah: Yeah, we were going to continue out there for a while.

[00:07:38] Jason: Got new tires.

[00:07:39] Sarah: And something told me it might have been God telling me like "go, you need tires. Go get tires." So I said to Jason, I said, "Can you find...?"

[00:07:47] Sarah: Can you find? No.

[00:07:49] Jason: I wanted to get some better tires on that car, for sure.

[00:07:51] Sarah: So, I said, "is there a tire place that's like, nearby, that's open right now, that we can go to right now?" So we did. Took a little pit stop detour, but it was very well worth it. I just don't think we would have made the rest of the trip in one piece.

[00:08:06] Jason: The first tire store we went to was closed.

[00:08:08] Sarah: Yeah. Like it wasn't even plowed to get to it. They were closed. The third one was a tread. So we got new tires. That's good. The guy at the tire store, what did he tell you? The tread level was like a four. It's real, it's really bad.

[00:08:21] Jason: Yeah.

[00:08:21] Sarah: It was real bad. Yeah. So, that was fun.

[00:08:23] Jason: So We got fresh tires. Then the car drove really well.

[00:08:27] Jason: Plus we had pretty much made it through the worst of the weather, which we had planned. Because there were two ways we could go. The northern route had less weather, so.

[00:08:39] Sarah: Yep. That's why we're in Ohio.

[00:08:41] Jason: So.

[00:08:41] Sarah: And not through West Virginia.

[00:08:43] Jason: Yeah, we'd probably be in a very terrible spot if we had gone the wrong way.

[00:08:47] Jason: So.

[00:08:47] Sarah: Yeah. We'd be off on the side of the road frozen like popsicles. Oh gosh. You guys would never hear from us again.

[00:08:52] Jason: So moral of the story is be prepared. Make sure you're prepared. Have a plan. And so we've done lots of plans and changing of plans and so this is part of life. And this is how businesses work. Your best plan is sometimes going to fail and you're going to have to come up with a new way of doing it and you're going to have to adapt. And so one thing entrepreneurs, we are good at is adaptability. We figure it out cause we have to, and we adapt. And so we've adapted a lot today.

[00:09:23] Jason: And yesterday. The last couple days. Yeah, the last couple days.

[00:09:25] Sarah: We had a plan, we changed a plan, we changed that plan, we changed a plan again. We just keep changing it.

[00:09:30] Jason: And that causes us. We're just rolling with the punches. That causes us to have to adapt in business. So here we are recording a podcast.

[00:09:36] Jason: Here we are.

[00:09:36] Sarah: At midnight.

[00:09:37] Jason: In a hotel room.

[00:09:37] Sarah: Which Jason did not want to do.

[00:09:39] Jason: No. No. I was like, we don't have to do anything that we don't want to do. We don't have to do this.

[00:09:44] Sarah: No. And I said, we are not recording a podcast live from the car because we might die. No.

[00:09:49] Jason: We're not going to do that.

[00:09:49] Sarah: We might die live on camera.

[00:09:51] Sarah: Yeah, that would be...

[00:09:52] Jason: All right. So hopefully some of you got some value from this. If you do not have a good plan for your business, then that's something that we can help you with here at DoorGrow, help you come up with a plan, and help you adapt to some of the things that are getting thrown at your way.

[00:10:09] Jason: This is why we mapped out the DoorGrow code, our roadmap, for some of the most common challenges and problems. So if you would like a copy of the DoorGrow code, just reach out to us. We'd be happy to give you one and tell you a little bit about how we might be able to help you and hear about your challenges.

[00:10:24] Jason: So reach out to us. You can check us out at doorgrow.Com or go to our website or join our free Facebook group by going to doorgrowclub.Com. Make sure to answer the questions. We reject 60 to 70 percent of the applicants that try to join that group. So it's only for property management business owners.

[00:10:44] Jason: So if you own a property management business or seriously planning on starting one, then you can request access to that group. Make sure to answer the questions. We would love to have you inside. And that's it.

[00:10:55] Sarah: No, that's not it. No.

[00:10:56] Jason: Oh, there's more.

[00:10:57] Sarah: That wasn't it. I said, what are we going to talk about this episode?

[00:11:00] Sarah: I told you what we're going to talk about, then we just... So.

[00:11:03] Sarah: It's not the end of the episode. Surprise! A little bit more. But wait, there's more!

[00:11:07] Jason: But wait, there's more.

[00:11:08] Sarah: So for those of you that do have a plan, and you're like, "yeah, no, I definitely have a plan. This is not applicable to me," we had a plan going into this as well.

[00:11:17] Sarah: So, when you have a plan and life does not work out the way that you planned, and things don't work out the way that you thought that they would, and you're going through things and you're trying to figure out, you know, "what am I doing wrong? And why isn't this working? And like, why is this so hard? I don't understand why it's not happening the way that I wanted it to happen," and why it's just maybe not happening at all...

[00:11:40] Sarah: or maybe it's happening, but it's just so slow, and it's so hard, then you just need to know that sometimes there's a bigger plan in place for you somewhere. And if you're religious, you might believe that God, or the universe, or fate, or whatever you might want to call it. There is a bigger plan out there for you, and there may be a reason that things are not going the way that you wanted them to go right now.

[00:12:07] Sarah: There may be a reason that you're not experiencing the results that you thought that you would at this stage in the game. Just like when we thought we would go to West Virginia. Had we actually gotten to West Virginia, we'd be stranded there for sure, because they are getting hammered with snow right now.

[00:12:22] Sarah: So the whole, like, West Virginia, D. C. area Hammered with snow, and that was our plan. So I'm grateful, although it's a little crazy, I'm grateful that we didn't end up going that way. I'm grateful that there was a bigger plan in place for us. So just trust that you do have support when you reach out to people like your mentors, and if you're in the DoorGrow Mastermind, there are so many resources for you, including property managers who are in the exact same spot that you are in.

[00:12:56] Sarah: They've been there. They've done that. They've experienced everything. So leverage the resources that you have available to you. Know that there's support and know that everything is unfolding exactly the way it's supposed to for you in this exact moment. And you will have your breakthrough. The only time that you won't have your breakthrough is if you quit.

[00:13:14] Sarah: See, and now we're done.

[00:13:15] Jason: Good words. Good stuff, Sarah. All right.

[00:13:18] Sarah: All right. We're going to go to bed now.

[00:13:20] Jason: Yeah. Get some sleep.

[00:13:22] Sarah: Yep.

[00:13:22] Jason: So until next time, to our mutual growth. Hope you all crush it. Bye, everyone.

[00:13:27] Jason: you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:13:54] Jason: At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

View Details

It’s already 2025! What goals do you have for the year for yourself? For your property management business?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss their goals for 2025 and how they will impact property management business owners.

You’ll Learn [01:36] DoorGrow’s Yearly Planning and Goals

[07:30] DoorGrow in-Person Events in 2025

[13:05] The Future of Property Management: DoorGrow Live 2025

[16:11] DoorGrow’s Commitment to Rescuing Dogs

Tweetables  ”Strategic time invested in the business is what actually grows businesses.”

“Most of y'all are focused so heavily on the tactical, the day-to-day tasks that just come at you and the business isn't moving forward.”

”Broke people often have a broke mindset.”

“You can do it. You just need a really good plan.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: Most of y'all are focused so heavily on the tactical, the day to day tasks that just come at you and the business isn't moving forward.

[00:00:09] Welcome, DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:27] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:47] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts property management growth experts Jason Hull and Sarah Hull the owners of DoorGrow.

[00:01:07] Now, let's get into the show. All right.

[00:01:10] So today, we're going to be...

[00:01:12] Sarah: It's new year's eve!

[00:01:13] Jason: It's new year's eve as we're recording this episode. So those of you watching us live, happy new year's. And those of you that are not, then I hope you had a happy new year, and you didn't like drink too much and you are like ready to go for the new year.

[00:01:28] So we're going to be talking about the new year. What are we going to chat about today?

[00:01:33] Sarah: I thought we were going to talk about where we want to go.

[00:01:36] Jason: Yeah. So we're going to tell you a little bit about what's up with DoorGrow. We do our annual planning in the middle of the year. We offset it by two quarters.

[00:01:45] We find that to be a lot more effective. So we actually coach our clients to do the same. Why? Because this time of year, everybody's a little bit too focused on other stuff, holidays, family, all good things, right? And not as focused, maybe, on the business.

[00:02:00] Sarah: Can you imagine if today was the deadline for all of your big annual goals?

[00:02:05] Like, man, we gotta do that one thing! Today's the last day. Hard push, guys! Everyone's like, "..."

[00:02:10] Jason: Or just even this whole month of December or even like Thanksgiving time. Like just trying to push your end of the year goals and trying to achieve as a team, your team are like, "cool. I'm glad you are motivated, Mr. Business Owner, but..."

[00:02:24] Sarah: "I'm taking two weeks off for Christmas, and I'm off for Thanksgiving, I'm taking time off for Christmas, I'm taking time off for New Year's."

[00:02:31] Jason: "That's cool, you want to hit that end of the year revenue goal, or sales goal, or whatever your goals are, but I need to figure out what to get my Aunt Susie for Christmas, and who's bringing what for Thanksgiving."

[00:02:43] Sarah: "I'm cooking, and I'm cleaning."

[00:02:44] Jason: And, "what party am I going to for New Year's? Who am I going to kiss at midnight?" Like, it's hard stuff. That being said, some of the goals we have for 2025 I think one of the things we've really put a lot of attention into over the last three, four years, maybe even longer is just making our program better and better.

[00:03:05] We've just added a lot to the program, like focusing on decreasing churn, keeping our coaching clients longterm improving systems. We just rolled out some cool stuff, our client workbooks. What are some of the things we've done in the last year? We rolled out this new Accountability Sales Tracker.

[00:03:19] We rolled out, you know...

[00:03:20] Sarah: all kinds of client workbooks content...

[00:03:23] Jason: new courses,

[00:03:23] Sarah: operations revamp.

[00:03:25] Jason: DoorGrow, we get a lot done. Part of that is because of DoorGrow OS and our planning process. It allows us to really focus on Goals and outcomes, strategic growth of the business instead of just tactical day to day work.

[00:03:38] And strategic time invested in the business is what actually grows businesses. Most of y'all, because I've talked to thousands of property managers, most of y'all are focused so heavily on the tactical, the day to day tasks that just come at you and the business isn't moving forward. So our goal for this year, because we've got a really good program, we're getting great results.

[00:03:59] We're keeping clients for a decent time now. You know, we even got rid of over the last several years, we got rid of any sort of annual contract. A lot of vendors like DoorGrow have annual agreements or whatever. We got rid of those because we could keep clients longer than a year. And so we didn't need that.

[00:04:16] Like it increases the risk of people wanting to like get on board with us. So we're like, let's lower the risk to come on board with us, prove ourselves and just keep them. So the next goal for us really at DoorGrow is to focus on lead generation. That game has changed so much over the last decade plus that we've been in business.

[00:04:37] We've used LinkedIn to get business for a while through automation. We used our Facebook group and we've used organic stuff through SEO. Like we've used a lot of different strategies and we still have several things going at a time, but the game always changes. And so lead gen is something where we're shifting our focus.

[00:04:57] As you focus on the business, we've got our six core functions, lead gen, nurture, conversion, delivery, lifetime value, pricing, retention, et cetera. And then financial finances. And so we're shifting our focus every year towards what's weakest. Where does our attention... yeah.

[00:05:17] Sarah: Every quarter, we're like, "okay, Hey, we solved that problem. Now we have this whole other problem.

[00:05:22] Jason: So our weakest thing right now is probably lead generation. Like we've got a lot of tools for nurture. This podcast or newsletter. We've got lots of content on YouTube. Yeah. Nurture's strong.

[00:05:35] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:05:36] Jason: Delivery and fulfillment is strong. Conversion, like we're pretty good at conversion.

[00:05:40] Sarah: Hassan follows up with people like crazy. He's just on top of it. He's done everything.

[00:05:45] Jason: So lead gen, we've been getting a lot of leads, you know, through Facebook ads and through our Facebook group where we funnel people to, but we're getting a lot of unqualified leads.

[00:05:54] Like basically there's a lot of startup property managers that are broke and don't have money and we can help them with that stuff if they're willing to invest. But broke people often have a broke mindset. So if you're listening and you're not growing, you're probably not investing any money towards growth.

[00:06:10] Like who are you paying to coach you or teach you or help you figure out how to grow? If you're not paying somebody, you're selling yourself short. And we eat our own dog food. How many masterminds am I in right now? I don't know, two, three?

[00:06:22] Sarah: I don't know. You just added another one.

[00:06:24] Jason: Yeah, but they're for different areas of the business.

[00:06:26] And and we leverage them and allow the team to leverage them and to make sure that we're always innovating or getting new ideas and moving things forward.

[00:06:35] Sarah: Think the answer is four.

[00:06:36] Jason: I think I'm in four different masterminds right now. Yeah. We're in plenty. So, yeah. So, and yeah we've got two online programs that we're in right now related to just leads.

[00:06:49] Oh, I wasn't counting those.

[00:06:50] Ads. So we've got access to at least, you know, at least two focused on lead gen. So we're going to be putting our attention and focus this year on lead generation. Like how do we attract more property managers that are struggling, that want to grow, or that are struggling with being able to scale their operations and adding doors is causing a problem for them?

[00:07:14] These are problems we solve and we're really good at solving it. So we're going to be shifting our lead gen from just like, "Hey, are you a property manager? Join our free Facebook group and then we'll give you free stuff." We're going to shift it more towards, "Hey, do you have these particular challenges we want to help?"

[00:07:28] So that's going to be our focus this year.

[00:07:30] Sarah: I also want to focus on doing some cool events this year.

[00:07:33] Jason: Yeah.

[00:07:33] Sarah: Those are so fun for me. I love that. Like even our jumpstart events.

[00:07:37] Jason: Yeah.

[00:07:38] Sarah: It's a whole day, so it's a lot. Like I am tired afterwards, but I walk away feeling really fulfilled I walk away...

[00:07:45] Explain what a jumpstart event is

[00:07:46] ...and I just feel like we just changed the trajectory of people's lives and businesses.

[00:07:52] Jason: Yeah, they're powerful. Explain what a jumpstart is for those that are like, what's that? Yeah.

[00:07:56] Sarah: What's a jumpstart session? So the jumpstart session is available for our mastermind clients. They're held here in the North Austin, Texas area, and they're a one day deep dive into the business. So, there's no pre selected topics.

[00:08:08] Sometimes I get, "well, what are we going to talk about?" I don't know, what do you need in your business? What are the problems? What are your challenges? What are you working on? What has not been working for you? You know, what questions might you have that you're like, "man, I just, I know I can do this better. I just don't know how." That's what we're going to talk about. So whatever it is. We've done a couple of them we've done pricing. Some of them have been focused on sales. Some of them have been focused more on the back end, like delivery and team operations.

[00:08:37] Jason: Yeah.

[00:08:38] Sarah: So they're different every single time and we never know what we're going to talk about really until we get there and we start diving in and we start asking questions.

[00:08:48] So, they're usually smaller events. I like to keep them small because if they get too big, it's hard to go really deep into a business if there's like 20 businesses in the room. Now it's not a deep dive. Now it's just, we're going to talk about some stuff. So we keep them generally pretty small.

[00:09:03] There are usually about like three, maybe four businesses there. And it's like a one day deep dive. We do break, we get some really good tacos. We go for lunch and then we dive right back into it. But every single time people walk away with an action plan, they walk away knowing what to do. We update our client workbooks.

[00:09:22] So they get a lot of clarity and then we wanted to mimic that, but build on it and do this a little bit in a more robust way. So we're actually hosting an event. This is open to anyone who wants to join. It will be called Thrive 2025 because as we're talking with people, we're realizing we're at the end of the year.

[00:09:44] The clock is about to reset. Some people, they have an idea of what they want to do, but they don't know how the hell they're actually going to get there. So, we're going to get into the nitty gritty and help them figure out, well, what is your plan? What are your goals? And then, how are you going to get there?

[00:10:01] What are the things that you need to do? And by what time frame do you actually need to do them? So that you can hit this goal that you're trying to hit in all of 2025. So at this event, we're not just planning for like, "Hey, here's what you're going to do for maybe the next month or the next couple of weeks."

[00:10:18] "Here's what your 2025 is going to look like, and here's the entire roadmap for your 2025." So that you can be on track and hit the goals that you're looking to hit so that you don't have another year where you're like, "man, it just didn't happen again. I just don't know what's going on. Maybe I'll just never do it."

[00:10:38] You can do it. You just need a really good plan. You need a solid plan put together. So we're going to spend the day with a room of property managers. We're going to brainstorm. We're going to create some goals, figure out what is it that you really want for your business? Why do you want it?

[00:10:53] And then, what are the action steps that you need to take so that you can get there? So this essentially is going to write the business plan for your business for 2025. And we're going to do that in a really cool place. It's going to be in Nashville.

[00:11:07] Jason: Yeah, we're going to take you through a bit of our planning process the way we do this at DoorGrow I really think this is the technology that has allowed us to surpass any other coaches in the space it's our planning and it's the planning process gets our team in alignment It gets them out of that transactional sort of leadership system.

[00:11:28] It gets them focusing on objectives. It gets them functioning more like like intrapreneurs, instead of just waiting to be told what to do. And if you're frustrated and always having to tell your team what to do and always having to answer all their questions, you have a transactional leadership system because that's the least risky thing for them to do is to let you do all the thinking and decision making.

[00:11:48] So when we start focusing on a team, figuring out what is the business need? What are the objectives to like brainstorm as a team? And you're the last to speak as a visionary or the people that are running the business and you get feedback, real feedback from your team who are on the front lines, who know what challenges they're running into, then we can start to innovate as a company.

[00:12:09] Then they start to focus on those outcomes and they start to move things forward. And so we're going to take you through that process. And come up with a plan. So we're going to spend a day and just dig in. And this will be a game changer for you and your business. So we're going to have a small group.

[00:12:24] How many are we allowing to come to this?

[00:12:26] Sarah: There's going to be eight spots total. And some of them are already spoken for.

[00:12:30] Jason: Okay. Eight businesses.

[00:12:32] Sarah: Eight spots.

[00:12:33] Jason: Eight people.

[00:12:34] Sarah: Eight. Yep. Eight human beings. So, a business might just have one person.

[00:12:39] Jason: Or bring a plus one. It can bring a plus one. Yeah. Okay.

[00:12:43] Sarah: Two, two max.

[00:12:44] Because if someone goes, Oh, I have three people. So it might only be four businesses. Four people. Like now that's really.

[00:12:49] Jason: Okay.

[00:12:50] Sarah: It's hard then, because it takes up so many spots.

[00:12:52] Jason: So we're going to be doing events as another goal for the year.

[00:12:56] Sarah: Yep. Yeah, so we're going to kick it off with right in January Thrive 2025.

[00:12:59] Jason: If you're listening this podcast later on like iTunes or something then you probably missed it, but we'll have other stuff.

[00:13:05] Sarah: But don't worry because we have our DoorGrow live event coming up.

[00:13:08] Jason: Okay, that's another event So we've got DoorGrow live coming up. You want to talk about DoorGrow Live?

[00:13:13] Sarah: Yeah, let's talk about DoorGrow Live. So that is going to be a Friday and Saturday. It's May 16th and 17th. And you'll want to make sure that you come in on the 15th because that Thursday, the day before from 7pm to 9pm, we're doing a mixer.

[00:13:27] So we're doing some networking. You'll meet the DoorGrow team. You'll meet a lot of other business owners and property managers, and we're going to have some live entertainment. So you're going to get to see some dancers. We're going to have a singer. It's going to be a good time. So make sure that you travel in the day before, attend the mixer.

[00:13:46] And then this year we're talking about innovating the future of property management. So we want to talk about where is this whole industry going? Because things change really quickly, especially with all of the developments in AI. So things can change really quickly. So we're going to have some great speakers there.

[00:14:07] You can go actually right now. You can go to doorgrowlive.Com and you can get all of the event details. You can book your rooms at the discounted room rate that we've negotiated with the venue for you. It's at Kalahari Resorts in Round Rock, Texas. And you can check out some of the speakers that are going to be there at the event. Every year we do one of these we always try to make it a little bigger a little better, and this year is no exception We've got some great stuff planned.

[00:14:39] Jason: You know, I think a lot of people are burnt out on conferences. A lot of you maybe have gone to a lot of events and conferences. But there's something special and different about DoorGrow Live.

[00:14:49] I've been to a lot of different events as well. And there's just something special and different about DoorGrow Live. And one, we're creating a lot of momentum for property managers too. I think we're a lot more holistic in our approach. We're not just focused on property management. All of y'all know plenty about property management, but what I find is usually what's holding you back in business is not even related to business, it's everything else going on. And that's why we take a much more holistic approach. And so we're going to benefit you in a lot of different ways. Like people walk away from these events and become better people. That's our goal. And so, and better people have better businesses and better families and make more money and more contribution and make a bigger difference.

[00:15:33] So, so get your tickets to DoorGrow Live. That's coming up as well. And any other events?

[00:15:39] Sarah: Well, there's this secret one that we haven't talked about yet. When we were in Mexico, we were talking about it.

[00:15:45] Jason: Okay, well I guess we're not talking about today 'cause it's a secret . So, so sorry, everybody.

[00:15:51] All right. So something cool is coming. All right, so we've got events coming up and then so what other goals do we have for DoorGrow? Those are kind of the key ones for us internally. It's lead gen. Yeah. Yeah. It is going to be our focus, so.

[00:16:04] Sarah: I want to just find it to help more people and

[00:16:07] Yeah.

[00:16:07] I don't care what that looks like.

[00:16:08] Jason: It doesn't

[00:16:09] Sarah: even matter what it looks like, really, so. Oh, and then my, I have some personal goals, too, I'm going to help more dogs. We're going to save more dogs this year. Jason's going to kill me, probably. I might be divorced by the end of the year. Hopefully not.

[00:16:22] Jason: I will not kill her.

[00:16:22] Sarah: What's the number of dogs that we can get before we talk about divorce?

[00:16:28] Jason: Is this, like...?

[00:16:29] Sarah: On the pod, we're going to record it, yeah. So, like, what's the number? Because we're at three right now. We just rescued enough.

[00:16:35] Jason: There's no amount of dogs that would make me divorce you. There's plenty of other things you could do that would probably lead towards that, but it's not a dog thing.

[00:16:44] Sarah: So we're going to have 99 dogs.

[00:16:46] Jason: We just adopted. Yesterday, we officially just adopted our third dog, who was a foster. We had for, what, a month? And then...

[00:16:55] Sarah: we had him for a month.

[00:16:56] Jason: And then he got adopted. We got him adopted.

[00:16:58] Sarah: We did our job.

[00:16:59] Jason: We took him to farmer's markets and places and we met somebody at one of the things we took him to and got him adopted.

[00:17:06] Sarah: And it was a great situation for him. We were super sad because he's such a great dog. He's so perfect for him. And then when we dropped him off, I was just I was crying. I was a mess.

[00:17:15] Jason: Yeah, it was, that was hard.

[00:17:16] Sarah: I was so sad.

[00:17:17] Jason: He's just like the sweetest dog ever. Like, he's so, like, loving, he just loves everyone, like, well, loves us, not everyone.

[00:17:24] And yeah, so we got him adopted and then they took him back to the animal shelter.

[00:17:30] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:17:31] Jason: Which is sad. I guess.

[00:17:33] Sarah: Husband wasn't really on board.

[00:17:34] Jason: Husband wasn't really on board with it. No. The wife had adopted him and.

[00:17:37] Sarah: She got him while he was in Florida like. He was out of town. Rebuilding houses from the storm.

[00:17:43] Jason: Yeah.

[00:17:43] Sarah: And he was like, yeah, babe, go ahead. And he comes home and there's this dog.

[00:17:47] Jason: I'm coming to Texas. And he's like, I don't know if I like this dog. Yeah. Hans doesn't like new people, so he was probably like a little iffy about him, and it probably just didn't go well. I don't know.

[00:17:57] Sarah: Well, he let me know that it wasn't going to work out, so I said, okay, bring him back, and we'll foster him again, and in fostering him again, we both just, we knew we can't, we just can't, we can't give him up.

[00:18:12] Jason: So we're on number three. If we keep doing this fostering, we may end up with 20 dogs eventually. We'll need to buy land and a farm for dogs.

[00:18:21] Sarah: Y'all heard it. He said there is no amount of dogs.

[00:18:25] Jason: I'm not going to divorce you over dogs.

[00:18:26] Sarah: He said there's no amount of dogs.

[00:18:27] So this is recorded. I have video evidence

[00:18:30] Jason: that doesn't mean I'm going to allow any number of dogs. There's only so many we can handle. Do you like taking trips? You like taking trips?

[00:18:37] Sarah: I do, but that's...

[00:18:38] we're not boarding 20 dogs.

[00:18:40] No, we just need a farm. Need a farm.

[00:18:43] Need some volunteers. We'll start a nonprofit.

[00:18:47] Jason: Okay.

[00:18:47] Sarah: Get some people to help out. I'm going to save all dogs.

[00:18:50] Jason: This is Sarah's goal for 2025.

[00:18:54] Sarah: We'll have buses full of dogs. And he's not going to leave me, so that's great.

[00:18:58] Jason: God help me.

[00:19:00] Sarah: Seriously.

[00:19:00] Jason: Please, protect me from this woman and all of her dogs, so. Okay, so that's it.

[00:19:07] That's our goals for DoorGrow. What are your goals? Figure them out. Let us know inside our Facebook group. You can go there by going to doorgrowclub.com . And let us know what your goals are for the year. And if you would like some help, we would love to help you with your goals. You know what your default future is.

[00:19:25] You know what you achieved last year. You know what you achieved the year before that. And if you're anything like the majority of the property managers I've talked to over the last decade, your results probably aren't super great and you're probably not super excited about it. And you're probably getting a little bit burnt out on your business.

[00:19:43] And you probably do not want to keep doing things the way that you're doing it for the next year or the next five years. And so if you would like to have a different year this year than you had last year. Like a great year, like things really going well, like adding a lot of doors, getting a team that actually makes your life easy and you feel like you can just take vacations and step away and the business works swimmingly well, then reach out to us. Reach out to us. This is stuff that we're helping clients do all the time, and you would be amazed how much we can get accomplished even in your initial jumpstart session as a new client, but certainly within the first 90 days, we are changing lives, and we would love to change yours.

[00:20:26] We love getting to do this. We just we want to help more people and reach out to us. Have a conversation. We're expensive. Yeah. Not going to lie, like we're expensive, right? But we help you make so much money that you're not going to be worried about the expense. So that's the goal.

[00:20:43] Sarah: What's this, what's the, I don't know what it's called, but there's this framework where you have good, you have cheap, and you have fast and you can never have all three.

[00:20:51] Jason: You can only pick two.

[00:20:52] Sarah: There's only two. There's no combination in this world of anything. No product, no service, no nothing that's good and cheap and fast.

[00:21:00] Jason: Yeah.

[00:21:00] Sarah: So

[00:21:01] Jason: Yep.

[00:21:01] Sarah: So figure out which one you want to sacrifice, right?

[00:21:04] Jason: Reach out to us. You can check us out at DoorGrow. com and until next time to our mutual growth and happy new year.

[00:21:10] Bye everyone.

[00:21:10] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:21:37] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

View Details

Many property management business owners out there struggle with having a bad brand, bad pricing, cheapo clients, a lack of confidence, and more.

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull sit down in-person with property manager and DoorGrow client, Kelly Rafuse, to talk about her journey with property management.

You’ll Learn [04:53] How to Be Picky with the Clients You Bring on

[10:59] Overcoming the “Hustler” Mindset

[15:04] Choosing an Effective Brand

[21:07] Cheapos, Normals, and Premium Buyers

Tweetables  ”As you live and you grow in this business, you learn what makes money and what doesn't.”

“ The more confident you are, the more some of these… difficult personality types will kind of abdicate and allow you to lead them.”

“ It's better to be at the top than to be competing with the garbage at the bottom.”

“ Need is scarcity, need is starving, and need is survival.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Kelly: You know, as you live and you grow in this business, you learn what makes money and what doesn't. And I learned how to manage property the hard way.

[00:00:07] Jason: But you learned it.

[00:00:08] Kelly: Yes.

[00:00:10] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives. And you're interested in growing in business and life. And you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it.

[00:00:37] You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason Hull, founder and CEO of DoorGrow, and Sarah Hull, the co owner and COO of DoorGrow. And now let's get into the show.

[00:01:13] So our guest today, we're hanging out with Kelly. Kelly, introduce yourself.

[00:01:17] Kelly: Hi there, my name is Kelly Rafuse with Crimson Cape Property Management in Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania.

[00:01:22] Jason: And you have a really nice logo. Where'd you get that really nice logo?

[00:01:25] Kelly: It's this little mastermind I joined called DoorGrow helped me with that.

[00:01:29] Jason: And it's, I was saying, I think it's cool because it's like you are flying right there.

[00:01:33] It's like, it like reminds me of you.

[00:01:37] Kelly: Well, yeah. I had this Marvel Comics stud fetish, so.

[00:01:41] Jason: Yes. Okay. You're the Marvel comic gal. All right. So really excited to be hanging out. We're actually in Pennsylvania because this is kind of the neck of the woods Sarah grew up in and managed properties nearby and you manage properties in a neighboring market and so.

[00:01:59] The same market. The same market. She, yeah. Exact same market.

[00:02:02] Sarah: I left and she has the market.

[00:02:05] Kelly: While you were here, I was just managing my own portfolio.

[00:02:08] Jason: Oh, okay.

[00:02:09] Kelly: And people were coming to me to manage theirs, and that's how I got into this mess.

[00:02:15] Jason: Yeah. Well, give us a little more background on you, Kelly.

[00:02:18] How'd you get into property management?

[00:02:20] Kelly: Oh, well, I started off as a real estate investor. You know, buying homes out here in Northeast PA. It's a very good place to invest in property. Cash flow is, I mean, I think cap rates were like 12 percent when I got in. So, I mean, it was huge, and honestly, I was trying to replace my income because I'd gotten as far as I could go in my former career, you know, hit a huge glass ceiling, and realized that, you know, real estate was probably my ticket to freedom.

[00:02:45] Jason: What was your former career?

[00:02:47] Kelly: I was on the radio.

[00:02:48] Jason: Yeah, okay, you've got a great voice for it, so.

[00:02:51] Thank you very much.

[00:02:53] Yeah, so you were doing the radio.

[00:02:54] Kelly: Yeah, so I actually got into this market, and I liked it here. I actually, I did my two years and then moved to a bigger market. I was in Hartford, Connecticut for a while.

[00:03:03] And then an opportunity to come back presented itself. And I came back because I genuinely like the area. And you know, the inexpensive real estate was an attraction. And then My husband and I got into investing in properties. We built up quite a portfolio. We had 25 units of our own at one point.

[00:03:20] We're down to 14 now. We sold a few off that, you know, really weren't moneymakers for us. But, you know, as you live and you grow in this business, you learn what makes money and what doesn't. And I learned how to manage property the hard way.

[00:03:33] Jason: But you learned it.

[00:03:34] Kelly: Yes. I made all the mistakes.

[00:03:37] Jason: Yeah. And that's sometimes learning through mistakes and pain.

[00:03:41] I sometimes joke that DoorGrow was built on thousands of mistakes.

[00:03:45] Kelly: You're telling me. And I will introduce My biggest pain point in just a second here. So what caused me to join DoorGrow is my husband's a real estate broker. And so people were banging on his door. "Can you manage my property? Can you manage my property?" It's like, "well, I don't do that, but my wife does."

[00:04:03] Jason: Yeah.

[00:04:04] Kelly: And I'm like, well, I can't manage their property. I don't have a real estate license. And so it was a whole year of, "come on! Just get the license. Just do it! Just do it. Come on!" So I got the license. And I took on one of his investor clients, and I joined DoorGrow, like all in the same day.

[00:04:23] And what I found out when I joined DoorGrow was I never should have taken on that client.

[00:04:27] Jason: That was the price of tuition. It's one of the key lessons that defines you in business, which is you learn those lessons and not take on bad clients. Well, I mean, for us, it's been really inspiring and exciting to see your journey as an entrepreneur and see you kind of get all this ready and get things developed and start to grow.

[00:04:46] And so, we were talking about it, like, what should we talk about on the podcast today with Kelly? And you had mentioned.

[00:04:53] Sarah: Yeah, I had said, I think for me, one of the biggest shifts that I've seen in Kelly again and again and again is shifts in mindset because it was just even a few weeks ago where maybe a month ago or something, was relatively recent, where you were saying like, "oh, I read this book and it changed my life I'm waking up at like 4:30 in the morning and structuring my day different" and it was just again and again. But you've had these little shifts that end up leading to these huge changes for you and how you run things and how you structure your day and like just even your, your energy levels seem to be more protected now.

[00:05:32] Kelly: Yeah, I'm not getting up at 4:30 in the morning anymore. Although I just learned yesterday I might have to start again because my daughter wants to join the swim team. Oh. And they practice it. 5 a. m. sometimes, but yeah, I mean, it's, it's been a struggle because I'm not only a real estate entrepreneur.

[00:05:48] I am also, you know, a wife of a whirlwind. I mean, my husband is a broker. He's into wholesaling. He's into flipping. And I go to manage him.

[00:05:58] Jason: The whirlwind broker.

[00:06:00] Kelly: Yeah, and,

[00:06:02] Jason: yeah.

[00:06:02] Kelly: No, we'll say no more about that.

[00:06:04] Sarah: There's a lot going on.

[00:06:05] Lots of moving pieces.

[00:06:06] Kelly: He's a genius. He's like a Bill Gates level genius.

[00:06:09] I'm just waiting for the ship to come in. Yeah, nice. It's been 30 years, but it's coming.

[00:06:13] Jason: So what do you feel like maybe was the first mindset thing that you noticed in Kelly, kind of overcoming? Or what do you feel like was your first?

[00:06:22] Sarah: I don't know if I can think of a first, but I know that there's been several that I'd like to highlight.

[00:06:27] Jason: Okay.

[00:06:27] Sarah: So I think one of the things is being much more picky with what clients you take on and what properties you take on and how you kind of screen and vet people.

[00:06:41] Jason: Maybe that first client helped you learn that lesson.

[00:06:44] Sarah: Yes.

[00:06:45] Jason: Yeah. So what, what was the lesson there? Like, what did you figure out?

[00:06:48] Kelly: Oh, wow. You know, the, the first thing is I have to see if our philosophies match.

[00:06:53] Jason: You and the client.

[00:06:54] Kelly: Yes. And when I got into real estate investing, I admit I'm a bit of an idealist. I know you're into personality types.

[00:07:01] Jason: Yeah.

[00:07:01] Kelly: And I test as an INFP.

[00:07:03] Jason: Okay.

[00:07:03] Kelly: So I probably have no business being in any business at all, but yet here I am. But I'm a dreamer. I'm a visionary. And so my first company was, and still is called Good People, Good Homes, LLC.

[00:07:15] And I own property in that LLC. I'm not really doing business in it. It just holds property for me. But when I started it, it was supposed to be the company and it was: you buy these distressed properties in these neighborhoods and you fix them up and you put great people in them and it brings up the whole neighborhood and then everybody loves you and we hold hands and sing Kumbaya and that didn't really happen.

[00:07:36] Jason: Yeah.

[00:07:36] Kelly: But I did improve a lot of properties.

[00:07:39] Jason: Okay.

[00:07:39] Kelly: Right. Yeah.

[00:07:41] Sarah: I think arguably in this market, you are outdoing anything that I've ever seen because the befores and afters are just wild. And the rent rates before and after are wild. And this area, yes, you can absolutely get a great deal, a great bargain on real estate, and that doesn't come without its challenges and its problems.

[00:08:06] But one of the things that I think is just so great in this area that you do is you take these distressed properties and you make them beautiful and livable and safe. And you provide a wonderful home now on something before that was dilapidated.

[00:08:25] Kelly: And the market's full of C class properties. You know, I hear a lot of property managers say, "Why are you even bothering with those?"

[00:08:31] Well, honestly, there isn't anything else. Yeah, that's what we hear. You work with what you got. And I probably wouldn't be a real estate investor if the market wasn't like this. Because that's how I got in. I didn't make a ton of money in radio. I didn't. But I made enough to get in, you know, with a C class property.

[00:08:48] And now those C class properties are paying for my life, and my daughter's life, and it's beautiful. The property management company? That's just icing on the cake, but I think it might even eclipse what I've been able to do with my rentals.

[00:09:00] Jason: Oh, I'm sure.

[00:09:01] Kelly: And there's a need for it.

[00:09:02] Jason: Yeah. Big need.

[00:09:04] Kelly: Yeah. So the biggest thing I learned, back to your question about how to vet clients, does their philosophy match mine? Do they believe their C class property could be turned into a desirable place to live? And yes, you will be charging market rent for that, which is a lot more than maybe you thought you could charge. And you'll get a better class tenant that way. Or are they just happy not doing anything to the property, just letting it be what it is and getting whoever they can get into it and, you know, getting whatever money they can for it. I don't really want to work with those people.

[00:09:38] Jason: Do you find part of this though is just selling?

[00:09:41] It's like convincing them to align with your vision? Because it sounds like you have a better vision than a lot of the people that might come to you.

[00:09:48] Kelly: Sometimes when I show them the spreadsheet, of, you know, what I've done for some of my other clients, including the first one that I told you about. I mean, I really turned some of his properties around.

[00:09:59] And I've tried to fire him twice. Yeah.

[00:10:01] He won't go and, you know, he's also a third of my income, so I'm going to keep him on. And, but the thing is, he's kind of listening to me now. Kind of.

[00:10:11] Sarah: He's open. Well, I think. It's like a walnut shell. We've just cracked it open. Maybe some of the good ideas are seeping through.

[00:10:18] Jason: I've talked about this before, but I think also part of it is, as we've seen, you come into your own in more confidence in what you're doing and the more confident you are, the more some of these A personality types or these difficult personality types will kind of abdicate and allow you to lead them.

[00:10:36] And I talk about metaphorically punching people in the face sometimes. So you probably maybe punched them in the face metaphorically a couple of times since then. And so setting those healthier boundaries. Is something we naturally do when we start to believe in ourselves more. And so what other shifts do you feel like you've noticed in Kelly?

[00:10:55] Or what are some of the things that DoorGrow's helped you with? Are you making changes too?

[00:10:59] Kelly: Well, like Sarah said, a lot of the mindset stuff, I mean, a big revelation came to me when I was at DoorGrow live.

[00:11:05] Jason: Yeah, what was that?

[00:11:07] Kelly: Well, first of all, getting to DoorGrow Live was a challenge because I was in the midst of my survival mode.

[00:11:13] I'm a solopreneur still. I do everything myself. My husband's my broker of record, but, like, he's off doing his thing. Sure. So.

[00:11:21] Jason: You were doing everything, you're really busy, and you're like, how do I take a break to even just go to DoorGrow Live?

[00:11:26] Kelly: Yeah, and, you know, then I've got this mindset that, you know, how can I afford it?

[00:11:30] But the thing is, I did have the money to go. That's another thing. I've got a poverty mindset I need to get past. And when I went to DoorGrow Live, that was really thrown in my face. Because I was talking about the challenges of being a solopreneur. And one of the pieces of advice that I was given by one of the speakers is, "What's your time worth?"

[00:11:49] You know, you can't be doing all of these things when you pay somebody. Yeah, and I thought, well, what's my time worth? And then this little voice in the back of my head said, well, not a whole heck of a lot.

[00:12:00] Jason: You told everybody that. You said, "not a whole heck of a lot."

[00:12:04] Kelly: Yeah.

[00:12:04] Jason: And we're like, "oh, okay."

[00:12:06] Kelly: Yeah.

[00:12:07] Jason: Yeah.

[00:12:07] Kelly: Well, I mean, that comes from, you know, my background. I grew up without a lot.

[00:12:11] Jason: Yeah. You know,

[00:12:12] Kelly: I saw my parents struggle. They're working class people. You know, I got into an industry that was on its, you know, downslide when I, I started on the radio in you know, the early nineties, you know, probably right after it started to slide down and, you know, there've been multiple layoffs and, you know, voice tracking and automation and, you know, I survived, but I think one of the reasons I survived was I was willing to work really hard for not a whole lot of compensation.

[00:12:40] Jason: Sure.

[00:12:40] Kelly: \You know, as people were let go and reductions in force, I was given more duties, but not more money.

[00:12:47] Jason: Sure.

[00:12:48] Kelly: And, you know, you do that long enough, you start getting the message that, oh, well, your time really isn't worth a whole heck of a lot.

[00:12:54] Jason: Yeah.

[00:12:55] Kelly: Yeah.

[00:12:56] Jason: Who decides what your time's worth?

[00:12:57] Kelly: I do.

[00:12:58] Jason: Yeah. I do.

[00:12:59] Yes.

[00:12:59] Kelly: I do.

[00:13:00] Yeah!

[00:13:01] And, you know, that's...

[00:13:02] you do now. Yes.

[00:13:03] Jason: How has that shifted for you then? What's your perception of your time and the value of it? of your time now?

[00:13:09] Kelly: My perception of my time is, you know, first of all, I don't need to be tied to the Henry Ford 40 hour work week or even the 50-60-70-80 hour work week that I hear people say you "should" do when you're running a business because, you know, it's impractical.

[00:13:24] I have a daughter. She's a teenager. She's just started high school this year. She's a field hockey athlete and now she wants to be on the swim team and she's got needs. Mhm. Right? I've got a husband who does not have a cushy job I can fall back on while I do my entrepreneurial thing.

[00:13:40] Jason: Right. Right.

[00:13:41] Kelly: He's also an entrepreneur.

[00:13:43] We are living off self employment income. So it is a constant, you know, point of stress. So, you know, I need to find out my key productivity time, and that's when I work. And sometimes I get four or five hours a day, and that's it, of key productivity time. But then I find myself, you know, when I'm walking the dog, having all these great ideas.

[00:14:06] You know, I do things like I listen to your podcast you know, some great audio books that have been recommended to me. I devoured The One Thing by Gary Keller, the Profit First book. And I'm starting to implement these ideas. And it's just sort of like they're ladder steps.

[00:14:23] Jason: So basically, little by little, you've been investing in yourself by leveraging reading, getting coaching, doing this stuff.

[00:14:31] And that's translated into you valuing yourself a little bit more.

[00:14:35] Yeah.

[00:14:35] Awesome.

[00:14:36] Kelly: Absolutely. And I've learned to turn things over, like maintenance, you know, I hired one of the vendors that you recommended, Vendoroo and they're, you know, the tenants still text me with maintenance issues.

[00:14:47] Sure. And I text back, "put it in the portal." Right. "If you can't put it in the portal, call this number and they'll teach you how to put it in the portal."

[00:14:55] Jason: But yeah, probably less willing to take phone calls than you were before.

[00:14:58] Kelly: Yeah, I've never really taken phone calls.

[00:15:00] Jason: That's good, that's good.

[00:15:02] Kelly: Thanks me. Get it all in writing.

[00:15:04] Jason: So you went through our whole rapid revamp process as well, like with the branding and like getting everything kind of dialed in, pricing. You've implemented a lot of things. And so, has that impacted your confidence level as well?

[00:15:20] Kelly: Oh, absolutely. I really feel like, you know, I'm marketing a real brand now with Crimson Cape.

[00:15:25] Jason: Yeah. What, what was it before that?

[00:15:26] Kelly: GPGH Management Company.

[00:15:29] Jason: Oh, the acronym.

[00:15:30] Kelly: Yep. Good People, Good Homes.

[00:15:32] Jason: Yeah.

[00:15:32] Kelly: You know, just to take off of that and, you know, everything was GPGH. My husband was GPGH Realty.

[00:15:38] Jason: It sounds like some sort of drug or something. What do you take in GPGH?

[00:15:42] Kelly: Well, it's the right market.

[00:15:44] Jason: Okay. Well, then there's that GLP 1 joke too that you could put in there. GLP 1. Yeah. But my husband actually reprinted his real estate company because of, you know, he was inspired by what I did.

[00:15:54] Yeah. Yeah. Okay. What's his brand?

[00:15:56] Kelly: He's Gorilla Real Estate. That's the little stuffed gorilla you saw on the way in.

[00:16:00] Jason: Okay, yeah. Yeah, and they're different, which is nice. They're not like, you know, kind of mixed together.

[00:16:06] Kelly: Right, right. And I don't want, you know, people to really associate us together, even though we do share an office.

[00:16:11] Jason: Yeah.

[00:16:12] For now.

[00:16:13] So you've gone through the branding, your pricing is different than anyone else in the market.

[00:16:19] Kelly: Yeah. It's higher than anyone else in the market too. And that keeps a lot of the riffraff away.

[00:16:24] Jason: Yeah. It's better to be at the top than to be competing with the garbage at the bottom. For sure. Yeah. Especially in a difficult or lower end market. Yeah. Yeah. So awesome. What other changes?

[00:16:36] Sarah: I think, well, how many, we've gone through the rapid revamp a couple of times, so she's done the mindset piece a few times, and I think every time you go through it, you kind of get, like, an extra layer out of it, like almost like the next, like we're stacking like, levels and levels and levels of different like mindset tips and tricks, and then the perception piece, which once we're done with the little pieces on the website, we can get that launched for you.

[00:17:04] I think that will make a huge difference. And recently. I mean, for the whole entirety of the time that you were in our program, you had always said "there is no way I can add more units. There is no way I can do more work. There is no way I can even focus on growth." And you are now adding new doors.

[00:17:24] Kelly: Yep, I added three last week. I added another two Sunday night from a current client. I didn't know she had another double block. You know how I got those doors? She called me from you know, her poor husband is at the Cleveland Clinic. So she called me from Cleveland and she's like "I got a no heat call from this one building that you're not managing And I can't deal with it. Can you please take these units?"

[00:17:47] Jason: Nice.

[00:17:48] Kelly: So I just got two more doors.

[00:17:49] Jason: Okay.

[00:17:50] Kelly: And I'm hopefully closing on another five by the end of the week.

[00:17:53] Yes!

[00:17:55] Jason: So doors are just starting to flow and you're able to dedicate time now towards growth which before you're kind of

[00:18:01] Kelly: yeah

[00:18:01] Jason: Chicken with head cut off running around and dealing with stuff.

[00:18:04] Kelly: It's going to get a little iffy again now that I've added these doors, you know, okay. Now I have to onboard all these tenants. And there's a couple that come with the vacant units that they want me to rent in January?

[00:18:16] Jason: Yeah.

[00:18:17] Sarah: The best time of year here.

[00:18:21] Jason: Right. Lots of activity.

[00:18:23] Sarah: Speaking of vacant units, You have none now in the portfolio that you're Managing?

[00:18:28] My current portfolio, I filled them all.

[00:18:31] Yeah, and how many did you have? Because I feel like all throughout the year I was getting updates and it was like 20 something and down a little bit, down a little bit, and now you're at zero.

[00:18:41] Kelly: Yeah, I filled I think 17 units over the course of the last year.

[00:18:45] Amazing.

[00:18:46] 10 of them were filled between September and now.

[00:18:50] Jason: Nice. Wow.

[00:18:50] Kelly: And I've got a few that are coming up. I've got, you know, two of my tenants are moving into senior housing. So, you know, that means I'm probably going to have to redo their apartments because they've been living there since like 1965 or whatever.

[00:19:04] I'm sure they're going to need to be some updates.

[00:19:07] Jason: So in getting this business started, if you hadn't heard about DoorGrow, or say, DoorGrow didn't exist. Where would you be you think right now?

[00:19:15] Kelly: Oh my gosh.

[00:19:16] Jason: What'd be going on?

[00:19:17] Kelly: I'm not sure I'd still be doing it.

[00:19:19] Jason: You think you would have quit?

[00:19:20] Kelly: With this client that I took on from the beginning, if I didn't know any better, I would think this is what property management is.

[00:19:27] Jason: And you'd be like, yeah, right, so talking with us saying you should probably fire this client was probably enough to go, "okay, this may not be everybody."

[00:19:35] Kelly: Right.

[00:19:36] Jason: Okay.

[00:19:36] Kelly: Right, right. And you know, and you also helped me work with this client. So he's still my client, and he could be a very good client now that his buildings are cash flowing. But that remains to be seen because I got a little pushback on a repair last night that I wasn't real happy with, but we'll see.

[00:19:53] Jason: You're going to set some strong boundaries with this guy.

[00:19:56] Kelly: I might have to punch him in the face a third time.

[00:19:58] Jason: Metaphorically. Right, right. Metaphorically, we're not advocating violence. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay. All right. Well anything else that we should chat about or cover? I mean, it's really been, like I said at the beginning, it's been inspiring and exciting to see you grow.

[00:20:13] We're really excited to see where you take this and we've seen just it and that's why we do what we do. It's great to see clients just grow like you've come so far. Your whole energy is just different. Just how you are from when we saw you at DoorGrow live and you're like, well, what's your time worth?

[00:20:29] And you're, you've spouted off, "well, not very much," you know, or whatever you've come a long way. And I'm really excited to see where you go with this because this could be a really great residual income business. I think absolutely it will overshadow what you're making off your rental properties, but then it also feed you some more real estate deals in the future.

[00:20:47] For sure as you, as you work this. And so, yeah, I think it'll be interesting. And how does the, the king of Gorilla Real Estate feel about everything that you're doing?

[00:20:56] Kelly: Oh, he's incredibly supportive. Yeah. I think he misses when I used to just, you know, clean up his bookkeeping for him. We now have to hire someone to do that.

[00:21:05] Jason: Mm-hmm. Yes. Those wealthy problems. Yeah.

[00:21:07] Kelly: And yeah, and that's another mindset thing I need to get over. And you cover this in the rapid revamp when you're talking about, you know, the three types of clients you got, your, your normals, which you're, you're aiming for.

[00:21:18] Jason: Yeah.

[00:21:18] Kelly: But then you've got, you know, your cheapos and your premiums.

[00:21:21] Sure.

[00:21:21] Jason: Yeah.

[00:21:21] Kelly: And and, and one of the things you talked about, the cheapos is. Are you a cheapo?

[00:21:27] Jason: Oh. Yeah.

[00:21:27] Kelly: And I realize that, yeah, I kind of am a cheapo.

[00:21:30] Jason: You get what you attract. Huh. And so, yeah, we're blind, we have a blind spot towards which category we are showing up as, and so stretching yourself to not be a cheapo.

[00:21:41] Kelly: I grew up with nothing. You know, I grew up with nothing, so, yeah, that's why I'm a cheapo.

[00:21:47] Sarah: Yeah. And I get it, because I too was in that mindset, especially when I lived here.

[00:21:52] This area is in that mindset.

[00:21:54] Yes, the whole area is very, and when you find someone who kind of breaks through that bubble, It's odd here, right?

[00:22:03] And it's different. And it's weird. And it's like, what are they doing? What is this all about? This is just weird. Like, why are you not, you know, normal like us? And when that was something that I had struggled with for a very, very long time, too, because back when I had lived here, I thought, "okay, well, I want to make more money. And like, I need to make more money. And the only way I can do that is I can either work more hours and maybe get some overtime or maybe I can find a job that's going to pay me more and or ask for a raise, or and this is my go to strategy, was let's just work two jobs, three jobs, four jobs." I was working four jobs at a time.

[00:22:44] I was working seven days a week and I did that for years and years and years just because, well, this job I maxed out on and I can't get any more money out of here, but I need more money, so, oh, let me just add on another job. Yeah, so I understand that completely and it was just, it was with time that that started to just crack and shift a little bit.

[00:23:02] Jason: Kind of the trap of time for dollars. As if that's the only way.

[00:23:07] Sarah: Absolutely. Absolutely.

[00:23:09] Jason: So yeah, so being exposed just to other people that are not of that mindset probably is cracks that glass ceiling you spoke of a little bit before maybe.

[00:23:19] Kelly: Right. Yeah. And what I'm noticing is that I'm attracting people, local people, that have a similar mindset and they exist.

[00:23:28] You know, there's a lot of entrepreneurs in this area. Chris Jones started Pepper Jam, and he decided to keep his company here.

[00:23:34] Sarah: Oh, wow.

[00:23:34] Kelly: Yeah, I mean, there's, there's a few. Tech company, you might have heard of them. But yeah, there's, there's a few.

[00:23:39] Jason: So, you are no longer a cheapo.

[00:23:42] Kelly: No. I, well, I'm working on it.

[00:23:45] I'm working on it. I catch myself.

[00:23:46] Jason: You say...

[00:23:47] Kelly: I am no longer a cheapo.

[00:23:49] Jason: I am more normal.

[00:23:51] Kelly: I am more normal.

[00:23:52] Jason: Graduating towards premium.

[00:23:53] Kelly: And I'm graduating towards premium.

[00:23:55] Jason: It's good to be premium. We get to decide this, right? We get to decide this.

[00:24:00] And so as you stretch yourself into more premium experience and recognizing, like, money is not the painful thing to be focused on, there's, and there's better things to be focused on that are more valuable and more important, like your time. And as you put a greater and greater premium on your time, you shift out of that currency of cash being the, you know, the God of your life controlling you and then you can start to be grateful.

[00:24:26] And I think one of the key things for everybody listening is when we start to celebrate all of the things that we used to complain about related to money, I think this is how we shift out of that poverty mindset is, oh, we got to pay this bill. Thank you God that I have lights and power that I'm able to afford to do this.

[00:24:44] Or thank you that I'm able to do this. And when we start to be grateful instead of projecting pain every time we see or hear money, And we start to project gratitude, then we start to attract more money. Like we start to be open to that. And as we shift into normal, yeah, we attract more normals. As we shift into premium, we attract more premium clients.

[00:25:05] And they recognize you. It's like, there's a knowing between you and them, like, yeah, this is how it works. You come to us and we take care of everything and we take care of you and you get a premium service and product and they're like, "yeah, that's what I want." because premium buyers, when they see people that are cheapos.

[00:25:20] They can like kind of smell it on you, right? So then they're like, "I don't want to work with this person. They're not going to take care of my property the way that I would want or do things or take care of me the way that I want." And so investing in ourselves. Sometimes for me, one of my coaches said, "go get a massage, you know, go do things to invest or take care of yourself to where you feel like..." you know, anything where we say, I think the poverty mindset is we hear this voice that says, " I don't need that nicer car. You don't need to go get a massage. Why do you need that?" Normal and premium is about shifting beyond need, right? Need is scarcity, need is starving, and need is survival, and so, and then what happens is we have to create drama or problems in our life in order to justify taking time off, so we have to get sick, or we have to justify it.

[00:26:09] Doing something and so when we shift out of that then we shift into a healthier state where we can decide I am going to take a vacation or I am going to take time off. I'm going to go to DoorGrow live. You should all go to DoorGrow live, so.

[00:26:20] Sarah: I highly recommend coming up in May!

[00:26:23] Jason: It's coming up in May. Go to doorgrowlive.Com. So, all right anything else we should touch on?

[00:26:28] Sarah: One thing and I don't know if I've ever said this on the coach a call where you've been on but for me, it was actually Roya Mattis. She, at the time, was in Mary Kay like, and I was in cosmetic sales for Mary Kay, and It was very early in my Mary Kay career and I was kind of learning how to be entrepreneur ish, right?

[00:26:53] Like, "Oh, I can write these things off and I can do things differently" and, "Oh, this is an expense, but it's a good expense." And it was a lot of new things for me. And one of the things that she had said is and I'll never forget because it just stuck with me and I went, "Oh, okay." Yeah, I need to stop thinking like that right now.

[00:27:11] Is " come tax time, there are people who can't wait for tax time because they're waiting. They're depending on that refund and they're like, 'Oh, thank God I get this refund.' Right?"

[00:27:21] A lot of rent gets caught up in it.

[00:27:23] It sure does. Yeah. Funny. All of a sudden they have money. So. Once you start really making money, though, you don't get refunds anymore.

[00:27:33] What ends up happening is you pay money. And not only do you pay money into it, but you now are, like, quarterly paying money. But you don't have to do that if you're, like, barely scraping by, if you're not making money. So, what she said to me is, " when you're, like, rich and you're making money You're excited to pay this money because you're making so much money that now, not only are not going to get a refund, but you don't, you don't worry about the refund, you're making money and now you're paying the taxes and you are going to hit a point where you want to be paying taxes more often than just once a year because that means you've reached a certain level and now you're making a certain amount of money and your goal at that point is then going to be, 'well, how can I increase this?'"

[00:28:24] And that for me, it just stuck in my head forever. And I went, "Oh. Oh, geez. I didn't even realize that." And at that time I was, I was. Like, "well, I'm going to get a couple thousand dollars back, like on my tax refund." I haven't gotten a refund in years. And it's true though. It's just a different way of thinking about things.

[00:28:40] It's like, well, you know, if you make this tiny little bit of money and then I can get, you know, a couple thousand dollars back at the end of the year, or I can make a whole lot more money. And then, yes, I have to make some quarterly tax payments. Man, I'd rather make a lot more money and I'll just give the government some of it.

[00:28:54] And then what you have to do is just figure out how can we reduce that as much as possible.

[00:28:59] Jason: I would love to see taxes just be reduced dramatically. So, we'll see.

[00:29:04] Kelly: But, who knows what they're going to do.

[00:29:05] Jason: I don't get super excited about paying taxes, but I do get excited. I would rather, like, see more income on my tax return.

[00:29:13] You know taxes every time so.

[00:29:14] Sarah: Would you rather make the big amount of money so that you have to pay the taxes in or would you make a really small amount of money so that you get a refund?

[00:29:22] Kelly: Yeah, just a really good accountant that can help you zig when the government zags

[00:29:26] Sarah: So that that was something that she said to me and I went oh, okay, that is a very different way of thinking about it.

[00:29:33] And it just, just stuck with me.

[00:29:35] Jason: Yeah. Always looking through the lens of 'why is this positive?' it's a healthy mindset for sure. Yeah. Why are taxes positive? All right. Everybody listening is like, "they're not."

[00:29:45] Sarah: I know. Right. Cool. My brother wants a shout out. So shout out to Jason.

[00:29:50] Jason: What's up, Jason?

[00:29:51] Sarah: He's like, "you never shout me out!" Here, here you are. The three of us are waving to you now. So, what's up, Jason?

[00:29:58] Jason: No, he's got the same name as me. Everybody's like, what's that all about?

[00:30:01] He's dating a Sarah.

[00:30:03] Kelly: Oh!

[00:30:04] Jason: Which is funny. And you have a stepsister, that's Sarah, so he's got two, three Sarahs in his life right now.

[00:30:13] Three Sarahs, two Jasons, and a partridge in a pear tree. All right. Cool. Well, Kelly, it's been great coming to hang out in your office and to meet you in person like here in Pennsylvania. Thanks for hosting the DoorGrow show and having us hang out with you and we're excited to see where you go and how you progress in the program and all the things you're going to do as you add doors.

[00:30:36] And I think the future is really bright for Crimson Property Management, Crimson Cape. Hey, I missed the Cape. It's like superhero stuff here. Yes. I am. I love it. All right. And that's it. So if you are tuning in, make sure to check us out at DoorGrow. com. And if you are wanting to grow your property management business, or you are getting burnt out on it, or you are one of the many sucky property management companies that exist, you don't have to be.

[00:31:04] It could be good. It could be better. Then reach out to us. We would love to help you scale and grow your business. We help people from startup all the way to breaking the thousand door barrier. Whatever your goal is reach out to us. Check us out at DoorGrow. com. Bye everyone.

[00:31:18] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:31:45] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

View Details

Even with all of the property management software and tools breaking onto the scene lately, it seems that some entrepreneurs are still identifying gaps they could potentially fill…

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Eric Nelsen of Walkthroo to talk about a new maintenance solution in development for property managers and vendors.

You’ll Learn [03:36] What is Walkthroo?

[08:43] Developing Software and Utilizing AI

[16:52] Getting Time Back with User-Friendly Tools

[23:02] Get in Touch with Walkthroo

Tweetables  ” It's a lot easier to make changes to software when you're smaller and you're getting things started and you're doing it in the right way.”

“ Time is probably the biggest benefit we provide.”

“ Vendors in a lot of situations end up being the eyes, ears and hands for the property manager.”

“ User experience is a big deal when designing software.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: It's a lot easier to make changes to software when you're smaller and you're getting things started and you're doing it in the right way. Once it turns into a giant beast and it's old, then it's really difficult.

[00:00:11] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:52] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:12] Now let's get into the show. And today I'm hanging out with Eric Nelson of Walkthroo. Eric, welcome to the DoorGrow Show.

[00:01:21] Eric: Thanks, Jason. Glad to be here.

[00:01:23] Jason: So Eric I would love to first get into your background. And my wife's chiming in saying I need to remember to promote DoorGrow live today, so I'll just do that right now real quick, and then we'll get to you, Eric. So if you are a property manager and you're watching this make sure you get tickets to DoorGrow Live like this is the most contribution focused, holistic property management conference in the industry.

[00:01:44] We do things very differently. "There's heart" is kind of the feedback we get from others. People cry at our events. Like it's really awesome. It's going to be at the Kalahari resort here in Round Rock, Texas. And get your tickets right now. They go up in price over time. So head on over to DoorGrowLive.Com and get your tickets and be there. We've got sponsors. We've got cool speakers. It's going to be awesome. And DoorGrow magic is there. You're going to learn about growing your business from Sarah and myself and we'll help you out. All right, cool. Shameless plug inserted.

[00:02:20] Now, Eric, I would love to get into your background.

[00:02:23] You know, we hung out briefly in in Austin you came out and got to know each other a little bit, but I want my audience to get to know you share a little bit about How you kind of got into entrepreneurism, how you got into this. So tell us a little bit about your background.

[00:02:37] Eric: Yeah, sure. Sure. I grew up in Houston, Texas kind of came up through the finance world. So I spent about 10, 15 years in finance, went to grad school at Rice in Houston, and I just couldn't walk down the finance hallway. I saw the entrepreneurial professors down a different hallway, really wanted to kind of do my own thing.

[00:02:55] So you know, stayed in finance for a couple more years and got into the pharmacy business. And through that business, I got exposed to IT technology and building software to kind of run our pharmacies and improve our ops and, and run those companies. And then a good friend of mine in Shreveport Springs, Texas was is a general contractor and said he works with these property managers and they, he does a lot of maintenance for rentals.

[00:03:20] And he said, "yeah, Eric, I want to take on more business, but I can't keep track. There's so many little jobs. There's so much communication going on, text, emails, phone calls. You've got a software background. Can you help me?" And so that's, what's really exposed me to the property management industry and kind of started me on this path.

[00:03:36] Got it. All right. So let's get into talking a little bit about Walkthroo and what it is. And it's, it's "walk T-H-R-O-O. So tell us a little bit about Walkthroo and what is it? What does it do?

[00:03:52] Yeah. So Walkthroo is, it's a really kind of a mindset and approach to the business and the underlying core is as much as accounting and tenant screening and even inspections, that software, those tools have grown, you know, with technological advances and whatnot.

[00:04:13] If you really look at what we think is one of the four main pillars of property management is the maintenance, that hasn't grown. I mean, if you look back 10 years ago you really couldn't get multiple bids to do any work. If you look back 10 years ago, you couldn't pull up on your screen and compare two different bids.

[00:04:29] 10 years ago, you couldn't split charges on an invoice between a tenant and owner. And you look today, fast forward 10 years, and I would say You know, 90- 95 percent of the platforms, you still cannot do those things. Well, when my partner brought me into this, you know, first he wanted me to help him with his, you know, just his construction company, but we quickly realized the problem wasn't him.

[00:04:52] It was the property managers he was working with and the inefficiencies that came with the way they handle maintenance. So right out of the gate within a month. We switched that mantra. We're going to work to help property managers. And so that's really been what Walkthroo's focus has been the last three years.

[00:05:09] And we really just, again, within the first three months we can get multiple bidders, we can split charges. And so it just showed me right away that it's not for a lack of technology or, you know, lack of know how even. It's just when you look at these software platforms and these operating systems, they just have bigger fish to fry.

[00:05:27] They, you know, they all agree we should be able to hire multiple bidders with a couple clicks, but we're going to spend time doing X. So I can't explain it, but again, within the first six months, we had all these features built. And so now we're coming up on three years. We're really looking to round out the platform and keep growing.

[00:05:45] Jason: Okay. So besides doing multiple bids and splitting charges, what would you say Walkthroo is? Like, what is, what does it accomplish?

[00:05:53] Eric: So we're going to be a full operating system for property managers. We started backwards. I spoke with the former CEO of Buildium post sale to real page.

[00:06:03] And he told me flat out, "we did a lot of great things." I think they were in 19 countries at the time. He's like, "but I'll be honest here. We never figured out maintenance. And so if that's where you're starting, you know, good on you. Good luck." And so we started with maintenance and we built our platform around maintenance.

[00:06:18] We've recently added inspections. And so we'll keep growing. So Walkthroo will be A full suite of operating suite for property managers. Currently, we're not there yet, I'm going to go through a couple of rounds of raising money. Currently, we're a maintenance tool. People can use our platform. And we also provide maintenance services still.

[00:06:39] So that's, that's, that's kind of what we do today. And the third leg, which just launched, is, and this is probably the most unique feature of what we're building, every other maintenance tool or platform or operating platform out there has property manager and they invite people in and the people have to learn how to use your system and whatnot. We actually sell our software straight to contractors.

[00:07:02] So they're using it independent of property management They're using it to paint houses, do handyman jobs around around their cities, and so we're building this network where property managers will be on Walkthroo, the contractors are on Walkthroo, and it's just a simple connection and you don't have, you know, the training and, you know, as a vendor ourselves the last few years, I've been through some trainings to use different systems and I can imagine. It's can like a painter, you know, in downtown Austin that has two employees trying to figure out all these platforms and how to work with these clients. So we're, our goal is to really simplify all that for all the stakeholders.

[00:07:39] Jason: Got it. So it sounds like Walkthroo, you're building this from the ground up.

[00:07:43] You're building it as a tool to support and help based on what business owners actually need in property management. You started with one of the biggest challenges, which is maintenance. You're now adding inspections, you're adding other things. And the goal, the roadmap is to make it a full suite that helps maybe a better property management back office or software solution.

[00:08:05] So the next big piece is then I'm sure on the roadmap somewhere is accounting and, tenant portals, owner portals, so they can see statements and submit the maintenance request, maybe like all of this kind of stuff. And so yeah, and I don't, I think that there's, there hasn't been a lot of innovation.

[00:08:23] We've seen Rentvine come out recently. And it was born kind of out of a lot of complaints people were having about Appfolio. Appfolio was kind of born out of a lot of complaints people were having about maybe Buildium and Propertyware. Right. Right. And so, you know, when software is born out of complaints, you know, of different tools, yeah, it's going to be better than that tool, but it is interesting to start from the ground up building around the needs of and supporting the property manager and the work that they're doing. It'll be very interesting to see where you guys end up and what's kind of the timeline for all of this?

[00:08:55] Eric: Well, you know, it depends on fundraising, right? So it's expensive, especially, you get into the accounting engines and a lot of that. There's a lot of costs involved. So we're hoping in the next You know, 12 to 18 months, we'd have a product out of, you know, for small property managers to run their business off our platform.

[00:09:12] Jason: That's pretty fast. That's really the goal right now. Yeah. Okay. Got it. Yeah. And it sounds like you guys move quickly. You know. It's a lot easier to make changes to software when you're smaller and you're getting things started and you're doing it in the right way. Once it turns into a giant beast and it's old, then it's really difficult.

[00:09:30] Like some of the older maintenance software companies I'm sure they're toying with the idea. Like, should we just rebuild from scratch or throw all this away? Or do we just work this until this horse dies, you know? And so that's always the challenge with software.

[00:09:46] And then adoption is always a big challenge. So getting people to use something new or to change to something else. And a lot of times it's easier to get the smaller guys and the smaller companies to make changes. And the big companies are usually watching the little guys make all the mistakes or test stuff out or see.

[00:10:04] And then they stand back to wait to see who the winners are. So...

[00:10:08] Eric: yeah, yeah. And thankfully I've got some experience on our side. My partner, Travis, he before he got into construction, him and his dad ran a small microscope specialized software company they sell it to universities. I don't know the ins and outs of it, but they could like take a laser and look into this, you know, the elemental makeup of a molecule.

[00:10:26] It was really, really specialized, but that was exactly where he came from. He's like, yeah, you could go with Hitachi or a big Japanese brand, but you can't get them on the phone. You know, like you said, they've, they've done good. They've built so big, but now that's a hindrance. And we're in the same path.

[00:10:40] You know, we didn't have splitting the owner and tenant charges, but you know, after talking to a few clients and a few property managers, that was just a common, very common thing. And I said, "well, let's just build it." Well, we're small or nimble, you know, we can, we can get away with that.

[00:10:53] So we're going to take that same approach as we go through the accounting side of things, you know, and just interviewing property managers and listening to the industry and saying, Hey, my background is finance and operations. And so, you know, when I met you, something you brought up a lot was transforming lives and, you know, kind of making people enjoy their work and that's something I don't see. When we launched this tool. We decided to launch it internally two years ago. So we haven't really been selling Walkthroo, we've been using it ourselves. We currently manage Over 250 jobs in nine states. And so I talked to more maintenance coordinators and property managers every day and a lot of them could be happier.

[00:11:35] So as we build this out, we want these tools to allow some sort of automation and allow people to focus on growing doors and, you know, and doing other things that are more beneficial versus banging their head against walls.

[00:11:49] Jason: Sure. Yeah. I know property management business owners would much rather spend their time focusing on scaling their business than dealing with all the the nitty gritty day to day challenges and difficulty in all the tools that they're dealing with.

[00:12:04] So Eric, we're in the middle of this AI revolution and you're like right in the middle of building this tool as we're coming into this new AI revolution where there's just tons of software just coming out. And people can create tools and software a lot more easily and their AI is helping them.

[00:12:22] And then everyone's trying to integrate AI. And then you see all these companies that are dinosaurs. They're trying to strap chat GPT on the side of their crazy rollercoaster. And like, you know, say now we have AI. And so how's AI kind of tie into you guys, you know, getting Walkthroo built out?

[00:12:43] Eric: Yeah, great question. We've got a roadmap for it. We don't have anything integrated yet. I think it's, it's too early, but you know, my background is really improving operations efficiencies. And so once we have this tool built out, then we will again, deploy AI where it makes sense. Like you said, it's a buzzword.

[00:13:03] People will say everything is aI generated. It's like, no, that's just a search function, but call it AI. And so we, you know, we know most of the data. I'm not well tuned on the accounting yet, but definitely on the maintenance side, we know what data and what decisions are being made every day because again, we've lived that life and we're living it now we're doing jobs.

[00:13:24] And so we will bring in AI kind of as we roll out the full suite, you know, I'm not sure to be perfectly honest. I don't know if it's going to be a heavy lift. I mean, again, it really comes down to the operations of the business and work and we see efficiencies and you know, there's some decisions you want eyes on, you know, you want, you want human interaction and others are a little more mundane task.

[00:13:45] And so we, we are definitely have that in the playbook but I, at this point, you know, our plan is not to have this fully automated AI, you know, software, it's going to be just a much cleaner, easier tool to use and AI will be obviously just a natural component of that.

[00:14:01] Jason: Got it. I mean, I think that makes sense. A lot of people start, you know, thinking, Oh, let's make AI do everything. But I think, I think it probably does make a lot more sense to make sure that the tools and systems are working for humans and they're working the right way first. And then AI create some leverage now that this is working well.

[00:14:21] And I think that goes for how business owners should implement technology in general is you first do the process manually, and then you start to look for points of leverage and where can I leverage tech, where could a tool like Walkthroo facilitate what I'm doing now or help move things forward? So who's your current target audience?

[00:14:39] Like, who are the people listening to this podcast that you think should reach out to Walkthroo to get an assessment on their current maintenance situation?

[00:14:49] Eric: Yeah. I mean, we've talked to everyone from PMI to sole proprietors to self managers. So I would say our sweet spot is probably property managers with, you know, 200 to 500 doors.

[00:15:02] Seems to be small enough where the data is not overwhelming. They're doing a lot of work, I feel from what I've seen personally, and so working with Walkthroo helps some of that. And people can work with us in different ways. We some people just use our software. You know, we, If we can, if we can manage jobs across nine states, truly, you know, we know people can manage jobs in their own town or their own state and some of them just hire us as a, they just have us on their preferred vendor list, you know, we obviously I don't have staff in nine states, so I use my tool to manage jobs and manage vendors and the third way people can access and partner with us Is we come on as your maintenance coordinator, you know, we'll use their vendors, their top vendors, let us manage it.

[00:15:43] One question I always ask property managers, not surprisingly, the answer is usually similar is, you know, "have you ever logged in as a vendor to whatever system are you using?"

[00:15:51] " Well, why would I do that?" It's like, well, yeah, you probably wouldn't think of it, but I recommend it because you know, it's, it's one of those tasks. It's important, but it's also been done since the dawn of property management, I give someone a job, they go do it. But if you, if you're using tools, I recommend logging in as that contractor and seeing what they're seeing. And, oh, this is why it's hard to communicate because I can't upload anything or I can't text or, you know, whatever, whatever it may be.

[00:16:20] So the maintenance coordinator role is something we've been taking on more and more where it's like, yeah, you give us your favorite painters and handyman, and we'll either API into your system, or you just send your tenants our way. You know, we structured any way that works best for our clients and the, let us do the dispatching, you know, all the status checks.

[00:16:39] I mean, you know, it's just a constant barrage of phone calls every Monday morning on where we're at. And of course, Sunday night we send out reports so we don't have to get those calls. Those are the three ways that property managers can work with us currently.

[00:16:52] Jason: What, what are the results that people that start working will Walkthroo tend to notice or what sort of the changes that you're creating for these business owners.

[00:17:02] Eric: It's time. Time is probably the biggest benefit we provide. You know most I just mentioned the Monday check ins or daily check ins most maintenance tools that I've seen in, by the way, the other way that we know our, our tool is is well built, it's acting and being a vendor for the last three years.

[00:17:21] I've logged into all the other tools. You know, when a property manager sees Walkthroo, yeah, they say Oh, Eric, yeah, we're always looking for a new painter. Here's our login to our system. Great. So immediately we take notes and, and figure out what's, what's wrong, but the time component I would say is probably the, the most we hear back on, on the biggest benefit and then most systems will have status indicators, maybe something's in progress.

[00:17:44] We've got over 20 statuses. Are we waiting on the contractor to finish the work? Are we waiting on the tenant to accept the schedule and confirm it? Are we waiting on the after pictures to come in. I mean, there's all these nuanced steps that I think historically again, bigger companies are busy, but coming from at it from fresh from outside the industry, it was like, well, this is important to know if I know that I'm waiting on the tenant to confirm a schedule, I don't need to waste my time calling the contractor, ask what's going on.

[00:18:14] And so those, that's a little microcosm of. How we built our system and also just a, again, just the workflow. I mean, I was shocked. None of the systems I've used since I've been in property management, offer me a way to do a change order. Very simple, very common request. And I have to like make a phone call or send an email.

[00:18:32] And it's just time, time, time. So we make all that click, click, click.

[00:18:37] Jason: For the listeners. Explain a typical change order sort of situation.

[00:18:41] Eric: Leaky faucet. We've got a leaky faucet. We want somebody to go check it out. Contractor shows up on site, looks at a leaky faucet, and says, yeah, this faucet's leaking here.

[00:18:51] I can fix that. But also, it created mold and damage all behind it. All under the counter. We've got to rip all these counters out. Well, that's not what the contractor was there sent to do. It's definitely not approved without, you know, anyone signing off on that. So he's got to communicate back to the property manager, "Hey, there's a much bigger issue here."

[00:19:11] And so in the industry, it's, you know, typically referred to as a change order. And so now the contractor usually sits and waits and says, okay, I'll, I'll wait for the property manager to talk to the owner. And see if they want me to rip off this cabinet and do all this extra work. You know, I'm just, you know, I'm just a contractor.

[00:19:28] Can I explain what I see? So now we're in a waiting game, right? So a week later, property manager boss comes in and says, "what's going on on one, two, three Smith street?"

[00:19:36] Jason: Yeah.

[00:19:37] Eric: "Oh, well, there was a problem."

[00:19:38] "Okay. What's going on now?"

[00:19:40] "I don't know. Oh, it looks like, I think we're waiting for the owner to give us the green light to do the new repairs"

[00:19:46] and so you can, you can step back and realize how that can. And you add that times 50 jobs or 100 jobs and it starts, it really adds up. So again, the way we built our system was to really eliminate a lot of that excess time. And where are we in this maintenance process? And just put it on the dashboard.

[00:20:03] Just like, you know, many other things in life now. Put it in front of my face, so I know where all my jobs are and all my maintenance tasks are located.

[00:20:11] Jason: Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Very cool. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I'm sure that's a challenge, like people discovering new work when they go out to do work. And there's also the issue a vendor goes out to do work and then they notice other stuff they think the property manager should be aware of.

[00:20:25] And yeah, I mean, vendors in a lot of situations end up being the eyes, ears and hands for the property manager, so.

[00:20:32] Eric: Yeah, actually that's, that's why we built our own inspection tool. You know, we see everything else that's out there, but a lot of it's not connected. It's, you know, it's separate tools. So I've got a system that does this and does that.

[00:20:45] So we tell our contractors, it's in our app, which I think there might be two or three other maintenance platforms, but not many that actually have an app in the app store for the vendor. So again, I challenged property managers to log into whatever system they're using as a vendor. And you'll probably see it's not the easiest thing to use or communicate with.

[00:21:05] Well, we turned that upside down and. We've got an app live in the app store. Contractors can download it. So when they're doing work for us, it's super easy. They're on their phone. So we added an inspection tool and said we're going to require you to do, if it's vacant, to do a full inspection. And we just provide that as a free service, like, hey, in case, in case you or the owner missed something, we happen to notice these other 10 items that you didn't want us to fix, but here's some pictures and a report, and so again, like, just to your point, we know we're the eyes and ears a lot of time, you know, at the property, so anything we can do to capture all that data and get it back to the property manager.

[00:21:43] We think so it's a win for everyone.

[00:21:45] Jason: Yeah, I love that So, I mean historically that's been a big complaint about some of the property management maintenance coordination tools out there is that the getting vendors to use it the adoption of vendors has been like real difficult and maybe it's Just your from your experience.

[00:22:02] Maybe they're just not very good for the vendors through for their experience. It's just not a great experience. So user experience is a big deal when designing software. And it sounds like you guys have kind of designed this from the ground up to make sure that the vendors are going to have a good experience using it.

[00:22:17] Eric: Absolutely. You know, again, we, you know, we're, we're signed on as preferred vendor across, across nine states. And so it's, you know, it's our insurance, our butts on the line if the jobs aren't getting done. So we figured out very quickly, we cannot make this difficult for this contractor in Florida that doesn't know Eric from Dripping Springs, Texas.

[00:22:36] So let's make the tool super easy. And that's exactly what we did. And so we've had... oh, I would say over three years, I think maybe three or four times we've had to coach somebody through how to use our maintenance tool.

[00:22:48] Jason: Really? Sometimes vendors are old school.

[00:22:49] They're not the most tech savvy. They're, they're using physical tools, you know, but yeah. And so that says a lot that it's pretty intuitive or easy for them to figure out.

[00:22:59] Eric: Yeah, that was a big focus for us right out of the gate.

[00:23:02] Jason: Got it. Okay, cool. Well, for those that are, like, hearing about this, or a little bit interested in this, is there anything else they usually have questions about that we didn't touch on, or that they should know about Walkthroo?

[00:23:14] Eric: Let's see, not really. I mean, I think we covered most of it. Again, our goal is to really provide more time. I just, we see so much wasted time, you know, in the maintenance process. Obviously, we're going to carry that on through the rest of the modules and operating software, but our goal is to eliminate that time and give it back to property managers and really allow them to, like you said, I know they'd much rather growing doors and making connections and using their time more wisely.

[00:23:39] So, yeah. If we can save them hours a week that's really, really our goal.

[00:23:45] Jason: Got it. Okay. Well, it sounds like you guys focus on simplicity. You focus on making these work. How can people get in touch with Walkthroo?

[00:23:55] Eric: Yeah, you can go to our website. It's www.walkthroo.com . You can also send an email over directly to me or my team. My email is eric@thewalkthroo.com and if you want to just send it to our team, it's work orders@thewalkthroo.com.

[00:24:21] Jason: Got it. So it's 'the Walkthroo' and through is T-H-R-O-O. Okay. All right. Everyone listening, go check that out.

[00:24:30] Eric, appreciate you being here on the DoorGrow show and hanging out with us. And I'm looking forward. We'll have to have you come back on once you guys have added some new features and it sounds like you guys are pretty aggressive at doing that.

[00:24:44] Eric: Absolutely. Thanks, Jason. Appreciate the time. Good seeing you.

[00:24:46] Jason: Good seeing you too.

[00:24:47] All right. For those of you that are looking to grow your property management business or you're struggling, check us out at doorgrow. com. We would love to help you. We are getting amazing results with our clients. And so if you want to get from 0 to 100 doors, from maybe 100 to 200 doors, or you wanted to go from 200 to 500 doors, Or from 500 doors to a thousand doors, we can help you at each of these stages and each of these sticking points to grow and scale your business rapidly and to get the right stress free ops and systems in place so that you are able to do this without making your life worse personally.

[00:25:21] And so check us out at doorgrow. com. And until next time everybody to our mutual growth, bye everybody.

[00:25:28] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:25:54] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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When moving from being a solopreneur to having a team, a lot of entrepreneurs struggle with hiring high-quality team members, creating accountability, and streamlining processes.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with award-winning coach and author Kon Apostolopoulos to talk all about unlocking your team’s potential.

You’ll Learn [04:16] Hiring for Competance

[12:48] Leadership and Building a Team

[29:19] Developing Team Members

[49:42] Tough Love as a Business Owner

Tweetables  ”They say the two most important days in your life are the day you come into this world and the day you figure out why.”

“They all have their strategies, their business plans, but one thing for sure is that if they don't have the right people in place to execute those plans, they're not even worth the paper they're written on.”

“If they're hiring for competence, it's probably a step up, because in most cases, people are hiring for a pulse.”

“You can teach people the technical skills. You can't teach attitude. You can't teach certain behaviors. You can't teach integrity.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Kon: When we are appreciated, we always give more than what is expected of us. So when you are looking at it, build your team around that principle. Show people that you value them. Don't just say, you know what, you get a paycheck, don't you? This is why I brought you on. Do your damn job.

[00:00:16] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently then you are a DoorGrow property manager DoorGrow property managers, love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:18] Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:21] All right. I, my guest today is coach Kon. So Kon, how do you say your last name? I want to make sure I don't mess it up.

[00:01:29] Kon: Wow. Well, first of all, thanks for having me, Jason. Last name is Apostolopoulos. It's as simple as it looks.

[00:01:37] Jason: Man, that is fun to say. Apostolopoulos.

[00:01:39] Kon: It rolls off the tongue.

[00:01:40] Jason: Yeah. The closest thing that might be as fun was the Snuffleupagus.

[00:01:45] Kon: It's inspired from that.

[00:01:47] Jason: Okay. All right. We'll go, you know, all great ideas have an origin. All right. So Kon, we're going to be chatting a little bit today about the keys to engagement, resilience, high performance, unlocking team potential.

[00:02:02] So before we get into that, I'd love to get a little bit of background on you. How did you get into doing coaching and you know, kind of share your origin story.

[00:02:12] Kon: Wow. Okay. So let's kind of take a look at this. First of all, I'll start with one of my favorite sayings. Because I do feel blessed.

[00:02:19] It is the season for that kind of a feeling. You know, they say the two most important days in your life are the day you come into this world and the day you figure out why. And so to me, I have always gravitated towards being a coach, being a teacher, being a leader, stepping up and taking responsibility.

[00:02:38] And so that's kind of shaped my life. Being the firstborn in a Greek household and the firstborn male at that. It's one of those situations where, Inevitably, you're thrust into that role, but I gravitated towards it, and I found myself, regardless of which industry I've been working in, everything from the military to cruise ships, from restaurants to call centers, from construction to coaching little kids' soccer, I've always been in a situation where I found myself in the role of coach, teacher, leader. You know, I've worked for large corporations. I've had my share of corporate where I've cut my teeth and I've learned a lot of the business secrets and the things that I needed to get. And in the last 12 years, I've hung my own single shingle and been in a situation where I've been able to help clients and transfer three decades of knowledge of managing talent, of being able to build engaged and resilient teams and helping them now achieve their goals.

[00:03:34] And the way I do that is I explained to people that most of the companies that I work with have their business plans very much like the audience that we have here. They all have their strategies their business plans. But one thing for sure is that if they don't have the right people in place to execute those plans, they're not even worth the paper they're written on. And so to me, that's where I come in and sometimes that involves providing workshops to build competence. Sometimes that involves individual or group coaching to build commitment. Sometimes that's speaking at events for them to be able to get everybody on the same page. And ultimately that may involve helping them build the systems that they need so every dollar that they spend on their people is a dollar well spent.

[00:04:14] Jason: Got it. Okay. Now I think a lot of times that the challenge I see in a lot of companies is they're bringing in, it's often people are hiring just based on skill. That's the thing they're looking at is like, are they willing to do this job for this pay? Instead of looking for people that fit their values, fit the culture, have the right personality fit to actually be able to succeed in the role.

[00:04:38] And so I call those things, the three fits. What have you seen related to this?

[00:04:42] Kon: When people go out and start hiring Jason, they typically do it out of need, and a lot of times they've let it go for so long that it becomes a desperation. If they're hiring for competence, it's probably a step up, because in most cases, people are hiring for a pulse.

[00:04:56] They're trying to throw a body at a spot, and that's a desperate place to be in, unfortunately. Hiring process, the selection process, should be an ongoing thing. When you're looking at making sure that you have the right people on your team. That's an ongoing process to me. That's tending to your garden year round, to making sure that you have the right people in place year round.

[00:05:17] The mantra that I teach my people is a three part piece, just like you were mentioning earlier. It's hire hard, train smart, manage easy. And to me that means basically being very picky about who I bring on my team. It's easy for people or it's easier for people to look at, do they have the skills? Because that's an yes or no answer most of the time, especially if you do it right. But what they don't realize is that you can teach people the technical skills. You can't teach attitude. You can't teach certain behaviors. You can't teach integrity. You're bringing somebody in your team in their thirties.

[00:05:50] If you have to teach them how to be honest, that's too late in the game.

[00:05:54] Jason: Yes.

[00:05:55] Kon: So hire for the attitude, like you were talking about the things that are harder to teach, and then you can teach them smartly about the business that you want. If you have a right person in the right spot, they can do wonders.

[00:06:09] Jason: Yeah, I've noticed this. I've noticed this as well. One of the things I've noticed is I call it the process myth. I see a lot of businesses, you know, a lot of entrepreneurs go through this journey of graduating from solopreneur to having a team, right? And that's usually one of the most painful transitions they go through.

[00:06:25] It's because they have no clue how to do the hiring correctly. And they're hiring the way a solopreneur sort of thinks. And they're usually hiring based on what they think the business needs. Like you said, out of need, maybe they graduate to desperation. Maybe they graduate to competence, as you said, but at that stage, they usually believe the process myth.

[00:06:43] I've run into this a lot where they think they just need better processes. If they just had better processes, their team would actually perform well. Like, I just need to micromanage them more. I need more KPIs. I need more metrics. And what I've noticed is, this weird dichotomy, I've noticed that in companies that have great culture and they have a great team, they have great people, but they even have shitty processes, they still perform well, even without great process documentation, but I've seen companies that have like process documentation, like crazy, and they focus on this heavily, but they don't have the right people. And they're never able to perform well. There's no amount of process documentation or micromanaging or controls that can make a mediocre team with maybe the wrong attitude or wrong culture fit or wrong values to perform well.

[00:07:35] Kon: No, I agree with you there. When you look at why people try to heavily process things, it's because they don't feel confident in people's decision making and abilities. They tried to legislate everything. They tried to create a way. We used to have a saying that, you know, every time you think you idiot proof something with a process, they come up with better idiots.

[00:07:55] And that's a situation where you have to be very careful. You put a good person in a bad process, the process is going to win. So you have to be very careful because when we evolve this piece and we take it to its natural conclusion, which is why do we hire good people or try to find good people?

[00:08:12] Why do we try to create processes that can produce results? It's to get performance. It's to increase performance, to become more predictably good. That's ultimately what we're doing. Performance is about results. When you look at your metrics that you were talking about, you're a pro, you do this and you know exactly what you're trying to do.

[00:08:31] You have a methodology, you have a way of doing things, you have a philosophy about how you go about things because you know it works and you know it works well enough for you and for others that you're comfortable going out and sharing that message with others. Well, when you talk about performance, performance happens at three different dimensions.

[00:08:50] Think about it like a Venn diagram, three overlapping circles. One is organizationally. How are we set up? How are we set up? Our culture our vision, our messages, our values, all of those things that we want to set ourselves up with. And then you have the process. How do things hand off from one person to the next?

[00:09:10] What does the customer journey look like? What does the experience with us look like? How do we engage with each other? And then ultimately, it's the individual level. Do we have the right people on the right seat on the bus going in the right direction? Do they have the skills, knowledge, ability, attitudes that we're looking for to get things done?

[00:09:29] So when people say, we're struggling to improve our performance, they automatically Only look at one, maybe two of those areas, not realizing that you need all three of those to hit in order to be at optimal level, when you've reached your peak in your performance, all three of those things are in place.

[00:09:47] You've organized the team. Well, you've got your systems in place and you've hired the right people.

[00:09:52] Jason: Yeah, I love this. You know, they say all truth gravitates towards itself, you know, so to speak. And so I actually draw a Venn diagram for clients and they teach them a framework called the three fits and your organization, I would just call culture, this is, do they share your values? Is there alignment there? Because otherwise you'll never be able to trust them. So you want one offload to them and then you always want to micromanage them. And then for process, I usually call that a skill fit. And the question there is, do they have the intellectual capacity to be able to develop the skill or do they already possess it? And that's the one that maybe the needle can be moved on right like you had mentioned they could maybe be trained, but some people are untrainable. They just don't have the intellectual capacity for that particular role. They just won't get there.

[00:10:38] You can train and you'll just demoralize yourself, right? And then as then when you mentioned kind of people this is where I look at the personality fit. Are they the right personality for the role? Not everybody can be great or enjoy doing cold calling. Not everybody could be great or enjoy doing accounting, right?

[00:10:57] And that means that they would love doing the role if they're the right personality fit, which means you don't have to motivate them. You don't have to try and push them to do it. And they, if they don't have that, they'll just never be great. And so I love this. Like it's always validating to see alignment when somebody's kind of graduated to this knowledge set on their own and see that, Hey, we both kind of arrived at a similar conclusion.

[00:11:22] Kon: So, well, the truth is pretty universal and that's how we get there. We each discovered in our own way and application, but even with my company is called Fresh Biz Solutions and the the origin of the name and the philosophy behind that name is that I've worked, as I mentioned, in very diverse industries across continents, across countries, across boundaries.

[00:11:45] And what I found is people are people. The needs are fairly universal. And so something, a process, an idea, a solution that works well in one industry, when you take it, look at it, dust it off, repurpose it, repackage it, it can work just as well in another industry. Why? Because you're dealing with people.

[00:12:05] You're dealing with principles that are universal. And so, there is no need to reinvent the wheel. There is a need for us to find what works and continue to apply it. In different situations.

[00:12:17] Jason: Absolutely. And you know, my personal sort of mission statement is to inspire others to love true principles. I love figuring out what works and sharing it with other people.

[00:12:25] That's just fun for me. I would do that for free for fun. And yeah, so, so I get that. And yeah, there's, you know, a whole business book might be just written about one principle, you know, and there's that one nugget that you can pull out of it. But yeah if, you know, as I'm always seeking for those principles and those ideas, I'm then able to share and benefit others and it can be applied to a variety of different situations.

[00:12:48] Yeah. Love that. So how do people go about doing this? It's like, usually entrepreneurs are very, you know, focused on just hiring based on as you said, need, desperation, competence. How do you graduate them through this?

[00:13:03] Kon: So when we look at the process, I mean, we, when solopreneurs graduate, like you said, when you have, when you've been working on your own for a long time and you decide to bring on team members, one of the mistakes that we make is that we think that everybody is motivated the same way we are. Everybody sees the same vision that we do.

[00:13:20] And that's just not the case. Yeah. We don't have that luxury. There's not enough people there that automatically will instinctively know what you're working on and really align themselves. Most of the time you have to do some connection of the dots for them. You have to explain to them why you're doing what you're doing and how they fit into this.

[00:13:39] This is part of my engagement model that I talk about in my new book, The Engagement Blueprint. And the principles here are universal, whether it's one person or 1000 on your team. You can look at it and say the same thing. The way to understand this is that when you are leading a team, you're bringing people onto your team.

[00:13:57] You're developing them. You're aligning them. What are you trying to do? You're trying to amplify the reach that you have as an individual. You're trying to get more done through your team, but through your team is the key because you need the voluntary contribution of these people. They need to want to do this.

[00:14:13] Otherwise, it's a slog. It's a heavy lift to constantly micromanage people That's where the heavy processing comes in. You're chasing them around and the property trying to figure out where are they on where they supposed to? Be are they on their computer? Are they? responding to the needs?

[00:14:29] How are they dealing with my clients? You're constantly living on edge and you're in fear and uncertainty all the time. My methodology is all about taking the uncertainty out of that and making sure that when you invest in your people, you know you're going to get a return on that investment. You know that basically they are an extension of you.

[00:14:49] Now, the way to go about it is to understand that there are four key drivers of engagement for people. I mean, I've done my homework, I've spent almost two years researching the topic, talked to some pretty smart people across the globe, and pulled together 30 years of experience looking at this. And the four drivers start, first and foremost, with the need that we all have to feel valued.

[00:15:10] When we are appreciated, we always give more than what is expected of us. So when you are looking at it, build your team around that principle. Show people that you value them. Don't just say, you know what, you get a paycheck, don't you? This is why I brought you on. Do your damn job. It's easy to say that.

[00:15:28] Jason: Yeah, there's a lot of bosses that think because they grew up sort of in that culture and they, it's kind of the dinosaur boss that says, "well, I pay you, so just do your work," like it's very transactional.

[00:15:40] Kon: Correct. And when it's transactional, you lose so much because people will only do up to a certain point and then you have to keep telling them what is part of that transaction.

[00:15:49] So. When people are appreciated though, they will continue to find ways to support and help you and do more. When you realize that it's all about that discretionary effort, engagement is about discretionary effort, giving that little bit extra because you feel first and foremost valued. And the way you do that, I mean, here are some ideas that Our audience can go out and do right now.

[00:16:13] First and foremost, think about how you can create an environment that is safe for your people. Physically, mentally, emotionally, psychologically. I mean, if you're in a situation where you have people out there physically doing work, they're climbing up to clear gutters to do certain things, make sure the environment is safe.

[00:16:32] Set a protocol so people can feel safe. Emotionally, if you're in a meeting, make sure that people feel comfortable telling you the ugly truth sometimes, the information that you need to make decisions. If people feel like there'll be chastised or reprimanded for telling you the truth, those stops sharing that information with you, and you will lose opportunities there.

[00:16:52] Make sure that people feel that you appreciate them or that they can bring their whole self to work because if they can bring their whole self to work, they'll bring their best self to work. And then ultimately, even if you only have five minutes a week to spend with each one of your people, make sure that those five minutes, you're present, give them your attention.

[00:17:13] I mean, these are simple ways that when you ask somebody, "how are you doing?" You pause enough to get the answer to that. That tells people you value them and then say, thank you. You know what? I really appreciate the fact that you treat this property like it's your own, that you take care of our guests, that you take care of our clients, that you went above and beyond.

[00:17:34] You'll get more of what you're looking for when you do that. So that's one key driver things that people can go out and do right now simple things

[00:17:42] Jason: Yeah, I think yeah that first item you mentioned feeling valued or feeling appreciated It's interesting because what i've noticed is on a lot of DISC assessments, there's the values index and most entrepreneurs I think focus on things being transactional and focus on trying to motivate people through money because they mistakenly assume that everybody likes money.

[00:18:01] And the economic score and a values index for most people is low except for entrepreneurs and salespeople typically. And if the economic score is low, that means they're more recognition motivated. So this is very much in alignment with the appreciation aspect, right? A lot of entrepreneurs are trying to throw money at people when they could save that money and just appreciate them and recognize them.

[00:18:25] And they would get far more output.

[00:18:27] Kon: But even with entrepreneurs and salespeople, Jason, I mean, look at us from this perspective: we all love being appreciated, but even with the money piece, if I'm driven towards money, it's rarely about the dollar bill itself. It's about what that represents for me.

[00:18:41] And for entrepreneurs, sometimes it's a recognition of their arrival, their accomplishment. For some people, it's a representation of financial security that gives them the freedom, the life that they want. That's what you see. When you see all of these people advertising these solutions that produce money for people, what are they putting out there?

[00:19:01] The big houses. The freedom, the lifestyle, the cars, all of that stuff. That's what that a big part of what that represents. It's never just about the money, but it's just as much for your entry level laborer in your property that's going around cleaning out things. For them, that money means security.

[00:19:20] That means that I am a paycheck away from living on the street. And that's what you need to understand. What is driving? I mean, you mentioned the word motivating earlier, and it's important for our audience to understand that you cannot motivate another person. That is a falsehood. Motivation is an intrinsic process.

[00:19:39] Psychologically, you cannot do that to somebody else. All you can do is create the right environment where people will feel self motivated.

[00:19:49] Jason: Yeah.

[00:19:50] Kon: This is the proverbial. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make a drink unless it's thirsty.

[00:19:55] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. I love that. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make a drink.

[00:20:00] But you can salt its oats, correct? Another phrase that I love is "whenever we fail to inspire, we always control."

[00:20:08] Kon: Correct. And that's the part where you want to drive that you want to create the environment for anybody that's spent any time out there trying to go fishing. You realize that not every fish likes the same bait.

[00:20:23] So you have to put the right bait out there to attract and inspire that fish to bite. And it's the same with your people. The job of a leader is to really set the course, give them a plan, give them the reason why, and the how becomes "this is how I want to motivate you." I want you to achieve your goals by helping me achieve our goals.

[00:20:44] That's the second driver, connection. We are tribal creatures, Jason. Part of the reason why we all wear uniforms, for example, at a job, or the same t shirts, is because we want to belong to the same tribe. That builds bonds, camaraderie, connection to people. I mean, think about the last time you met somebody in a crowd that's from the same hometown, went to the same university, supports the same sports team.

[00:21:08] I mean, you go to a stadium, there's 50, 000 people wearing the same jersey as you, and you feel connected to them.

[00:21:13] Jason: Yeah.

[00:21:13] Kon: And so people crave that.

[00:21:15] Jason: I just went to one of those Texas Football games that at the university here and yeah, it's like, it's crazy.

[00:21:22] Kon: Correct. So people want to feel part of a team.

[00:21:26] And so in order to do that, use your team building skills. Make sure that people understand what it is that you're going after. What game are you playing? Are you playing football? Are you playing tennis? What are you playing? These are different games. Make sure that people understand what's the game, what's the values, how are we going to get there?

[00:21:42] And then create that bond and respect between you and each team member while you're building the bonds between the team members themselves. And give people a path so they can see how they can achieve their aspirations by working with you and the team. We talked about that. If my goal is to make sure that I secure a paycheck because I'm financially insecure to pay my bills, or you know what, I have to support my kids, show me how to do that.

[00:22:07] Show me how to get there. If my goal is to become the best salesperson in the region, show me how to do that. Because that way, when you align their goals and yours you can unleash huge energy and potential because people will be striving because it's a win win. They don't have to do your goals instead of theirs.

[00:22:25] They don't have to sacrifice one for the other. That alignment really gives them permission to give their best.

[00:22:32] Jason: Yeah, we're looking at the proverbial win, like if there isn't a win, it's win lose and either we're going to lose or they're going to lose. So correct. So this kind of speaks to their needing to be for connection.

[00:22:42] There needs to be alignment in you know, mission.

[00:22:45] Kon: Correct. And that's what you hire for. Back to your original question. If you find people that are aligned because this is what they want to do and you can show them how they can fulfill their personal mission by working with the team to achieve its mission.

[00:22:59] That's where the win, that's where the secret sauce is. That alignment truly alleviates the need to micromanage because when they are confronted with a choice, they will make the right choice because their why is intact. They understand why they're doing something. It's easier for them to take that personal accountability for themselves and for the team.

[00:23:19] Jason: A lot of business owners don't even know their why, which is why they're running into these sort of mistakes.

[00:23:24] Kon: Correct. Again, because they are operating at a very tactical transactional level. They're not elevating to their higher self. I mean when you look at it, the people that achieve the greatest things are the ones that have a purpose behind them They are driven by that when you have purpose driven organizations They will always outperform the others the same way that engaged organizations when they harness that power from their team will always outperform their competitors by a lot i'm talking about 20 percent more in operating revenues.

[00:23:56] I'm talking three times the profitability. I'm talking almost nine out of 10 people say "I have no reason to go anywhere else." So you're keeping your best and brightest and probably attracting your competitors' best and brightest.

[00:24:09] Jason: Absolutely. I've seen a three times the output from a team if they align with the culture the personality and the values and you know, all that easily three times the output. And that's the biggest, one of the biggest profit levers in a business because the biggest expense in a business is the people and those all connected with people.

[00:24:29] Kon: Correct. And when you start looking at that at that line item in your P and L.

[00:24:33] As truly an investment, you're going to approach it very differently because you're going to be smart about where you put the money. I mean, it's the same way you wouldn't find a temporary solution to fix something in your buildings. You want to find a solution that makes sense, the best return on that investment.

[00:24:48] And that's where, for example, you come in and you look at the productivity piece, which is the third driver. People want to know that they contribute, that they make a difference, Jason. I mean, the example that I give in my coaching and my training sessions on this topic is If I was to give you a team photo from a recent event that you were together with a group of people, what's the first thing that most of us would do, you think?

[00:25:12] Jason: If you were to give a team photo,

[00:25:14] Kon: if I was to give you a team photo that you were in of a recent event, you were there with your team. Let's say you're celebrating something and there's 15 of you on this, in this picture. What's the, one of the first things that you would do? I just handed you that picture.

[00:25:27] Jason: I would look to see if everyone's happy.

[00:25:31] Kon: Or even where you are, right? People want to know where they fit into this picture.

[00:25:34] Jason: Oh yeah. If it's a new photo, I'd be like, I'd look at myself first.

[00:25:37] Kon: Yeah. Right. Yeah. So most of us will take a look at that picture and say, Hey, where am I in this picture? And then look around and say, Oh, I can see Steve smiling.

[00:25:44] I can see Mary over there. She looked like she was having a good time. All the men. Now we see where we fit into this bigger picture. It's the same thing for entrepreneurs. Show your people where they fit in. Show them that even the most menial task. Joe, thank you for cleaning up that mess over there. You know what, that represents the standard that we have here at the property.

[00:26:04] When you did that, that made a big difference. Somebody passing by will look at us and know that we care about this property. They will care about it. That's contagious. And you know what, Billy last week tripped on a mess like that and now he's twisted his ankle and now he's out for three months and now you have to do his job as well.

[00:26:21] So thank you for taking care of that. So nobody else got hurt. That tells people That even the most menial task has a purpose they can connect the dots when people feel like they can contribute in meaningful ways, they can be productive your systems your processes allow them to be productive back to our starting point. They will flourish. They want to make a difference.

[00:26:43] You're going to spend time at work. Anyway, we spent what a third of our day typically at work at least unless you're an entrepreneur and then you're probably spending a lot more But the thing is are you making a difference? How are you impacting others when you can do that, that fuels you that makes a difference When I see the light bulb go on in my clients and the people that I coach the people that I teach, that is fuel to me. That fuels my passion about what I do.

[00:27:10] And so knowing that I make a difference, knowing that people come back to me and say, you know what, I applied your technique, your system, what you recommended, what we discovered together, and it made a difference. That is power. That is a driver. And people want to know that they contribute. You see it in volunteers, Jason, all the time.

[00:27:29] They're not doing it for the money. They're going out there because they believe in what they're doing, that what they're doing makes a difference. Get that volunteer spirit on your team. Get them excited about what they're doing, knowing that they can make a difference. That's power.

[00:27:43] Jason: Yeah. It's amazing. You look at churches as a business, they have a lot of people just volunteering. You look at open source software initiatives. They have a lot of people that are working their day job, but their passion hobby is to contribute to this open source thing for free. You know? Exactly.

[00:28:00] Kon: I spent recently 25 hours a week or more coaching kids soccer.

[00:28:06] I didn't do it for the money. I did it because I wanted to see that passion. To me, I believed in what I was doing and I was making a difference. I teach girls, especially I coach girls. Why? Because I believe that when we can teach young women how to advocate for themselves, tap into their leadership abilities from a young age, and they know that they can perform well as individuals, as team members, as team leaders, they become better leaders tomorrow, and we need more of those leaders tomorrow. I'm working with the early generations now, so in the future I don't have to go in and try to change the mind of 40 year old executives

[00:28:45] Jason: Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, when they're young and they won't depart from it. Right.

[00:28:51] Kon: Teach them those foundational pieces.

[00:28:53] They become better. I mean, I have kids, I've won and lost games and tournaments and championships, but you know what the biggest reward for me is? When I have a kid coming back to me years later and say, coach, thank you. I still love the game because of you. And these are the things that I've accomplished because of the life skills that I learned playing on your team.

[00:29:12] Yeah. That stuff that they pick up from you, I'm sure applies to everything.

[00:29:18] Correct. And then finally, the last driver is people need to feel supported to learn and grow. Speaking of coaching and developing, I liken this Jason to the example of water. Water is a life source, right? Right. But a swamp is water, so is a river.

[00:29:34] The difference between the two is the flow, is the is the movement. Nobody wants to be caught up in a swamp in their careers, in their jobs. Everybody wants a flowing river, and they want to know that there's a path, there's a career path for them, there's a way for them to grow. Even if, like you said, they might be limited by their own abilities to some extent, or their own desires, to some extent, show them how they can be the best in the current role that they're in.

[00:30:01] Maybe they're not going to be promoted to the next general manager managing a hundred units, but maybe there's somebody who can teach and mentor a young person coming in to your business, and they can offer value through that. Maybe that becomes part of what they do. So there is room for everybody to continue to learn and grow.

[00:30:18] Give them that opportunity. This is the train smart, the growth part where everybody has a sense of, I'm showing up to work and I'm a little bit better than I was yesterday, or that there's a clear career path because if they can't find the path in your business, they're going to try to find it somewhere else.

[00:30:36] Jason: Sure. Yeah. Nobody wants to feel stuck or stagnant. And, you know, I think that's what our soul craves. Our soul craves growth. I think that I think a lot of people mistakenly, I think the point of, you know, Life of marriage of everything that people recommend that maybe you do is to be happy. I think the point I think happiness is a more mediocre goal than growth.

[00:30:59] I think the point is growth. That doesn't always mean you're going to be happy, right? And I love your water analogy. I've heard a similar analogy before where it's like, which would you rather drink? The From the crazy wild raging river or the stagnant puddle in front of your house Right. And it's that sort of turbulence and challenge that purifies the water and that makes it a much safer environment to drink from.

[00:31:26] Kon: Absolutely. And I mean, my, my first book was all about managing crisis and about managing sudden change. And even in that you realize that crisis presents opportunities on the flip side of it. Crisis is not all bad. Crisis means that, you know what? Hey, things are being shaken up big time unexpectedly, but who wouldn't want to be? I mean you think about crises over time I mean in 2008 prior to 2008 we didn't have you know Airbnb and uber eats or ubers in general you didn't have any of that stuff I mean, after the crisis of 2008, people got creative and they found new ways of dealing things, you know, sharing out rooms in their house, renting things out, short term rentals, looking at opportunities to replace cabs, using their cars smartly.

[00:32:12] You look at the recent pandemic crisis. I mean, wouldn't you have liked to have stocks in some of these virtual meeting rooms, Zoom and others? Wouldn't that be great to have that beforehand because that was an opportunity all of a sudden everybody's gone virtual. So this is important for us to understand.

[00:32:27] Growth comes sometimes through turbulence, through upheaval, you know, things change either as an evolution progressively, slowly, or as a revolution.

[00:32:38] Jason: Yeah. Crisis equals opportunity. Correct. If that's your mindset, otherwise it equals something horrible.

[00:32:45] Kon: I mean, there's a lot of entrepreneurs that aspire to the mantra, especially when they're in the DISC profile.

[00:32:50] When you say about the D's, the dominant ones, you look at it and you say, if it ain't broke, break it. That's the mantra. Right.

[00:32:58] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, cool. So we've got four items feel valued, appreciated. Number one, these are the four key drivers, the drivers of revenue, performance, everything else.

[00:33:09] Kon: Engagement and engagement leads to the performance. Right.

[00:33:12] Jason: Okay. So we've got number one, feeling value. Number two, connection. Maybe we should stick all of our team members in the same t shirts. I don't know. And, you know, making them feel like a team. Make it feel like a soccer team. Maybe I don't know number three productivity, meaning they feel like they're contributing to something that contribution I think is something that entrepreneurs deeply crave and they want to feel like they have impact And then number four supported to learn and grow,

[00:33:40] correct.

[00:33:40] Kon: Yeah. For the four drivers. I mean, this is basically the 80 20 rule. When you can do those four things, that'll get you the majority of the way there to really create an engaged team and engaged workforce with you as a leader. I mean, think about it this way. Leaders contribute about 70 percent of the variance between an average team And a high performing team.

[00:34:03] 70 percent of that difference comes from your leadership style. If you apply these simple four principles, these simple four drivers to your business, and you start engaging your people, you can transform your workplace to win in the marketplace. You're igniting the fire in your people without burning them out.

[00:34:22] That's essential.

[00:34:24] Jason: And if you have bad team members, but you have these four things, they're just not going to fit. They're not going to want to stick around. I mean, if everybody's feeling valued, there's connection that, you know, there's focus on making a difference and people are supported, learn and grow.

[00:34:37] It's going to be obvious. Like there's going to be these B players that no matter how appreciated they are, they're just, or there's nothing to appreciate or that, you know, they don't want to be a team player. They don't care about the connection with other people. They aren't productive. They don't feel, they don't care if they're making a difference.

[00:34:53] They just wanted like, kind of basically they want to complain about you, their boss and live for the weekend. Correct. And they are, and they don't care about growth. They're like, they're just showing up that it's going to be very obvious that they're not a culture fit.

[00:35:06] Kon: And so that's where you look at it.

[00:35:08] And now bringing a full circle back to your original piece of staffing. Now, you know, where your holes are now, you know, where the gaps are, and now, you know, what you're looking for. And then you can enlist the help of the rest of your team to bring them on board, to be part of this group, to really embrace your culture.

[00:35:24] It's a lot easier once you get this in motion to be able to have this operate because it's a self sustaining organism. It's a community. I mean, one of the biggest things that I tell people in the last closing part of the book is I let them know that people think the grass is greener on the other side.

[00:35:44] It's not. The grass is greener where you water it. Sure. So you need to take care of your patch of grass. You need to make sure that you apply these principles, and then that rest will take care of itself. The grass that's flourishing will crowd out the weeds. It'll take care of all of those different things.

[00:36:03] Your people, through their own empowerment, they will see your business as their own, and they will start monitoring and managing this process with you. And for you, because that's the power of true engagement. Now you've got people that feel that personal accountability, that ownership, because they feel empowered.

[00:36:20] Jason: Yeah. If the grass isn't green on your side of the fence and you're the business owner, the problem is you, this is a leadership factor. I had one of my mentors, he used to say to me, he said, he'd say, Jason, If you don't yet have the business of your dreams, it's because you're not yet the person that can run it yet.

[00:36:39] And you know, that's good medicine, but a bitter pill to accept, you know, in moments for a lot of people. But yeah, I think Yeah, I think it's greener where you water it. And if you, if I love these four principles, if you can align your team around this, that creates a really good culture.

[00:36:56] The environment then is safe. People are feeling appreciated. And then you're moving people eventually out of just this transactional leadership into moving them towards a transformational leadership that turns them into leaders.

[00:37:11] Kon: Correct. Correct. Because you want leaders at all levels. I mean, great leaders don't create followers. They create more leaders. So you want to be able to empower people and set them in the right direction. You know, create those leaders at all levels of the organization and that way they all feel empowered to take ownership of, they see something that needs to be fixed. They fix it. They need somebody who's struggling. They're going to reach out. They need to communicate information. They will communicate that information because they feel empowered and they feel like leaders. And that's what leaders do. If you just have followers, if you just have people out there that are waiting for you to tell them what to do.

[00:37:49] That's a lot of work.

[00:37:50] Jason: Yeah. I think that's the challenge is when the way a solopreneur thinks, you know, they start hiring and they're not hiring usually based on what they need as a business or they're hiring based on what the business needs. And so eventually they have an entire team. Yeah. And their first initial team, usually I've noticed, is the wrong team.

[00:38:11] They built a team around the wrong puzzle piece. They're showing up involved in wearing hats and doing things they don't really enjoy doing, and they built an entire team around that. And so by default, And the way I get them to realize this, I say, look, if you've got, if you're, you have an entire team and you are still wearing all the hats you don't enjoy wearing or involved in all the things you don't enjoy doing, then by default, you have to have the wrong team.

[00:38:38] Kon: I would agree with that. Again, your job is not to sit here and do everybody else's job. The people that you bring onto your team should be willing to do their job and then start reaching at the next level to start taking on more because you've empowered them and you want them to grow. That's the big part of this.

[00:38:54] It's a difference between leading a team and doing the work. Just like in even in an organization, but especially when you're an entrepreneur, the first thing that you're going to need to let go of when you start creating a team is the thing that probably got you there. All of the things that you did well, if you're the top performer on your team, you got a problem.

[00:39:14] That's a big problem. You need to now start thinking of it as, I need to create a team of high performers as opposed to me being a high performer. And that's a very different thing for salespeople, for managers, for people that have done well in the past. They've done well and they've probably reached this level.

[00:39:30] Either they got promoted to a job to the next level, or they started their own business with that mindset, but they have to stop competing with their people. They have to start teaching all of the good things that they've learned that made them successful. So they can now build the team around them.

[00:39:47] There's a reason why from the famous Bulls team of the nineties. Why Michael Jordan, the best player potentially in history, is not a coach, as opposed to Steve Kerr, who was on his team and probably was a big player on the Bulls team, but an important one. Steve Kerr understood what it took to become successful.

[00:40:08] He watched some of the best. He played with some of the best. He learned how to teach that. Michael worked hard, tirelessly, but at the same time. Steve had so many natural talents, things that came so naturally to him that those things were very difficult, if not impossible for him to teach. So, whereas Steve, with his limitations physically and his talent, understood how to take good players and make them great.

[00:40:35] Jason: You know, I love this example. Michael Jordan, though, before he had the right system, was just a showboat. Before he had Phil Jackson, a good coach, before he had Scottie Pippen and the team that he had. That Phil Jackson built around Michael Jordan's abilities. He wasn't winning championships.

[00:40:54] Kon: Correct.

[00:40:55] Jason: It was just a showboat.

[00:40:56] And this is, you know, a good analogy when we can take really good people and put them into the right, we create the right environment, the right system. We give them the right system. Then they become. Become rock stars.

[00:41:08] Kon: Correct. And they shine in that. And you see that sometimes like you call them a system quarterback because they shine in that system.

[00:41:15] And the thing is at the end of the day, what are you building? You're not building a place to showcase individuals per se. This is not even about the owner or the entrepreneur to some extent. That's not the vanity piece. You want a successful business. You want to be able to build that around people that can get things done for your clients so you can have success however you define success, whether it's the revenues, the profits, the customer satisfaction.

[00:41:38] I mean, those are the three key drivers that all businesses are founded on. And then you look at that and you say, okay, It's not about me. And we've got big companies that went to the toilet because their CEOs thought it was all about them. And that's part of the problem. Part of the challenge, Jason, you look at it and say, okay, when did you start building a team?

[00:41:56] It's about the team. It's about how are you performing as an organization? It doesn't matter how many followers I have on social media or how many likes I get on my posts, if my business is in the toilet.

[00:42:08] Jason: Yeah. I think one of the challenges I see is that. In the beginning of the journey for entrepreneurs, is there a solopreneur, there's a lot of ego, and there's a lot of self belief they need in order to get started because there's a lot of difficulty, a lot of friction, the challenges that creates a hindrance in the future.

[00:42:24] Because one of the initial things I noticed that a lot of solopreneurs believe when they start hiring is what I call the clone myth. They think I just need to clone myself. I need to go find somebody like me cause I'm so special and so adaptable and so important. I need to go find somebody like myself.

[00:42:39] And then they wonder why this person maybe steals their clients and eventually starts their own business. Cause you know, they're, that if somebody's like, yeah, instead of finding people that are better than them, and this is kind of the next level, they don't think that people can be better than them.

[00:42:54] And my goal is to hire people that are way better at me on all the things that I don't enjoy doing. That's not difficult to do if I don't enjoy doing it I'm, definitely not going to be the best at it and I can definitely find people that are better at it And then when we hire people and then we treat them transactionally, it's like here's a task you return a report and do it, our team members then don't feel safe as you talked about to make decisions. The safest thing is to abdicate all the thinking decision making to me because then they're not responsible for the outcome.

[00:43:26] And so this, there's kind of this graduation of having to learn to let go of going from a transactional leadership system to a strategic or sort of planning system where they have outcomes and goals and we'll do whatever's required in order to achieve it by a deadline instead of just being told what to do because you're the smartest person in the room, so to speak.

[00:43:47] Kon: Yeah, I mean a couple of things. Let's unpack that for a second if I may. First of all, I aspire to the idea that like you, you have masterminds, you have groups that you coach, you work with people in a group setting as well as one on one. If I find myself being the smartest person in a mastermind in a group, that's the wrong group for me to be in.

[00:44:04] Jason: Yeah. Right. So that's the first thing of being in the group. That's one of the best benefits of being in a mastermind is being able to be around other people that excel in different areas, you know, over what you do.

[00:44:18] Kon: Yeah. Correct. So that's number one. Number two, when you are constantly just telling your people what to do and you're asking them to delegate or you're taking ownership of all the thinking you are teaching learned helplessness.

[00:44:31] You see it in parents of teenage kids. When you do all of the thinking for them and you just say, "fine, I'll just do it" or "clean up your room. You haven't cleaned it up to my expectations." Well, guess what? Why don't you explain the expectations and show them how to do it?

[00:44:47] You cannot do that. There's a time and a place.

[00:44:49] To be very directive with people when they're first learning a task, you want to basically be very highly directive with them. You want to show them step by step how to do that. And as they become more confident and capable, then you start letting go. It's like you take off the training wheels. When you're teaching a kid how to ride a bike, you're not all of a sudden going to stick them on this racing bike and just push them down the hill.

[00:45:11] You want to progressively give them a chance to learn and grow from that. That's how you do with your people. Don't expect them all of a sudden to have mastered that. They're not going to be where you are. Show them progressively how to master each step. That takes time, but that's the job of a leader.

[00:45:25] Most people look at why "I don't have time to do that." Well, what are you doing? Where are you spending your time? Because to me as a leader, that is your time. You brought these people on, you're paying them a salary.

[00:45:36] Jason: How do people create this learned helplessness? Because people are doing it and they're kind of blind to it.

[00:45:42] I would imagine.

[00:45:43] Kon: Correct. Because they keep saying, well, I don't have time to stop and teach you this. Just give it to me. And when you add all of these things onto your plate, time after time, 30 minutes for this, two hours for that four hours for this one day for this, all of a sudden your plate is overflowing and you've taught everybody around you to sit around and wait for you to do it.

[00:46:03] Yeah. Because yes, it might take you longer in the moment to teach somebody how to do that task, but that is compounding interest because the next time they'll do it more and more, they'll eventually get good at it. Perhaps even better than you at something, but the fact of the matter is that you are taking off that time over the course of time off your plate.

[00:46:26] That's freeing you up to do the other things that you need to be doing. You cannot afford to try to be, again, the best player on your team. If you are, that's a problem. Why did you hire these people?

[00:46:38] Jason: Yeah, it's like we need to trust them with outcomes and give them outcomes to achieve, goals to achieve, instead of just telling them what to do all the

[00:46:47] Kon: time and giving them that.

[00:46:47] Correct. That's the paradox. Most people want to measure outputs as opposed to outcomes. Yes, outputs have a place. How many hours did you spend on this? How many calls did you make? How many widgets did you produce? Yes, I get that part, but overall measure people's success based on outcomes, because maybe you care about effort, but most of us care about results in this business.

[00:47:12] Jason: You know, this is one of the things when we coach clients on the operational side of things that we've noticed is that, and we have this formula for the ultimate job descriptions we call R docs, and one of the key sections that are usually missing from job descriptions is results.

[00:47:27] This is, you know, they'll have the role of the responsibilities, but there's no methodology in this for prioritization, right? And we want to pay as business owners, we want to pay for outcomes. That's really what we want. We're desiring outcomes. We're desiring results. And so I think just clarity on helping our team members understand Why they're doing certain things and understanding why it matters and then understanding what are the outcomes or the results that we want? We get far better results, you know, not so surprisingly.

[00:47:56] So, yeah, so be around others that exceed expectations, love the idea of learned helplessness.

[00:48:04] Kon: Yeah. I mean, we condition our people to do certain things a certain way. I mean, we teach them how to do it and from our behaviors, the things we tolerate, the things we accept, the things that we focus on. All of that is sending clear messages to our team about what matters.

[00:48:19] We, whether we realize it or not, we're constantly training them and educating them based on the way that we behave. They're going to respond to that. That's what people do. That's what happens in a system. They're going to look at the leader and say, Oh, What kind of mood is he or she in today? I mean, where's he going with this?

[00:48:35] And the more unpredictable you are from that, the more people are not feeling safe in this. And again, that comes back to when they know that they can bring you issues and you're not going to fly off the handle when they know that you know what, Hey, you're going to sit there and listen to them. You're going to appreciate what they're saying.

[00:48:51] Even if you don't like the message and thank them for the courage to share that with you, you know, good news, bad news doesn't get better with time. And so you want to know these things ahead of time, you want to find ways and then teach them how to solve problems so they can come to you with potential solutions.

[00:49:07] Hey boss, this is what I'm thinking. This is what happened. These are the options that I'm thinking. Which way do you think we should go? Let's talk about that. Why do you think we should go this way? Why do you think we should go that way? Again, teach your people, treat them a certain way. I treated my kids, even my entry level kids, even my recreational teams.

[00:49:25] I've won championships. Why? Because I treated them as champions before they even won a damn thing. Because I held them to that standard. Treat your team like champions and they will perform that way. Even if they're not the most talented. That's the thing you condition them to do. You create that culture, Jason.

[00:49:42] Jason: You know, a lot of things you're touching on just now really speak to the point of empathy and just being empathetic and you know, caring about people and caring about their situation, caring about what they want and figuring out their motives and it seems like, you know, the highest performing teams are not the teams that have the most KPIs or the most metrics.

[00:50:02] It's, there's been studies that say it's that there's the most empathy involved. So it's difficult, I think, for business owners to be empathetic though, sometimes.

[00:50:12] Kon: Well, what is empathy? Empathy? We talk about empathy as an emotional intelligence skill. We talk about empathy as our ability to be aware and understand where somebody else is coming from, where they're going, how they're approaching things, how they're processing things.

[00:50:26] It's a it's a way to understand and acknowledge others' behaviors, feelings, et cetera. That's a capacity that we have as leaders, as emotionally intelligent leaders to be able to do. That's key. But to me, empathy unto itself in a business environment, especially or a high performance environment is only half of the equation.

[00:50:46] Because to me, empathy needs to be paired up with tough love. I want to understand where you're coming from, but I also want to make sure that we set clear expectations through my understanding of what you can produce and what you're willing to produce. I can set clear expectations and boundaries, so we're both safe from that.

[00:51:05] I look at back when I was, for example, working with people during The COVID days when we were all stuck and all of a sudden we're all doing virtual teams, or even now in a hybrid environment where we're operating that. That's one of the biggest challenges a lot of leaders have because they don't know how to manage teams when they're not in front of them.

[00:51:21] If I can't see the whites of your eyes, how am I going to know you're working? I have that with a lot of my clients. They struggle with that.

[00:51:28] And to me, it's all about the leadership paradox. And one of the paradox elements that I teach is this empathy and tough love. I need to be empathetic with the fact that somebody is working in a very different situation.

[00:51:42] Not everybody has a home office like I do, or you do. People sometimes have to work at their kitchen tables. They've got kids, school aged kids that they're trying to be a business person. They're trying to be a teacher at home. They're trying to be a short order cook. They're trying to take care of an aging parent in the background.

[00:51:59] And guess what? They may have to pick things up at 10 o'clock at night after they put the kids to bed to try to cram the rest of the work that they didn't get finished during the day To me it's important as an empathetic leader to understand their situation and their plight, but on the other hand I need to protect them through tough love and say look, let's focus on the things that you can do the most important elements. Here are the priorities. If you get nothing else done, I want you to do one two three things this week. When you do them is up to you. I'm understanding your situation, but these are the three things that we need to agree to get done. That now allows me to pair empathy with tough love and that paradox creates a powerful synthesis that now I am leading from an effective way.

[00:52:42] Jason: Yeah, I love the idea of tough love because you know tough love is two two words here, right tough and love and if we're tough, if we're just like shoving leadership at them without empathy, then it's cruel, right? They're going to perceive it as cruel. And if we showcase love and empathy, but we don't showcase any leadership, or any toughness or direction for them, then we're almost keeping them in their mediocrity.

[00:53:09] Kon: Because with the tough love piece, again, you're setting those firmer boundaries, the expectations, the clear expectations, but you're doing it from a place of caring for them, caring for the team and caring for everything that you're trying to accomplish. That's the part of it. It needs to be that.

[00:53:25] And sometimes as a leader, you're going to have to make those difficult decisions or have those difficult conversations with people and see what you can do. You're trying to manage people from where you think they should be. Try managing them from where they truly are. I've had very talented young people that are coming up and I see them as rock stars and the world is their oyster.

[00:53:45] But guess what? Something changes in their lives. The priority, a health issue, an ailing parent, a new kid in the family, their priorities change just because I want to promote them and give them more responsibility, they may not be in a position to accept that responsibility. And it's important for us to really understand that because if I burn that person out or force them to make a choice, I put them in a big difficult situation and then I will lose that person.

[00:54:11] Again, make sure that you understand how to harness that power and work with people.

[00:54:17] Jason: We need to know our people and we need to care about them. Well, Kon, this has been really enjoyable. I love your ideas. I love your frameworks that you shared with us today.

[00:54:25] You had mentioned your business is Fresh Biz Solutions and you have a book, The Engagement Blueprint. Maybe in closing, you could just tell us like, what are they going to find? What was this book and how can they get in touch with you and any closing words?

[00:54:40] Kon: Thank you. I appreciate that. Well, the book is basically A distillation of 30 years of talent management and team building experience.

[00:54:49] And in that book, I've spent a couple of years researching what is it that truly drives this level of engagement from people? How can we harness that? How can we build the kind of workplace that we all want to go to, that we all want to be part of? A place where we can raise the level of commitment and performance with our team members and really get the best out of them.

[00:55:10] It includes some of my key frameworks, the things that we talked about. Earlier today, it includes my performance framework and the four elements of what I do for my clients. Building competence, building commitment, building teamwork and building systems and how that fits into the four drivers of engagement that we talked about.

[00:55:28] So there's a path and pattern and a method to the madness. I've had the opportunity to interview some wonderful leaders, global leaders that have had broad teams, broad, different industries, different circumstances, but people that I have tremendous respect for, and they've all shared their information.

[00:55:45] I've got case studies in the book from places where I've applied this, so it's not just my theory or things that I hope will work. I've showed people how this has actually worked in the real world, and they can take those in practical ways and apply them immediately with them. If people want to reach out to me, if the people are ready to work together, if I can support them in their efforts, they can reach out to me either by going to my website, fresh biz, B I Z solutions with an S at the end. com. And they can find a lot of wonderful information there, including a free engagement assessment so they can immediately see how their team is performing, where their strengths are, or they can reach out to me and connect through LinkedIn. That's where I normally play on my social media there. I have posts and newsletters there that come out weekly, and they can find me there under Coach Kon.

[00:56:34] Coach Kon with a K, because it's hard to get people to trust you when you spell Kon with a C.

[00:56:40] Jason: There you go. Yeah, probably true. All right. Coach Kon. Great to have you here on the show. Thanks for hanging out with us on the DoorGrow show. Appreciate you being here.

[00:56:49] Kon: Thank you, my friend.

[00:56:50] Jason: All right. So for those of you that enjoy the show, you know, check out his website, freshbizsolutions. com. And if you are a property management business owner and entrepreneur, and you're struggling with adding doors, getting your systems in place. We would love to support you and see if we might be a fit. Reach out to us at DoorGrow.Com. And if you would like to get into a community, join our free Facebook group by going to DoorGrowclub.Com. We reject 60 to 70 percent of the people that apply to join that group. You have to be a property management business owner. So make sure you answer the question. And it's a great community you get access to our podcast episodes and everything else goes into there And we'll give you some free gifts for joining as well.

[00:57:33] They can help your business And until next time, to our mutual growth, everyone. I hope you crush it. Bye, everyone.

[00:57:39] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:58:06] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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These days, you aren’t limited to the area your business is located when looking for great team members. In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Laith Masarweh from Assistantly to talk about how hiring VAs can help you scale your business.

You’ll Learn [01:34] Creating an Offshore Talent Acquisition Company

[09:38] Importance of a People Process

[16:11] Virtual Executive Assistants and Operators

[24:57] Finding Your Unicorn

Tweetables  ” Having community and good compensation definitely is going to allow you to attract and have the best people.”

“ If you are operating your business, you are not growing your business.”

“ When you have good people, they help other good people grow.”

“ The bottleneck is you.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Laith: When you have good people, they help other good people grow.

[00:00:03] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:23] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management, growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:04] Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:07] All right. So my guest today is Laith. Laith, tell me how to say your last name. So I don't butcher it.

[00:01:13] Laith: It's all good, man. It's Masarweh.

[00:01:15] Jason: Masarweh. All right. Laith Masarweh. And awesome to have you here on the show. So in this episode, we're going to dive into the power of offshore talent, explore how businesses from startups to fortune 500s can unlock exponential growth.

[00:01:31] And you run a company called Assistantly. Which I've heard great things about. You came highly recommended by one of my mentors, Sharran Srivatsa a, who runs a multi billion dollar real estate company called Real. And so tell me like a little bit about your background.

[00:01:48] How'd you get into this? How did you get into entrepreneurism?

[00:01:51] Yeah.

[00:01:54] Laith: I mean, I think I always had the entrepreneur inspiration since I was a kid. My dad always had like a small business that he was running and, you know, it made me want to be an entrepreneur from a young age.

[00:02:03] He used to have me working in the grocery store shop since I was eight years old and it was cool to kind of develop, I guess, my like interpersonal and just learning more about the business at a, you know, such a young age and, you know, I knew I wanted to start my own business. I didn't know what I wanted to start it in.

[00:02:18] Of course, you know, I attended Chapman University. I went to the business school. I thought I was into like virtual reality and tech. Didn't really know what my fit was. Got into corporate after college. I knew that wasn't a fit, even though I tried it. Didn't really work very well and then I started a real estate marketing company here in Orange County, California where we help agents, brokers whether you're residential, commercial, property management you know, we just have done what's like real estate marketing needs and during the pandemic, we got extremely busy and You know, we couldn't, there's too much demand and our team was super small and somebody was like, Hey, you should hire a virtual assistant.

[00:02:53] And I thought that was like an AI robot and I didn't understand what that was. And I never learned about offshoring in college or any of that kind of stuff. And I got introduced to somebody thought she was local. She ended up being in the Philippines. I was like blown out of my mind because I've actually been working with her for years thinking she was in Irvine, California, but she was actually in the Philippines the entire time.

[00:03:12] Our time I had, you could not tell any difference. And then I kind of got the spark in my head and I go, man, I work with so many real estate professionals, you know, and they're always asking me for help, whether it's administrative or operations or marketing. And I, you know, when I asked this girl, Hey, how many people are highly skilled, great communication skills, you know, looking for employment, like you? And she goes, I don't know, maybe like hundreds of thousands. And I said, hundreds of thousands, there's hundreds of thousands of talented people like you? And she goes, Oh yeah. And it kind of just clicked in my head. I'm like, Oh, People need this and it can't just be me.

[00:03:45] And I pretty much started Assistantly 45 minutes after learning what offshoring was didn't know anything about it. And I'm just like, let me go, you know, I'll send it and kind of see kind of test it out, pilot it with a couple of my, you know, people in my network. And four years later, here we are.

[00:03:58] And we started this obviously real estate, property management, law, tech, healthcare, finance, a little bit of everything.

[00:04:04] Jason: Yeah. All right. Awesome. So, so let's get into this. I mean, there's a lot of challenges that people have with this and everybody's had, I mean, a lot of property managers have tested the waters of working with, you know, VAs in the Philippines or maybe Mexico and there's kind of mixed feelings about how that's gone. If you've done this at all, you've had some bad experiences and maybe some good ones. And so it can be really difficult. And so you're kind of at the mercy, if you're using a company like yours or some third party company, you're kind of at the mercy of their hiring process to some degree.

[00:04:43] And some of these vendors that provide VAs have better hiring processes than others. Some of them, you know, they all claim, Hey, we've got amazing talent or they all might sound American, you know, but then you end up kind of getting somebody that has a heavy accent. They aren't showing up, you know, on time or they just disappear and ghost you because they're non confrontational sometimes in the Philippines or some of these sort of issues, and I'm sure you see, you see some of this, right.

[00:05:13] How do you kind of do things you think maybe differently at Assistantly versus some of these other players in the marketplace

[00:05:22] Laith: Yes, it's a great question, you know, obviously I started off, you know, really when I got into the industry I started hiring these people on my own whether they're from like people going to the upworks or the fivers of the world or like job boards and to like Interview a whole bunch of candidates to understand where they're located in the Philippines.

[00:05:38] Like what type of equipment do they have? You Internet connection speeds. Do they really have that much experience? You know, because people obviously, whether you're US, Philippines, anywhere, they will always oversell on an interview or a resume. There's a lot of things that we do on like on our end.

[00:05:52] So like, number one you taught me this and I think we had a conversation when we were, when I met you in Franklin about like that job description is so important when sourcing somebody, right? You know, everybody obviously wants a job, but you want to essentially attract people that are like, you know, that's their zone of genius, and they're passionate about it.

[00:06:10] That's why we actually follow the four R's that Jason taught us a long time ago. And it's something that we actually, it's really important. The first step is crafting the job description to compel to candidates. So they're actually passionate and interested about it. So that's number one, filling that top of the funnel.

[00:06:25] Number two, there's, you know, there's obviously a series of interviews. You can't just have one interview. We did multiple interviews. But like, I think obviously experience matters, of course. Like I want people that are mid to senior level that know what they're doing. If they're in property management, you know, I want, you know, helping with like property admin stuff, tenant communication daily operations through Appfolio.

[00:06:42] Like I look for those types of things, of course. But also like, what's really important to me is like, when working with the client, like, you know, your personality and your culture is very different than my other, you know, than client Jamie or client James. Right. And I think that's very important when finding the right match.

[00:06:58] And we do like a personality culture assessment that we built ourself to essentially line them up with like whatever role, whether it's an admin operations or marketing role to really understand what type of person they are, but like beyond just their experience. We also verify references like, right.

[00:07:12] You know, because again, people could say, Hey, I worked somewhere for seven years. How do you know that? Right. You know, I put, I see people put like they went to Harvard on there. I mean, how do I know they went to Harvard? And it's those things that you've got to cross check, call references. I think that's super important.

[00:07:27] But then we also vet out like equipment. Do they have 2020 and newer equipment? Because that's a big slowdown in the Philippines and like Mexico and a lot of these countries. When people go, my team member is so slow. Well, their equipment is from 2002. Like, of course, it's very slow, you know, or their internet connection is very slow.

[00:07:44] Like, we vet out those types of things, which I think are very important. You know, so between like the job description, the interviews, the proprietary personality assessment, the reference checks you know, we've obviously sourced for these positions thousands of times, so like, we really know what makes an A level player slash we call them unicorns here at Assistantly. Unicorn meaning they're rare, not meaning they can do everything, you know, in the kitchen sink. But like those are things that we go kind of, you know, beyond our measures. Plus, like also one really important thing, whether you hire from us or you hire offshore is it's not just compensation that matters.

[00:08:14] Like we, we give the highest compensation in the industry. But people really want a sense of community. That's what we built out a system where they feel supported, they feel loved, they feel cared for, we give really good benefits. And that's why like our retention is like, I think I've maybe what in four years, there's been like two people who leave.

[00:08:31] And you know, and that was just for family emergency, not because they didn't like their job. So, but a couple of things to know.

[00:08:37] Jason: Yeah, I think that's really powerful. Having community and good compensation definitely is going to allow you to attract and have the best people. Yeah, and you mentioned like R docs like for us. Yeah. I got the four R's concept I got from one of my mentors Alex Charfen and then I started adding more R's to it because I was like this is I like And like, like the most significant, I've talked about this before on the show for those listening when hiring to attract the right personality type is this resonate section at the beginning where we describe the personality that would naturally love doing this. So that they can resonate with this, they read and go, Oh my gosh, that's me, which is way better than somebody going I would be willing to do this if you pay me enough, like, you know, that's a very different type of team member. And I think this goes back to regardless for those listening, I think anyone that is going to use any sort of company to collapse time on hiring, eventually every business needs their own hiring process internally. Even if I use Assistantly or other companies to get a team member, I'm still going to put them through my stuff, my process because I trust my process. And this is one of the things we do at DoorGrow is help our clients install a really good hiring mechanism. We just had a client come on board who was a past client. We'd helped clean up their branding, website, and now he's like at 200, 300 doors or something. And he just had total team turnover twice in the last six months.

[00:10:06] He's on his third team in a six month period. And before that he said, life was amazing. He had this great virtual team. He had this person that was like trained or educated as a lawyer that was running everything. And then he lost that person. They went and found an actual law job. And then chaos started to ensue because he realized that person was so great.

[00:10:25] They were carrying the entire team. And then he had no mechanism for knowing how to effectively hire or replace a team quickly. He had no real hiring machine. And what I've noticed, even in the largest companies, I've talked to people I talked to a guy the other day with 800 units, loves his business, doesn't want to change anything super comfortable.

[00:10:45] And then I asked him questions about, you know, people, planning, and process, you know, what we call our super system. And he realized he didn't have a hiring mechanism and I could tell he got scared, like, and you know, people don't realize they're vulnerable when it comes to this, but they've built their team usually through a decade of Russian roulette.

[00:11:04] And they finally have a great team, great culture. He's like, I've got great team. I trust them. Great culture. I'm like, cool. If you lost one of those key people, what would you do? You could see like panic sets in, right? He's like, well, yeah, I don't know, I guess. And so, I feel confident in my own business.

[00:11:19] Even though everybody on my team, I feel like is like really great culture of it. I really care about them and they're really important. Some of them I've had a long time. If I lost any one of them because I have good process documentation, I know that I could get somebody else in to do that work pretty well pretty quickly to do the job.

[00:11:40] But I know even more than that, I have way more safety and security and confidence as an entrepreneur. With the business because I know because of my hiring process I could get the right person relatively fast like within at least 30 days. I could have somebody else in play to be doing that may be as good at their role or better because usually if I lose a team member, it's because they kind of either the business outgrows them or they've outgrown the business, but there's like, they're no longer that culture fit maybe.

[00:12:11] And then they leave, which is cool. Then I can go find somebody that's even better. And I, over time at DoorGrow, either my team members have leveled up, like I've had Adam for over a decade or I level up the team members like by getting new ones. Yeah.

[00:12:27] Laith: Well, there's different people for different phases of growth, right?

[00:12:30] You know, you get to the zero 1 to 5 million, you get to the 10 million, you know, we've changed our team and it's evolved. I mean, I've had people that have been with me since I started instantly, but then there have been people like client success I think we should upload this position maybe with somebody with an ops background because they understand the client a little bit more.

[00:12:47] And I just did that recently and I'm like, Oh my God, game changer. Like, you know, client success, having an ops brain, they can go and help our clients and say, Hey, you should think of things very differently. I also think like a misconception, like talking about the your example, because like one.

[00:13:00] You know, one person left the whole team crumbles. If that ever happens and you have the wrong team, right? Because people, you know, I have people that will say, you know, like 20 percent of your team members make 80 percent of the work. I go, maybe at your company, not mine. I go a hundred percent of my team members make a hundred percent of the work.

[00:13:16] Why would I have 20? And you know, the magic, I tell my team, Hey, just 20 percent of you guys are making pretty much all the work very consistently. Everybody's like, what the F am I doing here? Then if those 20 percent are taking over the work, like that's not. That's a misconception. Of course you have A level players, but, you know, and I always talk to our internal team about it.

[00:13:32] I'm like, Why do we have an A level department here, but a B level department here, but then a C level department here? Like, why can't we all be A level and working towards the same goals and help each other, you know, collaborate. And I think like finding A plus players, they're not easy to find. But like A level players can also help those, let's say B level players become A level players.

[00:13:50] Like that's like, that's part of it. When you have good people, they help other good people grow. And I think that's like a huge misconception. It's like, I have this really good person, but then like, I was here, but like the rest of my team is like, okay. I'm like, then you got to switch out your team, you know, keep your A level player, but then you need other A level players.

[00:14:05] Cause like, if you're at 3 million in revenue, like you should be at seven and a half million with the right team, you know, and I see that even with my own thing is like when I switch out somebody, whether it's ops or client success or recruitment, I do this all the time. And I up level, Oh dude, like, I'm like, man, this is what heaven and unicorns and rainbows look like.

[00:14:23] You know, I don't even have to worry about any of this stuff. They're just taking care of it. They own it. And that's where like the zone of genius comes in. Yeah. Yeah, because you want with that resonate section, right? You want people to be like, that's me. I want to work there so bad. Like, that's exactly what I want to do all day.

[00:14:39] And people are like, really, you want to go through Appfolio all day? Like, that's what you want to do? And people were like, yes, I love Appfolio. I want to go through leases. I want to go, you know, coordinate with maintenance requests. Like there are people like that, that just because you don't enjoy it, which I don't blame you, you're an entrepreneur, owner, founder, whatever you are.

[00:14:56] There are people that are like, that's my bread and butter. I got it. It's easy for me and I like to do it. And like that zone of genius, like if you could find people that go, I'm passionate about it, it energizes me, it makes me feel good. That's how you get A level players. Not somebody that's like, I'm good at it, but it's like a vampire sucked in my tongue.

[00:15:13] Jason: Yeah, I call that them being a personality fit. Like if they're the, they resonate, they're the right personality fit for it. If they're the right culture fit, they'll believe in you and be inspired and want to support you and work for you. And then there's the skill fit, which really is, do they have the intellectual capacity to develop the skill or do they already possess it?

[00:15:31] Right. Not everybody can have all three, you know, and if they can't have all three, they're not really going to be a great executive level team member that you can trust to think or make decisions. So then they become, maybe they could be people as process. Like they're like a robot, just do what I tell you to do.

[00:15:46] So, and this may be a perception. Is everybody is Assistantly, is it all Filipino hiring? Where is talent sourced from this?

[00:15:54] I guess my question.

[00:15:54] Laith: I got you. So externally, it's Philippines and Latin America, Argentina, Colombia, Mexico, and then the Philippines is our talent pool. I've also sourced from like Eastern Europe and different countries, but the Philippines and Latin America are typically the two talent pools in which we pick from.

[00:16:11] Jason: So one of the things I've noticed that's a challenge in the property management space for those that are listening, I think there's one of the things I've noticed is that it's really common for entrepreneurs to be miserable in their own businesses, have an entire team, and not have an assistant for themselves.

[00:16:28] And it's really mind boggling to me that they build an entire team around themselves and they don't support themselves and they don't have an assistant. So my usual recommendation is their first hire should probably be an assistant. It doubles their capacity immediately and allows them to be more effective at whatever they're doing.

[00:16:47] And so that's kind of that first little bridge. I think a lot need to build in order to get to the next levels. They just need an assistant. Maybe around 50 units or something, they need an assistant and that allows them to get to another level. And then the next major, the most important hire that any of these property managers that are visionaries or entrepreneurs could bring into their business would be an operator because this is kind of an opposite personality type to the business owner.

[00:17:13] Business owners like to create operational systems, but they don't like to run it. They don't like doing the details they don't like running the planning meetings or you know running the hiring system or building out process documentation. That's not usually the most fun For the entrepreneurs and it's usually that's all the stuff on their to do list that they've been avoiding for like months It's been on their to do list.

[00:17:35] I got to do this. I need to do this And what they really need is an operator or an operational person now It can be challenging to find good operators, especially when you're trying to You offshore and stuff like this because you're needing somebody that's a high level of intelligence. They're not going to be this person is process that's just going to follow a to do item list. They need to think they need to make decisions. Is this something that is possible through Assistantly or through offshoring? Is this something you've been able to do even in your own business?

[00:18:05] Laith: Yeah, I mean, I'd say our three highest requested positions are executive assistants, operators, and marketers, right?

[00:18:11] And that's typically what I see. And I say, don't get an EA confused with an operator. And I think a lot of people try to, like, kind of intertwine those roles. They're completely different. You know, so when somebody goes, well, I want an EA that has ops background. I'm like, no, what you need is an operator, and then you need, you know, you need an EA.

[00:18:25] So EA, then operator. That's how I recommend, very similar. Talking about the EA, and then I'll get into the operators. So. EA, by far, is the number one hire for you, because like you said, it opens up time capacity. It's funny, I've been pitching EAs for four years, it took me three years, I hired an EA not too long ago, even though that's like, you know, what I pitch.

[00:18:44] And I'm like, holy shit, dude. I go, I've been pitching this. Why haven't I had an EA? Oh man. I mean, like I've added to her plate for the last, who knows how long, but I mean, from like, if my email inbox every day is at zero, my calendar is always organized, you know, I have research on all my prospects.

[00:18:59] I have research on all my meetings before like all prepped ready to go before I get into for the day. All the follow ups for me when, you know, when I talk to a client and I'm trying to close a client on a strategy call, for example, they think it comes from me, it comes from Angie. I don't do any of that stuff.

[00:19:14] She creates the portal, she follows up with the client, she nurtures 'em, they close. I don't do anything. She, you know, engages with my LinkedIn for a couple hours a day. She helps with my post writing. She helps with the blogs. She helps with the case studies. She helps with the reviews. She's unbelievable.

[00:19:28] And these are all the things that I used to do on my plate, especially that like sales component of like client communication. Dude, that used to take me hours a day, like at least two to three hours a day. Like for me to free up two to three hours a day in my own capacity to go focus on strategy and vision, infinite ROI for me.

[00:19:44] Right. So like EAs, like, you know, email calendar management, you know, client prospect communication, CRM management, you know, obviously some light marketing, like light marketing tasks. And then also helping with your personal stuff. Like I go to a lot of conferences, I'm sure you do too. Masterminds, all that kind of jazz, like booking flights, itineraries, hotels, like, All that stuff's taken care of for me.

[00:20:05] I don't ever have to worry about it. I check in. I'm in like the first 10, like I check in right at the time. I'm like always in a good seat. I, you know, so that always works out super well. So like, those are just some things in EA can do.

[00:20:16] Jason: Yeah.

[00:20:17] Laith: That I think like number one hire for like both personal and business get like EA, it will change your life.

[00:20:22] It's a highest requested position, probably like in the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Australia at the moment is an EA. Like if you don't have an EA, I don't know how, like you're just doing everything on your own and then you're just going to throw it out.

[00:20:35] Jason: Yeah. I love not having to ever look at my email.

[00:20:39] It's like my favorite. I like email is the email and having to like calendars and checklists and like these things are the bane of my existence. I love building things, creating things and being able to like coach and support people. And so for me to be able to stay in my area of genius and not have to do the stuff that I don't enjoy, I think it, I think as business owners, we often make the mistake early in the entrepreneur journey of believing that because we're the business owner, we have to be miserable or we have to do certain things like, Oh, well, I'm the business owner.

[00:21:15] I have to do my own email or I have to do the accounting piece or I have to do sales or whatever it is you might not enjoy doing. And the reality is you don't have to do anything if you're king or queen of your business. You really don't have to do anything that you don't want to do If once you build the business up to a size where you can build an entire team around you But we usually build the wrong team because we're showing up consistently as the wrong person in the business

[00:21:42] Laith: Well, I always say, the bottleneck is you.

[00:21:44] If you really look at it you're the one, you know, you're the one controlling everything. I mean, like you're saying that I got to respond to emails. They don't have my tone of voice. You know how people are going to not think it's me. Really? What? Why is that? I mean, do you look a couple of responses?

[00:21:56] I mean, I even had my EA use Claude AI, she mapped, she got my tone dialed in. So if it's emails or blogs, or any of the social media posts, even my LinkedIn and comments and engagement, like people think it's me, she matched it through ai, like she's AI enhanced, like, and I have all that training I give to people on for EAs.

[00:22:15] Hey, you want your EA to sound like you? I have it like, here it is. Make it easy for you. Yeah. There's no there, there's no excuses there. Getting into operators, 'cause like that's like, well, okay, ea I get it, they're an assistant level, but like operators, that's a high level role. What does that look like in the Philippines or you know, Latin America?

[00:22:32] You can find a good operators, right? But again, operators are different than EAs in the fact we're like, they think of things very macro. They look at the business as a whole and see like where they can streamline things, where they can fill in gaps, where they can like stop the leaking of the holes. They love implementation of systems, implementation of processes, like they like to tweak that kind of stuff and especially property management, you can find really good, you know, operators, like even, I know, again, I'm going to use Appfolio as an example, or whatever, you know, there's a ton of tools out there like you should never be in your tools and platforms.

[00:23:04] You should have your operator managing the day to day tasks in your, you know, because that's the whole idea when you hire somebody in offices and manage those day to day things in your business so that you don't have to deal with it. If there's a fire should be your operator that, you know, it should be that type of person to like, Hey I'm taking care of this.

[00:23:19] I'm working on the day-to-day type of things. This is kind of high priority. This is medium priority, this is low priority. You know, because when you're operating, if you are operating your business, you are not growing your business 'cause you're the one operating it, right? Like, there's no way you can grow from 50 doors to a hundred doors to 300 doors.

[00:23:35] I talked to the guy in Baltimore who just, he's a property management client. But he just came on and he is like, dude, I'm at like 800, 900 doors. But I can't get past a thousand. And I'm like, why? And he goes, well, I'm like working like 18 hours a day. I'm like, why are you working 18 hours a day?

[00:23:50] Right? Because he's like, yeah, he's like, well, I'm pretty much the property management of a lot of these things. Yeah. And I'm like why don't you just hire somebody ? He's like naming the tasks, right? Of like, I'm like looking at it like, you know, pre qualifying leads and day to day operations with, you know, interactions with tenants and helping with the maintenance and responding to those maintenance tickets and scheduling the payments and, you know, all that kind of stuff. And I'm like, you're doing those for your clients? Why are you doing those for your clients?

[00:24:16] Jason: Yeah, that's like frontline level work. That's like the first exit to make in your business is to exit the frontline work.

[00:24:22] Yeah.

[00:24:22] Laith: 100 percent and I'm like, just have somebody like, and that's what I'm saying with the whole operator. Cause like an EA is for you, an operator for your business. That's the difference, right? Like that's, you know, EA for you, operator for your business. And if you have yourself taken care of and you have your business taken care of, are you telling me you don't have capacity to grow your doors and scale and, you know, get to the revenue targets?

[00:24:42] Like that's obviously like, once you have those two dialed in, you got time back, you know, you're looking at things, just you know, plugging in where you, you know, you need to, but it's not so much the day to day anymore, which is that's where you feel actually a sense of freedom.

[00:24:56] Jason: Yeah, no, I love it. I want all of my clients to get an EA. We surveyed them and we were really surprised how few of them have an assistant. I was like, this is what we teach, but it's hard for them to justify. And they also are their control freaks in the beginning. And it's difficult for them to trust.

[00:25:13] But once you have somebody that is a good culture fit, a good personality fit, a good skill fit, it's easy to start to let go of things, it's easy to start to trust. But before that, you shouldn't trust and that's the mistake, they've probably been burned, they brought in the wrong person and they tried to maybe trust and you can't, like, you're not, that's stupid, you're not supposed to trust people that you shouldn't trust.

[00:25:36] Laith: And it takes, I mean, look, like I'm a full, honest and transparent person. Like sometimes it takes a couple of people to find your unicorn, right? Like I always say, you go through a couple of donkeys and zebras to get to your unicorn, right? Like it happens like, you know, is your first hire, like when you, whether it's local or offshore going to be your ultimate 10 year hire? I don't know, maybe, you know, hopefully, but maybe not.

[00:25:56] And then you hire somebody else. Like I've been burned. Of course. Like I've hired you a Filipino and you've been burnt, but then you find like an Adam, and you're like, dude, this guy is like Lord and Savior to me. I can't function without this guy. And you have to go through the process, you know, because like, again, you being the bottleneck, if you don't just, you got to, it's like rep, you got to keep doing it until you find the right person.

[00:26:16] Then you, when you find the right person, you're like, this is it. We're going to grow. There's no way we don't.

[00:26:21] Jason: Yeah, absolutely. So, what should people know about, well, what can they, what should they expect to spend to have a really good operator? I mean in the U. S. you're looking at like 60 to 80k minimum, right?

[00:26:37] Minimum to have a decent operator by a year. What if they're using maybe Assistantly or going, you know, to these other countries, what? What's sort of the cost savings for those that are like, man, the operator sounds like a dream. How can I get one?

[00:26:51] Laith: Yeah. And it operator obviously depends on where you're located.

[00:26:53] Of course. Let's say like I even like you find an operator in California, you're spending like probably six figures you know, depending obviously where you're located, but like, you know, let's say the average is. Let's just give an example. 75 grand, right? You know, like with us, and it's that 75 grand, you got to take care of HR, payroll, taxes, benefits, typically.

[00:27:12] With us, you're typically spending between 30 to 36, 000 for the year. So it's pretty much half. And then we take care of all the HR, payroll, benefits. You don't have to worry about any of that stuff. Taxes, compliance, all that jazz. And then it's a write off for your business. It's like a software write off, which makes it even super attractive.

[00:27:28] So, the fact that we will source, really great candidates for you. We will help you obviously interview because I think that's super important. Like, again, like Jason mentioned, everybody has a different process. You want to ask them questions according to you and make sure it's the right fit.

[00:27:41] Then we will onboard you, but then we also manage them on a day to day as well. You know, making sure the clock in it. highest level, keeping them accountable. And we keep track of all that stuff on the backend. So that performance success on the talent side and the client side is, you know, part of our managed solution.

[00:27:55] You know, and if anything doesn't ever, you know, for example, you hire Kate, after eight months, you're like, Hey, you know, I want to try somebody else. It's we offer a free replacement guarantee. We can switch out people as easy in 48 hours as possible. So, The cost savings, it's half. That's why people do it.

[00:28:09] So, you know, even the guy from Baltimore, he goes, so you're telling me I can hire two people for the price of one?

[00:28:14] Jason: Yeah.

[00:28:14] Laith: I'm like yeah. You can hire essentially two virtual property managers for the price of one. That's exactly what I'm saying. And then I, and then we take care of all this stuff on our backend.

[00:28:22] And so now his team can double the way he wants to, and he still gets that stuff taken care of on his plate.

[00:28:28] Jason: Yeah. Very cool. All right. Well, Laith, awesome having you here. I think everybody listening should reach out to Assistantly if they don't have an assistant yet, and get an assistant. I think we have a special DoorGrow code or something's set up with you guys I believe that they can use. Let me see if I can find it here in our vendor database. But yeah, I've heard great things about you guys from others. And I think it's, you guys would be a great company for people to go with. Yeah, so our clients get a 10 percent recurring discount on their subscription if they use our links.

[00:29:03] So we'll make sure and throw that link out to the marketplace if people are looking for it. On our podcast episode, when we post this and yeah, and check out Assistantly. Well, what's the easiest way for people to get in touch with you besides that?

[00:29:17] Laith: Yeah, I mean, I mean, my email is Laith@assistantly.Com if you want to reach out to me. It's LAITH@assistantly.Com if you want to reach out to me directly. Otherwise, our website assistantly. com you can book a call. It typically gets routed to me or my team members. It's a great way for us to kind of have a good 30 minute strategy session where we're going to outline the role, the responsibilities.

[00:29:37] Take all your blame dump of like, this is making me frustrated. I don't want to do this. I need help with this. Like, we take all, like, just, you literally come. You don't got to come with anything. You come, you just vent, we take it, we organize it, and we say, hey, how does this look, you know, for the job description?

[00:29:51] According to the RDoc, essentially, right, template, how does this look? They go, great. And then, We can go head on accordingly. So we make it super easy for you. I mean, from you just brain dumping to us putting the JD to getting candidates to onboarding, like you sit back, relax, you take care of all that stuff off your plate.

[00:30:06] So, any way I can help, I'm just here to support.

[00:30:09] Jason: Awesome. All right, Laith, appreciate you coming and hanging out with us here on the DoorGrow show and excited to do more stuff with you in the future.

[00:30:17] Laith: Awesome, Jason. Appreciate you, my man.

[00:30:20] Jason: All right. So, if you are a property management entrepreneur and you're wanting to grow your business ,add doors, you're struggling with operational stuff, you want some systems and some processes and mechanisms and an operating system, planning, people, process systems installed in your business.by an operator, you want some help getting these things in place, reach out to us at DoorGrow. We can help you with that and then you can leverage, you know Assistantly to get the bodies get the people that can really make the difference but you need to give good people good systems and good training and this is stuff that we can help you with here DoorGrow supporting your operators, we've got a call just for operators that we do every friday and we have a call every Wednesday for BDMs.

[00:31:02] And this is how we're helping grow and scale companies rapidly. And if you want to be part of that rapid growth and be around other cool entrepreneurs talk to us about joining our mastermind and we'll see if you're the right fit for the group. So until next time, everybody to our mutual growth. Bye, everyone.

[00:31:17] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:31:44] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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As entrepreneurs, we have the ability to make a difference in the world and in those we serve by aligning our

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Ryan Pineda, real estate investing expert and author of The Wealthy Way to talk about real estate, business, and faith.

You’ll Learn [01:34] Getting Started in Entrepreneurship

[08:07] Faith and Business

[17:16] Having Impact as a Business Owner

[29:50] You are What You Consume

[45:35] Don’t Wait to do the Work

Tweetables  ”There's no more efficient business model for positively changing the world than business.”

“ When you start becoming process-driven more than results-driven, your life changes.”

“ We should expect things to be hard and worth it.”

“ You are what you consume in all areas of life.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: There's so much wisdom in there and if you can at least just be willing to extract wisdom wherever you can find it, then you're not an idiot And so at least start there, everybody listening, just look for wisdom, be a seeker of wisdom and look for the things that are better and higher.

[00:00:16] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:34] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:54] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:13] Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:17] So my guest today, I am honored to hang out with Ryan Pineda. Ryan, welcome to the show.

[00:01:22] Ryan: Hey, happy to be here. Good to see you.

[00:01:25] Jason: So Ryan, I'd love to kick things off by getting into your background of how you kind of got into this journey of entrepreneurship. But before we do that, your company's called Wealthy Investor, right?

[00:01:36] Yep. And you've worked with a lot of real estate investors. My target audience listening to the show are usually the vehicle or the support mechanism for a lot of investors. I think the audience would be interested in hearing a little bit about how you got kind of started into entrepreneurism first of all, and then maybe how you got into real estate.

[00:01:57] Ryan: Yeah, I'll give the quick story. You know, I never wanted to get into real estate or entrepreneurship. I was a baseball player growing up and that was all I wanted to do. I was grateful and thankful that I was able to actually do that. You know, I ended up getting drafted by the Oakland A's and got to play professional baseball for eight years.

[00:02:15] But, I didn't get paid much in the minor leagues. I never made it to the bigs. I was making 1200 bucks a month. And so I had to make money elsewhere. And that's what led me in entrepreneurship. You know, I got my real estate license in 2010. Yep. And, you know, so I've been in the game for about 15 years now.

[00:02:32] And, you know, I've seen a lot. You know, started as an agent and hated it. My mom was actually a property manager. I didn't tell you that. So, I watched her do that for a little bit while being an agent as well. So she was an agent herself, but you know, watching her, I had no desire to be an agent or do anything in real estate because when I got in in 2010, she had just lost everything.

[00:02:53] You know, and she's like, you need to get like a safe job. You need to get something that has a salary and a pension. That was literally her advice. Well, and I was like, yeah, maybe, I don't know. Hopefully this baseball thing works out. But while I'm playing, I can't get that. So I'm going to have to do something.

[00:03:11] So anyways, I become an agent. Hate it. Do it for a few years. Ended up getting into other weird things. I started flipping couches. I was a substitute teacher. I was just doing anything that could make a buck on the side. And then eventually that led to flipping houses in 2015.

[00:03:27] And that was when I, for the first time, started to make some real money. And yeah, I mean, by my third year, I had made, you know, I became a millionaire after year three, flipping houses. And it was just like, wow, this is crazy. And since then I flipped, you know, I think almost 600, 700 homes. And. You know, I've bought rentals.

[00:03:47] I own apartment buildings through our syndication. You know, we've coached people, like you said, with wealthy investor. We've coached thousands of students and held really big events. You know, I've started another subsidiary businesses for real estate investors. You know, we have a lead generation company called Lead Kitchen where we help them get leads for sellers.

[00:04:05] We have, you know, I had a tax firm, you know, I've kind of done almost everything you can imagine in the real estate world, but

[00:04:10] Jason: Yeah, that's a lot. So I'm curious you said your mom was a property manager and she gave you the advice It was kind of like maybe steer clear of this stuff.

[00:04:19] What does your mom think now about everything?

[00:04:22] Ryan: You know what? She's still always hyper cautious so, you know, I retired my parents in 2019 I bought him a house bought him all the cars and everything and my dad actually started working for me in 2018 as a project manager. So he would oversee a lot of our flips and even to this day, he still does it.

[00:04:42] Not cause he has to, because he's just like, well, if you're going to, you know, pay for us, I might as well like earn it, you know, and he just wants to support and whatever. So, You know, my dad understands the game. My mom though, obviously she's seen the results, but she's still always hyper cautious.

[00:04:57] And so, she doesn't think I need to get a job now, but she does think a lot of times the big risk I take, I shouldn't be taking.

[00:05:05] Jason: Yeah. Looking back, when do you see in hindsight that there were clues that you were maybe destined to be an entrepreneur? Maybe even doing baseball.

[00:05:16] Ryan: Yeah. I look back in hindsight, even as a kid and I was always buying and selling and thinking about money. Like I started an eBay account when I was like 12 years old. I remember. You know, buying stuff and bidding on stuff and getting good deals on eBay. And then I remember I was selling Pokemon cards and Yu Gi Oh cards, you know, in middle school and stuff.

[00:05:37] And it's just like, You know, the signs were always there. And then even I was always attracted to just making money myself. So like I was good at poker, you know, I won poker tournaments and I played online and I made money that way. And so in hindsight, it was always very clear. I was never going to have a job.

[00:05:53] Really the only true job I ever had was playing baseball. And even then it's like, yeah, there's not really a way to be an entrepreneur. I mean, you kind of are you're in charge of your career and how well you want to do and like how well you want to train and. And so, yeah, even in that sense, baseball is kind of in that same vein.

[00:06:12] Jason: Yeah. So I'm sure even to get as far as you got in baseball, there was a lot of drive involved and a lot of effort involved, even though there wasn't a lot of pay, it sounds like.

[00:06:25] Ryan: Yeah, I think yeah, for me, like, I had to learn how to like win, you know, at the end of the day, losing is not an option, right?

[00:06:33] It's a zero sum game in sports. One person wins, one person loses, you know, for the pitcher to succeed, you must get out. And so, dude, I'm like, I'm going to just figure out how to win. I'm competitive. And so I think competitiveness has always fueled me. It's different in business now because I understand the games that we play.

[00:06:52] It's like, you know, We both can have good podcasts. We both can win in business. You don't need to lose for me to win. But that doesn't mean I'm still not competitive.

[00:07:00] Jason: Sure. Yeah. I'm sure in the different industries that you have businesses that you focus on, you have competitors and you probably want to win.

[00:07:09] Ryan: I don't want to lose.

[00:07:11] Jason: Right. I want to be the best. I think that's true of most entrepreneurs. There's this drive or, this bite to win. You know, I remember early on, I think some of my first clues as to that I might be an entrepreneur is I was into music. And I remember in college, I was going around door to door pre selling CDs so that I could fund doing an album.

[00:07:31] And yet I still at the time was thinking I've got to get a degree to get some sort of job to rise the corporate ladder. And I had no clue that entrepreneurism was like a path at the time. So it's interesting and Entrepreneurism sort of found me In that I needed a way to not be doing a nine to five job to be able to take care of kids because I ended up as a single father right and divorced and like went through all this stuff.

[00:07:57] And so I was like, all right, what can I do? And so I sometimes joke that my kids turned me into an entrepreneur. It was just what needed to be done, but there were always clues before, right? So you know, one of the things that you've talked about a lot, I've noticed on your social media, on podcasts is you're very faith forward.

[00:08:15] Like you're very comfortable talking about your faith and like the things that kind of motivate you and drive you. And you're involved in some charitable sort of, you know, businesses or charitable entities or organizations as well. How does faith sort of play into all of this when it comes to business for you?

[00:08:33] Ryan: Well, you know, I grew up in the church. So, you know, for those who don't know, I'm a Christian. And you know, I grew up in a baptist church and you know, faith was always a part of my life. And I felt like for the most part, I did things the way God wanted me to. You know, I didn't really rebel and go crazy in college, got married young.

[00:08:51] You know, I've always tried to put God first and everything. And You know, I think in the last couple of years, God was just pushing me to get even more deep in faith and more bold and to really embrace the spiritual and supernatural side of faith because I was always a very theologically sound person.

[00:09:11] And you know, I've read the Bible many times, and, you know, I spent a lot of time, like I said, in church and serving and other things, but you just realize in everything in life, especially with faith, that there's so little that you actually know, and you know, as I've grown in my faith, I've learned to hear from God better.

[00:09:29] And tune out all the noise of everything else going out in life, right? I mean, there's so many distractions in life. There's your business, there's social media, there's your kids, your family, you know, the recession, the election, it's like distraction. I think that's Satan's biggest, yeah, that's Satan's biggest tool is to distract you from the truth.

[00:09:49] And so the truth was God wanted me to get more bold and to really use my platform for him, not for me. And, you know, with that, I became convicted to just really go all in because I mean, one thing I guess people would notice about my career too, is like, there's no really lukewarmness, you know, when I go all in on something.

[00:10:09] It's like, yo, if we're going to throw an event, it's going to be crazy. If we're going to start this, we're going on a blitz. And so I said, you know what, we need to start something for Christian entrepreneurs and Christian business people. And so, you know, I created Wealthy Kingdom last year and you know, we're a nonprofit and, you know, we have three goals.

[00:10:27] Well, I shouldn't say three goals. The one goal, the mission is to bring the kingdom to the marketplace. And what I mean by that is so many entrepreneurs just think it's the church's job to, you know, go get people saved and to go disciple people. And it's like, yeah, you know, just invite them to church on Sunday.

[00:10:44] It's like, no, our job, every Christian has this goal or mission. You know, Jesus tells us right before he left, he said that the mission here is you need to go make disciples of all nations. We all have that same mission. And it's like, it's not to make the most money. It's not to do the thing that you love.

[00:11:05] Like, Jesus never said do the thing that you love. Like that's another big lie that, you know, people have been told.

[00:11:12] Jason: Jesus didn't even do what he loved necessarily. Like to a degree, he said, I don't even do my own will. Yeah. He does the will of him who sent me. Right. He's like, I'm not even doing my own will.

[00:11:22] And so if that's a model, then maybe it's not about just selfishly doing our own will all the time.

[00:11:29] Ryan: Absolutely should not. Our will, as we grow should be more aligned with the father's will. And that's what sanctification is. So anyways, to, to long story short. God called us to go be disciples where we're at.

[00:11:42] We don't like, we need to go make disciples of all nations right now. That's in our job, in our career, in our business, at an event, whatever. And so I took that to heart. So we started you know, looking at everything that we currently do. And we said, well, let's do it for the King. And so I said, all right, well, let's get a kingdom based community.

[00:12:01] And so, you know, we started an online community because that's something we currently do in business. It's like, well, let's get one kingdom based. And so we have that it's completely free. Anyone can join it. Then I said, let's throw events. We throw a lot of events. Why are we not throwing kingdom events?

[00:12:14] And so we started throwing big events for the kingdom. And in fact, in my secular events, I just started throwing worship services and pastors in the middle of the event without even telling anyone. Because I'm like, look, this might be the only time they ever hear the good news in their entire life.

[00:12:31] And, you know, whatever they might like it, they might not like it, but I don't really care. They need to hear it. And so we started incorporating faith into our events. You know, and then the last thing was really just discipling the current believers because I'm all about the lost. I want to get the lost at the events.

[00:12:50] With our content, with our community, but also too, what about the people who are already saved? Well, we need to disciple them and make them better. And so we started running Bible studies all across the country. And I think we're close to a hundred, actually across the world right now, that meet every single week in people's offices, in their homes.

[00:13:07] And we all go through the same studies together in these Bible studies, across as a body. And it's really cool. So, yeah, we're trying to attack it from a lot of different angles.

[00:13:18] Jason: It's a lot to organize.

[00:13:20] Ryan: Oh, yeah. But here's the thing, right? It's weird because I just said, Hey, don't do your will. Do God's will.

[00:13:26] Right. But on the same hand, God gave us all talents, abilities and different life experiences. And so, you know, he calls us to use those to do his will and it's like all right god gave me a lot of influence online. Why am I not making videos and content, you know helping people understand what that means?

[00:13:47] God gave me the ability to throw massive events. We threw wealth con every quarter a thousand plus people every quarter for years. Why am I not throwing massive events for the kingdom? God gave me the ability to organize communities and groups and all these things. Why am I not organizing and using my administrative gifts to do that? And it's like it's all the same thing, and they're all the same gifts and they're all the same skill sets, but on one hand you're putting him first and on the other hand you're putting yourself first

[00:14:16] Jason: Yeah, I love the idea of you know positively impacting the world I think business a lot of people don't realize I think business really there's no more efficient business model for positively changing the world than business, right?

[00:14:31] I don't think charities don't function as well like businesses. There's an exchange of value And if there's value like behind it and there's a mission and a purpose behind it Then even the team members the employees everybody Are more lit up and excited and so business is a very efficient business model and you know, one of my past mentors, Alex Charfen, and he would say something to the effect of like entrepreneurs are the people that have changed the world throughout history.

[00:14:57] They're the people that kind of think differently. And you know, you mentioned the word disciple like several times and I love the scripture where it's like, how do you know who's a disciple, right? And it's by this shall men know, right? You're my disciple. If you have loved one towards another and I think you know this spreading this message of like sharing true principles Which I think is what makes scripture, right?

[00:15:20] It's that there's true principles that can be applied to things that are useful and I think a really good business book will have maybe one key principle it teaches, but then you take a book like the bible and it's just full of lots of different instances of principles that these levers that you can apply to various situations in your life or in decision making.

[00:15:39] And you know, that's always been sort of my purpose, I feel is to bring principles to people and to share principles of truth to others, because I feel like that's the easiest lever to impact people's mindset or change their lives is to bring some truth or light or some true principles that they can apply, especially if it's facilitating more love or more kindness.

[00:16:01] And there's so many different things different principles that apply in business in order to figure things out like related hiring related to you know running an efficient business

[00:16:11] Ryan: How do you know like a non profit is a business right? I mean, it's a non profit.

[00:16:15] Jason: Yeah, it is. It is a business. Yeah.

[00:16:17] Ryan: A church is a business technically based on its designation, Wealthy Kingdom is a business.

[00:16:22] It's a nonprofit, right? I mean, in many cases, well, I shouldn't say this because every nonprofit's different, but like for me, I make literally nothing from it. You know, I do it out of a, you know, I just want to do it. Now we have employees, we have staff, we have marketing, we have event costs, we got to pay for all this stuff.

[00:16:38] Right. And so we got to figure out, man, how do we use the resources we have in the best way possible? Well, it's the same thing we ask ourself every day in business. We have a limited amount of labor, a limited amount of capital, a limited amount of time. What do we do, you know, to make the most of it? So it's all the same.

[00:16:57] And I think too, right, you don't even have to have a nonprofit for this to be the example, right? This is just simply the idea of stewardship. You know, God talks a lot about stewardship and it's like, well. I've given y'all different varying degrees of talent. I've put y'all in different places. Y'all are going to be judged accordingly based on how you used your talent.

[00:17:16] And I think that, well, I know that 1, 000, and a lot of Christians don't realize this. A lot of Christians, so, for all the Christians on the show, this is going to hopefully convict you, okay? A lot of people think that when you get saved, that's the end of the journey. Yeah, when literally that is like they've arrived they're done.

[00:17:39] You just started! Great!

[00:17:41] Jason: Yeah.

[00:17:41] Ryan: Now guess what you your whole rest of your life now actually begins and so many people like, God tells us that hey, guess what? Once you're saved, you know, there's a new judgment now. Because before it was like, all right, what happens in eternity, right? You're going to be in heaven.

[00:17:58] You're going to be in hell. That's like the salvation question, but then there's this next question about judgment and stewardship and what you did with what he gave you because Somebody like myself and you will be judged more harshly than other christians and people are like, what does that mean?

[00:18:18] Well, it means that if he gave you more resource and he even says if you're a teacher and you cause other people to stumble, you are going to be judged significantly more harshly than others. And so I take that super serious because I'm like, all right, yeah, I'm saved. I'm not worried about that, but man, I better do everything in my power to be a great steward and to understand if I have influence and I'm teaching people, I know exactly what I'm saying.

[00:18:44] Jason: Yeah, it's much like the Parable of the Talents, you know, the worst was like to try and bury it and hide it, hide the money. The person that did the best with the money that he trusted with the most money, like, made twice as much money, like, he increased it significantly, right?

[00:19:00] Ryan: And he was also given the person's talent that, who buried his talent.

[00:19:04] Jason: Exactly. He's like, I'm going to take it away from you because you don't know how to use this or how to deal with it. And so I think there's a nice summation of business in that for us, like where much is given, much is required and yeah, I've got a little bit of an audience.

[00:19:18] You've got a little bit of an audience as well, right? We've got these audiences and people are listening, people pay attention to what we're doing And you know, we have a ripple effect. And I have a ripple effect through my clients who have a ripple effect through all the families that they support, the investors, the team members that they have. And that's significant and to me, that's exciting. Like, that's what motivates me to do what I do.

[00:19:43] That's inspiring. But yeah, I could see that some people would maybe it would convict them. Maybe they would feel maybe they feel a little ashamed if they thought about it, man, you know, the energy I'm putting out into the world and in the universe here, isn't the ripple that I really feel is the best ripple I could create.

[00:19:59] Ryan: Well, the other part, too, is obviously we have ripples here on Earth, but, you know, there are ripples for eternity based on our decisions for the people we help and everything else, and, you know, the Bible talks about how, you know, you store up your treasures in heaven, and if you read, you know, a lot of Christians also don't know this, they think that Heaven is this place where everybody's equal and, you know, we're all in the same thing.

[00:20:25] No, it's actually not like there's hierarchies in heaven there. Like it's clear when the disciples are talking to Jesus and they're like, man, dude, I want to sit on your right hand. He's like, you don't even know what you're asking for. And. you know, they're clearly trying to be in that inner circle after this too.

[00:20:43] And, you know, you could read all about it. There's hierarchy with demons. There's hierarchy with angels. Hierarchy is going to be in heaven. It's already there. And it's like, you know, you got a lot of investors on this podcast who are like, Oh man, I got to invest for the future. I got to get my net worth here.

[00:21:01] I got to get my cashflow here. I got to. And it's like, we're investing trying to build for the future of this life. And once you truly understand that this life is so short in the span of eternity, you start thinking very differently. And you're like, well, I would rather invest for eternity. And actually, we just read this book in our Wealthy Kingdom group.

[00:21:21] It's called Driven by Eternity by John Bevere. It's a great, one of the most convicting books I've ever read. But, he goes, alright. He's like, I learned this in math. Anything divided by infinity is infinity. And it's like, eternity is infinity, right? But if you were to try and even just, finitely say it with our brains, let's just say the next 24 hours, we're going to dictate the next thousand years of your reward here on earth, right?

[00:21:48] How you spent the next 24 hours would dictate what reward you got for the next thousand years. You'd be like, that's insane, right? That doesn't seem right. That, you know, this is going to be

[00:22:00] Jason: proportionately skewed. To this moment. Yeah, it's-

[00:22:04] Ryan: that's not even close to infinity.

[00:22:07] Jason: Yeah.

[00:22:08] Ryan: We spend 100 years here on this earth thinking we have all this time. In the scheme of infinity, it's worse than way where it could be 24 hours to 10, 000 years to a million years, a billion years. It's still not infinity. And yeah, people just don't, they don't think about it because it's so hard to grasp. But it's like I wish and this is why god has you know kind of got me more vocal about it.

[00:22:33] So we're talking about it now But it's like I want investors because I'm an investor right now, you know, like I'm always looking for the best investment I'm always looking for the best use of my time, but I want people to start thinking about man, Invest for eternity. That's way longer than this! Your retirement is way shorter than infinity and eternity.

[00:22:54] Jason: Though, could Jesus be a house flipper in the eternities? Because he says in my father's house, there's many mansions, right? And he said, I'm going to prepare something for you guys. And so I think what you're talking about is maybe we should be paying a little less attention maybe to just our real estate assets and our investing here and maybe do some heavenly real estate investing.

[00:23:17] Ryan: I'm being 1, 000, that's 1, 000 percent what I'm saying. And it's changed my mindset so much in the last year that I could care less about my net worth. I could care less about how many properties I own. I could care less about any of it. Because eternity is so much greater.

[00:23:36] Jason: So some people might be saying, Ryan, come on.

[00:23:38] You're wealthy now. You run Wealthy Investor. You've got money. So it's easy for you to say that. What would you say to the naysayers?

[00:23:46] Ryan: I would say that I've had a certain level of contentness, no matter how much money I had. I made 1200 bucks my entire 20s a month. Okay. So like, I understand what it is to have nothing.

[00:23:57] And you know, people always make an excuse, right? It's like, I got three kids and a wife, five, five and under, man, I got a special needs son. I spend a lot of time with my kids. And it's like, well, you know, that's cause you, everybody's default is that's cause you have money or this or that.

[00:24:14] It's like, no, all these things were built with nothing. They were all built simultaneously. It wasn't that, oh, this came after that. It's like, no, they were all built in the same construct. So people just need to realize it's just an excuse. It's a cop out. Right. And the other part too, is it's just a fact of not trusting what the Bible says.

[00:24:33] So if you're not Christian-

[00:24:34] Jason: which essentially is just not trusting God,

[00:24:37] Ryan: Yeah, and if you're not Christian and you don't believe it, that's one thing. But if you are a Christian, you cannot say that you are a Christian and then claim that. It is a lie. And it's like, if you read Matthew 6:33, seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, then everything else will be added to you.

[00:24:54] And so this is where it comes into play of like, if I'm seeking those eternal rewards, everything else will be added to me. Now, does that mean I'm going to be a hundred millionaire billionaire own all these prop-? No, but I do know I'm going to be just fine here on earth. Like, I don't have to worry about that.

[00:25:11] Like I'll be taken care of. It'll be added to me. So I just trust that promise.

[00:25:17] Jason: Yeah. I think I've always just trusted, even when money was tight, I've always trusted in my ability to figure things out and that God's going to take care of me. I just, I bought

[00:25:27] Ryan: money's been tight for me many times after I've been rich.

[00:25:30] Jason: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:25:31] Ryan: Like so many times every business owner every you know, Elon Musk, dude I mean the richest man in the world, right? This guy struggles with money like, you know Yeah, dude, he had to buy Twitter for 50 billion dollars he didn't have 50 billion dollars just laying around It was like the last hour to figure out how to go buy that thing. You know, they tell the story of how he invested all of his, like, 300 million he got from PayPal into Tesla and SpaceX and they were going to both go bankrupt and not make it.

[00:26:01] Yeah. So, you know, I guess it all just is, like, it comes back to this idea that people think that there's a certain amount of wealth that prevents you from, you know, ever having to work again. And that's not true. It's just not true. Like, it can all be taken from you instantly.

[00:26:16] Jason: So, here's a thought I have that I think might convict, as you say, you know, Christians or just other people that claim to believe in God.

[00:26:24] Is one thing I've noticed is you know, especially among, I guess, poor christians or people that have money issues is that I've noticed this action of cursing reality while claiming to love god. It's like oh well this sucks and this and they're kind of they're negative about everything showing up in reality and my favorite name for God in a lot of instances is reality because he says I am what is I am the truth he's the ultimate and reality always wins God always ultimately wins and I don't think it's fair for a christian to claim, I'm like so like faithful to god yet I'm going to curse my reality and complain about reality and complain about how everything is and complain about my family and my spouse and my job and the world and everything else. And there's such a difference I think in people that are at odds with reality which reality will always win. Reality doesn't lie reality is what is and those that are actually in alignment with reality, and align their will to god.

[00:27:29] What do you think of that?

[00:27:30] Ryan: Yeah, I mean look god has been here way before us and here's another thing. I tell people I'm just like, all right, look, you know Even if you're not a Christian, right? I think majority of people believe there is something after this life. People believe there is, you know, some supernatural thing.

[00:27:47] Most people would believe in the afterlife and whatever. And then, you know, almost everyone agrees there was nothing and then there was something right. And we would call this the creation of the world. But you know, my belief is, you know, It's based on the Bible, and the Bible tells us that there was a supernatural world well before this physical world you know, God talks about there was angels, there was all these things happening well before he created the earth, and the earth is going to pass away, and then, you know, You know, it's going to be back to how it was.

[00:28:16] And you know, it's like, and you know, there's going to be a new heaven, new earth, all these things, but my point with that is God was always, that's just the best he has always been. He will always will be. He will always like he's past, present, future. He's just all present. And you know, The other part I struggle with a lot of Christians is they just don't understand the power that they have.

[00:28:44] You know, they walk in weakness. And in reality, it's like, Do you realize, an axe, Jesus said or not an axe, but in the Gospels, and then it happened, an axe. He said, look it's good that I'm leaving you, because you're going to get something far better than just me being here with you physically. You're going to get the Helper, and then an axe, they receive the Holy Spirit, literally God living within them, inside of them.

[00:29:08] And it's like, you have literally the same God that has always been here, that created you, that created this world living inside of you, and you're worried? What would you ever be worried about? You know, just think like back to just metaphors, you know, would you ever be worried if like, you know financially if you had just like all this money just with you at all times?

[00:29:31] No, you wouldn't be worried financially. Would you be worried for your physical safety if you had the most elite killers as bodyguards around you at all times? No, you wouldn't be worried about your safety. You know, like, we have something so much better than all of those things, and we're worried.

[00:29:46] We think we can't do things. We don't trust.

[00:29:50] Jason: So this is a good question. Let's bring this back to entrepreneurism. How can people, maybe they don't believe in God, maybe they, they do, but how do they bring themselves, do you feel, and how do you do this? How do you bring yourself in alignment with this greater power for those that maybe can just believe that or towards the universe or the God that created it?

[00:30:12] How do we start to get ourselves in alignment? So we know we're on the right path.

[00:30:15] Ryan: Well, this doesn't apply to just God. But this is just everything in life, right? You are what you consume. So if I consume junk food and crap, then, you know, I'm going to be fat and my energy will suck and all those things, right?

[00:30:30] Or like for another example, right? If I consume the news all day, 24 seven, right? I'm probably going to be a very skeptical, not trusting person. I'm going to have biases, all these things. Yeah. If I consume entrepreneur content all day and I watch all these guys I'm probably just going to be thinking about making money 24 seven, right?

[00:30:48] You are what you consume in all areas of life and you know, you are the average of the five people you hang around with all of these things are a form of just what you consume And so if you want to become more like jesus you have to consume and get around people that are like Jesus. And so, you know, what does that look like?

[00:31:05] Well, it looks like reading your Bible every day. It looks like praying every day. It looks like hanging around, you know, other Christians who are walking the walk. It looks like going to church on Sundays. It looks like listening to sermons, listening to worship music. You know, you just have to immerse yourself in it and consume it. And that's how you're going to become more aligned. It's crazy because like, I'll tell you this, and this could sound extreme to people, but it's like, you start to realize the rest of the things in the world that are deception, right? It's like, I used to not think rap music and things were like bad.

[00:31:38] You know, I used to listen to gangster rap all the time, man. I love Tupac and all these guys. And then you start to just like, you know, they call me little Ryan. You know, you look, you listen to the lyrics, you know, from a different point of view and you're like, Oh my gosh, this is not good. This is crazy that I listened to this when I was a kid, I should not have been listening to this.

[00:31:59] Right. Because you start to get convicted if you watch porn, it's like you're going to start looking at your wife a different way because you're just you're consuming the wrong things. Yeah. Yeah, and even little things start to convict you too. It's like, for the first time ever, we didn't celebrate Halloween this year.

[00:32:15] Because I just became convicted that you know, its origins are demonic. And it's like, you just watch all of this stuff with it. And it's like, yeah, definitely none of this glorifies God. If it doesn't glorify God, why would I do it? You know? And it's like it glorifies demons and, you know, all of these dark things, it's like, that doesn't seem proper.

[00:32:39] Jason: Yeah, like, you know, it's kind of that balance of how to be in the world, but not of the world, right? Like Jesus was hanging out with publicans and sinners and he was around people, but he also wasn't like just doing everything that they were doing. And so, yeah, I think that's an interesting concept.

[00:32:53] I like, though, what you said about. And that wasn't even where my head was going, when I asked the question, but I love that you said like look at the people that you're choosing to be around. There's a consumption there and There's this book called the Dark Side of the Light Chasers it's by Debbie Ford and it's interesting because she talks about in it that we each have this golden side and we also have this dark side to us and the golden side Is the side of ourselves that we see reflected in others that we of the people that we look up to. And there's different people that kind of trigger that in us.

[00:33:25] Some people, for example, like look at Donald Trump, very polarizing figure. Some people look at him and are very triggered and their dark side is triggered. They see a narcissist, they see all these negative attributes and then there's some that look at him and they're like, Oh, he's an entrepreneur or he's strong or he's masculine or whatever.

[00:33:42] Right? And they look at the golden side. And I think what we see in other people and the people we choose to be around, we want to choose to be around people that we perceive as having a light. Somebody that has something that we want and attributes that we want to become more like. And I think choosing to do that, especially in choosing mentors, is important.

[00:34:01] Because you're going to ultimately become a little bit more like them. And that doesn't mean every mentor that I choose is, like, ahead of me in every key area of life. But if they're at least in the area a little bit ahead of me in success in the area I'm getting coaching from then I'm going to absorb that but I'm careful not to take on everything else and to be discerning and to use discernment.

[00:34:23] I think it's important like you said to be around people that you perceive as being a high caliber or people that you believe are moving towards greater light.

[00:34:33] Ryan: I agree with all of it.

[00:34:36] Jason: Love that. All right. So Ryan, what if somebody is listening to this and we talked a lot about like kind of faith, God, religion, stuff like this, and somebody who's like, okay, maybe I'm willing to entertain the idea that God exists.

[00:34:54] Maybe Jesus is somebody I should like figure out, what would you say is a good first step for those people?

[00:35:02] Ryan: Well, you know, obviously like the Bible is the truth, right? That's God's revelation to us. And so a lot of people are like, well, I don't even know where to start with the Bible. I would say step one buy a study Bible.

[00:35:13] So I would just go on Amazon. I would just, I would get an IV study Bible. It's very simple. So that way it has you know, just notes on the side for you to help you understand what it's saying and different questions. And so, you know, I have a study Bible right here. So this is, you know, maybe you can find this one on Amazon.

[00:35:31] This is called the Quest Study Bible. Now, this Bible is like 15 years old. So maybe this one, they don't make this one anymore. But actually, I know they do make a version of it. It's not called the Quest Study Bible anymore, but just look at the NIV Study Bible. And I would start in Matthew.

[00:35:44] That is the very beginning of the New Testament. I would just start in Matthew and read it all the way through. So, unlike other books where you start at the very beginning. You're going to start about two thirds of the way through in Matthew and just trust me, it'll make sense. So that would be step one.

[00:35:58] Step two, I would say, you know, obviously you want to get plugged into a local church. That, that's a lot harder for somebody who doesn't know anything. So here's what I would advise is join us at Wealthy Kingdom. So it's wealthykingdom.Com. Everything's free. You can be a part of the community and you can get plugged into a Bible study with other entrepreneurs in your area or virtually. So that's going to be your best place to really build connections because you're going to also be around other people who understand the actual life that you live right now. And they're open. We have lots of non believers in our Bible studies who are there to learn, man.

[00:36:34] They're like, look, I'm here to learn. I don't know. I don't believe. I don't even know what you believe, but I'm here to learn. And so we, we love those types of people. So I would, those would be the two steps I do because I don't know everybody here listening is listening to different things. So I don't know what local church you should go to or anything.

[00:36:52] So come join us virtually. And then you're probably going to meet people in Wealthy Kingdom that are in your area, especially the local Bible study. And they're going to know what local church for you to go to.

[00:37:02] Jason: Got it. You know, this is maybe a controversial hot take of, mine But I feel like a lot of people get so caught up in trying even among christians or non christians trying to prove whether the bible and everything in it is factual history or not It's like facts and data.

[00:37:19] They're trying to prove it and I think both sides miss sight of the most important elements, which is are there true principles that are applicable? Can you apply these things to your life? Are they useful tools? And I think that's the real measure of a principle, whether it's true or not, is you try it out.

[00:37:38] You test this, try this on in your life and see if the fruit is good. See if it gives you positive results. Does it give you positive results to believe these things? Or does it cause, you know, does it take you in the opposite direction? Do you feel like you're moving towards something higher? Or is it taking you backwards?

[00:37:57] Ryan: Yeah, there's biblical truth to that. You know, there was a reason Jesus performed miracles, you know, like a lot of people, a lot of people are like, well, why? Right? He could have just said all the things he said, hey, you know, don't steal. You know, follow the Ten Commandments. Love your neighbor.

[00:38:13] Everybody can agree with those things. But it's like, yo. I'm going to make this person the lord of my life, which he was asking them to do, to believe that he's the son of God, to believe and give their entire life to him. It's like, well, dude, you better show me something else if you want me to commit to that degree.

[00:38:31] And you know, that's why he performed signs and wonders to show them that, hey, look, I am the one. And You know, it's true, right? Like, that's why he did it. And that's why all of the disciples you know, were killed for preaching it well after he was gone, because they saw it, they believed, and they knew that the reward, you know, was going to be great eternally, right?

[00:38:52] Look, Jesus says it to Doubting Thomas too, when he returns, right? A lot of the disciples believe, they're like, Oh dude, like he's back. And then Thomas is like, I ain't believing until I see him. Until I see the holes in his body. And so Jesus comes back and he's like, Look, Thomas, feel the hole, right?

[00:39:08] Shows him the hole in his hands. And he's like, blessed are those who believe without seeing.

[00:39:12] Their faith is stronger, but still, it's all good that you needed to see to believe. Like, it's all good. And so. There are going to be people who listen to this and they're like, I believe all this makes sense.

[00:39:26] And then there are going to be those who say no, I need to see the fruit. I need to see why I should believe. And in fact, I still believe miracles happen today. I've seen them with my own hands. I've prayed for miracles that cannot be explained other than they were miraculous. And you know, with that, it's like both happen.

[00:39:43] Jason: I think that I think if we're really created in the image of God,. Then I think that is a clue that we might be a lot more powerful than we realize and you know there's even evidence that the placebo effect is getting stronger as time goes on. So like as they do drug testing and stuff like this drugs have to pass a certain test that they're stronger than placebo. The challenge is drugs are having a harder and harder time showing that they're stronger than placebo because the placebo effect is actually getting stronger. And I think that humanity worked our consciousness is raising a bit.

[00:40:19] I think that people are realizing that we are creators, that we are more powerful than we give ourselves credit. And, you know, Jesus says, if you have faith, like a grain of a mustard seed, you could like move a mountain or something. Right. And so I think that I think there is something to, you know, this idea that we can create this positive future or alter our reality or alter things real time, like people's physical health or blessing people or different things. I do think that miracles can occur and there's evidence of it happening all the time. And I think in religion, see, I grew up Mormon. And I'm a very ultra conservative.

[00:41:00] I was a Mormon missionary for two years and then eventually left it. I didn't even try alcohol until I was over 30. And I'm the only one in my family that, that left. I'm the black sheep and I'm the oldest of five boys. So, sorry mom, sorry dad.

[00:41:14] Ryan: I'm not happy with you.

[00:41:15] Jason: They still love me, but I think one of the things that I, and I'm grateful for all that I learned, like we, we did, I did a lot of religious study growing up and I was the one that just kept digging until I took my way out of it, I guess.

[00:41:26] Ryan: Mormon apologetics is a tough thing to defend.

[00:41:30] Jason: Yeah. So I think you know, there's a lot of people think that they need to sell some sort of gospel or good news of, Jesus or the christian church by convincing people their life is going to suddenly be magical or better and that's not always true, and I don't think that's the whole point is that you don't magically make everything about your external circumstances in your life better, but I think being more in alignment with god and being more connected allows you this greater strength to weather what's happening.

[00:42:02] I mean if you look at what happened to Peter or any of the apostles, like they suffered horrible deaths. I don't know that their life magically became more amazing because they followed Jesus, but they had that conviction and they knew truth. And I think in a lot of instances, becoming Christian or believing in Jesus or following his principles may make your life in some instances, more challenging, you know, maybe there's more fiery darts thrown at you by the adversary, for example, but I do believe that there's some sort of there's some sort of power and confidence that comes with knowing that your personal life and will is in alignment with God wants for you.

[00:42:45] Like you're following that calling and that knowing within, and there's a strength that comes from that, that nobody else can shake. It doesn't matter like what your parents are saying to you. It doesn't matter what your spouse maybe is concerned about. It doesn't matter if you know, you're doing what is right, then you're willing to just let the consequences follow.

[00:43:03] And that's different than just looking for this better life or a mansion here on earth instead of a mansion in heaven.

[00:43:10] Ryan: Yeah, and you know, Jesus said hey you got to pick up your cross and follow me. It's like picking up your cross literally means dying to your old self and giving your all to Jesus And you know somebody's like oh, but like I got to say bye and to my dad and I gotta bury and he's no.

[00:43:27] No, this has nothing to do with your current family. This is about you and me You know, whether or not you're going to follow. And you know, I've met many Mormon, ex Mormons, Jews, Muslims, people who have given their life to Jesus. And you know, it's tough because there's so many family dynamics that go on to it.

[00:43:46] And it's like, it ain't easy. And I feel for those people, cause that, that's very hard. But I also am a believer that, you know, through your faith and through, you know, those who make that commitment, they have the chance to impact their families. So much more and they can be sanctified through them.

[00:44:02] Jason: Yeah, I mean I had a meeting with the mastermind this morning and we were talking about distractions And we were all these they're all men and we're all sharing like what's distracting us and what's holding us you know back from the things we should be doing and you know and I was thinking about you know, just how can I be a better father?

[00:44:21] How can I be a better partner, a better spouse? How can it be a better business leader? And at the stage I'm at now, it's just more discipline. It's less distractions. And it's all like cutting out all of the fat and the little things that are so easily taking us. And that's kind of what you led us into here in the beginning.

[00:44:39] You know, what do you, what would you say to those that are just, they're trying to run their business, they're dealing with a lot of distractions, which is common for entrepreneurs. We see shiny objects everywhere. How do they get focused and how they start, how did they start listening to that inner voice that connects them with the divine so they can start making the right moves?

[00:45:00] Ryan: Well, I think it's very simple, right? You just make God the focus. You just have to trust that if you make him the focus. Everything else will fall into place. And then it goes back to Matthew 6, 33, seek first the kingdom and his righteousness and everything else will be added to you. And that's faith.

[00:45:18] That's faith in a nutshell, because you'll be like, well, don't understand the fires that I have, Ryan. You don't understand the drama and the problems. My kids are doing this, my relationship with my wife sucks. Like I got to focus over there in order to fix. You know, well, before I can go worry about God.

[00:45:35] I mean, that's like the biggest thing I hear all the time too. It's like, well, I. Once I get my life right, then I'll start going to church. I'm like, no, you can't get your life right. That's why Jesus paid the price, because you can't. It's the same funny thing I hear when people are like-

[00:45:49] Jason: it's like saying once I get abs, I'll stop eating candy bars.

[00:45:53] Ryan: Yeah, well, I was going to use a health example too where I hear this actually from people because I was in sports for so long Hey, I'm going to get in shape first, then I'm going to go get a trainer and start you know, because I'm not ready to go train with them like, that's too hard. I got to like get in shape first and I'm like, dude.

[00:46:09] No, that's why you need a trainer like no, And yeah, it's the same thing with faith. It's like if you follow god and you seek his ways I mean just like you've been saying from a practical standpoint. If you follow what the Bible says, your relationship with your wife will get better. Like, you're just going to be a better leader, you're going to serve her, you're going to be different.

[00:46:27] Your relationship with your kids will get better. The relationship with your employees will get better. The way you act in business will be better. You know? And it doesn't mean that it's going to be easy. I didn't say it was going to be easy. I just said, it's going to get better. And you know, I've had, yeah. And I had, I've had so many difficult situations in business, you know, lost millions, investors pissed, customers pissed, lawsuits.

[00:46:53] I've dealt with everything you could imagine in business. And guess what? Every time I've been able to get through it and it's because of my faith and I didn't know how I would get through it. I didn't know what the outcome would be. I didn't know how I would solve it. But I can tell you I slept pretty good throughout all of it because I just knew God would take care of it some way somehow.

[00:47:16] Jason: You knew it would be figured out and you felt like you had somebody on your side that's pretty powerful.

[00:47:21] Ryan: I mean, God promises to be on my side.

[00:47:23] Jason: Yeah.

[00:47:24] Ryan: You know, Romans 8, 28 says that, you know, he works all things for my good, for those who believe.

[00:47:30] Jason: Even the tough stuff.

[00:47:32] Ryan: All things, not some things.

[00:47:34] Jason: Whom God loves, he chastens. Despise not the chastening of the Lord, right? So may not necessarily be easy, but yeah, it'll be worth it.

[00:47:41] Ryan: Don't expect anything to be easy.

[00:47:43] Jason: Right. I think we go into it, we should expect things to be hard and worth it. And I think when we're, it's kind of like the old stoic adage, you know, hard choices, easy life.

[00:47:53] Easy choices, hard life. We all know people that they're focused on ease. They're focused on trying to have comfort They're focused on how do I how do I avoid doing stuff? I just want to relax. I just want my weekend I just want time and I think as i've grown into adulthood and you know focus more on stepping more into my masculinity.

[00:48:13] I've realized that you know, nobody's coming to save us, except maybe Jesus, right? Nobody's coming to do it for us. There's a level of work that's expected and we need to get beyond always seeking comfort because comfort is a deceptive and alluring sort of drug and we need to be willing to put in the work put in the effort and focus and put in that discipline and then life gets a lot easier overall Like life gets a lot better overall when we're disciplined. Disciplined people don't cheat on their spouses.

[00:48:47] Disciplined people like, you know, take care of their kids and spend time with them on the weekend. Disciplined people you know, focus and take care of their health so they have less health issues. They're putting their own oxygen mask on first, so to speak, so they can take care of others, right?

[00:49:02] And that's it. That's discipline. And I think that's important. Well, Ryan we're about out of time. I really appreciate you coming on the show. This has been I think inspiring conversation. It's got my brain sort of running in a bunch of different directions thinking about, you know, how can I be better and how can I evolve as a human?

[00:49:19] What would you like to say in your final words to those listening to this podcast and maybe how they can get in touch with you or your various businesses.

[00:49:30] Ryan: Yeah, I think you know, as far as getting in touch with me, that's easy. You can just go on social media, search Ryan Pineda, wherever.

[00:49:37] So that part's easy. I would say the final thing to leave him with, I mean, we've talked a lot about faith and eternity and everything else. And that's usually the final thing I leave on podcasts because I don't depending on where the conversation goes, right? You know, I'll always draw it back to faith.

[00:49:51] So I would just say that, man, I mean, like, look there's a common theme for what we're saying. It's like, life's going to be hard one way or the other, you know, you're going to go through tough times. You are going to have uncertainty. You're not going to know if things are going to work out or not the way that you're hoping.

[00:50:08] You know, One thing I know for sure is, and this will apply for both ways, not just faith, but also business and faith. When you start becoming process driven more than results driven, your life changes. Because you're never going to be up and down with the result. You're always just trusting the process.

[00:50:28] And so, you know, baseball, we had to learn this every day. It's like, I don't know who's pitching tomorrow. I don't know. Like, I just got to trust my routine, my process, and then I'm doing the right things every day. And if I follow that, I know I'm going to get the best result that I possibly can get. In the long run, and I think you were referencing that when it comes to, Hey, you know what?

[00:50:46] Even if you don't believe these biblical principles are going to change your life, that's a form of trusting the process. And if you do, you know, you'll end up getting better results just overall, whether you believe or not, and you just follow that process. And then, you know, I would say even to take it a step further, it's like, man, if you trust that he is the creator of this world and he has promised to take care of you then that's a process to choose to have faith and trust that's the case, to trust that his plan is better than your plan. And it's not easy because we all want control. We all want certainty. That's, you know, that's our human nature.

[00:51:21] That's why we're trying to get financially free. That's why we're trying to you know, get enough cash flow and I teach on these things like I get it. But there's a better plan. And you know, if you just trust the process every day of following him, he will make your path straight, you know? And so I've seen that in my own life.

[00:51:42] I'll tell you this. I never thought I'd be a podcaster, an events guy, a social media guy. I never thought that was going to be the thing, but. I felt like God was calling me down that path, and here we are. And I don't know where he's going to call me the next 10 years. I don't have a 10 year plan. I don't have any of that, and I don't care.

[00:51:59] All I'm trying to do is whatever God's calling me to do at this moment, and I want to be flexible to his will, and be very careful not to just insert my will. And that's it, right?

[00:52:10] Jason: Yeah, appreciate it. You know, appreciate you coming on the show. I think, I agree. I think you know, even if you, For some reason don't want to be christian you don't you don't you're opposed for some reason.

[00:52:23] Some people are just like opposed to the bible, just look at the bible through the lens of what are the principles that have made this book one of the greatest books of all time? Why has it stood out? Why has it stood the test of time? Why do so many people look to it for wisdom and for insight? There's so much wisdom in there and if you can at least just be willing to extract wisdom wherever you can find it, then you're not an idiot And so at least start there, everybody listening, just look for wisdom, be a seeker of wisdom and look for the things that are better and higher.

[00:52:53] And that's going to eventually lead you to better and higher things and help you to weather the storm. And you can tell Ryan has, you know, he has this confidence that comes from knowing it's not all reliant on him. He trusts that there's something greater than him that's going to give him a source of power or ideas or decision making or guide his paths and to not have that for those of you listening must be terrifying. It must feel a little bit scary to just not have nothing else above you to reach up to. And so there is a god. There's somebody reach up to, go ahead and test it out.

[00:53:29] My way of aligning towards God is to sit, read things that I feel like lead me closer to something better and higher. That could be scripture, whatever, or to meditate on something, but then to think, how can I align my will with that? What is that voice inside? What is that calling telling me to do and take those actions and do it.

[00:53:47] If you don't take those actions, listen to it, that voice will get quieter. But if you start to listen to that voice and take those actions, it's going to get more and more clear to the point where you have that confidence to go out and make decisions. So I think that's a good ending note here.

[00:54:01] So Ryan this is a very different podcast episode than we've ever done here on the DoorGrow show. So there we go. I like it. The most impactful one though. I appreciate you inspiring us to get into faith and chat about that. All right. And And that'll be it for today's show until next time everybody to our mutual growth If you are struggling within your property management business to figure out how to figure out what you need to do next in your business operationally or how to add doors, reach out to us. We'd love to support you. Check us out at doorgrow. com and that's it. Bye everyone.

[00:54:33] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:54:59] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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Many of our property management business owner clients are focused on hiring or restructuring their teams right now.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss the most important parts of the hiring process and offer a little bit of “tough love.”

You’ll Learn [04:39] 1. Finding the right person for the role

[11:04] 2. The importance of training your new hire

[24:41] 3. Implementing accountability for your team

[30:20] Review: what does the initial training period look like?

Tweetables “We need to be clear on what results we're expecting.”

“Any ambiguity or fuzziness, then you're going to get fuzzy outcomes.”

“You cannot ever hire somebody and just say, "now my problems are solved." They're not solved yet.”

“If you skip onboarding or if you don't have a very solid onboarding and training process, it's going to cause just so much friction.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: You cannot ever hire somebody and just say, "now my problems are solved." They're not solved yet.

[00:00:09] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently than you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners, and their businesses.

[00:00:53] We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:11] Sarah: All right.

[00:01:11] Let's do it. Before we do anything, we have an announcement for those of you that have not yet heard. Our foster dog Hans has been officially adopted. So we didn't do a podcast since he was adopted. So this is our first podcast that we don't have Hans kind of hanging out in the background. And I miss his little face, but he has an amazing family.

[00:01:32] Jason: I miss Hans. I don't-

[00:01:35] Sarah: love him so much.

[00:01:37] Jason: I don't miss him chewing my stuff in my office, but I do miss his little face as well. All right. Yes. Yeah, so he's adopted All right So the topic today and if you want to check that out, you can go to doorgrow.Com right at the top. There's dogs click on that see all our stories. Maynard got adopted.

[00:01:55] Sarah: Maynard is adopted. Yeah, he now lives in California.

[00:01:59] Jason: This dog was like on death's door multiple times. Well, many times. Now he's living it up with a wealthy dude.

[00:02:06] Sarah: Who just fell in love with him.

[00:02:07] Jason: Guy in California.

[00:02:08] Sarah: Maynard just captured his heart, loved him so much and wanted to provide him an amazing life, so.

[00:02:15] Jason: He's got a new name.

[00:02:16] Sarah: He's Bodhi.

[00:02:17] Jason: Bodhi.

[00:02:18] Sarah: Bodhi. So he's now driving around in a convertible in California. That's one of the pictures they put on there. Oh!

[00:02:25] Jason: All right. So

[00:02:25] Sarah: Maynard has a great life now, too.

[00:02:27] Jason: So you can check that out at doorgrow.com/dogs. All right. So our topic today that we're going to be chatting about you said that it came up a few times in You know this week with some of our clients dealing with some new team members We've got we're doing helping a lot of people with hiring right now.

[00:02:45] Sarah: Oh my goodness so many. I built so many DoorGrow Hiring accounts in the last week.

[00:02:49] Jason: Yeah, so we're setting up this hiring mechanism and machine and system so that people can have some consistently good hires. But that brings us to kind of the next challenge. So what have you been hearing?

[00:03:00] Sarah: Okay, so one client asked me, he's about to hire.

[00:03:05] He's going through the hiring process. So he doesn't have anybody lined up yet, but he's It's about to start this whole process. And he had asked me, "Hey, what about expectations for when they start when they come on?" And specifically this is a BDM. The second instance of this happening this week is a client who has already hired and his BDM is now about 60 days in.

[00:03:31] And he sent me a message yesterday and he said, "Hey, listen, I really need to talk with you before the end of the month. I need to make a decision on my team." So I said, okay, let's. Let's figure out what's going on? And he said "yeah, I'm kind of pissed because my BDM is like 60 days in, and last month he didn't do anything at all. And then this month he started like he hasn't closed anything yet," and by he didn't do anything at all, what he means is he didn't close anything.

[00:04:00] Jason: Okay. Not that he wasn't working. No deals yet.

[00:04:01] Sarah: Yeah. Okay. Not that he wasn't working. He was working. And this month now is his 60 day mark and he hasn't closed anything, but he's, you know, making calls and he's starting to, you know, get some things kind of ready and warmed up in the pipeline.

[00:04:16] He, he said, "man, should I just let him go? Like, is he just not the right person? I feel like it's 60 days, like, I should see some results at this point."

[00:04:26] Jason: Okay.

[00:04:26] Sarah: So I'd like to, I'd really like to talk about that. And this is going to be, whatever episode this is "Sarah's Tough Love episode." So here it is.

[00:04:35] Jason: Got it. Okay, I mean, let's get the basic stuff out of the way, right? First, we need to know that we have the right person. So, we need to know what those expectations are. So, that's where we define that. Usually, we call them R docs, but in this ultimate job description. So, we need to be clear on what we're looking for.

[00:04:51] We need to be clear on what results we're expecting. We need to be clear on, you know, what outcomes we're hoping for and they need to be clear on this, right? Like if we're bringing somebody in, they need that clarity. So if there's anyone listening and there's any ambiguity or fuzziness, then you're going to get fuzzy outcomes.

[00:05:09] And those aren't good, right? And so there needs to be at least, and you need to be on the same page. Literally, the way we do that is with a page called an RDoc. And so you make sure you're on the same page. And all those young Gen Z people, notice how I used the word literally, correctly like it's an actual page.

[00:05:28] Sarah: I was just thinking that.

[00:05:29] Jason: Stop saying the word literally. It drives me fucking nuts. So, all right.

[00:05:33] Sarah: Literally.

[00:05:34] Jason: I literally, like if, yeah, nobody's confused about it being figurative, then don't, you don't need to say the word.

[00:05:41] Sarah: I literally died yesterday when I read that text.

[00:05:43] Jason: No, you would be dead.

[00:05:45] You would actually be dead. All right. So, Now the next piece is we need to make sure we've got a person that fits that job description, right? They actually are the right personality. Well, let's talk about the three fits real quick. They have to match all three or they're not going to be a good BDM.

[00:06:01] Sarah: Or it's never going to work out. And it doesn't matter if it's a BDM, an operator, a property manager, an assistant, a maintenance coordinator. It doesn't, name the role, doesn't matter.

[00:06:10] Jason: So, first, they have to be the right personality for the job or they'll never be great at it. They'll never be motivated to do it.

[00:06:18] You bring in somebody to be a BDM, for example, and they're not the right personality to go out and want to talk to people and connect with people and network and that's not fun for them, they're always going to resist it. They're going to avoid it. They're going to do a bunch of time wasting stupid activities They're going to train everything else other than what really should be done, which is to go connect with people and have conversations. So they're going to be like "well I'm trying some marketing thing and i'm trying this thing and like and-"

[00:06:47] Sarah: "I sent 5,000 emails I don't know why none of them came back."

[00:06:51] Jason: "We did direct mail to, like, 7,000 owners."

[00:06:56] Sarah: I've heard that and it's because this is a true example. "I sent 5,000 emails."

[00:07:00] Jason: Yeah.

[00:07:01] Sarah: So essentially you did nothing. That's great. Right. Good to know.

[00:07:05] Jason: Yeah.

[00:07:05] Sarah: Thank you.

[00:07:06] Jason: Lots of emails, right? So. So,

[00:07:09] Sarah: you know how many junk emails we get in a day? What happens when you get junk email?

[00:07:13] Do you open it? Do you read it? Do you respond to it? No. That's what you just did to somebody else.

[00:07:19] Jason: Yeah. It lacks depth. All right. So we can get into tactics later, but they need to match the personality for the role. Which means they would love succeeding at this. They would love doing it. They would enjoy it.

[00:07:32] They get some fulfillment out of it. And so that's personality fit. They need to be the right the right culture fit, which means they need to actually believe in your business and in you and in the product. They have to believe in this. You cannot sell effectively if you lack belief. And that goes for everybody on the team.

[00:07:53] Like, if your operator isn't a believer in you or the business, they're not going to want or care to make sure that it runs well for you. If your executive assistant isn't, you know, a believer in you or shares your values, they're never going to do things in a way that makes you feel safe or that you trust them.

[00:08:09] Cultural fit means they do it the way that you would want it done, that they share your values. The big clue we talked about this at our last jumpstart event where we had clients and somebody had a team member. And I just asked, I said, well, do you feel better when they're around?

[00:08:25] Do you feel calmer when they're around? And they were like, no, I'm like, yeah, then they got to go.

[00:08:30] Sarah: He said, oh, well, a lot of our communication we do over the phone because that's better.

[00:08:36] Jason: Because there's such a high degree of conflict.

[00:08:37] Sarah: Jason says, better than what? Awful?

[00:08:40] Jason: Yeah, and then he laughed.

[00:08:41] Everybody laughed in the group and he was like, well, yeah.

[00:08:44] Sarah: Well, I can't talk to this person in person. I can't be around them. Because when we're around each other, there's too much conflict. It's just too, it gets, yeah, it gets too feisty. Well, that's not good.

[00:08:55] Jason: Yeah, that means that person's not a good fit for that person for that particular client.

[00:09:00] Sarah: And let's be clear. It doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with this particular person. No, it doesn't make them a bad person It doesn't mean, you know, all the they'll never succeed No, it just means that they are better suited in a different environment That's all. It means not everybody like when you're dating, you don't want to date everybody. You want to date people that you like generally and there are certain people that you like and there are certain people that you just don't mesh well. The businesses work the same way.

[00:09:31] Jason: Yeah. They've got to match your values. Because regardless you get somebody that's amazing BDM, for example, or an amazing operator for your business, they don't share your values, you'll never trust them. Like you just can't. And then the third fit is skill fit. So they have to have the skill or the ability or the intellectual capacity to learn and develop this skill quickly. And so if they don't, then you'll invest a bunch of energy into trying to train them and they're just too stupid to get it.

[00:10:01] Or they just can't figure it out or maybe you hire somebody and they've got bad habits or they can't adapt. So they need to have that skill fit. They got to be all three or they're not going to be a good fit. So let's assume if we've helped them with DoorGrow Hiring, we focus on these three fits.

[00:10:18] We have a whole hiring mechanism. Make sure these generally go well.

[00:10:22] Sarah: Yeah. So I can tell you, I don't think that's any of those are the problem.

[00:10:26] Jason: This person. Yeah. So in these situations, the person is the right fit. Yeah, usually that's the problem is they're not even getting the right person.

[00:10:33] Most of y'all doing hiring, you're playing Russian roulette hiring and you don't have good fits.

[00:10:38] Sarah: Or it's, oh, this person had the experience and they came from such and such a Yeah, we hear that all the time.

[00:10:43] Jason: Yeah. Well, they're so experienced, and you feel uncomfortable around them and you don't trust them.

[00:10:50] Yeah. So let's assume that, you know, with our clients, we've helped them find people that match the three fits. So now we're past that hurdle, that's very typical for most people, well, now, if it's not them, then who is it?

[00:11:04] Sarah: Okay. So here's where the tough love comes is. This is always my question.

[00:11:08] And I'm very, very particular about what happens when you hire someone. You cannot ever hire somebody and just say, "now my problems are solved." They're not solved yet. I know it feels like you've gotten through it and now things are better and you should just be able to rely on that person. You're not there yet.

[00:11:33] You will be. But you're just not, you're getting closer. You're just not fully there yet. And this is what happens a lot of times and they go, "Oh, okay, so I know I need to train this person and then I'll probably train them for like a week or two and then they'll just be good."

[00:11:48] Absolutely not. So especially with a new person and it doesn't matter. Here's the other thing that I hear all the time, especially when somebody has the experience. Oh, well, you know, they have a sales background. They know how to sell. Great. They don't know how to sell for you. They don't know how to sell what you've got.

[00:12:05] They don't know how to sell your values and your mission. They don't know how to sell that yet. They don't quite know. So you can take any salesperson in the universe and plug them into your business. Do they have the skill? Yes. Do they have the experience? Of course, but they still have to be trained. So having the experience does not mean "Oh, I don't have to train them," or, "oh, I don't have to train them as much."

[00:12:32] You still have to train them a lot. There is a lot of training. And I hate to break it to you, but your life when you hire gets worse. So your life is bad, you know you need to hire, then you hire somebody, your life is now worse for a short period of time. The reason being is everything that you were doing, you still have to do it, and in addition, you now have to train somebody. So nothing has changed except that you just added another responsibility for yourself for the next 30 to 90 days. And there is no way around that with hiring. So if you hire and you fail the train, it is probably not going to work out. They will not get the results.

[00:13:16] They will be frustrated. You will be frustrated. And at some point, you will get back into the cycle of, "Oh, well, now I guess I have to hire again." And then you live in hell forever. And it's not a good place to be.

[00:13:31] Jason: Yeah, so unless you hire somebody that is an amazing 'who,' right? There's a book called Who Not How it's a great book.

[00:13:40] Unless you hire an amazing 'who,' like you bring in somebody, they're a sales trainer and an expert closer, and they've had tons of success and they can teach other people's sales, then I think, in any role, you have to assume you need an assumption that they're going to do it wrong. You have to start with that foundational assumption that they're going to do everything wrong.

[00:14:01] If I hired an operator cold, they're doing it wrong, that I need them to install my operational system. If they are coming in as a salesperson in the business, I know they've been trained poorly because most sales training out there doesn't work anymore. There's a new model and a new way of selling and all the old stuff.

[00:14:20] All the salesy guys that are sales trainers and sales coaches largely out there that push. Doesn't work anymore. It's outdated. And we don't push that stuff at DoorGrow. We've had to shift how we sell and we teach clients differently, even in the last year. And so my assumption is that they're going to do it wrong, but.

[00:14:40] What I do assume is if they've done it well before, they have the ability to learn it. They have the ability to be a good operator. They have the ability to be a good BDM. But there needs to, you can't assume because they have done it before, that you're just going to rely on them to do it.

[00:14:56] Sarah: It's not plug and play.

[00:14:58] "I hired them now they're just going to go do it and they're going to sell a bunch of stuff for me." No.

[00:15:02] Jason: Right. You're always going to be disappointed with most everybody if you come in with this assumption and they're going to feel unsupported and untrained and frustrated.

[00:15:13] Sarah: And they will inevitably either quit or get fired.

[00:15:16] Jason: Yeah, they'll go find a better situation.

[00:15:18] Sarah: No matter what, it will not work out. So here's a good moment to talk about Vendoroo.

[00:15:25] Jason: We'll talk in just a minute. We're going to talk about the onboarding and then some of the next steps that are really important. But quick word from our sponsor. If you're tired of the constant stress and hassle of maintenance coordination, meet Vendoroo, your AI driven in house maintenance expert that handles work orders from start to finish. Triaging, troubleshooting, vendor selection, and coordination built by property managers for property managers to provide cost effective and accountable maintenance operations, where every dollar is accounted for, and every task is handled with unmatched reliability Vendoroo takes care of the details so you can focus on growth. Schedule a demo today at vendoroo.ai/doorgrow and experience maintenance done right. Okay. So check them out.

[00:16:10] Sarah: Speaking of doing things right, let's talk about what happens after you hire somebody.

[00:16:15] Jason: So the next step after you hire it, it has to be onboarding. There needs to be a good transition of bringing somebody out from the wild, this untrained wild creature, getting them to be something that is going to work inside of your business and fit you and fit what you want.

[00:16:33] It's onboarding.

[00:16:34] Sarah: And if you skip onboarding or if you don't have a very solid onboarding and training process, it's going to cause just so much friction because I'm sure that you can think back to a previous job that you've had back when we all had job jobs, right? Have you ever just been hired and then kind of just, it's almost like train yourself or figure it out or, well, "I'm going to train you a little bit and then the rest is up to you. Well, what do you mean? I trained you for a whole day. Now I'm done."

[00:17:06] "Oh, okay. So that's it. That's all the support I'm going to get. All right."

[00:17:10] have you ever been hired and then you don't even truly know what you're supposed to do? I don't know. I'm supposed to sell stuff.

[00:17:16] Jason: So here's the challenge. Here's the challenge with this with entrepreneurs, I've been thrown into job situations where there was terrible onboarding, terrible training, but I'm an entrepreneur personality type.

[00:17:27] I then innovated, figured it out. And in some situations where at a job I then quickly was put into leadership and sort of managing others. But I had initiative. I had drive, like I had adaptability and I find entrepreneurs are incredibly adaptable and they make the mistake of assuming that everybody else is like them and they're not, they're like, "well, I would just figure it out and I would just ask enough questions. And if I didn't know something, I would just like, and so you can't assume that everybody is like you, if they were like you, they wouldn't work for you. How many of you would go work for somebody now? Like, you're unemployable. Like, let's be real. You would suck as an employee, probably, right? I'm unemployable at this point.

[00:18:10] I'm not going to like sit around and let somebody just tell me what to do all the time and whatever. Right. But they're not the same as you. And if they were, then they might just, you know, start a business and leave your business. Right. So they're willing, if they're willing to work for you, you need to assume that they are not the same as you and that they need to be guided. They need support. Now that doesn't mean they can't learn or they're not adaptable. That's the skill fit Don't make the assumption that they'll just wing it and figure it all out unless they're just incredibly driven and incredibly patient And they're really a strong believer in you.

[00:18:45] Some of them may do that, but you don't want to lose a good person simply because they feel like you don't care or you're not invested.

[00:18:52] Sarah: So this is There's so much time that goes into hiring and this is why I say don't waste the time that you've spent trying to find the right person and screening applications and interviewing and you put a whole bunch of time and probably effort into this and now you found the person, don't waste that opportunity.

[00:19:18] So you need to onboard them properly. And what does that mean? We need to make sure that they have access to all of the systems that they're going to need. And that they know all of the systems that they're going to need. So, oh, what are the tools that I use? And then, do I know how to access it? And, do I know how to use it?

[00:19:36] Right? Don't just assume that they'll figure out, Oh, well, this is how I use this phone system. Train them on it. Just show them that. So, there's got to be training for those sorts of things. If they're in sales, then, well, How do I sell? How do I reach people? What am I doing? Am I just doing the fit call, figuring that out?

[00:20:00] Am I doing the full pitch? Am I closing? Am I setting them up for you and then you're going to close? What exactly am I doing? So train them on every single thing that they need to know. And I know this sounds so silly, but most people do not do this. So, what do I say? What do I do? Do I have a script? Do I just make it up?

[00:20:22] Where do I find people? Am I in the office? Am I driving around? Am I, like, meeting people at events? What am I supposed to be doing all day? Because I'm brand new and I know nothing. So I'm completely reliant upon you to tell me what to do. So if they don't know, don't assume that they're just going to go and figure it out for you.

[00:20:44] You have to show them and they have to shadow you. So for the first 90 days, this is all training. So when you hire any person, now some of them will pick it up a little bit quicker and some of them will take the full 90 days and either way it's all right. But just in your head, tell yourself it's going to take the full 90 days, right?

[00:21:07] So in that 90 days. With any position, but especially in sales, don't expect them to come in and then just start selling. Oh, wow, they closed a bunch of deals. That was awesome. That's so cool. So there's kind of a ramp up period in every position, but certainly in sales. So shadowing is very important here.

[00:21:31] They need to be all over you. All the time. So you need to meet with them every day.

[00:21:40] Jason: Or whoever is the person they're learning from. Sometimes it's not going to be you, eventually. In the beginning, it's always you, right? Which leads us to, like, availability and access is huge in the beginning. Like, if a team member doesn't have access to you, or you are unavailable because you're so busy.

[00:21:58] They're going to feel stuck. They're going to feel unsupported. They're going to feel fearful in what they're doing. And so they need to have availability. This morning, I got a phone call. Like a call came in through Telegram. She called me and she's like, "Hey, I'm supposed to do a triage call right now? I have a scheduled appointment, and I'm trying to load Zoom and it's saying, it's waiting for the host. And I'm supposed to be the host." And I said, Then just call them, like pick up the phone, just call them. It's a quick call anyway, but it probably has to do with maybe you're not logged in or you click the link somewhere else and it doesn't realize you're logged in.

[00:22:31] It happens to me sometimes. And she said, okay, yeah, I'll just call them. You know, if she were in that situation, this is her first triage call and she's like totally stuck and I'm like unavailable and she's freaking out, then she's going to feel, you know, people go through all sorts of emotions like anger, shame, guilt, fear, like, you know, stuff like this. And so we don't want to put our team members on this emotional rollercoaster of discomfort when everything's uncertain in the beginning. So that's important. Once we get through and the onboarding period, my general rule for onboarding is 90 days, like you said, then the first the first 30, I'm usually meeting with them maybe for an hour a day and I'm highly available.

[00:23:12] Sarah: Every day.

[00:23:13] Jason: Yeah.

[00:23:14] Sarah: Every day.

[00:23:15] Jason: That's usually the goal. And then after that, I might the next month, maybe it's a shorter time period every day if I'm over like consistently training them like a BDM especially. But otherwise, it might be that we start backing it off to maybe meeting weekly. And then depending on the role of whether or not I'm their supervisor directly, or if they're kind of owning a piece of the business, I then might back it off in the last month or eventually for the future to meet with them monthly to support them or whatnot. Like you kind of gradually step it down and it'll be obvious because you'll be getting on calls with them and like, Hey, what else should we talk about? What else do you need to know? What other questions you have or hey, I want to make sure you know this and you're going to start to run out of ideas. And they're going to start to not need you as much. And so then it's pretty obvious. Well, okay, then I guess we'll end this early. And that's a clue. Well, maybe we don't need to meet as often now. And they'll let you know. You know, do you think we need to keep meeting all the time like this? Like, well, it is helpful, but I don't know that we need an hour, maybe 30 minutes. Okay, cool. If we could just meet 15 minutes each day so I can get unstuck on a few things. Awesome. Right. So I meet with my assistant every day for a short amount of time.

[00:24:26] But they're directly responsible to help and support me on things as an operator, like you run our weekly meeting and our daily huddles. Right? And so there's different things like there's sort of a cadence of structure, even regardless. So. I think after we get through onboarding and you've got good access, good availability, they feel supported and they're succeeding, they need to be getting results.

[00:24:50] So I think the next step in my mind is there needs to be accountability. So if you're letting somebody just run and it's 60 days in and they are not succeeding or getting results, like cool, how many calls has the BDM made? "I don't know." Okay. How, like, how often have you met with them? "Well, you know, not often." If there's no part of meeting with them is to create accountability.

[00:25:13] Like, Hey, what are you working on today? What do you feel like is next? What are you going to be doing? And to make sure that you're guiding them towards what they should be working on. So accountability means, you know, metrics if they're a bDM.

[00:25:26] Sarah: You need to know the metrics.

[00:25:28] Jason: How many networking events have they gone to in the last week?

[00:25:31] How many phone calls and outreach have they made to potential referral partners or real estate agents? How many investors have they reached out or called? Are they on top of all of the follow up tasks and deals that are in the CRM? Do you have a CRM, right? Like there needs to be accountability. So there's a record.

[00:25:50] Are they keeping notes? Are they, are the calls recorded? Can you listen to their calls to help them improve? Like if there's no transparency or accountability, there's almost no likelihood that they're going to succeed. Like it's because they're not being watched. So, basically, you're sending the signal, it doesn't matter.

[00:26:08] You might get somebody that's an amazing self starter.

[00:26:11] Sarah: Go figure it out. Well, shit, I don't know. I guess I'll just make it up. But then when they make a decision and now their decision is different than your decision, now, you didn't tell them what to do. They just made something up and now you're not happy with the results.

[00:26:28] Jason: Yeah, and they're lacking leadership and if they're lacking in your jobs to be the leader and they're lacking leadership, then they have no accountability and they have no, there's no transparency or visibility in what they're doing. You won't know. If what they're doing is working or not working. And so they'll just keep doing what's not working.

[00:26:48] Because if they still get paid either way, that's a bad situation for most team members. Most team members will continue to get paid whether or not they're really performing at an exceptional level or a decent level. And with a BDM, their compensation should be directly connected to getting results, so they should really want it.

[00:27:06] But if there's no accountability or transparency in the beginning, They're probably going to do a lot of stuff that isn't working and they're going to be frustrated and they

[00:27:15] Sarah: know why it's not working

[00:27:17] Jason: Yeah,

[00:27:18] Sarah: they'll come to you and say hey like I'm doing what you told me to do. You told me to make all these calls I mean all these calls. It's not working.

[00:27:26] Jason: And this is one of the ways in which DoorGrow can assist.

[00:27:29] We can assist with this, right? Like they can show up to our Wednesday coaching call if they're a BDM focusing on growth. And the BDM can come to the call and say, Hey, I'm trying to do this and I'm getting this result. It's not the outcome I'm looking for. It's not working. Cool. Maybe you need to change this.

[00:27:44] Or how are you saying it? Or what are you doing? Or could you send us a call recording? So all of these things that we teach, we know work. They can work. If it's not working, then it's obvious that it must be what they're doing. They're not doing it correct. They're doing it maybe in the wrong way or maybe they're not saying the right things or maybe their tone is off or maybe They are turning people off and they sound like a telemarketer or they're creating the sales ick or the sales resistance in people by how they're approaching people and these are easy changes These are little things that are very easy to tweak or change.

[00:28:22] I mean just listening to one sales call from somebody, I can give them a lot of feedback and it's like they grow so much faster and quicker. And that's one way to add some visibility or accountability into the equation. But as a business owner, you need to know their metrics. They need to have metrics and be accountable for that, right?

[00:28:40] They need to know what are the leading actions that I need to be taking that are going to get the business development results? What are the daily activities that I need to be doing in order to succeed? So that's my take

[00:28:53] Sarah: for sure. And I love listening to the call recordings because then sometimes when you're in the moment and this happens to all of us, sometimes when you're in the moment, you have a certain perception of how things went and then when you go back and you listen to it later, you'll catch something that you weren't aware of in that moment.

[00:29:14] So maybe it's something that they said, maybe it's something that you said, maybe you. Didn't explain something the way that they understood it, but you'll hear things that you may have missed in the moment and Especially with salespeople, this is a training opportunity. So a lot of times people go "what am I supposed to train them on? Like they know how to use the CRM? they know how to use the phone system. They know what to do. They got to just go do it." Okay? Well Are we honing in skills? Are we improving things? Or are we just saying like, "Go do it! Go make a thousand calls this week!: Okay, well, if I make a thousand shitty calls

[00:29:53] Jason: Yeah, you're just wasting energy and you're wasting your leads or your opportunities.

[00:29:58] Sarah: So there's always this fine tuning that we have to do. And very rarely are people able to do it for themselves. Sometimes they can go back and listen to a call recording and then go, Oh, you know what? I'm going to improve that. But a lot of times it's really good to have two people listening to the call recording for that reason.

[00:30:20] And then the last thing that I do want to talk about is what does the 30, 60, 90 day period look like? So I always tell people in their first 30 days, this is nothing but training. This is deep training, you really do need to be meeting with them every day, not when it's convenient, not when you have time, not, "oh, well, I skipped that day because this happened."

[00:30:42] Every single day, every day, they need to have the correct resources, the correct knowledge, the right support, the questions need to be answered, you need to be available to them. They need to have all of this because they're brand new. So a lot of times what happens is people hire somebody and it's like a little baby bird and then they push the baby bird out of the nest.

[00:31:08] The bird can't fly yet because you didn't even teach it what its wings are, right? So we can't do that yet. So in the first 30 days, really expect nothing. Really, they just need to be training. If they close something in their first 30 days, that's awesome. Great! I mean, they should be doing the activities.

[00:31:27] Jason: I expect work.

[00:31:28] Sarah: Yes,

[00:31:29] Jason: I expect to actually and work like if it's to make calls, I expect them in like a BDM should be making some outbound outreach and calls right away.

[00:31:39] Sarah: Absolutely.

[00:31:40] Jason: Otherwise, how are you going to know that

[00:31:41] Sarah: if it's going to, yeah,

[00:31:43] Jason: they shouldn't just be like, just learning. So it's like, I want to get them on the phone and get them making calls.

[00:31:47] Sarah: No, but in sales, let's be really clear here. Training. This is hands on training. This is like trying to say, "Hey, I need to go learn how to drive a car. But I'm never actually going to get in the car. I'm going to meet with you on Zoom or I'm going to sit with you and you're going to tell me about how to drive a car."

[00:32:03] No, honey, you gotta go get in the car. So, yes, you have to actually be doing it, doing the activities.

[00:32:09] That is training.

[00:32:10] Jason: There's no amount of manuals or videos you could read or watch that would teach you how to drive a car. You have to drive the car.

[00:32:17] Sarah: Yes. So, if they close something in their first 30 days, that's awesome, that's gravy, that's a bonus.

[00:32:23] But sometimes people go, "oh man, it's been 30 days and I haven't closed anything. Like, man, they must suck." They're new. They're learning so much and when you implement a new thing, you're probably not going to be very good at it. Especially a new strategy or a new way of doing sales because the way that we teach our clients to sell is different.

[00:32:43] It's different. We're not hardcore closing everybody. We're not doing that. So it's, everything is different. They don't have their bearings yet. They don't even have their footing and their foundations, right? So 30 days, if they close something, that's great. But I still, I want them to be training and I want them to be doing some sort of, you know, whatever it's going to be.

[00:33:04] If you have them doing events or presentations or calls or a mixture of all of them, great.

[00:33:10] Jason: There should be progress. You'll see progress. And if that's the thing you don't want to tolerate somebody being in the business for 60 days, 90 days, and you're not seeing progress or action, and you're trying to push them.

[00:33:23] If you're having to push somebody to do something. Probably they're not the right personality fit. If you feel unsafe with them doing things, and it makes you uncomfortable, how they're doing things, probably not a culture fit. They're not doing it according to your values.

[00:33:36] The "how" they go about doing it is different than you. If they're just not doing the right things, then that's a training issue. Or they're just not intelligent enough to learn the skill. So that's a skill fit. Okay,

[00:33:48] Sarah: so then 60 days I do want to see some progress. They might close something.

[00:33:55] They still might not it depends. I can't say yes or no Oh, they should definitely close. I can't you can't say that because everybody has their own time frame, right? And investors sometimes they work on their own time frames. You can't control that but I do want to see I want to feel like things are happening, and I want to feel like, Hey, we've got some stuff in the pipeline, we've got some stuff that I feel like might close.

[00:34:20] If you say, Hey, what do you have that's about to close? Do you feel like anybody's close? And they go not really. Oh...

[00:34:27] Jason: are they getting appointments? Are there relationships being built? Are there deals now kind of get in the pipeline at some of the earlier stages? Like you should start to see the sales pipeline mature and build.

[00:34:37] Sarah: So then 90 days they've been doing that. Now they understand everything. They know what to do. They know how to do it. They've gotten their feet wet. They've now tested things and then also made some improvements. They're like, Oh, well, when I say it like this, it doesn't work. It doesn't resonate.

[00:34:53] But if I say it like this, it's better. Oh I have to switch this and this, right? Now you're making those little tweaks, those little improvements. So 90 days, they should be able to close something at this point. And same thing with the pipeline. I need to see the pipeline moving forward. I need to see more being added in the pipeline.

[00:35:11] I need to see them further along in different stages in the pipeline. Things need to start kind of really moving forward at this point. And then after the 90 days, Now, you get to push the bird out of the nest, right? Now, you're a baby bird, go push him. You should now have everything that you need to be able to soar, as long as we did our job.

[00:35:34] But a lot of times, I get it, it's hard, because you're running a business, and you're an entrepreneur, and you're busy, and it's crazy. And now you want me to train somebody? Yep. Yeah. Because once they are able to do it for you, now you can relax into it. But if we skip the training, what's going to happen is you're going to go, man, they're just not getting me the results.

[00:35:55] Or they might get frustrated and go, man, my boss sucks. Like they don't train me on. Anything, and it's just not, it's not a good place here. I know, I'm going to leave because I know that if I don't, then I'll eventually get fired. So regardless, they're going to leave. And then you're going to have to go, God, well now I have to go hire somebody.

[00:36:11] And then you're going to hire somebody. And then you're going to be in this whole hiring cycle of hell for the rest of eternity. And that's not a fun place to be. It's not. It's really painful.

[00:36:21] Jason: Yeah, a lot of people wait until they're in pain to hire instead of hiring strategically with a plan or, you know, in advance.

[00:36:29] And so once you get to the place where you need a new team member, and then you hire, and now you're going to have to, you're kind of shot in the foot, and you're going to have to like go backwards time wise, like then you're in a worse spot, like that's not the ideal place to be hiring. And then later you'll create more freedom you know, eventually, but yeah, you want to make sure that you are kind of aware of your capacity and starting to like get your hiring systems, get your new hires in place in advance before you need it.

[00:37:01] And this is why it's super important to make sure you're making the right decisions in the business. So we have frameworks for how to decide what you need most in the business and frameworks for how to decide what the business needs most. So you're making healthy. financial hiring decisions because making wrong decisions that way can really hurt cash flow and can, you know, especially early in the business can really be dangerous.

[00:37:22] So, well, is there anything else you'd say to maybe some of our clients or people that they've gotten a new hire. It's probably a good hire and they need to make sure they're doing their onboarding and taking care of this new hire correctly.

[00:37:36] Sarah: Yeah, get it on your calendar. Don't just say you're going to do it.

[00:37:40] It has to be scheduled time where it's dedicated. And also, don't half ass it. Don't be like, oh yeah, I'm going to be on the phone with Joe while I'm like over here. They know. That's not dedicated. That does not feel good. We've all been on the receiving end of something like that. So, don't make people guess.

[00:37:59] Don't make them figure it out. It's not going to work out well.

[00:38:03] Jason: Alright. That's our episode for today. So I think that this should be pretty helpful for some of our clients that are getting into new hires And hopefully it was helpful for a lot of you listening if you're struggling with hiring or building your team or systems or profit, all this relates to the people system in your business. You need people, planning, and process and that's our super system. If you're needing some help with this, reach out to DoorGrow and we can take you to a whole nother level by getting helping you get these systems installed and you'll have a business that you actually enjoy being in. So until next time to our mutual growth.

[00:38:42] Bye everyone.

[00:38:43] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:39:10] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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How do you figure out the most accurate market prices for rents on your properties?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Nathan Jackson from RentFinder.ai to talk about how you can level up your listing game.

You’ll Learn [01:24] The creation of RentFinder.ai

[05:06] An AI tool for finding rent prices

[09:17] Making the switch from one tool to another

[13:00] Customizability and integration

Tweetables “You come up with something cool and you show it to your friends, then other people are going to want it.”

“You can either have it done accurate, cheap, fast, but you can't have all three.”

“I think early adopters to it are going to reap a lot of rewards and a lot of benefits financially and otherwise.”

“Once the entire world catches up, you know, and adopts these things, then it can be a bit more competitive, a bit more of a challenge.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: I think early adopters to it are going to reap a lot of rewards and a lot of benefits financially and otherwise. Once the entire world catches up, you know, and adopts these things, then it can be a bit more competitive, a bit more of a challenge.

[00:00:14] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:32] DoorGrow Property Managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not. Because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:14] Now let's get into the show. So today I'm hanging out with Nathan Jackson. Welcome Nathan.

[00:01:22] Nathan: Hey, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.

[00:01:24] Jason: So Nathan, is with RentFinder.ai and so Nathan, before we get into talking about RentFinder, which I think is a super cool tool. I've gotten to take a look at it, play with it a bit.

[00:01:36] I want to get into the audience hearing a little bit about your background. How did you get into playing around with property management related stuff. What's your history here.

[00:01:47] Nathan: Yeah. so my background is really you know, kind of growing up as a kid, technology was kind of my life, the most important thing to me.

[00:01:52] But as I got towards that age for college, I was more interested in the finance side of things. So I went to school to get a degree in finance and investments. I lived in Manhattan for a little while, and then I also ended up starting my workout for a property management firm doing data analytics.

[00:02:07] That was kind of the first thing I started doing. And when I got in the door, it was one of those things where I just slowly started gravitating more towards the data analytics and technology at the same time. And as the company I was with called ONEprop got acquired ultimately by a company that rolled up into HRG, I kept being more on that analyst side role, but then also doing more with automation technology.

[00:02:28] And that entire side of the business you know, obviously the space, even five, six years ago was very immature from a tech side. And so I saw all sorts of opportunities to kind of get into that space. And then after being with the company that was acquired by HRG I came over to a company called Specialized Property Management and that's where I've been for about five years.

[00:02:47] And then I've been leading all of our technology efforts here at Specialized Property Management. So even with the background in finance, I kind of gravitated back towards my roots, which is tech and all that space. So that's what I've been doing here. We've been building software internally, building sort of, integration type stuff and all sorts of cool tools here at Specialized.

[00:03:04] And then RentFinder was born out of Specialized. So it's kind of where we are today.

[00:03:08] Jason: Got it. And so I know Chuck Thompson and he's, is he CEO of Specialized or? Yes. Yeah. He's CEO. Yeah. So He used to be part of the RPM franchise and he was a client of mine and helped him with websites and, you know, some other things early on.

[00:03:28] And he's got some other like former RPM people that are part of his his organization as well. And that are connected to this like Rod Schifferdecker past client as well. So, I mean, it's really cool to see, like, I've got clients creating stuff now that can benefit my clients. Like, that's really awesome.

[00:03:45] Nathan: It's great, great circle of life there. Yeah.

[00:03:47] Jason: Yeah, it's really cool. So, RentFinder.ai was developed to solve what problem? What was the problem that Specialized was having with all the other rental tools? Because there's a bunch of them out there.

[00:03:59] Nathan: Yeah, so fundamentally that's a great question.

[00:04:01] We built this solely as an internal tool to begin with. We had no intention of launching this as a product whatsoever. We were just going to all the different sort of rental evaluation tools that were out there, whether it was a Zillow, whether it was a Rentometer, whether it was a RentRange, a RentFax, there was just fundamental problems with every one of them.

[00:04:18] And with a lot of my work that I've been working on with Specialized, we got really heavy into the, you know, AI statistical modeling and deeper science behind how to do some stuff with data. And I said, Hey, I think I can build a better tool, build a better mousetrap to do this. And it was one of those things where just kind of organically, we started building out internal models to price out for our own agents.

[00:04:37] We started sharing it with some key clients and one day we had a key client say, Hey, you know what? I would love to share this with my investment partner. Can we go ahead and get an account for them set up? And all of a sudden we went from checking five, 10 a day to, you know, within a few months of just building internally, running hundreds and hundreds.

[00:04:53] And it's just sort of been off to the race ever since then scaling the same space. So.

[00:04:57] Jason: I mean, you come up with something cool and you show it to your friends, then other people are going to want it. Yeah, that's true. And so you guys have built the better mousetrap. You guys have built this cool tool.

[00:05:06] So tell everybody, like, what is RentFinder.ai. Let's start there.

[00:05:10] Nathan: So fundamentally, if you know those tools like RentRange or rentometer we're fundamentally providing a very similar service. The key differentiators of what we do specifically versus them is that we are taking in just say a monstrous amount of data, the price out of home.

[00:05:23] You know, we're not looking at just like the recent comp, plus the beds, bathroom square footage. We're looking at hundreds of data points per property, all the little things that you don't necessarily think about on any sort of listing that you see, we're looking at photos of the property. We're doing an analysis of what exactly the inside of the home looks like if we have them as well as a virtual tour scan.

[00:05:41] We're basically trying to look at the nitty gritty about what really makes a home rentable. And when you find what makes a home rentable. You can really hone in on that price because it's pretty easy to look at two homes on paper, a 3, 000 square foot, three, two next to a 3, 000 square foot, three, two and say, Oh, they're the same.

[00:05:56] But we all know that's not the case when you walk in the door, right? One home is a lot prettier and a lot better than the other. And fundamentally that was the aspect that's been missing. So we've added that into our analysis. And we've been able to really hone in on very, you know, precision rents by going that route and just going way beyond the limited amounts of data the other tools use.

[00:06:14] Jason: So you said there's like hundreds of different data points. Can you give us an example of what maybe some of the other tools might not be looking at?

[00:06:22] Nathan: Sure, like, we'll be looking at like, how recently were the new wood floors installed in the kitchen, right? What color are the wood floors? How are the wood floor colors in this area of the neighborhood renting compared to this over here?

[00:06:32] Because we're looking at all the other homes, like little tiny details like that. We're looking at, you know, do you have a pool? If you have a condo, are you facing the north or the south side of the building? Just all the How are you getting all

[00:06:41] Jason: this data though? Where does all this data come from?

[00:06:44] Nathan: So generally, I joke with my team that we're kind of like a data vacuum. We get data from anywhere and everywhere that we can. We buy data from sources. We find data online in publicly available places. And if we can't find it or buy it, we generate it. We do things where we're taking data sources like photos, for example.

[00:06:59] Photos are a very rich source of information. They're just not really normally easily extractable, right? But if you look at photos and analyze them in a smart way, you can get data out of those photos to be able to do an analysis from there. That's kind of what we're doing.

[00:07:12] Jason: And you're leveraging the AI to do this?

[00:07:14] Like AI is looking at photos and going, "Oh, they have hardwood floors."

[00:07:18] Nathan: Yes. Yeah. We have some trained AI models that we've done. You can do visual analysis on the photos and it'll basically take a look at a photo and say, you know, here's the types of floors. Here's what's going on in the kitchen. Here's what we think it was most recently updated.

[00:07:30] How up to spec is it? How is it spec wise compared to the rest of the neighborhood? Things like that.

[00:07:34] Jason: Okay, that's pretty cool. So I know when I was using the tool, I tried it on my property. And so I was curious and then what's cool about your tool is you can chat with the tool, so then I can ask it, like I'm talking to the AI, I can ask it to make some changes.

[00:07:52] Like I told it, I said, "well, some of these in the comps that you've got listed below are don't have a golf course view of the backyard like my property." So I was like, "can you only show ones that have a golf course view," and then it adjusted it, right? And so yeah, so if somebody's like my property special because of whatever or this property special they can ask the ai to just show the properties that like where that criteria fits And then it was like, yeah, no problem.

[00:08:19] I'll do this and then it changed it.

[00:08:20] Nathan: Yeah, I know that's one of the features that we've been baiting right now that we've had a lot of great feedback from our customers is that ability to kind of give the really holistic analysis that we provide to the client, but then give them the interactive ability, whether they want to be changing something on the analysis or asking the question about it, you know, being able to take that data.

[00:08:36] It just makes it much more personal, more real experience to understand how we got to that number. It's not just a black box that you can only see. Here's the number, take it or leave it. You can give your input. You can say, hey, a lot of customers like to say we're going to add in a new bedroom to this home, or we're going to convert the garage, or we're going to change the kitchen over to fully update it.

[00:08:53] How much do you think that'll impact the rents based on everything else in the area? So you can use it as kind of an analysis and evaluation tool to understand, you know, what really is worth doing or not. So we've had a lot of customers that have really enjoyed doing that. Got it.

[00:09:05] Jason: So they can sit there and play around with it and try and figure out, oh, how do we get the most rent?

[00:09:10] Would it make sense to convert the office into a room or like, yeah. Okay. Got it. That's very cool. So, everybody listening they might already be comfortable cause they've been using some sort of tool like the several that you mentioned they're already using, they're like, it's all, it's already doing an okay job what would you say to them?

[00:09:30] I think the things they would be like concerned about would be price, one of the things that I notice is your tool seems to be a lot more affordable to do a lot more reports than the others, probably because the leverage of AI.

[00:09:42] Nathan: So when we launched the tool, my idea behind it was I wanted to be the best, I wanted to be the most accurate, I wanted to be the cheapest, and I wanted to be the most user friendly. I said, I want to give no one any reason to stick around to the older tools to make it to where it's very easy to switch.

[00:09:55] So from a price perspective, you know, even if you're getting a really sweetheart deal with some of the biggest competitors on the market, we're almost always going to be way cheaper, right? We can get down to, you know, about a dollar per report, depending on the volume that you're doing. And we have packages that kind of range anywhere the highest price you can possibly pay for a report is 3. 50 per report. And that is still way below, you know, like the rent range, for example but they market as well for their advertised price. Okay. And then also the biggest thing that matters most is accuracy. That is why you come to us first and foremost, is that when you look at a large section of a portfolio, when you look at what this home actually rented for, you look at a rent range report, you look at a RentFinder report, you look at a rent fax report and a rentometer.

[00:10:31] We're going to be the closest every single time. We have a lot of data sets to validate this. We work with very large firms that have done large analyses on thousands of properties to say, Hey, you know, definitively RentFinder is the best rental tool for pricing on the market. And so if you want accuracy, that's why people come to us.

[00:10:47] Jason: You know, they usually say it's kind of a joke. You can either have it done accurate, cheap, fast, but you can't have all three or, you know, stuff like this. And you're like, yeah, but we figured it out.

[00:11:00] Nathan: You know what? It's funny you mentioned that. I've said that a few times myself. That's, that was one of our goals.

[00:11:03] I wanted to make it that easy and that quick and it makes it a no brainer, right? When it does meet all those goals, it makes it easy to switch. So you're exactly right.

[00:11:10] Jason: And you know, it's really AI that's kind of allowed all that to happen. Right? Like AI, we're in the middle of this AI revolution right now.

[00:11:17] And I think early adopters to it are going to reap a lot of rewards and a lot of benefits financially and otherwise. Once the entire world catches up, you know, and adopts these things, then it can be a bit more competitive, a bit more of a challenge. But property managers right now that adopt some of these AI tools, like we've had some really cool new tools that are coming to the market like, Vendoroo.

[00:11:40] Which is one of our podcast sponsors. They're doing the maintenance coordination, AI maintenance coordinator, which is just super cool. We've got tools like RentFinder.ai. There's all these different AI tools that are coming out right now. There's Super hiresuper. com I think is the website that does like an AI inbox for property managers.

[00:11:59] Like there's all these tools right now that where there's this innovation that's being able to happen that just. Wasn't possible earlier, and it really cuts the cost down for property managers. And so if you're able to decrease costs and increase output and do things faster and better, then that gives property managers more margin.

[00:12:20] Nathan: Yeah, absolutely. Right. I definitely agree with you. I think the landscape of the AI tools, especially is fascinating. You're able to see a lot of new things come to market that really were not possible before, right? Like you said earlier, you know, we're gonna find, we're gonna find there's only possible because of the AI set of things, right?

[00:12:34] You know, what we would do today. Would not have been possible whatsoever, you know, 10 years ago, by any means. And so I really do think it's interesting when you can get these tools off the ground and into people's hands sooner, it allows PMs to be able to move a lot more quickly. And as I mentioned before, you know, we started, I still am a PM myself, right?

[00:12:50] So I understand the industry very well. And I always, I'm looking for new tools to be able to bring into that side of the business as well. And it's a very interesting landscape right.

[00:12:58] Jason: Now. What else should people know about RentFinder.ai?

[00:13:04] Nathan: So the big thing is that what we do fundamentally is provide that price but we provide you that price in however many ways you need it, right?

[00:13:10] We can connect to you through Zapier. We've got a fully built out rest API for companies that are needing large amounts of reports and have their own technical integrations. We've got systems built out to allow you to do bulk uploads of reports and things from like default Appfolio and property reports.

[00:13:24] We made it very simple. So whatever your workflow, you can fall into what we do for you. You know, we have full white labeling as well. We love people to put their brand and logo and colors on that report. And then also share that really nice interactive report with their end user, whoever that client may be, just to make it to where it's very easy to switch.

[00:13:39] And there is no barrier from going from like a rent range or rentometer and making it to where you can immediately start day one using our tool and integrating it into your current workflow. And a lot of people also love the. Biz dev integration. We've got like the, you know, get my free rental analysis widget that you plug into your website and you can take those leads and pump them right into lead simple right into HubSpot and have them just go directly to your email.

[00:14:01] And then your client can get that nice report while you also get that this dev side of the things as well. So all of our clients that have integrated that have had very great success and it's something that people really like.

[00:14:11] Jason: Yeah, I like the rent analysis website, which that's cool. So, you mentioned api for those that are not as nerdy as maybe you and they can't figure out what to do with an API, but they like things connecting.

[00:14:26] Do you guys have in the works, is that Zapier connection or make or anything like this?

[00:14:31] Nathan: Yep. We do have a Zapier connections invite only right now, but if anyone is interested if you sign ,up we can invite you to be able to start using it. Make you something as well that we're also in the works with.

[00:14:40] I've been working with them pretty closely to get that online. And then if you don't have any one of those that you want to go down, Our API is very simple. We try to make it to where it's very plug and play to where you can just start up with, you get your API key and you can just submit just the single line address and we'll do everything in the background.

[00:14:56] You don't need to give us 12 other data points to determine what property your property is. You can just very quickly, one button, one address, and then it'll work via the API. So very quick and easy.

[00:15:06] Jason: That, yeah, that is really cool. This is largely for long term. Could this also apply to short term?

[00:15:12] Nathan: Right now, we don't do short term. We focus solely on long term SFR as well as basically we don't price apartment homes, right? We don't price large. 400 unit apartments. We'll price condos, townhomes, mobile homes, basically needs to be SFR of some sort. And you're like, even like a 10 or 20 spot apartment complex will price, but there be honest with you that there are better tools in the market for the large apartment pricing, that's just not what we do.

[00:15:34] So yeah, we're SFR focused. Got it. All right, that's largely our target audience that of this podcast.

[00:15:42] Jason: So very cool. Well, I thought the tool was really cool. I love that. It's cheap and that it shows you all the properties that are connected to that particular report. I mean, it makes it really easy to show to your potential client or your existing client.

[00:15:59] Hey, this is what your property probably could easily or should rent for and with some serious accuracy and at a level that the other tools just wouldn't be able to do. Yeah, so very cool. How can people, Nathan, get in touch with or find RentFinder and what's the best way?

[00:16:19] Nathan: Yeah, sure.

[00:16:20] So if you go on Google and search RentFinder.ai, you can type that in and you'll see, we'll be the first result on Google, or you can visit us at home. RentFinder.ai directly and just click the login or sign up button. And if you click that, you'll get free reports just to start out and play with the tool.

[00:16:34] You know, I like to put my money where my mouth is. You don't have to give us a credit card or anything just to start trying it. You can go in right now. Start running reports for free to see how you like us compared to what you're doing today. And so you can do that and just see how you like it. And then from when you're in there, you can hit the contact us button and reach out to me, or you can email me directly by you'll see my contact information on our page as well.

[00:16:53] Reach out there. But most of it's all very self service. You should be able to just get using it today right away. And we've worked out a deal with you and your team for those who want a discount, if you use the code DOORGROW15, DoorGrow one five, you can get 15 percent discount off the publish rates.

[00:17:09] Jason: So, yeah. So check that out. Really excited about this. So Nathan, appreciate you coming and hanging out here on the DoorGrow show. And I hope you guys have a lot of success with this.

[00:17:21] Nathan: I really appreciate it. No, thanks for having me. It's been a great time talking to you. All right. Awesome. We'll let you go.

[00:17:26] Jason: All right. So if you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, you're struggling, you're finding things difficult or maybe you're just struggling with the operational side. You're like, I can add doors, but adding more doors is not making my life better anymore right now. It's making my life more stressed.

[00:17:42] Then you need a really good operating system in your business and that's something DoorGrow can help you with as well to make your business what I call infinitely scalable. You just need to get that Super S ystem of systems in place. And so reach out to us at DoorGrow. We would love to help your bdms scale and grow your business. We would love to help you as a business owner function like a bdm and scale and grow your business. And we would love to help you be able to you Have the ops and the backend and the support that you need in order to comfortably scale your business without it making your life worse.

[00:18:13] So reach out to us, check us out at doorgrow.Com and you can learn more about us there, or make sure if you're a fan of the podcast, you're enjoying this, join our free community for the podcast, which is our Facebook group, the DoorGrow club. It is the best property management Facebook group, hands down.

[00:18:32] We reject 60 to 70 percent of the people that apply to join this group. We only let in property management business owners. Check out this group. It's an awesome group. Great resource. If you are wanting to be around others that are growth minded, that are crushing it and be more connected to DoorGrow, go to DoorGrow club. com and until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:18:55] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:19:22] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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Those who listen to this show likely either manage or invest in rental properties. There are several different types of real estate to choose from, but have you ever considered self-storage units?

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with the “OG” of self-storage real estate investing, Scott Meyers to talk about an opportunity to invest in real estate without the common challenges of residential properties.

You’ll Learn [01:22] Switching from residential investment properties to storage units

[08:35] Investing in self-storage without the management

[12:15] Pros and cons of self-storage

[14:51] Self-storage education

Tweetables “When you have just a hammer, everything looks like a nail.”

“Be honest with yourself, and sometimes the best cook in the world can't fix a broken recipe.”

“Once you get behind in habitational real estate and rental real estate in general, you know, it takes double the effort to get caught back up again.”

“The more valuable you are to your property management business the less valuable your property management business is to everybody else.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Scott: Self-storage really found me instead of me finding self-storage. Which I just felt it's a simple, predictable business model that you can replicate over and over again without as many moving parts and that human factor.

[00:00:11] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you're interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:28] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:09] Now let's get into the show. All right. So. I'm hanging out here with Scott Meyers. Welcome Scott.

[00:01:18] Scott: Thanks. And so good to see you again. How are you?

[00:01:20] Jason: Good. Good. It's good to have you. So, why don't we get into your background, how you kind of into this, but Scott, you're a self storage investment expert. Is that fair to say?

[00:01:33] Scott: That's fair to say. They call me the OG in self storage now. And I guess I can step into that role.

[00:01:38] Jason: All right. The OG, the original gangsta. All right. So tell us a little bit how you got into this.

[00:01:44] Scott: So like many people got into real estate by buying one single family rental house. Of course, this is a back a little ways now back in 1993, I bought a single family house. with an assumable VA mortgage on it. So I took out a home equity loan from my own home and bought this one, no money down, just like Carleton Sheets, the other OG in the real estate space taught me how to do. And so I bought that house, we rehabbed it to refinance it, rented it out.

[00:02:11] So the BRRRR method before everybody called it the BRRRR method. And then we went out and bought two more. And then that turned into four, six, eight, and my wife and I got married along the way and brought my wife into this hobby. I was working for a fortune 500 company at the time, and this was really just to supplement retirement until it kind of took on a life of its own.

[00:02:29] And that was because in 1999 with the dot com crash, when all of our tenants were then able to buy a house shortly after that, because the presidential administration at the time reinstituted the Community Reinvestment Act and allowed anybody who could basically fog a mirror to buy a house while all our tenants left and they were doing so.

[00:02:49] And so at that time, we were now rehabbing a second time so that we could sell our houses just to be able to keep up with what the market trend was at the time. Well that just about broke us. And so we decided then to get into multifamily and all we needed to do was get some economies of scale, work a little harder, work a little smarter, and we'll make this all happen.

[00:03:08] But really what I found is that we just had more doors, we had more tenants, we had more toilets. And to be honest with you, Jason you know, we made a lot of money in residential real estate and growing that side of the business. I mean, we were very big, we got up to just shy of 450 doors. But I realized that I don't think I was cut out for this.

[00:03:24] I understood the math, you know, the real estate math and everything that went into it. But I found even though we had property managers and property management companies, I was finding that I was becoming less loving of my fellow man and women, because they were destroying our properties and stealing from us, as well as our contractors and some of our staff.

[00:03:40] And so at that point, I began to look around the landscape and, you know, we love real estate because of all the reasons to love real estate. It appreciates, we can depreciate it. We can borrow money to buy it. And then our clients pay down our basis. I mean, there's no other investment like that. So as I looked at the landscape and real estate, that really only left parking lots and self storage if I really didn't like the tenant and toilet business.

[00:04:01] So. I looked into storage and loved what we saw in terms of the fundamentals of the historical, the track record of performance of the asset class. And it was right under my nose all the time. It's just this ugly, you know, stepchild of commercial real estate that nobody was really talking about. So I researched it and spent a lot of time understanding the nuances bought my first self storage facility in a partnership.

[00:04:22] And then yeah, the light bulb went off and recognize after owning it from the operation standpoint, that It was truly what everybody had said that it was. And what we found is it was all the benefits of real estate without the hassles of tenants and toilets and trash. And so we began simultaneously selling off our houses and our apartments and then going forward into self storage.

[00:04:41] And here we are today at about just shy of 5 million square feet of self storage, 28, 000 doors nationwide and growing. And then along the way, also built a sizable education and consulting and mentoring and coaching and event business that only not only teaches people how to get into the business, but also became a funnel, a conduit for a lot of partnerships and a lot of deal flow into our organization.

[00:05:01] So that's either the long winded version on a podcast or the short winded version however you want to look at how we got started in the business.

[00:05:07] Jason: Yeah, love it and qualify yourself help everybody understand like where are you at right now with storage and rentals. I mean you got some impressive numbers.

[00:05:17] Scott: Yeah, so we're sitting at about we've done over 5 million square feet We're sitting at about three and a half just maybe three and three quarters million square feet right now assets under management So we're right now jason, we're basically a syndication company where we're a financial services company that raises capital and layers that on top of debt and then deploys it in nothing but self storage.

[00:05:37] And so many of these projects, these partnerships, these joint ventures in our funds, they have a shelf life and they expire in four to five years because that's when we can capitalize and pull our chips off the table, if you will. And we have a capital event by way of sometimes a refinance, but usually a sale of the property or properties within that fund.

[00:05:55] And then we just go out and buy more. So it ebbs and flows when some are going out the door, we have more projects coming in the door as well. I only own two residential properties. One of them is an Airbnb and the other one is the one that I live in. And that's it. Everything else is 100 percent self storage at this point.

[00:06:10] Jason: Got it. How many units of storage do you represent then?

[00:06:14] Scott: Yeah, so 28 to 29, 000 overall is what we've invested in and we're sitting at about 20, between 20, 000, 21, 000 right now in asset center management. Awesome.

[00:06:25] Jason: Wow. Okay. So for those listening that are in residential property management, and they're listening to you what would you say to them?

[00:06:34] Like, maybe there's some of them that they're like, "man, I don't want to deal with toilets, tenants and trash anymore." And, you know, "I'm starting to love humans less. And I love real estate," but what's kind of your message?

[00:06:49] Scott: You know, in the education side of our business, Jason, of course, when there's a room full of folks interested in self storage, it's really easy to say that you know, I think everybody should have a self storage facility, one in their portfolio, if you're in real estate and, you know, all roads lead to self storage eventually, because I think everybody gets to that place where they do get frustrated and it could be just a day.

[00:07:06] It could be, you know, in terms of, "wow, that was a whole lot coming at us." But it doesn't mean that, you know, my recipe is the catch all, you know, when you have just a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And I'm not saying that anybody should go out and do what I have done because we made a lot of money you know, on the residential side and commercial multifamily.

[00:07:21] I just found for me, that this self storage really found me instead of me finding self storage. Which I just felt it's a simple, predictable business model that you can replicate over and over again without as many moving parts and that human factor. And so for a knucklehead like me, I think it was the perfect fit to be able to go out and just master this practice and that business model and the standard operating procedures. And then just at scale and at speed go out and just make a go of it. And we grew really fast and never really get over our skis. It was just it's a manageable model as well. And so it just fit for myself. But I would say Jason, when business gets so difficult that it's just absolutely no fun anymore, and it's drudgery... I see many people doing it right now, they're just throwing good money after bad. Well, you know, be honest with yourself, and sometimes the best cook in the world can't fix a broken recipe. And if they find that is the recipe is your business model or just your business in general, then get help.

[00:08:13] Or, you know, maybe it's time to take a look at some of their asset classes like self storage.

[00:08:17] Jason: So if somebody's an investor and they're wanting to get into this, there's probably a learning curve. There's probably potential pitfalls. So like, yeah, I've tried my Airbnb. That was kind of difficult. I didn't like having to mess with pricing constantly. Like maybe I should try self storage. I'm curious about what you would say to them and then, you know, if somebody's just an investor and they're just looking to just invest, but they're not wanting to really actually manage storage units, then what path would you recommend?

[00:08:45] Scott: So sure. Two paths, but also some folks just take a one and end up achieving the same result. So if this is something that you're looking to do actively you know, of course, Jason, I own, you know, I run an education company. And so we're always going to tell you to get education because the cost of not, you know, you pay the dump tax.

[00:09:03] And sometimes we've seen people pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for the dump tax. And that just means that they've gone out and they've watched a couple of videos read a book and all of a sudden they're experts in masters and this is commercial real estate. There's a lot of nuances to it, no matter what the asset class you pick within commercial real estate, but also because it's commercial real estate, there's lots of commas and zeros to profit from it, which is fantastic.

[00:09:23] But also if you make a mistake. Those mistakes in underwriting and in other areas also come with commas and zeros behind them as well. And we've seen many a good investor that maybe it was a little prideful or maybe thought that, "Hey, this is an easy asset class compared to what I've been doing. You know, I can do this with one hand tied behind my back." And then they find out that this is an operating business on top of real estate. And there's more nuances to this and they need to dig in and understand what that looks like, because as you know, once you get behind in habitational real estate and rental real estate in general, you know, it takes double the effort to get caught back up again, and if that goes on for a quarter, sometimes people just can't recover. So, you know, we can go into all the reasons why and the mistakes that people have made, but I think just understanding you need to educate yourself. Now, if you're looking to do this passively, in other words, you don't want to take on the credit risk, you don't want to take on, say, the construction risk or a lease up risk of a turnaround or a development project then you can invest passively.

[00:10:20] There's a number of REITs out there and we have funds and individual syndications and joint ventures that we do with folks where they come in as a limited partner. They still get equity. They still have ownership. They have a piece of ownership of this property. So they get the depreciation, they get a share of the cash flow, and then the profits upon the sale.

[00:10:38] But they don't take on the lease up risk, the development risk, the risk of a project going south no matter what, and or have to go out and create a business, you know, and a team to be able to do so. And along the way, many folks, Jason, they start as passive investors either with one of our projects or others, and by, by just following along, you know, you get that education.

[00:10:59] You know, we hold webinars once a quarter and we send out monthly reports and we send out updates as to what's happening with our projects. And so by def facto, our passive investors are getting an education and they earn while they learn the business.

[00:11:11] Jason: Got it. Earn while they learn. Like it.

[00:11:15] And that's probably a better path to start out as is to first explore doing it passively to figure out should they jump in and do it more actively.

[00:11:24] Scott: I don't know better. That's not my decision to make. I think some folks, if they have a team in place, you know, they can make that pivot just by learning the business, but it just really depends on where they're at.

[00:11:34] I would say that it's It's certainly the safest. And if you have a small amount of capital to set aside to invest in a project, that's the best way about doing it. Because once it comes time to do your own, it's going to take a larger chunk of capital to be able to do so unless you're raising private equity.

[00:11:49] So you know I can say that is the best and probably is for most people, but not everybody.

[00:11:54] Jason: Got it. Yeah. Well, a lot of people listening already have some sort of business, a lot of them, they won't just throw it in, jump right into storage units, maybe. But I think a lot of them, it would resonate with them.

[00:12:06] "Hey, then maybe this is another way to diversify my portfolio, another way to invest. I would love to do, try it out passively, and then maybe even get some education." for those that maybe heard the beginning of this and they're like, "Man, I don't have to deal with toilets, tenants, trash, and it's real estate. And it sounds so easy." What are some of the things that maybe they have a blind spot to? That somebody, you know, they would learn once they start doing this, it's not all, you know, stars and rainbows and roses with this as well.

[00:12:38] Scott: Right. So, you know, outside of the front end and the due diligence that needs to be done just to make sure that you've bought a solid property from an operational standpoint, which is what you're referring to, you know, what we found is that, you know, a million bucks, 5 million bucks goes a lot further, meaning you buy more doors you buy more square footage and it allows us more doors because these are metal boxes on concrete slabs and they're not, you know, multifamily that has drywall and plumbing and, you know, a lot of HVC, it just goes further.

[00:13:03] So that means that there are more units to be able to keep track of. You know, the good news is there's software and we do have property management companies and property managers to handle that and a lot of it is automated, but at the end of the day, you know, it's a large amount of units and a large amount of rental tracking that needs to be done to make sure that the dollars come in the door. On the flip side of that, just because I am a bright side up, kind of guy, you know, we have the ability with our leasing structure within self storage that, you know, it's a 30 day lease automatically renewable. And so anytime that we want to raise the rates, we don't have to wait. It's not an anniversary. It's not an annual lease. It is a month. And so that means on month seven, if we see that the market is changing and the demand is higher and there's a whole lot of development going on, then we can raise the rates in seven months.

[00:13:46] We can do it in four months. We can do some nuisance increases in between, you know, either way, and we're very flexible when it comes to that. But then also, the good news is even if people do fall behind in the rent, you know, we have the ability to, or we have the power behind us of the lien laws instead of habitational or versus habitational real estate in which you have tenant and toilet courts. And so when I used to walk out of there, I had a pink piece of paper and very little ability to be able to get my money back and to be able to you know, execute on getting that the money back in the door.

[00:14:18] But with self storage and the lien laws. We can put a lock on their unit, lock them out and we don't have to go to court within 60 or 90 days depending upon the state, my manager or an auction company will cut the lock off and open it up for bids on the date that we have an auction and I can recoup my back rent to my late fees and, you know, we are the judge and jury so we don't have to wait.

[00:14:36] I know you asked for the pitfalls but, you know, the good side is that you know, even though there's a lot of units to manage the, just because of the nature of the industry and the safeguards that we have in place, it's much, much easier and simpler to handle.

[00:14:48] Jason: Awesome. Cool. Well, yeah, this is very informative.

[00:14:51] Tell us a little bit about your education company, what you do there and and maybe how people can get in touch if they're curious.

[00:14:58] Scott: So on the education side, you know, when I got into business, you know, there wasn't an education company out there. There wasn't anybody that I could go to to learn the, you know, the A to Z to the nuts and bolts of the business.

[00:15:10] I could certainly go to the trade shows and some of the industry events and I can learn about doors and how to build these facilities and some of the, you know, the bolt on property management software. But there wasn't anybody teaching about the investment side of the business. And so, you know, we scraped as much as we could, you know, leaning on and building on the foundation that we had in commercial real estate already by owning multifamily and office buildings and warehouses.

[00:15:30] But just digging into this business and talking to as many people as possible. And I hired a consultant to fill in the gaps and spend a day with him touring his facilities and others that he managed for other investors. And, you know, that's how we grew our you know, bank of knowledge and created our standard operating procedures, at least the foundation of it.

[00:15:48] But then after we got into the business a little further down the path and buying facilities I used to run the Real Estate Investor Association here in Indianapolis. And we had 600 folks in the association. And about 300 of them wanted to know about self storage after they saw what we were doing.

[00:16:04] And so we started holding workshops and then some of the agents that represent the national speakers in the industry, again, there wasn't a person speaking and experts on the industry. And so they contacted me and one of them assisted me in setting up presentations, the ability to sell tools and resources for folks, and then helped us to create a live events, and thus, our education industry was born. It was really just out of a, I guess, like any good entrepreneur, you see an opportunity in the marketplace and a hole to be filled, and we stepped in and filled that. And so it's evolved from just a home study system, which is, you know, that's such a guru, you know, term to use that what we developed, what we put together was a very extensive business plan with all the tools, the resources and links and software, you know, and everything you need to find, manage, purchase a self storage facility. And that is the name of our home study system. And then that evolved into live events, three day events, which is an immersive workshop and then also for folks that are looking for either one on one or a group coaching and mentoring, you know, begin offering that. And to this day, still offer that. And so we have you know, we're the nation's leading education company in the space.

[00:17:14] We've taught more people how to get into the business and grow and scale the business and than anybody else out there in any other organization out there and still going strong at this is what we'd love to do is, you know, we love to take people from zero to 55 miles an hour in storage.

[00:17:26] And then in our mastermind and in our other areas, we like to take them from 55 to a hundred and build partnerships and do syndications with them as well. Awesome.

[00:17:35] Jason: Yeah. Sounds very much like our goal here at DoorGrow for the residential space. So what's the name of your education company?

[00:17:44] Scott: Self Storage Profits is the name of the education company.

[00:17:46] SelfStorageInvesting.com is the website for all the tools and the resources, a ton of free information, pull downs, white papers, a whole lot to not only just dip your toe in the water, but really to help you get started, and then anything else that you would want or need with regards to coaching, mentoring, attending our live events, it's all located on that page as well, including access to our passive investments as well.

[00:18:11] Jason: Very cool. Awesome. Cool. Well, I appreciate you coming on the show, hanging out with us here on the DoorGrow show. It sounds really interesting. I think there's a lot of our clients that are involved in different types of management. And so this may be another one that everybody should maybe take a look at that could be interesting. I think it's fantastic. Or as to do management, you know directly so very cool. Scott, thanks for coming on the show. Appreciate you.

[00:18:39] Scott: My pleasure, Jason. Good to see you again

[00:18:41] Jason: Good to see you. All right So if you are a property management entrepreneur and you're dealing with frustrations, you can go start a storage unit business as well. So appreciate Scott for being on the show. If you would like our help in cleaning up your business so that you don't hate it and getting you out of that first level of exit of doing the frontline work and getting out of the next exit and the next exit until maybe eventually you decide to sell that business, we can help you with that because the more valuable you are to your property management business the less valuable your property management business is to everybody else. And what I find with clients is as we ascend them through these levels of exit, It becomes more and more business that they would enjoy keeping perhaps And so let's see if we can ascend you and get you past that first exit at least, maybe the next exit where you're out of managing the people in the team and you've got an operator and things are really smooth and so if you would like our help here DoorGrow reach out to us at DoorGrow.com And until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:19:45] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:20:11] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

View Details

F

You’ll Learn [02:01] The Team Sandtrap + Cycle of Suck

[12:20] Why You Might Have the Wrong Team

[20:54] Building the Business Around You

[29:40] How to Escape the Cycle and Level Up

Tweetables “If your business isn't healthy and growing, it's dying.”

“Here's the reality: it takes 10 people to clone yourself in a business.”

“How did you build it the wrong way? You built it around what you thought the business needed, and you didn't build it around what you needed.”

“If you have capacity less than a hundred doors, then the odds of you getting another a hundred doors in the near future is slim than none.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Healthy business owners have healthy businesses have healthy team members and feel very well supported. And the only reason you're not there is you just don't know yet what healthy business owners know.

[00:00:11] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings.

[00:00:38] Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses.

[00:00:56] We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS. Build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, Jason Hull, the ceo and founder of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show. All right, so before we get started I wanted to just mention our sponsor Vendoroo. We've seen some great results with these guys.

[00:01:22] So if you're tired of constant stress and hassle of maintenance coordination, meet Vendoroo, your AI driven in house maintenance expert that handles work orders from start to finish, triaging, troubleshooting vendor selection and coordination. Built by property managers. for property managers to provide cost effective and accountable maintenance operations where every dollar is accounted for and every task is handled with unmatched reliability.

[00:01:47] Vendoroo takes care of the details so you can focus on growth. Schedule a demo today at Vendoroo.ai/DoorGrow and experience maintenance done right. All right, so let's get into the show. So what has been going on in the DoorGrow universe or in DoorGrow world? So, one, we are raising our rates, our fees, because we are taking better and better care of our clients and getting them better and better results.

[00:02:17] And so this is something that we coach clients on all the time. Are you taking your business to another level? Are you confident in raising your fees? Or have you kept them small or competitive, or even worse, low in your market? Are you striving to provide and deliver more value? Are you taking things to that next level in your business?

[00:02:40] We meet regularly with business owners in this industry. So in the last week or two, I've met with several businesses that are stuck in what I call the second sand trap. This is where maybe they were a client a long time ago in the past. We helped them figure out how to get growth. They've gotten to maybe the 200, maybe somewhere 200- 300 door range, maybe even up into the 400 doors range.

[00:03:05] And they are now experiencing the second sand trap of constraint. And so some experience this even earlier. I have had people come to us, people that have joined our program recently, that are having these second sand trap problems around just over a hundred doors, like 150. And they're already in this painful spot.

[00:03:26] And there's a few reasons for this. One, they could be caught in the cycle of suck, which means they've taken on too many shitty clients that are You know, too high of operational costs. And so they have too many difficult properties to be dealing with which makes the tenants more difficult, and so they've kind of created this mess in which their entire portfolio that they're managing and dealing with are a lot more difficult than most of my clients' situations.

[00:03:53] And so their operational costs are really high and they're making a lot less money because of that, their profit is down. And then what that means is it's a lot more difficult to deliver customer service and be effective. So I have a partner with me today, which is a dog we're fostering named Hans.

[00:04:12] And he is trying to chew a toy right at my feet. So what's up Hans. And if you haven't seen our previous dog episode that we did go to DoorGrow. com Click on "Dogs" up at the top. We've got a little dog emoji on our website. Check that out and learn a little bit about Sarah and my passion in helping dogs. And this is to be fair, mostly Sarah's passion. I like dogs definitely more than cats. I like dogs, but Sarah loves dogs. She really loves dogs.

[00:04:40] And so this is more her thing. So check that out. And that lets, you know, a little peek into the our reality here in our home with DoorGrow. So you can also check out our funny videos at the top right there as well. That'll give you a perspective on how goofy we are and we try to incorporate our dogs in these videos.

[00:04:58] Hans made it into one of our recent ones that will be released. You'll see it. So this second sand trap, the challenge here at the second sand trap is that these property managers have figured out how to grow. They know they could probably double in size. Most of you that are at the stage, you know, you could probably double in size door wise.

[00:05:16] You could easily go get more doors. You could attract more owners if you felt comfortable. So here's a question you need to ask yourself. This is something I love asking people that are at the stage so I can see how bad is it? How bad is the problem? So some of them get at this stage, business owners get really burnt out, like really stressed.

[00:05:38] We're talking like I had a lady say to me, "I fucking hate my business. Can I be real with you?" That's what she said. "I fucking hate my business." And she's having a ton of health issues and stress. I don't know if it's all related directly to this, but stress can eat you alive, right? Basically every health situation gets worse if there's high stress. And so she's dealing with a whole mess of stuff, right? And this is a challenge. This is a challenge in business. We deal with a lot of stress as business owners, but property management can be especially stressful. You're dealing with sometimes really upset angry people and a lot of that stress doesn't have to exist If you're not in that cycle of suck the other challenge at this stage besides maybe being caught in the cycle of suck Is not being paid well enough.

[00:06:28] And so Not only is your operational costs high because of the cycle of suck, but then also your pricing may not be optimized or very effective. You may not have a premium offering for premium buyers that may exist in your portfolio. And so they just go with your cheaper option, which is the only option that you have.

[00:06:45] And then there's also this weird race to the bottom in terms of price where everybody's priced like similarly, like 10 percent in most markets in higher rent markets, maybe like 8%. And then in some markets, it's like really grotesque with flat fee, you know, property management and stuff like this.

[00:07:01] And so the challenge then there's kind of this race to the bottom in terms of pricing. And so you may not be getting paid as much as well. And so sometimes if you can just increase the amount of money that you're bringing in and decrease the amount of operational costs in the business, you could easily double your profit margins.

[00:07:22] We've had clients go from 25 percent margin, which is good to 50 percent profit margin by getting some pieces dialed in. Now, the three biggest profit levers we find at this stage are people planning and process. Why? Because they're all connected to the biggest expense, which is. People, right? Which is staff and whatnot.

[00:07:43] So we need a really good people system, which means a hiring system and a really good existing team so that we can always maintain really good personnel and team members. Then we have a healthy team that buy into our culture, that have the skill and intelligence to do the job and have the personality type that is a fit for the role.

[00:08:01] I call those the three fits culture, personality, and skill. You need all three in order to be a good team member. If you have team members right now that don't match all three, you are spending too much money on this person and you're getting too little output. If you're caught in the cycle of suck, you are spending too much money on all of your people and getting too little output.

[00:08:22] If you don't have a good hiring system, you can't replace, confidently, the people on your team to get good people. And so you don't have a system or mechanism to do this. And so most businesses at this stage usually spend five to 10 years playing Russian roulette to get a decent team so they can finally break 600 doors.

[00:08:42] A lot of them by that time, even before they hit that, just give up, they sell the business, they exit. And so the time can be collapsed on this significantly. So here's the question that I ask. I asked people that are caught in the second sand trap, "what is your current capacity for adding more doors on that you believe right now? How many more doors do you think you can handle with your existing team before things start to get uncomfortable, maybe fall apart, or maybe break?" A healthy response would be, "we could double in size," which means they are not concerned like, "we could easily add another 200 doors, and it doesn't break. It's not an issue." Okay response would maybe be "I think we could add another hundred." That means they're already experiencing some challenges and constraints. They think they could squeeze to another hundred units or so and there might be an issue. Really bad is if you're like, "we could probably handle 50 more units and then I would have to change something dramatically, get a key team member, change something significant or that would really max out my stress."

[00:09:42] So if the capacity is 50 doors right now, if your future capacity that you can envision is 50 doors or less right now, it's even worse, like 25 units or something like that, you are already in a dangerous and uncomfortable spot. You need to get out of that dangerous, uncomfortable spot. If you have capacity less than a hundred doors, then the odds of you getting another a hundred doors in the near future is slim than none.

[00:10:09] Like you're just not going to do it. Even if people were throwing business at you, you would start to lose doors because things would start to fall apart. Clients would lose trust and you would lose business. You need to create the capacity, the space to be able to easily handle another couple of hundred doors or double in size, or no confidently we can get higher people very quickly and get people up to speed without making a bunch of mistakes, without thinking that the, that all people are crappy and it's difficult to hire, and there's no good people out there. There aren't good people in my market, or I have to have people that have property management experience. Then you need to have the confidence to be able to get them up to speed quickly, which means you have a really good process system. You have processes, you have a mechanism for getting them up to speed and in place, into position quickly, and that you know you've got the right people.

[00:11:03] So that they, and they now have the right processes and tools and resources that they can get training and get up to speed rapidly, which is your process system. And then you need a really good planning system to get the entire team moving in the same direction to rowing together as a business, as a team, to use a rowboat analogy, that they are all moving and headed in the same direction instead of in conflict or at odds or just focus on their tasks.

[00:11:34] We need a strategic planning system so that there are goals and planning to move the business forward so that you have a solid annual plan broken down into quarterly plan and quarterly goals and then you have your monthly goals and plan which are broken down into your weekly goals and commitments that each team member are taking on that are to move the business forward strategically so that the business is moving towards strategic growth instead of just transactional leadership where you're giving them a task and waiting for them to come back and say they've done it. So transactional leadership is this leadership style that demotivates your team and gets them to perform worse. Many of you live in a very transactional process system.

[00:12:20] So the other challenge at this stage is what I call the process myth. Everybody that's stuck at this stage believes they have a pretty good team.

[00:12:29] Because you have a team, you've built some sort of team, but you built it the wrong way. How did you build it the wrong way? You built it around what you thought the business needed, and you didn't build it around what you needed to get to the next level and having more fulfillment in your day, more freedom, and less stress.

[00:12:45] Each team member you've added has built more stress and added more questions to your day and you're involved in every single role. And so you have not built the team based on what you needed. You built the team based on what the business needed, which means the business now is evolving and becoming a monster that is like a high chair tyrant flinging food in your face and it's in control.

[00:13:06] Instead of building the team and the business around what you need. So you have more calm, more freedom, more fulfillment, more support. And so we need to shift this. So you built this entire team the wrong way, and you think you have a good team, but if you are showing up, if you have an entire team and you are showing up in this business, not in a role in not doing the things that you love doing, not in a role and a position of fulfillment and enjoyment, in your own business, you are in charge of, you created, and you are miserable in your own business, then by default, you have the wrong team.

[00:13:44] Zero question. This is as if you started with the wrong puzzle piece and went and found puzzle pieces to attach around your business to build out your team. You were showing up as the wrong square puzzle piece when you really are probably a beautiful round peg or round piece. And so you've built the wrong puzzle pieces around you, the wrong team. And I guarantee you're getting probably half to maybe a third, the output of a mediocre team like that, then you would, if you had a rockstar team and you may think "my team's pretty good," but if this is all you've experienced so far, you have no idea how amazing a team could be if they were really motivated and really performing well, and they loved doing what they got to do and they believed in you instead of just believed in getting paid as a transaction for work done. Here's the thing, entrepreneurs need to realize this. Entrepreneurs are money motivated naturally. Most of us are motivated and we love money. We don't hate money, right? You probably don't hate money. If you look on a disc assessment, there's usually a section called the values index or something like this, and there's a score called the economic score, this index and the economic index or economic score for most people is low.

[00:15:00] It's below average. Which means they're not motivated economically, they're not motivated by money. They don't love money, right? It's not that big of a deal to them, which means once their basic needs are met, throwing money at them does not increase performance It doesn't motivate them giving them bonuses giving them pay just in exchange for doing tasks does not motivate them to perform well or better. Money's not a motivator really for them so If you have a high economic score and you view everyone else through that lens, and the only people that generally have a high economics score are entrepreneurs and salespeople. Well, good salespeople should like money because you want to reward them and incentivize them to want to bring in more money and they get paid if they bring in more money So that your interests are in alignment. So you need salespeople that are in alignment with compensation like commission structures, stuff like this that are motivated to make you more money and if they're not making you more money, then you're not having to spend as much money on them, right? There needs to be proper alignment incentive wise. Everybody else on your team though, are not going to be motivated by bonuses and money. And the mistake entrepreneurs make is they try to reward bonus them, compensate them for money. "Hey, if you get us some more positive reviews, we'll give you this bonus."

[00:16:13] "Okay."

[00:16:14] Right stuff like this and if you hire people that are- I want you to really listen to this if you hire people that are not money motivated, and their only motivation for working for you really is to get paid by you, then you have hired a dangerous person in your business. Let me make this clear I'm going to say this again, maybe in a little bit different way if you hire people and the exchange you're giving them is, their whole motivation to work for you is largely they just want to get money. That's the only reason they're really working for you. And you might be thinking, "what else would it be?" I'll explain that in a second. But their only motivation is to work for you to get money from you because they want money, but they're not money motivated necessarily, then they become dangerous to your business.

[00:17:05] These are the people that steal. They steal time. Maybe they have ethics and they have some values and they're not going to actually steal money. But I've seen property managers repeatedly have their trust accounts depleted by people on their team before coming to us. I've seen people that handle their accounting and finances, steal money from them.

[00:17:28] These are people that are not as money motivated. But their only motive is money. And so they are bringing people that maybe don't have the same value system as them, and they're not good fit for their business, et cetera. Okay.

[00:17:42] If you bring in people that believe in you, let's talk about the opposite.

[00:17:46] If people believe in you. They believe in your culture that you've established for the business. They believe in your company core values. They are inspired and they want to work for a business that has a greater purpose than just extracting money from tenants and owners. They want a mentor, A business owner that they can believe in that they feel like is going to help them grow and become even better person.

[00:18:08] They want to be part of a business that is having a positive impact in people's lives and in the community. Then if they're not money motivated, it's okay. If their economic score is low, that means they're recognition motivated. So they also are motivated by being part of a team that has a positive culture of wins and recognition, which is part of the planning system that we would install, which is an accountability and recognition system that increases motivation among the team.

[00:18:37] It inspires creativity, inspires innovation, inspires motivation among the team, especially team members that are not financially or economically motivated. Then you will get three times the output from these team members. You get way more output from these team members. They are willing to work for you because they're getting so much value in other ways.

[00:19:00] They feel like they have a greater sense of the four reasons, as I've talked about on this podcast before of fulfillment, freedom, contribution, support. They feel like they get more of these four things because they're working for somebody that has these four things. Then they also get that fifth reason of safety and certainty because they're working for a business that is safe.

[00:19:17] It's stable. It isn't crazy. It's a calm workplace because the leadership is calm. The leadership is in control. There is leadership there where they are leading from a space of having fulfillment and having freedom and having contribution and feeling like they're contributing, making a difference in the world and where they are supported.

[00:19:39] And if you don't feel those four things in your business, you've built your business incorrectly. You may have taken good care of the tenants. Maybe you've taken good care of the owners, but you gave yourself a shit deal. You weren't taking care of yourself. And the whole reason the business exists for you is to provide you with fulfillment in your day to day.

[00:19:59] You enjoy doing what you're doing. You're having more and more freedom and autonomy to make the choices and do the things you want to do in life. And that means you're making more and more money. And if you're making more and more money, you should have more and more freedom and fulfillment.

[00:20:13] But most of you, if you're caught in the second sand trap are as a business are making more money than the business has ever made. But a lot of instances you're making less per unit or door than you've ever made, you know, profitability wise, and you don't really have more fulfillment and freedom. You are losing it.

[00:20:32] Every door you add in every team member you add steals fulfillment and freedom from you steals a sense that you're making a difference and contributing in the world and makes you feel less supported and makes you feel like you have to support more. And so you're building your team and your business the wrong way.

[00:20:49] And so this is the mess that DoorGrow helps businesses climb out of.

[00:20:54] How do we escape this? We need to do things like have you do a time study, have you figure out energetically, which things are bringing you more freedom and fulfillment, which things are your plus signs, which things are your minus signs. Then building out your job description. Like what is your actual job description and what do you want it to be? And then figuring out, all right, what role do we need to hire or bring in or get to build the team around you to make sure you're supported. Usually this means the first person you hire should be an assistant that just helps you.

[00:21:24] Not a clone, not somebody that has all the same attributes as you, but somebody that's opposite and complimentary to you. To help you with all those minus signs that fits that personality. A big mistake, a lot of entrepreneurs make in building their team initially is they try to first go follow the clone myth and go hire somebody like them.

[00:21:43] Here's the reality: it takes 10 people to clone yourself in a business. Just roughly, it takes about 10 people to match all of the skills and things that you do when you're wearing all the different hats in a business. It takes 10 different personalities. Because you don't enjoy wearing every one of those hats.

[00:21:59] You need to find people that enjoy wearing each individual hat as you build that out. So just get that idea in your head. It's going to take about 10 people to clone you. So kill that clone myth and don't go try and find a mini me or somebody like yourself. That's a huge red flag and mistake when you hire somebody that's like you.

[00:22:15] These are usually the people that have the same skill set, capacity, intelligence level as you and an entrepreneurial drive as you. That go and steal portfolios, steal clients and go start their own property management business. Because really be honest with yourself as an entrepreneur, you are probably now unemployable.

[00:22:35] You probably couldn't just go work for somebody else. You probably wouldn't want to. So you're not going to do that, right? They don't want to work for somebody either if they are entrepreneurial. They eventually start seeing flaws in how you think and how you do things. They're like, "I could do this better. I want to do this differently. I can see all these different things I would be good at I could change," and they go and start their own business and then steal whoever's loyal to them if at all possible, because that's the easiest thing for some of these people to do. Right? "Well, yeah, that guy's, or gal's a bad boss. You should come with me. We're going to do things differently." And they're like, "yeah!" And that's like people that are not a good culture fit. They're not loyal to you. All right, if they're not a good culture fit if they're not a right personality fit, they're not they don't really love the role or position and if they're not the right skill fit or intelligence level, they don't have the capacity to do the job or they don't have the training to do the job Right, so you need all three.

[00:23:32] All right so If you want to escape this second sand trap and escape having this business that is frustrating and difficult, just recognize you can do this. Like you can have the business of your dreams and you don't have to change the industry. You don't have to give up on property management in order to do that.

[00:23:53] You just need to align the business with what you most enjoy doing in it. So let's say you love doing sales. You could be the bdm in your own business. You could do sales. A lot of business owners do that Let's say you hate sales, but you love the accounting. You would just love to spend more time doing that you could do that It's your business Let's say, you love doing the operational pieces and the tech and geeking out on systems you could just focus on that and you could bring somebody else in to be the bdm and to make everything like grow, right? There's nothing you have to do you could even get to the point where you do nothing in your business if you wanted to, and you wanted to get to that level of exit where you exit or leadership, and you're no longer involved in the business.

[00:24:35] That's possible, too. But then, for most entrepreneurs, you would probably be bored, right? This is another factor that I think is important. If you're stuck in this next sand trap, a lot of times the reason people end up really frustrated, really demoralized, really stressed is because they don't understand these different levels of exit that exist.

[00:24:56] And so this is a concept that I got from a gentleman named Roland Frasier. He's an interesting dude. He's an attorney and he's a couple of different things if I remember correctly, but what he generally teaches is about buying and selling businesses and stuff like this. And one of the things I picked up from him and from Ryan Deiss, who are both connected to a program that we were in called Scalable, is the more valuable you are to your company, the less valuable your company is.

[00:25:27] So if you're ever looking to exit or sell this, that's important to recognize. The other thing that I thought was really interesting is this five levels of exit that I learned from Roland Frasier. So the first exit is exit the line. This is where you go from worker to manager. In property management frontline work is handling tenants doing all the property management stuff.

[00:25:48] That's difficult And if you can't exit level exit one. You can't exit one and you think the only way to escape that is to sell the business, then you have a really unhealthy mindset and you're probably super miserable in your own business So you need to be able to exit level one. If any property management business owner that doesn't exit level one, they're still a property manager and they're not the entrepreneur or the business owner.

[00:26:11] They're not truly an owner of the business. They're the, they're an employee in it, right? Number two is to exit the staff. This is where you go from manager to CEO. So you're no longer doing like the frontline lowest level work. Then you're exiting the staff, which is maybe the managerial sort of level work.

[00:26:28] And now you're a CEO where you have managers. You have people you trust to oversee departments. Like you have a head of maybe maintenance coordination and you have a head of property management, you know, whatever. Right. The next is to exit the org chart. So you go from CEO to maybe being an advisor, being on a board, you're on the board of advisors.

[00:26:48] And now you have a business, it, you're an owner, it pays you and you've exited the org chart. The next would be to exit the board. You're no longer like really having to like steer the business, you know, from behind the scenes, you're no longer involved. You trust that there's a whole group of people that make this work and there's a board and you just own it.

[00:27:11] You're just taking cash, like you're just getting paid. And then the fifth level of exit is to exit ownership. It's to leave the business. So one of the things that's super important is for you to recognize where is your best level of exit you want to be at right now? If you've been in pain a while, you're probably thinking "exit five. Like I want to sell this thing. I hate it. It's awful." I talk to a lot of people that are like that and I'm like "you're just doing it wrong let's get this fixed" because The myth that people believe is that if you're at this stage of misery in your business It's "I should go start another business, something else I'll do something else." I guarantee if you go start something else, you're going to start with less knowledge, less skill. You're going to have to go through the pain and the lessons and everything. And you're going to get to the same stage in the video game where you have the same boss to beat. He's just got a different outfit on but it's that same giant gorilla that you got to fight or whatever it is in Donkey Kong and you've got to beat this beast of a gorilla and it is building the right hiring system, the people system, the right planning system and the right process system.

[00:28:16] And you still have never figured this out. And so you're going to end up miserable building the wrong team around you again. You're going to end up in the same place, just in a different industry. You have to learn how to solve this boss. And that's what we do at DoorGrow. We help you figure out how to beat this level boss.

[00:28:35] We've helped lots of people do it. We've replaced entire teams. We've helped install hiring systems. Hiring is a problem at any level of business. I've seen multi million dollar very wealthy business owners In lots of different industries and masterminds have been in hiring is still consistently a problem for these individuals and so we want to make sure that you're able to let go of that. That you're able to not have to deal with that.

[00:29:01] So figure out the level of exit that you most desire to be at. If you're in a healthy state, most of you would probably not want to just be out of the business and retired. Most of you would be bored. You enjoy maybe dealing with certain things in the business and you enjoy maybe running the business.

[00:29:19] If it were healthy and you had a good team, so we need to restructure the business around you. So it's giving you what you want. Then it can start to give the team members more of what they want. And you'll have better team members that will stick around because they're not working for somebody that is making bad decision making and making bad choices and running the business in a state of chaos and misery.

[00:29:39] Right? Healthy business owners have healthy businesses have healthy team members and feel very well supported. And the only reason you're not there is you just don't know yet what healthy business owners know there's just a little gap in knowledge and maybe a gap in some systems that could easily be given to you, learned and installed rather than having to play Russian roulette, take lots of risks, spend tons of time through trial and error and reading books and watching YouTube videos, wasting time and money and focus and energy and all the other currencies.

[00:30:15] Our goal at DoorGrow is to help you collapse time and figure out what works. I've made all these mistakes. I've done all the mistakes that we've talked about. I've done it. And I've worked and I've shelled out a lot of money to operational coaches, to relationship coaches, to fitness coaches, to, I mean, you name it, sales coaches.

[00:30:35] Like I've spent. I'm still always learning and I've invested so much into figuring these problems out. My goal is to help you not have to waste all that time, energy, money, to collapse time and just help you go faster. I believe everyone listening to this, if you really are an entrepreneur, you can figure all of this out on your own. I like I have no question. You can absolutely do this. I did it, and I was super clueless in a lot of areas I was super clueless in financials, super clueless in sales like I've had to get coaches and mentors in all of this stuff, super clueless in relationships. I'm on my third marriage. Like I've studied relationships in an insane amount, right?

[00:31:17] There's nothing like pain to cause you to learn right? My goal is to help you collapse time on all this because all of these things affect your business All these things affect your revenue all these things affect your team All these affect your ability to lead and if I can help you collapse time on this, just with some clarity and some direction and some systems, you will go so much more fast, so much more quickly, add so many more doors, so much more revenue, have so much more space, so much more freedom, so much more happiness and joy in your business.

[00:31:51] It doesn't have to be this hard. And our program in my opinion, even though we raised our pricing is so much cheaper, so much less expensive than the cost of tuition of learning that I've paid to get to the point that I'm at in business. And it's so much cheaper than the price of tuition and stress and money you're going to have to pay in challenges and mistakes in order to get to that level and learn.

[00:32:17] I'm going to help you collapse time. Our programs, even if they cost thousands of dollars a month on some of our most expensive ones, are easily offset. They're so easily offset. Like sometimes we offset that in our first jumpstart session that we do in person with new clients. We offset that. That expense right away you have enough doors we can easily find another couple grand or a few grand in the business monthly just because of some of the challenges that exist, and then our program is paid for then even if you a lot of you if you add 10 20 or 30 new doors, which is not hard to do. There's no scarcity out there in the marketplace. It is so easy once you get things in alignment to bring a new business and to attract new business without spending any dollars on advertising, we can usually eliminate two to three grand a month, just in expenses in advertising that larger companies are doing that doesn't even need to exist.

[00:33:14] Just that alone would like pay for the program and it would be easily offset. And then you'll actually grow faster using the strategies that we give you. So there's so many ways in which making the decision to work with DoorGrow is not an expense. It makes you money. Otherwise clients don't stay with us. We don't have any sort of term limit or contract where you have to stay with us, like even over a month, like you don't have to, you can quit and cancel at any time.

[00:33:42] And the reason we don't have agreements and contracts, like a lot of the vendors you work with like in property management space or tools that you use or software or whatever, you've got contracts and agreements with a lot of different people. We don't need it because clients stay with us longer.

[00:33:56] They stay with us for years. So we've eliminated that. We knew if we could just keep people for a year in the past, we could get them great results. And so we had agreements in place. We don't even need that anymore. We are super low risk. We have more testimonials and case studies than any other coach or consultant in the industry.

[00:34:13] They can't keep up with us. And we have such a great system because we have our planning system and we have a great team and these systems in place that I'm speaking of on this call. Nobody can keep pace with DoorGrow's level of innovation and what we're adding to our program consistently. We just rolled out these new client workbooks.

[00:34:31] We just rolled out recently in the recent years, we rolled out a new martial art style belt system for clients to level up going from a white belt with zero doors. Well, one door up to a black belt with a thousand doors quickly. And we've consistently keep rolling out new and better systems and resources.

[00:34:50] And so nobody can catch us. That's why I'm confident in saying DoorGrow is the best, most comprehensive coaching and consulting program for property managers in the space. Period. If you are, especially if you're doing third party property management, but even if you're like, you know, an owner operator, if you're at that next level, we've got operational challenges we can help you be able to increase your capacity and get to the next level. So this is all I wanted to say today. This is my, a bit of a rant, but I want you to understand there's hope. You can do this and you could do it on your own. Doing things on your own is the stupidest path to growth. I've been that idiot.

[00:35:31] I have done that. It was slow. It was grueling. It was frustrating and it was demoralizing. And when I started getting coaches and mentors, every decent coach I had because I had the belief that I was going to get something out of that program, come hell or high water. I was positive active in my mindset.

[00:35:50] I was positive. Like focus on what's the positive outcomes I can get from this and I was taking action and being active I always made my money back on anything that I did or any program that I did I was making even more money than what that program cost me and that's what we want to help you do. We can easily offset the cost of our program.

[00:36:08] So I don't believe DoorGrow is an expense. DoorGrow has legit roi. DoorGrow is a value add to your business so. If you're not an idiot and you're intelligent and you want to collapse time and you want to work with DoorGrow reach out to us we can help you do this. It doesn't have to be so painful. It doesn't have to be so hard We have proven this over and over again that our systems, our growth strategies, our ops stuff all works. We've proven this. We use our own op stuff internally.

[00:36:41] We have proven that this stuff works and we know it can work for you. We've done this with multiple clients. The only question I have is, are you going to do the work? That's it. I can't do it all for you. I can't do it for you. You've got to do it, but you're already working hard. If you would like to work less hard in the future and more smart, reach out to DoorGrow.

[00:37:02] You can reach us at DoorGrow. com or make sure to join our free Facebook group doorgrowclub.com where we will nurture you, give you some value until you're ready to work with us to grow your business and get it to the next level. And if you're comfortable, it's time to get uncomfortable because when you're comfortable, you're at risk.

[00:37:22] There's risk. There's challenge. If your business isn't healthy and growing, it's dying. If your business doesn't have the right systems in place and you lose a key team member, it's at risk and it's in danger. You need to get these systems installed, regardless of how healthy your business feels right now.

[00:37:38] If you do not have a people system, a planning system and a process system. Then your business is at risk. You are in a dangerous position and you're acting like the ostrich with its head in the sand, hoping that if you ignore the problem. You will always be good. And that's not going to be the case. You will get hit with something.

[00:37:56] This happens. I want you to have a safe business. I want you to take care of your team, take care of your family and set some protective barriers in place. You need these systems installed in your business so that you have a healthy business continually. And you become what I call infinitely scalable, which means your capacity is no longer a hundred doors, 200 doors, you know, you could get to a thousand doors and nothing's going to break or fall apart because you'll be able to handle it because you've got the support of an expert team DoorGrow.

[00:38:25] And you've got systems like people planning a process, the super system, and you're able to continually scale and get to that next level. We've helped clients do it. We want to help you and it gets easier and better the more doors you have if you do it in the right way, not worse and not harder and not more stressful because you get better team members, you have better systems, you have more money and revenue. You can take more vacations. You'll have more freedom. Let's make that happen for you. Reach out to us. Check us out at DoorGrow. com until next time to our mutual growth Bye everyone, and I'm out.

[00:39:00] Jason: you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:39:27] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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For those who manage short-term rentals, which tools and pieces of software do you use to keep things organized and running smoothly?

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull brings on Jacob Mueller, founder of Renjoy to talk about using technology to help manage short-term rentals.

You’ll Learn [01:36] The creation of Renjoy

[16:55] Software and systems for STR

[25:38] Building out systems using Airtable

[34:20] Strategic planning systems

Tweetables “One of the things that's different about short term rentals is that it's constantly changing.”

“You have to be on top of your game. You can't just do the same thing you've been doing.”

“It's kind of like you've got a swiss army knife or one of those multi tools, and it's not the same as having a toolbox of high quality.”

“The only thing I want to share with all the property managers out there is keep on doing the hard work.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: It's kind of like you've got a swiss army knife or one of those multi tools, and it's not the same as having a toolbox of high quality.

[00:00:08] Jacob: That's exactly right. To be able to have like specific specialized tools, you then have to know what you're doing to accumulate those tools and have them all talking and speaking to each other, but if you do it right, very powerful.

[00:00:21] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow Property Managers to the DoorGrow Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:22] Now, let's get into the show. All right. Today's guest, I'm hanging out with Jacob Mueller from Renjoy. Jacob, welcome to the DoorGrow show.

[00:01:33] Jacob: Thanks. It's a pleasure to be here. Jason.

[00:01:36] Jason: Glad to have you. So Jacob, give us a little bit of your background in maybe entrepreneurism and how you eventually got connected maybe to rentals, property management, and and then we can get into Renjoy.

[00:01:51] Jacob: Sure. Well, I won't give you the full backstory. It goes all the way back to a college class I took, but I really started getting into real estate right at the perfect time, beginning of ZIRP, zero interest rate era. And I was actually a commercial broker for a little while. I did about six months of leasing and realized I did not enjoy that.

[00:02:09] And so then I transitioned to a residential property management firm based out of Denver that focused on investors. When I joined them, Atlas Real Estate, they're in, I don't know, five or six states now. But when I joined them, they were only in Colorado. They managed maybe 2, 500 doors and I was kind of their regional broker in Colorado Springs, which is where I am.

[00:02:30] And they are now, I think north of 10, 000 units under management and have grown tremendously on the management side. But I learned a ton from these folks. I learned how to flip property. I learned to invest in real estate. I learned a lot. And so that's kind of where my real estate investing career started.

[00:02:46] That was about four or five years ago. And since then I've acquired single family homes some small multi units. And then I've also diversified in my income streams from just long term tenants to also short term tenants. And that's kind of where the story of Renjoy begins. One of my clients and I worked with, as a broker, happened to have quite a few Airbnbs, short term rentals.

[00:03:09] And he was buying properties like every six months. And I was trying to figure out how is this guy, he's my age, how's this, you know, 28 year old buying so many properties so quickly back to back? So I started learning about his process and his insights into the industry. And I thought, man, this guy's got, a peg on this industry.

[00:03:25] And of course, during ZIRP, Airbnbs were easy, making money was easy, everybody was doing it. And so I saw this interesting opportunity, decided to partner with this client of mine, and another client actually. And we formed Renjoy together with our own portfolio to start.

[00:03:40] Jason: Nice. Okay. So what is Renjoy?

[00:03:45] Jacob: Yeah, so Renjoy is kind of an unintended consequence.

[00:03:48] It was not our plan. It's a short term rental property management business. But when we first started the company, it was just to manage our own portfolios. And people started asking us to manage theirs because short term rentals and long term rentals are complex and difficult and a lot of work. And so owners are constantly looking to handover management for these things.

[00:04:09] Jason: Yeah. And that can be a challenge. You know, with those short term rentals. I mean, everything has to move quick, right? You're having to check and adjust prices every day to make sure you're getting the, you know, the best rate possible. You need to communicate like immediately all the time with all the guests and then, you know, then like you're trying to figure out how to make sure you're getting as many people through this property as possible But not getting it damaged and then maintenance stuff hasn't dealt with like super fast Or people get really frustrated and upset and so it's a difficult game and then for you know for people managing short term rentals It's almost like a cleaning talent acquisition business more than it is a property management business And so, how does Renjoy help with this stuff?

[00:05:02] Jacob: Yeah. Yeah. There's so many ways we can go with this, Jason. A lot of what you were saying, you know, resonates with me. I think there's an increased complexity on the stakeholder relationships that we have as a manager. All property managers have this complexity where they have their tenant who is a stakeholder.

[00:05:18] They need a tenant to pay rent. And they also need to have properties with which to have a tenant pay rent on. And so all of the property managers have this balance they have to walk between these stakeholders. They have to serve their tenants and they have to serve their landlords, their property owners. We're the same, but one of the challenges is our tenants leave us reviews.

[00:05:38] Every single time they stay and so there's this increased out of, shall we say, accountability almost on how we manage our relationship with this key stakeholder, the guests that are coming to the properties, the tenants, but also the owners too. And then this all leads to the same challenges all property managers have, which is balancing meeting your tenant's requests for service, for maintenance, kind of meeting their expectations while also keeping costs as low as possible and trying to meet the owner's expectations. And you have to constantly balance that when you're thinking about maintenance and your service level agreements and how they can get impacted by the occupant versus the owner.

[00:06:16] So that's one thing that's really complex. But there's a lot of things we can get into with short term rentals. We are a full service short term rental management company. This is another pretty big distinction between long term rental property managers and short term is that the suite of services provided varies quite a bit from one short term rental manager to another.

[00:06:36] Not to say that long term rental managers are all the same, but generally speaking, there's a pretty similar core group of services that all long term property managers provide for their clients.

[00:06:47] Jason: Got it. So, Is Renjoy a service that those that listening that are running a property management business are you their competitor or is there a way that they can work with you or how does that work?

[00:07:00] Jacob: Great question. I do not believe we're competitors. We don't do long term rental property management and we refer out for that. And so we actually kind of have a lot of good relationships with our property managers, mutual referring relationships, actually, in the markets in which we serve.

[00:07:16] Jason: So what you're saying is long term residential property managers, if they're not wanting to deal with the complexity of short term property management, is there a way they can sort of partner with you and maybe get paid?

[00:07:28] Jacob: Absolutely. Yeah. We have a referral program. And for everybody who signs a contract with us, it's a thousand bucks. Easy peasy. And if the property manager happens to also be a practicing broker, we actually do work to execute exclusive right to lists in our property management agreements, which is assignable.

[00:07:46] And so we just assign, should that client that you've referred to us choose to list their property, we can actually reassign that exclusive right to list back to you as the property manager slash broker.

[00:07:56] Jason: Got it. Okay. So that's an additional benefit. They can keep the real estate deals.

[00:08:00] Jacob: That's right.

[00:08:01] Jason: Got it.

[00:08:03] Okay. So for those that are investors listening and, you know, we have a lot of property managers and they should be investors as well if they believe in real estate investing, right. And they're servicing people doing it. So they're probably investors as well. If their primary focus is longterm residential management, but they're wanting to, you know, get a couple of short term properties in their market, but they don't want to do short term management. And they're buying these properties. Why should they choose you to do it instead of having the side job or why do investors tend to choose you instead of doing it themselves?

[00:08:38] Jacob: Yeah. That's a good question. In general, actually, Jason, what I would say is if you are depending on your life and what all you have going on in your life, generally speaking, I recommend folks who are buying their first Airbnb to run it themselves because there's just a lot of things you need to learn and understand.

[00:08:55] And I actually would say the same thing about long term rentals. I would say you as the homeowner or the property owner should try to manage it yourself. Because then you understand the challenges that, you know, your property manager might face and you know what to look for in a good property manager.

[00:09:09] Same thing applies for short term rental management as well. So if your listeners are looking at acquiring their first one, my recommendation is do it first of all. And then second of all, learn the ropes, do it yourself, understand the challenges and the complexities, and then go and shop around for a manager because it's expensive to switch.

[00:09:28] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. So my wife and I, we got a short term rental so that we can do client events at it and stuff like this. And, and so we'll bring clients in and we'll use that and then in the like in between we'll just we'll use short term rental it and send it out for other people to use right and so, but even with this one property like to make this to manage it well, we've got a whole suite of tools in order to like make this efficient and, you know, sarah my wife she runs it and she went through a whole university and a course and like all this stuff to like, learn how, learn the game and learn how to do photos different than typical real estate photos and like all this stuff.

[00:10:11] And so, you know, to figure everything out to get this working and it's working really well, but. It just seems like a lot. It seems like a lot of stuff. So what competitive advantage do you feel like Renjoy like affords over people that eventually they figure out how to do all this stuff. They've got all these tools, but it still takes a bunch of time and they don't want to do it.

[00:10:30] Jacob: Yeah, I know. That's right. It is actually very complex. It's also not static. One of the things that's different about short term rentals is that it's constantly changing. For acquiring the guests, meeting the demand out there, capturing the existing demand for short term lodging, you have to be on top of your game.

[00:10:47] You can't just do the same thing you've been doing. In fact, we see quite a few property owners now who are kind of getting off that ZIRP high, you know, 2020, 2021, 2022, when people were spending like crazy, and now their properties aren't cash flowing very well. They're not capturing the demand that's in their market nearly as well because the game has changed.

[00:11:04] They're saying, Hey, I'm doing everything the same I did before, but my revenue is going down. I don't understand why.

[00:11:10] The reality is, you have to compete you're competing with actually folks like us who have this professionalization of the industry, which I think is going on right now in short term rentals.

[00:11:20] And one of the big challenges with an individual owner operator is not only do you have to message your guests promptly, you have to make sure they check in, check out okay. You have to check for damages after the stay, you have to organize the cleaning, you have to organize the house or the maintenance, you have to do all that.

[00:11:35] But on top of that, the big thing that I see people miss is that you have to be on your pricing every day. I mean, you have to not just use algorithmic based pricing with some of these tools like Price Labs or Wheelhouse or something like that. You have to be doing it every day. And when you're looking at your pricing every day, you can't just look at your property.

[00:11:53] You have to compare it to all your comp sets and see, hey, who's booked on these, you know, next 10 days and at what rates and where do I sit in that comp set and what do I need to do to my prices today to capture the existing demand before somebody else in my comp set captures that, that guest or that demand.

[00:12:11] And it's very hands on. And so one of the big advantages of a property manager like us is we have, you know, two people full time looking at pricing for every property.

[00:12:20] Jason: So, and how many properties do you guys over right now?

[00:12:24] Jacob: We manage about 165.

[00:12:27] Jason: Yeah. And so with 165, you, two people are able to handle all the pricing checks and updates on a daily basis.

[00:12:34] Jacob: That's right. Because not every property is unique, right? We have comp sets. So if you have Let's say 15 two bedroom, one bath units that are all, let's say, basements or, you know, attached ADUs, and they're all in the same geographical area, we could do a lot of pricing at the same time for all 15 of those units because we're trying to capture that segment of the demand.

[00:12:56] Jason: Got it. Got it. Okay. So, so for those that are listening, they're managing short term rentals. And maybe they're not doing that, that one missing piece very effectively. What would you recommend that they do?

[00:13:11] Jacob: You have to, I mean, I think you have to do that, right? I mean, big part of the value proposition of a property manager for short term rentals.

[00:13:18] This is key for all your listeners who are thinking about buying a short term rental too. Short term rental property managers are expensive. And so, you want to ensure whichever manager you choose to hire is going to exceed or excel or expand beyond what you might otherwise earn in revenue to offset that cost.

[00:13:35] And so, if there's a property manager out there doing short term rentals and they don't have a sophisticated pricing strategy, I would say your value proposition is very weak because you're going to charge, you know, a large percentage of commission on what's already coming in without necessarily increasing the amount of revenue coming in to offset that cost for your property owners.

[00:13:53] And I think you're going to end up in a tight spot when your owners aren't making enough money. And another manager can increase or boost their earnings. So I would say get on it. There's no reason not to. There's a lot of access to global talent who knows how to do this kind of stuff. So it's not a lack of talent or even that they're terribly expensive.

[00:14:11] You can get a pretty good program implemented. Okay.

[00:14:15] Jason: Well then let's allow you to poison the well a little bit against any of your competitors. So let's talk about then what, how do you find and vet a good short term rental management company? I mean, everybody, when they hear what I do, if I'm at a cocktail party or an event or anything, I hear people all the time.

[00:14:34] Oh, I had some rental properties, but man, it was a nightmare. And I got rid of them. And I'm like, maybe you should've just got a property manager, but in short term, like if they're not cash flowing, or it's not making money, or it's not working out it could sometimes be the property manager.

[00:14:50] Especially based on what you're saying. So what would be the biggest initial filter? Would it be that? Would it be, Hey, how often are you checking the pricing on the property? And what's your pricing strategy?

[00:14:59] Jacob: You know, it's tough because you can, you know, with anybody, they can tell you whatever they want.

[00:15:03] You have to like verify. And so I would always say there are a lot of like basic ground rules, questions similar to what you're saying, Jason, where, Hey, tell me about your pricing strategy. Tell me about how you will price my property. Tell me about how you'll handle work orders when things come up. Like tell me about your communication strategy with guests.

[00:15:22] Tell me about your philosophy on refunding for issues or how you handle cancellations or how do you handle damages? Like all of these like key components, you'll weed out a lot of crummy property managers that way. Actually, if you just go through, Hey, here's the 15 core things you got to do just to be a worthwhile candidate for property management for me. Here's the 15 main things, but to go beyond that's when you have to start doing things like show me your Airbnb account that has all your reviews and going through that list and pick, you know, out of the last three months, find a bunch of reviews and ask them to explain what happened on those poor reviews.

[00:15:59] Hey, this guest said this thing happened. What all what happened on your end? And just literally do your due diligence on guest reviews to see how the guest stakeholders are impacted by this manager. And then furthermore, try to find another owner. There's kind of a reputation game here where you need to understand, Hey, has this owner been with you a long time?

[00:16:19] Why are they with you? Are they happy with you? Have they considered transitioning to another manager? Kind of a lot of stuff you would expect. And it is a lot of due diligence, I will say, but I think it has a very large impact on the performance of your property.

[00:16:32] Jason: Yeah, no, I think that's significant.

[00:16:35] So you've kind of built a platform for your business, correct? With Renjoy. And so tell us a little bit about that. How is that unique? Maybe some others listening might get inspired if they're doing short term management, but explain how what kind of your, maybe that's your competitive advantage.

[00:16:55] Jacob: I would say it is. And this actually, I think Jason would apply for all of your audience, even long term rental property managers. One of the things that we've been thinking really carefully about with our business as we're growing is who owns our data our property data, our guest data, our owner data, like where's that data being held.

[00:17:16] And if it's being held by a third party, like our property management software provider, in our case, guesty, in your case, you know, at folio or whatever, when you think carefully about where that data is going, you have to ask yourself, am I okay with this third party data provider being the one who's going to initiate, you know, improvements to how we interact with our data?

[00:17:39] Am I okay with them developing all those features and all that kind of stuff? Or do I want to have control over that based off of my needs and what I see in the market?

[00:17:46] Jason: Yeah.

[00:17:47] Jacob: And I'm not saying this is for everybody, but because we are more, I would say, tech focused and tech forward as a company, we've decided to keep that data in house.

[00:17:56] And so, we use a third party tool called Airtable. I'm sure some of your audience members will be familiar with this tool. All right.

[00:18:02] Jason: Airtable geek.

[00:18:03] Jacob: Oh yeah, we love it.

[00:18:04] Jason: We run our business off of it.

[00:18:05] Jacob: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. We do too. And so, we use our property management software because you need it.

[00:18:12] Right. We use it to handle our reservation data, all the calendars kind of, it's where we actually push all of our listings to market them to acquire the guests and all of our reservation data flows through there as well. But it all flows from our property management software tool into airtable. And some of it flows back and forth. But what it allows us to do is we can pull in all of our work orders from another software. We can pull in all of our accounting from another software. We can pull in whatever kind of data we want into Airtable. And we can relate the data in ways that you wouldn't otherwise be able to do, if you're using a single tool.

[00:18:46] For example, Guesty, our property management software has work orders in it. It has review management in it. It has accounting in it. It has everything in it. But the problem is If you use the full suite of services within your main software provider, your property management software provider, typically, each of those ancillary services are not best in class.

[00:19:08] And so, you're constrained on what you can do with the tool that you have. And we very much want to be constrained with, you know, our own kind of creativity and our own ability to create efficiency in our business

[00:19:20] Jason: It's kind of like you've got a swiss army knife or one of those multi tools, and it's not the same as having a toolbox of high quality.

[00:19:28] Jacob: That's exactly right. Yeah, but it's complicated and it's costly I mean you have to be able to have like specific specialized tools. You then have to know what you're doing to accumulate those tools and have them all talking and speaking to each other, but if you do it right, very powerful.

[00:19:44] Jason: Got it. Okay. So, and you're using guest CSPM software and then you've paired it up sort of with Airtable, it's feeding data into Airtable and then because you have it in Airtable, you're able to probably notice patterns more, run reports with the data. You then can create automations and things that happen from, you know, Airtable, maybe, are you using Zapier?

[00:20:08] Jacob: Oh, of course. Yeah. We use Zapier and make as well for certain things. We also do have a little bit of Python scripting, but that's, it's very powerful.

[00:20:17] Jason: That's getting really nerdy.

[00:20:19] Jacob: So yeah, it's not me. Let's put it that way. It's not me doing it.

[00:20:23] Jason: Right.

[00:20:24] Jacob: But let me give you an example, Jason, of how these things work together and are really powerful.

[00:20:28] So we have a lot of our housekeepers are actually in house now. They're W 2s. They're paid hourly. One of the big challenges is You can't have a manager inspect every single turnover. I mean, we've had like 72 cleans in a single day on Labor Day weekend. So there's no way you can cost effectively have somebody inspect every single clean.

[00:20:49] Like it's just not possible.

[00:20:51] Jason: Right.

[00:20:51] Jacob: And so how do you hold cleaners accountable? How do you actually rank them? How do you know whether they're doing a good job or not? Other than after the fact, the next guest says, "Hey, this place is terrible."

[00:21:00] Jason: Right.

[00:21:01] Jacob: What we actually do is we do that. When the review is generated.

[00:21:05] From a guest stay. Okay, now if that review mentions any kind of cleanliness issue or whatever, the review is an object in Airtable, then gets linked to the person, that is the cleaner, who is also in Airtable, and we can say, hey, who cleaned before this review? And we can actually tag that review and tie it to the cleaner, the person, and we can rank them.

[00:21:26] And so we can say this person has an overall ranking of 4. 9 out of 5 on their cleanings over the last however many cleans. We can actually go back and look at every single turnover they did and what was the guest report afterwards. And by that, we can eliminate cleaners who are not doing a good job.

[00:21:43] Anybody below 4. 9, you just eliminate and then you refill that pipeline. And Yeah, by having that connection, it's really powerful. That accountability happens way faster. That's what you're trying to do. If you're trying to speed it up,

[00:21:55] Jason: right? Because you have the data, you've got the timestamp of the review.

[00:21:59] You can then check who was the cleaner before this review and, you know, and. You know, figure that out and then you can link to the cleaner and then you've got a database of all your cleaners I'm sure in air table and all the cleaners in Airtable. You've got these Cross links to all their reviews that are affiliated with them And then you've got a rating that you can see and so each cleaner is rated in your system yeah.

[00:22:24] Yeah, so you're connecting the reviews to the cleaners

[00:22:27] So you with that data you're able to make much faster decisions as to whether, and it's not just like, you know, the really noisy, greasy, squeaky wheels that you're kind of paying attention to. Wow. This cleaner is really horrible. Who did this?

[00:22:42] You know, you're able to just look at it almost like a spreadsheet and see, all right, these cleaners are performing at the top. These are not so much. We're going to send more work to these ones, maybe less than these ones are gone.

[00:22:53] Jacob: Yeah, that's right. You gamify it too. They enjoy it. I mean, it's a little bit of a friendly competition too.

[00:22:58] Cause what we do is we display with a dashboard. Hey, who are the top 10 cleaners this month? Or like, it's actually live dashboard. So like, Hey, who are the top 10 cleaners? You know, we have 35 or 40 cleaners. And so, you know, if you're not on the top 10, you know, you're not on the top 10, but those who are on the top 10 are constantly competing with each other to be the best.

[00:23:17] And there's a lot of shuffling going on. So yeah,

[00:23:20] Jason: I love that. That's great.

[00:23:22] Jacob: That's just one example. There's a lot of things where if you own the data, you can connect it and gain insights in ways you would not otherwise gain from a lot of tools because the people who build the software are not managing property.

[00:23:35] So, they don't know what you're trying to understand about your property. They just say, Oh, you need accounting? Here's some accounting. It's like, well, but they don't understand the complexities around trust accounting and how I'm spending money on behalf of the owner. So, they don't make it easy for me to send and receive invoices within their accounting software.

[00:23:50] I have to do that outside. Then I have to reconcile it with their trust accounting module. It's like, they just don't understand what you're doing. And so, their tools are often pretty, pretty weak.

[00:23:59] Jason: Okay, cool. Yeah, I love Airtable, man. We geek out on it. We use it for our client success database. We use it for our planning system.

[00:24:09] We built DoorGrowOS in it. We built our applicant tracking system and hiring system in it. And built a bunch of stuff in it. So if you're a property manager and you're using Airtable, then let me know, like reach out to me. I'd be curious to see what kind of things other property managers are doing in order to you know, leverage Airtable.

[00:24:30] And how they're using this in their business. I know there's some out there doing it. I've seen it in some of the groups and they're leveraging Airtable to keep track of things. So. All right airtable is really cool. Basically for those that aren't familiar with Airtable, it on the surface, it looks like a Google sheet sort of, but the difference is It's beyond just spreadsheets. It's a database software and really it's now considered no code software because to have software, you need input, you need data storage, and then you need output and so you can build in air table forms or things to entry under data or you can even connect it to zapier or other automation softwares or tools to feed data into it so you have input and then you have data storage and you can build really complicated databases of stuff where things are cross linked and then based on that then you can create dashboards or extensions or output or feed data to other systems based on that data.

[00:25:32] And so, yeah, so there's some really cool stuff that you can do with Airtable. So, yeah, so give me another example of something cool that you do in Airtable that you think is may be relevant to property managers.

[00:25:44] Jacob: Yeah, we actually incorporated our CRM into Airtable and the main reason for that is because Oh,

[00:25:52] Jason: Airtable is your CRM?

[00:25:54] Yeah.

[00:25:55] Okay, got it.

[00:25:57] Jacob: There are some limitations with it, of course, but because we're not doing like mass, we're not doing like really mass marketing, we have really good lists. So we're not targeting like a ton of people because it's very B2B.

[00:26:07] Jason: Yeah.

[00:26:07] Jacob: And we don't necessarily want everybody short term rental.

[00:26:09] Like we're very particular on which properties we want to manage. So anyway, one of the benefits of it is when you're going through the sales process, right? A lot of that process is discovery of property data. Not just owner data, owner problems, whatever. It's also property data. And so, we noticed this huge inefficiency in a lot of sales processes where the salespeople learn all about the property, they get them signed, and then they hand them off and they don't communicate all of the things that they learned about the property.

[00:26:38] And then you have to relearn and the owner's like, I already told you this. Like, now I have to tell you about this furnace again, and this AC unit again, and this hot water heater, and this thing about the backyard, and this thing about the sprinkler. This thing about the neighbor, this thing about the, like, there's just on and on.

[00:26:49] It's a lot of work for the owner. And so what we've done is we've built that data intake to your whole point about what software is for that data intake that the sales person is collecting through the whole process gets built into the system. So that when that lead converts, that opportunity converts into a client.

[00:27:07] All of that data goes straight into the property data, and the onboarding team just has to fill in the gaps. And so it really smooths the transition of data from sales to operations.

[00:27:18] Jason: Yeah we sync and merge our CRM, our sales CRM, which is our tool for communication and our text, email, phone, everything fees through our CRM with our existing clients with perspective clients, all that, but we have it sync to our client success database for our existing clients that are in our mastermind and our coaching programs.

[00:27:42] And it feeds data across. So for example, we'd like to track how many doors our clients have. We have them complete a weekly check in form. The air table and they're providing their monthly revenue, their door counts. We capture this data and we use this to build what we call proof bombs later that are like visual testimonials that people can absorb seconds, which is an idea I learned from Sharran Srivatsaa, which is the CEO of real and brilliant guy and he taught this to Alex Hormozi.

[00:28:13] Alex Hormozi used it in his book launch. As they're showing all these people getting results And so we have the data to prove that our clients are getting results over time and we can show the time period so it just feels more credible. And that data syncs over to our crm and updates their door count updates these things So when we're talking with them in the crm We can communicate with them.

[00:28:36] And so we've we're always geeking out and optimizing our system, our client success database, everything so that we can better take care of our clients. Like we have a photo of every client's face in our database. We can learn who they are and know who they are and know their names. So when they show up, Recognize them and yeah, so we stalk them a little bit to get a photo or we capture their face on one of the Zoom calls that they show up on or something, but my team are responsible to make sure Every client has we have a photo.

[00:29:06] We have the name. We know their current door count. We know what they're working on and and then yeah, we've got some other really cool things that we've done recently as well so we're always improving this and. Because our key system we run our entire business on is called DoorGrow OS.

[00:29:21] It's a planning system that we've built out in Airtable. We coach clients on how to do this as well. And it really, I believe, is our greatest competitive advantage.

[00:29:30] Jacob: So do you, like, white label an Airtable instance for those clients?

[00:29:33] Jason: So what we do with our clients is we have an enterprise Airtable account and then we give them, we create or duplicate some of our proprietary Airtables that we built for clients and give them access to these.

[00:29:47] Jacob: I think this is brilliant. I actually think if there's any property managers out there who are thinking about this, the value that Jason's offering actually through pre building or pre packaging an Airtable setup on how your processes should flow accordingly. That's actually extremely valuable. It's fascinating that you're doing that, Jason, because we've been thinking about it ourselves for a short time.

[00:30:07] Jason: So we never really built the process system, because we partner with Flussos, another company that has this brilliant flowchart process software,

[00:30:16] Because I think there's three levels of process I've talked about, but the level one is process documentation, which is really shitty because people don't really read processes.

[00:30:26] It's like the owner's manual in the glove box of your car, right? Then there's the next level is checklist and that's okay. We've used process street stuff like that in the past. Some will use lead simple. Checklist has its own inherent flaws that the more complicated the process the more only one person understands how to change it or edit it or make it work and then there's like the next the third level which is is visual workflow and this is where everybody understands it and they're clear on it. So visual workflow, what that's done is it's allowed me the nerd to not have to do processes anymore. My team all understand them. They can see them and they can be crazy complicated because it's like playing with flow chart, Visio.

[00:31:06] And that's where the processes are built. So that's been a game changer for us, but everything else, like our planning system, and our hiring system, this is where I think Airtable really magically shines because we can custom tailor their hiring system for particular needs. Like we have a client who's adding like 114 doors in like, like a month or two, or like he's just has this ridiculous.

[00:31:30] And so his biggest constraint is hiring maintenance technicians. And he lost two he had four. So now he's down. He was down to two He got on a call with me and he was using our DoorGrow ats our applicant tracking system and we talked with him about cloning the application form reducing it to get more maintenance text to flow through, reducing the difficulty and then giving them working interviews and my coaching for him was you need to be probably hiring four techs a month and firing two or three.

[00:32:01] That's right. That's exactly right. Which is very different. And so I explained to him, I was like, you are no longer property management business because your business now, your biggest constraint, your business now is, and you need to swallow this pill that your business now is a maintenance talent acquisition company.

[00:32:19] And once he's like owns that, then he'll move on to another level boss in the video game of business, you know, but that's the business he's in now. It was originally, it was like, Oh, we're in the business of trying to get clients. And then he was in the business of trying to deal with getting on clients.

[00:32:34] And now it's maintenance, right, technician. And hiring and keeping that going. So just like short-term rentals is largely a game of cleaning, and hiring. Yeah. No, I mean, we have a recruiter managing cleaners.

[00:32:48] Jacob: Yeah. We have a full-time recruiter. I mean, yeah, we have a constant pipeline of cleaners. Same with maintenance techs.

[00:32:53] I mean, yeah, it is. It is. And you have to be shedding them, just like you shed property owners too sometimes.

[00:32:59] Jason: Yeah, we also built a rental property analysis tool that our clients use with real estate agents in air table We had some programmers do some custom coding to do some of the more complex formulas that you can't do an air table like amortization schedules and stuff like this And so they're able to create these really cool one page reports for a rental property that are branded with their branding and have their pricing built into it as a property manager, that they can get the real estate agents that are working with investors, they're working on deals, or trying to attract investors, that they can then put on their rental listings to show how that property could either cashflow or in the long run would be a better investment than maybe investing in the stock market.

[00:33:41] Jacob: So it's a great idea. We do something similar. Again, part of our sales process is we, when a lead converts to an opportunity, we basically have this template pro forma that gets generated from fields within air table, but it's a Google sheet template. So it allows us to do more is what we want in the Google sheet because it's not just a single page.

[00:34:00] It's, you know, there's quite a few pages because short term rentals are very complex in terms of setting them up. Your setup costs, your startup costs are quite large and having a reliable, accurate number for startup costs is actually remarkably difficult. With Airbnb, so similar process, you end up with kind of the same result.

[00:34:18] Here's an accurate projection.

[00:34:20] Jason: Awesome. Well, cool. Well, maybe we'll have to hang out off out and geek out on some air table stuff. So, but yeah, this has been our competitive advantage. Largely is our planning system and cadence of annual planning, quarterly planning, monthly planning, and have a database where it's all late cross linked.

[00:34:37] And so we In our system team members, and clients that use this their team members show up and there's we're keeping track of all the wins. So there's this culture of winning and Nobody wants to show up getting a red no on their weekly commitments. They're getting they want to get a green Yes, and so this is outside of our daily tactical stuff, this is our strategic goals.

[00:35:00] And so it gets my entire team focused on innovation on moving towards goals and outcomes moving forward instead of just their daily tactical work, which we're using DoorGrow Flow or Flussos that visual workflow tool. And so that's allowed us to I think that's our strongest competitive advantage is that

[00:35:19] other businesses, usually the entrepreneur comes in, throws out a bunch of goals and ideas and it's like a pulling the pin on a grenade. If they get back from a conference to their team and their team trying to do their tactical daily work and they're like, how are we going to do all this? And there's no real plan or clarity and they rarely achieve any of their goals or outcomes that they're aiming for.

[00:35:41] And we, on a weekly basis, our goal is we have sometimes four somewhere between 30 to 50 commitments between everyone on my executive team And they've committed to that week that are going towards our 30 day goals And we get at least our goal is to hit 80 percent and we do that with consistency. Now, years and 80 percent of our goals.

[00:36:03] And which means our 30 day goals are largely almost always achieved. And which means our quarterly goals are almost always achieved and annually hit our goals. And so we move really fast. We get a lot of stuff done and we innovate a lot in our coaching business. And I don't think there's. And I work with some of the best coaches in the industry.

[00:36:23] So we've really built something. I think that's pretty amazing. And we just, we roll out new things like every month. And that innovation has, that system has allowed it us to innovate. And I'm the way we've set up DoorGrow OS and Sarah runs this, my, she's our operator and my wife, she's always like, we vote on things.

[00:36:43] We get feedback on things. And she's like, not you, Jason, you're last. Like I'm always last to speak. So I don't end up as the emperor with no clothes in my own business. So anyway, yeah, Airtable is pretty cool. So, yeah, that'd be interesting to see if there's some other ways in which our clients could leverage or use Airtable for keeping track of their own clients because that's not something we played around much with, but.

[00:37:06] Jacob: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:37:08] Jason: Cool. Well, Jacob, for those that are interested in getting their property managed by you, what, which markets do you cover and how do they get ahold?

[00:37:18] Jacob: Yeah. So we do have full service management in Colorado, kind of, Southern Colorado, so South of Denver, Colorado Springs, and then further West.

[00:37:27] And we also manage in Gulf coast, Florida between Tampa Bay and Fort Myers. So, we're in these two geographic areas for full service, but going back to the pricing thing, we've realized that there are a lot of property owners who love the hospitality side of the Airbnbs, but not the pricing side. That's not why they got into it.

[00:37:46] We actually do have a pricing service. Where we market and distribute your listing on a bunch of different booking channels. So a lot of people are seeing your listing and we do the daily pricing for your property. So you don't have to do that. And then you do the cleaning, the maintenance, and the interaction with the guests.

[00:38:03] You take care of the property. It's your account. They're your reviews. They're your guests. We don't interact with them. And that is global, a global service.

[00:38:11] Jason: Oh, so that's a service that property managers could use, self managers could use. Yep. Okay. Yeah. Great. In fact,

[00:38:17] Jacob: we do have some small property managers using it.

[00:38:19] .

[00:38:19] Jason: Alright, cool. So, how does that work?

[00:38:23] Jacob: Yeah, so it really depends on the client. Like with a property manager and some property managers are for their own portfolios. Some, you know, are managing for others. It really depends on the property situation and the setup that's currently in place. But the most common thing is there's an owner operator who says, Hey, I don't want to do the pricing.

[00:38:40] I'm getting crushed by my competitors because I'm not doing this algorithmic based pricing and I'm not reviewing it daily. So we come in and we say, okay, great. I see you're on Airbnb or I see you're on VRBO or I see you're just on Airbnb and VRBO. What we do is we come in and we create a bunch more booking channels for you and we aggregate it into a white labeled property management software.

[00:39:00] It's not guesty actually. It's a different software tool. So the owner only has one place to go for their calendar, for their messaging. It's all in one place. They don't have to do anything. And then we create those listings and then we market them and then we continue to price them on an ongoing basis and to reset their prices.

[00:39:16] to compete whichever market they're in.

[00:39:18] Jason: Got it. And is this a fairly affordable service? It is.

[00:39:22] Jacob: Yes, it's very low cost compared to full service short term rental management. And it also doesn't have any, like, contracts or anything. It's just day to day.

[00:39:29] Jason: Okay, devil's advocate, what if, some listening might be like, well, why would I trust them to price my property when they might have properties in my market?

[00:39:38] Like, if they're in a market that you're in, like Colorado, what if they're going to Price there's better or more competitively than my own.

[00:39:45] Jacob: That's a great question. Yeah. No, it's a great question. And actually it's related to kind of one of the things that we set out strategically for our market.

[00:39:53] Like Colorado Springs, we manage about 120 properties in Colorado Springs out of about 3000 Airbnbs. And we kind of set our market cap at about, or sorry, as large, our market saturation at about 200 units in the Springs. So, we actually won't go above managing 200 properties in Colorado Springs for this very reason.

[00:40:10] The cannibalizing of market share. Now, that gets even more detailed where it's not just properties total, but also comp sets. So, if we have more than, let's say, 10 percent of the two bedroom properties in Colorado Springs, we're going to start cannibalizing our own market. And so, we actually have limits on the sizes of properties within our specific markets.

[00:40:30] So, right now we actually are pretty, we're pretty darn close to being capped out at one bedrooms and two bedrooms. So, we don't really take on those units anymore.

[00:40:38] Jason: Got it. Just 10 bedrooms now.

[00:40:41] Jacob: Yeah, that's right. 3, 4, 5, 6. We don't have any 10s. We have a 9, but that's the biggest.

[00:40:48] Jason: Yeah. You're not in some giant family reunion markets?

[00:40:52] Jacob: No, we are. We're in Two Springs. I mean, that place sleeps, I'm talking to a lady now. She's got a place that sleeps 60. So, that'll be That would be a family reunion for sure.

[00:41:02] Jason: Well, cool. So that sounds like an interesting service. Maybe I'll have Sarah check it out. So, cause I know she's checking the pricing every day.

[00:41:09] I think she kind of enjoys it though.

[00:41:11] Jacob: Yeah, that's totally fine. Yeah. If you enjoy it, then we are not, you know, like it's for people who is like pulling teeth, right? Like I hate doing this. I don't, or I'm not like really into the whole game theory around pricing. Like that doesn't interest me. That kind of thing.

[00:41:25] Jason: Yeah. I mean, yeah, it'd be interesting to have her do a demo with you guys and see how it compares to what she's doing and whether she would trust it or not. Yeah. That'd be interesting. I mean, she's checking

[00:41:35] Jacob: it every day, Jason, she's probably doing, you know, she's already like 85 percent of the way there.

[00:41:40] Yeah.

[00:41:41] Jason: Yeah. I don't know, but I think it's interesting. There's you know, there's a lot of property managers that do short term rentals that they're not doing anything like this. And they just not, and they basically set it sort of at a rate that's similar and maybe occasionally they'll adjust it, but they're trying to just let it happen and yeah.

[00:42:02] And then the owners get frustrated because they're like, why isn't this renting out as often? Or, you know, it's renting out a lot, but why am I not getting paid very much? You know?

[00:42:11] Jacob: Yeah. It's this passive versus active approach, right? I always tell owners like, Hey, there's two kinds of demands. There's existing demand for short term lodging.

[00:42:20] These are people who are coming to your market no matter what. They're already coming, now they're looking for lodging. But there's a second kind of demand that's really important, which is the generated demand. These are people who aren't coming to your market and wouldn't otherwise come to your market if you hadn't reached out to them first.

[00:42:34] So you're generating demand by marketing, essentially. And so we have a pretty sophisticated system for marketing to very specific or very likely customers to then book and come and stay because of your property that they wouldn't otherwise have come. And so that's a really big distinction with a lot of property managers.

[00:42:52] They just look at existing demand and try to capture their share of existing demand versus generating net new demand. So as an example of how we do this. We require our owners to have our tech package in their property. And part of what is included in that tech package is a commercial wifi router system.

[00:43:10] So every guest, not just the one who books the property, but every guest who comes to the property and wants to access the internet has to give us their phone and email. And so we build a massive database for marketing towards for guests, direct guest marketing.

[00:43:23] Jason: Wow. Okay.

[00:43:24] Jacob: A lot of managers don't do that.

[00:43:26] Jason: So, the managers out there that would, these pieces, they don't even enjoy doing it. Like the advanced pricing service. And maybe there's some other little things you can help them with as well. They can reach out to you and get this and you said you mentioned white label does that mean they're able to still maintain their brand and people aren't in your business name.

[00:43:46] And yeah.

[00:43:46] Jacob: Yeah, absolutely

[00:43:48] Jason: Okay, very cool. Yeah, cool. Anything else you'd like to share before we wrap up?

[00:43:54] Jacob: The only thing I want to share with all the property managers out there is keep on doing the hard work. For those who are outside the industry, they don't understand the challenge of the beat down that can be property management. So just keep it up and do the good work that it is.

[00:44:07] Jason: Yeah, it can be challenging. Well, All right. Thanks for Somebody jump on I don't know who that was All right. Thanks for hanging out with us until next time everybody to you know until next time to our mutual growth if you're interested in getting connected with Jacob. How do they reach you?

[00:44:24] Jacob: Just go to www. renjoy. com and just fill out a form and you'll get ahold of me.

[00:44:30] Jason: Okay. Awesome. Well then, if reach out to them and then if you are interested in growing your property management business and scaling it and getting some support in how to reach out and attract more owners to do third party management, check doorgrow.

[00:44:46] com and make sure to join our free Facebook group at doorgrowclub. com. All right. Thanks, Jacob. And bye everyone. Thanks, Jason. Bye

[00:44:53] Jacob: everyone. Bye.

[00:44:54] Jason: you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:45:21] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

View Details

Owning a business of any kind impacts your life and relationships.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts talk about marriage, relationships, and how these things correlate with having a property management business.

You’ll Learn [02:03] Owning a business impacts your relationships

[07:45] You have to be selfish sometimes

[11:10] Why people pleasing is harmful

[14:13] Masculine and Feminine frames

[24:51] Leveling up in business and your relationships

Tweetables “In business, you don't want to be the needy, pleasy guy running a property management business, trying to please every tenant, trying to please every business owner.”

“I think as a business owner, you, there is part of you that has to be selfish and you have to be comfortable with being selfish because there is a time and a place for it.”

“If you do not take care of yourself, you are not going to have energy to then continue to take care of other people.”

“Ironically, the more you are trying to please somebody, the less they value you.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: In business, you don't want to be the needy, pleasy guy running a property management business, trying to please every tenant, trying to please every business owner.

[00:00:08] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you're interested in growing in business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:29] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS. Build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull the owners of DoorGrow.

[00:01:11] Now Let's get into the show.

[00:01:14] All right, so today's topic, we're going to chat a little bit about marriage. So let's talk about it. We're going to tell a little bit about marriage. Those that have followed my journey over the years have probably seen that I've been divorced. I've gone through struggles in marriage. I've learned things the hard way. Some of y'all probably been married forever like my parents. I have amazing parents and they were a great example of just loving each other from the beginning forever.

[00:01:44] They've been married for, I don't know, like 50 years or something.

[00:01:48] Sarah: Almost. 49.

[00:01:50] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. I think

[00:01:52] Sarah: this year is going to be 47. So they're like going to be 50.

[00:01:55] Jason: I think they got married two years before they had me. So yeah.

[00:01:58] Sarah: They celebrate it though, but they're still in Australia.

[00:02:01] Jason: Yeah. So my parents, they just love each other.

[00:02:03] But one of the things that I think it's been coming up a lot, I've been noticing a lot of clients as I go deeper with them and they kind of open up especially the guys like relationships are a struggle. It's a challenge. I think it's difficult. It can be difficult for entrepreneurs. I think it's difficult for the women entrepreneurs because in a lot of ways you have to kind of step into sort of a masculine frame to run a business. And that creates an interesting dynamic in a relationship. And this is in general. Some women out there, maybe you don't want a masculine guy. Maybe you don't want a guy that leads. Maybe you don't want a guy that initiates stuff. Maybe you don't want to be able to let your hair down after work and like have him kind of take the reins and like plan something and take you on a date. I think a lot of women do. A lot of women appreciate that. Even the ones that are running businesses and showing up in a masculine sort of frame and being kind of dominant in leadership and displaying these things, they would like to have somebody else take the lead. Is this accurate do you think or no?

[00:03:03] Sarah: Yeah, well. You think it's different.

[00:03:05] Jason: You've run your own business.

[00:03:06] You've been kind of in that frame.

[00:03:08] Sarah: I'm a very masculine woman.

[00:03:11] Jason: Yeah, in some ways I think you've consistently since we've been together.

[00:03:15] Sarah: I look very feminine. I do it's deceiving. Yeah.

[00:03:19] Jason: Yeah, I think since we've been together, you've consistently stepped more and more into your feminine and I've stepped more and more into my masculine I think has kind of been a trend.

[00:03:29] Would you say that's accurate?

[00:03:30] Sarah: It could be. I don't know. I think you've probably more recently been focused on that. I can't say, I really cannot say, oh, I've ever been focused on.

[00:03:41] Jason: I don't think you've been focused on it. I just think.

[00:03:44] Sarah: I'm just living life.

[00:03:45] Jason: Yeah, you're just living life and this is the thing.

[00:03:48] Sarah: I'm just going about shit, doing my thing.

[00:03:50] Jason: She's not as conscious of it probably because I think this is something that men, if you are the leader and leading, you should be conscious of this. And women, when men are kind of taking that leadership role, women respond to that, and it's natural. Like, I've noticed it in Sarah, she's not even probably super aware of it, but there's behaviors and things that have kind of shifted.

[00:04:15] And so, the way it'll show up for a woman in this, in a relationship like that, as a man stepping more into leadership and into his masculine role, she will generally, over time, feel calmer. There'll be probably less fights, probably less explosions, you know, things like this. And the guy will be like letting go of some of the needy, whiny, pleasy, weak behavior that's kind of gross to women.

[00:04:39] Does this sound accurate?

[00:04:40] Sarah: That is, yeah, that is gross.

[00:04:42] Jason: Yeah.

[00:04:42] Sarah: To me, anyway, I cannot speak for all women.

[00:04:45] Jason: Yeah.

[00:04:45] Sarah: To me, it's gross.

[00:04:47] Jason: Ironically, when women are showing up kind of more in a masculine frame, they sometimes bring that out in guys. Like the guys think, Oh no, there's a problem. I got to please more.

[00:04:57] And so it kind of creates this weird, gross spiral in relationship. And so, which I've experienced in past relationships. Right. And so the man needs to kind of. shift and lead out of that. And so I've been noticing this in clients. And so, this is something that I've been paying a lot of attention to.

[00:05:14] A lot of guys show up in a feminine frame because we've been raised by our moms. Maybe you had a loving mom. She took care of you. Maybe she didn't. And she wasn't really a great mom, maybe but either way, that feminine influence towards pleasing has a strong impact on the male psyche, which puts us into kind of a growing up with kind of a feminine frame. If we don't have a really strong sort of masculine walled stoic father, you know, and there's really great book I would recommend for men that want to kind of eliminate that feminine frame that they're carrying around.

[00:05:49] It's called shattering the feminine frame by Jerr, J E R R. It's really hard to find, so you may have to search for it on Google, because if you search for it on Amazon, even though it's there, Amazon won't let you see it. I don't know why. It's super weird. You may not be able to find it. Sometimes searches on some of the books by Jerr don't show up when I search for them.

[00:06:11] His main book that he puts out there, I can find, and then I have to go to the author, click on the author name, and then find his other books to find some of these books. I don't, it's really weird, but you might be able to find it through Google.

[00:06:23] Sarah: Maybe it's just you. It could be just you. It'd be an interesting test.

[00:06:27] Maybe everybody else, even though.

[00:06:30] Jason: I bought multiple copies of the book and sent them to guys. So Jason gets blocked on everything. He gets himself blocked. I'm a little controversial. I get shadow banned all the time. It was something. I was definitely shadow banned on Twitter. My accounts aren't working, your whole Instagram account.

[00:06:45] I have a political account on Instagram that's totally blocked and shut down. Like, I log into it, it blocks everything. I can't do anything. I can't even go to settings to, like, request help to support. Nothing. So, yeah. So, which probably might be why I can't find which probably means my ideas are actually correct.

[00:07:04] So since we live in a world of control and censorship nowadays, all right, so that aside, so I think you know, to kill that needy sort of pleasing behavior, I think guys, this is really important. And it's important in business too, because in business, you don't want to be the needy, pleasy guy running a property management business, trying to please every tenant, trying to please every business owner.

[00:07:30] And that was something you were very good at not doing in your property management

[00:07:34] Sarah: business. I don't give a shit about that at all. I

[00:07:37] Jason: think you're like, what do I want my business to look like? How do I want to show? Yeah. Yeah.

[00:07:42] Sarah: Right. And I think it's, It, part of it is very selfish. And I think as a business owner, you, there is part of you that has to be selfish and you have to be comfortable with being selfish because there is a time and a place for it.

[00:07:54] Now I am not sitting here telling you, be only selfish and only think about yourself all the time. No matter what, prioritize you and forget everything else, right? That is not what I'm saying, but there is a time and a place to be selfish and to really think about you. And if you think about it this way, there's a lot of people, like one of my, one of my very good friends in Pennsylvania she will just give and give and give and give to everybody.

[00:08:21] She worries about her kids and she worries about her friends and she worries about her family and she worries about, it's like, she's like, so giving and like, I mean, she would literally give you the coat off of her back in the middle of winter if you needed it. I have watched her do it. And that is great.

[00:08:42] However, if you do not take care of yourself, you are not going to have energy to then continue to take care of other people. And I tell her that all the time because she's just in this constant exhaustion. Like now it's manifesting physically. Now she's had like, she had health issues. She had like a heart problem.

[00:09:02] She had all kinds of issues and it's because she's not prioritizing herself. She will go to do something for herself, but then something else pops up and needs her attention. And she's like, Oh, well, I can't worry about me. Now, I have to worry about this other thing. So there is a time and a place to be selfish, and you must take care of yourself first in order to then serve and take care of other people.

[00:09:22] It's like, put on your own oxygen mask before helping other people. Because if you die trying to help your family, well now your family doesn't have you. When you could have just put on your own oxygen mask first. Yes? So there is a time and a place to be selfish. I think in my later years, especially after my, like, my divorce when I was, what was I, 28?

[00:09:48] Yeah, I was 28. So, 28, I flipped my entire life upside down. All of it. Everything. I pretty much scrapped it all. Anything that wasn't serving me, anything that was toxic, anything that wasn't good for me, anything that didn't make me feel happy or bring me joy or make me feel loved and cared for, I said, fuck it.

[00:10:10] Gone. Gone. So I cut off relationships with my biological father. I ended my marriage. I cut off a lot of friendships. I quit my job. I did all kinds of things. I was like, yeah, this isn't working like, and that was the end of it. But that was very much about, that was for me. I did that for me.

[00:10:30] And up until that point, I wasn't really living for me. Yes, I was concerned about myself. I was always trying to take care of myself. But I was also always worried, Oh, well, who needs this? And who needs that? And, oh, you know, this person, you know, is kind of, it's always like in the back of your brain.

[00:10:48] And after, after that, I made that change and that after that point was when I started my business, when I started my business, I'm glad that I didn't do this before I had that shift in my life because when I started my business, number one has to be me. If the business makes me miserable, then I'm doing something wrong.

[00:11:07] So why do it like that?

[00:11:10] Jason: A lot of people are miserable in their businesses. They like, we see a lot of them. That's why a lot of people come to us. We can turn that around. Ironically, the more you are trying to please somebody, the less they value you. And so if you're like just bending over backwards trying to please tenants, they're going to treat you even more and more like garbage because you're showcasing and demonstrating in your language your behavior everything, "I'm low value."

[00:11:37] I'm a doormat. Walk all over me. You might do that with owners. You might be displaying, Hey, I'm low value. I'm available whenever you need me. Your time is so much more important than my time. Interrupt me anytime. Here's my cell phone number. Right? And so by displaying that you're low value, you actually end up being treated worse and being perceived as worse.

[00:11:58] And people respect business owners that are leaders and then are able to display strong behavior that they can lean into and that they can trust. You need to have a stronger frame or a more masculine frame if you are the leader of a business. Otherwise, people are not going to really trust, respect, or feel safe with you.

[00:12:18] And so I think that Also, when we're in relationship and we're with somebody and I think that this is probably more true of women, a lot of women might throw me some shade for saying this, but as guys, I don't know what the major difference is. Maybe it's testosterone levels, whatever. Maybe it's just in our DNA, but we do not grow up feeling fear.

[00:12:41] We just, we don't generally feel afraid of a whole lot of things. Like, most guys would never even think, like, am I safe if I go walk out on the street? Unless they're in a really shitty area, you know? But if I go out for a walk, I'm not concerned about my safety at all. I could roll down my windows and take a nap in my car, parked by the side of the road, and wouldn't even worry.

[00:13:03] Women, I didn't realize this until later years, but women from.

[00:13:08] Sarah: Even going like for a walk by myself, no way, I'm taking my pitbull, like

[00:13:12] Jason: Yes.

[00:13:13] Sarah: Or I'm carrying.

[00:13:15] Jason: Right. Or some combination.

[00:13:18] Sarah: Something. There's no, there's no chance. Yeah,

[00:13:21] Jason: I mean even if I'm out of town, for example You'd like you get a little bit more concerned about things and your safety and stuff like that, right?

[00:13:30] Sarah: See, I'm the type of person I'm like, I want like a fortress. I want like reinforced concrete like five inch, you know, like, maybe even 11 inch thick, like, walls, I want, like, a moat, I also like some sharks that we don't feed, like, ever, and then, you know, somebody might accidentally fall down.

[00:13:49] I've been getting in, like, this is how I'm like, that would make me feel safe. I want like bulletproof glass. Give me the Cybertruck glass just everywhere. Like, that's like, this is what I need. I need like laser beams, like you see in museums. Like motion sensor laser beams that trigger like the SWAT team.

[00:14:06] That's what I need, but I've watched way too many horror movies, admittedly, way too many for my own good.

[00:14:13] Jason: So regardless of your gender, masculine and feminine energy is always at play. And, Feminine energy generally is not going to feel safe without masculine energy nearby.

[00:14:24] That's just generally how it works. Masculine energy creates that protection and safety. This will be true of your clients. So you'll need to show up somewhat in a masculine frame so that your clients can feel safe. feel safe with you. And that's what they want to buy. They don't want to buy property management, but they want to buy a safety and certainty.

[00:14:40] They want to buy peace of mind. And so that certainty that you can display is more of a masculine energy or masculine frame. This is true of women that are in relationships. If they're not getting that from the man that they're with or around them, That sort of masculine frame, they're going to become, a lot of times, they become more nervous, more neurotic.

[00:14:59] They're more concerned about things and more fearful. And especially if they have to then step into the masculine frame to take care of the guy that they're with because he's even more needy and pleasy and whatever and feminine than she is, then it's like, it creates this gross sort of I'm your mother type of dynamic, right?

[00:15:17] And you don't want to be my mother, right? You don't want to be cleaning up after me and telling me what to do all the time.

[00:15:22] Sarah: I don't want to be anybody's mom.

[00:15:24] Jason: Yeah, exactly.

[00:15:24] Sarah: I am not cut out to be a mom, let's be honest. I'm just not, I'm just not good. Like my mom is the best mom in the world and then like, how do I measure up to that?

[00:15:34] Like I can't compete with that.

[00:15:35] Jason: Well, I don't think it's a competition.

[00:15:37] Sarah: Everything is a competition.

[00:15:39] Jason: It's not really.

[00:15:39] Sarah: You know nothing about me.

[00:15:41] Jason: It's not really competition. You don't need to compete with your mom, but you can take, you know, some of the good that you've got from her and the stuff that you don't want to apply or we learn from our parents.

[00:15:51] We don't want to be like. We don't have to take that. Right. So, you know, I guess the takeaway from this episode maybe is men, check out that book, like step into a little bit more masculine role in your relationships, your wife will be calmer, she'll be more loving, you will definitely get more respect and you'll get more sex if you're showing up in a masculine frame. And it's your responsibility. Stop trying to change her. Stop trying to get her to be something different. Stop wishing she was nicer to you. Stop trying to focus on I need love and I need to please her and do things like that like Show up in a confident leadership position, like plan stuff, plan dates.

[00:16:35] We're going on a date this weekend, right? We went on a date last weekend.

[00:16:40] Sarah: Round two.

[00:16:40] Jason: I messed up last weekend. I planned a date. I was so excited and took her out to eat. We went to go to where the date was, we were supposed to go watch a show. And it was closed, like, there was nothing there. And I was like, what?

[00:16:54] And I checked and I had the date wrong. I had the date wrong. So what did I do as a leader? I found another date. So I quickly booked tickets, found tickets to a comedy show that was right there, downtown Austin. And then we went to that and we had a good time, right?

[00:17:08] Sarah: Well, that was when I rescued the bird.

[00:17:09] Jason: Yes.

[00:17:10] Sarah: So here, let's talk about this. This is how crazy my life is. Jump out of a moving car because my husband wouldn't stop the car.

[00:17:16] Jason: Let's, let me explain this. I'm driving into a parking lot, there is a bird that has landed on my hood and it's just staying on there so I'm like, this is weird and I'm turning into a parking structure and I was barely moving.

[00:17:30] I was slowed down or you would have hurt yourself but I'm like, she's like, I'm going to get out and I'm going to take care of the bird and because it had jumped off. And I was like, No.

[00:17:37] Sarah: It didn't. It tried to fly, like, it was on the hood. And it tried to fly a little bit and it, like, barely cleared, like, the roof of the car and I went, Jason, that bird is injured, I'm telling you, it's injured and he's like, okay.

[00:17:51] And I'm like, stop the car, and he's like, what? I'm like, no, stop the car. I was like, I am not stopping the car. Yeah, he's like, I'm not stopping.

[00:17:57] Jason: There were, like, homeless people on the street, like, right outside there. Yeah, I know. Ghettos, they probably were all high on drugs, like, it was not a great area.

[00:18:06] And she jumps out of the car and I have to then find a parking space because there's nowhere to park and I had to go up seven floors in this parking structure. I'm like, my wife is probably going to be dead by now, right? So I eventually get to the top floor, then I come down, I'm, like, so anxious because I'm, like, I need to protect this woman from her crazy bird saving, like, whatever.

[00:18:27] Sarah: And actually, I had this dress on. And my high heels, and I'm running around trying to, like, scoop up. I'm like, it's okay, try to scoop the bird. And the bird, like, it can't really fly. It flew a little bit for, like, a couple feet, and then it, like, sank back down. And I'm like, oh no, it's injured. So I'm, like, chasing the bird, and the bird, like, hops around.

[00:18:45] Like, it comes out of the parking garage, and it hops around to the corner. I don't know what's back there. So I'm just following, I'm like, come here, bird. And there's a man in the corner. who I can only think, my guess is, like, coke, I don't know. I don't know what he's doing, it's, I don't know, crack, whatever crack is, it's probably that.

[00:19:03] So, I don't know, I'm not a drug expert, I've never been in narcotics, I don't know. But he's, like, in the corner and he's, like, doing, I was, like, okay, I'm just going to, like, not look at what's happening, cause I don't care, I'm just, Hi, I'm just getting the bird, I'm, like, don't, like, sorry don't mind me.

[00:19:19] And yeah, he didn't like that. But I did get the bird, and then I didn't know what to do with the bird. So I have the bird now, I'm like, oh, what do I do now? So I was going to walk back to my husband and tell him to get in the car.

[00:19:33] Jason: Yeah, we were seven floors up. You had no idea where I was.

[00:19:36] Sarah: No, I didn't. I was just going to walk around until I found you.

[00:19:39] But I had the bird in my hands. And I was going to go back to my husband and then say, like, I guess we have to figure out what to do with this bird. We have a bird now. But this woman, she was on the street and she's like, Oh, hi. She was like, excuse me, do you need help? And I said, I don't know.

[00:19:54] Can, do you know what to do with an injured bird? And she said, actually, yes I do. And I said, Oh my God, thank God. Because I didn't know what I was going to do with this bird. And she said, Oh, you have to take it to whatever on earth she said. And she's like, I can do that because I guess she works there or something.

[00:20:11] So she's like, oh, I'll take it in tomorrow. She's like if you give me the bird So then she had this whole bird probably ate

[00:20:18] Jason: the bird. She's probably some homeless person that ate the bird.

[00:20:21] Sarah: He was not a homeless person. It was a couple.

[00:20:23] Jason: Okay.

[00:20:24] Sarah: There was a couple they had a dog.

[00:20:26] Jason: Okay, meanwhile, I'm coming down an elevator.

[00:20:30] It lets me out on the first floor of this parking structure, does not let me into the parking structure. There's no, like, it just exits the building. So I exit the parking building and it locks me out of the building. So I can't even go back in and I'm like trying to find her. I have no idea where she is.

[00:20:49] And so I'm calling her and yeah

[00:20:53] we ended up talking, didn't we?

[00:20:54] Sarah: No, I called you.

[00:20:55] Jason: Yeah, you called me.

[00:20:56] Sarah: Then so the lady takes the bird and now I have no bird, which is great and the bird is safe. And now I'm thinking, okay, let me just, I didn't realize it was as tall. I really did not know that the building was that tall.

[00:21:08] So I figured, Oh, there's probably like three levels, whatever. I'll just walk around and find the car. It won't be hard. Well, I'm walking around and I'm realizing, Oh, okay. Well, this just keeps going. Yeah. And you

[00:21:18] Jason: were wearing the worst shoes on the planet.

[00:21:19] Sarah: Worst shoes. I was wearing a

[00:21:21] Jason: Okay. Let me explain this.

[00:21:23] They can't see your outfit right now. Sarah looks like sex on wheels. Like, her outfit is hot. Like, this is a hot dress. This is like a form fitting store dress. I bought this for her. She looks really good in this. Sorry. And she's wearing these high heels.

[00:21:39] She's wearing these high heels like Louboutin, whatever they're called. And they're like, did I buy you those?

[00:21:46] Sarah: That pair? Yes.

[00:21:48] Jason: Okay. Yeah, I bought her these shoes and they're wicked uncomfortable.

[00:21:51] Sarah: They're so uncomfortable.

[00:21:52] Jason: Like whenever she wears them on a date.

[00:21:53] Sarah: Christian Louboutin, I have to say something about him.

[00:21:55] He either hates women or he has no idea what women's feet are like.

[00:21:59] Jason: I don't know, but he's laughing. Or both. He's laughing all the way to the bank, whatever. Because they're not cheap. So, she's wearing these shoes that she can't even walk around in. And you're going to, there's no way she's going to go up seven floors of parking.

[00:22:12] Sarah: I was on the third floor.

[00:22:14] Jason: Yeah.

[00:22:15] Sarah: Yeah, I got to the third floor and then I realized, oh, okay, so then I called you.

[00:22:19] Jason: Yeah, and then she eventually finds me. We get. You need to go back up to the car because I didn't grab your purse. Because

[00:22:26] Sarah: he left my purse in the car.

[00:22:28] Jason: Because I should have been psychic and known that she needed me to grab her purse.

[00:22:32] Right guys. And so we go back up, but he had to let me back into the building because I was locked out and their thing wouldn't work to let me back in with my parking pass thing. So she comes down to the first floor, opens it up, lets me in. We begin in the elevator, we go back up the top floor.

[00:22:47] I'm like, what were you thinking? And she's like, what were you thinking? You didn't grab my purse. You left my purse. I'm like, you're way more important than the purse, woman. And you're like going around crazy homeless people and like trying to save a bird.

[00:23:03] Sarah: It was saved.

[00:23:04] Jason: So

[00:23:05] Sarah: It was saved.

[00:23:06] Jason: Okay, good job. You did it.

[00:23:08] Good job. You're like

[00:23:09] Sarah: We've been saving lots of animals.

[00:23:11] Jason: I think there's a Bible verse where Jesus says something or God says something about like your life is worth more than many sparrows or something like that. Yeah. So I don't know. Some of you don't know what the verse is.

[00:23:24] Sarah: I must've missed class that day.

[00:23:26] Jason: Yeah, exactly. So anyway, we go up to the car, get this, come back down, we exit that same exit down on the first floor and I'm looking around, I'm like, this is not a great area. No, it was not.

[00:23:37] Sarah: It was bad.

[00:23:37] Jason: There's some rough characters and like, they're walking around and like,

[00:23:41] Sarah: bleh. In fact, we went to the comedy club and one of the comedians, he said, so now I have a bully and he's a homeless man and the same homeless man, he like, hangs out right outside the comedy club and he said, I'm here all the time.

[00:23:52] And now the homeless man is like harassing me every single time. And he's like, so now I have a bully who's a homeless man. He's like, what do I do about that?

[00:24:01] Jason: Yeah, this is great. This is great. So

[00:24:05] Sarah: yeah.

[00:24:06] Jason: Yeah. So I may be able to keep Sarah safe from her bird rescuing adventures in the future. We'll see.

[00:24:13] Sarah: Stop the car.

[00:24:15] When I tell you to stop, just stop the car.

[00:24:16] Jason: You still would have gotten out. I didn't want you to get out. We could have come back.

[00:24:20] Sarah: Oh, no. It could have died in the meantime. What if it went in the street? It tried to go in the street. I had to stop it.

[00:24:27] Jason: All right. I would rather a little bird die than my wife.

[00:24:31] Sarah: So that's okay. Yeah. But I don't feel like I feel like there's a third option.

[00:24:36] Jason: Men, you know what I'm thinking right now? You know.

[00:24:40] Sarah: They're like, what is wrong with her?

[00:24:42] Jason: They don't think what's wrong with it. They just go, that's what women do. Like, and yeah, and guys understand. So.

[00:24:49] Sarah: We have to save things.

[00:24:51] Jason: Okay, so, should we wrap this up? Anything else we should have? I didn't know we were going into this whole date, but I have a date planned for this weekend. It's the one that I thought had been the previous weekend. So we're, I'm taking her out again, but men plan some dates, show some leadership. Don't wait till she asks you to do things.

[00:25:10] Try and Be proactive and find ways to do things before she asks you right. And if she's asked you to do things multiple times, you probably are being a lazy bum. Comfort ease and that's feminine, right? Everybody loves to see a woman in comfort in with her pillows and cushions laying out attractively but guys. They love to see guys at work, like they, man, you do the work.

[00:25:34] If you are just sitting around watching football games all day and being a bum, then you are actually in your feminine as a guy and men are men of action. Get some stuff done, do some things, be proactive, improve yourself. So that's all I'll say about that. All right. So yeah. And join our program and get, join our program.

[00:25:56] Get a coach like me. That's going to call you out on your BS and help you step into a mass more masculine frame. We will crush it more in business. And I guarantee that you will be getting more respect, more love, more sex, more, all the good stuff. If you show up and if you like show up and be the person you were meant to be.

[00:26:16] So, we, I will challenge you to do that. I've worked with relationship coaches. I've got a coach for a marriage coach right now. I've got we've had business coaches like you need to be constantly improving yourself. So, I will make sure that you're doing that if you join our program. All right.

[00:26:33] That's it for today, right? All right. Until next time, everybody to our mutual growth. If you would like to be part of the adventure with door, grow, Go to doorgrow. com. Check us out. Book a call with us. We'll find out if we can help you. And if you are wanting to be a little bit more connected to our free community, you can go to doorgrowclub. com and join our free Facebook group. And that's it. Bye everyone.

[00:27:01] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:27:27] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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Man can learn valuable lessons from man’s best friend…

In this episode, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull talk about their passion project of fostering dogs and how business owners can learn about resilience from these adorable rescue pups.

You’ll Learn [02:56] The story of Chance the dog

[11:09] What does this have to do with running a business?

[18:39] Jason and Sarah’s foster dogs

Tweetables “You will look back on this as being such an easy thing for you to deal with in the present moment.”

“If you're going to go through tough stuff, it's a lot better to have the right support around you.”

“You're going to make mistakes, but that's the price of tuition in business.”

“We're all doing the best we can with our current limited capacity and knowledge that we possessed in that moment.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: If this dog can go through everything that he went through and still push through, whatever is happening in your business, whatever is happening in your life, whatever is happening in your marriage, in your friendships, in your relationships, you can push through it.

[00:00:14] Jason: Yeah, just tell yourself you're not yet at Maynard level.

[00:00:17] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:35] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win we're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, founder,

[00:01:16] cOO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:18] And now let's get into the show. All right So we were thinking what we should talk about today and one of Sarah's strong passions Is dogs. I think Sarah likes dogs more than people. Is that fair?

[00:01:34] Sarah: That's accurate.

[00:01:35] Jason: Okay, she's an intj. Any of you that are familiar with myers briggs intjs typically like animals more than people. I don't know why, and I like dogs too, so not a fan of cats I'm allergic to them and I think they're smelly.

[00:01:51] Sorry, all you cat lovers out there, but I'm more of a dog person. You can see in the background here is. Hey buddy, who's smelling around. This is a dog that we're fostering right now. And the working title for this dog is Hans. That's they give them names, but this is a dog we're fostering and it's such a sweet dog.

[00:02:13] And so I wanted, this is a passion of Sarah's. We've been fostering some dogs and we've had, had some difficult times fostering dogs and we've had some good times, you know, let's, should we talk about our first foster?

[00:02:27] Sarah: Yeah. Yeah. If that didn't turn us off to fostering...

[00:02:31] it was like worst case scenario, I would say.

[00:02:35] Jason: So Sarah's dog, one of our dogs, he's a large dog and he's a Pitbull. American.

[00:02:44] Sarah: He's an American Pitbull. American Pitbull.

[00:02:45] Jason: Terrier. 100%. We got him DNA tested, purebred. And then we have another little mutt that we can talk about that we got.

[00:02:53] Sarah: That we adopted. Well, that one was after the whole Chance thing.

[00:02:56] Jason: Yeah, totally. So we decided to, like foster, we brought a dog in and this dog's name was Chance and he was a pit bull. We thought maybe they'd get along but we didn't know Chance's background. We didn't know Chance's history. The previous people made it sound like he was a good dog sort of, but they really, I think we're kind of keeping secrets from us and gave us a bunch of rules.

[00:03:21] Like, be careful with other dogs and like separate for a while and we did everything

[00:03:25] Sarah: that's always the rule.

[00:03:26] Jason: Sure.

[00:03:26] Sarah: Careful with other dogs be separate for a while. Slow introductions. Never feed together. That's yeah, those are always the rules. You say that as if that was like a red flag.

[00:03:35] That was not a red flag.

[00:03:36] Jason: Okay.

[00:03:37] Sarah: They tell you that with every dog.

[00:03:38] Jason: They had to have known that this dog had some violent tendencies or some history. So long story short, this dog bit Sarah. They gaslit us and blamed, it bit her arm. And they were like, "oh, well, there was food involved" or something like this.

[00:03:53] We're like, okay, maybe it was us. We'll be more careful. So we still kept the dog. And we had the dog for like a month.

[00:04:00] Sarah: We struggled with that too. Because we really, we, right then and there, we thought, okay. I think we're done. I think he's got to go back. Someone else can foster him.

[00:04:08] Yeah. And they kind of talked us into it. Like, "oh, well, can you just hang on to him until I find another place for him to go? Because like, nobody can take him right now."

[00:04:18] Jason: I don't think there's any safe place for them to go. So later. At this point later, it had been a month, we had integrated the dogs, they were hanging out, they're on the couch together, like it didn't seem to be a problem.

[00:04:31] It was kind of, but I think really was like a working truce or something. I think this dog had a history of maybe being involved in dog fights, something like this would be my guess. Because some dogs will usually get together. And they'll do a little bit of have a little tiff, but they're not trying to kill each other, right?

[00:04:48] They'll, like, bite, they'll do something, they'll give a warning, and they'll be done with it. So, I had come home from a walk, Parker came up to me, I played with him a little bit, he did a little playful sort of growl with a toy or whatever, the other dog gets off the couch. This dog had no expression. He's just headed towards Parker.

[00:05:07] Parker saw him and it was like, it was on and saw him coming towards me. And they just locked up and they got into this horrible dog fight. Like, and we have a long entryway into our home, like a big hallway, like entryway that runs kind of all the way to the back of the house almost.

[00:05:26] Right. And this was. in our family room towards the back of the house and the fight continued all the way to the front door. Like it was just, it was a disaster. This dog Chance and Parker were fighting and we were trying to break it up. Sarah was on with Parker trying to pull him and I was trying to get Chance off and Sarah, you were freaking out if you don't mind me saying.

[00:05:51]

[00:05:51] Sarah: I mean, yeah. Like, rightfully so.

[00:05:54] Jason: Yeah. She's freaking out. And so it, yeah it was interesting. So there's blood everywhere. Blood flying all over the place, dogs are locked up and fighting, biting at each other and so then I, yeah. You know, if I had my gun or knife on me, dog probably would be dead.

[00:06:09] I couldn't figure out what else to do. And we weren't going to let him kill our dog. And he was much stronger than Parker. So, we didn't want Parker to die. Right. So, but what I did in that moment is I was like, I had done a little bit of jujitsu training in the past. So I was like, Oh, I'm going to choke him out.

[00:06:26] I was trying to, I first tried to lift the legs up. Cause that's what people say. I didn't, that wasn't really a great idea because I lift his back legs up and to try and pull him off. And he just turned and latched onto my leg. He turned really quickly, latched onto my leg, bit my leg through my pants. I have permanent bite mark on my right leg and had latched on my leg.

[00:06:49] through my pants and was biting me. Then Parker was coming at him. So he turned back to Parker. And then I use that moment when he came at my leg towards me to get my arm underneath his neck and then to choke him out, just like in martial arts. So I did a blood choke and I figured he's probably got veins going through his neck to his brain, just like all of us humans.

[00:07:13] And it choked him out. And then He passed out. I was holding him in my arm and I picked him up and was choking him out because he eventually released Parker and I was choking him out. I'm holding this limp dog in my arm. And then his Parker was latched onto one of his legs or something. And Sarah was like, "what do I do? What do I do? He won't let go!" And I was like, Sarah has a martial arts background, so I figured you knew how to do a choke. So I was like, "choke him out. You got to choke him out!" So she had to grab Parker and get him to release. And and he did. Parker really was trying to protect us. That was obvious.

[00:07:52] But Parker was losing, like it wasn't going well for him. Parker, the other dog had some bites on him, but he was okay. But Parker had to go to the hospital. Like he was really messed up. He had to get surgery. His ear was like torn in half. Yeah, his

[00:08:09] Sarah: ear was torn and then he had a chunk ripped out of his neck.

[00:08:13] Like the back of his neck. Yeah, it was ugly. Yeah, it was not good.

[00:08:16] Jason: So, while I had Chance in the choke hold and limp, I carried him through the house to the backyard and put him into the backyard. And shut the door so we could just keep them separate. And then, yeah, we were just, I was totally scared of that dog after that.

[00:08:33] But that's what we did. And eventually I think we just got him into a crate or something. So he wasn't in the backyard.

[00:08:39] Sarah: Yeah. No, I had to go get him.

[00:08:41] Jason: Yeah.

[00:08:42] Sarah: Into the crate. Because he was like, I don't think he's going to want to see me. I just choked him out. No. No, that's probably a good call.

[00:08:48] Jason: He probably wouldn't want to attack me. Yeah. Because I was pretty rough with him. So, that's my adventure in choking out a pit bull. Yeah.

[00:08:58] Sarah: So I think you never really know what you're going to do until you're like in the moment.

[00:09:02] Jason: Yeah.

[00:09:03] Sarah: And then your adrenaline kicks in and sometimes you know what you're going to do or you think you know what you're going to do ahead of time and you find out there's no plan.

[00:09:12] There's no plan. And the they do tell you like, oh, lift the dog's hind legs over its head and it will release. Yes, and

[00:09:20] two out of two times it released and then latched on to.

[00:09:25] Jason: Yeah, they don't like that it's being lifted up.

[00:09:27] Sarah: No.

[00:09:27] Jason: So, I mean, that was an interesting moment because I went into tunnel vision.

[00:09:31] This is how guys brains work. We're generally singular focused. This is why they send us to war, right? We can just focus on one thing. So I wasn't really particularly traumatized by the event. I mean, it was, but I was like, okay, I'm in mission mode. I'm doing what I need to do with the dog and that's it.

[00:09:47] Yeah. And then we got to clean up because there's blood everywhere, all through our home. Yeah, it was like a freaking emergency. Walls, everywhere. It was awful. There's blood everywhere.

[00:09:53] Sarah: Everywhere. And then I was covered in it. Because I was holding

[00:09:57] Jason: Parker and I had a white t shirt and then

[00:09:59] Sarah: when we like I got Parker in the office and Chance was outside because Jason put him out there and Jason looked at me and I'm literally like from here down I was just drenched.

[00:10:12] Jason: You were holding Parker and he was the more wounded. Drenched. Yeah.

[00:10:15] Sarah: And he's going "oh my god. Oh my god." He's like, "Sarah, there's freaking blood" It's not mine. It's not mine. Like, I'm okay. I lost my pinky nail. That got ripped off. So for a while I had no pinky nail that, that was not fun.

[00:10:27] Jason: Like your actual nail.

[00:10:28] Sarah: Like my actual, everybody says, okay.

[00:10:30] Let me clear something up. Everybody says, Oh, those aren't real nails. These are real. These are actually attached to my real nails on my finger. So like underneath you can kind of see,

[00:10:41] Jason: yeah, there's like,

[00:10:42] Sarah: there are real nails here. And then yes, I make them longer, but it's not just a tip. Like if you pull off one of these nails, it is attached to your real nail and your real nail will come off with it.

[00:10:55] Jason: You had a flesh pinky, like there was no nail for a while. Yeah. Yeah. It was kind of odd.

[00:11:00] Sarah: Yeah, it was horrible. Yeah that, that was awful.

[00:11:03] Jason: Yeah, and it took a while for my bite mark to heal. So, yeah. So, so that was our first adventure.

[00:11:09] Sarah: Let me pause here and say, cause I know some of you guys are going, "why the freaking hell are they talking about any of this? It sounds awful. And it's like, oh my God, I don't even want to keep listening to the episode." Keep listening. Because I think one of the things that I would say about particularly about this situation that we had to go through is sometimes in life, sometimes also in business, you gotta go through some shit.

[00:11:34] And you're going to be in some situations that you definitely did not plan for, that you've never been in before, and that Maybe you don't know what to do, and in the moment, the only thing you can do is whatever comes to your mind, whatever you can think of, and then, it's afterwards, then there's the PTSD, so then you just have to heal from the PTSD, but I also would say it's fair that every entrepreneur has a little PTSD from their business.

[00:12:07] Jason: Yeah, for sure.

[00:12:08] Sarah: Yeah

[00:12:09] Jason: Well, because entrepreneurs we take bigger risks. We get to experience you know issues like cash flow problems or staffing issues or team members that losing faith in us and leaving or team members stealing from us, right?

[00:12:24] Sarah: Having to fire somebody.

[00:12:25] Jason: If you're working for a boss you don't generally have to experience a lot of this stuff that you experience as a business owner. We're choosing into a higher level of stress, trauma, difficulty, which is why it's not for everybody when not everybody starts a business. And but yeah, it's important to heal from these things and to level up from these things and learn from these things so that you can get to that next level of capacity to be able to deal with that next level of stress that exists in business. And I tell clients this all the time.

[00:12:55] They're currently dealing with some problem they think is so hard and they're at kind of a lower level and I tell them, someday, you will look back on this as being such an easy thing for you to deal with in the present moment, you'll be like, Oh man, I can't believe that was so hard for me then. I'm dealing with such bigger challenges and bigger level, higher level things now. And that's encouraging for them. They're like, Oh, that's good news. They're like, and they know they're like, yeah, someday this will be easy. I'm like, someday, this hiring stuff will be easy. Someday this, you know, process stuff that you're dealing with will be easy.

[00:13:29] Because you're going to increase your capacity. You're going to learn, you're going to level up. It's the price of tuition and business. So let me take a quick break. I'm going to share our sponsor for this episode, which is Vendoroo. So if you are dealing with constant stress, the hassle of maintenance coordination, and that's an issue for you, check out Vendoroo. They're your AI driven in house maintenance expert that handles work orders from start to finish, triaging, troubleshooting, vendor selection and coordination. It's built by property managers for property managers to provide cost effective and accountable maintenance operations where every dollar is accounted for and every task is handled with unmatched reliability.

[00:14:08] Vendoroo takes care of the details so you can focus on growth. Schedule a demo today at Vendoroo, V E N D O R O O dot AI slash doorGrow and experience maintenance done right. I was actually, we were hanging out with the Vendoroo guys and I was telling them the story. Because we were telling them how we were fostering a dog and we had to get home, you know, from dinner.

[00:14:29] And then they were, we somehow shifted in that story and they were just like, so interested. So, but yeah, so if you want to check out DoorGrow. com, we actually just put this up yesterday because we've been fostering and taking care of dogs and our team are really excited about this. I had the idea with one of my team members, we did a secret project.

[00:14:51] Yeah, because we knew Sarah would probably like it. So we put up a dog page. So you can see the dogs that we've like, fostered. I don't think we put Chance on the page. Did we? I don't think we put Chance on the page.

[00:15:03] Sarah: No, we didn't. No. Chance was not a great story. But Parker isn't on there either. And Parker is the OG.

[00:15:09] Jason: Parker's the OG. We can add Parker.

[00:15:11] Sarah: Parker's like the mascot of everything.

[00:15:14] Jason: So, anyway, check that out right at the top, you'll see a little dog emoji and it says dogs on our website. And you can see, you know, a little bit of the passion we have for helping out dogs. All right. So we told the story of Chance.

[00:15:27] And you would think after that we would be done. And I think we were for a little while. It was like, yeah, kind of free, especially for you to like, get past the PTSD of that. You beat yourself up quite a bit about it, which you can be good at times, right?

[00:15:43] Sarah: I'm really, yeah. Yeah. Because on the DISC profile, I'm a DC, so I'm super critical of everything and everyone, including myself.

[00:15:54] Yeah.

[00:15:54] So yeah.

[00:15:56] Jason: Which good operators are hard time.

[00:15:58] Sarah: And hard time with that. And I, like I, I internalized a lot of that. I took blame for a lot of that and I had to just kind of work, work my way through that. And it kind of goes back to anytime that you deal with a hard situation, it might be in business or otherwise, you know, you're going to reflect on the situation and some people are really good at externalizing and saying like, none of that was my fault.

[00:16:25] You know, I have like no ownership in that whatsoever. Some of people, they take all of the ownership and are really bad at externalizing. So I think you have to kind of find the middle ground. Like what am I responsible for? What am I accountable for? You know, how can I learn? I'm going to learn from that.

[00:16:43] And for me it was the, it hands down, it was the scariest moment of my life. Most terrifying moment of my entire life. And I've been in some pretty scary situations back when I did property management. This puts it to shame, absolute shame. But I think it's really just, it's finding the middle ground and figuring out what am I responsible for and how can I learn.

[00:17:06] Jason: I think also, I think that some people are kinder to themselves and have more grace for themselves. And I think it's important to remember, like all of us have been through tough stuff and we may beat ourselves up for it, but beating ourselves up doesn't really have any saving power. It doesn't make us better to beat ourselves up.

[00:17:26] What we can do though, is we can recognize, you know, in that moment. And based on the decisions we made we were making the best decisions we knew to make at that time And I think you know, we can all afford ourselves a little bit of grace. You're going to make mistakes and screw things up in business.

[00:17:41] You're going to fuck up and you're going to make bad choices. I've made some big mistakes like in business. You know, I did a whole episode on my two million dollar mistake or whatever you're going to make mistakes, but that's the price of tuition in business and you keep going. But I think also we need to be willing to afford ourselves some grace and recognize we're all doing the best we can with our current limited capacity and knowledge that we possessed in that moment.

[00:18:08] And so if you knew better, you would do better, right? We are definitely going to behave differently having had that lesson with Chance with other dogs, right? We're a little bit more attuned to their behavior. their temperament, like how to integrate them. Like we're paying more attention.

[00:18:25] Like we just, we have a different level of awareness and that's what happens in business. If you can move past the trauma and the difficulty and you go right back at it, you pick yourself back up. You dust yourself off. You're going to learn from the experience. So should we talk about some other dogs real quick?

[00:18:42] All right. Who else? Well, let's first, let's go to the OG, right? So Parker's my baby. Parker is the best dog I've ever had. And I don't know if there's ever going to be a dog that is better than Parker. I just don't, I said that about my first pit bull and then Parker, I love him so much more than my first pit bull.

[00:19:01] . So Parker, I got him 2016, so he's like eight now. And he his mom was a family pet who got out of the yard one day and got herself pregnant. So she went, had a good old time. Her owner found out that she was pregnant and decided to drop her off at the pound because he didn't want a pregnant dog.

[00:19:25] Sarah: So, you know, instead of like spay, neuter, that whole thing, he's like, yeah, I'll just take her to the pound.

[00:19:29] Jason: Let's get rid of her.

[00:19:30] Like, while pregnant.

[00:19:32] Sarah: Still going to find you, bud. Like you're out there, I'll get you one day. So dropped her off at the pound. Pregnant dogs should not be at the pound. They will, you know.

[00:19:40] Get very sick. So, they moved her to a foster. She had a bunch of puppies and Parker was one of those puppies. So I saved him and he's my baby. He's fiercely loyal and protective of me, even when he probably shouldn't be. Sometimes with Jason, he's protective of me. Like you'll smack my butt, and Parker does not like that.

[00:20:04] Jason: I do smack Sarah's butt butt, everybody. Honest confessions. Husbands, if you are not smacking your wife's butt occasionally, something's wrong. Letting you know. So.

[00:20:15] Sarah: Yeah. But Parker doesn't know. He doesn't know that. He doesn't know it's friendly and playful and loving. No. He knows hitting is bad.

[00:20:21] I

[00:20:22] Jason: have to do it when he's not nearby.

[00:20:24] Sarah: Yeah. To be fair, I can't hit myself either, so, like, if a bug lands on me or something, I hit myself.

[00:20:30] Jason: Yeah, he starts getting around you and, like, trying to, like, climb on you and, like, protect you from yourself, yeah.

[00:20:36] Sarah: He does.

[00:20:37] Jason: And he'll get, try and get in between us and, like, prevent me from getting near her, yeah.

[00:20:41] He does.

[00:20:42] Sarah: He does. So Parker was the first dog that I had ever rescued.

[00:20:45] Jason: He's like a nanny dog.

[00:20:46] Sarah: He is a nanny dog. We call him the nanny dog. He is. And we say, when he's doing his thing, I'm like, oh, he's nanny dogging again. Yeah. So, Parker, we've got Parker. And then after the whole Chance thing, we took a break for about eight months.

[00:21:01] And then I thought, okay, well, what if we do a smaller dog? Because after that, Parker was more selective with bigger dogs. Rightfully so. That's his version of PTSD. So I thought, okay, well, maybe a smaller dog could work. And that is where Captain came in. So Captain just for reference, size reference, Parker varies between 80 and 85 pounds.

[00:21:24] Jason: Big dog.

[00:21:24] Sarah: Captain is 14, 14 pounds.

[00:21:27] Jason: Yeah, Parker's tall like a lab, but built like a pit bull.

[00:21:30] Sarah: Yeah. Yeah, so Captain is only 14 pounds. He's a little baby. He's about

[00:21:36] Jason: tiny

[00:21:37] Sarah: three or four ish He was we got him from a shelter about like an hour and a half away an hour 45 minutes away and Someone had him and his two brothers and decided they were done with him So they shoved them in a crate and they dropped them off at an animal shelter overnight

[00:21:56] Jason: Yeah, because it says you're not allowed to leave animals here.

[00:21:59] So they secretly did it in the middle of the night, left the crate there.

[00:22:03] Sarah: On the doorstep. So the staff came in at 7 a. m. and found three dogs shoved in the crate. Huh. Super, super, don't be like these people, be better, okay? So, then him and Parker actually worked really well together and Like Captain just loves Parker so much.

[00:22:21] He just loves him so much. Like I take Parker to the chiropractor and Captain stays here. And when I come back with Parker, Captain is way more excited to see Parker than he is to see me. He loves me so much, but he's like, just

[00:22:35] Jason: he's jumping all

[00:22:36] Sarah: over the moon about Parker. So Captain's our second rescue.

[00:22:40] Jason: And Captain's, he's kind of a mutt. He, we did a DNA test on him.

[00:22:43] Sarah: Oh, no, he's a he's absolutely a mutt.

[00:22:45] Jason: Yeah, he's got Rat Terrier. He's got...

[00:22:48] Sarah: I think if you could do him in order, probably not.

[00:22:50] Jason: I don't know. Rat Terrier was probably the largest.

[00:22:52] Sarah: Rat Terrier is the largest. What's next? Then American Pit Bull Terrier, which is why he's brindle on the top.

[00:22:57] Jason: Oh, yeah.

[00:22:58] Sarah: Huh. Yeah. Okay. Yep. American Pit Bull Terrier. Then Super Mutt.

[00:23:03] Jason: Yeah, that's what the That's a breed. Super Mutt.

[00:23:05] Sarah: I'm like, oh, wow. They call it a Super Mutt. Okay. Okay. It's like 14 percent Super Mutt. Huh. I think. Boston Terrier, Yorkshire Terrier, And then Dachshund, which is what we're told he was.

[00:23:19] Jason: Yeah, and he's little. He's really little. He'll get in our face. All the time. Alright, so, next dog.

[00:23:27] Sarah: Yeah, so, we've had Captain for a little over a year now, and then I thought, okay let's foster. We won't adopt another one, but like, we'll foster, we'll, you know, help train it, kinda get it back on its feet, do something good, get it ready for a family.

[00:23:42] And that's where Maynard came in.

[00:23:44] Jason: Mmm. Maynard.

[00:23:45] Sarah: That one, that, he's heartbreaking. So if any of you guys had followed us on social media, like, a lot of people I guess were checking in with you, like, how's Maynard? How's Maynard?

[00:23:55] Jason: Yeah it was hard to even look at him and not get emotional. This dog was so emaciated, so starving.

[00:24:03] It was a bulldog. They found him in the, in San Antonio, on the street. And this is like in the height of summer. In 104 degree Texas heat, which, if you know anything about bulldogs, they can't breathe because their face is smushed. He was basically a skeleton with fur. If you see pictures or any of our, if you see it, you'll be like, Oh my gosh, like, how's this dog alive?

[00:24:27] Yeah, he was covered in like over a hundred ticks. Yeah and he had all sorts of diseases and problems related to that.

[00:24:36] Sarah: Like lesions and wounds. Yeah, he had wounds.

[00:24:38] Jason: Burns it looked like all over his body?

[00:24:40] Sarah: He may have hidden under a car that was hot and like burned himself on the hot car trying to find some shade.

[00:24:47] Jason: Yeah.

[00:24:47] Sarah: And cool himself down. Yeah

[00:24:49] Jason: It's super sad.

[00:24:51] Sarah: This dog was in bad shape. He was 25 pounds and he's supposed to be probably at least 50 or 60.

[00:24:57] Jason: Yeah, they spent And a whole evening trying to pull all the ticks off of him, like they had to give him a blood transfusion or he would have died. Like he was just, he was in bad shape,

[00:25:07] Sarah: He had two tick borne illnesses.

[00:25:10] He had pneumonia. He needed a blood transfusion just to survive this. He was obviously severely emaciated and severely dehydrated. And eating, you can't just take a dog like that and shove a bunch of food like Edla, she was like, oh, we could just feed him a lot. And I'm like, you'll kill him.

[00:25:29] He'll die. Yeah. So your body, very what happens when you're that far along is muscle atrophy. So your body will eat the muscle. So he had literally no muscle left on him anywhere.

[00:25:42] Jason: He didn't hardly walk

[00:25:42] Sarah: at all.

[00:25:43] Jason: He would just crumple over like he would like, yeah, he would try to walk.

[00:25:46] You fall the time, man.

[00:25:47] Sarah: But he would try. He was really like, he tried. You'd think that a dog like this with this many problems would just say like, fuck it, I'm out. Like, I probably would. If I was up for it, I'd be like, alright, just, like, where's the plug? Pull it. Let's do it. But he did not. He did not want to give up.

[00:26:04] He did not want to die.

[00:26:06] Jason: We had him for about a week?

[00:26:07] Sarah: We had him for a week. Yeah, we had him for a week.

[00:26:09] Jason: And then, like, he was in bad shape. I don't even think they should have let him come to us, but they didn't know all the stuff that was wrong with them. They

[00:26:15] Sarah: didn't, yeah, they didn't know everything because they didn't do the full like, scan.

[00:26:19] Jason: So we had him for a week and took care of him, but we started to notice he was like, he was getting worse. So then we we reached out to the foster organization and then they took Maynard to the doctors and they were, like, he was in bad shape. His whole esophagus had been destroyed so he couldn't, like, move food down.

[00:26:38] They've, we've, later they figured out, well, he just needs to sit upright, and like, gravity, and maybe that'll heal over time, I don't know, but he had a whole bunch of issues, but before they figured that out, they were like, this dog is in such bad shape. He's not really getting food down.

[00:26:53] Sarah: He's. Well, they didn't know what exactly.

[00:26:54] Yeah, so they were about to put him down. When I brought him back to the vet. So they started doing some tests on him. They said he actually lost weight and I'm like that doesn't make sense. Like he's been with me for a week. He's eaten every day and he wants his food. Like he wants it, desperately wants his food.

[00:27:11] And that doesn't, it doesn't make any sense. How did he lose weight? And they're like, I don't know. So then they found out that he had. A very rare parasitic infection that attacked his liver. He has heart disease. His pneumonia has gotten worse. And then they were trying to figure out the whole, why did he lose weight type situation?

[00:27:38] And they ended up doing a scan. They did not think he was going to make it. They just, they didn't know. There was so much going on with him. Like issues as long as my arm, the list was as long as my arm and they didn't think he was going to make it. So the president of the organization, she let me know, she's like, I have to make a really tough decision right now.

[00:27:59] Jason: And they put a lot of money towards this dog. The whole, like, a lot, thousands of dollars.

[00:28:03] Sarah: It was, I think his treatment was somewhere, All of it was like over like 7, 000 so far.

[00:28:09] Jason: Yeah, they were really doing everything they could to take care of this dog. But she was at the point where she was like, I think we're going to have to... yeah.

[00:28:16] Sarah: Oh, and he was anemic on top of all of that. So he couldn't keep heat in.

[00:28:19] Jason: Okay.

[00:28:20] Sarah: Poor guy.

[00:28:20] Jason: So like, they were about to put him down. Right.

[00:28:25] Sarah: Yeah they decided like it doesn't seem like there's anything like he's too like he's just too far gone and The vet came in the room like with the shot and they said all right, let's give him like one last really awesome meal So they gave him mac and cheese and he Scarfed it down like you wouldn't even believe and that whole day and the whole day before he wasn't moving.

[00:28:49] He wasn't walking. He wasn't really interested in anything. He was just very lethargic, very tired. He didn't, he did not care. Mac and cheese, he was like, what is that? Give me all of it. Perked right up for the mac and cheese. So the mac and cheese literally saved his life because he was minutes from being put down.

[00:29:08] Said that she has never been that close to putting a dog down and then didn't do it.

[00:29:13] Jason: Yeah.

[00:29:14] Yeah, but that gave her hope that, Hey, there's something here. There's some life in him. And he's, You know, he's motivated for some reason.

[00:29:22] Sarah: Yeah. And the vet who was going to euthanize him then, she said, there is something weird with this dog.

[00:29:30] Like, it's just, there's something off. We don't know, like, is it okay if we do like the full scan? And she's like, if you think it'll help him, like, if you think that we can figure this out and save him so that he has some quality of life. So

[00:29:45] Jason: because of the mac and cheese, and seeing something that seemed a little bit off, because that like, he was so excited about that and he was eating it, they then did and he perked up, they did the scan and they found what?

[00:29:59] Sarah: So in dogs, they call it a mega esophagus. So essentially, his esophagus doesn't work. They think that he may have, back like when he was dumped on the side of the road, and also, I should, we should have said this, he was intact, so we think that he was used for breeding. And then when he got too far along, these fuckers dumped him on the side of the road.

[00:30:21] So they're number two on the hit list. I will find them and they're not even far from me. I will go get them. So they dumped him on the side of the road. When he was on the side of the road they think that he either ate something or drank something that was toxic and messed up his whole esophagus.

[00:30:38] Yeah.

[00:30:39] So that's why he was eating food, but it was all impacted in his esophagus. Hardly any of it was actually getting through to his stomach.

[00:30:47] Jason: Yeah,

[00:30:48] Sarah: so they found that out and Bruni the president of the organization said well wait a second when he was with his fosters like he had a bowel movement So something had to have gotten through like what can we do?

[00:30:59] She's like, what if we like prop them up. They have like a little Bailey chair, but they didn't have one there. So they made a makeshift one out of like blankets and cardboard.

[00:31:07] They're like, what if we do like a makeshift Bailey chair, test it for 24 hours, see if any food actually gets through into the stomach because that is a treatable condition.

[00:31:17] Now, if they're born with it and then that's really hard. But he wasn't born with it. Something destroyed his esophagus. So they said, oh, that's like, it's a treatable condition. So what if we try this, give him 24 hours, and then he's got to show us that he can get some food and medication down into his stomach because all the medication for all of the problems, it wasn't even getting into his system.

[00:31:46] Jason: Medicine, food, nothing was making it.

[00:31:48] Sarah: Nothing. No water. Like he had a couple bowel movements with us. So like Something must have, but not. Not the way he should have been. So after a 24 hour hold, he had a full stomach of food.

[00:32:02] Jason: Yeah, they figured out he just needed gravity. Like they just had to prop him up.

[00:32:06] So he's sitting up like a human eating, you know, and he was perfectly happy to eat. Like he was a hungry dog. So then he went to be taken care of full time by the foster organization. Yeah

[00:32:18] Sarah: He has multiple medications he has to eat like a very small strict

[00:32:23] Jason: And she has a lot of dogs at her place that she's taking care of so she asked if she had another foster. She said could you take this dog Silver? Yeah So then we got Silver was the next...

[00:32:33] Sarah: oh, wait. The thing I want to say about Maynard is that he had every reason to give up and he had every reason, multiple reasons.

[00:32:43] Like he had like literally so many health problems.

[00:32:46] Jason: Yeah. And everybody around him had multiple reasons to give up on him. .

[00:32:48] Sarah: He had every reason to not trust humans and every reason to be like a nasty, vicious dog. And he just wasn't he was not he was so sweet and he loved to like just shove his little smush face into me And just nuzzle it and when it was in there, he still wasn't close enough He was still like pushing trying to get closer Because I think that was the first time he ever experienced love and even though he had every single reason stacked up against him.

[00:33:19] Like the odds were not at all in his favor. There's no reason that this dog should technically be alive. It's only because he's so freaking stubborn. He did not want to give up on himself. Even through all of that, even through all of that, he didn't want to give up on himself. So when we were going through all of that, like with him, I was telling people like when I would run my scale calls on Fridays, my our operations call, I was telling people like.

[00:33:45] If this dog can go through everything that he went through and still push through whatever is happening in your business, whatever is happening in your life, whatever is happening in your marriage, in your friendships, in your relationships, you can push through it. Because every single time that they thought they had the issue figured out, there were like five more issues that popped up with him.

[00:34:08] Jason: Yeah, just tell yourself you're not yet at Maynard level. You can handle it though. He also had a really good support mechanism around him eventually, right? And I think that's also there's a little lesson in that is that you need If you're going to go through tough stuff, it's a lot better to have the right support around you and to have people that believe in you, even when you might feel like giving up, and that, you know, can see that you can be better.

[00:34:36] And we need those. We need those people around us. And so if you don't have that in your business, it's probably feeling pretty hard because you're doing, you feel like it's all up to you and you're all on your own. And that's a dumb way to grow business. It just is. All right. Next dog.

[00:34:54] Sarah: Okay. So the medical foster that took Maynard after his second, third ER stint she said, Hey, like I, I cannot take another foster, but I have to take Maynard.

[00:35:05] Can you take Silver? And then that gives me room to take Maynard. And I said, so Silver, like this is Austin Bulldog Rescue. They largely work with bulldogs. It's not only bulldogs, but most of them are bulldogs. Silver is not a bulldog. He looks like some sort of terrier. I think he had very terrier fur. But he was little, like 30 pounds.

[00:35:28] Very high energy. He was probably like in his teenage phase. They also found him on the side of the road in San Antonio. The sad thing about him, though, is he had like, he was house trained. He had like house manners. So he lived in a house at one point. And Either escaped or was dumped, but he was hanging out with a pack of dogs and the bulldogs He was like, these are my friends and the rescue were saving all the dogs and they were like, okay There's like this other dog like what do we do?

[00:35:58] And she's like, well, you can't leave him like come on he's an honorary bulldog now. So so they They fostered him, took him in, and then we had him. We had him for about a week, and he already had some applications coming in on him, and he got rehomed to a family that I think is a great fit for him.

[00:36:17] Jason: Yeah.

[00:36:18] Sarah: They're such a good fit.

[00:36:19] Jason: Silver had a lot of energy. Yes. He was like doggy teenager. He had a ton of energy, super excited, loved running around. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:36:30] Sarah: And they're like, we want to go for a walk every day. And we like to go on hikes and we like to go camping and we'll bring the dogs. And I was like, Oh, he would like,

[00:36:37] Jason: he'll love that.

[00:36:38] Sarah: He would love that. He would love that. And every dog that Silver saw, he wanted to play with every single one of them. And then they have another dog. So it was just figuring out, are those two going to be nice to each other? And they're great. He was very like respectful of her boundaries, which none of us had seen previous to that.

[00:36:57] So that was really good. And they're doing great so far. And then. The woman that adopted him, she sends me pictures of him. Like, she's like, just so you know, he's doing great. I'm like, oh, thank you. Thanks for sending that.

[00:37:09] Jason: All right. Next.

[00:37:11] Sarah: Next is this guy behind me.

[00:37:13] Jason: Yeah.

[00:37:14] Sarah: Baby.

[00:37:15] So we wanted to do another foster. Bulldogs are a lot of work, like so much work. And we went to a shelter that's local and we were looking, I was looking online for a dog that was not small, but also not large. So he's like 44 pounds ish. He's

[00:37:37] Jason: got a bit of a cough right now.

[00:37:39] Sarah: Yeah, he had kennel cough.

[00:37:41] So we're. working on clearing that up with him and they don't know a whole lot about him. They found him as a stray in Round Rock but that's also so sad because he's so sweet and like he's house trained and he's got manners and I'm like, oh, Jason keeps saying he's like this somebody's like some family's dog like they must be missing their dog and I'm like, it was in the shelter for over a month.

[00:38:06] So yeah, like Parker goes missing. I'm not sleeping until I find him.

[00:38:11] Jason: Sure.

[00:38:11] Sarah: You know, I would there would be a bolo out on it everything like I would call the SWAT team like Everybody would be involved. So now we are fostering Hans and We're looking for a forever family for him. Although we might foster fail and keep them ourselves.

[00:38:30] We'll see but we're That's what it called. It's foster fail.

[00:38:33] Jason: Oh. Yeah. This one's hard to not

[00:38:37] Sarah: The first day we got him, the two kids and Jason were already pushing me. They're like, we could just keep him.

[00:38:44] Jason: He's a special dog.

[00:38:45] Sarah: It didn't take long. They're like, we could just, and I thought I was going to be the one who was weak.

[00:38:49] I thought I was going to be the one who says like, oh, we should keep him. Like, let's just keep him.

[00:38:54] Jason: Yeah.

[00:38:55] Sarah: And shockingly enough, I was the one that was like, yes, but like, we're fostering so we can help more dogs. And the three of them, they're like, but we can just keep him. He's so perfect. Aren't you perfect?

[00:39:07] So if he gets along with our other two, then. I think we might keep them. We'll see. See what happens. So. All right. So there's our dog story. That's the current. That's what Jason wanted to talk about dog thing

[00:39:20] Jason: today. So, you know, gives you a little glimpse into, I guess, what? Our personal lives a little bit.

[00:39:27] Some of the things that Sarah cares about that we care about. And yeah, so. Dogs. So if you like dogs, then maybe you enjoyed this episode and maybe you learned something. I don't know. All right. Well, I think that's it for today. Until next time to our mutual growth, everybody, if you're wanting to grow your property management business, you can use some extra support, then reach out to us.

[00:39:50] You can check us out at doorgrow. com and be sure to join our free Facebook group. If you are a property management business owner or planning on starting a property management business in the near future, go to doorgrowclub.Com and join our free community and that's it. Bye everybody.

[00:40:09] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

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View Details

In the world of entrepreneurship, there is a lot of conflicting advice on how to make it and become successful.

Property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull recently came back from a masterminding event. In this episode, they sit down to debrief and share how humility, hospitality, and transparency can be more effective than trying to be “cool.”

You’ll Learn [01:10] Masterminding with fellow entrepreneurs

[04:04] Humility as a business owner/visionary

[10:41] Example of hospitality and care

[15:37] Humility comes from being grateful

Tweetables “Transparency kills the cool vibes, but creates followers like you wouldn't believe.”

“By building that goodwill out in front of you, it helps everything in the business go better.”

“I think really humility is born or created out of gratitude and being grateful.”

“It's not all you. And because it's not all you, that doesn't mean you're not great. It just means that part of what makes you great is that you're able to work with others.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: It's not all you. Other people believe in you. Other people are supporting you. With others and with God you can do amazing and great things.

[00:00:09] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow, property manager. DoorGrow property managers, love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow.

[00:01:07] Now, let's get into the show.

[00:01:10] All right. So we were talking about what we should talk about this morning, and we recently just got back from a mastermind event. We're in a mastermind with some kind of a mastermind put on by coaches, I guess for coaches. Is that accurate?

[00:01:27] Sarah: It's not only for coaches.

[00:01:28] It's a mix of entrepreneurs that do different things. A lot of them do happen to be coaches, but not all of them are coaches. There's like the people that run the like the tree house Airbnb's and I was like, that's not a tree house. That's really cool.

[00:01:44] Jason: Yeah.

[00:01:44] Sarah: So there's people like that.

[00:01:46] He's also, I guess, a musician. He's like a rock star. I learned that this time. So there's a mix of people. Some of them happen to be coaches and some of them are not, they're just entrepreneurs, but these are high level entrepreneurs that are focused on investing in themselves and learning and growing and being better all the time.

[00:02:07] Jason: Okay.

[00:02:08] Sarah: So quarterly, we meet, we go out to Tennessee, which is where one of the hosts live. So it's like right outside of Nashville, which to me is like a second home. Like I just, I love it there so much. And it was a really great event. I mean, it's always a really great event. I don't think we've ever gone and then said, oh, that wasn't so great.

[00:02:33] It's good every time. Because you never know, and this is what I personally like about it, is you don't know what you're going to get out of it all the time ahead of time. So sometimes, you know, if there's like an event or a conference or something like that, and they go, Oh, and we're going to talk about this one topic.

[00:02:51] Well, what if I don't need this one topic? So what I like is I don't know what people are going to share. I don't know what the topics are going to be ahead of time. So we always get something out of it. And we rarely know what that will be.

[00:03:08] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. It was really helpful. And you know, the two gentlemen leading This particular mastermind that we're in, we're in several different things, but this particular one is Sharran Srivatsaa. He's the CEO of Real which is a multi billion dollar real estate company and Aaron Stokes runs a multi million dollar coaching business, coaching auto repair shops called Shop Fix Academy. So it's really cool to hang out with both of them and they're just really wise, lots of insight, great people, you know, and they attract great people around them. So it's just a high caliber group. There's kind of a, at least from Aaron Stokes' side, a very Christian sort of focus.

[00:03:51] But Sharran also a very moral person. I don't know. He doesn't seem to focus on that as much, but it's not a religious thing, you know, but we're learning from these two men that have really strong values and really care about the people that they serve.

[00:04:04] So I think one of the biggest things that stood out to me was the conversation that they had that related to just who we are. As a coach, I thought was really interesting, and I can touch on that a little bit.

[00:04:21] So I think for me that the thing that I really liked is, one of the phrases I wrote down, I take a bunch of notes. And one of the notes I wrote down is "boastful people are exposing their insecurity. Honor is positive things being said behind my back."

[00:04:37] And "hospitality builds goodwill out in front of you" and "master the ability to have confrontational conversations." So there's kind of a conversation a lot about hiring and team, but I really enjoyed the conversation about you know, this idea that when we try to look cool in front of other people, we're not being as transparent and transparency kills the cool vibes.

[00:04:58] So we don't maybe look as cool, but he said it creates followers. Like you wouldn't believe. You know, increase trust. And so I think in the past I was very much focused on trying to look cool. And it was, it definitely was born out of insecurity. And it was like, I need to appear great at all times. I need to look like a leader because I just felt maybe insecure.

[00:05:23] I wasn't really confident in my ability to perform or to do stuff. Sarah's giving me the nudge to stay further back. So, I'm not too close to the camera.

[00:05:34] Sarah: On what episode does Jason remember to stay behind a lot. I need to put like a...

[00:05:39] Jason: I want to get in your faces! Get excited! All right.

[00:05:42] Sarah: What episode does that happen?

[00:05:45] I've got a hundred dollars on none of them.

[00:05:47] Jason: Yeah, i'm going to stay back here. Okay, so Yeah, so in the past I was very focused on that and it was kind of a blind spot I had I didn't realize that I was trying to be cool, but part of it was you know, I had some insecurity that i'd never even had a property management business yet somehow, I ended up coaching hundreds of property management business owners.

[00:06:08] So there was a bit of imposter syndrome and there was a bit of insecurity and it took coaches to prompt me and push me to like, Hey, you should make some changes to this industry. You can benefit people because I cared, but I was like, it should be somebody else. And so maybe somebody that has thousands of doors or something like that.

[00:06:28] And, you know, I did a lot of things trying to look cool, trying to look cool online and stuff like that. And and maybe it's just that I'm getting old I don't know, or maybe I'm getting wiser or I'm learning, but you know, some of the things I've been through recently in life, I'm like, I'm less and less attached that I need to look cool or interesting or special or something, or to try and get some people that perceive me as important.

[00:06:54] And I think it's because I'm starting to just value myself more. Right. And And so, you know, transparency kills the cool vibes, but creates followers like you wouldn't believe. So that's, that was one of the key things that stood out to me. So, I,

[00:07:10] Sarah: on that note, something that he was talking a lot about and he's, he has said this before.

[00:07:15] It wasn't like, this is not the first time I've heard him say this. And in fact, we've asked him specifically about like some of our events. Like, what can we do to just like blow this thing up? Like, we want to have a conference with like, you know, a hundred people there, 250, 500, a thousand at some point.

[00:07:33] So like, how do we do that, Aaron? And, you know, Like the conferences he runs and he did not start large at all. He had 19 people at his first conference and then 19 people at a second conference. So we have more than that, but it's not hundreds yet. And now he's at the thousands. Thousands, multiple thousands of people.

[00:07:57] So I had asked him, we were like in our little like van and Jason and I were sitting in the front row and he was driving. So I peeked up and I was like, I think Jason asked him about events and I said, okay, but Aaron, before you answer, I was like, what did you do when you were our size?

[00:08:15] Because him telling me what he does now doesn't help me. I don't have a million dollar budget for a conference. Like I wish I did. At some point I might. I don't. I can't pay freaking Jay Leto $500, 000 to come and speak. Like not unless we're going to go bankrupt. So it doesn't work. But the one thing that he talked about, I think he just said it differently or maybe it hit differently this time is like the hospitality aspect of it.

[00:08:46] Jason: Yeah.

[00:08:47] Sarah: Like, don't just run an event and have people like show up and do whatever. It's like, if you were attending this event, what would you want it to look like from start to finish? So this coming DoorGrow Live in 2025, which we're already starting to plan, it's going to be very different.

[00:09:04] Like all of our events that we do, any in person events, whether they're small or large, they're going to be very different. So we're going to incorporate some like fun, cool things into it. I mean, we live in Austin. Like there are so many fun, cool things here. We don't, there is no lack. So we can build some of that into.

[00:09:24] Our events and give a like a much better experience overall, and that I think will help actually create more connections and networking. amongst the people. So that's, that was something that I kind of on that note. It just hit me different this time, you know?

[00:09:44] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. I like it. Aaron puts a lot of focus in his events hospitality for his auto repair shop owners.

[00:09:51] Yeah. So, let's take a quick time out to go over our sponsors here. So, if you are tired of the constant stress and hassle of maintenance coordination, meet Vendoroo, your AI driven in house maintenance expert that handles work orders from start to finish, triaging, troubleshooting, vendor selection, and coordination. Built by property managers for property managers to provide cost effective and accountable maintenance operations, where every dollar is accounted for and every task is handled with unmatched reliability. Vendoroo takes care of the details. So you can focus on growth, schedule a demo today at Vendoroo V E N D O R O O dot AI slash DoorGrow and experience maintenance done right. And we've got clients getting some great results with them. We just got to hang out with them here in Austin.

[00:10:43] Yeah. Came out for a conference or event and we went out to dinner and they're great guys. Like there's a lot of fun. They're great.

[00:10:50] Sarah: And you know what I liked? Yeah. When I, when we met up with him, so oddly enough, we were also running a very small event that day. Yeah, we were. And one of the people who attended the event was new with Vendoroo.

[00:11:02] Yeah. We're trying to figure out, there was like a gap somewhere in like their portal or the system or something. And he had our client voice that to us. And I said, well, this actually happens to be. Perfect. Because we are meeting almost like their whole team later tonight for dinner. So when we were waiting for them for dinner, one of them walks in, David.

[00:11:26] So David walks in and he says, Oh guys, like, I'm so sorry. I'm late. Cause he was late, but it's not a big deal. He's like, Oh guys, I'm so sorry. I'm late. I was actually on the phone with Ron. I was like, wait, like my Ron? And he's like, yeah. Ron, and I was like, Oh good, because I was going to talk to you about Ron.

[00:11:44] He's like, it's already done. It's already handled. He's like, we are on top of it. And I'm like, that's amazing. So like, there's not a lot of companies that focus that much on like customer service so much so that at seven o'clock at night, they're going to be on the phone with you. Yeah, but that's what David did.

[00:12:03] He's like you need me. I'm going to handle it right now. I don't know. Oh, it's seven o'clock at night. I'm not working. Don't call me. I won't get back to it tomorrow. He was like, I'm doing it right now. And if I'm late meeting Sarah and Jason, I'm late meeting Sarah and Jason.

[00:12:15] Jason: Yeah.

[00:12:16] Sarah: And that to me was really cool.

[00:12:17] Jason: Yeah, it goes right along with the totality.

[00:12:20] Sarah: Like, we were sharing, like, the feedback and they were like, oh my god, we all have to fix this, like, right now. It wasn't like, oh, that sucks, like, oh, that, oh well, what do we do about that? Oh, give it to the other team. No. All of them were like, we need to fix this right now, like, call him now, like, what can we do?

[00:12:35] I'm going to talk to him tomorrow, I'm going to look at his portal like, as soon as I get done with this. It was awesome.

[00:12:39] Jason: Yeah.

[00:12:39] Sarah: So I will say that.

[00:12:40] Jason: Yeah, and part of it was, I think the Vendoroo team, were wanting to maintain relationship, healthy relationship with us as well. Right. They're like, we're going to take care of our mutual clients.

[00:12:50] And that's that hospitality aspect, you know, where we're focused on their comfort and that's a way you can stand out really more cost is what Aaron had talked about. He says it doesn't really cost anything extra to just show a little bit more care, to be a little bit kinder, to like focus on hospitality.

[00:13:11] If you've already got team members that you're paying a salary, there's some costs, get them to focus on more hospitality and that's way you can stand out. And it. It builds goodwill out in front of you. And by building that goodwill out in front of you, it helps everything in the business go better.

[00:13:26] So let me mention our next sponsor True Submeter. Attention, multifamily property owners and managers discover True Submeter, the number one water and sub metering company in the U S say goodbye water use abuse by your tenants and hello to billing for exact water consumption with no unit minimum. Enjoy smart cost effective solutions designed to optimize your property's operations and save you money. Plus get an exclusive 10 percent discount with the code DoorGrow 10.

[00:13:58] That's DoorGrow 1 0 visit truesubmeter. com today for intelligent utility solutions and substantial savings. That's truesubmeter.Com. All right.

[00:14:09] Sarah: So everybody in the multifamily space.

[00:14:13] Jason: Yeah.

[00:14:13] Sarah: Where you've got your tenants. Like I literally had a tenant one time, she was so mad, she, and she was a little bit off.

[00:14:20] She was just really mad. She would run her sinks just for fun. She would turn on water in the sink, turn on water in the bathtub. She would overflow her bathtub, and it's like, well, we're paying for the water. Well, like the owner was. When we, like, a 1, 300 water bill.

[00:14:36] Jason: Now you can figure out which units, even which state for a device is causing the water issue.

[00:14:42] Yeah, and bill accordingly.

[00:14:43] Sarah: And you can help your clients be more profitable, because that's something that they have to eat the cost of. And if you are a real estate investor, because I know there's some of you listening that aren't property managers, you're real estate investors yourselves.

[00:14:57] If you've got multifamily and the water meters are not separate and in larger multifamily, they're usually not. Maybe if you have a duplex or maybe a triplex, Sometimes like a little bit bigger, but not normal. It's usually like one water meter for the entire building. So this, I mean, this will help you make more money and actually more profitable.

[00:15:24] That would have been great for me. Like I had so many small multis that the water was just included. So we had to then try to like raise the rent to compensate for that. It was just messy.

[00:15:37] Jason: So I guess today's topic was humility and you know, hospitality, you know, or just hospitality and kind of revealing yourself or transparency.

[00:15:49] So, you know, the last bit I'll touch on is Aaron talked a little bit about humility and I've always believed humility is recognizing. Humility it's not debasing yourself. It's not putting yourself down. And I think a lot of people think that. And I think Aaron, even though he's got wealth and you know, a lot of things and stuff like this.

[00:16:06] He's doing very well as well Sharran, they have this they have humility about them And I think what humility really is created by or what true humility is instead of putting yourself down and saying Oh, i'm like not so great. I don't think that's it at all. What I believe humility is recognizing God and others' hand In your results, that's it.

[00:16:28] I think it's just not it's not attributing everything beneficial in your life to yourself It's recognizing that other people around you are having a positive impact and That's why you're able to get results. And so I think really humility is born or created out of gratitude and being grateful And so that's what i'll leave the listeners with if you are feeling really prideful and you deep down don't really feel good about yourself or insecure, then just start to recognize where have others or God or the universe or whatever you're into, where have these things impacted your results and helped you get positive results and start to recognize and, you know, gratitude.

[00:17:12] And you'll start to recognize that, Hey, it's not all you. And because it's not all you, that doesn't mean you're not great. It just means that part of what makes you great is that you're able to work with others. Other people believe in you. Other people are supporting you. With others and with God you can do amazing and great things. There's no limit and you know being around other people in programs and masterminds and things like this that are playing a high level game that are maybe ahead of you that are doing really well is one of the main reasons to be in these sort of programs and this is the environment that we, you know, aspire to create and facilitate for our clients is to give them something better to look forward to and to look up to and to be a part of and to be around.

[00:18:02] And this is why I think a lot of clients are able to get such great results. If you are struggling in your property management business or you're doing well, but you just know it could be better, you know, your day to day in your life could be better. It's not quite where you want to be. Like you, you want more freedom. You want more time with your family. You want more time with your spouse.

[00:18:22] You want to take more vacations, more trips. This is what we can help you get towards and what we can help you accomplish and what we can help you focus on so that you can get the business to serve you instead of you feeling like the business is your master and controlling you. And it's a high chair, tyrant, flinging food in your face, controlling you every day.

[00:18:43] Telling you what to do. So let's turn that around reach out to us. You can reach us and find us at doorgrow. com and schedule a call right from that website. Check out our funny videos right at the top If you'd like to you know experience a little humor and levity for the property management industry And make sure to join our facebook group at doorgrowclub. com, and join our free community and until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:19:09] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:19:36] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

View Details

Recently, Jason and Sarah hosted a few momentum coaching calls where they taught DoorGrow Mastermind members ways to grow and scale their businesses.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull go over 3 strategies property managers can use to increase their close rate.

You’ll Learn [01:53] Sales in a post-trust era

[07:16] Objection-handling with a newer sales strategy

[09:59] Proof bomb testimonials

[13:55] One of the most effective selling tools

Tweetables “A lot of you are trying to sell the way you learned maybe in real estate or the way that things happen in the past and you're probably finding it harder and harder as well.”

“My agenda is to figure out simply, do they need what we have?”

“If they can't find a consequence to not starting now, then they won't start now.”

“People's trust levels are at an all-time low. And so in selling, I've had to really change things up.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: If you have any leads, deals, opportunities in the pipeline right now, and you would love to maybe double your close rate or double the deal count that you're getting out of your existing lead flow, I think these three elements combined would easily do that.

[00:00:14] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:31] DoorGrow Property Managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:50] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management, growth experts, Jason, and Sarah Hull the owners of DoorGrow.

[00:01:10] Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:13] So today we're going to talk a little bit, this is going to be a quick episode. We've got camera malfunctions. I don't know. I don't know what's going on, but I had a coaching call with clients recently, just the other day. We do these momentum coaching calls with some of our clients in the mastermind to get them back in momentum.

[00:01:31] Like if they've maybe been disengaged a little for a little bit, or they've been focused on other things, or they're kind of unclear on what they should be doing next, we want to get them back in the state of momentum, which is where entrepreneurs want to be. And so, on that call, I was sharing with them some of the new stuff cause some of them have been a little bit unplugged and we're always adding new, innovative ideas.

[00:01:53] So one of the things that I've noticed recently is that sales, we're kind of in this post trust era. I've noticed over the last three, four years, sales has become really difficult. It's become harder to sell using older sales tactics or typical sales tactics. And so I had to change up how it was selling.

[00:02:14] And I did a lot of research, a lot of study. I took an empathy course and a communication thing, like seminar thing, and just a bunch of other stuff. And the old school sales, methodology just isn't working here in this post trust sort of era, like nobody believes anything anymore. The news, you can't really trust it.

[00:02:37] We all know now the news is fake, right? Voting has been fake. Food's been fake, right? A lot of the medical stuff shoved on us, fake, right? Just saw something about the conspiracy theory or scam of like C sections being pushed on people, which is like ridiculous amounts, like everything's fake.

[00:02:56] And so we don't know who or what we can trust. But we trust ourselves and so what I've noticed is people's trust levels are an all time low And so in selling I've had to really change things up and transparently sales was not going really well for us for a while, right?

[00:03:13] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:03:13] Jason: Like we had a lot of clients that stayed in our program, but closing deals was hard.

[00:03:17] Sarah: Yeah, and we didn't focus on sales.

[00:03:20] Jason: Yeah, it wasn't really a focus for us. At all. We focused a lot on the product. Yeah.

[00:03:24] Sarah: For like a year and a half maybe almost two years and then by the time we needed to focus on sales, it wasn't as easy to like, just flip a switch as we thought. We were like, "okay, we're ready now. Like, let's amp up sales." And they were like, "oh, that isn't happening the way we thought."

[00:03:43] Like, we just thought, you know, like, just pick it right back up where you left off.

[00:03:47] Jason: Yeah. I thought, because I hadn't been doing sales for years. Like I had sales team members, people. So then I was like I'll go back to doing sales. And and the game has changed. Like, and a lot of you are trying to sell the way you learned maybe in real estate or the way that things happen in the past and you're probably finding it harder and harder as well.

[00:04:08] I would imagine. So what I've noticed is that we need to shift to a different model. So I shifted to a more question based empathetic model of selling. And I went through and coached our clients on this and they're already starting to get some different results, which is awesome. My close rate using this different methodology has gone through the roof.

[00:04:32] So what I've noticed, my close rate has gone through the roof, but what I've noticed is by just being super curious and not trying to sell something.

[00:04:40] And I know that sounds wild, like I'm closing way more deals by not trying to sell. I'm just being curious and I'm just being helpful and I'm asking a lot of questions. If I'm on an hour call, I'm spending like almost the entire call just asking questions and letting them talk. If I ask questions in a strategic order, what I'm noticing is that if I ask the right questions, it helps them figure out what their problem is. It helps them figure out what their sort of ideal solution is. It helps them figure out what the consequence is if they don't change this, or if they continue doing what they're doing.

[00:05:14] And then at the very end, like, I'll get into the pitch a little bit. But what I'm noticing is people don't know, we assume people know what their problem is. Like somebody comes to you for property management and you're like "they're already dealing with the problem. They're aware." They might be superficially, but they're not aware of the problem. They're not aware of how they feel about the problem. They're not aware fully about what the impact of that problem is. And they're not really even aware of what they want or what the ideal solution is to some degree. They become aware of all of this stuff when you ask them, like in that moment.

[00:05:47] And so when I start asking clients these questions, they start, these potential clients, they start formulating this real time. I know NLP stuff. I can see their eyes moving around the right way. I know they're now creating this in their head. They're figuring it out. And if they don't know that they have a problem or where their pain is and what they want and what paradise looks like and the ideal outcomes and if they haven't formulate all this, it's really difficult to close the deal. It's really difficult to get them to move forward towards what they want. And I've also given up focusing on trying to you know, having any sort of agenda. My agenda is to figure out simply do they need what we have? I can see this, but they need to figure this out. So I need to ask questions to help them see that they might benefit from this or that they need something. And they, if they do identify that they need something different or they need help, then the next question I need to figure out is, do they want what we have? And that's it! i'm no longer trying to pitch and spending the majority of the call telling them how awesome our program is and all the cool stuff that we have. I go through and I just ask some questions and then at the very end My pitch is like I just picked three things because there's so much in our program. It was overwhelming people.

[00:07:02] I spent the whole call like "we have this call! We do this! We have this! And we have all this content in DoorGrow Academy and Telegram messenger access and blah blah blah," and like they were just like "oh, well, I need to think about it." And if you overwhelm them with features and benefits, you're going to get that objection every time. What I'm finding is with this new methodology of selling that I've been coaching clients on there's a very few objections.

[00:07:22] There's not really anything to object to because you've gotten clear on what their problem is. They've gotten clear on what the problem is that you've gotten them clear on what the, you know the positive future outcome would look like and they're clear on that now, and so that creates this pain gap in between and then you're able to create urgency and one of my big challenges is I wasn't able to create urgency because I didn't get them clear on their problem or what they wanted and what that gap felt like and if the if that was really an issue And then I didn't ask some questions to help them get clear on why does this matter now?

[00:07:58] Does this why would it matter to get this going now? Why not change it? Why not keep it the same and by asking that it helps them to identify also urgency and so then adding urgency was one of the big things I was missing because everybody would go through, listen to me pitch. And they'd be like, "this sounds amazing. It sounds like it's solved my problems. It sounds really great, but I'm onboarding a new assistant right now and I'll do it later." Or "I'm dealing with this challenge right now," or "I've got this problem in my business right now," or "it's summer and things really busy," right? And so there was no urgency.

[00:08:30] And so if you're running into that with clients, the lack of urgency is caused by a lack of identifying this pain gap and then a lack of helping them identify what's going on. Why does it matter to do this now? Is there any consequence? And if they can't find a consequence to not starting now, then they won't start now.

[00:08:47] They may never start. And so, my close rate is ridiculously high lately. And I'm not really doing anything other than asking questions to help them figure out what they want rather than trying to push my really cool ideas like, shove it, cram it down their throat, you know, like old style sales.

[00:09:06] So I don't have to deal with objections. I don't have to use manipulative things like, "do you want the red one or the blue one?" And they're like, "I didn't even say I wanted one." You know, you don't have to use any of these old school. Pushy, icky sales tactics. And so what I'm also noticing is it doesn't create sales resistance or ick, this gross feeling in them that they feel like you're like disgusting or they feel awkward.

[00:09:30] And a lot of you that have problems doing sales or you have problems with salespeople or you have problems feeling comfortable being a sales person or identifying with that, it's because of that gross feeling that you get when selling, when you're being pushy or manipulative instead of helpful. So I'm actually really enjoying doing sales because to me this feels more like what I love to do, which is coaching so that's one of the things I talked about with our coaching clients. Other thing I talked about with proof.

[00:10:00] Sarah: The other thing that you're gonna do right now is take a break.

[00:10:03] Jason: Oh, we're going to take a break and then I'll tell you about proof bombs. One of our sponsors for this episode is Vendoroo. We're hearing great things and getting great feedback. So if you're tired of the constant stress and hassle of maintenance coordination, check out Vendoroo, your AI driven in house maintenance expert that handles work orders from start to finish, triaging, troubleshooting, vendor selection and coordination. Built by property managers for property managers to provide cost effective and accountable maintenance operations where every dollar is accounted for and every task is handled with unmatched reliability, Vendoroo takes care of the details so you can focus on growth. Schedule a demo today by going to vendoroo.ai. vendoroo.ai/DoorGrow and experience maintenance done right. And go to that page, you get a special little perk or benefit. So, check out Vendoroo. We're hearing great feedback. And this is part of the AI revolution right now. If you're not doing stuff like this, you're getting left behind.

[00:11:00] So, we're hearing some amazing things. True Submeter. Let me tell you about True Submeter. If you are a property owner or manager, check out True Submeter, the number one water Submetering company in the U. S. Say goodbye to water use abuse by your tenants, and hello to billing for exact water consumption.

[00:11:21] With no unit minimum, enjoy smart, cost effective solutions designed to optimize your properties operations and save you money. Plus get an exclusive 10 percent discount with the code DoorGrow10. That's DoorGrow one zero. Visit True Submeter today for intelligent utility solutions and substantial savings.

[00:11:43] That's truesubmeter. com. Okay. Proof bombs. The other cool thing I shared, it was an idea I learned from one of my mentors, which is Sharran Srivatsaa. Do you want to mention, tell them about Sharran?

[00:11:54] Sarah: Yeah. So, if you guys are in real estate there's a publicly traded real estate company.

[00:12:02] Which is insane. Like it's on the stock market. Crazy. It's real. R E A L. Real. He's the CEO. Yeah. Of Real. They're A multi billion, billion with a B, yeah, multi billion dollar company. And they're growing really rapidly. They do some really cool stuff. Thanks to Sharran's leadership. Yeah.

[00:12:26] Sharran's a really cool dude. His story's just so interesting. And he like, I mean, he literally came here with like 150 in his pocket and he got robbed on the street. So then he had zero dollars in his pocket and he's just so Well, wait such a cool dude.

[00:12:41] Jason: I want to share this story. So he got robbed He had a certain amount of money and then he negotiated with the thief to allow him to just have enough money so he could like do a train ride or get on the train. So he negotiated with the thief, like, and he was able to

[00:12:56] Sarah: "...take all of my money."

[00:12:57] Jason: Yeah. "Just leave me this much and you can have the rest." And they did that, like, he's negotiating. This just like, he's just a brilliant guy. And so he shared this idea with proof bombs and he was sharing how he had basically taught this to Alex Hormozi if you've heard of Alex Hormozi or followed his stuff, Sharran's kind of one of the mentors behind the content that Alex Hormozi shares.

[00:13:20] And Alex Hormozi used this proof bomb concept in his book launch that went amazingly well. And proof bombs are basically this idea of showing a visual testimonial that you can just see without having to watch the video which uses like a photo and bullet points and some data as evidence and stuff like this.

[00:13:39] So I trained my clients on how to create proof bombs, which we have in our pitch deck that I'll pull up sometimes or that we use because it helps get an idea across very quickly using images basically. And so, we shared the idea of proof bombs. And the other, the third idea I shared on these calls was I coached clients on an offer doc because the question came up, "well, what if I don't have a really effective website or I don't have a website yet? I need to wait until you guys help me with that before I can really sell effectively." And then I shared with them what's more effective, even if you have a website or what we call offer documents. If you have conversations with us, we will share one of our offer documents with you at some point, because this gives you everything you need to know or understand about our offer, our program, or what you might be interested in. So we have offer documents for just about everything in our DoorGrow all our different programs our different one day things events stuff like this we have offer documents. So I shared, I coached clients on how to build out these offer documents real effective.

[00:14:44] And so those three elements alone will dramatically increase somebody's close rate, like significantly. So if you have any leads, deals, opportunities in the pipeline right now, and you would love to maybe double your close rate or double the deal count that you're getting out of your existing lead flow, these, I think these three elements combined would easily do that.

[00:15:06] It'd be significant. Yeah. Very significant. My close rate is just through the roof right now. And if you want to experience some of the sales magic and not even feel like you're being sold to or sold on anything because nobody wants to be sold really, set up a call with our team and we'll help you grow.

[00:15:24] We'll help you figure out if we can help you. So, that's basically what I've been up to lately. Is there anything else we should share?

[00:15:30] Sarah: I don't know if I told you this. On the scale call on Friday, Portia actually mentioned that they created offer docs and she's like, "these work so well." She's like, "these are so cool."

[00:15:39] She's like, "this is such an awesome tool." So, you're not, you don't run that call, I run that call. So, I wanted to... yeah.

[00:15:47] We've got clients, super excited.

[00:15:49] Jason: We've got clients creating offer documents, proof bombs, and and using that new sales model and they're seeing results. So, just some of the latest stuff just to kind of open up the I don't know, the curtain a little bit and let you know what are some of the things that we're helping people at DoorGrow accomplish and do. Always innovating, always learning and getting new ideas. So that's the advantage of having coaches and mentors, which we have, and we recommend you have. So if you're interested in getting coach, it doesn't have to be us. Go get one.

[00:16:23] If you are interested in it being us, then you can check us out at DoorGrow. com. And until next time, to our mutual growth.

[00:16:31] Sarah: Oh, and check out our Facebook group.

[00:16:33] Jason: DoorGrow club. com Join our free facebook community. And that's it until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone

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As business owners, we often mistakenly assume that micromanaging our teams will make them more effective and efficient.

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert, Jason Hull sits down with award-winning real estate coach and industry influencer, Jo Oliveri to discuss how implementing automated workflows can revolutionize your property management business.

You’ll Learn [03:14] USA vs Australia for property management

[07:03] Property management is stuck in the past

[17:38] What is automation?

[21:11] The importance of having good policy

[31:24] Why your business needs a set of values

[40:23] Implementing automated workflows and processes

Tweetables “In some respects, we're struggling as an industry to change our mindset and have a fear of moving forward.”

“When we use something manual, it's not logical. It becomes part of what a person feels like doing at that time.”

“If you don't have your business founded on a very strong policy, then you're going to struggle when things go wrong.”

“Out of policy becomes the promise that we can make, and we know that we can deliver on it.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jo: They say every leader is present even when they're not present. So you need to have that. And the only way to have it in property management is through your automated workflows that are built upon the logic that you created through your process.

[00:00:18] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives. And you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently than you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:38] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust, gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:59] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, founder and CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull.

[00:01:18] Now let's get into the show. And my lovely guest today is Jo Oliveri. Welcome, Jo.

[00:01:25] Jo: Hello, Jason. How are you?

[00:01:28] Jason: Good. What time is it over there right now?

[00:01:30] Jo: I think it's about 7am in the morning. So we're a little ahead of you. It's Wednesday. We're in the future here.

[00:01:37] Jason: Yeah you're in the future. How's the future look?

[00:01:39] Jo: The future in Brisbane is actually very bleak. It's a very wet day, which is unusual for Brisbane, but we need the rain so.

[00:01:46] Jason: Got it. Well, we're going to be chatting a little bit about about automation, about automating your team and processes a bit, but why don't you give people a little bit of background on yourself?

[00:02:01] And how you kind of got into this.

[00:02:04] Jo: Yeah. Okay. Well, I've been around the industry in property management, I chose property management for 30 years, which seems like a long time when I say it, but I've been through the process of when they first introduced property management programs through to where we are today in technology.

[00:02:22] And I've worked as a property manager right through to being the kind of like the creator of property management for one of the big international franchise groups until I was ready to launch my own business 15 years ago as a property management business coach and consultant and yeah, just feel blessed to be doing what I do every day because it's a great industry to be involved in.

[00:02:49] Jason: Awesome. So where do we start?

[00:02:52] What do you think?

[00:02:53] Jo: Oh, well it's interesting when I say I started 30 years ago, I feel like we're still back in, you know, what we were doing 30 years ago, in some respects we're struggling as an industry to change our mindset and have a fear of moving forward. So it's quite interesting.

[00:03:14] Jason: So. You've been back and forth between the United States and Australia involved in property management conferences, events. I've actually just for kicks been reading on my morning walks, the LPMA manuals or doc like books or whatever because I'm like, what do they got going on over there? And it seems like there are some notable differences.

[00:03:35] It seems it's really interesting. I'm like, Oh, that's really weird. Why did they do stuff that way over there? So, but what have you noticed between the two countries, like what's kind of different in property management.

[00:03:46] Jo: It's an interesting question, because a lot of people think there is a big difference, but there's really not a lot of difference.

[00:03:55] And I say that because I worked in the USA as vice president of a very large company over there in company management.

[00:04:03] Jason: Yeah.

[00:04:04] Jo: And I really believe that in a lot of respects, the USA is way ahead of where we are here in Australia. But I think that probably the subtle difference is team structures.

[00:04:18] We seem to focus more on property managers doing everything over here. And when I say here, I'm in Australia at the moment. Whereas in the U. S. they like to have like the breakaway roles, I call them. You know, someone focused on maintenance, someone focused on leasing. And yeah, a little bit more task orientated in the U. S.

[00:04:41] Jason: Got it. Okay. What I've noticed in my perception is that property management over there is almost always connected to a brokerage. That's the perception. Is that accurate? Or is it often that there are property management businesses that do not do real estate?

[00:05:00] Jo: Yes. I would say going back two decades, that was probably the case here.

[00:05:05] But we are seeing a lot more entrepreneurial type business owners who start up as property management companies and as they grow, then what they're doing, they're losing management's to people selling. So as they grow, they're now adding in you know, like a sales service, which obviously makes sense. So yeah it has changed in the way they're doing it, but certainly when I started property management did belong to an brokerage. But you know, the, when I first started, I worked for a property management only company, which was very unusual back then.

[00:05:45] Jason: Yeah. I was particularly surprised by the growth strategies that I was reading the book. To me, it felt like they were a bit, I don't know, old school and I was like, man, why, but maybe there's just a lot more opportunity in the U S. One of the things that we have a big opportunity here is there's a lot of rental properties that are just not professionally managed.

[00:06:07] Whereas it sounds like there's quite a high percentage are professionally managed in Australia.

[00:06:12] Jo: Yeah, I would say, you know, in Australia, we don't see the people who own big property portfolios, like personal property portfolios who become their own managers. So, you know, in the USA you see a lot of people who might own, you know, ten or more doors and they end up starting their own property management company, their own LLCs.

[00:06:35] We don't see that In Australia you know, there's not a lot of people in Australia compared to the U. S. that have vast property, you know, holdings. We see more of the mom and dad or the mom and pop, as you would say over there, type investors in Australia that, you know, own one, maybe two properties.

[00:06:57] So of course, most of those are managed through you know, a professional property management company.

[00:07:03] Jason: Got it. Yeah. Well, cool. Let's talk a little bit about the topic at hand. So we're going to talk about automated workflows in property management. And I did a webinar in the past talking about three levels of process documentation or of a process system in a property management business.

[00:07:21] And my level one was just documentation. It was like google docs or something like that. Level two was checklist It was like Process St. or LeadSimple or some of these kind of tools and then level three was something like DoorGrow flow or Flussos which is It's basically the same thing. It's just Flussos, which is visual workflow. And we use that system and we've upgraded from checklist, which I've had a huge level, right?

[00:07:54] First level is kind of like a Google, intranet back in the day when sites and then basically Google docs pretty much. And then and then we had some processes like in Basecamp and eventually we upgraded to Process St. And had that, and that was nice. I liked the software, but I had to do everything.

[00:08:14] Like I had to always create the processes. Nobody else understood how the process were created, especially if they were complicated and now using visual workflow and using Flussos, it's been very intuitive. I don't have to create the processes. My team members all can figure it out and it's really like I jokingly say it's like Visio or flowchart software and something like Process St., like had a baby.

[00:08:41] And so it really incorporates the best pieces of checklist and of documentation, but with visual workflow and it starts as a visual workflow, which is how everybody generally wants to create processes from the beginning. It's how we think process wise is like we create the boxes with the lines connecting things.

[00:09:00] And so I found it to be very intuitive. So what have you noticed in companies in the U. S. and in Australia with their current process system and challenges that they're experiencing and then I'm curious about the contrast when they're switching to something like visual workflow.

[00:09:18] Jo: Yes. Yeah. And you know, there's a massive difference, but I think as a whole, the industry is still a little bit stuck in the old kind of like manual system. Whereas with automated workflow like DoorGrow Flow or Flussos, which, you know, is one in the same thing and it is the best system for property management, you create the logic in everything that we do. You know, when we use something manual, it's not logical.

[00:09:46] It becomes part of what a person feels like doing at that time, or, you know, they might be focused on a task because someone is screaming the loudest to get something done. So, as a result, We're not working or focused working on the items within a task that we need to be working on at any given time.

[00:10:08] So, you know, like the other thing with automated workflows is we see 24, 7, 365, all the tasks that we need to focus on exactly when we need to focus on. Whereas when you've got those paper checklists or even online checklists, we can move things around. You know, we can say, I don't feel like working on this at the moment. I'm going to go to this part of the flow. I'm going to look at that and your flow becomes illogical. Yes. So it's you know, it's interesting, the mindset that we're dealing with at the moment in the industry, because people like to do what they want to do. And they kind of like wanting to step past other steps because they don't like doing certain steps.

[00:10:52] And a lot of the other workflow programs, you know, they allow people to bypass certain steps. And if you're doing that, it's not a proper workflow program. So, I think the industry is just struggling with understanding when they do a task, there is a lot of elements, a lot of actions and steps within every task.

[00:11:15] And now we're seeing it. In front of us and people think, "I don't want to do that" or "I never do that," hence why we've had problems in the past

[00:11:24] Jason: Yeah, so steps get skipped, you know a lot of times in checklist systems or just project management type of systems where it's check boxes processes like the other challenges with those systems, it's always very linear it's like step one step two step three, but a lot of processes are more like: Step one, make a decision and based on the decision, go different ways and then maybe even split. So concurrently, one team is working on this and another person's working on this at the same time for efficiency is how we work in real life.

[00:11:58] But in the linear checklist, we're waiting until somebody does the first steps and then it gets moves on to the next person. Or you have two people trying to attack the same checklist at the same time. So it just gets really messy. Using checklist and we would run into those issues, so then I had to create controls in my system so that my team would not skip steps.

[00:12:18] So then they had to do things. And so then you have to create logic and then you have to make things show or hide based on whether it clicked. And like, there's all these, and so I had to get really nerdy to make things work really well in a checklist system. And it's still, once it got that complicated, if anything broke or was unclear, or somebody needed to alter the process.

[00:12:39] I was the only person that could do it. I was the only person that understood what the process was supposed to be doing, because I built it. And if the process is old enough, I might even forget why I was doing things a certain way. So then I have to go back and kind of figure out, what was I trying to create?

[00:12:57] Unless I actually created a visual map, or, you know, Visual flow chart in like Lucidchart or Visio or something and did that. And so I've loved being in Flussos. I love being able to even just create visual flows, and even if I'm not going to use them as a process, just creating the map. And i've mapped out my different growth engines for my business so I can pull it up and say, "this is how we get a customer. Here's what we do. Here's the steps. Here's one of our engines Here's another growth engine how we get customers" and so i've used it for other things as well because creating visual flows and everybody being able to see it and understand it creates a lot of clarity. And Sarah, my wife, she honestly believes technology is out to get her.

[00:13:44] I don't know if there's anybody else listening to this podcast that like. She thinks technology is like trying to cause problems for her. It's confirmation bias, I'm sure. She's like, "see, look at this! The wifi is not working on my computer or this is not happening. And it's like being mean to me."

[00:13:57] But she loves working inside of Flussos, like she loves being able to just drag and drop, move stuff around. She's our operator. She messes with all the processes, even though she's not generally fond of technology. That says a lot because the most difficult factor I've noticed when trying to implement or roll out new tools and things in our business or in any business with clients is adoption. Like it's really difficult to get people to adopt new tech unless it's really easy to use and really intuitive. And so that's one of the things i've really noticed is it's taken the burden off my shoulders. I create no processes. I don't do it! And I just tell my team members. They're like, "Hey, we noticed this. We need to change something". And I'm like, "cool, update the process." And they just do it. I don't have to be involved anymore, which is taking a big load off of my shoulders where I used to kind of think maybe I'm the smartest guy in the room and I'm the only guy that can do process, which is not the case.

[00:14:54] I'm just nerdier than most of the people on my team, but having a tool where everybody else can create it makes it a lot easier and it's taken a big, big weight off my shoulders and it gives me that safety and certainty or security that I know because we have all of our processes in there, that if I lose somebody, we can put somebody in place right away, change the role of that person and they can start to use that process and just go through it and do it. And so it creates a lot of safety because we've had things like we've had team members like go on maternity leave. We have team members come back from maternity leave and then quit right away, you know and stuff like this and so it's nice to be able to have anybody on the team like be able to step in and just follow the flow and go through that and then while going through the flow they can see where they are In the process.

[00:15:44] Jo: Yeah exactly. And, you know, like team members don't just leave, they could be away for the day. And if they're away for the day in property management, we've got timelines on everything and you create those timelines within Flussos or DoorGrow Flow. You put the timeline on when that particular action or step should be completed.

[00:16:05] So, so what it means is it gives the business owner the opportunity to reassign that particular act or step to someone else, always completing the task within the given timeline and delivering on the promise that you made to your clients. There's no excuses of, "I'm sorry, Jo wasn't in this afternoon, so we didn't get it done."

[00:16:28] You know? The company has a responsibility and an obligation to the clients to deliver on task as and when due, not on a person, on the company. So, yeah, you know, like when we look at checklists, I like to think of them as, you know, the old school signs and guardrails on the road, whereas our automation is like the magnificent satellite navigation that we have now.

[00:16:54] It just guides you. It takes you there in the most you know, fastest, efficient way that you can get there. It gives you the opportunity as your business grows and you restructure roles that you can split those tasks and assign it to the relevant person. So there's no impact on growth as you scale up and grow the business.

[00:17:17] It's just, it's the most logical thing for property management because what we do in property management is built on tasks. It's just task after task. So, you know, to me, it's the industry that, you know, really should have automated workflows. That's for sure.

[00:17:36] Jason: And by automation, there's a lot of buzzwords around this right now.

[00:17:39] A lot of people think automation means that a robot's doing all the work. And so, but there's I think what we're talking about here is automating or making it so that your team members can follow the processes. And so the machine of the business becomes automated so that the team are more automated instead of doing it manually as you were talking about before. There's this myth kind of in the industry. There's maybe two myths. One I call the process myth. I've noticed this that a lot of businesses that are maybe You know 200 door +, they a lot of times fall prey to this myth that it doesn't matter what their team looks like, they can just go get the cheapest, most mediocre team members as long as they're dumb enough to follow a process, and I feel like that's not accurate like and so there's this process myth.

[00:18:31] They think "I just need better processes," and a lot of times when i've dug into their businesses, I've also noticed though that companies that have amazing people and have really good teams, even if they have a lack of processes, there are processes in their heads and they care enough to make sure it's working And things work and the business works well, but i've yet to see businesses Is that are able to grow quickly, have a lot of success that overly micromanage and create endless amounts of processes and try to hire low dollar wage people to just do everything.

[00:19:06] And the challenge there is that they still have to be the thinker and decision maker in a lot of instances. And so how do you look at processes versus humans making decisions? And so where's the decision making come in where you need somebody to think versus just follow a to do list and do tasks and be told what to do?

[00:19:30] Jo: Yeah, well, to be able to make decisions, you have to have process because process is built on policy. So policy creates the protocol where you can make decisions. And there are things that come from left field every day in property management. And if you don't have a protocol that says "if this, then that," then people make decisions based on their own knowledge or. Perhaps fear of the situation that they're involved in and so potentially wrong decisions are made, delays are created, and so risk and mitigation is a result of that and liability. So if you don't have your business founded on a very strong policy, then you're going to struggle when things go wrong.

[00:20:16] You'll struggle with growth because you start to become very reactive to everything that's going on. And when you've got policy, it provides that platform for being proactive in everything you do. There is, you know, deliberation and determination in every element of your business. And it removes that element of desperation that we see so many companies built upon.

[00:20:42] You know, they feel losing a key member of staff. And I think if ever you've got that fear, then your business is not strong. You should never fear losing staff because the only constant in a business is the business owner. Everyone else will come and go. So if you fear losing any particular staff member, it means that you're not in control of your business.

[00:21:05] Jason: It's job security for them, but it creates risk for you. Exactly. Exactly. Could you explain, you've spoken on this at one of our events and I thought it was really interesting, the difference between landlord tenant law and policy procedures process, like that sort of idea because I think a lot of property managers are like, "well, there's the law," but that's not always clear, right?

[00:21:30] Jo: The law is created, to me, by lawyers and therefore it's not black and white. It's gray So we have to interpret what the law says and there is some very strong guidelines in law as in, you know timelines for you know, issuing a breach or you know, notice to quit or anything like that.

[00:21:51] So there is very strong timelines, but there's other things that we have to interpret legislation into our policy. And then when we've got policy, we can then create process and protocol should something happen. So an example of that is, you know, if we issue a pay or quit, and the owner is saying no, you know, like, "I don't want you to give that notice to my tenant. I want to give them a little bit of time to, you know, pay the rent." And then we're outside the guidelines of law. Then, you know, what have we got written into our policy should an owner say, "don't give my tenants you know, notice to pay or quit," or should an owner be saying, "no, I'm not going to do that maintenance on my property" when the tenancy agreement states that maintenance has to be done as does the management agreement.

[00:22:44] So, you know, it's understanding all those things that do happen in property management or, you know, one that happens all the time is when managers do so much work on securing an applicant that should be approved for a property. A lot of work goes into that, showing the property, advertising the property, processing the application. And then we've got someone who is, you know, the star applicant and we can't get a hold of the owner. And what happens is property managers delay the process out of fear of making a decision because they can't get a hold of the owner, and then they lose that applicant. Now, you know, that's cost the company a lot of money and the owner has got extended periods of vacancy, whereas we should have a protocol in place that in the event that we can't contact the owner, we've had the discussion, you know, when the property is, knowing that it's going vacant to say, "if we can't contact you when we've got a an applicant that suits the criteria within that 24 hours, we will make a decision on your behalf because we know what you're looking for." But fear prevents people from making decisions.

[00:24:02] And we shouldn't be like that. And the only reason why we're like that is because we don't have a strong policy. So, you know, don't build your business on legislation. You have to interpret that legislation into your policy and what you do to manage. That, you know, legislation.

[00:24:24] Jason: So it seems like there's kind of a process here, right?

[00:24:27] So first people know and understand the legislation. They need to be clear on this and they need to be up and current on this. And then based on this legislation, they need to create rules internally for how we are going to go about doing business, how we're going to do things and we have these different policies in the business of how we're going to interpret the law or the legislation. Once we have these policies then we can start to create process around this so that we can follow our policies and achieve the good or desired outcomes that we're aiming for. Does this sound accurate?

[00:25:02] Jo: Absolutely spot on. Yes. Okay, exactly. Yes, right.

[00:25:06] Jason: So what are some things that you notice, because you help a lot of business owners get their processes dialed in get some of these visual workflows mapped out, what's lacking a lot of times in their thinking about how to build a really good process? One of the things that really stood out to me in one of the previous calls as an example was setting expectations. Just setting expectations reduces a lot of extra unnecessary work, like, "Hey, tenant, we will let you know in a day that about this," instead of them following up multiple times asking you and then multiple phone calls and emails and stuff like this. And so just communicating clearly expectations of when you're going to communicate again seems like a really simple addition to a lot of processes that reduces a lot of extra unnecessary work and interruptions.

[00:25:55] Jo: Yeah. No, there again, you've got a business that will be proactive and not have that, you know, like, "Oh my goodness, what do we do now? This happened, the tenant won't talk to us," or "the tenants changed the locks at the property," or, you know, "we can't get a hold of the owner to get this decision."

[00:26:12] So everything becomes reactive and the focus and the energy goes into whatever that situation is. And meanwhile, we've got other things that are cropping up in the business that are also going to just ignite. And then they'll take our attention. So, you know, we've got this constant hopping from one drama to another because we don't have the proper policy in place.

[00:26:35] And when we say that, you know, like an automated workflow is logical. Well, logic is built on reality. You know, you can't have something that's logical if it's not created out of reality in the first place. And the reality becomes the policy that you create for your company. So I would say a lot of companies actually lack that foundation of policy.

[00:27:00] It's all very much hearsay. When you talk to the teams, and I work with a lot of teams, and what I like to do is talk to each team member one on one and, you know, ask them, in the event of this, what do you do? How do you do this? And very rarely do I ever get the same response from, you know, the team, they're all based on their own experience, their own need to be valued. And the way people are valued is very personal. Whereas if you create your policy, then we create how people value what you do as well. So it's not all, you know, like, "I like this to make me feel good." You know, we do get the thank yous from the clients because we deliver on the promises we make because out of policy becomes the promise that we can make, and we know that we can deliver on it. And hence that's the expectation.

[00:28:00] Jason: So I've noticed one of the things I've noticed in some businesses, it sounds like there's kind of this issue of like, you ever played the telephone game? Where like you say something to somebody and they say it and then by the end they reveal what they think the person at the end that the beginning said and it's like totally off, right? And so it gets ridiculous because they're just passing it along and this hearsay as you mentioned, this is often how sort of the policies in a business kind of get passed around or passed on like somebody trains somebody else, somebody brings them in, they're asking questions.

[00:28:33] "Hey, susie. What are we do in this?"

[00:28:35] "Oh, I just kind of do this," and so then we create this whole nebulous, cloudy, fuzzy, weird thing where everybody's kind of making decisions. And the reason why is "Susie told me, like when I first got hired because she was impatient and I was annoying her that to do it this way, and I've been doing it that way ever since, and that's what I've been telling everybody else that I've been talking to is how we do it." because it's not defined. So. That's interesting. So a lot of businesses they might have processes. I mean, almost every property management business probably has some process defined, if not, you are probably very new, but a lot of them are lacking policy being documented.

[00:29:13] Jo: Yeah. Yeah. You know, a lot of them when they create the process, it's based upon, you know, what the team feel is right to, and you quite often hear property managers saying, "I never do that," or you know, "I do it this way and I've always done it that way, and I'll continue to do it that way because I feel comfortable."

[00:29:31] Jason: "Manuel says this, but that seems mean or uncomfortable for me. So I've found a better way of doing it."

[00:29:39] Jo: Exactly. And "all my clients would never like it if I did that." Well, you know, when you hear that conversation, it's like, you've got a problem in your business because your business is not grounded in its policy.

[00:29:52] So it's all made up as they go along. That's where we start to have that desperation. We don't have a finger on the pulse of that business. We don't know what's going on because your team is doing things the way they want to do it. And they're telling you what you want to hear. So you're hearing, "Oh, everything's great."

[00:30:12] And then all of a sudden that team member is, you know, really struggling and with not coping and they leave, and we find an enormous amount of unfinished tasks of dissatisfied clients of liability sitting there.

[00:30:29] Jason: From my experience, every team member that I had that left that I thought I would just probably die if I lost them.

[00:30:37] These are always the team members that you probably need to leave, I've realized. Because when they do, you think you can't lose them. It's because you don't know what they're doing. You don't have clarity on their processes. They're not documented, which creates job security for them, but it creates a lack of transparency and clarity for you.

[00:30:55] And often they're doing things that are stupid or the wrong way or that don't make sense that you would change if you were aware of it. And so when I have a team member leave that I was unclear about what they were doing. We started digging into it. There's a lot of dissatisfaction, you know a lot of clients were frustrated a lot of situations where I didn't know it was being done that way, and so that's it becomes a, you know, kind of a blessing in disguise a really good opportunity to now define things and improve things.

[00:31:24] So It sounds like maybe we've got the legal that impacts the policy, but it sounds like maybe also the business because different businesses have different set of values, right? So, for example, let's say one business, their maintenance value is to do things high quality as possible. Real high quality so that there's no repeat work.

[00:31:48] And then another is like "our owners are cheap and we want to do things as cheap as possible." Duct tape is appropriate in plumbing. Something like this. And so there's a difference in value and maybe neither one is right or wrong. Right. There may be more repeat work, but it's cheaper and that's what the owners want or what and the values of the business owner and what they dictate. These are the values of the company. And so it sounds like maybe also going into the processes and maybe even into the policy is also there needs to be mixed in the principles or the values of the company, which should be defined.

[00:32:21] Jo: Oh, definitely. Yeah, definitely. It's about the principles and the personality of that company.

[00:32:27] So what's the personality of your brand? How do you want people to see your brand when they talk about? So I always say, if you don't write your own story, people will make up your story about your brand. So you've got to write your story and tell your story about what your brand is all about. You know, is your brand, you know, filled with care and heart, or are they just, you know, a brand that's churn and burn? Just get them in. And, you know, we don't build on relationships. We get them in and, you know, do what we need to do. And it's a very interesting, a lot of that comes from one, the vision, the original vision of when that person created their business, and two, the marketplace that they're working in because you can't, you know, be a suave, sophisticated brand if you're in a marketplace where you're going through an area of the area is going through rejuvenation because what we find in those areas is a lot of the old homes that the, you know, the owners of those homes are developers.

[00:33:30] And they don't want to spend money on those properties because they're just kind of like waiting until they've got the approval to knock the property down and rebuild, you know, high rise or something like that. So, you know, you've got to understand your market area and make sure that your brand aligns with your market and your message aligns with your brand.

[00:33:51] And then to do that, you've got to make sure that what backs you up is your process because your process is in how you deliver on whatever that image is, that story is, that you created on your brand. Because this is where we start to see as the business grows, everyone has their own spin on your story and they it becomes their story not the brand story. So yeah, the chapters all start changing

[00:34:22] Jason: I've seen this in my own business.

[00:34:24] I've seen this in our clients business and we refer to kind of that a lot of times as culture because what we've noticed is If culture is off in a business, then it seems like everything is worse. Everything gets worse. And it's, it means the business isn't really built effectively around the business owner.

[00:34:41] So usually the business owner is miserable in their own business because they haven't created cultural clarity. They don't have their core values mapped out or they've got too many so they value everything and nothing all at the same time, kind of. And they don't have clarity on why they do what they do or why they're in the business.

[00:35:01] And so getting clarity on the motive also when we create our processes one of my rules for creating processes for our team is It needs to state at the beginning of the process what the outcome is supposed to be, so there's clarity on exactly the best desired outcome and then why we're doing it like why is that important? So that they understand the reason because sometimes you may not achieve at the full outcome, but if as long as you're in alignment with our values or you understand why we're doing things a certain way, then you're less likely to screw it up or try to change it or be cute or be clever, right?

[00:35:38] And so sometimes it you know, I really believe that transformational leadership is way more effective than transactional leadership and transactional is like "here's a task. Just do what I tell you to do. Be a robot, all of the orders" and you know, "don't think," and when we get into transformational leadership, it's more, "here's the outcome that we want. I don't care how you get there, well do it according to these values at least, but whatever steps you need to do to make sure this happens, this is the end desired goal. Here's a possible way of doing it, but get this outcome, right?" If the outcome is: we want to provide great customer service, that's going to look different in a variety of different situations.

[00:36:20] But if you're like, "well, the policy is that we never give a refund for this, and we only, you know, blah, blah, blah, and tell you to go pound sand," then maybe it's not going to achieve great customer service. And so, you know, I had a support team for a while that they were getting stuff done. But their communication skills in the support tickets was like really terrible.

[00:36:41] They were like, "this is done." And they like, that was their reply. And I was like wait a second. So like, we changed our why at the time, because it was to build websites or whatever back in the day. And I was like, "our why statement is to build incredibly effective relationships and websites."

[00:37:00] And so the emphasis became on the relationships. And so then I was focusing on the team. So they started to, "Oh, I need to communicate in a different way." And they followed the same process to achieve closing a ticket out. But what was different is how they communicated it and whether they showed care and whether they showed, you know, had effective communication or kind communication, which is very different than just, I did this, it's done.

[00:37:25] Jo: Definitely. And I agree with you. I think every task that we do and everything we do is a task in property management has to have its own objective and outcome. And then we also need to understand the clients that we serve, we need to understand their why and we become their how to their why because, you know, like they only engage us because they've got a certain goal that they want to achieve.

[00:37:54] They don't know how to do that. So they call on us because we become their how and the how is then our objective and outcome for everything that we do. And it's consistent because then what we do is we break down that, you know, personality, who wants to be the hero in everything or the one who's the villain or the one who's, you know, got a split personality and they're a hero to some clients and a villain to others.

[00:38:22] So, you know, that's where we start to have the schizophrenia within a brand. It's not the one personality. So, you know, like we do when we create a team is about different skills, different personality, but it all joins to actually deliver to the clients the way that we see our brand, the way that we've created our brand through the policy, the platform of policy.

[00:38:47] And that's the reality of our brand, to then create the process and the protocol. And you know, you've got a good, solid brand. And I think the best example of this in the world is Disney. You know, Walt Disney he Died decades ago, but when you go into Disneyland, you feel him there. You look through the eyes of Walt Disney when you walk into Disneyland, when you watch a Disney movie, and that's what we need to do when we're creating our business.

[00:39:20] We need to show what our vision is so all of our team can almost look through our eyes to see what it's going to be like. And you know, every leader, they say every leader is present even when they're not present. So you know, you need to have that. And the only way to have it in property management is through your automated workflows that are built upon, you know, the logic that you created through your process.

[00:39:51] So, it's very interesting and people keep trying to shortcut it, or they think that, you know, they've hired the, you know, the next best thing since sliced bread and then they're disillusioned. They think, well, what happened to that person? And there's all the blame and justification. It's like business should not run on blame and justification. That's ignorance.

[00:40:14] Jason: That's terrible fuel for a business. Yeah, it is. So, well, I think Jo, this has been, I think very helpful. You do a lot of different things. Right. And you help people with process, you've got great systems, probably can help people with procedures, et cetera. So, how can people get in touch with you if they're needing some help with something?

[00:40:39] Jo: Yes, definitely. And I would encourage, you know, everyone in the industry to invest in getting your policy and process done correctly, because once you've done it, then changing it as your business scales and grows is simple. It's just adjustments and alignments. along the way. So, you know, invest in it now.

[00:41:01] And I'm more than happy, you know, we could even do group exercises, Jason. But probably the best way to contact me is I'm on social media you know, through the messenger and chats on social media or email. So, the email, it's a long one because my. My company is called E Revolution, which is Oliveri backwards.

[00:41:26] So, yeah, so it's just Jo, which is simple Jo@ireviloution.Com. I R E V I L O U T I O N. Dot com. So it's super simple.

[00:41:41] Jason: All right, we'll throw that in the show notes, make sure people got it. All right Well, Jo, thanks for coming on the show. Appreciate you being here. And so how can people learn more that are interested about Flussos or this visual workflow tool.

[00:41:58] Jo: Yeah, the easiest way there is jump on our website.

[00:42:01] Sorry Flussos. com FLUSS OS dot com and Flussos is Italian for flow. So jump on there, book a demo and you'll most likely get my husband Stacey who will do the demo with you and you know, like go through the process of don't push back immediately. Yeah. Anyone who starts working on automated workflows, it's about adapting to a new mindset in the way that you do the do every day in property management. So, you know, be patient with yourself, be very deliberate and focused on going through a mindset. And I liken this to When we introduced, you know, property management platforms 30 years ago in the industry, and I was new then, so I adopted immediately, but I see all the people that have been in the industry failed to adapt, and they didn't hang around for long.

[00:42:58] So we're going through that change that we did, but go in there, get help, don't do it alone. You know, it is difficult to create flows because you like engineering and architecture. So, is that a word? So yeah, go on to Flussos. com, book a demo let them know that you're, you know, with DoorGrow as well. Just say hi I'm with DoorGrow because we've got some special things for all the family at DoorGrow. So yeah. Yeah, you know, like, just do it.

[00:43:27] Don't delay. Don't let fear get in the way. Don't let fear of your team not wanting it get in the way. You know, if you've got fear of your team pushing back,

[00:43:36] that's a problem. So yeah.

[00:43:38] Jason: Not sure what it sounds, but I can tell you, like, having gone through switching process software multiple times.

[00:43:45] This one, we love. Like, we love being able to run processes on it. And once you figure it out, I really think it's super intuitive. At the basic level, it's drag and drop. It's really easy to use. And, yeah, there's a lot of complexity that can be added under the hood to really make things really well dialed in, but you'll get there.

[00:44:04] Stacey will help you. All right.

[00:44:06] Jo: He will.

[00:44:07] Jason: All right. Cool. Well, it's great to have you here on the show. Jo, thanks for being here on the DoorGrow show.

[00:44:13] Jo: My pleasure. Such a joy. Thanks, Jason. All right. Bye.

[00:44:17] Jason: Okay. So if you are a property management entrepreneur and you are struggling, you don't even know what the problem is, you're trying to grow your business, you're not even sure why, what is the problem? Maybe you think, "well, I just need more leads or I just need better processes or whatever it is that you believe." Get on a call with our team and we'll help you figure it out. And maybe you're not clear on what the problem is.

[00:44:40] We'll help you figure it out. And maybe you're not even clear on what the solution is or where you're at currently and what your current situation is. You're like, "I know there's something off or it could be better, but I'm not even clear." We'll help you get some clarity on that and figure it out. And we're not going to try and sell you anything unless you need something.

[00:44:57] And if you need something, then we're just going to try and figure out if you want it, you know, if we have something that could help you we're not we're not pushy salespeople. But we do love helping property managers. So check us out. You can go to doorgrow. com. A lot of people are like, what does DoorGrow do?

[00:45:12] We grow and scale companies dramatically and quickly. And so if you would like to grow your business, you're tired of wasting time, trying to figure out what works, wasting time doing advertising, falling prey to a bunch of different marketers. And you want to figure out what is actually working to grow businesses?

[00:45:29] We're helping people grow their businesses without spending money even on advertising. You're able to grow even faster by eliminating that stuff. And so we may be able to cut your ad budgets and increase the output and the ability to grow and add doors in your business. And so we do a lot of other stuff to consult property managers and helping them get things dialed in, reach out to us.

[00:45:51] We would love to help you figure out how to grow your business. So you check us out at doorgrow. com. And if you are a frequent podcast follower or listener, we would appreciate it if you like subscribe and leave us some sort of review on whatever channels you're listening on. It helps us help more people and we appreciate it.

[00:46:11] And that's it for today. Until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everybody.

[00:46:15] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:46:42] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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There was a recent event where the stock market plunged. Some are speculating about an impending recession. We’re seeing the real estate market downturn in real time…

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull talk about the impact the current real estate market and economic downturn will have on property management businesses.

You’ll Learn [02:10] The current state of the economy

[10:00] The real estate market and leasing challenges

[21:07] Having empathy in property management

[25:03] Real estate investing in a recession

Tweetables “In every single recession, new millionaires are made and this is an opportunity for that to happen.”

“Those that have built that ark so to speak, like Noah did, are prepared for the storm. They're ready. They're just going to float through it instead of drown.”

“We always have to remember that property management is a relationship business.”

“One of the most magical, impactful ingredients that you wouldn't think has an impact in getting people to move or do things or to take action is empathy.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: If you want to be in doom and gloom and "the sky's falling and I'm never going to make any money" then you're absolutely right. But if you want to look at the opportunity that is staring you in the face and say, "what can I do with this and how can I capitalize on this?" that is where millions are made.

[00:00:16] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives. And you are interested in growing in business and life. And you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow.

[00:01:22] Now let's get into the show. All right.

[00:01:27] Sarah: That was good multitasking there.

[00:01:29] Jason: You saw that? See.

[00:01:30] Sarah: I saw that. That was one time of you multitasking. So you are capable of it.

[00:01:35] Jason: That was hard, but I had that part of the intro memorized. I was putting my phone on do not disturb as I was reading and she decided to call it out. It's hard, right guys? It's hard for us to multitask. Women have us beat in this area.

[00:01:49] Sarah: Oh, yeah. Yeah, we dominate you here.

[00:01:52] Jason: Yeah, your brains are just wired differently, but we have that singular focus advantage. We can just cut everything else out and focus on one thing at a time.

[00:02:01] Sarah: Well, speaking of focusing on one thing at a time, let's get into the show.

[00:02:07] Jason: Yeah.

[00:02:07] Sarah: So we were going to talk about some doom and gloom today.

[00:02:10] Jason: Yeah. So we just saw the stock market tank, like a thousand points, right. Pretty wild. And friend of mine who runs a company, Jeremy Pound, he had mentioned, I saw his post online.

[00:02:23] Shout out to Jeremy. He said, "now's the time to reach out to your real estate investor clients and say, 'Hey, look, your property didn't go down by a thousand points and never will,'" you know, something like that. So I thought that was clever. But yeah, real estate, probably a better investment right now than long term but a lot of investors are still in general freaking out. There's a recession that seems to be looming and coming or is already here depending on who you listen to. And so yeah, the sky is falling and chicken little's been shouting which is the news media and like everything bad is coming and so is this going to be how's this going to impact property management?

[00:02:59] Might be a good question to start with.

[00:03:01] Sarah: Yeah, I think one of the things that we're already seeing is we have been seeing in many markets at least a decline in prices if you are trying to purchase a property right now. And we are no longer, no matter what market you're in, because some markets have still held pretty steady, no matter what market you're in, we're no longer in the days in which you list the property on a Monday, you get multiple offers and it's accepted for well over the list price the same day.

[00:03:40] We're not in that situation any longer. So how does that affect property management? Well, on the real estate side, investors right now should be, if they're not, but they should be looking. Because things are on sale right now.

[00:04:00] Jason: Steals.

[00:04:01] Sarah: So as you think about what is your favorite store of all time?

[00:04:06] Let's ask you, what's your favorite store ever?

[00:04:10] Jason: Amazon. Amazon. Okay, cool. I spend a lot of money there.

[00:04:12] Sarah: That's great. That's actually, you know, I wouldn't have thought of that. Because I don't, for my brain doesn't equate it to a store, but I guess it is.

[00:04:18] Jason: Okay.

[00:04:19] Sarah: I love it. I love Amazon. Okay, cool. Amazon. So if Amazon had a sale where everything was 30 percent off, would you probably buy some stuff?

[00:04:29] Jason: Oh yeah, I'd buy a ton of stuff.

[00:04:31] Sarah: What if it was 55 percent off? 60. Oh. 70.

[00:04:36] Jason: No brainer. I would stock up on so much stuff.

[00:04:39] Sarah: You'd be like, "I don't even need this, but what if I do?"

[00:04:41] Jason: A million supplements. I would like.

[00:04:43] Sarah: Right.

[00:04:44] Jason: I'd be healthy set for the next year.

[00:04:46] Sarah: You'd be buying everything. So investors, this is your call.

[00:04:48] Hello, real estate is on sale right now. So the savvy investors, they already know this. They're super excited right now. The savvy investors are not freaking out. The savvy investors. They know. This is where millions of dollars can be made and in fact in every single recession new millionaires are made and this is an opportunity for that to happen.

[00:05:18] So people who are like the accidental investors and they've got that property they've been hanging on to and they're just waiting until the market gets hot enough and then they'll probably sell it. But in the meantime, I guess I'll hang on to it and rent it out. They're going to freak out right now.

[00:05:36] They're going, "Oh my God, what if rents dip even more? What if vacancy rates are longer? So I can't fill a property or my property manager can't fill a property in a week like they used to be able to?" It was just churn them out and hurry up, get another one in there, find a warm body, put them in. They're like coming in droves.

[00:05:54] That's not the situation anymore. And they will freak out. But the investors that understand the situation that we're in and the market at where it stands. Oh man, they are excited. Yeah, I'm excited right now. I'm like great tank, baby. Let's go .

[00:06:12] Jason: So the big news out there like right now is Warren Buffett decided to sell off a ton of stock like half of his stake in Apple like some major things and he doesn't make very many moves, right?

[00:06:24] He's like this minimalist in making Purchases or selling he's like he's the he's got the diamond hands, right? And He's now sitting on a cash stock pile 277 billion

[00:06:39] Sarah: billion with a b

[00:06:40] Jason: he's just hanging out with cash He's waiting for the bottom to hit because he knows he must know that things are going to get worse.

[00:06:47] Sarah: Because he's gonna go shopping.

[00:06:50] Jason: Yeah, he's gonna he's definitely waiting to go shopping is my guess And so there's going to be some deals to be had And that may mean the real estate market could be getting worse. Could be getting a lot worse, perhaps. So, and if that's the case, then savvy investors right now should be stacking cash, right?

[00:07:09] Property managers, you should be stacking cash because you should be a savvy investor. And looking for these deals. Now we've been through a recession before here at DoorGrow. Historically, what I've seen happen whenever there's a recession, the real estate market kind of dries up. Things get tough for real estate agents.

[00:07:26] So a lot of real estate agents get squeezed out. So they find other jobs. And there's quite a few of them that think, "well, why don't I do property management?" And a lot of you listening, maybe during the last recession, that's what you did. You started a property management business. Maybe that's why you're now listening to this podcast and you have a property management business that you've probably, hopefully grown by since the last recession to at least 200 units or something, but maybe you haven't put enough focus on it.

[00:07:53] Who knows. Those that have built that ark so to speak like Noah did are prepared for the storm. They're ready. They're just gonna float through it instead of drown. And you're going to see a lot of people scrambling to start property management businesses. That being said if you are a real estate agent, you're struggling you're like, "you know what? I don't really like the hunt and the chase of real estate buying and selling I would be really interested in property management," check out our foundations program. It's pretty great And it's super affordable. Hit us up, learn about DoorGrow Foundations. It's going to help you avoid thousands of dollars in costly mistakes and stupidity in getting started.

[00:08:33] Sarah: Since we're talking about avoiding costly mistakes, it would be a great time to talk about our sponsor.

[00:08:39] Jason: Cool. So, let's talk about Vendoroo. All right. Awesome new tech. Are you tired of the constant stress and hassle of maintenance coordination? Meet Vendoroo, your AI driven, in house maintenance expert that handles work orders from start to finish, triaging, troubleshooting, vendor selection and coordination. Built by property managers for property managers to provide cost effective and accountable maintenance operations where every dollar is accounted for and every task is handled with unmatched reliability. Vendoroo takes care of the details. So you can focus on growth schedule demo today at Vendoroo that's a vendor, V E N D O R O O like a kangaroo, get it? Dot AI. vendoroo.ai/doorgrow and experience maintenance done right. We've got some clients getting great results with that.

[00:09:33] Yeah. So check that out. We're in an AI revolution right now.

[00:09:37] Sarah: Get in.

[00:09:38] Jason: We're hearing great things from our clients about this so far. I mean, it's been programmed for the last 12 years and has over half a million work orders already in it and never forgets any detail you tell it about the property and is intelligent.

[00:09:53] And they put a human layer between that. So it's really cool. All right. Yeah. Back to the topic at hand.

[00:10:00] Sarah: Let's also talk about how things look right now in the property management world because you're like, "yeah, Sarah, things are on sale right now. Cool. But, man, it's just tough being a property manager right now. It's harder than it normally is." And a lot of times what we're seeing is again in certain markets right now is well rents are lower and that means property managers typically make less especially on that percentage part that you're charging so if the rent is 5, 000 versus if the rent is 1, 000, simple math will tell you, yes, you'll make less when the rents dip.

[00:10:40] The other part of that is occupancy. So just like we used to be, what, two years ago, three years ago, we used to be able to list a property for sale and we would have multiple offers very quickly and it was no problem getting it sold. And the rental market has shifted a little bit as well. So we used to go, "Oh, we have a vacant property. Well, let's market it. And then we're going to have multiple applications and we'll get it filled really quick. It could be in a day. It could be in a week, but we know it's going to happen and we're not really worried." And now we're seeing that cycle take a little bit longer. So the rents are lower and the renting cycle of getting the applications and finding someone who's qualified, that is taking a little longer, so now it might take a few weeks. And if things are really bad, that might take a few months.

[00:11:38] Jason: So in some markets, vacancies are up right now, rents are lower, the rent cycle's taking longer, so leasing in general can be a bit more of a challenge.

[00:11:47] And to be fair, a lot of property managers in the longterm rental management game, I've had it pretty easy, right? When you look at like multifamily stuff like this, 2020,

[00:11:58] Sarah: 2021, like none of y'all were complaining then, right? Super easy then.

[00:12:03] Jason: When you look at the multifamily industry, like getting tenants in place has always been a challenge in a lot of these multi family places And so they focus on this.

[00:12:12] They're more aggressive. They put a lot more attention on this and so It may mean that you're going to need to put some greater attention on the leasing side of things to be a bit more competitive and a bit more aggressive to get these properties seen to get these properties like showed, to get these properties rented out.

[00:12:33] So what are some things that they can do to kind of deal with this challenge with leasing right now?

[00:12:37] Sarah: Well, number one, I think the most important thing that you can do here is you may need to look at changing your processes depending on what they are in the leasing process, specifically regarding showings, right?

[00:12:52] So if you're like, "well, we do two showings a week." This is how I used to do things. "I do two showings a week and one is at this day, this time. The other one is at this day, this time. This is when you can come and look at the property." Well, if we consistently aren't having anyone show up and then now all of a sudden we have someone who's interested and they can't make any of those showings, you may need to change your processes, right? So now we might need to look at "how can I offer more flexibility for someone who is qualified and interested? How can I offer more flexibility?" And that doesn't mean, "oh, I'm just going to be on call 24 hours a day as a leasing agent, and I'm just going to jump when somebody says, 'hey, I want to look at this property.'"

[00:13:34] That is not what you're going to do. So, can we do self showings? Can we use electronic lock boxes? Can we have a team member just go to the property, unlock the door, stand and wait, and then lock it up? Because that's what I used to do, right? "Well, they have to be licensed." No one has to be licensed to unlock a door.

[00:13:56] Unlock the door, stand there and wait, and lock up when they're gone. That does not require a license, right? So how can we offer more flexibility so that people who are interested are now able to go see the property when it's convenient for them? Because they might work 9 to 5. So 5:30 might be impossible because at 5:30 I'm stuck in traffic. Right. So I might need a 7 o'clock showing or a 7:30 showing, or I might need to do something on the weekend. But on the weekend, you know, I have all my kids stuff and soccer camp and all this stuff. So like finding those little spots that do work for them. "Well, great. What day and time would be good for you because I can see if I can fit you in" and, or if you have the electronic lock boxes that opens a whole host of availability. I think they shut off at a certain time. So you can't go at like midnight. Right? But, then you have a whole bunch of available slots. And they get to choose what's convenient.

[00:14:57] Jason: So, maybe even a step earlier, which I love the idea, like, you can start to be more flexible.

[00:15:04] And maybe that could be helpful is just to get more eyeballs on properties maybe optimizing the listings and so there's several ways to optimize listings and a lot of property managers probably been a little bit lazy about this. Some companies put a lot of detail on this but this is a competitive advantage if you have better photos. We've had companies on like box brownie and others where they will improve or edit the photos there's so many ai tools now as well for photos and so if you can get your photos optimized and improved without lying without like, "Hey, look, the carpet and the walls are all perfect." And AI made it that way. And it looks like garbage, right? That is not going to like bode well for you. But yeah, if you are getting better photography, Improving and optimizing the listings, making sure the descriptions are really clear, adding video tours to these. One of the big things I would look at I loved seeing on any listings when we were looking to buy a rental property to rent out or anything. I love seeing the floor plans

[00:16:05] Sarah: That's so easy.

[00:16:06] Jason: Just I love seeing the floor plans like then I could go "oh, this is how it all fits together. This is how it works," you know and all these photos that are taken from the corner with a wide angle lens and make everything look giant. That stuff's probably not serving you. It's not showcasing reality And so I think there's going to be a greater push with ai and fake humans and all this stuff, there's going to be a greater desire for humans to get reality. Everything's been fake news, fake everything, fake voting, fake food, right? Everybody's waking up to this So we need to stop trying to make everything look better than it is. We need to start showcasing reality. And so it might mean photos instead of wide angle from the corner, maybe more like we've done with our airbnb taking photos straight on.

[00:16:52] Sarah: I think with Airbnb, that works really well. The types of photos I've put on our Airbnb, I would not.

[00:16:58] Jason: You wouldn't do on real estate?

[00:17:00] Sarah: What I would do though is I don't want to use the wide angle lens. That's going to make a little tiny closet look triple its size.

[00:17:08] Jason: Sure.

[00:17:08] Sarah: So that I think is something.

[00:17:10] But still maybe from the corners. Yeah. And I would because when you're trying to either sell or rent a home, you are looking like, "Hey, imagine your family in here. Look how big the space is. Look how great it is. It's beautiful. Lots of light." But don't advertise there's lots of light if there's not lots of light, right?

[00:17:27] So be realistic in it, but still do things to make it look attractive. That being said, a step even before the listing is really do some research in the market. What's available? "So, okay, this property, I can rent it out. I know what it looks like because I'm familiar with it, but this property is competing against other properties. What do the other properties in my market look like?" If all of the other properties have a swimming pool and you're the one without a swimming pool, you may have a problem, right? So if all of the other properties, they have certain amenities. You may need to look to see, "Hey, is it possible for us to also get these amenities?"

[00:18:10] Right? So you might need to look at doing some updates to flooring, kitchens, bathrooms, and it may or may not be something that investors are able to invest in right now. But the important thing is, "Hey, this is in fact, an investment."

[00:18:29] Jason: Sure.

[00:18:29] Sarah: So right now, what we might need to do in order to be more attractive and in order to get those higher rents and in order to find a qualified tenant sooner, we might need to put some work into the property to make it look more attractive.

[00:18:42] Now, right now that might seem really painful. However, it is an investment, which will give you an ROI on the property because even though rents are low right now, everything moves in cycles in real estate and the stock market. So we're at a low right now, but we're not going to stay there because if you recall, just two short years ago, it was booming.

[00:19:08] So see how quickly things can change? So that means that in even two years from now, this can very easily be something that "Hey, rents have bounced back." And now this calls for a higher rent.

[00:19:24] Jason: So price is also going to be a factor right? And being able to get and convince your owners that "hey, we're going to need to drop the price. It's not just about cashflow in having a rental property." We've talked about our ROI calculator on previous episodes that have been helping clients close deals But being able to showcase the life the investment long term of the property, even if it's not cash flowing right now, it's still a good investment to keep can be effective and just getting the price low enough sometimes is what it takes to get at least out like that's always going to be a significant factor.

[00:20:01] Sarah: Absolutely.

[00:20:01] Jason: Related to that, our next sponsor is True Submeter. So with True Submeter, what's interesting about this is you have multi family properties and you're trying to fold the utilities into the rent and your rent looks higher on listings than other places where they're not including the utilities, then you are putting yourself at a disadvantage.

[00:20:21] Here's a way to solve this. Attention, multifamily property owners and managers. Discover True Submeter, the number one water submetering company in the U. S. Say goodbye to water use abuse by your tenants and hello to billing for exact water consumption with no unit minimum. Enjoy smart, cost effective solutions designed to optimize your property's operations and save you money. Plus, get an exclusive 10 percent discount with the code DOORGROW10. That's DoorGrow one zero. Visit truesubmeter.Com today for intelligent utility solutions and substantial savings. That's truesubmeter.com

[00:20:57] Another way, maybe to get the rent down, at least on the surface and the utility separate. All right. So, I think another factor in solving the leasing challenge... I've been studying sales a lot lately and one of the most magical, impactful ingredients that you wouldn't think has an impact in getting people to move or do things or to take action is empathy.

[00:21:25] And so there are a lot of tenants that they will pick you, or pick getting a property from your business because you showed care, you showed empathy. You weren't an asshole. You weren't rude to them. You didn't make them feel unimportant or like a number and so just showing a little bit of care and showing a little bit of empathy is often the determining factor why somebody picks something over anything else. "Well, I got along better with them," or "they were nicer to me," or "they seemed like they actually cared and I could imagine them as a landlord" or "they answered their phone."

[00:21:58] Sarah: "They answered the phone when I called them, that was helpful."

[00:22:01] Jason: And so adding in empathy or making sure that the people that are having, like working on the leasing and you know, showing the property and communicating with the tenants are team members that are feelers and are empathetic and show care would probably be a little bit more effective in getting placement would be my guess.

[00:22:22] Sarah: One of our clients, I think he's outside of the Chicago area, Ed Kirch. He was saying in his area, there's like two, 300. New apartment buildings like being built and they're like large multifamily like apartment complex buildings. And then of course, they're not going to work with like a small mom and pop.

[00:22:40] They're like, they're corporate owned. It's a big corporation that manages it.

[00:22:45] Jason: Yeah, they'll be brand new.

[00:22:47] Sarah: They're nice. They're pretty. And he said, "and sometimes the rents are either the same or even less than the units that we're managing." And he's like, "man, it's really hard to compete with that." And I said, "well, is it though?"

[00:23:04] Because yes, there are always going to be the people who just want the bargain. They're like, "well, if this thing is $100 and this thing is $110, I'm going to go with this cheaper thing. Even if the $110 thing gets me better service, I don't care. I'm just all about the money." So if you're attracting those cheapo tenants, good luck managing those.

[00:23:27] Have fun. Have fun with that. But if you're looking to attract great tenants, price is one factor, but it's not the only factor. So again, it's the relationship. And we always have to remember that property management is a relationship business because we have a relationship with the client and we have a relationship with the tenant.

[00:23:51] So if one or both of those fails, it's going to be really hard for us then. So just by building that relationship and you do not need to be friends with them. You don't need to take them out for pizza and beer but just by being available to communicate with. Now again, don't go too far with this.

[00:24:13] This does not mean you're at someone's beck and call 24 hours a day. "Oh, i'm going to be glued to my phone and as soon as somebody calls i'm going to answer right away." No, but it does mean that you are available. You are responsive. It's not a hundred percent of the time. Sometimes you might need to call someone back, but it's can they get in touch with you? And do they feel like 'I'm talking to a person who actually cares about me and my situation, or do I feel like I'm talking...' we've all had these conversations where you can just tell they're like, "hurry up. Come on, just sign the stupid application so I can be done with you and move on to the next thing that I'm doing. I don't really care at all, but I just want to make the money. So like, would you hurry it up here, sweetheart?" Right? So there's a big difference on how you're communicating with people as well.

[00:25:03] Jason: Got it. So is there anything that you think will be shifting related to recession related to the owners? Like maybe money gets tighter for them. Inflation is going up. They're having a more difficult time paying for some of the repairs on the properties. Maybe it would make sense for some of the property managers now to be communicating with the owners, like, "Hey, set aside cash. Things are getting more expensive. Make sure you have the funds in order to take care of things related to this rental property, to weather this, you know. What do you think?

[00:25:31] Sarah: Yeah. I think that's fair for sure. I also think that, I mean, for me, that's always something that I do because I've been in situations where we needed a cash call and we had no cash available, so now we're really in hot water. So I do that anyway, but I think right now, especially just having those conversations like, "Hey, and just so you know, like this too shall pass. So you might not be in the best situation right now. Maybe cash flow is not happening. Maybe we're cash flow negative. But this too shall pass, right?"

[00:26:06] So it, again, it comes in waves. It comes in cycles. And I think that's even more important at this point to discuss why investing on cash flow alone is just not a great strategy because if you buy a cash flowing property right now that can change in a year or two years or five years, right?

[00:26:31] And vice versa. So right now you might buy it and it's not going to cash flow at all, but in two years or five years or eight years, then all of a sudden, "wow, we have a lot of cash flow happening." So everything comes in cycles, but it's important to understand cashflow is just one piece of the pie. It's not the entire pie.

[00:26:48] Jason: Right. Like even great stocks will lose money in the short term.

[00:26:52] Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. And real estate is a long term game. It's not, "I'm going to buy it today and sell it tomorrow and bank a million dollars."

[00:27:00] Jason: Yeah.

[00:27:01] Sarah: Can you do that in certain situations? Absolutely. But is that going to be the normal experience that people have? No.

[00:27:09] Jason: Okay.

[00:27:10] Sarah: So I think yes, talking with your owners about the other pieces of the pie or pieces of the equation. "Well, let's look at the tax benefits that you get," right? Because a lot of times people don't even understand really what it means to be able to take your losses, losses on paper, from real estate to apply them to your active W 2 income.

[00:27:38] So you can pay less in taxes just by owning a real estate, a piece of real estate. That's amazing, right? You're getting the depreciation. You're getting appreciation because even if it's not appreciating currently, it will over time appreciate. Every property over time appreciates.

[00:27:55] It's just a general rule of thumb. So it might take a couple years to get the appreciation, but you will get it. And now you're building up equity in an asset that you can tap into later. And if your tenants are paying some or all of your mortgage for you, that's amazing. Where else can you get something where you're going to take out a loan on something, but somebody else is going to pay that loan for you?

[00:28:21] Even if it's not all of it. Even if your mortgage is 2, 400 a month and you're like, well, the 1022, but then I have some other expenses on top of it. That's great. They're still paying a large chunk of your mortgage for you. And again, things change. So right now that might be your situation and you might not cashflow and that can change very quickly in the future.

[00:28:43] Because again, back in 2020, 2021, people were cashflow and really great, especially if they had bought. If you buy in a dip and then things spike, you're sitting pretty.

[00:28:55] Jason: So maybe to sum it up with your existing owners, now is the time to help them build their ark right before the storm hits. With the intention for yourself to protect your portfolio, to protect your rent roll and to make sure that you keep that up and as healthy as possible. And You know, and look into, you know, there may be investors you have in your portfolio clients that you have that they're sitting on a bunch of cash. They're waiting for the deals to happen. And then you have investors that they're like kind of struggling. They're already like kind of the straw that breaks the camel's back might like float down and land on their back like any moment now. And so there may be opportunities to keep the properties in your portfolio, but move them over.

[00:29:39] I've been hanging out a bit with the the founder of a blanket, which is a cool platform. Maybe we'll have them on the podcast here shortly, but there's different methods to keep your portfolio, even if the owners are changing. So you keep the properties. And so that's some things to be strategically thinking about as well.

[00:29:58] So, well, I think we've covered several things. Is there anything else to prepare people listening for the doom and gloom, get them maybe focused on the positive.

[00:30:08] Sarah: Just in the height of the market, one of the strategies I used was tapping into my current investors. Is, "are you looking to pick up more properties?" Can I partner, you know, two or three investors together so that they're able to get more properties? And anyone who's looking to get out, can I shift that to someone else in my portfolio? And to get referrals. Like, "Hey, this is going well for you. Do you know anybody else that might be interested in doing this or might want to purchase a investment property or have already an investment property?"

[00:30:42] So, and that, in the height of the market, that worked really well for me. So right now they would work even better. It would work even better. So even if you're like, "well, I only have like 20 clients and that's it." Plenty. That is plenty. You have an untapped gold mine. So if you want to be in doom and gloom and the sky's falling and "I'm never going to make any money and rent rolls are down and vacancies are longer and my investors aren't interested and people are losing money and I'm going to make less and oh, this sucks..."

[00:31:18] Then you're absolutely right. That is the situation that you're going to create for yourself. But if you want to look at the opportunity that is staring you in the face and say, "what can I do with this and how can I capitalize on this?" that is where millions are made. So you can choose what you do with this weird time that we're in right now.

[00:31:38] I know what I'm going to do.

[00:31:40] Jason: You know, during the Great Depression, some of the greatest companies were made. It was the companies that decided to double down on their marketing efforts doubled down on their growth experts and not put their head in the sand and freak out that the world and the sky is falling and so choose your frame I think sums up what Sarah's saying.

[00:31:59] I think it's great mindset. Choose your frame. Either you're going to believe in the opportunity and see all the positives. Why is this positive? Figure that out or you're going to view this as a threat, be scared, kind of tighten up, And you're going to watch some people make a lot of money and pass you by and stack a lot of doors.

[00:32:19] There's going to be a lot of opportunity for growing a property management business. I think a lot. So, and if you want to capitalize on that, reach out to us at DoorGrow. And I think that's that's it for today. So until next time to our mutual growth, everyone. And if you are interested in connecting with us, you can reach us at DoorGrow. com or check out our free online facebook group community at DoorGrow club. com. And we'll give you some free gifts for joining. And hopefully you'll get on a call and chat with us and we can figure out if we can help you grow and scale your business significantly. So until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

View Details

In over a decade of coaching and working with property management entrepreneurs, we have realized that the mindset stuff is often more impactful than the tactics and strategy.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss some of their favorite mindset hacks for property management business owners.

You’ll Learn [03:09] Having a Bad Mindset

[11:15] Hiring and the Process Myth

[13:28] Limiting Your Own Growth

[16:18] Shifting Your Mindset

[21:59] The Myth of Needing to be Happy

Tweetables “If you really want to grow your business, you have to get off of this high horse of you being special.”

“Whatever you believe is going to be true.”

“You can either have excuses or you can have wins and results.”

“A lot of times we can't see the future. We know our current past and the past doesn't always equal the future.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: If you believe that you're special and nothing applies to you and nothing will work in your market, you're going to be right.

[00:00:07] But if I get the right client that has an open mind in your market, I can help them crush you.

[00:00:13] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:33] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income at DoorGrow.

[00:00:56] We are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull.

[00:01:17] Now let's get into the show. All right.

[00:01:20] So today we're going to be talking about mindset. This is this distinguishing, determining factor between clients having success or business owners having success and business owners that don't, even if you know all the tactics. And a lot of times people come to us for the tactics and they think, "Oh man, if I could just learn the right things to do, I'll suddenly have success."

[00:01:43] But in the end, when I asked clients, "what really made the difference? What did you really get from us, from DoorGrow?" The usual answer historically has been, "you've shifted how I think about things. You've shifted my mindset." And mindset is probably what's holding you back more than just tactics.

[00:02:00] Now, this is what we're going to talk about. Before we get. Into this, I want to share a sponsor that we have for this episode. Vendoroo really cool tech company. If you are tired of the constant stress and hassle of maintenance coordination, meet Vendoroo, your AI- driven, in house maintenance expert that handles work orders from start to finish, triaging, troubleshooting vendor selection and coordination. Built by property managers for property managers to provide cost effective and accountable maintenance operations where every dollar is accounted for and every task is handled with unmatched reliability. Vendoroo takes care of the details so you can focus on growth. Schedule a demo today by going to Vendoroo. ai So that's V E N D O R like vendor and then O O. Vendoroo.ai/ DoorGrow and experience maintenance done right. And we've got clients already getting great results with them. I think this is like the next awesome big thing. So go check them out. Okay. So let's talk about mindset and let's first, let's show some contrast, right? Sometimes we get some clients and they don't have good mindset. What do you notice with those clients?

[00:03:13] Sarah: They always get stuck. They overthink everything. Everything just seems hard or harder than it has to be. A lot of times these are the clients that are like, "this isn't possible." It's like, "yeah, Sarah, I know that's how you ran your business, but like, I just can't do it that way. It's not possible in my market." So there's been a lot of I feel like it's justification. "Well, why isn't this possible for me? Like if Sarah can run her business that way, if like Jeff Garner can run his business that way, like if other people can run businesses the way that I would like to, but it just doesn't seem to be happening for me. There must be a reason, right?" So then there's a lot of justification. That's what I see.

[00:03:55] Jason: Yeah. So they'll be like, "this won't work for me or this won't work in my market."

[00:03:59] Sarah: "My clients would never..."

[00:04:01] Jason: "my clients would never go for that." Yeah.

[00:04:03] Sarah: "They would never do it that well."

[00:04:05] Jason: There's kind of this attitude of superiority that they just know more than everybody else. "There's no way, even though it's worked for countless others in a variety of different markets, there's no way it would work for me because I am so special and my market is so special." Let me tell you, you're not that special. Nobody's that special that things are not going to work for you that have been proven and time tested to work. That's the case. And so if you really want to grow your business, you have to get off of this high horse of you being special. "Well, I'm so special. My situation is so special. I'm so unique." And as long as people hold on to this myth that they're so special, that means nothing else applies to them. Nothing else can work for them. And so they stay stuck in their dysfunction and bottom line, the thing I think that's really important for people to look at when evaluating their current situation and whether their mindset might be off or not is just look at reality.

[00:05:05] Look at your results. Results do not lie. If you have not grown significantly over the last year, your results are shit. Your results suck. Bottom line.

[00:05:16] Sarah: Did we trade places today? Are you the bad guy today?

[00:05:19] Jason: Maybe.

[00:05:20] Sarah: That means I have to play good guy? I can't play good cop.

[00:05:22] Jason: We can both be bad cop today.

[00:05:24] Sarah: I don't know how to play bad or good cop. I can only be bad cop.

[00:05:26] Jason: We're both bad cops against bad mindset. I mean Here's the thing, like whatever you believe is going to be true. That's what I think. So if you believe it's tough, you're right. If you believe that you're special and nothing applies to you and nothing will work in your market, you're going to be right.

[00:05:46] But if I get the right client that has an open mind in your market, I can help them crush you. I can help them like totally destroy you. Like your business. They could acquire you. They could eat your business for lunch because they're willing to believe something different. And so take a look at your beliefs because your beliefs create your results.

[00:06:07] And if you don't like your results, your beliefs are garbage. Bottom line, and this is the tough love dad and me coming out. Like if you don't like your current results in life, you don't like the clients you're dealing with. You don't like the tenants you're dealing with. You don't like your business.

[00:06:23] You probably have a crappy belief system, which means you are not setting healthy boundaries. You're tolerating too much abuse. Maybe you've got some past trauma that led to this. I don't know, but you need to change your thinking and you need to change your story because your story creates your results and you cannot change your results dramatically and keep your old shitty story and your old excuses.

[00:06:45] You can either have excuses or you can have wins and results. You can't have both. You've got to change the story. And so really healthy mindset is a process where people are continually evaluating their own beliefs and their own story to, to just decide and ask the question, "is this serving me? Is this getting me what I want?"

[00:07:08] "If not, then I can choose to change it. I can choose to believe differently about that situation that happened to me in the past. I can choose to believe differently about my market. I can choose to believe differently and find evidence to the contrary or figure out what works."

[00:07:22] And if you're trying to do it all on your own, it's kind of like trying to look at the back of your own head. This is the challenge is if you don't have good mindset, you need to go be around somebody that can install a healthier belief system into your brain. This is what we do at DoorGrow. In every training that we have, I'm not so secretly injecting new mindset into your brain because in order for you to take action on the things I need you to take action on, I've got to get you to understand it and believe something different or you won't do it. And I think this is one of my areas of genius, I think, historically, is I've been pretty good at persuading people to actually believe in themselves.

[00:08:02] I've been pretty good at persuading people to actually think a little bit differently about a subject so that I can get them to do crazy stuff, like completely overhaul their pricing with their existing clients. They're like, "no, it'll hurt them, they'll be upset," you know, "they'll all cancel," whatever. And then they're making more money, right?

[00:08:19] Or getting them to change their business name. "No, this is my baby. You called it ugly and said it needs plastic surgery." No, right? So their branding or whatever it is, we get them to think differently, which, gets them to take different actions. And you are the person creating your current results with your actions because of your current mindset.

[00:08:40] All right, that's my soapbox rant. This is a good place for me to share our next sponsor. And then we'll get into how to install healthy mindset

[00:08:47] Sarah: and yell at you some more

[00:08:49] Jason: Do it! Get good mindset. What's wrong with you people? All right, cool And we're going to talk about some healthy mindset things And maybe challenge some of the beliefs you have we'll do that and this won't take too long.

[00:08:59] Our next sponsor for this episode is True Submeter. This is some cool technology. Attention, multi family property owners and managers! Discover True Submeter, the number one water submetering company in the US. Say goodbye to water use abuse by your tenants and hello to billing for exact water consumption with no unit minimum, enjoy smart, cost effective solutions designed to optimize your property's operations and save you money. Plus get an exclusive 10 percent discount with the code doorgrow10. DoorGrow 1 0, use that code. Visit truesubmeter. com today for intelligent utility solutions and substantial savings. That's truesubmeter. com. So this is a cool tech actually for small plexes and yeah.

[00:09:50] Sarah: I would have loved that on my multifamily because that was so irritating. You have to try to like increase the rent to offset the water cost, but how much is the water cost going to be? And then sometimes you price yourself out with the rent being too high and You can't track.

[00:10:04] You just can't. And then every once in a while, you get the tenant like I had, you know who you are, who just ran the sink for fun because she was pissed. Yeah, that was great. Oh, man. Oh, I hated her so much. Yeah, you, like, man, I wish I had that true submeter device on her, like a bill for that.

[00:10:23] Yeah, she would just run the sink, she would turn on the water, she would walk away, it would flood the apartment downstairs and it would jerk up the water bill.

[00:10:30] Yeah oh, yeah, it was great market I was in guys. It was so fun. I miss it every day

[00:10:35] Jason: Wow Okay. You good?

[00:10:37] Sarah: I think so. All right.

[00:10:38] Jason: Can we move on? Yeah. All right. We're going to talk about healthy mindset.

[00:10:42] Sarah: This is a great episode. You're cute.

[00:10:44] Jason's yelling at people. I'm yelling at people. This is a good one.

[00:10:47] Jason: Okay. Healthy mindset. I'll give you some examples. I actually, because I kept having clients say, like I would say, what was the best part of our program? Or, you know, things like this. And they would say mindset.

[00:10:58] And I was like, what? I don't even have anything about mindset I didn't think. It's just kind of what I do. It's built in, but I actually then created a training. I'm like, "I'm going to create a training that's legitimately mindset stuff." So I have a training called mindset secrets. So let me share some mindset ideas.

[00:11:15] One of the things that I've noticed in negative mindset is one really unhealthy mindset that would shift everything for property management business owners I see happen, especially between the stage of going from a hundred to 200 doors is this mindset that "I need to hire and build the team around the business" and it's so unconscious.

[00:11:37] It's just so wired. "Oh, like the business is getting stressful. I need to get a team member" and we just hire based on what the business needs instead of what we need. And so this is where I see business owners end up in two to 400 door range and they're more miserable than they've ever been and they stop focusing on growth and getting doors or they can't because adding more doors makes their life painful and they are more miserable in their business than they've ever been.

[00:12:03] I talk to people every week that are in this situation there and we've signed like how many businesses in the last two weeks did we sign up in our mastermind? Like seven. Yeah. Something like this. The majority of them are in our super system tier of our mastermind because they're dealing with this problem.

[00:12:21] This problem. And they're not happy. They don't have a rockstar team. They have sometimes an okay team, or they have a terrible team where they've really struggled with hiring. And they think they have a good team, but then they think, "well, we just need better processes." Let me tell you, if you think your biggest problem is you just need more processes so you can handle growth, you don't have a good team. Your team is not the team that you need. A good team can still perform amazingly without process documentation. They will figure it out.

[00:12:52] I call this the process myth.

[00:12:53] This is really unhealthy mindset. You cannot out process bad team members. And you cannot build the right team around the wrong person. So if you are showing up in the business still wearing hats you don't enjoy wearing, still doing things you don't enjoy doing, you then are building the wrong team by default.

[00:13:09] If you still wear a bunch of different hats you don't enjoy wearing and you have an entire team, you have the wrong team. Period. This is bad mindset because you haven't been taking care of yourself. You haven't been building the business around you because you're probably not even clear on you and what you really want.

[00:13:24] And so that's caused this problem. So that's mindset. Another mindset issue. People come to me and I'm like, "what do you want?" They're like, "I want to grow, but maybe only to about 250 units or 300 units. I hear this all the time. It's like they, they have a cap." What would you say about that?

[00:13:39] You've heard me talk.

[00:13:40] Sarah: So that's one of the things that I think it really holds people back. And if you're limiting yourself right out of the gate, then you're not, first of all, you're not living up to your full potential clearly. But in addition to that you're creating the glass ceiling. That we're all, like, pissed and fighting about.

[00:14:01] It's like, you know when you get a job and they're like, "Oh yeah, but this role, it maxes out at this salary. Like, you can't make any more. This is, like, the top. Okay? So, no matter how great of a job I do, I can't just make more?" Well, no. That's, like, you would have to get promoted, or move laterally to a different role, and that's how you would make more money. Oh, well, you're creating that for yourself now. You're putting a limitation on yourself and your business. And then what happens is it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. And that's where you get stuck. And sometimes you can't even reach that because you know that it's the end. So sometimes you're like, "okay, I want to get to like 250, 250 would be like really good. Then you can't even get to 250 because your brain already knows it's done at 250. Especially if you're Power and Achievement. If you're Power and Achievement and you say, "Okay, 250 and then I'm going to stop." Your brain will literally never let you stop. Because you have to keep winning if you're Power and Achievement.

[00:15:03] And once you hit 250 and then you're done, then you're done winning. Your brain is going to go, Nope, not for me. Not doing that. I'll play in that game.

[00:15:11] Jason: So what I've noticed is our brains were really good at kind of creating and predicting the future. I mean, if I asked you right now, imagine what you could be at in a year and what you could be doing.

[00:15:22] Like you can instantly come up with something. And so the problem is when I ask people what their goals are, instead of just thinking of the ultimate amazing possibility, they think of the pain. There's part of us that always focuses on, "well, I want this great outcome, but I also know there's going to be some pain involved.

[00:15:42] And so they have this false mindset that adding more doors is also going to be, which is, can be true, which is true for people that end up in the second stand trap. And so they're a little bit like magical and seeing the future. They can see their future that somewhere between two to 400 units, life's not going to be as good for them.

[00:16:01] And it's going to get hard. And so part of healthy mindset is being exposed to a different possibility. So here's a different possibility for everybody that thinks that would be the max level pain that they could tolerate would be maybe 250 units, 300 units or whatever. I want you to ask yourself this question.

[00:16:18] Do you think it could be possible that if you do it the right way, that the more doors you add. Every door you add, the more doors you add, the more money you could have and the better the team members you could get and the easier your business could get over time. Could you see a possibility in which a thousand doors, managing a thousand door business could be easier for you as a CEO than managing a hundred?

[00:16:44] I think most of us can see that's possible, but if you don't know how, then that's why you would maybe come to DoorGrow. Like, we would help you see that future. We would help paint how that's going to map out and how that's going to work so that it can become a reality. But a lot of times we can't see the future.

[00:16:59] We know our current past and the past doesn't always equal the future. It does if you don't get some sort of injection of something new, you don't bring something new into your space, some new ideas, a new mindset. And this is why it's very important to be around people that have health mindset. I think that's one of the best benefits of our mastermind is that it's full of people that are around Growers, full of people that are believers.

[00:17:22] It's full of people that are optimistic, that believe in potential and possibility. They're growth minded and not everybody out there growth minded. There's a lot of worn down, sad property management business owners and they won't admit it. You might be one of them. They won't admit it, but there's a lot of them and they would love to get out of the business.

[00:17:45] They just can't see a way out. I've had clients we just signed up that wanted out of their business. And as soon as they can paint a picture of how they can stay in the business and that selling it may not be the only way to escape the shittiness that they're experiencing, that they also could just change how they're running their business and do different types of exits.

[00:18:08] They can exit some of the frontline work. They don't have to sell the whole business. And that the business can be good because mindset wise, they are off, right? And I just show them the possibility. I show them evidence. I show them results from people that have done this. I share testimonies of people that had felt exactly how they did.

[00:18:27] So I had, it was an interesting experience yesterday. I signed up a client in the morning that wanted to get rid of her business.

[00:18:35] She hated it. And the husband wanted to like keep it and she was miserable and I helped paint a picture of possibility of a different future that we could create. And I was excited to her, like emotionally, she was like, it got her. And she was like, "yeah, let's do this." Ironically, I had a call later that afternoon with Annemarie Sunde.

[00:18:55] If you go back and like, check out her podcast episode, this was a past client. She eventually sold her business. She did exit the business eventually, but when she first came to me, it was the same story. So I told her the story and she's like, "Oh my gosh, I have so much to say about that." But it was the same story.

[00:19:11] Annemarie came to me and was like, "I hate my business. I want to sell it. I want to get out of it. And after listening to her," I just said, "you're just doing it wrong." Like, let's just change what you're doing. And she was letting me know on this call yesterday, just catching me up on her life, like how grateful she was and and what she's up to now.

[00:19:29] And it's awesome to see that contrast. Because I've helped so many clients get out of that spot where they hate their business and they're miserable. There's no question. I know it's super possible that we can change how they show up in their business and we can change their mindset and things can be really good.

[00:19:47] And that gets me really excited. I'm excited for them because I know what's on the other side. They don't know it. They just have hope. And sometimes that's all people need to shift their mindset is an injection of hope. So come over to DoorGrow. We'll give you a little bit of hopium. We'll throw some hope in your face and get you to start to believe in some possibility that's, and that'll shift your mindset.

[00:20:07] So what other mindset things?

[00:20:09] I

[00:20:09] Sarah: think the only other thing I would add to it is going back to your story and your excuses and everybody, this is what I'm realizing is everybody kind of is going through their own shit for most of us. It's not easy, right? Like, we don't just grow up having everything that we want and life just gives us the perfect scenario all the time and it's rainbows and butterflies and everything's just perfect all the time.

[00:20:40] It's just not reality for most people. We grow because of the things that we've been through. And I think that the best thing you can do is realize that first of all, you're not alone in it and second, it's what you do with it that really makes a difference. That's what counts. It's not the shitty thing that happened to you.

[00:21:02] It's what you do with that because you can have this horrible, awful thing happen to you. We all do and then go, "okay, that's the reason. That's the reason I don't feel love in my life. That's the reason I can't run a successful business. That's the reason I'll never make money. That's the reason I can't have a great relationship or great friendships. That's why I don't trust people. That's why I can't do this. That's why I can't do that." Or you can take that and say, "you know what? That's the reason I'm going to do it anyway. That's the reason that I am going to be successful. That's the reason that I am going to have trust in people, earned trust."

[00:21:41] Right. It's like it's what you do with it that makes the difference.

[00:21:46] Jason: What you decide about it and what you decide about what it means, and you can decide, yeah, that it makes you a victim or you can decide that it taught you valuable lessons and empowered you. For sure. I love that. That's good mindset.

[00:21:57] People listen to her. I think one of my favorite things I've been thinking about lately is a lot of times people, mindset wise, a lot of times people think the goal is to be happy. And I think that's a really shitty goal. I, ironically, I know, people are like what's wrong with that? I think people mistakenly think the goal of life is just to be happy all the time.

[00:22:18] And so every moment they're not happy, they're not experiencing this one set of emotion that they think that there's something wrong with life. And I think a healthier mindset is that life should be full. You should experience a fullness. You should experience everything. Life is beautiful in its totality, if you are willing to experience everything. Can you imagine a life where you never felt lost? You never felt sorrow? There's beauty in all these things. I have a friend whose father just passed. And I was just thinking about that, you know, and she wrote about like what she's realizing, how she hasn't shown up for people that are grieving, didn't know how to, and she's like made a little list of the things that she thought would be beneficial to those, you know, in the future for people to know about those grieving and like what they would want. And it may be a bit different for everybody, but I think the point of life is to be able to experience everything. And that's where I think things get beautiful. There's some beauty in missing someone.

[00:23:20] There's some beauty in wanting something that you don't have. There's beauty in feeling sorrow. There's beauty in feeling loss. And if we're always trying to just manipulate things so that we can only experience one thing, we're going to be way less happy, I believe.

[00:23:34] And we're going to be way more focused on all the lack and the loss. And we're just unwilling to experience all these different emotions. Who's to say that a happy emotion is better than a sad emotion. They're just different emotions. And maybe we're supposed to be experiencing everything all the time and not trying to control it, just being willing to experience.

[00:23:55] And when we're willing to fully experience things, and we're actually in the present moment, instead of in the future, worrying about things or in the past, worrying about stuff that's happened. We're actually in this moment, we're far more likely to experience the good stuff, but we're experienced everything real time.

[00:24:10] So that's a mindset thing that I've been kind of chewing on me in noticing other people because I see people so caught up in their own misery that they're not experienced all happiness all the time. And there's so much beauty around them that they're missing out on in their relationships and their connections.

[00:24:25] This was just so focused on staring at the garbage. So that's my little mindset bit for today. So if you don't feel like you have the right mindset, you feel like things are unnecessarily hard. You don't feel like you're growing. Maybe you still are like, "man, Jason, I still really isn't in tactics."

[00:24:45] Cool. We can help you with that. Come check us out over at DoorGrow. Let's have a conversation and see if we might be able to help you out and figures your situation out and see if we can help you grow. Set up a call with us that won't hurt. It won't hurt anything like set up a call with us and we will help you figure out if this would be a good fit for you or not.

[00:25:03] And we only want people in our program that this is something that's really going to benefit them and it's going to be a good fit for you. So we're careful and I know you, you want to be careful. And so let's have a conversation, reach out to us. You check us out at doorgrow.Com and if you're wanting to join our free online community, our Facebook group.

[00:25:21] Called the DoorGrow club, which is just for property management entrepreneurs, your team members, just entrepreneurs, the business owners go to DoorGrow club. com and you can join through there. And that's it until next time everybody, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone

[00:25:38] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:26:05] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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It’s been 6 years since we’ve had TenantCloud join us on the podcast, and a lot has changed since then!

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull welcomes Mark DeHaan from TenantCloud to talk about how it can help property managers collect payments, advertise properties, and screen potential tenants.

You’ll Learn [03:03] TenantCloud update!

[06:46] How does TenantCloud compare?

[09:34] TenantCloud integrations

[12:20] Scaling with your software

[15:56] Starting strong with Rentler

Tweetables “A lot of times when you get into rental real estate… you log into a property management system and you're like, "holy smokes, this is so overwhelming like I can't figure this out.”

“A lot of property managers have all of these different tools. They kind of build their own Swiss army knife or stack of different tools and software.”

“A lot of property managers have a challenge with financials and accounting.”

“We love the rental real estate industry and helping people grow and make passive income and that's what we're all about.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Mark: A lot of times when you log into a property management system and you're like, "holy smokes, this is so overwhelming, like I can't figure this out."

[00:00:07] And that's, I think the differentiator that we tried to solve.

[00:00:11] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:29] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners, and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:10] Now, let's get into the show. And my guest today is Mark DeHaan of TenantCloud. So Mark, welcome to the show. Good to have you.

[00:01:19] Mark: Yeah. Thanks Jason. Nice to meet you. Appreciate it.

[00:01:22] Jason: So we haven't had TenantCloud on the show for like six years. Back then, Joe Edgar was CEO. I had to look it up because I'm like, "I know, that they've been on the show before."

[00:01:32] So I'm guessing a little bit's changed since then. So why don't we start by getting into a little bit about Mark. Tell us, tell everybody like, who are you and how'd you get into your entrepreneurial journey and then what led you to being at TenantCloud?

[00:01:46] Mark: Yeah, great. Yeah. So I'm based here just outside of Salt Lake city, Utah.

[00:01:50] And I was a co founder of Rentler. And we partnered with TenantCloud, merged with them about five years ago with Joe. And when he exited, I ended up taking over as a CEO and running both Rentler and TenantCloud. And it's been a big journey by then, but yeah, my history was rental real estate.

[00:02:13] And being an entrepreneur and really sacrificing and so forth. And it's been really exciting, and I love your audience because I think they can relate to, you know, being an entrepreneur and trying to grow in the real estate business.

[00:02:25] Jason: So for sure. I'm looking up Rentler right now, cause I don't know what it is.

[00:02:30] What's Rentler?

[00:02:31] Mark: So Rentler primarily focuses on listings and filling vacancies for landlords, small mom and pop landlords. Yeah. It does some payments and screenings and a few other tools and syndicates out your leads. And then TenantCloud is a lot more robust. It does the accounting, the maintenance, a ton of things that you can track with service professionals and your owners and reporting.

[00:02:53] And so they came, they come together really nicely. And we just try to really focus on. landlords and property managers and using technology to make their lives easier.

[00:03:03] Jason: Got it. So what's what's been going on at TenantCloud since in the last six years? Like what what are you guys doing lately?

[00:03:12] And you know, why should people use TenantCloud? Like, let's get into it.

[00:03:17] Mark: Yeah. So the last bit we've been growing tremendously. We're processing over a billion dollars in rent payments a year. Well over that. And TenantCloud really as its core is to help the rental life cycle and help owners, service professionals, tenants, and landlords really come together and leverage technology to run the business and the way we built it was with that in mind to really make things seamless and easy. And you can pay your rent with, you know, ACH, credit, debit, Apple Pay, Google Pay. We have a lot of things that we're working on to just make life easier there. We do screenings, have a ton of different bundles, options for you to do screenings and to protect your investment. And that's been really good to help people with income verification and criminal and background checks and of that nature.

[00:04:11] Yeah and we do a lot of accounting. We will even file your Schedule E for you automatically. So the cool thing about TenantCloud is you don't have to have a degree in accounting. You can really log into our software and we're, we'll lead you along that process. And we'll do a lot of the tax reporting team management and you know...

[00:04:33] Jason: Can you explain what a schedule E is for those that might not be familiar with it.

[00:04:38] Mark: Yeah, absolutely. So schedule E is you know, to report income or loss on your rental real estate. And that's one thing that you'll have to do. You'll get a 1040 form and, you know, the government will want you to file that. And sometimes that can be tough to do, but with our system we will track all of your expenses and all your income and so forth and help you file that form on your behalf.

[00:05:05] Jason: So for property managers, they're doing this third party for owners, this then becomes a resource for the owners that they're managing properties for. It will do it for them as well?

[00:05:15] Mark: Yes, and we do have like an owner portal. So what's great is you can have your owners log in instead of having that back and forth.

[00:05:24] We give them a login where they can have some view access to see their portfolio as well. So it just makes it easy for those property managers to work with their owners.

[00:05:35] Jason: Got it. Okay. Now what's different between a property manager using this tool or like owners just going direct and getting TenantCloud and bypassing the property manager?

[00:05:46] Mark: Well, yeah, I mean, some owners can do that, but I mean, then they have to deal with a lot of the heavy lifting with the maintenance and managing all the units. And so with the property manager using our system, we make it easy for the owners to have access and you can send your distributions to them and so forth.

[00:06:05] But it really comes down to the ease of use and being able to manage all your leads. Manage, you know, all your contracts, all your communications with your tenants and with it, it's such a affordable option. Like our lowest plan is 17 bucks a month and we don't do a lot of unit restrictions like other competitors where you can add a bunch of units on the system. And really make it affordable for you as a property manager. So, yeah, hopefully that answers your question there.

[00:06:36] Jason: Got it. Okay. So you would say TenantCloud's probably a lot more affordable than some of the competition that exists for property managers out there. So how would you say TenantCloud kind of compares to some of the big names in the industry like Appfolio, Propertyware, there's a bunch of these You know, and then I know Bodia just came out with RentVine and then Rent Manager, you know, these tools. So we've got clients using all these different tools.

[00:07:03] So how does TenantCloud sort of fit into the mix and how do you kind of stand out among all these different tools because there's so many of them now.

[00:07:11] Mark: Yeah. So we started with the end user in mind where it was more of a business to consumer platform where you didn't have to do a heavy integration and you could just quickly create an account and more of a self service where it would be really intuitive.

[00:07:28] If you were, you know, if you had one property up to, you know, 50 units, you could easily log in. And it was way more affordable than those bigger players. They have monthly minimums, and you'd have to spend months to integrate your stuff. Everything we built was to make it so, boom, within a couple days, you could get set up, and we would help you add your accounts, add your units, add your tenants data. And so we really tried to make it cutting edge where we used a lot of the technology to help you get set up a lot quicker. And so one thing that people really, they come over to us is. You know, they're like, "man, your platform is a lot easier to use because of the way you built it. It's just really quick to get it. I don't have to hire an accountant or get an implementation manager to help me use your software" because a lot of times when you get into rental real estate, you're an entrepreneur or you have a day job and then you log into a property management system and you're like, "holy smokes, this is so overwhelming, like I can't figure this out."

[00:08:35] And that's, I think the differentiator that we tried to solve is that you don't have to have a professional help you use our software. You can just go ahead and get started and it will help you from day one.

[00:08:46] Jason: So basically, you're kind of one of your unique differentiators is since you started with the consumer in mind, instead of maybe a property manager in mind, you focus really on maybe the tenant and the property owner's experience being you know, really great, which once you started focusing on property managers, probably made a lot easier for the property managers. They're probably getting less questions. Maybe the reports are a little more clear. It's a little bit easier for them to figure out what they need, which has been a frustration. I've heard from a lot of software, you know, the owners find it confusing. They find their statements confusing. The tenants are like feeling things are confusing. Now a lot of property managers have all of these different tools. They kind of build their own Swiss army knife or stack of different tools and software.

[00:09:34] How are integrations with TenantCloud or which things do you guys do really well that they might not need? You know, some of our clients might, for example, be using TenantTurner, even though they use Appfolio in order to get properties leased out and, or they might be, or to do self showings, or they might be using we've got a lot of clients getting going on this new AI maintenance coordinator called Vendoroo, or in the past, they might use PropertyMeld, you know, for maintenance coordination.

[00:10:01] So they're stacking all these different tools because usually there's better stuff than what the property management software has internally. How does TenantCloud sort of go with this?

[00:10:11] Mark: Yeah, that's a great question. So TenantTurner is an awesome company and we have an integration with them.

[00:10:18] Jason: Okay.

[00:10:18] Mark: And so we feel like we're a platform and we're doing more and more integrations with companies like you mentioned with maintenance. There's others out there that solve that problem. I mean, we have a maintenance portal, but we love to integrate other tools and make it so it's seamless and easy that you can do a show in coordination like a TenantTurner and so forth.

[00:10:39] And so, yeah, that's a big thing for our users and we love to work nicely with other companies that will help benefit them.

[00:10:47] Jason: Great. So, TenantCloud has an open API that some of these companies can connect with? Yeah. Okay. Awesome.

[00:10:54] Mark: Absolutely. I mean, we have a partnerships team and they can reach out and we can, you know, when our users request certain things, we say, you know, that makes sense.

[00:11:04] So absolutely. We love that.

[00:11:06] Jason: Is there a scenario or a situation in which you think. TenantCloud' s maybe not a good fit for certain property managers or certain types of management.

[00:11:18] Mark: Yeah, that is sometimes like multifamily or you're getting really a ton of units. You're going to probably need something a little bit more robust.

[00:11:27] Now, we just launched reconciliation and some other features more reporting tools to help as we move up market because primarily we were focused on ones that, you know, had under 10 units and then we started growing. Now we have people that use us that have a few hundred doors and they love it.

[00:11:46] They love the ease of use. They love the cost. They love that it's not restrictive, but some of that trade off is like, "Hey, you don't have some of these other customizations that you know, maybe a Yardi or some of these bigger players have." And so I would say if that's the case, you know, you'd have to wait a little bit as we continue to add more of those robust features for the upmarket bigger players.

[00:12:08] Jason: It sounds like TenantCloud is a great place for a property manager. And it's small to start, especially when they're getting pushed back from places like Appfolio or Buildium, saying you have to have a 200 door minimum stuff like this. Is TenantCloud something that can scale with them up to maybe a thousand doors? Are they going to run into some capacity issue or some challenges if they continue? Because switching software is hard.

[00:12:31] Mark: Yeah, it is. And we do have some that have a thousand doors and some bigger ones and they love it. And I think it's just the way you approach your business and how you can adapt.

[00:12:41] I mean, you'd save a ton of money and the way that every property manager is different. You know, I wish there was a standard in how accounting worked in the industry and how things did with money in, money out and so forth. But so sometimes people say, "well, I'm just so used to how these older systems work," and that's fine.

[00:12:59] But if you want to be more innovative and more customer facing and adopt, you know, the latest technologies on how payments are being transferred and so forth, then I think you'll fit in really good, you know, with what we have going on.

[00:13:13] Jason: Got it. Yeah. I know that's been an industry issue for a long time is they're not being sort of a standard in accounting and NARPM then released the NARPM sort of chart of accounts and the NARPM accounting standard that hopefully is starting to get people a little more on the same page.

[00:13:30] It has kind of been an adoption challenge, I think, and some people are starting to get going on it. And then there's definitely some businesses that have been capitalizing on it financially to like help businesses get that dialed in and get their QuickBooks like mapped out. Related to that, a lot of property managers have a challenge with financials and accounting.

[00:13:51] They've got the accounting they've got to do for the client, right? Which is usually done by their property management software. But then there's their internal accounting, their own books. And some of them try to run that through their software, which I think is a little crazy. Or some of them tried, like, will have QuickBooks or something else.

[00:14:07] I've noticed this it is a common problem in the industry is like people having this accounting mess and not being focused on it. Some outsource it and I've had clients come to me that say they found out their bookkeeper or accountant wasn't doing things right for like three years. And then one of my clients was suing their accountant and won and like, but it's still a mess that has to be cleaned up.

[00:14:31] And so, maybe you could touch on TenantCloud. I know you help with the owners and their properties and the accounting. I'm sure. How do they help with their business accounting? Is there any connection to like maybe quickBooks, or is this something that the tool helps with or how would this work?

[00:14:50] Mark: Yeah. So we have an integration with QuickBooks and that helps. And then everything we do with the reporting and with all your financials, we just try to make it really easy between the owners and the property managers so that, you know, it's seamless, but I do feel like, you know, QuickBooks could help.

[00:15:09] And, you know, primarily we're trying to do property management software. But you know, personal finance is a big part of that. We just are launching a cool product with our banking partner where we can now loan some capital to folks that want to grow some doors. And so with our payment system and our banking partner, people can quickly get a loan directly through our system and they could use it to then go buy their next rental property. So we're looking at more innovative ways. That just kind of reminded me on the personal finance, like, "Hey, I really want to go buy this next door, but I don't have some money." We can help loan that money to help you grow your business.

[00:15:51] And that's going to be coming out here at the end of this year.

[00:15:54] Jason: Cool. Very cool. So how does how does this relationship with Rentler and TenantCloud benefit, maybe property managers that are looking to use your software. And this, your shirt has on it. So then you've got this relationship going there.

[00:16:08] So how did these kind of work together? I'm curious.

[00:16:11] Mark: Yeah. So Rentler doesn't have a subscription. It's free to use. And so if you're just like one unit. And you're just barely getting in. Let's say you're moving and you just need to rent out your basement apartment or you just have one property, you can use our payment system, do screenings and you can list your property, syndicate, get your leads, fill vacancies. And it's like super light. I mean, it would probably be very similar to like a Cozy back in the day, or like a Zillow Rent Manager just something there to just boom, do that. And then as you graduate, as you go, "Hey, I really want to do more accounting or actually property management software."

[00:16:51] Then you graduate up to TenantCloud and when you list with TenantCloud, it will post on Rentler, but Rentler was primarily, you know, a listings and filling vacancy. So that's how that works.

[00:17:02] Jason: Is there an easy upgrade path from Rentler to TenantCloud or?

[00:17:06] Mark: Absolutely. Yeah, there is.

[00:17:07] Yeah, we have a fantastic support system. Pretty much 24 seven support. We have chat, we have people you can call and we'll help you. Most all of our support have been in property management and ran their own property management companies. And so they're really helpful to. to guide you and what you need for your business.

[00:17:26] Jason: Got it. Okay. Very cool. So, well, this is very helpful. Anything else that people should know about TenantCloud if they're working on making this decision right now between all these different software that exist out there?

[00:17:38] Mark: Yeah, I'd say we have a free trial and give us a shot and there's a lot of great things coming down the pipe.

[00:17:44] So just ask our team, you know, Hey, if we don't have something that we probably will have it coming soon, but yeah, give us a go and you'll love it and we'll make your life a lot easier.

[00:17:56] Jason: Very cool. Awesome. Well, Mark, how can people find out more about TenantCloud? How can they get in touch with y'all?

[00:18:04] Mark: Yeah, they can log on TenantCloud. com. We do a webinar every Thursday and they can learn about our system. And they can sign up for that on our website, TenantCloud. com. They can reach out. We have a great sales team, account management team that will give you a demo. You know, We'll do a consult free consultation on your business and help you out with that.

[00:18:25] So we're happy to help we love the rental real estate industry and helping people grow and make passive income and that's what we're all about.

[00:18:34] Jason: Awesome mark. Thanks for coming on the DoorGrow show giving us an update on TenantCloud and everybody check them out at TenantCloud. com. Thanks for coming, Mark.

[00:18:43] Mark: All right. Thank you, Jason. Appreciate it.

[00:18:45] Jason: You bet. All right. So if you are a property management entrepreneur and you are either struggling to get leads or to add doors to your property management business, reach out to DoorGrow. We might be able to help you and we've been able to help lots of our clients add hundreds of doors to their portfolios to help them scale their businesses.

[00:19:09] And we would love to see if we might be a fit for you to help you scale as well. So check us out at doorgrow.Com. And if you are a fan of the podcast or you follow us on YouTube. Make sure to like, and subscribe and make sure you're plugged in and make sure to join our free Facebook community by going to DoorGrow club. com. If you go to doorgrowclub.Com, it will redirect you to our Facebook group so that you can join. Make sure you answer the questions clearly because we're really careful about who we let in. We reject 60 to 70 percent of the people that apply to join that group every month. It's for property management, entrepreneurs, property management business owners.

[00:19:54] That includes those of you that are starting a property management business, just let us know that in the questions. So answer the questions. Join that and make sure you're asking questions inside the group and you'll by joining the group. We will also send you a series of free gifts to benefit you including a fee bible and some other resources that I think would be really useful to your business.

[00:20:18] And you can also then schedule a call with our team. So check that out doorgrowclub.com. Until next time, everybody. To our mutual growth. Have an awesome week. Bye everyone

[00:20:28] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:20:54] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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As business owners, we often feel imposter syndrome or worry about our status. Have you ever wanted to elevate your image and be more relevant?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Michael Sartain, CEO of Men of Action Mentoring to talk about how to make high-status friends and attend VIP events.

You’ll Learn [03:27] How to Utilize Networking

[19:03] Becoming High-Status Using Social Media

[26:54] How to be Relevant

[38:58] Social Media is Fake

[53:21] Authenticity vs Effective Content

Tweetables “You need to be the person who always solves problems for other people and ask for nothing in return.”

“You're building a brand. Status is status.”

“A lot of our beliefs that we're holding on to that are holding us back.”

“You make millions of dollars from solving other people's problems, not by doing what you love.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Michael: Your ability to grow is based on your perceived status, your perceived trustworthiness, your perceived know how. Not your actual know how.

[00:00:11] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing a business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:30] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:10] Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:13] So I have an awesome guest today. I actually joined his program just for kicks. This is Michael Sartain. Michael, welcome to the DoorGrow show.

[00:01:22] Michael: Hey, what's going on, man? Hey, I gotta be honest with you. Two years ago, I didn't know what doors meant and then I started hanging out with Justin Waller and he's like, "yeah, man, I have 300 doors."

[00:01:29] I was like, "bro, what are you talking about?"

[00:01:31] And then he's like, now he's got 400 doors. And I was like, "oh, it's like all these different properties." And then my buddy Myron he's got 17 homes that he owns up in Connecticut. He told me about, and I didn't understand how this whole thing worked. And then the property management side of it, like "my company, we're like, we're buying properties because we want to use the depreciation. And we need someone to keep, you know, these places rented, blah, blah, blah." And then the property management, I don't know that much about it. So that's why I was really excited to come on here and check this out.

[00:01:57] Jason: Cool. Well, yeah. And I didn't know very much about like maintaining a presence.

[00:02:03] Looking cool, like actually looking cool on social media instead of just trying to look cool. And and so I've learned some good things by being in your program. So let's get into a little bit of background about you for those that are like, who's this Michael guy? And maybe how you kind of got into entrepreneurism and I think that'd be relevant to anybody listening.

[00:02:25] Michael: So I'm originally from East Dallas. I grew up on the good side of the tracks and went to high school on the bad side of the tracks. And graduated from my high school, barely like did anything. It was not a very good experience. And I got into UT Austin because I was in top 10 percent of my class.

[00:02:39] Went there four years, studied astronomy and business and then got out of there. And then I ended up managing a nightclub for a while, for a couple of years because MCI Worldcom and Enron had gone out of business. So if you know, UT Austin, Enron was like a huge supply of jobs once you graduated you know, as a Longhorn.

[00:02:56] Once they go out of business, none of us can find jobs. I ended up working at a strip club for like several years as a DJ. And this is the first point in my life where I'm like, "okay, there's something going on here. There's things that I've been taught growing up, but there's something different now." Of course, I want to preface this.

[00:03:10] By no means am I saying that people who go to a strip club or people who work in a strip club are indicative of the median of society. They clearly aren't, clearly are not. What I am saying though is that you can see the extremes in society when you go to places like that and from those extremes, you can see overt reactions.

[00:03:27] One of the things that I do in my course is I teach how people can network, get invited where the cool kids sit like that phenomenon of where the cool guys are and the not cool guys, the hot club versus the not club that the club people don't want to go to, or the party everyone's trying to get into.

[00:03:42] What is it that causes that phenomenon of popularity and status? There has to be something that can explain it. And so what I've been trying to do for the last 15 years is use evolutionary studies in order to figure out a way in order to do that. And so a lot of times when you do that, you know, you can see subcommunication between a man and a woman and you don't really know what's going on.

[00:04:02] They have the internal focus of what's going on, but when you see it in like a nightclub or a festival or someplace like that, you see very overt communication. And from that, you can learn a lot of cool stuff. It's like watching, you know, crows you know, pick at a carcass versus watching a giant white tiger go kill a gazelle.

[00:04:18] Like that is overt examples of predation that you can see and be like, okay, this is how biology works. This is how natural selection works, et cetera. And I know for your audience, you're like, "where the fuck's he going with all this?" Yeah. The reason why, just to explain. I got fascinated. I did seven years in the military after 9 -11.

[00:04:33] I joined and I flew a KC 135 as an instructor navigator. And then I was I did counterintelligence for about the last two years I was there. And then, so, in that time period, I learned how a very structured business could work and like how accountability works. Accountability and leadership, I learned very much during that time period.

[00:04:49] But at that same time period, I was also going out a lot and I was like very interested to me in like, what is it that caused certain men to be phenomenally good with women and get a lot of people to show up to an event and then what caused other men to just not get it. And I always, I also noticed that there was a very small group of men that got it.

[00:05:05] And then a very large group of men that didn't understand this concept whatsoever. So I became fascinated with that idea of 2011. I ended up retiring from the military and I ended up moving to Las Vegas and this is the first time when I started going out to some of these nightclubs and these venues here in Las Vegas.

[00:05:19] And I meet a lot of real estate agents. I meet a lot of accountants. I meet plastic surgeons, doctors. And it was very clear to me like that some of them got it and some of them didn't get it. I threw a real estate event recently where we took a blue heron home. And then we had a charity event for animals.

[00:05:33] And while we're there, I invited every single female influencer in the city to show up. Well, these, some of these girls were interested in getting into real estate, but I just want you to imagine it was just like a regular real estate event that you have, except you're doing it for animal rescue.

[00:05:47] So now all these people who are in real estate, mortgage brokers, et cetera, property managers like yourself, they would show up to this beautiful three story house. It was catered. It was beautiful. And then every pretty girl in the city in Las Vegas who wasn't working that night showed up to this thing.

[00:06:01] So now you're drinking champagne. There's three times as many girls as guys. Some of you guys are listening to this and you're like, "okay, now I understand. I'm starting to understand what he does." You're able to create these incredible environments and in doing so, just imagine, everyone... I try to teach networking through events.

[00:06:17] That's basically how I try to teach networking through small events at your house or large events, you know, like a CES conference. I try to teach networking through those mechanisms. And then I try to show how evolution created humans throughout history. Dr. David Buss writes in his book the evolution of desire throughout history.

[00:06:34] The men who have worked in groups and in tandem with one another always had access to more resources and always had access to more women. And so that's the reason why, you know, I teach these concepts. And so what happens is that blue Heron thing that we did, the guy who ran it, he's at the forefront and he goes, "I want to just thank you guys for coming out here and helping me, blah, blah, blah."

[00:06:52] He had endeared so much goodwill with every mortgage broker, real estate agent. It was really crazy. All these other real estate agents wanted to train under him. People started sending him business. His business blew up. Another example I give, that's Jeremy Green's name. I have another example of my buddy, Mark Pearlberg, who's one of those also in my program.

[00:07:09] Mark is an accountant. Mark started to see the way that I would use zoom calls and on the zoom calls, Mark would go on and show. How he understood accounting backwards and forwards better than everyone else who was listening, he showed himself to be a subject matter expert in the zoom calls. He was hosting in doing so, just imagine Jason, like, you know, I don't believe accounting is your specialty, but if you listen to accountant at first, it's interesting, but after like an hour and a half, you get to the realization, like, "this is interesting, but I don't want to do this."

[00:07:37] And then at about the two hour mark, you're like, "This is interesting. I don't want to do this. How much do I have to pay you to do this?" And so because what we did and he started hosting a podcast and because he started hosting these zoom calls with other professionals, now he tells me, he's like, "I actually had to slow down the podcast because I can't handle all the business that I have.

[00:07:55] There's not enough of me. In order for me to be able to do this." And he works from home. He just, an incredible lifestyle that he's created. So when we go back to what we're saying before, you know, I learned initially, "okay, what are the mechanisms that cause people to be cool or not cool, to be popular, not popular, to be low status or high status?"

[00:08:13] I learned that when I was working in Austin, you know, nightclub, I learned that when I was in the U S military, like what good leadership and bad leadership was. And then I learned it in the last 13 years here living in Las Vegas. And I took all those lessons and I, from the last say, 25 years, and I put them into a course called the men of action course and try to concisely take this 25 years of knowledge and put it into one space so that everyone can learn how to do these kinds of things.

[00:08:35] Now, here's where it might be confusing for some of your audience, the mechanisms that men use in order to show status with women in order to date them and the mechanisms that men and women use in order to pitch an idea or to sell a product are the same mechanisms. They are the same. This is difficult. A lot of people don't grasp this. if you guys ever want to see a great example of this, great book you should all read is Oren Klaff's book called pitch anything. Listen to some of the words he uses. Jason, you remember eliminate neediness.

[00:09:06] Do you remember that? Eliminate neediness. Where does that come from? Where does that come from? It didn't come from self help. Eliminate neediness is a dating concept. Okay? Avoid beta behavior. Do you remember? Oren Klaff says this in his book. He goes, "avoid beta behavior." Where does that come from, Jason?

[00:09:21] That is a dating concept. So where do these things come from? At the highest level Jordan Belfort, he calls it goal oriented communication. So goal oriented communication is, "will you go on a date with me?" Goal oriented communication is, "Ken, will you invest in my project?" Goal oriented communication is, "will you come work for me?"

[00:09:36] Goal oriented communication. I'm doing this because this is like the apex of community of goal oriented communication. All these places meet at the apex, and that is the understanding of basically Dale Carnegie's how to win friends and influence people, get people to talk about themselves. You can find common interests, figure out ways to break rapport, all these different things.

[00:09:53] And like what I teach my clients, Jason, the number one thing I teach my clients when it comes to high stats networking is you need to be the person who always solves problems for other people and ask for nothing in return. A great example is, do you remember Harvey Keitel in the movie Pulp Fiction?

[00:10:08] You remember he's the wolf? Do you remember Pulp Fiction? I haven't seen Pulp Fiction. Okay, so tonight you're going to watch Pulp Fiction. Every single other person watching this has watched Pulp Fiction.

[00:10:17] Jason: I know, everybody else has watched it but me, so.

[00:10:19] Michael: There's a point, there's a point where they have to clean up a dead body and they have to call this guy named the wolf and he just, he fixes things.

[00:10:25] He's a cleaner. The wolf shows up in his Acura NSX, it's Harvey Keitel and he just fixes things. He goes, "are you going to listen to me or do you want to go to jail?" And he does, he just fixes everything. That's what I become. I'm the guy who fixes things for other people. I have a bunch of friends. I help them find people for their sales team. Most of my friends have met their boyfriends or girlfriends through me. I help people find their employees. I'm the hub. I'm the hub of the social wheel. And that's what I teach you to do in my course. If you cannot replace your social circle, your girlfriend, or your job in 15 minutes, you don't have enough abundance and I need to teach you how to have more abundance.

[00:10:56] And so how do you do that? There's just certain mechanisms that people who have an abundance mentality and understand networking have, and when they use those techniques, then they can have anything they want. They get into any door. So another example, Jason is like the guy who goes to the Tai Lopez conference or the Taylor Welch conference or goes to see Cole Gordon or goes to see Wes Watson or goes to see whoever.

[00:11:17] The guy who is like, "Hey man, thank you for your time." The one who like goes and pays Patrick bed David for his counseling. And then there's the guy who Patrick Bet David who goes to see Patrick David for his counseling. And then Patrick David was like, "Hey man, can I come visit you and hang out? Come meet my wife. Let me take you out to dinner." Does that make sense? There's a mechanism you'll see, like with a lot of people have asked me this before. Why is it that, you know, other people are like paying to listen to Justin Waller speak, but like Justin Waller and I are like close friends?

[00:11:42] Why is it that other people like buy Rollo's book, but Rollo is one of my best friends? Why is it like all these other people call me and I'm not trying to say this to brag, but the reason why I'm trying to say this is there's a status line that you get to where you're a customer, and then you're his friend.

[00:11:56] How do you cross that status line? This is such a key for those of you who are like, trying to get into sales or trying to understand networking. It's just like, I'm paying this guy, like how much, like I'm paying Tony Robbins. I'm a customer. I'm customer. Now Tony's like sending me messages on my birthday.

[00:12:09] What is that status line? Some people's like, "well, you just need to have more money." And I'm telling you that is not what the case is. That's definitely not what the case is.

[00:12:15] Jason: Who would want to connect with people that they're only connecting with you because of money? I mean, that'd be a really shitty reason to be connecting with somebody.

[00:12:22] Michael: In the beginning, you will. But after a while you learn, whenever I go up and talk to my favorite influencer, let's say I paid for his coaching program is my voice cracking or my eyes getting big is my vocal tonality changing because I see this person as high status.

[00:12:38] Am I dressing too fancy to try to show off? Am I doing too much or am I just like just the normal dude? I am. Oren Klaff, one of my favorite YouTube content creators. I don't know if you are not Oren Klaff. I'm sorry, Orion Terriban. All right. His name is Psych Hacks. Well, I had him on my show a couple of days ago.

[00:12:54] He kind of converges behavioral economics with evolutionary psychology. And he basically talks about the sexual marketplace as far as economics is concerned. Okay. Really great person. Have him on my show. Ask him a bunch of stuff during the show. One of the things I talk about is like, "Hey, Orion, I know that you do some sales stuff, some coaching stuff. If you want my help, I'll help you how to, you know, put out a low ticket offer, high ticket offer, how you can like buy back your time." he's like, "yeah, you know, I can't scale myself that much." I was like, "okay, so you're going to read buy back your time by Dan Martell."

[00:13:21] And then I gave him a bunch of books, you know, that would probably help him. And then at the end, I was like, bro, anytime you want to call me and you ask me about any of this stuff, I'll help you. The guy who has the world, you guys look it up. The guy with the world record in the high jump on planet earth is a guy named Darius Clark. He went to Texas A& M. He's the leading scorer in slam ball. Have you ever seen slam ball, Jason? Remember the trampolines and the basketball, they go dunk on each other. Anyways, I bumped into Darius at a slam ball game. We started talking and I'm, and then Darius is like, "Hey man, I want to level up my social media."

[00:13:50] And I'm like, "Darius, let me figure out ways that I can help you level up your social media." So it's like one guys are like a professional athlete. Another guy's an accountant. You might be saying like, "why is it you're able to do all these different things?" And the reason why is because these are evolutionary problems.

[00:14:04] These are evolutionary challenges that all men we're looking for. There are three things that really differentiate men from women. Three massive things. There's more than three, but these are the three biggest ones. Jason here. Number one, this is the most obvious one. It's upper body strength. Men are about two standard deviations stronger than women as far as upper body strength, meaning the medium grip strength for a man it puts them in the top, you know, 98 percent and top 2 percent of women. Makes sense.

[00:14:27] Jason: Yeah. Which also throws off our balance is higher. Yeah.

[00:14:31] Michael: Correct. Also. Yeah. It also, there's a reason why some of the reasons why men live shorter lives is because they keep their weight up here around their waist.

[00:14:37] Whereas women keep it below their hips. And that's really, it's further away from their heart. There's a couple other things according to that now that's the first thing. The second one is a variety of sexual partners. Men are again, two standard deviations. Yeah. Far more like meaning the median man is interested in more women than the other way around but puts them in the top 2%.

[00:14:55] But the third one, and this was a really interesting one and I knew this one, but it was Tai Lopez I was at his house last Wednesday. And he was explaining this, do you know the main thing where women just do not care that much about at all? But men are obsessed with, you know what it is? It's in your title.

[00:15:09] No, it's in your title.

[00:15:10] Jason: Let's see, friends, high status, what I don't know?

[00:15:13] Michael: Status. Women in general do not care as much about status as men do, meaning women don't kill each other over status as men have been doing for the last hundred thousand years. So in fact, Dr. Buss, women care about men having status.

[00:15:26] Jason: Women care about men having status.

[00:15:28] Michael: Women care about the men that they're with having status, yes. Yeah, okay. Yes. I see. Meaning they care about status as an object to obtain, but not as a something for themselves. Or rather, if you've ever, if you've ever lived on a military base, it's one of the strangest things.

[00:15:41] Whoever the base commander's wife is, she's like the leader of the wives. It's so weird. She did nothing. She didn't go to officer school. She didn't do shit, but because she's married to the 06, the base commander, whenever they have engagements, she is... it's so funny. Anybody who's been in the military, you know, this is true.

[00:15:58] Whoever the base commander's wife is. She's all of a sudden like the leader of all the events, even though why? Because she's married to the base commander. That's the way it works. So men, women in general in gendered into themselves, don't care as much about status as men do men severely care about status far more than women do.

[00:16:16] And so because of the, these concepts, that's why you'll see like with a lot of the stuff I'm saying when it comes to sales, this is for men and women, but when it comes to dating, women do not sit there and have to show their status in order to attract men. But the other way they do. Does that make sense?

[00:16:29] Yeah. And that's why it's like an important differentiation to make. And that's one of the other things I teach in my course. Like when you also, when you're selling to men versus women, it's something that you need to understand. You don't necessarily need to sell to women based on status. Like how, "Hey Sherry, how'd you like those big shoulders to show off those muscles to get those guys?" No, they don't. It's that's a status thing shoulder to waist ratio is like a male strength machismo testosterone status thing that women just aren't as interested in, you know, so there's just interesting concepts like that.

[00:16:59] This divergence innate differences between men and women and where do we find these differences? We find them in evolutionary studies.

[00:17:05] Jason: So I think it's really interesting what you talked about earlier. You mentioned like this gravitation towards basically what works, right. And we see this everywhere.

[00:17:14] Like I've been in lots of different programs. I've worked with lots of different mentors, coaches, read lots of different books and I'm noticing more and more I evolve as a human being. I'm noticing more and more parallels between the best ideas. Like I just read a book on kids. It was like how to talk so kids will listen and how to listen so kids will talk. And it's probably one of the best communication books I've ever read. Like anybody could learn from reading this book because to some degree, we're all little kids in bigger.

[00:17:44] Michael: Even without kids.

[00:17:45] Jason: And also I was like, this is brilliant, like self talk like psychology even in this book.

[00:17:51] And I'm like, this could be applied to so many different things. And it talks about empathetic, like being empathetic in your communication. I'm like, this is brilliant. This will work so effectively for sales or for anything. And people think, "oh, it's for kids." Right. And so what works works.

[00:18:05] And I read another book, something about relationships by David B. Wolfe. It was a really good book, and this was for grownups, but there were so many parallels between these things. And you had mentioned also with dating and you know, for example, sales really, there's so many parallels between going out and trying to get clients and trying to get dates.

[00:18:27] Michael: The higher you go, they're not parallels. They're exactly the same. When you get to the top, they're exactly like what I'm saying is when you get to the top, meaning like Hugh Hefner, like when you're at the top and then you just see, it's just a total presentation and it's nothing but just showing status.

[00:18:42] Oh, it's the same thing. It's the same. I bought a Tesla that like Playboy is a brand. Tesla is a brand. You start to see they're doing the same thing to your brain.

[00:18:51] Jason: So for the business owners, listening to this, who are not trying to be Hugh Hefner. Right. They're not, and maybe they're married like me and they're not like trying to get women, but they do want to increase their sales.

[00:19:03] They do want to increase their status and they want to figure out how to attract more business. What are maybe some of the things that they could do to be more attractive to the real estate investors that they're trying to get as clients?

[00:19:18] Michael: Yeah, I will tell you the first thing is you need to be a way more cognizant of how you are perceived socially and for a lot of people, one of the things you have to understand is the more things become digital and the more your image can be spread across social media platforms, the less your actual merit of your business matters and the more the perception of your business matters.

[00:19:40] Jason: Yeah. How do they get an accurate view of how they're perceived?

[00:19:46] Michael: You could ask other people. I mean, generally the market is going to tell you, right? What is the price of of a commodity? The market's going to end up telling you right. In a free market economy, but it's like when you make social media content, you need to make them the content to market your business in a sexy, fun way that catches people's attention, but it doesn't have to be extremely representative. And I know this is really hard for a lot of people to do because they're like, "no, I'm just going to be myself and make content that feels organic." And I'm just telling you that doesn't work.

[00:20:14] I don't care what Gary Vanderchuck told you. That is not the way the world works. Everyone else is stunting. Everyone is using FaceApp and Facetune. All these other people are just showing images and pictures of the best parts of their life. I post on social media all the time. I did not post anything about me feeding my cats this morning.

[00:20:30] Like, the people want to see the cool stuff. That's just generally the way it is. So, you're, the way you are perceived on social media again, that's what we, you know, Men of Action, our group, is when you're in a community that gives you accountability and feedback to let you know, hey man, this is not a good post or this is a good post.

[00:20:45] When we are on Instagram specifically instagram trades, a currency and that currency is called status. That's all Instagram is. Facebook is not like that. By the way, you guys will notice for those of you do any kind of marketing, Facebook is going to work really well for your 38- 40 year old audience and older.

[00:21:01] And Instagram is going to work for your audience below 38 to maybe 28 and then maybe to 25 and below 25, it's going to be TikTok. And you'll notice, depending on which audience you're trying to get to, that's where you're going to see the most prevalence on those different platforms. Also, you're also going to see the most politically progressive of those platforms will be TikTok and the most politically conservative all those platforms will be like Twitter or X. So you, these are kind of the things that you have to learn. What you need out there is a perception that people have of your business and you have it as an entrepreneur. So you need to be trustworthy. You need to seem like, you know, more than everyone else, like you're a subject matter expert and you need to seem extremely motivated.

[00:21:40] And in doing so as well, when you show images of your business and you personally, you need to show relevancy, competency, access to scarce resources, and social proof. Those are the things that will help. So what I mean by social proof? Other people in the industry following you on Instagram is a great way to almost look like a testimonial or maybe they leave comments.

[00:21:59] That's a great way to show social proof, relevancy. Are you trying to use banner ads from 25 years ago? Or you're like, "Well, I'm still using email blasts." Okay. If I'm talking to a guy in real estate and he's telling me about email blasts, I know he's not relevant anymore. If I'm sitting there talking to stuff, if that's all he's talking about, right?

[00:22:17] If he's sitting there being like, you know, he doesn't use Instagram, but he's got an SEO guy. I'm like, okay, he's not relevant anymore. He doesn't know. He hasn't changed things. But when I talked to a guy and he's like, "yeah, what I did was I started a podcast and in my podcast, I do 20 minute interviews with different people using restream. And then I have a guy come through and make clips and then I have, and then the best clips I end up promoting those clips on Instagram or using meta. Facebook Ad manager, meta ad manager, and in doing so, then I make the best ones and I turn them into advertisements and I put a CTA at the end." I'm like, okay, that guy's relevant, that guy gets it.

[00:22:49] Jason: Then we're relevant here at DoorGrow.

[00:22:51] Michael: What you're doing is extremely relevant.

[00:22:52] Jason: If they have an AOL email address, they're like, "what's your email?"

[00:22:56] Michael: That's exactly, it's not relevant.

[00:22:57] "It's aol.Com."

[00:22:58] "I have a Facebook, but I don't have an Instagram." You're just not relevant. Like I can tell you're not relevant. When people are like, "well, my audience isn't on Instagram." It's like, it doesn't matter if your audience is on Instagram, you're trying to grow your audience. And by the way, the market will tell you what it wants. And every day, I'm sorry for those of you who don't want to hear this. Every day, each one of these platforms becomes slightly less relevant. Okay?

[00:23:19] TikTok is on its uprise right now. Instagram is becoming less relevant because of TikTok, Rumble, YouTube, and Facebook to a certain audience is also already completely irrelevant. You'll see women below a certain age do not have a Facebook, but they do have an Instagram.

[00:23:32] So the answer is to have all of them. All of you should have, you should be making 30 to 90 second content, the up and down type of content. Not landscape of profile content. You should be making that and it should be going on Snapchat. It should be going on X. It should be going on YouTube. It should be YouTube shorts, TikToks, and Facebook and Instagram reels.

[00:23:50] It should be going at all those different places. You can use HubSpot or some other platform in order to post that content. And the content doesn't just have to be clips that go viral from podcasts. You can do man on the street videos. And here's a big one. All of you can do this. You can do reaction videos.

[00:24:04] All of you can do reaction videos. They're so easy to do. And by the way, you don't even have to like, you're just like, "Michael, I don't know how to use OBS and I don't know how to do a reaction video." All you have to do is sit like I'm sitting right now. I'm in my den. You know, obviously I put some soundproofing behind me, but I'm in my den, I got a big ol ring light in front of me, and somebody comes up to me and goes, "Michael, what do you think about the Trump assassination attempt?"

[00:24:23] Or "Michael, what do you think about, you know, Kamala Harris or whatever?" And I'm like, and I just turn my camera like this, like I'm talking, "Man, I'll tell you what I'm thinking. I'm thinking, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." And you just say, and as soon as people watch the video and they're like, "This guy's about to tell me what he's thinking."

[00:24:35] Then everyone will watch. And then some of you are listening right now and you're like, "I'm just a property manager. I don't want to talk about politics. Really go watch Ryan Pineda. Go watch Bradley, go watch Codie Sanchez, go watch Tom Bill. You go watch any of these guys who are crushing it in their fields.

[00:24:51] They give their opinions on everything. Did you guys hear Alex Hormozi now talks about dating? What? Yeah. You're building a brand. Status is status. Like nobody cares. This is the other thing, Jason, a lot of your clients, and this is something I've talked to you about, and everyone in my program hears me talk about this ad nauseum.

[00:25:08] Is the concept of like, I'm afraid that I'm going to post the wrong thing and nobody holds you accountable for anything you have to say, like, I was just looking at a video of Kamala Harris at a P Diddy party, walking around with Montel Jordan. No one seems to care that ever happened. No one cares about Joe Biden talking about, "I don't want to send my kids to school with the monkeys."

[00:25:26] Nobody cares about it. No one cares. Like you said, like Donald Trump had sex with a porn star while his wife was pregnant and they brought it up during the debates and no one cares. Literally one of the most popular movies of all time The wolf of wall street is a about a man who did 15 months in prison for securities fraud, punched his wife in the stomach, kidnapped his own kid, did quaaludes and slept with prostitutes, and then afterwards, he is one of the top sales trainers in the world today. But you guys think anyone cares. Caitlyn Jenner runs over someone, kills them, and then four months later is named woman of the year. But you're like, "Michael, I'm a property manager. What if I post the wrong thing?" Here's another thing, Jason, and this is a poor reflection on humanity, but it's absolutely true.

[00:26:09] If you get popular enough, they will forgive you for anything. And if you don't believe me right before OJ died, I had a conversation with him and they had offered him millions of dollars to do a fantasy football podcast, and I was like, OJ, what about those people you stabbed 56 times? Nobody cares. So many of you are watching this right now and you're like, you have 400 followers on Instagram and you're like so worried about posting the wrong thing, bro.

[00:26:32] You don't have 400 followers on Instagram. You have four followers on Instagram and one of them's your mom. No one cares what you're doing. Most of you on social media are irrelevant and because you're irrelevant on social media, in reality, you're invisible. Listening to this, when you ask me what the advice is, your job is to become visible.

[00:26:49] Some of you will be offended by what I say and the rest of you will be successful. You've got to decide which one you want to be.

[00:26:54] Jason: So I'm going to play devil's advocate for a second here, right? A lot of property managers, they think "I'm going to go start posting about property management. And maybe I'll get some investors that want to like work with me."

[00:27:06] And so they start posting property management with this false assumption that people really care about property management, right? And so the analogy I'll usually share with property managers is I'll say, "how many plumbers are you following on social media?" And they'll say, "none."

[00:27:23] "Why?" I said, "they want your business. Why aren't you following them?" And so there's this false reality that these social media marketers will sell to property managers. They're like wasting their time. And some of them spend a lot of money and time with these social media companies, wasting time promoting their property management business on social media, when nobody gives a shit about property management, even their clients don't wake up in the morning and go, "man, I'm thinking about property management."

[00:27:50] Jason, what should they be doing instead?

[00:27:52] Michael: Yes. Jason you saying that just got me. I want someone who's watching this to do this and then tag me in the video when you do it. Jason, as a property manager, do you ever have nightmare tenants?

[00:28:03] Jason: So to be clear for those listening...

[00:28:05] Michael: yeah,

[00:28:06] Jason: I'm not managing properties. I'm coaching property management business owners, but they would say, "yes," they have nightmare tenants. All the time.

[00:28:12] Michael: Do you ever have nightmare vendors? Like guys who come like when I say vendor, what I mean is the plumber, the carpenter, the guy who comes...

[00:28:18] Jason: Yes, they have problems with vendors constantly, they have nightmare owners.

[00:28:21] They're managing properties.

[00:28:22] Michael: What about, well, I wouldn't do nightmare owners cause you're trying to get business. I wouldn't talk about nightmare owners. What I would talk about is. I would start off a clip just like this. "I had a nightmare tenant. This guy was destroying," and then it would just show pictures.

[00:28:34] "This guy was destroying everything in the place. I swear. He didn't know how to, he couldn't aim and hit the toilet. He has just destroyed the place. And this is what I did to fix it. And here's three tips for you to deal with a nightmare tenant." Viral. Yeah. Viral. Not only are you viral. Everyone's coming to you.

[00:28:52] It's like, "man, I don't want a nightmare tenant. I just bought this two bedroom, two bathroom. I don't want a nightmare tenant. I'm going to go do what he does."

[00:28:59] Jason: I don't want it to be a meth house eviction. Like, yeah.

[00:29:02] Michael: Yes. Yeah. You know what i'm saying? Like that's what I would do. I would go over like what are these and because what you're going to do is what are the biggest fears of the people who are hiring property owners, my nightmare tenant, my tenant who doesn't pay. Like those kind of things, and I would make content. What are the three steps that I did to do with the five tips that a lot of people's in this place don't do right? I would make content like that. And you could do opus there's these ai software apps that'll basically take the clip and then they'll just inject B roll that fits whatever the words you're saying.

[00:29:33] You don't have to hardly do any work when you do it and then all of a sudden it's like, "it was a nightmare. This guy's made my place look like a roach house. Roach infested." And then it'll actually pull up an image like a whatever, a stock Shutterstock image of a roach infested home, whatever.

[00:29:47] Jason: Now they're using ai. Even I'm seeing a lot of AI images Just flashing. Yeah. Yeah. Or, yeah. Correct.

[00:29:51] Michael: It could actually illustrate using artificial intelligence, illustrate the image for you. You could actually do that. So you don't have run into any copyright issues. Right. Or any permission issues.

[00:30:00] There's just so many ways to do this. But what are you doing? You're showing relevancy and competency. You know how to use Instagram. You know how to create a clip using artificial intelligence. You have good audio. You have good lighting. You're showing relevancy. You're showing competency. You're showing high intelligence.

[00:30:15] You're showing high social status. And then in the comments, you're like "LMAO." Like people are laughing my ass off. "This happened to me." "Oh my God, Jason, same shit." "100 percent true." And now I have social status. I have all these things. Why? Because I made some content that was engaging about something that is incredibly unsexy, which is property management.

[00:30:35] That's how you do it. What are those ultimate fears that your prospective clients have? And I would just do nothing but make content about that. I have a friend of mine, FedEx fearless. His name's Bismarck. And this guy, he goes, "these are three reasons why you are ugly." And I'm like, "what?"

[00:30:48] And like, he really goes after people. "This is the reason why your girlfriend is cheating on you right now." And everyone just, I'm like, "what?" And I don't want to watch, but I'm like, I need to watch this video.

[00:30:57] Jason: What's going on there? Yeah.

[00:30:59] Michael: It's so great. It's so great. " No, Michael, you need to be authentic with your social..." no, you don't. You don't need to be authentic. You need to capture people's attention. You need to be attractive. Your primary job is to be attractive on social media. Now what happens is now you got them with the hook, "Here are the top three things that I do to deal with this horrible tenant that I have" And then when they come in the hook now throughout there you give those three, explanations But you also throw in a little piece of advice that shows just a little humble brag that shows "In my 27 years of property management, this is the thing that I've learned."

[00:31:30] Okay, little humble brag. And at the end, it goes, "if you want to learn more, comment, the word guide below," or if you're on YouTube, you'd be like, "go down into the description and click the link. And then blah, blah, blah." And it just ends up right down your sales funnel, maybe to a low ticket offer, maybe an ebook that you wrote something like that.

[00:31:45] And the next thing, you've 10xed profits. You've 10x revenue. You're selling a course on property management while writing a book on property management, while having a podcast on property management, while being a property manager, all of it at the same time. And then you got to hire a new accountant because you got too many write offs.

[00:31:59] Like you don't have enough time to pay your taxes. You got to get too much money. That's it. That's how this works. And that's about what I just explained to you. It's just the difference between getting it and not getting it, being relevant and not being relevant. And so a lot of people, what they're, they listen to me and they always make me out to be the bad guy because cause what I do is I tell people, no one cares about you. And no one likes to hear that. They like to think that the rest of the world cares about property managers. But like you said, no one's following plumbers. Right. But if I was a plumber, I would do the same thing, "man, I walked into this house and this toilet had exploded and just have an image of it."

[00:32:30] And it'd be like, "okay, I need to hear what this is." "And then a monster crawled out of the toilet." I'm just kidding. And like, I would just, that's what I would do just to keep people's attention.

[00:32:37] Jason: So for those listening, can we qualify you a little bit related to social media, because you've got a good following?

[00:32:43] You've got a sizable business because people listening if they don't know who you are, I want them to recognize you're very qualified to talk about this. Not so humble brag about yourself for a second.

[00:32:55] Michael: I have a men of action. We have 1600 clients that have gone through there.

[00:32:58] 200 video testimonials if you go on the school server. And also we have a free community a free school server. What's about 43-4,500 guys in there. You're welcome to message. One of the things that I've told people is that if I join a group and they tell me not to talk to the other people in the group, I know this is a scam.

[00:33:12] You'll notice sometimes with MLMs, you'll see that. I implore you to talk to anyone, any client that's ever gone through my program and they will tell you how incredibly satisfied they were. Also you, Jason, I'm sure you've seen my course is extremely comprehensive. It's about 65 hours long. That doesn't even include the live calls.

[00:33:29] And then also there's a book, there's a required book list that you have to read in order to go through the course.

[00:33:33] Jason: I'll tell you right now, like an eight figure business for you.

[00:33:36] Michael: Just today, we've done eight figures in total, but as of this month, this is the first month we'll recross the mark.

[00:33:42] It was what? 833 a month or something like that. We cross that this month. So that's about, yeah. So we're doing about a little bit under eight figures in revenue per year.

[00:33:50] Jason: This is more than any property managers probably listened to my show. So just for perspective. Okay. Yeah. Got it.

[00:33:57] Michael: Yeah. I mean, because coaching is scalable.

[00:34:00] That's the reason why. And like the other thing I want you guys understand is a lot of people got into real estate because they were trying to find a scalable way of making income and they're using you to make their lives scalable. So if you guys read, buy back your time by Dan Martell, they're paying you to buy back their time as real estate owners.

[00:34:15] That's what their job is. And essentially you're going to eventually do the same thing. You're going to pay someone to buy back your time from them. So the main difference, and I'm sure many of you entrepreneurs already know this, but. When you start off in the workforce, you are trading your time for money.

[00:34:28] You're working at Chick fil A or McDonald's and you're being paying an hourly salary later on. You're trading your money for time. I pay one guy. He comes into my house. He turns on my computer, he turns on my camera, he turns on my lights, he sits me down, and then he just starts yelling at me to talk about certain subjects, and I have no idea, I'm just like, drinking coffee, and I'm like, what up, and he goes, "what do you think about this?" And I'm like, "oh man, let me tell you something, and then they record it," and then it's just a reaction video, and I do nothing.

[00:34:53] I pay to get my time back. I have several editors that live in Romania and Nigeria and all these, because I don't want to edit videos anymore. I used to be a video editor and a videographer. I don't want to do it anymore. I pay one place to do the live editing for my podcast. I don't want to do that anymore.

[00:35:07] I pay to get my time back. For those of you who are considering hiring a personal assistant, once again, highly recommend Dan Martell's book, Buy Back Your Time. In the book, he talks about taking your yearly salary and divided by 8, 000. And that's what you pay the guy hourly. Take your yearly salary, how much you make in a year, your yearly income divided by 8, 000.

[00:35:24] That's it. They go over the reason why, but it ends up becoming like a 40 hour work week. You end up paying him one, you pay him half of what one hourly wage for years. So if your time is worth a thousand dollars an hour, you might pay him 500 an hour to get certain things done for your life. And one of my favorite sayings in that book is something done 80 percent right is 100 percent awesome.

[00:35:43] And like, it was one of the hardest things to give up. The guy who does my timestamps, that was really hard. I love doing timestamps because timestamps were giving me clips and those clips would go viral and the virality would make me money, but I had to give that up. And eventually you're going to give up all these processes.

[00:35:57] Another thing I'll explain for you guys who are entrepreneurs, one of the greatest tools you will ever find is an app called loom. Look up loom. What loom is allows you to make videos, but the video it's like, it's showing the screen on your phone or it's showing the screen on your computer while they're listening to your voice and you send it to your person.

[00:36:12] So like, for instance, I do mass invites for certain events that I do. So I'll go on loom and I'll have a guy, maybe he speaks you know, Farsi or maybe this guy speaks like his English. Isn't that great? What I'll do is I'll go through my invite slowly and I'll do it like for 30 minutes, I'll just do invites and I'll show so he can see what it looks like.

[00:36:28] And then I send it to him and then he looks at it and he has no questions. And my invites are done like that. Loom is one of the greatest way of passing along SOPs to people and then using them in order to buy back your time. So understanding all these concepts, it makes you more relevant, makes you more competent.

[00:36:43] It gives you higher status. It gives you more access. And these are the things that you're looking for. In any walk of life, but especially in something like property management and you guys also understand as property managers Your job isn't sexy So what you have to do is you have to show the sexy parts of your job, right?

[00:36:57] When I my favorite one are accountants and dentists. They're not my friend my friends who are dentists who know what they're doing, they show the fucking horror job teeth, You know car accident, messed up teeth, meth addict, whatever, and then they get the teeth back to 100%. And like me, as someone who doesn't care that much about dentistry, I'm just like staring like, "Oh my God, that was incredible."

[00:37:17] Yeah. what you do is you figure out people's primary driver emotion and their biggest fear. And then from those things, from the primary driver emotion and their biggest fear and from those things then you make your content attacking those primary driver emotions and those biggest fears, okay. And when you do so it doesn't make any difference if you're an accountant It doesn't make any difference if you're a property manager doesn't make any difference what it is that you sell people will watch and they will be obsessed.

[00:37:42] My brother, he watches videos of horseshoes. They basically, you know, they shave off the end of the horse's hoof and then they put the shoes on. He said it's like the most relaxing thing in the world to watch. And I wouldn't even think about that, but why is it? It's like something we don't even think about that much, but it's pretty amazing.

[00:37:56] Like when you see, it's like very relaxing to watch stuff like that. You can do stuff like that.

[00:38:00] Jason: There's a guy that's viral for just, he finds distressed houses. And he just cleans up their lawn and the sidewalk. He's like, "Hey, could I mow your lawn? And it's like relaxing to watch the transformation."

[00:38:12] Yeah.

[00:38:12] Michael: Another one that's great was if you guys watch the early Ryan Pineda stuff, what was he doing? He was flipping couches. He would find crappy couches, clean them up, and then he would sell them again. And he made a living from flipping couches. There's just all these different things. And like the concept of it sounds so boring, but I want to watch someone do it.

[00:38:28] Right. It was the one where you'd buy those storage units and then you'd see whatever's in this. Oh, I forgot what that was. It was pawn shop, pawn stars or something where the people would buy storage units and open up in there. And there's like, sometimes there'd be nothing in the storage unit. Sometimes there'd be like a dead body in there or some crazy shit.

[00:38:41] Like they find like a skull and like all of a sudden. Bag full of money. Yeah. Yeah. By the way, you guys know the producers were putting that bag of money in there, right? Like that wasn't real. That wasn't real.

[00:38:52] Jason: Reality TV isn't real either. You like to say social media isn't real and that's okay or something.

[00:38:58] Michael: So rule number four in men of action is social media is fake and I'm okay with that because the money's real. And the world isn't fair. And I'm okay with that.

[00:39:05] Jason: Yeah.

[00:39:06] Michael: The world isn't fair and I'm okay with it. Rule number four in a, in social and of action is about acceptance. It's about accepting the world the way it is and never being a victim.

[00:39:14] It's sure things are hard for you, but you're never a victim. You might be too short. English might not be your first language and you're having a hard time speaking it. You might be born poor. You might be born with some kind of ailment or disability that you feel like holds you back, but that's where you are.

[00:39:27] You start from where you are. And then you create from there. Okay. You were saying something before about how you notice like all these books kind of converge in to the same place, three books that have nothing to do with each other, but it's the same concept. Ready? The power of now by Eckhart Tolle, the subtle art of not giving a fuck by Mark Manson and sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari.

[00:39:45] You're like, wait a second. It's all the same thing. It's all the same. It's all this. I get to choose how react. I get to tell myself stories that change my behavior. It's all three of these books that have nothing to do with each other end up being the same book, not exactly the same book, but similar books.

[00:40:00] Because once you get to the highest levels of enlightenment, transcendence, goal oriented communication ends up being the same thing for everyone.

[00:40:07] Jason: There's a one of my favorite books is by Byron Katie called Loving What Is. And basically, she takes you through this process of just asking yourself these four sort of questions to challenge your current view of reality.

[00:40:21] And it takes you out of this victim sort of view. It's very much like cognitive behavioral therapy, maybe, or something like this, right? Yes. Or CBT or something. But yeah, so asking this question, is this belief that I have actually true? And a lot of our beliefs that we're holding on to that are holding us back.

[00:40:36] And like, if we're not getting results in life, it's because we currently have beliefs that are not working for us. And so, if you see people that things are working well for them, even though you think, like, somebody might be watching right now going, "Michael is completely full of shit. He's throwing out all these crazy stuff and he's, he worked at a strip club" and somebody's like, so against that or whatever.

[00:40:56] They're like their own stumbling block and they're in their way and they won't pay attention to the truth or the things that you're sharing that are good because they're so stuck on everything in the universe having to look a certain way that they are not even open to receiving more, they're not willing to challenge their own thinking.

[00:41:13] They're not going to progress. They're going to stay stuck.

[00:41:16] Michael: They identify more with their identity than they identify with success.

[00:41:20] Jason: Yeah. Good way of saying it. And I love how you talked about kind of these currencies. One of my mentors in the past was Alex Charfen. And he's from here in the Austin area as well.

[00:41:30] And he was talking about time, energy, focus, cash, and effort. He calls the five currencies. And Hormozi went through Alex Charfen's like coaching with me. I met Layla and Alex in this. And one of the things that I then saw Alex talk about these currencies. But what I thought was interesting is Alex said the most significant of those five currencies in order to scale and grow your business is focus.

[00:41:52] It's the most important to scale, grow a company. And then Dan Martell, I once saw him teach this framework that was, it was like about the power of one. He's like, "the most effective business is a business has one sales funnel, one product, one..." it was like all ones, like, And I see property managers, a lot of times they'll try and like start five different businesses.

[00:42:14] They're like, I'm going to start a cleaning company, a maintenance company, like all these other things.because they're complimentary real estate brokerage. And then they wonder why none of them are growing because they lack focus. And so all these things kind of converge, making sure that we have focus.

[00:42:28] You also mentioned Dan Martell, who I think is a brilliant entrepreneur, he generally was coaching like software companies, SAS companies to help them grow and scale, but his stuff's applicable to coaching businesses. I've noticed it's applicable to anything because the principles are valid.

[00:42:44] And one of the things I've had my clients do to get them to that next level, to basically get their time back is to have them do a time study to where they become accountable for their time, which things are positive and which things are negative, like plus or minus, which things give them energy in life and which things take it away in their own business.

[00:43:00] And I have them do this like usually once a quarter. And when I did my first time study, I realized I was doing like four hours of podcast production in a week. It all added up and I was like, holy shit. So then I just hired a company to do it. It was a no brainer to let that go because it was stupid at that point for me to hold on to that once I could see that challenge.

[00:43:20] And you mentioned loom, awesome tool for like one of my favorite tools, like it, which is next level. It's like loom, but it's Wistia's video recorder. It lets you actually record the screen and yourself. And then after the recordings made. You can then have it mid recording. You can switch which parts are showing and have segues between the two.

[00:43:42] And it's super fast. It's like super cool. But we use tools like that.

[00:43:46] Michael: Productivity. Yeah, definitely.

[00:43:47] Jason: Yeah. So, I love all these ideas for collapsing time. Michael has dropped several awesome tools, knowledge bombs, ideas for those that are listening and also how to leverage content social media wise.

[00:43:59] So what you know, if we were to bring this full circle what would you say is the most important thing that maybe business owners or property managers could be doing to scale and grow their business?

[00:44:13] Michael: Right now? Again, one more time. It is: understand, your ability to grow is based on your perceived status, your perceived trustworthiness, your perceived know how. Not your actual know how. Like, I can tell you so many guys that I know that are real estate experts on YouTube. And then I have my friends of mine that are real estate agents. And they're like, "that guy doesn't know shit." And I'm like, "no, he's coaching the white belts." That's the why, the reason why he says the things that he says.

[00:44:39] And they have a hard time dealing with it. So, understanding that concept. And then. You have to leave yourself. You have to subvert your own ego, go on places like TikTok or Instagram places you'd never think to go to, and then look at who's going viral, who's in your exact industry, and you're going to need to take pieces from what you see.

[00:44:56] Like, what are the kinds of videos that do really well? And you're going to be able to find those very quickly. You can literally right now would go on Tik Tok and look up property management and you'll find a bunch of videos, like just pick the ones that go the most viral or a real estate, a podcast, and then pick the topics that go the most viral and just blatantly steal them, steal, blatantly steal everything.

[00:45:19] You in the beginning, no creativity necessary, just steal. Okay, and you do that for a while and then you start to sort of get your footing And then you start to realize wait a second, I've been running ads and my ROAS per dollar my ads is x 1. 2 or 2. 0 or whatever but in organic my cost per lead is like nothing because my organic traffic, it costs me so much less to get a lead.

[00:45:44] It's incredible. Then I go on someone else's podcast because my content is getting better and better. And then all of a sudden now, you know, Rich Summers and Ryan Pineda want me to come on their show to talk about, you know, maybe I'm on ice coffee hour or whatever, talking about real estate.

[00:45:58] And then I get on bigger and bigger shows and now my cost per lead decreases even more because I just had this simple understanding that the way it works is my perceived status my perceived know how and my perceived trustworthiness to other people are the reasons why people will buy my product. Now you may already obviously everyone who's listened to this if you have any success in property management You already have your funnel is probably dealing with either word of mouth shaking hands, or it's dealing with some sort of paid advertisement, but I implore you try organic. Try to use organic and then organic meaning using Instagram posts or Facebook posts.

[00:46:33] And then once you do that, try to take your best content and turn your best content in an advertisement and promote those, promote that content. That's something we've also been doing. And if you want examples on everything I just said, a great book, a great place to start is the 100 million offer series by Alex Hormozi. He goes over every single thing that I just talked about. It's absolutely fantastic. It's really great stuff. The difference is with my program, MOA, we're a little bit more bespoke for what it is exactly that you're doing. But we're mostly talk about networking. And then the other thing is, When you actually meet that person in person that you want to work with, do you come off as a fan boy?

[00:47:06] Do you come off as too eager? Do you, does your body language show signs of neediness or signs of low status? Are these things that you can watch? And then how do you figure that out? You watch yourself on camera. Do you watch yourself on other people's podcasts? Because that's one of the things is like as social media grows and more people are exposed to more people, just remember like if you consider in the plasticine, you know, we live in hunter gatherer societies of 150 people and now we can legitimately have a hundred thousand friends on social media in that kind of situation because we're exposed to more people, we are more attuned to status, physical appearance, et cetera. And so now what happens is humans essentially become more shallow.

[00:47:46] They become more attuned to other people's status and rightly or wrongly. Is it a negative commentary on humans? Yes, it probably is, but it's the world you live on. And if you want to get rich, you need to listen to what I'm saying. And if what I'm saying, offends you, get ready to stay poor. Like, I'm sorry.

[00:48:01] If you guys are listening to this right now, and you're like, "No, social media is going to go away and we're going to go back to walking up to doors and do an email blast and buying banner ads." If that's what you think, go back to your AOL. com email and just keep believing that's the case.

[00:48:16] It's all about the handshake. It's like, if that's what you believe, that's fine. But for the rest of you who are ready to understand that if you think things are bad, I got news for you. They're only going to get worse. Meaning people aren't going to put their phones down at dinner. People aren't going to take fewer photos.

[00:48:30] People. I was reading something. It was like, like in one day, now more photos are taken in like an hour than were taken during the entire year of 1985 or something like that. It was like the amount of photographic and video data that's uploaded in one hour exceeds the total photographs taken in an entire year back in the 1980s.

[00:48:49] Some absurd number like that. If you think things are going in one direction, things are getting faster. They're more virtual. They're more digital. Digital, they're going to be controlled by artificial intelligence and they're going to be more scalable. You need to get on that train. The train is leaving.

[00:49:05] You need to get on the train. Now, if you don't want to get on the train, that's fine, but notice as the world passes you by and the rate at which it passes you by only increases every year. If you want to learn about that, read Ray Kurzweil series called the singularity is near, and you can see how he talks about the rate of change is increasing, and then the rate of change is also increasing.

[00:49:24] Jason: Okay, so this is awesome stuff. So Michael one thing I want to point out for those that are listening. Because I think you've sold your Men of Action short a little bit. So I'm gonna, I want to say something about it because what I think is in, what people think is in there probably based on what you're saying is it's a bunch of social media stuff and it's like how to, maybe how to get women or something like this.

[00:49:45] I think though you've created a program that are making men better men. Like you're covering topics in here like, Leadership and time management and like not just networking, which is to build status, but you're making them better people that people would want to network with that people would want to connect with and like I'm in the Austin group.

[00:50:09] For men of action. Yeah.

[00:50:11] Michael: And that was one of the first groups.

[00:50:13] Jason: These are good guys. Like they're cool guys. We've hung out. And and I'm like one of the, I'm the older married guy, like in the group, hanging out with them, but it, they're all striving to like better themselves, not just to show that they look better maybe on social media, but they're also like working to be better people.

[00:50:30] Yeah. And You know, I love the book extreme ownership, by the way. I like, I think just that principle alone would change every business's life. Every man's life every person's life. If they would just not be a victim and they would own their shit. Like it would be huge. It's like, should be required reading for business owners.

[00:50:47] So if you're listening to this, go read that book. You're sharing and exposing them to a lot of these books. Like I've read a lot of the books on the reading list, not all of them. So I've got a ways to go, but. You're also exposing them to some of the best ideas for leveling themselves up as a human being.

[00:51:04] Michael: Yes. So consider this concept, right? What was something that sounds super arrogant is the idea of taking pictures of yourself without a shirt on every day, and then posting a story on your Instagram at first, it seems like, well, how arrogant is that? But if it causes you, if it causes you to lose enough weight to where you're no longer, you know, a threat to get diabetes, or you lose enough weight to where your body fat index is low enough to where the opposite sex finds you attractive, or it caused you to lose enough weight that actually takes away strain on your heart.

[00:51:32] That narcissistic, arrogant thing that you did saved your life and made you a better person.

[00:51:37] Jason: Yeah. You get to be around for your kids, right? Like that would be better, right? I'm doing 75 hard right now. I was 31 days into it. And then I forgot to take the picture. I forgot to take the picture. And so I just started over on like a weekend.

[00:51:51] So it's now 107 days hard for me is what it's going to end up being. But but that's the thing. And every day you take the pic and you're doing the exercises and doing all this stuff, but it's more of a mental toughness challenge. And the fitness piece is tough, right?

[00:52:05] Like you have to take care of yourself in order to keep up, but it's more of just being willing to invest in yourself and do hard things and to make hard decisions in order to get to that next level.

[00:52:15] Michael: It's exactly right. Yeah. And it's also it's work smarter, not harder. Like if you really had all the Intel, like for instance, if you're just flat broke, but you had Dan Fleischman's brain, Tai Lopez's brain, if you had Wes Watson's brain, if you had Justin Waller's brain, if you had Gregor Gallagher's brain, Brandon Carter's brain, if you, if I could just take their info and put it into your brain, you were completely broke.

[00:52:38] You'd be a millionaire within 18 months. More than that, you'd be a decamillionaire in 18 months because these guys, there's two different things. There's money and then there's the mechanisms to make money. The second one is the one you want. The first one, people born into, with trust funds.

[00:52:51] They have money. Money's great. I'm not telling you money's bad, but the mechanisms to make money. Not only does it give you more security, it's just a more fulfilling way of living life. And then the other part is making your friends rich. That's another great thing We haven't even got into that part But like networking with your friends to help them make more money is another great incredibly a fulfilling thing that you can do. Having people who work for you and then like making their lives more fulfilling and ensuring their security in life because you're able, like again, I, what do I do?

[00:53:21] I'm doing a podcast right now. What am I doing? I'm doing this so that we can lower the cost per lead. Like essentially, I know that's, I'm saying the quiet part loud right now, but this is the truth and you're doing the same thing. What I'm trying to do is use organic traffic. To get leads to go down my funnel.

[00:53:34] And when they do so, then they get to my sales team because they're taking in a warm lead, the likelihood of a conversion increases from like 1 percent to 6 percent to 9 percent based on how warm the lead is. Now the lead goes through and the cost per lead decreases because I'm doing this whole thing right now. So i'm doing this to help my sales team and make my sales team's life easier, and in doing so make it so that they have more security in their life with their family when you get to that point, that's the most fulfilling way to live your life. That's more important than being rich is being able to do something like that accomplishing goals with a team

[00:54:07] Jason: Yeah. And me having you on the podcast exposes me to new audiences, new people, and people that follow you are people that are like, "Oh, Michael's had all these really amazing guests on his show also. And Michael has a certain level of status that helps my status level as well." Right.

[00:54:22] Michael: Yeah.

[00:54:22] Jason: And a lot of people think, "Oh, that sounds, you know, maybe that's not authentic or it's disingenuous or whatever," but these are how we make connections. This is part of the networking game of life. And by connecting with other people, this is how we create relationships. This is how we create friends. This is how we identify people that we want to become more like, or how we want to, or people we want to be exposed and connected to, and by doing that, it helps us to grow as a human being, right?

[00:54:52] The more people that I get to be around that are operating at a high level, the more it puts me in a state of wanting to be operating at a high level. And then this is also what you talked about is why I love coaching business owners. I love being able to coach and support entrepreneurs.

[00:55:08] I learn as I do it. I get lots of ancillary benefits by doing it, but also it allows me a reason to feed my addiction to learning and to growth so that I can turn around and benefit them. And so it really creates this win, win scenario. And I'm sure that your involvement in men of action, I can, I get from your content that you.

[00:55:29] Are legitimately invested in making these men better.

[00:55:33] Michael: Yeah. I did it for 14 years for free, so it's definitely not a money grab for me. The reason why we did six figures. The first month we opened was because I'd been coaching since 08 for no money.

[00:55:42] There were a couple of self help organizations that would fly me out to do speeches. I was a stock option seller. I was a portfolio manager for a small fund out of Florida. And that's what I did for a living. And all the other stuff was just like every, what I figured out was every time I read a book, if there was a lesson in it, I wanted to teach someone as soon as possible.

[00:55:57] So I'd make a video or I'd give a speech and it would help me codify these ideas. And then finally, once the the crash happened in 2020, the Corona crash, once that happened, I realized I need to turn this into a business. Like it's, and once I did, and once I started having more people, invest more time and resources into my program, their results got better.

[00:56:16] Again, somebody taking my advice. They're not invested, so they don't really care. They'll listen for a second, but they won't really listen. People join my program and because they've invested resources. Into taking my program. Now, when I say you need to listen to this book at 1. 4 speed, move it up to 1. 7 so that you can get more out of it and then take notes on every one of these chapters.

[00:56:34] Now they actually do it because they've invested in what I've asked them to do. And it's just been, it's just been so magnificent how different it is, but yeah, no money has never been the driver for this.

[00:56:43] Jason: Russell Brunson, I think it was, it says when people pay, they pay attention. And I noticed this, I used to give away this training.

[00:56:51] I used to give away this training on sales that for clients I would just like throw it in with like doing a project for them or a website or whatever we were doing. And then I got a coaching client. He was like one of my first, I was having to pay two grand a month.

[00:57:05] And I gave him this training. He was now paying. And he got results unlike anyone that had ever been given that course before because he paid attention to it. And that changed my perception forever about trying to benefit people by giving them free stuff. And I was just at that Taylor Welch event. I was about to say that.

[00:57:25] Michael: So three weeks ago, you and I were at a Taylor Welch event and he said, I hate giving away stuff for free because free trains your audience to get something for nothing. So we took our free course and now we're charging $10 for it. It's just $10, but it's like, it's going to separate the wheat from the chaff.

[00:57:39] Right. The sound from the noise.

[00:57:40] Jason: And I remember this, he was like, free. Free is stupid. And I was like, yeah, I'm being stupid.

[00:57:45] Michael: So we're changing. Yeah. And I'm creating a low ticket offer for a bunch of my stuff yet because of what I was saying. And I'm not going to charge a bunch, but like 3 we're going to do, I'm going to make an ebook and I'm charging $3 for it.

[00:57:56] And then I'm going to make the first four steps of MOA. I'm going to charge $10 for it. That's all. The reason why I'm going to do it is because you need to invest internally. There's the investment. There's the actual money that transfers from one fund, you know, from one place to another, but then there's the actual and internal investment that you have.

[00:58:11] Read, about like the Florence Nightingale effect, how like nurses fall in love with their patients as they continue to care for them. As you invest in an idea, you become more invested in the idea, additionally more invested. And so that's something that's a really important thing.

[00:58:23] So people who pay attention. That's absolutely correct. Yeah. So yeah, man, that's been something that's been really helpful for me, but just kind of getting out of your own way and thinking that, you know, better, or just holding on to what you think is moral or authentic. Like you don't do things because they don't feel authentic.

[00:58:38] And they don't feel organic and not recognizing that everyone you think is organic is they got their lights set up They're wearing makeup. They've got a fill light. They've got a director over here. They've got an editor They're using AI software, but you think to you it's organic, but it's not organic.

[00:58:57] It really isn't the other thing I'm gonna tell you guys If you listen to huge content creators like Alex Hormozi or if you listen to like David Goggins, they will say things and the things will be viral because they said it. Like Alex Hormozi will say a thing and people quote him because he's Alex Hormozi.

[00:59:11] None of you listening to this are at that spot. You need to say something that is actually transgressive. You're gonna need to say something that actually moves the needle or no one's gonna care. If you, and trust me, listen to Tony Robbins. If he makes a tweet... yeah, be bold.

[00:59:24] Trust yourself. Go out and take action every day. If you fall down, just get back up like 400, 000 likes any one of you say some shit like that. Be bold. Take chances. Do what's best in your life. They're like, who are you? Fall down, get up. You will not get a single like on Twitter. No one will care because you're not famous enough to where the message is viral because you're famous.

[00:59:45] No offense. Their message is useless. It doesn't help you at all. These messages are so vague. They do nothing for you, but you have to do something that is a bit more transgressive or no one's going to care. And I love Gary Vaynerchuk, I really do, but he gives this advice of like you just being authentic all the time and just always doing what you love.

[01:00:03] And I'm just thinking about Wayne Huizenga, the guy who owns waste management. The guy made a billion dollars from cleaning up diapers and porta potties. Do you think Wayne Huizenga woke up every morning and be like, "you know what my dream is to clean up porta potties?" No. You make millions of dollars from solving other people's problems, not by doing what you love.

[01:00:20] Sorry to break your spirit and sorry to be the bearer of bad news. Sorry to say the quiet part loud. Sorry if this comes off as offensive, it is the truth. And by the way, you want to know another example of that property management, you're not, none of you woke up this morning, like, "you know what? I just want that shitty drug addict fucking college burnout tenant who just makes my entire unit smell like a fucking hookah lounge, I can't wait to deal with that guy." None of you said that this morning. None of you did this was none of your dreams. But you did dream of being an entrepreneur.

[01:00:53] Jason: Yeah, nobody woke up as a kid and said, "mom, dad, you know what I want to be when I grow up? I want to be a property manager."

[01:01:00] Michael: Yes. No one said that. And yet you're doing it. And many of you are really happy and it's putting food on your table and you're learning new ways to make money and it's becoming an adventure and you're becoming super relevant and super competent in this area.

[01:01:13] And it was never your dream, but you're solving a problem and that's how you're going to get rich. Not by following your fucking passion.

[01:01:19] Have I sufficiently offended a happier audience? ?

[01:01:21] Jason: No, I don't think so.

[01:01:22] Michael: No.

[01:01:23] Jason: No, I don't think so. I think my audience they know, like most property management companies suck. If I have a room full property managers, and I say, by show of hands, how many of you, all of your competitors suck? Everybody's hand goes up. I have a room of property managers, "but not yours," I usually joke at them.

[01:01:40] Michael: Do this one. How many of you guys think that the media fools people and manipulates people?

[01:01:43] All of them will raise their hand. How many of you guys are manipulated by the media? And none of them raised their hand.

[01:01:48] Jason: I know. Dude, I love that.

[01:01:50] Michael: There's another friend of mine, I ask a group of women, "how many of you guys have dated a narcissist?" They all raised their hand and it was like, "well, 4 percent of the population are narcissists."

[01:01:58] And then the other one I asked is like, "ladies, how many of you think that your friends are bigger sluts than you?" And all of them were raising their hands. I was like, "if your friends were here, they would say the same shit about you."

[01:02:08] Yeah, it's really funny. It's this cognitive bias that individuals have.

[01:02:11] Jason: Yeah, so, I think, you know, property managers listening in the beginning, it's not fun. It's not a fun business. But if they get to the point where they recognize that they can create the business around themselves, instead of trying to build the business around the business. This is the big mistake most people make building any business in initially they build the business around the business. And they end up more and more miserable in it until they finally have a breakthrough in their business, in their journey of being an entrepreneur, that they figure out this is not what I had wanted from the beginning.

[01:02:44] And I call it the four reasons for starting a business. They want fulfillment, they want freedom, they want contribution, and they want support. This is why we start businesses. They think it's to get money, but really they want these four things that a business and money could create for them if they do it the right way.

[01:03:02] But we all tend to build businesses initially the wrong way. We have less freedom, less fulfillment, less of a sense that we're making a difference contribution and feeling like we're less supported, feeling more like, "why won't my team think for themselves?" Kind of a question. And we end up in a place that is usually the least profitable the business has ever been on a per like client basis and frustrated until we turn it around and we start to build the business around ourselves. And so property managers and every business owner need to be selfish enough that they recognize the business cannot be healthy. Their team cannot be healthy unless they build the business around them getting more of what they want out of the business.

[01:03:43] And this is where they start to change how they build their team, how they build what they're doing. And they stopped trying to pretend to be this wrong person and then build a team around it. You cannot build your right team around the wrong person. And so property management can be a really shitty business to be in, or it can be a really systemizable process, residual income, cousin of real estate that they can spend their days just doing the few things they enjoy doing and offload everything else if they do it the right way.

[01:04:15] Which is, you know, what we focus on with our clients. And I would assume that goes for anyone in any business. There's a way that you could show up in that business and just do the pieces that you love. Eventually, if you're willing to kind of like you were describing eat shit and do the hard things in the beginning to get there with that goal in mind.

[01:04:33] Michael: I love it, man. Definitely. I mean, it's the hard part. It's like they've been sold this idea that they deserve success. It'll be something where you follow your passion and it's going to be fair. It's going to be fair because you're going to work hard and you're just going to make money just because you worked hard.

[01:04:47] That's what they think it is. And then later on they start winding road. There's different parts where it's like, "this doesn't feel authentic." Guys, this is another thing really important. This is more self help advice than it is for specifically. If you aren't good at a thing and I'm elite at that thing, whatever it is. I'm a really good free throw shooter for instance I'm an elite level free throw shooter. It just happened to be some weird thing that I do every day when I work out. If I go and I were to teach you how to shoot free throws and and I teach you to keep your elbow in, I want your right foot slightly in front of your left foot.

[01:05:16] I need you to drop your weight a little bit. Only finger only your fingers touch the ball. Your palm does not touch the ball comes over your index finger and your humerus is pointing towards there. The first time I get you to do it, it's going to feel like it's awkward. It's going to feel wrong.

[01:05:30] It's going to feel inauthentic, but you've been doing, you've been doing the wrong thing authentically. I need you to do the right thing inauthentically. Whenever I give you a piece of advice that it leads to success and you don't have success, it will never feel authentic. Ever. Some of you watch this podcast, you've been getting advice and it doesn't feel authentic because it works.

[01:05:52] That's why it doesn't feel authentic. You need to let go of this romantic notion of your authenticity. This is social media. All of it is fake. All of it is fake. If any of it is real or authentic, it's only real and authentic because I allowed you to see it. That's the only reason. Let go of your notion of authenticity and romantic beliefs.

[01:06:16] Let go of it. It's imaginary. You want to be exciting and bombastic. You are going to have to be ostentatious because no one cares about you. No one is watching you. You don't mean anything to anyone other than your four closest friends and maybe your mom. No one cares. You are the tree falling in the forest and no one is there to hear it.

[01:06:39] And so many of you are not, you, "I have 400 followers on Instagram," bro, you don't have 10 real followers on Instagram. You don't. Sorry, you don't. And that's the thing. You, if you understand how the Instagram algorithm works, if you have Instagram, it's going to show your content to four people. 1%. That's how it works.

[01:06:55] Jason: So to be clear, What you're not saying is that people should be lying or unethical. No, no lying, no unethical.

[01:07:04] Michael: Don't even exaggerate. Don't even exaggerate. You ever seen the story about the blind people touching the elephant? One guy comes and touches the one blind person touches the trunk and said, "Oh, this thing is like a snake."

[01:07:14] Another one touches the tail and was like, "Oh, this thing is almost like a willow tree or a tree branch." One of them touches the leg. And it's like, "Oh, this thing's like a tree." There's three blind people touching the elephant. They're all correct, but they do not adequately describe the elephant in total.

[01:07:27] And my point is just take the parts of your life and just show the cool parts. You're just going to have to show the cool parts. Again, most of you when you look at your car, you have a cover over your, there's a fiberglass cover over the top of your engine. But you know, your engine might actually run more efficiently if you didn't have that thing in there, you'd be able to take in more air, right?

[01:07:44] But why do you do that? Why is it? You do it because this is the part that you're trying to hide. The world is about hiding certain parts and showing more beautiful parts. There's a beautiful place in the woods, you're out there in a grove and there's trees and you show it in a photograph and you take pictures with your friends and you have a picnic and it's beautiful.

[01:08:00] You don't show videos of cows taking a poop. You don't do that because even though both things are natural and both things happen, one of them is pretty and nice. Nobody is out there trying to like, let's say, Oh, what is it? What's an ugly animal? I'm trying to think of an no one's like, "let's save the aardvarks."

[01:08:14] No one does that, but everyone's trying to save the cats. Notice that you notice we pick and choose what we find to be more appealing as homo sapiens. And so when you understand this concept and understand that this whole belief is fueled through evolution, then you're like, okay, let me pick and choose the concepts that my audience are going to find to be more digestible or more exciting to keep their attention. And as I do that, I'm going to grow as a content creator. And one of the weirdest things that is ever going to happen to you guys is as a content creator, you're only going to have 10, 000 people following you on Instagram and maybe a thousand subs on YouTube.

[01:08:45] You're going to do that for a while. And the first time someone comes up to you and you can tell that they're actually visibly nervous to meet you because they've been watching all your stuff.

[01:08:52] Jason: Yeah.

[01:08:53] Michael: And that guy is going to convert and not only is he going to convert when he converts, he's gonna get more out of your content than anyone else because he's paying attention and that's the gift I give you It's just the ability to do that.

[01:09:04] Jason: Yeah. I love it. It reminds me of, I saw a video on probably, I don't know, reels, Tik Tok but it was talking about how all these influencers go to the Bahamas. Bahamas look super beautiful or whatever, but they, nobody reveals that people are getting bitten by sand fleas and getting infections.

[01:09:20] Michael: Yeah, those, you know, those pigs on Exuma.

[01:09:22] You know, those pigs, nobody shows that those pigs have like these horrible sunburns or like the pigs shouldn't even be out there or the fat or nobody even shows the part that everyone is just like like it's kind of abuse. It's kind of animal abuse. Nobody ever, they always just show the pigs up there swimming,

[01:09:35] Jason: living, cooking bacon.

[01:09:37] Michael: Yeah. It's just crazy, bro. It's like, yeah, we never see that. Like guys, I want you to understand most of you. You live on a planet right now where half the population of this earth lives on less than $5 a day. There are people literally right now living in Managua living in a trash dump, like thousands of people that literally live in a trash dump.

[01:09:53] Look it up right now before like you have no idea, not only how fortunate you are, but how fortunate you could be by using social media to scale your business and to scale your network. And so many people. In this world currently don't have that ability and no one on the planet had that ability before like 1992, right?

[01:10:11] When we had a dial up internet. No one had that ability You are so unbelievably fortunate for the place that you live in life. You need to take advantage of it

[01:10:19] Jason: Michael, I appreciate you coming and hanging out with me here on the DoorGrow show. For those that are wanting to get, you know, maybe they're a guy, maybe they're interested in men of action or they want to follow you on social media and hear more of your passionate conversation where, how can they get in touch with you?

[01:10:39] Michael: Go just go to Michael Sartain on Instagram. It's probably the easiest place to get ahold of me. If you guys are interested in the program specifically, you can go to moamentoring. com men of action, moamentoring. com or you can go to Skool you got no Skool. That's that new platform that Alex Hormozi just bought.

[01:10:53] It's S K O O L. com forward slash men of action free. There's a hyphen in between each word. So it's men hyphen of hyphen action hyphen free. You guys can join our free Skool group there and it's got all kinds of information. It's got our calendar. It's got Instagram testimonials. It's got video testimonials.

[01:11:08] It's got the book list and it's got the required podcast that we have for all of our clients that are on there. So if you guys want to go check that out, just go to skool.com/men-of-action- free.

[01:11:17] Jason: This has been awesome, Michael. I think you and I could have an ADHD conversation for like five hours straight and just go down a million rabbit holes, but I appreciate you coming and hanging out with me on the show.

[01:11:28] Thanks so much.

[01:11:29] Michael: All right, man. Hey, good to talk to you. Talk to you soon, Jason. All right, we'll let you go.

[01:11:33] Jason: All right. So for those of you that. Are wanting to grow and scale your property management business. And you are wanting to figure out how to get to the next level. You've been stuck for a while.

[01:11:43] Check us out at doorgrow. com. We would love to have a conversation, see if it might be a fit, see if we can help you get to the next level. And finally start getting the results that you're wanting in your business. And finally start feeling like you're making progress significantly, scaling your business and having success.

[01:12:02] And until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[01:12:06] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[01:12:32] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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If you are existing in your property management business but you aren’t enjoying it, you might be in property management hell.

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull explain how to escape property management hell.

You’ll Learn [01:19] How do you know if you are in property management hell?

[05:40] How to escape property management hell

[07:33] How do you know if you are in property management hell?

[10:32] What does an operator do in a property management business?

Tweetables “So if you are existing, living in your business and you're not enjoying it and it's frustrating… then you might be in property management hell.”

“There's definitely something to be said about working hard. There's definitely a time and a season for this.”

“We have to get to the next level, and what got you to where you are now is not going to help you move forward.”

“You can still be miserable and have an entire team.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: You will have more fulfillment, more freedom, more contribution, and more support in your business as it grows.

[00:00:05] And this is the right way to do it. This will change your life.

[00:00:09]

[00:00:10] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, and unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the founder and CEO and the COO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:15] Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:18] Welcome everybody. So we were thinking about what to talk about today, and one of the things that I coached clients on this week in depth was this idea of how to escape property management hell. So let's talk about how to escape property management hell. So if you are existing, living in your business and you're not enjoying it and it's frustrating, you've got an entire team and you're wondering 'why won't they just think for themselves?' And you're stressed out and you're tired of dealing with all the escalated situations where your team couldn't handle it like tenants and owners, and you're still wearing a whole bunch of hats that you don't enjoy wearing, you're still doing a lot of stuff in the business that you really don't wake up in the morning and go, "man, I'm excited to do that thing today," then you might be in property management hell. This is not property management heaven. This is not the place you're supposed to stay. And so if you're not enjoying that we're going to talk about how to get out of that. And it's not that complicated of a process. We're not going to go into a ton of detail cause we don't have a ton of time.

[00:02:20] Not as in depth as we would in coaching our clients, but we're going to give you the high level overview so you can understand that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. All right. So what do you notice with clients that they're doing and what's going on when they are in hell? What sort of frustrations and challenges are you hearing?

[00:02:40] Sarah: Overwhelmed. They're overworked. They're crazy busy. Most of it is just busy work.

[00:02:46] It needs to be done, but it's not high level things that a business owner would need to do. They're working lots and lots of hours. Sometimes it might be eight, 10, 12, 15 hours a day. Sometimes it's seven days a week. Usually it's at least six and then they do a little bit on the seventh day, but they don't really fully get time off and they're just responding to everything as it comes in and they're trying to handle everything and they're frustrated and they're just very stressed out.

[00:03:23] Jason: Yeah, I was talking with a past client who may end up, probably end up joining our mastermind program. I think we'd worked together four or five years ago, helped him with his website and some different stuff. And he's been using some of the stuff he learned and he was really excited to tell me how far he's come and he's like at 700 units and I think he was small when he came to me, I don't remember, maybe 50 or something, and so he's really excited about the progress he has.

[00:03:50] Then he was telling me he's working 17 hour days, some days, like he's working these crazy hours and he's going through these cycles of growth and like working crazy hard and then stopping the growth so that he can focus on building up the business and operations and doing a lot of the onboarding of the properties and then he goes back into this cycle and he hasn't taken a legit vacation since he started the business.

[00:04:17] And he goes on vacations, but he's on his phone the whole time. He's not totally available. And this is not a sustainable thing. Now he's just done it through sheer drive and will. To his credit, he's like, "nobody will outwork me." This is like a badge of honor for him. And he works incredibly hard and he's like, that's why he's had more success than any of his competitors is he's just willing to outwork all of them.

[00:04:43] And there's definitely something to be said about working hard. There's definitely a time and a season for this. And if all of you or any of you are being lazy, work a little harder. Like do some hard work for a little while to get to that next level. But we want more fulfillment and more freedom. And I wasn't getting a sense from this gentleman that he was experiencing fulfillment and freedom.

[00:05:03] To me, that sounds like hell. It's like a treadmill that you feel like you've created and you have to keep running on to keep the business going. And he's going to burn out. And you know, he even mentioned like it's affecting his health, it's affecting his body, you know, and it's probably impacting his relationships, you know?

[00:05:21] And so a lot of guys get into this stage and I think women do it as well. Everybody does this in business where they get into this mode of growth and work and hustle. And that's how we get businesses going. We have to get to the next level, and what got you to where you are now is not going to help you moving forward.

[00:05:38] You have to start to get out of the way. And so the way to escape this property management hell, this cycle of endless work and torment is we need to figure out what help do we need in the business? A lot of people go, "well, just offload stuff." Yeah, but how do you know what you actually should offload?

[00:05:58] Because the big mistake people make is they go hire what they think the business needs and they keep helping the business. And this gentleman and many others I've talked to have an entire team and they're still stressing themselves out. You can still be miserable and have an entire team. Some of you listening are like, "yeah that's me. I've got an entire team and I'm miserable," right? So, how do we escape that? Here's how we figure out what you need. Because if we instead shift it to figuring out what you need, then this will be a game changer. So, the first thing we do is, we have our clients do a time study.

[00:06:30] We have a sponsor and our sponsor is Venderoo, which we're getting some great feedback on from clients. Tired of the constant stress and hassle of maintenance coordination. Meet Venderoo, your AI driven in house maintenance expert that handles work orders from start to finish. Triaging, troubleshooting, vendor selection, and coordination built by property managers for property managers to provide cost effective and accountable maintenance operations where every dollar is accounted for and every task is handled with unmatched reliability. Vendoroo takes care of the details so you can focus on growth. Schedule a demo today at Vendoroo, VENDOROO dot ai/doorgrow and experience maintenance done right. And I'll just add one of our clients had 80 work orders in his first day of turning Vendoroo, the AI thing on, he had 80 work orders closed out. Another client had 54 work orders closed out in their first day as well.

[00:07:29] Like we're in this AI revolution. So I highly recommend you check these guys out. It's very cool.

[00:07:33] Okay, so back to what I was saying is here's the strategy. You do a time study. This time study will help you figure out what you're doing every 15 minutes and you're going to categorize your time based on whether it's tactical or strategic and you're going to figure out which things are your plus signs or your minus signs.

[00:07:50] We have a whole process for this and a training on how to do this and you want to do this once a quarter. This will move the business forward more than most anything else that you could do. And it'll help you get out of the way. You do the time study, figure out plus and minus signs. Then you create a job description.

[00:08:04] We call those R docs because each section starts with an R, ultimate Rdoc job description for yourself and your team members creates a ton of clarity. And so you get these Rdocs created, you create one for yourself, and then you highlight the things that you no longer want to be doing, or that are your tactical minus signs that are the things you're working in the business instead of on the business, which is strategic. And so then you take that and build out a new Rdoc for your ideal candidate and hire. And this needs to be a single personality type, not like, "Oh, I need somebody to do some sales stuff and some accounting stuff and some operations stuff."

[00:08:41] No, those are weird people called entrepreneurs. Don't do that. Pick one realistic human being that's not entrepreneurial like a specialist. So that might be a really good executive assistant. And then you'll have a really good job description, move all the things on that job description that would be for that person.

[00:08:58] And then you put that out to the marketplace. Now, if you want to do this correctly, DoorGrow hiring is the game changer. This is where you stop playing Russian roulette and you attract the right personality type for the role. So they will actually be good at it and the right cultural fit so that you will actually trust them.

[00:09:15] It's not just about finding somebody willing to do the work or that has the skill, but you also need to find somebody that's intelligent enough to be able to learn and adapt to you and to be able to do this. And then if you start building your team this way, you will have a team built around the right person would because you're adjusting yourself every quarter, you're improving yourself every quarter, you're moving closer and closer to your plus signs and more of what energizes you, and then you're going to do this with all of your team members. You're going to have them do time studies and identify their strengths and what they enjoy doing, and your team will get better and better. And you will have more fulfillment, more freedom, more contribution, and more support in your business as it grows.

[00:09:51] And this is the right way to do it. This will change your life. This is going to make you have a business that you actually enjoy being in that you're less and less involved in over time and that you're the only pieces you're still holding on to are the pieces you love. And so this is a business that is built to sell if you do want to exit because you're systematically exiting from the right pieces of the business.

[00:10:15] And there's the right accountability. And then you need to get a really good operating system like DoorGrow OS, where you have a good planning system and you need to get a good operator to run this system and to run the business. And that will legitimately change your life. Having Sarah as an operator, changes my life.

[00:10:31] Anything you'll add to this?

[00:10:32] Sarah: I think aside from the fact that people don't know what an operator is because everyone goes, "Oh yeah, I'm going to hire somebody for operations. And these are all the things they're going to do." They are not handling tactical work.

[00:10:42] Your operator is not talking with tenants. Your operator is not talking with your clients. They are not involved in maintenance, rent collection, evictions, owner statements. They don't do any of those things. That is all front end, front line work. And your operator, no one will even know who your operator is because they don't talk to anybody in the business except for you and your team.

[00:11:03] They're all back end. So they're very strategically involved in the business, which is very different. So they are responsible for the inner workings of your business and how things are progressing and moving forward. And are you guys running your strategic planning meetings? Are we on track for our weekly goals and our monthly goals, our quarterly goals, and most importantly, our big annual goal? Are we doing daily huddles? Are we attracting the right team members? Do we have the right team members? Do we have the right people in the right seats and the right roles in the business? If not, we need to make some adjustments. Do we have Rdocs and job descriptions for every single person?

[00:11:47] Are they up to date? Are our processes documented? Are they up to date and are they actually being used? Or do we just have this library of processes that nobody ever looks at? And then we spent hours and hours wasting time because now nobody ever uses them or looks at them. Right? So hiring, firing, strategic planning, daily huddles, your team check ins... how are things going with your team?

[00:12:11] If you don't know, and you're not regularly having these meetings, then you are missing out. Because your team will know things that you don't know, as soon as you get out of that role, and have somebody else fully in it. They're now going to know things that you don't know. So you have to rely on communication with your team to understand, "hey, is there some sort of cog that we don't know about now because I don't handle leasing anymore? But is there a big problem with leasing that we can probably shore up somewhere?" So, these are the things that your operator does. The operator and the CEO, they go together very well. They're like yin and yang.

[00:12:51] One will balance the other out, but they work hand in hand, and your operator does all of the things back end in the business to make sure that the business is growing and running well, and that you have the right team. So, your operator, just so you know, has absolutely nothing to do with front end work.

[00:13:09] They just kind of look over the people who do.

[00:13:12] Jason: They're not your property manager. They're not your maintenance coordinator. They're not your accountant.

[00:13:17] Sarah: No.

[00:13:18] Jason: They're not a lot of things. They're not your executive assistant.

[00:13:21] Sarah: They don't do move ins. They don't do move outs. They don't talk to tenants ever. And they don't talk to clients.

[00:13:28] Jason: No. They will run your business and they will change your life, right? And this will free you up to be more of a visionary entrepreneur in your business, which is what the business needs. It needs somebody leading not working. Cool. Preach! Preach, Sarah. I'm like I'm going to let her cook.

[00:13:44] She's going!

[00:13:45] Sarah: I hear it because I hear it all the time, "Oh, I need an operator. Great. What are the things they're going to do?"

[00:13:50] "Oh, they're going to handle my admin work. They're going to do my leasing." Not an operator. Right. Great, fantastic, that's the role that you need.

[00:13:57] It's not an operator.

[00:13:58] Jason: Operator is not a worker. They're like, "I need a worker. I need a worker to do work." There's a little confusion there. Okay, cool. So, in short, operator is going to help with people, planning, and process in the business. We call those three systems that are key part of the super system.

[00:14:15] So if this is of interest to any of you listening and you would like to get things flowing and working really well in your business and find these game changing people to build out your team so that you've got the right people to help you grow it, the right people to help you scale it, the right people to help you run it, then reach out to DoorGrow.

[00:14:33] We would love to coach and support you and help you get your business to the next level. And that's it for today.

[00:14:40] Sarah: Oh, and if you're not yet in our facebook group, you should check that out!

[00:14:44] Jason: Oh, yeah DoorGrowclub.Com. Join our facebook group. All right until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:14:52] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:15:18] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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When hiring a new team member in your property management business, one common mistake can cause you to lose out on potentially the best candidates.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss why having experience in property management is not a necessary qualification for the people you hire.

You’ll Learn [01:11] The Myth of Needing Experience

[04:19] More Important Than Experience: Culture Fit

[13:59] You Need a Better Hiring System

[19:17] What to do if You Struggle with Hiring

Tweetables “If you don't even know what your culture is, how are you going to figure out if they match that?”

“If they're not the right culture fit for sure you're overpaying or they're underperforming, either way, you're overpaying.”

“Even if you hire based off of experience, you still have to train that person. That does not forego the training.”

“If people are only loyal to a dollar, then yeah, you're at risk of losing those people pretty easily.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: If they're not the right culture fit for sure you're overpaying or they're underperforming or either way you're overpaying.

[00:00:06] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:45] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow, and Sarah Hull, co owner and COO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:06] Now let's get Into the show.

[00:01:08] All right. What are we talking about today, Sarah?

[00:01:11] Sarah: I wanted to talk about this thing that keeps coming up and I've seen it two times in the last week is hiring on experience.

[00:01:21] Jason: Oh.

[00:01:22] Sarah: Everyone goes, "Oh yeah, I would love somebody who's experienced and they already know the industry and they already know my systems and they know how to do things. And that would be fantastic."

[00:01:32] Jason: People listening are going to go, "well, yeah, of course you want people with experience. It would be dumb to have people with zero experience, right?"

[00:01:38] Sarah: Wrong!

[00:01:39] Jason: Okay. Okay. So let's explain this. What are you talking about?

[00:01:43] Sarah: All right, so the first thing that I'm going to say, as soon as I say it, it'll click right? If we are lucky to hire someone who's already familiar with the industry, who's working in the industry. Maybe they understand some of your tools, your software, perhaps some of your processes. You're narrowing your candidate pool to such a tiny little minutiae of a candidate pool. How many people do you think there are that have experience in property management that are now in the job market?. Right? Like, "Oh, I'm only going to hire somebody if they have experience in property management, or I'm only going to hire somebody if they understand how to use Appfolio." All right. So we went from here to here, tiny little segment of the market.

[00:02:33] The other thing I'll say about this is if you find someone who has experience in the property management industry, and perhaps even in your software and your processes. Why is it that they're looking for a job? If they were so great, would someone not have snatched them up already?

[00:02:49] Jason: What if they get them to come from another company?

[00:02:52] Like they convinced them?

[00:02:53] Sarah: Let's talk about that. I'm glad you brought that up. I'm so glad. It was like this morning, we were having a conversation and I had mentioned this to one of our clients who's currently trying to hire people based off of experience. So here's the other problem, and we've seen this a couple of times, businesses stealing other businesses' team members and employees. There's one case that I'm thinking of in particular that kind of getting a little nasty. The two competitors are trying to take what they can, clients, team members, whatever they can, market share. They're just trying to take anything that they can from the other one. And one of them snatched the operator, which is really.

[00:03:33] Not a good person to lose in your business.

[00:03:36] Jason: Yeah. No.

[00:03:36] Sarah: Why was that able to happen though? She had experience, right? So the new company is like, "Oh, this is perfect. She understands property management. She's got experience. She knows how to do this."

[00:03:46] Jason: I mean, most entrepreneurs would think it's just about money because entrepreneurs always look through the lens of money. So they'll think, "well, she probably just got a better offer."

[00:03:54] Sarah: And in this case, I bet she did.

[00:03:56] Jason: Okay.

[00:03:56] Sarah: And the problem that we're overlooking here is we're skipping the most important part, which is looking to see if they're a culture fit.

[00:04:06] And then the second most important part is looking to see, are they the right personality fit for the role. And then and only then do we want to look at their skill set and experience and do they have the intelligence level to be able to learn that particular task.

[00:04:18] Jason: Right? This is one of our frameworks, the three fits, culture fit, skill fit, personality fit, and culture fit, most important.

[00:04:26] So, yeah, I agree. If people are not the right culture fit, then by default, you're overpaying for your team members, period. Because either they're underperforming because they don't really believe in your business or buy in. So their secret goal really is just to get paid as much as possible and probably do as little work as possible would be their ideal, right?

[00:04:48] And so that's if they're not a culture fit. If they're a culture fit, they buy into the vision, they believe in you, they're excited to work for you. They want to have an impact. They have a motive besides just getting paid. And so, yeah, they're not a culture fit, it's guaranteed you're overpaying for that team member.

[00:05:03] Because either they're crappy or you're having to like compensate them a bunch of money in order to keep them on board at your business because they really don't enjoy being there. So then you end up overpaying in order to keep them. And if people are only loyal to a dollar, then yeah, you're at risk of losing those people pretty easily.

[00:05:22] Sarah: Absolutely. And that is why this particular operator was able to be swayed. So if you've got people who are a culture fit, if you've got people who really believe in the company, in you as the business owner, in the vision and the mission, where you are wanting to go and what you are wanting to build, if people are truly bought in and on board with that, that makes all the difference in everything that they do.

[00:05:52] So can you hire somebody with experience who understands how to use Buildium or Propertyware or your phone system, whatever it is, and your ticket system? Yeah. And they can come in and they can do the job and it would be a night and day difference If you had somebody who truly believed in your company and you had to just train them to do those things and then they were able to do that, they're going to outperform the person who only has the experience every day of the week.

[00:06:22] Jason: Okay. So can you share an example? Because you, you mentioned some clients were having issues with this. So like, let's tie this in with maybe a story.

[00:06:31] Sarah: Yeah. So it was just last week I was talking with Andrew and he had recently hired a couple of team members. I think he hired a BDM and an admin and there was maybe someone for maintenance.

[00:06:43] I don't remember who the third one was. So he had recently hired these people. Already he's looking to replace them because either they're not working out or they're moving on. So his BDM, she is a real estate agent as well. And she's like, "Oh, well, I'm just actually going to go focus on real estate. I don't think I'm going to do all of this."

[00:07:02] And it's been under maybe two months, maybe three months. So not a very long time. And he had mentioned to me, "yeah, so I've got this one person in mind and their experience." And as soon as he said experience, I went, "uh oh, okay. He's hiring the wrong way. He's hiring completely the wrong way."

[00:07:20] So I had asked him, I said, "all right, so just out of curiosity, when you're talking with people, when you're looking at resumes and your screening candidates, what are the things that you're looking at? Like, what do you look at first?" And he's like, "well, I look to see, do they have experience in the industry?

[00:07:35] And specifically, do they already know how to use my tools?"

[00:07:37] Jason: Yeah. So that's first. Yeah. That's a big red flag. And a lot of people listening might not get that, but that's a red flag.

[00:07:43] Sarah: Huge.

[00:07:44] Jason: Okay.

[00:07:44] Sarah: So aside from the fact that, like I said, your Canada pool is so tiny. I mean, if there is a person I would love to meet you, who, when you were in, you know, kindergarten and elementary who said, "Oh! When I grew up, I want to be a property manager. When I grew up, I want to be a leasing agent for a property management company. I would love to do that. That's my dream job."

[00:08:06] Jason: Right?

[00:08:07] Sarah: Who? That doesn't happen. Right? So people kind of work their way into property management, but it's not the dream that you typically have when you're a child trying to choose your career path.

[00:08:20] Jason: Yeah. And that's because the industry as a whole has an awareness problem. There's not a lot of people aware of property management and there's plenty of roles in property management that different personality types would enjoy doing or would thrive in. But people are not thinking of the industry.

[00:08:36] And so, yeah, looking for people with experience, I think would be really limiting,

[00:08:40] Sarah: yes, very challenging. So you need to find somebody who has experience in the industry that already will be hard. And then, even if they have experience in the industry, then you're going to say, "Oh, and they need to have experience with my specific tools and software that I use."

[00:08:57] That becomes harder.

[00:08:58] Jason: Right.

[00:08:59] Sarah: So I had said to him, I said, "well, all right, I have experience as a leasing agent. Would you hire me?" Because I might know how to do leasing. I do. I do know how to do leasing, right? But I know how to do leasing my way because when I was running my company, I knew how I did leasing.

[00:09:17] But that doesn't mean I know how to do leasing your way. So even if you hire based off of experience, you still have to train that person. That does not forego the training. And a lot of times I think this is what happens is people go, "Oh, I would love to make my life easier and hire somebody, and then maybe I don't have to spend a whole lot of time training them on a tool or a system or how we do things because they already know how to do it." Even if they know the tool, they still don't know your processes. They don't know your way of doing things. So you will still have to train them. Now, it is possible that the training is easier if you don't have to explain how to use the tool, if they already know how to do it.

[00:10:04] use it and they're familiar with it. Yes, that part of training becomes easier. It does not mean though that training will not still be a one to three month process, experience or not.

[00:10:17] Jason: Right. So, yeah, so you're saying a lot of people will try and hire somebody based on experience because they're trying to avoid having to take the time to train somebody.

[00:10:27] Sarah: You can hire me. I can come into your business. And I can screw it up just as well as somebody who doesn't know what they're doing can. Why? Because even if I know how to use that tool, I know how to do it the way that I did it. I don't know how to do it the way that you do it yet.

[00:10:45] I don't know your processes. I only know how I did leasing, and how I did leasing might be very different than how you do leasing. I know how I did sales, but that might be very different from how you do sales. I know how I onboarded clients, but that might be very different. I might do your leasing and you would go, "Sarah, what the hell? Why did this happen?"

[00:11:09] "Well, I don't know. That's just how I used to do it." So if you hire someone who has the experience and has the knowledge, you still have to train them.

[00:11:18] Jason: Yeah.

[00:11:18] Sarah: And training is the most important thing that you can do when hiring. If you hire anybody and you completely forget or just choose not to train them.

[00:11:30] It is going to be a train wreck.

[00:11:32] Jason: I think a lot of times as entrepreneurs we're in the mode of like doing things quickly and we're impatient. And so we get lazy sometimes when it comes to onboarding team members. We're like, "yeah, just, here you go. We throw them to the wolves."

[00:11:45] Sarah: Baptism by fire. Yeah, figure it out.

[00:11:47] Jason: Yeah. And lazy onboarding is not, a great strategy, right? It's going to take work regardless of the person that you bring on. And there's advantages when they don't have the skill or the experience in that you can make sure that they're doing it the way that you value and the way that you like.

[00:12:05] So there can be a benefit.

[00:12:07] I think for sure if they're not the right culture fit for sure you're overpaying or they're underperforming or either way you're overpaying. If they're not the right personality fit for that particular role you'll just constantly be frustrated and training them and trying to onboard them will just be a demoralizing experience for you because it's impossible.

[00:12:26] Like you'll be trying so hard to get them up to speed. And I think this is where people have experienced this and they're like, "well, I just need to go find someone with experience." But the real problem is they're not the right personality to do the job well. If somebody is the right personality, they would naturally be good at it.

[00:12:41] They would be inclined towards doing it. You wouldn't have to motivate them or inspire them to do it. They would want to because they love doing it. It's aligned with who they are. And otherwise there's always going to be some serious friction. Culture and personality are off, there's going to be lots of friction.

[00:12:57] And then even related to skill fit, if they're not intelligent enough to do the job, because some jobs require a little bit more Intelligence, right? You know, like the best team members are usually the best at problem solving. That's an intelligence challenge. You can give them all the skill, like here's the processes, et cetera.

[00:13:15] But if they can't problem solve because they're an idiot, like then it becomes a real problem because you have to then do all the thinking. You need intelligent people. And so that's part of the skill fit. So you need all three. What's interesting about this. And we've talked about the three fits before on the podcast is you can't create culture, personality, or skill and intelligence.

[00:13:37] Like you can't really create those. You have to go find it. You have to find somebody that has all three and just finding somebody that has one of the three is not going to be a fit. They have to be all three, or they can't be in your business. Or they're just going to be screwing things up and there's going to be so much friction so much waste. You're going to be spending way too much money. You're going to be spending way too much time trying to onboard them and it's going to be a mess.

[00:13:59] Sarah: I agree.

[00:13:59] Jason: Cool So, in seeing these clients and people dealing with hiring, how do we solve that? How do we solve

[00:14:05] Sarah: this?

[00:14:05] You have to take the hiring process and flip it backwards. So the first thing you have to do is you have to determine if they're a culture fit for your business. But in order for that to happen, you have to know what your culture is and it has to be defined, which is why, and this is where people fight me, is when they want to implement DoorGrow hiring, they're like, "I desperately need to hire somebody. I need somebody like, please help me with hiring." Right.

[00:14:29] "Send me your cultural documents."

[00:14:32] " Oh, I don't have those."

[00:14:33] Sarah: "Then I can't help you find a good hire. I can't do it because it's Russian roulette." So if you don't have your culture defined, meaning I need your company core values. I need a decision making guide.

[00:14:47] I need a client centric mission statement. I need your personal why, and I need your business why. Without those things, I cannot help you find someone who's going to be great because I will never know, nor will you, are they a good culture fit? If you don't even know what your culture is, how are you going to figure out if they match that?

[00:15:06] Jason: So what you're saying is people need a better system. They need a hiring system. And most don't really have a good system. I guess everybody has a hiring system, it's just usually a pretty crappy one. Building intentionally a really intelligently designed hiring system, which is what we do with DoorGrow hiring is a game changer for a business because hiring is one of the biggest challenges I've seen even in multimillion dollar companies with friends. And this is something we've gotten really well dialed in a DoorGrow, but this is a constant challenge for most businesses. And until they figure it out... I was talking with one of our clients yesterday ,and he added like 114 doors in like the last month or so. And so he's just like, his business is growing crazily.

[00:15:49] And he's this amazing client because he does everything we tell him to do. He's got an operator. Now they're using DoorGrow OS, like they're crushing it. And I was talking with him and his big challenge right now is maintenance technicians. He had four, he lost two. So he's now trying to hire and In having a conversation with him, I had to shift his mindset that he's no longer right now, a property management company.

[00:16:14] That's the business he thinks he's in. And because he thinks he's a property management company, he doesn't want to focus as much on the hiring piece. That's not the business that he's in, but I had to help him see right now, the business that he's in, is in order to scale, this is his biggest constraint is he's going to consistently need to be bringing in more maintenance techs into his business.

[00:16:36] And so I said to him, I said, "your business for right now, until you get this solved, your business is not a property management company. Your business is a maintenance technician talent acquisition company. That's the business you're in." And until he accepts that he can't solve this problem. And so most businesses, this is a big constraint.

[00:16:55] And for him right now, it's the constraint. And once he gets this solved, once he gets this dialed in. So that he becomes good at hiring and onboarding and getting up to speed with maintenance technicians. And he was planning on just trying to replace the two. In coaching, and we were talking about, you need to bring on probably four.

[00:17:13] You need at least four in order to find one, maybe two that are going to be good and give them a working interview where you have them do some work to see if they can perform. And this means he needs an engine where he's consistently every month bringing in a good amount of maintenance technicians and has a system for doing this.

[00:17:31] And so. Businesses need if you're wanting to scale and grow quickly, you have to have systems in place. And one of the key ones is a really solid hiring system that allows you to get culture, personality, and skill. And that's what we've developed with DoorGrow hiring and DoorGrow ATS, our applicant tracking system.

[00:17:49] And we talked about optimizing the ATS just for those particular candidates because they don't want to go through a more lengthy application process like we do with some candidates, you know, these maintenance techs and then vetting them through our AI assessments and stuff like this afterwards to assess them for problem solving because that's his biggest challenge.

[00:18:06] He says, "my best maintenance techs are the problem solvers." I'm like, "that's an intelligence problem." So we have to figure out a way without doing illegal things, you know, or that you're not supposed to do you have to figure out a way to assess or figure out that they're intelligent.

[00:18:21] And one way would be a working interview. Another way would be, you know, the AI assessment tool that can assess cognitive ability, you know, stuff like this. And that would come after he does a culture interview with them first. He was looking for skill and that's the challenge.

[00:18:35] So it was good. Super common. Everybody always goes, Oh, I need skill. I need experience.

[00:18:41] Yes, and you do want people that have some experience would be great, but having people that have the intelligence level to absorb information quickly and to learn and the problem solve is way better than having somebody that has a ton of experience, but is terrible at adapting and is dumb.

[00:18:59] Any day of the week. And so they will get up to speed and supersede somebody with a decade of experience if they're slow and not able to learn anytime. So, all right. This is a good topic. Anything else we should say about this?

[00:19:14] Sarah: That's what I got.

[00:19:14] Jason: All right, cool. Hopefully this was helpful for those of you listening.

[00:19:17] If you're struggling with hiring. A lot of you have made these mistakes, right? You've hired, you've had people churn out. You're like, "it's hard to find good people." These are the excuses we hear from people that have a crappy hiring system. "There's no good people out there. It's tough in my market. We can't find good people. Millennials don't want to work," you know, but whatever, right? "I just pay people, why won't they just do what I f*cking tell them to do?" You know, whatever it might be. So, that's just a sign that you have a bad hiring system or that you just have terrible culture or you have bad onboarding.

[00:19:50] Sarah: Or no culture.

[00:19:51] Jason: No culture to find. No culture. Yeah. And so, we need to get these things cleaned up in your business or your business is constantly going to be a prison for you. It's going to be really hard until you get a really good team and you have really good culture in your business defined, business is hard.

[00:20:07] And this is where I see a lot of people get stuck between two to 400 units where they have an entire team and they're the most frustrated and usually the least profitable per unit they've ever been because it's the team and they can't see it. They're like, "I have a good team." You have a team that are willing to take your money, but are they a great team?

[00:20:25] Super easy way to know... if you have an entire team and you've got two to 400 units or more, and you have been unable to scale it past 600 doors for the last three to five years, you've been kind of stuck there and you are still wearing hats that you do not want to be wearing.

[00:20:43] And you're sometimes asking, "why won't my team think for themselves?" You're the problem. This is the problem. You are showing up as the wrong person in the business and you have bad culture and a bad hiring system. And if you want to get that solved, reach out to us at DoorGrow. This is very simple to solve.

[00:21:00] It's not too difficult. And we can probably get most of that mess cleaned up in like a single quarter, like 90 days. So reach out to us. We'd love to help you out. You can check us out at DoorGrow.com. And if you're wanting more, if you stumble across this, maybe on YouTube or somewhere else, make sure to like, and subscribe and join our free Facebook community DoorGrowclub.Com. You can get to it by going to DoorGrowclub.Com. And until next time to our mutual growth by everyone.

[00:21:26] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:21:52] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

View Details

I recently turned 47 years old. The last year has been full of challenges in the business and in my personal life, but things are starting to shift.

In today’s episode, property management growth expert Jason Hull discusses his personal and business growth recently and his hopes for the coming business year.

You’ll Learn [01:17] Business Challenges and Revelations

[08:35] Personal Challenges and Revelations

[11:32] Learning Empathy

[18:25] Don’t Give Up

Tweetables “There's what people think they need and what they want, and there's what they actually need.”

“A lot of you don't even realize you have a garbage product.”

“Your business is one of the greatest personal development tools that you have.”

“I think God may trick us into starting a business to make money and eventually, he uses it to turn us into better human beings.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] I think God may trick us into starting a business to make money and eventually, he uses it to turn us into better human beings. Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:30] Jason: DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:52] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGroww, and now let's get into the show.

[00:01:17] I just had on the 30th, and today is July 2nd this may come out at a later date, you might hear it a month later depending on which channel you listen to this on. So my birthday is June 30th. This is also the end of our planning year.

[00:01:32] So we offset our planning by two quarters because it really sucks to try and hit your end of the year goals in December when everybody is kind of focused on holidays and family and to try and get them to put their attention on business, it isn't super effective. And I like that to be the middle of our planning year.

[00:01:51] And we do our beginning of our year is July 1st. So not only is my birthday, it's also the end of our sort of a planning year for our business. And so I've had a lot of introspection. I mean, this has been a tough previous year for me in a lot of ways mostly on the personal side, you know, business has been a little tough as well to be transparent. And so the challenge in business is that we've developed this really amazing coaching program and I really enjoy doing that piece. So we've shied away from doing websites and focusing on other stuff, even though I still have a whole web development team and they just haven't had a whole lot of work to do.

[00:02:30] But we've really put our focus into coaching and improving our programs and decreasing churn, which is a difficult challenge in a coaching business. And we've gotten it down, like half of our clients have been in our program for over a year, which is amazing because when I first even learned the word churn several years back our average retention rate was like five months, like it was super low.

[00:02:52] And so we were kind of addicted to sales. And this is the advantage in a property management business is that you're not super addicted to the next big deal, right? You've got residual income. And so I learned when the pandemic hit, I learned I want more residuals coming in so that I'm not beholden to sales because sales stopped that month of May, I believe it was, there was no sales.

[00:03:15] Every property manager, they were holding their breath. "Our tenant is going to pay rent? What's going to happen? is this scary?" And so they were like, "I'm not going to spend any money. I'm going to be careful here." So that was interesting and so we had to tighten our belt as a team.

[00:03:27] We had to like, cut out expenses. We got a leaner and I think I let some people go on the team as well that were just, you know, maybe not as essential. And we had to tighten our belts to, to survive as a business because we were so focused on sales and we're at a good click.

[00:03:46] Like we're a decent sized company. Like we make a good amount of money, but when you continue to have expenses every month and suddenly sales stops and that's the majority of our revenue, that's a bad thing. And those of you that have shifted from real estate sales and hunting and chasing to doing property management and building a residual income business model, you get it.

[00:04:05] And I've seen so many of my clients have these great subscription sort of service, right? So I wanted to emulate that and we switched to doing it that way, and making sure we focused on residual income. So we built that up, we built it up really well. We've got a great coaching business.

[00:04:20] We've got a great back end. We're really good at helping our clients grow and scale their companies. The weird and ironic thing though, that presented a challenge is that people don't want coaching, right? People don't like wake up in the morning, go, you know what? You know my business needs? I want to get a coach.

[00:04:36] This is not generally people's first thought. There's what people think they need and what they want, and there's what they actually need. And so people would come to us and what they thought they needed was leads. I call it the leads myth. And what they thought they needed in order to get their business growing was maybe a better website or SEO or something like this.

[00:04:57] And so they would come to us kind of thinking this is the stuff they needed. And then we could help them. Like reeducate them and help them see this is why you've been struggling to grow is because you believe these false beliefs And I would then point out like that like leads from the internet are not the best leads And there's better sources of getting business than just cold leads or cold lead advertising. And maybe having a website is nice, but you can grow a business without even having a website or without even having the top spot on google. And so we would get a lot of clients historically coming to us for a website and that was one major leak in their sales pipeline, but they had, you know, at least ,five major other leaks in their sales pipeline that needed to be shored up.

[00:05:41] And they thought, "all I need to do is turn on the leads." So they would turn on the leads full blast, like turning on a hose. And there's all these leaks in the hose, right? One of them's a website. One of them was their pricing. One of them was branding. One of them was reputation. One of them was their sales pitch and their sales process.

[00:05:58] One of them was what I call purpose, lack of culture in their team. So their whole product was just like garbage. A lot of you don't even realize you have a garbage product. It doesn't create trust and it has lots of leaks in the hose or in the pipeline. And you're just trying to shove more leads, like spend more money, time, energy, focus, cash, and effort.

[00:06:17] And so it wasn't hard to take people that came to us for a website. "Hey, I need a website. I'm starting a business where I'm trying to figure this out, or we're struggling to grow and we think we need a new website. " And then convert them into giving them what they actually needed in order to grow and then help them crush it.

[00:06:33] Yeah. But since shifting our focus towards coaching and changing our homepage, "let's focus on coaching." Because I just was so excited about coaching, it actually made it more difficult to get customers. So we spent a lot more money on advertising, doing a lot more marketing to attract people and to like reeducate the market, but that's a much more difficult challenge.

[00:06:54] And so we've struggled to really grow our business. And we're at a good size. We're a good size. Like, you know, we're over a million in revenue, but DoorGrow easily the back end of our business, our systems it's better than $ 10 million companies that I've been around.

[00:07:10] And we've got great systems. We've got great mechanisms. Our big challenge has just been client acquisition, ironically, right, and we're DoorGrow. And so we're going back to what has been working, which is focusing again on websites, especially in downturn markets like this, or where the real estate market isn't doing well,

[00:07:29] lots of people start property management companies. So we did create a startup training for them. So they'd stopped like coming into the industry and screwing it up and making it worse. So we created the ultimate property management startup course material called DoorGrow Foundations. And this is a great tool, and we give it away for like really cheap. It's like 95 bucks flat fee. That's it. We created it just so we could send people somewhere that just couldn't afford to join our programs or do stuff with us, and they can pay extra to get a website and some other things we can give them as well. we're shifting our focus now back to what the market needs. And so I'll be putting out a survey. This is how I get the data and what are they actually wanting to learn? What training are they wanting? What do they want to be exposed to? And we're going to go back to focusing on websites and leads and, you know, those sort of gateway drugs that like bring people to you.

[00:08:21] Right? And we'll see how that works. And I think It's historically worked really well for us. So I imagine we'll have our mastermind will get really nice and full and we'll have a ton of people in it. So I'm excited about that.

[00:08:35] The other thing over the last year on the personal side I've just been going through a lot of growth and, you know, when you're put into trials, tribulations, difficult situations, you're going to have a lot of growth.

[00:08:45] And one of the challenges has been my relationship with my ex wife, which has affected the custody situation with my kids.

[00:08:54] And they were dealing with a lot. It was just a really big mess. And it was a huge amount of stress on me. Huge amount of stress on our business. I don't think my clients realized it, you know, we take good care of our clients, but for me I wasn't able to put as much attention into moving DoorGrow forward, innovating and creating new stuff because I was inundated with dealing with custody situation, trying to get full control of the kids.

[00:09:18] She took off to California for like four months and, you know, the kids were with me full time, which I wasn't used to. That you know, created some stress for Sarah and I. And you know, in the beginning when Sarah came into my life, you know, the kids were going through a lot of pain.

[00:09:34] Because there was a messy divorce. There was a lot of problems in the relationship. It was just a mess. It was hard for the kids because, you know, I really tried to conceal all the challenges and stuff from them, but they didn't realize all what was going on. I have four kids and at least half of them still have no clue of all the stuff, the dark stuff that went on and the challenges that I dealt with.

[00:09:55] But you know, they've had to go through a lot of stuff, and so they weren't very nice, like, to Sarah in the beginning. Any of you that have been a step parent, or in a step, sort of, role, you know, it's the hardest parenting role ever. Period. There's nothing harder. Can you discipline them?

[00:10:10] Can you not? Like, there's not hardwired built in love. You know, it's a difficult thing, and they were hurting, and it was just ugly, right. And it was painful. They were really hard on her and they were disrespectful to me.

[00:10:23] And so it just, you know, it created a difficult scenario. And so it just made things even more difficult coming into this sort of custody situation and trying to get everything handled. The good news, the light at the end of the tunnel is, you know, God always takes care of me and good things have happened.

[00:10:39] She came back to Texas and now we can split time with the kids And she's wanting to get back, you know, and connect with them and get back in their life. And then that takes pressure off me. So I have the kids every other week and can focus on work and takes pressure off my marriage with Sarah and like, so that everything can work out better. So there's this light at the end of the tunnel. So things have shifted. In a way, I didn't even expect it would get this good. Like, and I got all this stuff legally handled the way I wanted.

[00:11:04] So there's a little bit of accountability in place now. And I'm really optimistic and hopeful for the future. And you know, for my ex wife, like she is a great mother, loving mother, and can be a really great, caring person. And so I think that's what the kids need.

[00:11:21] That'd be really good for them. I can give them the tough dad love, the kids need mom's love too. So this is some of the stuff I've been dealing with. And you know, this has caused a lot of growth for me also in the last last several weeks.

[00:11:32] Recently I went to this seminar put on by a group called SATVATOVE, S A T V A T O V E. A guy named David Wolfe he has a really great relationship book and I read the book and it it has some great content in it. It reminded me of this large group awareness training that I did in the past called the impact trainings out of Utah, which really has, you know, shifted my life.

[00:11:53] It was really positive. I think it was born out of est or landmark or some of these sort of large group awareness trainings, but it was a little bit more on the spiritual side. I think, I don't know, but his is more on the emotional side of things. And I went to this seminar and you know, to learn empathy and it's been a really effective thing for my life.

[00:12:12] Like it's really shifted how I communicate even with clients, with my family. I'm just able to connect with people more and my basic need, like in Tony Robbins, like five basic needs love and belonging or love and connection is like my primary, ironically because I don't generally have a lot of friends, I don't have a lot of relationships and you know, I've had a difficult time, you know, even communicating sometimes with my kids, and I just come across as very analytical, very logical in a lot of instances, I'm sure a lot of guys could resonate.

[00:12:42] But I really connected with some of these tools to be able to empathize and to communicate and to reflect back emotion instead of just reflect back what they're saying to really have them be heard. And there's some real power in that. And in going through that, I also got reflected back to me from you know, I was partnered up with somebody at the event to do the exercises.

[00:13:05] And the feedback I got from him was basically that in him hearing my story and some of the stuff I just shared with you all that he's like, "wow, you really care about your family. Like, you know, deeply and you try really hard to take care of everybody." And I just started crying because it wasn't what I was expecting but he was reflecting back the feeling and it really helped me connect with it because I didn't I wasn't seeing it. And I was like, "yeah, that's super true."

[00:13:30] Like I just felt it and I broke down and then he said, "And you don't feel that you're worthy of it in return." And that just gutted me. I started crying like full on just... and I'm trying to keep it together. It's a seminar. There's a group of people. We're doing an exercise.

[00:13:45] Everyone's talking in the room and here I am like, right. So I've really been thinking about that a lot the last several weeks is " What sort of self talk do I have? How am I making myself feel not worthy? Why am I allowing that to be in you know in my space internally? And what does that motivate or drive me to do?" And I realize that event like I'm always in group scenarios, even with clients or with anybody, I'm always wanting to showcase and give so much value. And a lot of it's born out of this insecurity that I'm not going to be loved or I'm not enough.

[00:14:14] And I need to like show them, I need to show them I have some great ideas and there's some important things here. And it's been a real roadblock to me listening and hearing people in some instances, you know, a lot of clients value me giving them ideas, giving them feedback, sharing things with them.

[00:14:30] So it works out okay in some business scenarios, but I've noticed since kind of letting go of that need for self importance in order to kind of be loved or for them to see me as valuable and just recognize I inherently have value and really putting my attention on them and connecting with them and reflecting their feelings and their emotion.

[00:14:50] It's such a richer experience for me to get inside of other people's world and to connect with them. And that empathy has really allowed me to get more of what I actually was craving, which is more of that love and connection. Like I feel so connected to everybody now and I'm really enjoying this. Right. I mean, you can hear the excitement of my voice.

[00:15:08] I'm really enjoying... it's made things deeper in my marriage with Sarah. It's made things deeper in my connection with my kids and helping them feel understood and heard and to allow them to feel. It's been with clients. I just feel like, you know, people don't care what you know, until they know that you care.

[00:15:25] And they, I feel like clients can tell even more that I care. I've always cared, but I'm able to show it in a way that they get it, you know, a lot better. And so I'm really enjoying the results of you know, reflecting back this empathetic communication where I'm showcasing more warmth, empathy, and genuineness.

[00:15:45] And then another part of his book and the seminar was about the difference between these three different types of communication, which are passive, aggressive, and then assertive. And really, there's passive, assertive, and aggressive, is probably how it really should be. Because passive is one extreme, aggressive is another extreme, assertive is the more true path.

[00:16:06] And the difference in passive is it's indirect. There's some pain involved usually. There's some fears involved, there's not direct communication. And we're not really clear in our communication. And aggressive is hurtful and abrasive and doesn't really allow people the space to absorb or hear and comes across too strong, and so we don't get really what we want and we don't communicate effectively what we're trying to communicate. And assertive is you know a much more effective mode of communication.

[00:16:33] So i'm focusing also on avoiding any sort of passive or aggressive communication I'm seeking to be more assertive in my communication and more direct and that also allows me to get more of what I want, you know, from my relationships and from the people I'm talking with in that. And especially if I'm coming from the space of care and I've showcased care.

[00:16:52] So this is kind of my journey and I'm 47 years old as of June 30th. I'm just a couple of days into this 47 years old. And what's wild about that to me is I'm three years away from 50. And if you're watching me on video, I know you're thinking, this guy doesn't look like he's almost 50. I've heard that so much around my birthday.

[00:17:13] Like I hear it every year. And so I don't know, good genes? Maybe it's my mom. I don't know. Maybe it's I'm an optimist eternally and I'm just trying to be positive all the time. I have no idea. But people are always like, "what doctor are you going to? What's your secret?" I don't know. I don't have a secret. But I've really been enjoying connecting with people emotionally, and so I'm grateful. My friend, Tim Francis, here in Austin set up the SATVATOVE event. He's been involved in it for a long time, and I just noticed how he would communicate, especially in difficult situations.

[00:17:43] And he was just so masterful at handling difficult situations with grace and with diplomacy. And, I mean, to the point where I even said, "Tim, where the hell did you learn to talk like this? Like, where did you learn to talk like this?" Like, it's just, it's so impressive to me. And he was like, "Oh, SATVATOVE whatever," I'm like, "whatever that is."

[00:18:02] Right. So eventually he put together a seminar here and said, "this is going to be awesome. Like, come do it." And I'm like, "okay I'm in." And it was amazing things. So I'm grateful to Tim, for my buddy, Tim for doing that. And yeah, we, it allowed us to connect even more and develop a better friendship at the event as well.

[00:18:19] So I appreciate Tim. Appreciate you a lot. Yeah, so I just feel like my relationships have really been deepening. And so, if there's a message to take away from this is that I know that life can be tough. I know you're dealing with stuff and running your business, your business is one of the greatest personal development tools that you have.

[00:18:39] It forces you to recognize some of your shortcomings because the marketplace will reveal it. And it forces you to make changes and you're always having to learn and to evolve. And so you start a business. I think God may trick us into starting a business to make money and eventually, he uses it to turn us into better human beings because he's clever like that. And so, you know, you can't in the long run build a sustainable business in which you are not focused on positive things. Like you have to benefit people in the marketplace. You have to take care of people.

[00:19:11] You have to care about people. Otherwise, if there's a lack of care and a lack of empathy, which " show care" is one of our core values at DoorGrow, then people will recognize that people won't feel it. And I've had past clients that didn't feel care.

[00:19:24] They didn't feel it. Like maybe I was too in my stuff or maybe I was you know, too focused on what I need to do or too stressed or whatever. And I'm sure that I've fallen short in some instances, but that's really why I have my business is I legitimately really enjoy being able to help move people's lives forward.

[00:19:40] And there's nothing more rewarding than that. And that's why I just, I'm so tempted to just lean into the coaching and do the coaching, even though the marketplace wants something else. If I give the market what they're asking for. and help all of you in the way that you think you need initially, then I will get a lot more people that I can help in the way that you really need, which is a passion of mine. And yeah, lot of introspection lately. I also went through a really great book recently called inner work and it to the basic principle of it was that how your consciousness level or your focus or area of consciousness. Whether it's a low level, which is like focused on wounds and hurts from your past and stuff like this, or whether it's very positive and like love and acceptance or somewhere in between your level of consciousness dictates your entire view of the world.

[00:20:27] And it. Makes the whole world seem different, but really it's just you. And so depending and a great example in the book, it was like, you know, related to like debt or loans. Some people's perception of that is like Dave Ramsey style, like it's always evil, it's horrible, whatever. And then there's people that are making millions of dollars because they know how to leverage debt and to get into real estate and to do things effectively, which is smarter than just using their own cash.

[00:20:52] Right. And so. It's just a difference in your perspective and your belief about that. And so by changing your consciousness, it changes everything around you. And so I've really been focused on how can I be in a state of love, be in a state of happiness, be in a state of joy, regardless of what is going on externally and not allow the external to control me or to dictate? Who I am? And so that's been a really interesting perspective as well. And so yeah, i'm excited for this coming year because I think this is going to be a good year for DoorGrow I think it's going to be a good year for our clients. I think it's going to be a good year for my marriage. I think it's going to be good year for the kids.

[00:21:31] I think there's going to be a lot of healing this year. And a lot of positive things moving forward. And so If you've had a tough year, maybe it's been a little tough, or you're in the middle of it right now. It's tough right now. Don't stay there. Like, don't stop. Don't quit. Don't give up. Keep going. You know, there's people counting on you. No one's coming to save you. There are people that if you open up your consciousness, if you change your perspective, there are people that can help you. I would be honored to help you. There's plenty of people out there that are willing to help and willing to serve, especially in property management.

[00:22:04] Go into the DoorGrow club Facebook group, or join any property management, Facebook group. There's tons of people willing to help. You can get to our Facebook group by going to doorgrowclub. com. If for some reason you're listening to this podcast and you're not yet in there, go join the group. We reject 60 to 70 percent of the people that apply to join the group.

[00:22:21] You got to be a business owner. You got to have a property management company or be starting one. If you're a property management entrepreneur, that group's for you. There's other groups that are just for property managers or employees or people in industry or vendors. Like, there's other groups you can go join.

[00:22:35] But for those that are my people, you know, you're entrepreneurs, you're weird like me. You value fulfillment and freedom and contribution and support more than safety and certainty like the rest of the world it's more important to you, then you're an entrepreneur than you're my tribe and come hang out with us in the DoorGrowClub group. For those of you that you're like, "man, I haven't redone my website. He's talking about a website I haven't redone that or taken a fresh look at it in like five years. Your website is ugly, and your website sucks." It's pretty much guaranteed by about the five year mark, it's time trends have changed. It's like fashion. Like it's like wearing, you know, I don't know what's an outdated fashion. It's like wearing bell bottoms or something. I don't know what's out. Maybe that's back and cool, but it's like wearing something that's out of style. And people just look at your business, go, "Oh, they're kind of old. They're kind of outdated. Oh, look at this modern company. They look fresh." And then it's also about whether or not it's focused on conversions. Like, is it focused on helping people get their questions answered and and capturing leads so that you're getting, making money, not just looking pretty. And so if you want to test your website out to see if it's effective in making you money, regardless of how pretty it is, go to DoorGrow, go to a DoorGrow.com/quiz, and you can take our website quiz. And most websites, even brand new ones, usually get a low grade, like a D or an F. So take that quiz and see how good of a grade your website gets. And if it's low, recognize that's a big leak because everything drives towards your website typically, at least online, and people always check out your website when they're trying to get more info about you, even from offline.

[00:24:16] And so that's a big leak. And if you have that leak, I can pretty much guarantee you have probably all the other major leaks that we see in businesses. You might have pricing similar to everybody else, 10 percent some sort of flat fee like 99 bucks, whatever you're priced like all the shittiest companies focused on the shittiest prospects on the internet.

[00:24:37] And so that can be improved. We're able to help clients close more deals more easily at a higher price point using our three tier hybrid pricing model. That we've innovated and I got the original idea shout out to Scott Brady on hybrid. And then I put my own tweak on it based on pricing psychology that I knew.

[00:24:54] And so, adding the three tiers, applying the Goldilocks principle, you know, some of these tactics and it's been really effective for our clients. Your branding might be off. You might be branded as a real estate company. You're like, why would that affect property management? Well, they're different target audiences and there's several other issues.

[00:25:10] And so, take the website quiz, doorgrow.com/quiz, get your website grade, and then you'll be able to set up a call with us and then we can go through and showcase some of the other leaks you might not be seeing. And if we get all these leaks shored up, growth is a lot easier. Like we've had clients just by showing up, those leaks are adding doors.

[00:25:30] And that's it. And they don't need to pay for leads anymore. They like cut off all their cold lead advertising. And then we do have like, six, seven major growth engines that can be installed in your business that are organic and that cost you nothing. And they actually take less time than cold leads would take to follow up on because you have to nurture them and it takes a lot of time to warm them up.

[00:25:49] So we focus on warmer leads. and organic leads. And that's how we're able to help clients grow faster by eliminating the cold lead advertising. So we're cutting down their marketing budgets and then they're spending less money and they're spending less time and they're adding more doors. So we'll help you figure all this out.

[00:26:05] Set up a call to talk with me or somebody on my team, and we'll help you figure this out. And you know, business can be tough. Business can be hard. One of the things that's made it a lot easier for me is I have mentors. I've got people I can reach out to. I just went to an event. It was awesome.

[00:26:20] I went up to Charleston and met with some awesome entrepreneurs and people that are ahead of me. And I just, I love being able to deliver and bring that value back to my clients. And so I'm always investing. And so there's plenty of mentors ideas out there. Just keep learning.

[00:26:35] Don't give up. Don't stop. Keep moving forward. And if I or my team could help you collapse time on your journey and entrepreneurism, just even a little bit, like if we could help you collapse time, even a little bit, you know, towards making more money, more revenue, having more impact, adding more doors, like anything we do will be very worth it.

[00:26:55] That's basically it for today. I hope that all of you maybe found yourself a little bit in my story, in my journey, as me reflecting on my 47 years of life and where I'm at now. And you know, what the future is for DoorGrow. And I'll be honored to help you in your journey as you grow and scale your business.

[00:27:12] And so reach out to us, you can check us out at doorgrow. com and that's it for today until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone

[00:27:19] Jason: you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:27:46] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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At DoorGrow, we teach property management business owners to build referral engines to feed them new owners and doors.

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert sits down with Brandon Barnum, CEO of hoa.com to talk about how property managers can bring on new clients through Raving Referrals.

You’ll Learn [03:21] The 3 Steps to Getting Referrals

[09:52] Automate the Ask

[13:43] Hyper-Local Social Farming

[22:24] Become the Expert

[30:41] Incentivizing Referrals

Tweetables “Most people feel uncomfortable asking for referrals, so they don't get many referrals.”

“The more you ask, the more you get, that's just how it works.”

“By having that team of people that you're recommending, they'll recommend you back as well.”

“Coaching is the breakfast of champions.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Brandon: Most people feel uncomfortable asking for referrals, so they don't get many referrals.

[00:00:04] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:26] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:48] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGroww, and now let's get into the show.

[00:01:13] What's up DoorGrow property managers. A quick disclaimer for this podcast episode. Unfortunately, the first few minutes were cut off by our streaming software. That means we will be jumping right into the meat of the episode, but quick intro for our guest today. Chatting with me in this episode is Brandon Barnum, CEO of HOA.com, the king of referrals, and he is here to talk with me about getting new clients through raving referrals. Enjoy the show.

[00:01:42] I was young, I was in my twenties, and I had two daughters and I was like, "how am I going to take care of them or have time with them if I'm working a standard nine to five job?" Like there's no space for that. And so I was like, "I need something with more flexibility and freedom." And it's funny, you know, they say that this need or maybe pain is the mother of all invention.

[00:02:03] I don't know. But yeah, so I had to figure something out. I can definitely resonate with that. And with daughters, it can be a little tough because I'm like trying to go through airports or take them places and I can't take them into the normal like my bathroom, but I don't want to go in to use the bathroom like without taking them, so I'm like, "do I take them in the men's bathroom with me so I can use the bathroom?"

[00:02:23] Like things have gotten a little bit more easier nowadays, but it was difficult back then. So, Awesome.

[00:02:28] So you exited refer.com and would you still recommend that tool? Are you allowed to say?

[00:02:35] Brandon: You know, it honestly, it has pivoted and the people, the company that bought us out completely shifted.

[00:02:41] So we were a B2B platform to help people build their referral business. And the private equity firm that bought us really bought us for the database. So they've shifted. So it's no longer referral based. In fact, you can't even find refer.com anymore.

[00:02:55] Jason: That's wild. Okay.

[00:02:56] Brandon: Well, they bought it for the community. They bought it for 5 million members and 46 million people in the database. And so they chose a completely different path. They're about, I believe, to exit in their new venture. So. Wow. I wish I could say the tool exists, but it gave us the opportunity to build something similar here at HOA.com.

[00:03:17] Jason: Yeah. Well, okay.

[00:03:19] So we're going to learn the magic trick to get current clients and vendors to refer like clockwork, right? That's the claim. So let's get into this. How does this work?

[00:03:30] Brandon: Well, there's a number of different ways that you can boost your business by referral. And one of the things that we teach is called the art of the ask, right?

[00:03:38] Because one of the things that we know is most people feel uncomfortable asking for referrals, so they don't get many referrals. But there's an easy way, and it's three steps to ask for more referrals and get more referrals. And it's step one is setting the stage. Step two is listening for the referral triggers, and then step three is to A-S-K to G-E-T.

[00:04:00] Okay, so let's unpack that a little bit, Jason. So, when you first have a new client that signs up for your service, what you want to do is at the end of that conversation, before you let them off the phone, off of Zoom, or in person, what you want to do is just say, "Hey, before I let you go. Can I ask you for a favor?"

[00:04:18] Everyone's either going to say "yes," or "maybe tell me more." And then what you want to do is just say, "Hey, we're so committed to giving you a five star experience. And once we do, and you experience our service and we take care of everything for you, and it just runs like clockwork, would it be okay to ask you for referrals?"

[00:04:38] Everybody's going to say yes, because you're not putting them on the spot right now. You're basically saying, "I'll do a great job for you and give you amazing service." Right? So that's step one is setting the stage. Now you're going to get some referrals right then because they're going to be like, "well, now that you mentioned it, I'm in this real estate investor group and I've got three other guys. We were just having this conversation about needing a new property management firm. So let me introduce you to Tom, Bobby and Susie." Right?"

[00:05:04] Jason: Okay. So you ask the step one, you ask for a favor, you express that you're committed to five stars. So that's a nice pre frame, you know, experience, and then you're getting permission to hit them up for that later, basically.

[00:05:19] Brandon: At a later date, right?

[00:05:20] And that's the key because you're not putting them on the spot now, everybody's totally comfortable. You're basically just saying, "I'm going to do a great job."

[00:05:27] Jason: Sure. Yeah, of course. "If you do a good job yeah. I'd be happy to do that for you."

[00:05:32] Brandon: So it's the easy "yes," and you'll pretty much get 100 percent buy in on that, right?

[00:05:36] So that's setting the stage. Now you go into step two, you start serving them and you're listening for the referral triggers. And that's something like, "Oh, thank you so much. You guys did such a great job, right? I just, I love working with you guys." You're listening. For those expressions of appreciation, right?

[00:05:55] And when you hear that, that means that somebody is in a peak referral state because they just recognize that you're doing a great job and they've expressed their appreciation for you. And that's when it's time to ask for referrals. And the way you do that is say, "I'm so glad to hear that. We love helping investors like you manage their properties and we're looking to take on a few more clients. So remember at the beginning we started working together, I told you we were going to deliver five star service. Well now that you know what our service is like, I'd love to see if there's any other investors you know that we can help."

[00:06:31] Jason: Yeah, this is really funny. It's like eerily odd to me because we use a very similar framework at DoorGrow for getting reviews from clients. And I like the idea though of the pre frame and setting the stage early on. So our formula for getting reviews is we like, identify peak happiness, which usually in property management is like when the tenant is placed. And then we reach out at peak happiness and then we first showcase the invisible.

[00:07:00] So we highlight everything we've done for them. So, "Oh, we've got your tenant placed. We got the rent check collected. It should be hitting your bank account right about now." Like all this kind of stuff. Then asking, "how do you feel we've done?" Which is a loaded question because you've just pointed out all the good that they couldn't see.

[00:07:15] And so, and then they're like, "Oh, you're great." So we're kind of intentionally making them say that, right? And so they're like, "Oh yeah, you guys have been amazing." "Oh, we love hearing that. Would you be willing to share that feedback online?" So brilliant. Brilliant. Yeah. So very similar. I've never even thought about just applying it to referrals, so this is great. I love this.

[00:07:34] Brandon: And Jason also you can ask the question too, "how would you rate us on a scale of one to 10?" Oh yeah. "How good are we doing for you right now?" Yeah, right. And the net promoter score says if you get an eight, nine or 10, then it's time to ask, we always recommend if it's less than a 10, you want to ask, "well, what would make it a 10?"

[00:07:52] Right? If it's a nine or an eight, "how can we get to a 10 for you? We're so committed to delivering exceptional service and excellence to you. What would get us there?" And if they say an eight or a nine, "I'm so glad to hear that. We love helping people like you manage your doors." Yeah. So there you go.

[00:08:08] Jason: Very clever. I like that. Okay. So what was your step three? It was some sort of acronym?

[00:08:14] Brandon: Step three is A-S-K to G-E-T. Now that's how it was taught to me. It's ask to get, it's a little different way of remembering it. And like my kids know. A-S-K to G-E-T. I pounded it in their heads and they're not afraid to ask for what they want.

[00:08:30] But it was taught to me by my mentor, Mark Victor Hansen. He wrote those chicken soup for the soul books, and that's the way he taught me the art of the ask years ago, 20 years ago.

[00:08:39] Yeah.

[00:08:40] Jason: Okay. Got it. Okay. So it's not an acronym. It's just spelling it out. So you can remember it. Cool. I'm like, "this is going to be something really clever!"

[00:08:49] It's just like ask to get, yeah, it's so simple. We don't ask often enough. Right. Okay.

[00:08:54] Brandon: So the more you ask, the more you get, that's just how it works.

[00:08:57] Jason: Now, this is kind of a system that you can build into the business, right? Like that's what we teach referrals, like build this mechanism. And so we create this open loop, like "would you be willing to give us feedback online?"

[00:09:09] "Yes. Oh, I'd be happy to do that. Awesome. We would really appreciate that. Let me send you a link to make this easier for you. And I know you're really busy, but would it be cool if I followed up in a week if I don't see something come through? Would that be okay?" And they're like, "yeah." So then they're in this endless loop where you continually follow up.

[00:09:26] "Hey, you know, you had mentioned that you'd maybe take some time to do this and notice, hadn't seen anything come through. I know you're really busy. Would you be willing to give us feedback online?" And we just keep this and we work at like a sales process. Like it's a pipeline until we get them to either do it or give them an out and say, "you know what, if you don't want to do it, it's totally cool. We appreciate your business." "No, I'll do it." Takeaway. So anyway, there's got to be more to it than this. Is that, or is it just simple?

[00:09:51] Brandon: That's one of the strategies. So the next thing we want to do is we want to automate the ask, right? So first we talk about how to get more referrals just in your regular conversations, and we give people a framework to make it easy for them and comfortable for the clients.

[00:10:06] Now let's take that same strategy and let's automate the ask. How do we do that? We integrate similar types of questions into our invoices, our email signature. If you're doing a newsletter, you can incorporate a section around that. I recommend that one of the things you consider doing is to incentivize people.

[00:10:27] The best way to motivate is to compensate. Well, you don't necessarily have to pay out cash like in an affiliate program or what we call referral rewards, but you may choose to. At the very least, what you want to do is have some sort of way to incentivize and reward those that send you business. So maybe it is for every new client you refer us, we're going to give you one free months of service or three months of service, whatever's right for your business model. You got to understand your lifetime client value. You need to understand your customer acquisition costs. And Jason, I'm sure these are things that you're teaching your guys. So I don't think we have to dig deep into those, but it's really about creating the mechanism so that your system is doing the asking for you, right?

[00:11:15] All of your automations have integrated referrals. If you're doing mailers and statements, you can simply put those requests as a footer, if you will, in your statements, and that way your system is constantly doing the asking and reminding people that you appreciate their referrals.

[00:11:33] Jason: So, what would be an example of what might be at the bottom of an invoice or at the bottom of an email?

[00:11:38] Like, like something like, "we don't hate referrals, do you know anyone?" I'm joking, but what would you typically put?

[00:11:45] Brandon: Yeah. I mean, you can do something as simple as "we love referrals," right? "The greatest gift you can give us is to refer someone who cares." It's really about your personality and your brand, right?

[00:11:56] So there's some standard language that you can use. "We love referrals. If you know anyone who is a fit for us, an investor looking for us to take over and provide five star service, we're here for them." And then again, if you're rewarding them, then you integrate your incentive into the ask.

[00:12:15] Jason: Okay. I love this.

[00:12:17] Again with our reputation secrets for reviews we also teach like identify all the touch points that you have with your customer And figure out where you can add in some sort of link or direction to get reviews. So I'm starting to think maybe I should take a look at everything that I teach for reviews and figure out how do I turn this into referrals?

[00:12:37] Brandon: It sounds like it's the same, Jason. I mean, everything that you're teaching is right on point. Now, just add that referral request into what you're doing. Now you've got the ratings, reviews and the referrals. You've got two different ways to ask for similar things that are both going to add to more business.

[00:12:53] Jason: Wow. Yeah, definitely. But the referral thing is a lot more direct, right? Let's get an actual lead. Let's get connected. And instead of, you know, looking good online and waiting for traffic flow in. It's definitely more direct. So I'm liking this. So, okay. Automate the ask.

[00:13:08] I'm guessing you have more points.

[00:13:10] Brandon: Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So many different things that you can do. One of the things that we teach is to become the expert, right? Become recognized as an expert. Now, many of your guys are probably already going to real estate investor groups. What are they teaching and training at real estate investor groups, right?

[00:13:27] Yeah, part of the reason that you are where you are is because you are establishing your expert authority by having this call this group, right? You have elevated your status in the industry and that's what everybody that's listening should be doing too. We teach a concept called hyper local social farming, right?

[00:13:47] If you think about the best realtors out there, they farm local communities. That's what they call it. They call it farming. And what that means is they're sending postcards to every homeowner in a specific neighborhood or HOA, and they do it regularly consistently because that consistency creates comfort and trust, right? So they become known as that top agent in that area. Well, we do that at HOA.com. It's part of our marketing platform that we've built, but we teach the strategy and I think it applies even to property managers, right? Number one, you can farm lists and I'm sure your guys are getting lists of non owner occupied properties and then doing direct mail and outreach.

[00:14:34] to the investors, especially if you see that they have multiple properties that they own. Right? We have all that homeowner data at hoa.com. And so that's one of the things that we do too. But if you farm the communities and work specific areas, then what happens is you start to get the referrals from all the people that know each other in that area.

[00:14:55] Or in that, that market, right? Because sometimes you're doing it down to the local area and other times you're working spheres of influence, if you will. Right. And so one of the other things that we teach is to teach others. When you establish that expert authority by teaching real estate investor groups, right?

[00:15:15] Go partner with not only the real estate investor groups, but also the realtors in the area offer a course for investors into the specific real estate branch. We've just done this actually with raving referrals. So we created a raving referrals CE course, continuing education course for realtors. And now what we're doing is we're having different mortgage lenders, business coaches, and other professionals are becoming the certified trainer. And the beauty is, like I was just talking to the partner manager for REMAX yesterday. She manages all of North America. They've got about 80, 000 agents. Well, I thought we were primarily having an HOA conversation, which we were.

[00:15:58] But when she found out that we had this CE course, her eyes and ears just lit up because their agents always need great content to grow their business. So somebody that is standing on stage and we help fill the audience, but somebody that's standing on stage delivering that content elevates their expert authority.

[00:16:18] And now everybody wants to do business with them because they're seen as the expert they are.

[00:16:23] Jason: This is funny. So one of the strategies we give our clients, we have a course called the 411 on leasing that one of my clients I coached in the past kind of shared with us and we've kind of cleaned it up and we have our clients go and get this approved as a CE credit and here's this course on leasing that scares the shit out of real estate agents in handling leases because the number one source of complaints at any real estate office or any board of realtors, I mean, is usually property management related, not real estate related. And so they teach this class that basically scares the shit out of them and handling their own leases. And so then they just start referring the business to the teacher of class. So I love this idea. So they're teaching the CE course for realtors related to referrals.

[00:17:07] Brandon: Yeah. And what we teach is for the trainer, whoever it is, typically we focus on mortgage lenders and business coaches because they want to be in front of rooms full of realtors, but it works for a property manager too, right? You can become a trainer, go give a course. What we do is we partner with the title companies because as you know, the title companies exist to help realtors win more business, and they do that by providing training and tools, right? Technology to help them win. So we provide the title company with great content that is drawing their agents in and helping their realtors expand their business.

[00:17:47] Because what we're doing is we're teaching the realtors how to formalize and activate their referral network. What we know about Realtors is they give a ton of referrals out and they don't get many back. And so if you want to win more business from Realtors, give more business to realtors, promote them, right?

[00:18:06] And then the property management company, that's easy to do. It doesn't take much. You could have your list of five or 10 agents. They can specialize in different aspects of the industry. Maybe some are first time homers, some are luxury, some are Airbnb short term rentals, but by having that team of people that you're recommending, they'll recommend you back as well.

[00:18:29] Jason: Yeah, that's great. I love it. All right, Brandon. I just want to milk all these ideas out of you. Like keep sharing because this is cool.

[00:18:37] Brandon: So next phase then is we've talked about activating the Realtors net network, right? How do we do that? We actually sit down with them. We teach something we call the referral partner blueprint.

[00:18:49] And if you go to HOA. com slash blueprint, you can download this. It's a PDF document. But it basically walked you through all the different ways to create your referral team. You're what we call your trusted team. Now property managers have vendors that you use all of the time. And my question to you is you're referring business to those vendors.

[00:19:11] Are those vendors referring you back?

[00:19:14] Jason: Yeah, it's a great strategy. We definitely have our clients focus on like vendors are great source of referrals. They know the bad landlords out there that they're doing jobs for. They know what it's like to deal with them and to not get paid. They would much rather have a property manager that they're dealing with.

[00:19:29] That's good. Yeah, for sure.

[00:19:31] Brandon: Yeah. And they're in a perfect position. If they get hired by an investor to go work on a non owner occupied property, they're in a conversation, a dialogue anyway. And they can say, "by the way, have you ever considered hiring a professional property management company? So you don't have to come out here at 2 a. m. and, you know, address an emergency with one of your renters?" So being in partnership with them is key. We help the realtors formalize and activate their referral partnerships. Again, they give a ton out. They don't get many back at HOA. com. We've actually built a co marketing engine and it's all automated.

[00:20:08] And so what happens is a realtor, after they come on board, they'll create their profile, and then they invite their trusted team. And on their profile, they get to feature the people that they know I can trust and recommend. So their mortgage lender, insurance agent, their painter, their plumber, their home inspector, property manager, their trusted team.

[00:20:29] And what we do once those people join their network is the realtor also uploads their homeowner database. And then what we do is every month we send. An automated home safe report to the homeowners in their database from the agent or the pro to those homeowners and what it does is it gives the homeowner a monthly valuation report.

[00:20:52] "Hey, your property has gone up by $4000. It's now worth $512, 000, right? Might be a good time to sell," and we include the estimated rental value of that property as well. The reason we're doing that is we want to help people find the resources that they need and they may see that, "wow, I could rent this house for $4, 000."

[00:21:16] It might be time to make a move, right? So we want to stimulate that activity, but the home safe report, it goes out from the realtor featuring all of the vendors that they know, like, and trust and recommend, and the beauty is we do the same thing for everyone else. So the insurance agent is promoting the realtor to all of their clients.

[00:21:38] The mortgage lender is promoting the realtor or the property manager. We help everybody work together as a team and automate the co marketing so that they're expanding the number of people that they get their message to. And everybody's recommending everyone else because a client for one can be a client for everyone.

[00:21:58] Yeah. Nice.

[00:22:00] Jason: That is very strategic. I love it. So yeah, very clever. Cool. And I just got your guide. Like I put it in it's up on my screen. Super fast. And I'm looking at it here. Yeah, this follows a lot of the strategies that we leverage in getting our clients to get clients.

[00:22:16] So this is really interesting, but I like the idea of the cross promotional campaigns and stuff like that. So. Very cool.

[00:22:23] Brandon: Yeah, you know, we started this company as the Homeowner Alliance and our original vision was to create like the BNI power team of professionals who serve homeowners, because there's nobody that's done that, right?

[00:22:34] There is no referral network exclusively for pros who serve homeowners. So five years ago, we set out to create that. We actually started as the homeowneralliance. com. That was our URL and we were able to acquire hoa. com. Right. Home owner Alliance. We need to do shorter brand. But what we know is that people that are in this space do a ton of business together, but most of them don't have any systems about how to cross refer and cross marketing like BNI is great.

[00:23:07] But once you leave the BNI meeting, then what?

[00:23:09] Jason: Yeah, I would say BNI is not that great. That's the feedback I've heard from so many people. Sorry, BNI. But the challenge is our property management clients will go there hoping to get a bunch of referrals. And what ends up happening is they have maybe one person there that could potentially be a client.

[00:23:27] Maybe and they have maybe one person there that actually could connect them to something that's relevant or they might not and so they just they spend a lot of time investing in this with getting very little yield. There's better groups that you could either curate or be a part of or join, I think, that would yield a much bigger result, but that's my opinion.

[00:23:45] Brandon: Yeah, and I agree, and I think it's industry specific, right? There are some industries that really thrive in BNI, and there's others that don't. Yeah. But the concept Is sound, right? The concept is let's build a trusted team of the people that we're cross referring my challenge with...

[00:24:02] Jason: your team, like the team that all like property managers are already connected to like property managers have accountants.

[00:24:09] They're connected to lenders. They're connected to title companies. They're connected. They're connected to all sorts of vendors, like every housing related vendor there is, right? And they, and that's part of Building a property management business. You have to build a network and a team.

[00:24:21] And so you might as well create that alliance strategically to facilitate that. So HOA. com on the surface, if people are assuming it's just related to association management would be probably a misnomer. That's probably not accurate, right? It sounds like you can help with facilitating some of this stuff happening that we're talking about.

[00:24:43] Brandon: Yeah. We've really built a referral partner platform. That's what is at the core and what drives HOA. com. Again, we set out to create a platform to connect homeowners to professionals they can trust. Now we acquired the hoa. com domain after the fact, but that's our mission is to really connect homeowners in local communities with professionals they can trust.

[00:25:06] And part of the way that we do that from an automation and a marketing perspective is we help people create their trusted teams, cross refer Cross market together. We automate that process. So it's easy, but we're creating community pages for every neighborhood in America, whether it's an HOA or not.

[00:25:26] Jason: Yeah. And then we select top trusted pros that become the recommended property manager of that community the recommended realtor mortgage lender painter plumber And so we choose kind of like the bni concept. We're a community maker, but thank you.

[00:25:40] You're picking the kings of the champions for each, role in this community.

[00:25:45] So okay, I love it. So, what's the process for a property manager to be one of those kings or queens of their local market in HOA. com. And how do you select them or how do they seduce you and get your attention?

[00:26:00] Brandon: They go to HOA. com up at the top, right? You're going to see a button that says, "become a pro." They're going to fill out that application.

[00:26:07] We do background checks on people. We want to much like you said, before we jumped on the show, right? You don't allow everybody in, you only allow about 30 percent of people. If I heard you correctly. That want to be part of your Facebook group. Yeah, we take a similar approach, right? We're interested in quality over quantity and our reputation is at stake.

[00:26:28] So we do background checks. We're going to check you out on social media. We're going to see what you're saying, who you are, make sure that our values are aligned. We don't just choose to do business with anyone and then we're going to make sure that you've got plenty of ratings and reviews that you got the experience and the expertise to take care of people.

[00:26:46] So once that is complete and then you're approved, then you're on the platform and you basically create a profile. You invite your trusted team. You have the opportunity of claiming communities where you become the exclusive property manager for that HOA or master plan development. And that way you get remarketed to all those folks.

[00:27:07] And then you have the opportunity to upload your homeowner database. So that every month they're getting a message and email from you with the value of their home. And then that home safe report has everything about their property in one location. Our goal is to be like Carfax for your home, but they're going to see all the square footage and you know, legal description, their mortgage information.

[00:27:31] They're going to see a complete list of the sales transactions on that property. And then they're going to see a section, which is the trusted team, the recommended. providers, professionals that serve that community. And then they're also going to see local events. What's happening in your area. And ultimately, our goal is to create unity through community.

[00:27:55] We want to connect people in the local neighborhoods so that they really get to know their neighbors and feel connected.

[00:28:02] Jason: I think that's super important nowadays because, you know, we've traded largely social networks for social media. And so we've lost the network. We've lost the connection in a lot of instances.

[00:28:17] And. You know, it's been proven that the more time people spend on social media, the more disconnected, the more depressed they feel. And these really are psychological engines for stealing attention from us by leveraging dopamine and And it's extracting money from our wallets. And so either you use social media or it uses you.

[00:28:38] And my daughter makes all of our social media posts, all my posts. Like I don't know where you really post anything, but she knows my voice. She knows how to write things the way that I would. And it's on my podcast. So she knows that. And so that allows me to use social media without using me as much, but I think everybody gets a little bit sucked in if they even have it on their phone.

[00:28:58] Right. So, I love the idea of creating more connection and more community. So, for the random person listening to this that's not a property manager for some reason. Right. But they're just like, "man, I really am craving community." What could they do to be more connected to leveraging HOA. com?

[00:29:18] Brandon: Yeah. Well, so if they're a professional, they can sign up as a pro.

[00:29:20] And one of the things that we do is we have a number of community impact events. Because part of the way that we bring people together is we give them a blueprint of how to host an event. You know, we do things like ice cream socials for the whole community, right? Or a watermelon eating contest. We do things like that, right?

[00:29:39] Just fun stuff that bring people together and create a reason for families to come out and really build community within their HOA or neighborhood. So we provide all these guides to our pros, because again, some of the realtors, some of the property managers, they like to host events. And what's interesting is more often than not, when one of our pros approaches an HOA about doing a community impact event, the HOA gets behind it and they even promote it to all of the neighbors in their.

[00:30:11] HOA because they don't typically have those types of events going on. Some do, but many don't. And so when, you know, a neighbor or a pro offers to do something for the neighborhood, they want to spread the word and get it out there. So what you're going to find is most HOAs will get behind it, especially if it's good for the community.

[00:30:31] Jason: Sounds great. So yeah, maybe I should somehow get my HOA that I'm living in to do some of these things. All right. So Brandon, is there anything we missed in how to really get referrals going for maybe property managers or those listening.

[00:30:50] Brandon: Yeah, I think you've got to be intentional. You've got to have a plan what we recommend is that people start by doing a self assessment.

[00:30:58] We have a referral score quiz. There are 10 Best practices when it comes to getting more referrals. And what we find is most often people have a couple of blind spots. There's a couple of things that they've never thought of before. And I'll give you one example. I had a mortgage company back in the early 2000s.

[00:31:17] And I had this client come to me one day and he had referred me a client. And he calls me about two months later and he says, "Hey, I just want to know what happened with Mike Johnson." And I'm like, "Oh, great to hear from you. Amazing. We just helped Mike do his refinance two weeks ago and he closed on his transaction."

[00:31:34] And then there was this awkward pause and he comes back and he says, "do you mind if I give you a little coaching?" And I said, "absolutely." You know, coaching is the breakfast of champions. And he says, "number one, it's a really good idea to thank people when they give you a referral," and I'm like, "Oh my gosh, how did I not?

[00:31:54] How did I miss it? This guy was a VP for Intel. He had given me a number of referrals and I just hadn't even been aware to think about thanking the guy who was giving me this. Oh, I felt like just a capital L on my forehead. Right? The second thing he says is "it's also a really good idea to update people when they do give you a referral" and I'm like "doing! I'm an idiot!" Right?

[00:32:21] And so what I did at that point, I had a mortgage company. I had 30 loan officers that were working for me. I printed up referral thank you cards. And they literally said, "thank you for referring." And there was a blank line and my people could write in the name of the client, quickly stick that in an envelope and send it out to the client to thank them for giving referrals, but if you're not thinking about it, then you're missing out. And that's one of the ways that you really build those relationships where people refer you on a regular basis because the trust goes up, especially if you update them on what happens, right? "Hey, thanks so much for referring Susie Smith."

[00:32:59] She ended up becoming a client. We're now helping her with her properties and so grateful. And then you can either give them a gift. Starbucks card, movie card, whatever the case may be to reward them and give them that dopamine hit. So they want to do it again, right?

[00:33:16] Jason: Right, yeah, it's all about motivating them to do it again.

[00:33:19] There's the idea you had mentioned before to incentivize, which is to throw money at them, right? But sometimes what really means even more to people is recognition. Like on disc assessments, for example, they have an economic score and most people's economic score is low.

[00:33:33] Now this is B2B business owners. Economic score is generally high for most entrepreneurs and business owners and for salespeople. So realtors for sure. Generally everyone besides entrepreneurs and salespeople have a low economic score and which means they are recognition motivated. And so it's the gesture of doing something to show recognition.

[00:33:54] Everybody likes recognition. Some people like money more, but if you do both, yes, then you're going to create a really solid incentive for these people.

[00:34:03] Brandon: How do you recommend that people recognize those that give them a referral? Do you have a system for that?

[00:34:08] Jason: I mean, I think the things that you mentioned are pretty solid, like a thank you card or something, but I think more. Depth is where magic happens. And so the deeper right so sending a card, that's nice, right? And that's a little deeper than an email, right? But the greatest depth would be "hey, let me take you out to lunch I really want you to know that I appreciate it," and looking them in the eye and expressing it would be the greatest step because there's more human connection and people like we mentioned before crave this nowadays and they will remember that forever. You know, I got chills just saying all that.

[00:34:42] Brandon: Oh, I like it. Yeah. You know, one of the things we recommend too, is you give them a shout out on social media, right? I mean, you were just talking about the power of social media and here's why I love this strategy. When you recognize a referrer on social media, "Hey, I just wanted to give a shout out to Bob Williams, right? Bob recently referred over this client and we were able to help them with 10 of their clients. Properties. And we're so excited to be working with them. They're awesome people. So thanks again." Right. What are you doing there? Number one, you're feeding that, that dopamine hit right, of giving them that recognition.

[00:35:18] You're doing it publicly by praising them. They're also going to tap into their relationships because birds of a feather flock together and that investor often will know others or that person will often know others who are investors as well. And you've also created social proof at the same time, right?

[00:35:39] Somebody is trusting you enough to give you referrals. That social proof is good for you and for them. So if you can praise them on social media, if you do a newsletter, you can incorporate that. I started doing that back in 1997, right?

[00:35:55] Where I did a week newsletter update on interest rates. I was in the mortgage business, but every week. I would include the people and thank the people that had referred me business. And what that did is it started to communicate and it was typically realtors, right? And what happened is other realtors would see that if they would be on my newsletter list and they're like, "Oh, Norma Reardon is sending business to Brandon. I've done business with her. She's high quality. If she trusts Brandon, I can too."

[00:36:25] Jason: Ooh, that is a clever, backwards evidence of social proof right there. That I love, that's clever. Yeah. Smart. Yeah. I like it. You've got a lot of ideas.

[00:36:36] Brandon: There's a few of them. You can pick up the book, Raving Referrals. Most of them are in this book. We haven't done one specifically for property managers. We need to think about that, Jason. We've got raving referrals for dentists, raving referrals for mortgage pros, and we're working on raving referrals for real estate agents right now.

[00:36:54] Jason: Hey, you want to coauthor a book? Let's get together and have that conversation... magic happen. So, yeah, and I think there's some cool stuff we could do together to do some referral magic. So, very cool. Well, before we wrap up anything else that you want to add, share, how can people get in touch with you? You know, anything you want to say about HOA.

[00:37:14] com. This is your guy.

[00:37:16] Brandon: So best way to get in touch with me is at BrandonBarnum.Com. I'm sure you'll put that in the show notes on BrandonBarnum.Com. You can get the referral partner blueprint. So there's a link to download that. You can take the referral score quiz. That'll take you one to two minutes.

[00:37:33] You'll rate yourself on the scale of one to 10 on the 10 best practices. And I guarantee. There's a couple of blind spots that are going to help you. The other thing you just mentioned, disc, this is a magic trick. This is called bank code, and this is a personality system that we teach. It helps you close more sales in less time and we did a research study to find out the impact of customizing your conversations and presentations for realtors on their listing conversions. And on average they increased their listing conversions by 123%. So more than doubled their closing ratio on listing conversions by understanding the personality style of the people that you're serving and selling and by customizing your conversation to the style that their brain makes buying decisions will help you close more sales in less time.

[00:38:31] And you can take that bank code assessment. It's free. It'll take you 60 seconds and you can do that on brandonbarnum. com as well.

[00:38:39] Jason: Cool. All right. I will definitely check it out. All right, Brandon. Grateful to have you on the show. This was a pleasure. Appreciate it. And I think we'll definitely be connecting after the show.

[00:38:50] So, all right. I love it. Thanks for having me, Jason. Appreciate it. Thanks for being here. So property managers, if you are a property management entrepreneur and you're struggling to add doors, you're adding plenty of doors, but you're struggling to figure out operations and you want to get your business to be what I call infinitely scalable, where you can continually add doors and stop stopping your momentum and break that hundred or thousand door barrier and hit your goals and achieve your dreams then reach out to us at DoorGrow We are helping people do this every day. This is what we do and we're confident that we can help you do it If you are positive and if you're active and willing to take action, we can help you get there.

[00:39:27] So reach out to us at doorgrow. com and until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:39:32] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:39:59] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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A lot of the property managers we talk to who want to grow say the same thing, “I just need more leads.”

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss the 6 major leaks that property managers can have in their sales pipeline and why they don’t just “need more leads.”

You’ll Learn [06:22] 1. Positioning

[10:14] 2. Perception

[11:19] 3. Presence

[15:30] 4. Pricing

[18:18] 5. Purpose

[20:24] 6. Pitch

Tweetables “Does it make sense to turn on the hose full blast if there's all these leaks?”

“People want to work with a specialist. They don't want to turn over their biggest assets ever and their financial future to somebody that's dabbling in property management.”

“If your reviews are good, it backs up everything that you say in your sales pitch.”

“Are you clear on your personal motivations for why you have this business beyond just getting money?”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: Get these things dialed in and shored up and what you'll find is: you may not need nearly as many leads.

[00:00:05] You won't have to spend nearly as much money on advertising or any money.

[00:00:12] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently than you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:32] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:54] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGroww, and now let's get into the show.

[00:01:19] Sarah: We wore DoorGrow colors today.

[00:01:20] Jason: Oh, we did. For those

[00:01:22] that can see us. We're wearing DoorGrow colors. It's not on purpose. Yeah. Green and blue. All right.

[00:01:27] Sarah: I wanted something easy. It was like, let me get a comfortable dress that looks nice, but it's comfortable. Ladies know what I'm talking about.

[00:01:34] They're like, "yeah, those are awesome. That's this."

[00:01:37] Jason: Okay. It's good to know. So we were talking about what we should talk about today. And one of the things that I've been doing on sales calls in conversations with potential clients is taking them through a diagnosis and diagnosing the front end sales pipeline of their business.

[00:01:56] The challenge is a lot of people come to us that want to grow. We're called DoorGrow. So we certainly can help with that. We've been doing that for a long time. One of the things we've noticed though, is that a lot of times people think, "I just need more leads." They just think they need more leads. And some of you are just going to be listening to this, so I'm not going to do a drawing, I'm going to explain what I would usually draw, but I usually draw like a spigot, or a faucet, or whatever you call it, and a hose attached to this, and this long hose, and then a like a plant pot at the end of this hose that you're trying to water a little tree or something.

[00:02:30] And I usually put fruit on it because that's your business and you want to get something from it. Like you want it to bear fruit, like make you money or something. Right. And so we've got this tree we want to grow and we've got this pipeline. This is our sales pipeline, this hose. And we think we just need to turn on more water.

[00:02:46] Right. It seems to make sense. What I've realized though, over time is we used to do lead generation for property managers. Like that was like a offering that we had, a core offering that we had for our clients. So we would help them just turn on the hose, like full blast. We'd help them turn that on and they wouldn't be able to get business.

[00:03:05] They wouldn't be able to get enough water to grow their business. Like it wasn't working and it wasn't the leads. It wasn't the lead generation necessarily. It was the hose. They had like all these major leaks that were preventing it. So over time, I started to see like, they'd be like, "well, it's not working."

[00:03:19] I'm like, "well, you're not even answering your phone," or "you're waiting 24 hours before responding to a lead. And it's only good for like 15 minutes." And there was just all these leaks and problems. And there were some bigger, more macro level problems in their sales pipeline.

[00:03:32] Like their pricing was terrible, so it was off. Or their branding was off. And so people were like, "well, yeah, but they look like a real estate company," or their website was awful and it would send traffic to their website and it was just leaking money. And so the fluid, if you will, that flows through the pipeline.

[00:03:51] Is five currencies, time, energy, focus, cash, and effort. These are what you have to invest. And if you're shelling out a bunch of money, time, energy, focus, all of these things, right into the pipeline because you're just turning it on full blast, it's just going to leak out and you're just wasting all of that.

[00:04:09] You're wasting time. You're wasting money. You're wasting your energy. Right. And it, and a lot of businesses are like, "I just need more leads." So I call this the leads myth. And so we found it to be effective is to start looking at the business and if they come to us saying, "Hey, we want to grow."

[00:04:24] "Okay. How would you like us to help?" They're like, "we need more leads."

[00:04:27] "okay, you may need more leads, but first, does it make sense to turn on the hose full blast if there's all these leaks?"

[00:04:34] "What leaks?" Right?

[00:04:35] "Okay, well, let's take a look at your business and see if you have any of these." So we thought today we would get into some of these leaks so you can self assess and figure out, all right, how's my business doing?

[00:04:43] We're going to do the quick, super fast version of this. And I recommend you set up a longer call with our team so we can go through this. Okay?

[00:04:52] Sarah: Oh, or if you want the short, shorter version and you're like, "Hey, I want to see it. It's visual." then go to YouTube on our YouTube channel. We have a video that we created about this and our hose just died and like, I think it froze over the winter and we went to go turn it on and everything was leaking. So then we were like, "Oh, Well, before we throw the hose away let's make a video because this is what we talk about all the time."

[00:05:16] Yeah. So we did make a video. So if you want to visually see this and watch Jason get water everywhere and make a big mess, then watch a video.

[00:05:25] Jason: It's pretty goofy. So if you wanna laugh at me or make fun of me, that'd be a good one to watch. So just go to youtube.com/doorgrow and go to the playlists that we have and then go to funny videos and I'm sure you'll enjoy laughing at me and Sarah laugh at ourselves, especially.

[00:05:44] All right. So let's chat about this, these leaks. So these are some of the things that may be preventing you from closing as many deals, and you may have plenty of leads, but you may not be closing as many as you could be. And so these are some of the leaks. So, there's six major leaks that we focus on in our Rapid Revamp class, and if you're interested in this class where we help you shore up all of these leaks so that you can more easily grow more quickly without even changing whatever lead generation stuff that you're already doing or what's working, this will increase the output of what makes it through the hose and to grow your business Okay, so the first leak at the very beginning, and these are all blind spots the most businesses have is Positioning and so in positioning, we focus on the brand branding And so what are some of the things related to branding?

[00:06:37] Sarah: Well, the big one that we see a lot, and we did a video about this too is what is the name of your company? Is it something "real estate, realty, properties, investments, assets, solutions," things like that. So if any of those is how your brand name ends. then that could be a very potential big issue in your branding.

[00:07:05] And you could be turning people off before they even decide to have a conversation with you.

[00:07:10] Jason: Yeah. People want to work with a specialist. They don't want to turn over their biggest assets ever and their financial future to somebody that's dabbling in property management but is primarily focused on real estate.

[00:07:21] So if you have realty real estate in your name, for example, you have a significant leak here. So if a hundred percent flow through would be the ideal, you have maybe a 50% right at this stage. There's this there's loss. Is your name generic to the location? For example, you're Phoenix Property Management in Phoenix.

[00:07:39] Or is it generic to the industry like property management inc? Sorry guys. Or real property management, right? These things are really difficult to remember right generic names. And that hurts word of mouth and it hurts people telling people about your business and all that kind of stuff, right?

[00:07:55] So is it unclear that it's property management? Like Sarah mentioned, like maybe we're "Prestige Properties or Radiant Rentals." Radient Rentals, "oh, do you do bouncy houses and like chairs and stuff for weddings?" Right. So there might be confusion there in the marketplace, or do you have a overly common name? Could be a problem. Like lighthouse, just Google lighthouse property management, and there's like a bazillion companies all over the place that want to be a lighthouse.

[00:08:19] And so they all get mixed up and confused, right? Because property management is a kind of a global competition. Even if it's only focused on a local market, right? You're getting investors from overseas sometimes you're getting investors from out of state. And so if they're trying to find you, "Oh, well, they said their name's light- oh man. There's a lot of lighthouse. I don't know." Right. And these are just some of the challenges with branding that we teach in our branding secrets and helping clean that up.

[00:08:45] Sarah: Yeah. And one of the worst things is if they're looking for you and then they find a competitor instead, or they find the same or a very similar named company, but they're nowhere near your market.

[00:08:59] Because then what happens is you're now connected to this other company. Even if you're like, "well, I'm in Tennessee and this other company, yeah, but they're in like Nevada." Well, Oh, okay. You would think the distance alone would be enough to separate the two, however, we have to remember that sometimes people make mistakes and sometimes people don't read, right?

[00:09:22] So if an angry tenant from that other company is like so fuming and they get on and they're like, "I am leaving a horrible review" and it hits your company just because you have a similar name and they didn't bother to read. Now we have issues.

[00:09:36] Jason: And there's lots of other challenges. You could have your name, like some clever misspelled name, like a barbershop called haircutz with a Z.

[00:09:43] Sarah: Like my biggest pet peeve.

[00:09:44] Jason: Like there's lots of ways you can screw up branding.

[00:09:47] Sarah: Spell things correctly. Don't get cute.

[00:09:49] Jason: Or acronyms. Acronyms aren't super effective. Like PMI. Sorry guys. All right. So let's go to the second leak. So give yourself a rating on that. Like just a quick judgment, like on a scale of zero to a hundred, how effective is your brand in being memorable and in word of mouth and whatnot?

[00:10:07] So maybe it's 50%. Maybe it's totally off in the category. Maybe it's worse. Maybe it's like 20, 30%. Next perception. This is reputation. How are you perceived online? What are your ratings maybe on Yelp, on Google, on Facebook? How many reviews do you have in relation to your competition? And what is your rating? So quantity diversity, do you have reviews on lots of channels? How do you compare to your competition in your local market? Because people are going to check you out. They're going to judge you. And if your reviews are bad, even if everything else you do is amazing, this can put, be a significant clamp in the hose.

[00:10:45] And if your reviews are good, it backs up everything that you say in your sales pitch.

[00:10:50] Sarah: And if you have no reviews at all, this is also an issue. Yeah. So sometimes people go, "Oh, well, like I'm brand new. I don't have any reviews, so I don't have that problem yet." It's still a problem. It's just a problem in a different way.

[00:11:02] Jason: So let's go to number three. So give yourself a rating on that. Zero to a hundred. Where are you at in relation to your competition? Are you the best reviewed company in your market? Are you like somewhere in the middle? Are you the worst, right? Or do you have no reputation, right? How are you perceived?

[00:11:17] All right. So you have a number there. All right. Number three, presence. This is the website, right? Your online presence. So there's a lot of different roles related to the website. I'll, I can throw out a couple, a few real quick. If you really want to grade your website, and not just like how much does Google like it?

[00:11:36] Not that if you want to grade your website, how much people like it, how effective it is for capturing business, right? How big of a leak do you have in the hose? Go to doorgrow.com/quiz and take our website quiz and grade your website. Do this, you might have a brand new, beautiful, amazing website and it's like just hemorrhaging and leaking money.

[00:11:59] All traffic feeds to the website, right? Your reviews feed to the website. Everything goes there. Your ads feed to the website. Take a look at this leak and get your grade and see what it is. And we're happy to then get on a call with you and tell you why your website sucks, help you figure out like how to make it better.

[00:12:16] So, couple of quick things. It should answer three core questions like above the fold when they first land on the page, what you visibly can see in on the screen should answer that there are three core questions, which is, "do you do what I need in the place I need it? What do you do and where?" And second, "why should I choose you to do it over your competition?" And then third is "what do you want me to do?" There should be some sort of call to action. Most websites don't even have those three really basic things, three basic questions that people have. So that's a great starting point And then there's other things like how many menu items do you have?

[00:12:54] If you have too many menu items, it actually decreases conversion rates. Do you have like distractions like social media icons and different things trying to send people away from your website which can decrease conversion rates and getting business and leads. Do you have trust symbols and social proof and testimonials and things that increase conversion rates?

[00:13:14] Do you have a lead capture form on the page? We've studied this for well over a decade. We've studied this the top website companies that target and focus on property management try to copy our stuff without understanding the psychology behind it and try and copy our designs.

[00:13:33] I believe we build the most effective and the most beautiful websites in the industry. And so if this is an issue, DoorGrow can help you with this. So, talk to us and get a new website.

[00:13:44] Sarah: Before we move on, I just learned this yesterday, I think yesterday or the day before. So if your website was once amazing.

[00:13:51] And you're like, "no, my website is great. It's so awesome." But it's old. Then it's not doing you the good that you think it is. And maybe at one point it was, maybe it was so fantastic. But now all of a sudden, if things seem like they dried up a little bit, it could be that it needs a little bit of a refresh.

[00:14:10] And apparently the shelf life on a website is about two to three years and then it needs. To be redone.

[00:14:17] Jason: Yeah, this is true. I've forgotten about this. I'm totally aware of this, but I just, I forgot that other people don't realize this. And so websites have a shelf life just like fashion does, just like anything else does.

[00:14:30] And so websites start to look stale or out of date or old and create the perception of being old too. So a lot of people don't perceive that their website is actually looking stale and looking old and causing issues for them, right?

[00:14:45] And people will perceive you, "Oh, this company's more modern and we're up to date or fresh or is with it or gets it, and this company it looks like they've been in business forever, maybe. They're using old techniques and they don't know what they're doing, right? So make sure your business is no older than maybe two to three years.

[00:15:03] It's probably time.

[00:15:04] Sarah: Not your business. Your website.

[00:15:05] Jason: Yeah, sorry.

[00:15:06] Sarah: If your business is three years...

[00:15:09] Jason: just get rid of it. So if your website, usually people will go until about five years. By five years, it's usually visibly painful, and this is usually where business owners reach out to us for a new website.

[00:15:22] If your website is five years old or older, it's due. And you know it, like you can look at it and go, "this doesn't look fresh." All right. So good point. All right, next is pricing.

[00:15:32] Sarah: I love the pricing calls that we do. They're so good.

[00:15:35] Jason: It's such a magic trick.

[00:15:35] Sarah: And also people get stuck here for a really long time.

[00:15:39] Jason: Yeah, so most pricing, just to be clear, is set by companies focusing on the worst people in the market. They're focused on the cheapos and they're focused on what they can capture through internet marketing, which are the worst leads. And so the cheapos are really price sensitive.

[00:15:56] So it creates this sort of downward race to the bottom in terms of price. So, most people typically do a 10 percent in most markets. Maybe a little less than that in really high rent markets, or they'll do some sort of flat fee. So, Most pricing is not good and it's probably similar to what everyone else in your market is doing, and so you look the same as everybody else.

[00:16:17] So there's unique methodology in doing pricing. And so we focus on our unique blend of what we call a three tier hybrid pricing model, which focuses on three different types of buyers psychologically and creates a proper incentive to get more high rent properties, less lower end properties and it lowers your operational costs, right?

[00:16:41] Because the higher rent properties generally have a lower operational costs and they make you more money. Right. And so your pricing model is probably unknowingly incentivizing you getting on some of the worst clients and the worst properties and not helping you to set yourself apart from the competition.

[00:16:58] So we've never had anyone really come to us with good pricing, never. And so we've always helped people clean this up. And then they close more deals more easily at a higher price point. And you might think that's crazy, but that's what we do.

[00:17:11] Sarah: And they tell us that!

[00:17:12] Jason: Yeah.

[00:17:12] Sarah: We're not just saying it.

[00:17:14] Like our clients tell us that they're like, "Oh, I didn't think I was going to do this and I didn't want to and I didn't even think it was going to work, so I figured I'd try it and then i'll just change it back when it doesn't work," And every time, they are so surprised and they love it and they're like "man I really wish I did this sooner."

[00:17:30] That would have been so much better if I did this.

[00:17:32] Jason: They usually get a significant number of their clients upgrading to a premium tier so they're making more money off their existing portfolio right away. And so usually pricing's this magic trick we can pull out of our hat that we can immediately pay for if they have a decent number of clients.

[00:17:47] We can immediately pay for our program and our program's now basically free, right? So let's get into the next one. So rate your pricing, if it's typical of everybody else then maybe you give yourself, if you want you can give yourself a 60 70 percent or something like that, but I would say it's a 50 percent because the profit margin difference can be pretty significant, right?

[00:18:08] But give yourself some sort of rating if you're cheaper than most of your competitors give yourself below a 50 percent Like you're worse than everybody else. So give yourself a number there. What's your leak? All right next:

[00:18:18] Purpose. This is the most important thing that we take clients through. This causes not just a leak in your sales pipeline, but it causes a leak with your team and a leak with financials. It's one of the greatest profitability hacks.

[00:18:30] It's one of our greatest. Sales hacks, and it sounds like woo fluffy BS, but purpose is the most significant thing that we do in companies. And our clients tell us this was the most significant thing that we did. So what do you want to say about purpose?

[00:18:45] Sarah: Yeah. So this is usually where we start in our rapid revamp and then, and only then can we then continue on with the rest of the class because everything stems from this. So if you're trying to fix your pricing and you don't understand your company culture yet, it's not going to make sense because you're going to have to redo your pricing. If you're trying to fix your website and your branding and your online perception, but you haven't figured out. the foundation of where all of these other things come from, then it doesn't matter because you're going to have to go back and fix it anyway, because you don't really have clarity on that. But once you get clarity on that, everything else becomes so much easier now.

[00:19:23] Jason: Yeah. So the way to score this is, some questions you might ask are do you have maybe three or four core values defined?

[00:19:31] If you have a lot more than that, then give yourself a lower score because that means really, it means nothing. Do you have a clearly defined mission for the business? Are you clear on who you're targeting and is it clearly defined and written down? Like, how do they know what a good client looks like versus a bad one?

[00:19:46] Right. Are you clear on your personal motivations for why you have this business beyond just getting money? That in a way that you could relate it clearly your personal why? Are you clear on the business's purpose or your team? Right? So do you have a ceo decision making guide so others know how you think on your team, right?

[00:20:03] There's a lot of different things that deliverables in the purpose Weeks in our rapid revamp that we help businesses define, and it changes the profitability. It changes everything in the business. So based on these questions, give yourself a rating on zero to 100 percent and figure out where you're at.

[00:20:19] And if you don't have a lot of these things defined, then give yourself a pretty low grade, right? Next is pitch. So purpose feeds into the pitch and so you need those things defined. But what's your sales pitch like? Is it basically just answer questions and then hope they sign up?

[00:20:35] Which is bad. That's pretty weak, right? Or do you, for example, like us have a four phase process that's systematically like getting clear on what they need and breaking things down and then figuring out like how to deal with objections and et cetera. Right. What's your sales pitch? How effective is it?

[00:20:53] Do you have visuals that maybe facilitate that, et cetera? Right. So if you feel like you have a high close rate, right. But it's just warm leads like a referral. You're you have a really high close rate, that doesn't mean you have a good pitch. That doesn't mean you're good at selling. That just means they were a warm lead, right?

[00:21:09] So in dealing with colder leads or where it's competitive or they're looking at you and several other competitors, how good are you at convincing them to use you over everybody else? May help you see how effective your pitch is right on colder leads or more lukewarm leads, right? So give yourself a rating on pitch.

[00:21:25] Anything else related to pitch

[00:21:27] Sarah: So I'll just one more time reiterate the company culture, you can't have a good sales pitch if you don't first know your company culture. Yeah. So if you're like, "Oh wait, like my pitch is so good. I can close anybody." You're missing your company culture and you do not have that piece defined, there is no way that you can have a great sales pitch, at least in the way that we teach it. So we have the golden bridge formula. You can not do the golden bridge formula if you do not first understand your why and your business why. You don't have those two pieces? You're not doing the golden bridge. And without the golden bridge, sales just gets hard. It just gets hard. And then it's like, "well, like I don't want to be pushy, but also I want to close deals and I have to sell people and like, I don't know, I'm in this loop I don't understand why I can't close things and like, this should be easier." And then people go and they take a bunch of courses to learn how to do sales better.

[00:22:23] You can just have a better sales pitch.

[00:22:25] Jason: Yeah. Good point. So to sum all this up, all of these leaks are leaks in trust. And if in your pitch, for example, you are trying to sell property management, you're selling the wrong product. Nobody really cares about property management. That's not what they want to buy.

[00:22:42] And so what they really want to buy is peace of mind or safety and certainty. They want to buy, they're buying their trust in you. They want trust. And so all of these leaks in the pipeline relate to trust. They're all trust leaks, sales and deals happen. You could write this down, tattoo it on your forehead.

[00:22:59] Don't do that. Put it up on your wall. Sales and deals happen at the speed of trust. And so if you have any of these major trust leaks, you are just wasting time, energy, money, focus, cash effort. Right. And so let's get these leaks all shored up. It doesn't make sense to keep putting blood transfusions into somebody when they have their arm chopped off and they're just hemorrhaging blood.

[00:23:22] That's pretty gruesome, but

[00:23:24] Sarah: yeah

[00:23:24] Jason: Stop the bleeding first. And then, "Hey, it makes sense now. Now that we've stopped this major bleeding, let's now take care of things. Right?" And so get these things dialed in and shored up and what you'll find is: you may not need nearly as many leads.

[00:23:39] You won't have to spend nearly as much money on advertising or any money. Our clients don't, most of them don't spend any money on ads or lead generation, and they actually had doors faster than their competitors that are. And so this is the starting point. Get this stuff cleaned up. It's like sharpening the ax first, before you go and chop down trees, do the smart thing first and everything else becomes easier.

[00:23:59] And this really is lubricating your entire sales process. Everything flows through a lot easier. And so you could double your deals flowing through without changing any of your lead sources that you've already got going right now, just by shoring these up. And so get these blind spots dialed in and reach out to us at DoorGrow.

[00:24:15] And we'll tell you about a rapid revamp program where we tackle each of these leaks in two weeks, two weeks for each leak. And so it's a 90 day program. It's really rapid and it will transform the front end of your business forever. Okay. That's it. So you can find us at DoorGrow. com and until next time to our mutual growth.

[00:24:35] Bye everyone.

[00:24:36] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:25:03] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

View Details

If you have a property management business, and you struggle in a particular area, you might benefit from a small mindset tweak.

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull talks briefly about figuring out what you need to focus on in your business.

You’ll Learn [02:25] You might not actually have a PM business

[05:48] Getting clarity on the 6 core functions

[09:35] What should you be focused on in your business?

[12:18] Figure out what you have been neglecting

Tweetables “If you're doing long-term management, I want you to ask yourself the question, "What business am I really in?"

“You have to do what the business needs most, regardless of the customer.”

“If you don't have a good planning system… you will always be focused somewhat on the wrong things.”

“If you understand the game of business, it's always changing.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: So you need to realize what business are you actually in right now? And a lot of times it's not the one you're focused on in this moment.

[00:00:08] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses.

[00:00:53] We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hall, the owners of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:12] So today you may notice in the background, I'm in a little bit different of a place. I am at an Airbnb. This is my Airbnb. So this is a rental property. And so we got an Airbnb at DoorGrow so that we could have client events. And bring clients in and do some little, small group things, masterminding things.

[00:01:33] And so I'm now experiencing what it's like to have a short term rental. And some of the challenges with that and the challenges with getting a management company to manage it and making sure our concerns are met. So i'm seeing all the different sides of this which is interesting. And some of you are old hats at this like you have way more experience than me at this stuff. So if you have tips, cool.

[00:01:56] Send me a DM and say, "here are the best tips about short term rentals." So what I've learned is it's primarily a cleaning game. Like this is one of the big things. It's about cleaning. It's about making sure you have a good cleaner. You have a good inventory. I want to point this out.

[00:02:13] So what I think is really interesting is that a lot of times we think we're in a particular business and we think that the goal of this business is a particular thing, but if we're smart, we eventually figure out we're in a different business. And shout out to Alex Hormozi. I watched one of his videos the other day and we were in mastermind together before, and he's a brilliant guy. Like I love learning from him. One of the things that that I learned recently that I thought it was really interesting is that a lot of times we think we're in a particular business, but we're actually, if we learn the game, we're in a different business. So he shared an example where there was a business owner that was focused on a particular business and they had plenty of sales, plenty of leads coming in. It was easy for them to get business. And he was like, "well, then what's your biggest challenge?"

[00:03:01] And he said, it's talent. It's like getting the right people. And I think this is very related to short term rentals. I think short term rentals are very much like this. I think the idea is most think that you're in a rental property business if you manage short term rentals, and you may need to get rental properties to manage for sure.

[00:03:20] That could be a little bit of a challenge, but I think there's a lot of short term rentals out there and a lot of them do not enjoy the high pace of turnover, doing all the laundry, having to get good cleaners. The challenge, really the biggest challenge I think from my perspective so far is this is really largely a cleaning business.

[00:03:43] It's about the cleaners and it's not just about cleaning or a cleaning business. It's largely about good talent and getting talent. So it's really a talent acquisition business. It's a hiring business. Being able to get really good team members and build out a cleaning business because you need control over it. When you're doing a third party, there's gonna be a lot of markup.

[00:04:05] You can't control the outcomes or the output, then you're like having to switch companies all the time I talked to a guy the other day with 50 short term rentals and they said they've got one company. It's really good. They do everything well, and the other company sucks and they said they have gone through five different companies already just to find the one that's okay and somewhat mediocre and they have one good one.

[00:04:27] And so I said, "you have that many rentals and that much cleaning going on. You really need to start your own cleaning company." And so one, they don't realize they think they're a property management company, but really what they need to become, what's holding them back in progress right now is because they feel they could get more rentals. Like that's not an issue. It's cleaning. They really are in the cleaning business. And then once you build this cleaning business, you realize, "well, I'm not really in the cleaning business." Once you have a cleaning business, "what business I'm really in is talent acquisition. I'm in the talent acquisition business."

[00:05:02] I have to find the right talent or the right people, so I'm really a hiring or an HR organization is the bigger challenge. And so that's really the business that you're in. Right. And so we need to pay attention. So if you're doing long term management, I want you to ask yourself the question, "what business am I really in?"

[00:05:20] And it might be the thing that is the most difficult for you right now. It might be your team. You think you're in the property management business, but you're lacking leads. That's the weakest area of your business right now is getting more leads. So that means your business really, if you really get honest, your business needs to be a lead generation business. That's really what your business is. It's all about lead generation and you're distracted by keeping it a property management business. So if you imagine these six core functions I've talked about before search six core functions and DoorGrow on YouTube, you can find one of my podcast episodes about it.

[00:05:57] If you look at these and the six core functions real quick are lead gen, nurture, conversion, delivery, lifetime value, and financials. What I see a lot is people will be like, "man, I need more leads, I need more leads." And if we were to rank all these different functions on a scale of one to five, then usually what they'll see is that delivery and fulfillment is a four or a five. You're like really focused on property management, like doing delivery, making sure you're doing leasing and maintenance and inspections, all this, and you're doing a great job. But lead gen, then you would rate as a one like being worst, right? And you're not getting leads.

[00:06:34] I see this a lot. And so you're so focused, "I have a property management business, so I always need to be perfect in property management, but I'm starving and I'm not getting more business because lead generation really is weak." I want you to imagine each of these functions as if it's one of your children, and what you're doing is stupidly feeding and keeping this one child super fat while your other one is emaciated and like starving and looks like a skeleton and is begging for food from you.

[00:07:05] And you're like, "well, I gotta keep giving this one the food, because they're my favorite. They're the one I'm focused on right now." That's not healthy decision making is a business owner. You have to do what the business needs most, regardless of the customer. You have to do what the business needs most.

[00:07:21] And if you do a better job at doing what the business needs most, yes, the delivery may slip down to a four, maybe even to a three temporarily, but that's better than having a one in the business, where things are terrible because you need all six of these functions. If your financials are really weak, right?

[00:07:41] Your sixth function, then maybe you need to work more on generating revenue, or you need to increase the lifetime value, which is one of the functions and charge your customers more. Like you've got to figure out what does the business need most right now? And you need to focus on that. So if right now you think you have a property management business, you might really have a lead generation business and you're avoiding that fact.

[00:08:04] And so you need to pay attention to lead generation. If you have plenty of leads and business coming in, but delivery and fulfillment's maybe like a three and you're not doing a great job there. So you don't really have integrity and you feel like you're like trying to sell something that deep down is not great.

[00:08:20] Then really, you have a delivery and fulfillment business. You need to focus on the property management aspect. So if financials are not healthy and you're not clear on your financials and you don't look at your bookkeeping and you don't look at your P and L and you don't even know what a P and L is, or you don't look at your balance sheet or you don't understand how you're doing financially in your business, then maybe that's what's holding you back. It's the thing that you are not focused on. That's holding the business back. And so you really have a financial and accounting business. That's really the business you are in. And until you wake up and realize that you will always have financial and accounting problems constantly. You'll be taken advantage of. You'll have people embezzle funds maybe even. You will like lose money. Like you will not be clear on your financials unless you really own up to the fact that this is a financial business. What do people pay you for? They pay you for an owner statement.

[00:09:17] That's accounting. They want to look at the numbers. And if you can't do that in your own business, then you're going to have problems with all of your clients financially, maybe as well. They're not going to want to stick around. So you need to realize what business are you actually in right now? And a lot of times it's not the one you're focused on in this moment.

[00:09:35] So I hope this has maybe created an epiphany for you. So for example, for me right now, we've got a decent amount of leads coming in and I've been heavily focused on sales. But the big frog that I've not been wanting to eat is really focusing on lead generation. Like we've done really great on social media.

[00:09:53] I've made millions off of social media. We've done really great in our little conferences we've done recently, but really we are a lead generation business. I need to really learn lead generation and learning ads and probably turn around and start learning how to do ads and that for my customers.

[00:10:17] It would be another growth channel that a growth engine besides all the organic stuff that we do that's really effective. And so I really right now DoorGrow is a lead generation business and I need to focus on lead generation, right? That's where my focus needs to be. We spent the last several years focused on delivery and fulfillment and being a coaching business because before that we didn't really realize we were a coaching business.

[00:10:43] We were doing website projects and cleaning up branding. And so we thought we are a branding business or a website business, but we are a coaching business and so we put a lot of energy and effort into really developing that side of the business that was not as strong. And so now we are a phenomenal coaching business.

[00:11:03] We're great. We have more client results than any other coach or consultant in the industry. We need to now feed that more. We need, now we're shifting and the business is not coaching business, at least not to me. It is a lead generation business. I need to focus on generating leads to get more businesses, more property managers into our programs so they can experience the awesome results.

[00:11:26] Once we have enough leads, then we'll be a sales business. It'll be all about sales. So that's also been a focus of onboarding a new sales person right now. And we just had a new sales person that came in. There was a great culture fit, but they weren't the right personality fit.

[00:11:39] They're like, I don't really like doing this. And I was like, "Dang it." We thought you'd be great. And so we had two that we're onboarding. Now we're onboarding one. Now I need to go back to hiring. Okay, so this is the game of business. And if you understand the game of business, it's always changing and you can't keep feeding the one fat child that is already fed. You need to feed the starving ones in the business. And you always focus "where's the biggest constraint?" It's the hungriest child in those six core functions. Lead gen, Nurture, follow up, nurture, conversion, closing the deals, right? Sales, delivery, and fulfillment, lifetime value, and then financials, right?

[00:12:18] So figure out where your attention needs to be. What business are you actually in? What have you been avoiding and ignoring, thinking mistakenly that you're a property management business? Or that you're in an owner pleasing business or that you're in a tenant pleasing business. What business are you actually in?

[00:12:37] And until you figure that out, your business will stay stuck indefinitely and it will be a grind and it will be difficult. This is why at DoorGrow, we are constantly innovating. We are constantly doing our core functions. We do this every quarter in depth, in detail. This is part of our planning system. If you don't have a good planning system like this, you will always be focused somewhat on the wrong things.

[00:13:01] And so that's why the business isn't progressing and moving forward. So hopefully this gives you a different lens at which to look at where you're putting your time, energy, and focus in your business. And if you would like some help with this, and you would like to go a lot faster, and you would like to collapse time, and you would like to feel like a success, And you would like to like, make your business fun to be in for you and enjoy your life.

[00:13:26] Then reach out to me and my team at DoorGrow. Let us assess your business and figure out where the leaks right now, where are you at on all this? And can we help you? And we'll show you a roadmap to paradise, like to a better place. I just got off a call with a client that I worked with eight years ago.

[00:13:46] And he said, "I want to thank you because you've changed like everything in my business. I still think about like the things that you taught me and all this." And I said, "man, we've done so much since then." And hopefully he'll become reengaged as an active client. But we helped him with his brand and he's like gotten a good team now.

[00:14:06] And he's been focused on a lot of things based on conversations that we had a long time ago. And we've gotten even better since then. So I'm really excited for them, but this is the impact that you can have with your clients if you are doing the right things in your business and you're focused on what the business needs most and at DoorGrow, we are constantly innovating because we're not always staying stuck focused on one thing.

[00:14:28] We have multiple things that we're like shifting towards based on what we as a team can see the business needs based on those core functions. And so we're a different business every quarter like and so our focus shifts every quarter towards what the business needs most and then we're different business, right?

[00:14:48] Then we're going to be in the lead gen business. Then we'll be in the sales business and then maybe we'll be back into the coaching and delivery business and that will be the focus. So what business are you in right now? Figure that out. And if you would like some help, reach out to us at DoorGrow, we can help you go faster by putting systems in place that make that your entire team work in the right way.

[00:15:08] And hopefully that's motivation enough. Reach out to us doorgrow.Com, join our free Facebook group. If you want to get around and get a little bit more nurture from DoorGrow, get a little bit more familiar with us, see a little bit more of our podcasts episodes, see join that free community.

[00:15:23] You can get to that by going to DoorGrowClub.Com. And you can throw up questions there. You can get support from other property managers. We have somewhere between two to three thousand members. I can't remember the last time I looked. On our Facebook group, we reject like 60 to 70 percent of the people that apply to join it. And so we only want to let business owners in. It says 2. 9k members right now. That's what it says on the Facebook group. We're almost 3k. So we're going to hit 3k eventually. These are business owners.

[00:15:55] These are property management business owners and maybe a few vendors. Like we try to filter everybody else out. We're really careful about who we let in. And so we want to make sure that the right people come in so that you can get support. You can talk about the challenges with your team. You can't do that in other groups.

[00:16:10] Your team members will see it, right? So we just want the business owners in there. And so join our free Facebook group, go to doorgrowclub.Com and get nurtured by us until you're ready. Listen to more podcast episodes until you're ready to finally work with us and get the results. And the constant thing that I hear, the consistent feedback I hear is, "I wish, I've been listening to you for a year, Jason.

[00:16:33] I wish I had reached out sooner." Like once we start working with you, you start getting the results, you start getting into our content, you're going to feel the same way. You're going to be like, "I wish I had just not been stubborn or whatever. I wish I just done this sooner and worked with you guys sooner so I could get these results."

[00:16:51] And so if you are somebody that's sitting on the fence right now, you've been listening to DoorGrow for a while and you're like, "man, it sounds really nice. It must be nice to have all this magic and like to be able to grow the business and I've heard about these business owners. I've seen some of their testimonials. It would be nice." You can have this too. There's nothing magical or amazing about any of the clients that I have worked with that you've seen in any of our case studies or testimonials. If they can do it, you can do it too. We are looking for the right people though. And if you're the right person, you're the person that you will join a program and you will make sure it works.

[00:17:27] You won't be looking for the finding fault. You won't be trying to destroy it, trying to figure out why isn't this going to work. Those are different types of people, right? Those are different types of people. They are not the people that should be working with coaches. They're too skeptical.

[00:17:41] They're too negative and they will always have confirmation bias and they will always be right. They will find a way to be right. They will see the problems, but clients that come in that are optimistic, that are positive, that believe in what we have to offer, they get amazing results, because they're committed and they believe in themselves.

[00:17:57] And so if you believe in yourself, I can help you really go the distance. If you don't believe in yourself, then this is not a program for you. I might be able to help you believe in yourself a little bit more. That's something we want to inject into all of our clients, but we're looking for the property managers that want to have impact.

[00:18:14] They believe that they can have a great business. They believe that they can do great things. I believe if you believe that it's going to be true, it's going to happen. And I can help you go faster. So reach out to us at DoorGrow. All right. Until next time, everybody to our mutual growth.

[00:18:28] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:18:55] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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In May, we had our annual DoorGrow Live event! What makes DoorGrow Live different from other property management conferences?

In today’s episode, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull talk about our most recent DoorGrow Live conference and some of the topics discussed.

You’ll Learn [01:12] What was different about this year’s DoorGrow Live?

[04:48] Tactics vs. Mindset

[06:41] Changing the order of your priorities

[10:17] Hard choices, easy life

Tweetables “Tactics and the how can always be figured out.”

“It's not really the tactics that are the problem. It's almost always the mindset.”

“The hard choice is to not go for what you immediately want, but to reorder and prioritize some things that are more relevant to the long term.”

“If you don't like the results, then it's probably because your priorities are not in the right order.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: If you don't like the results, then it's probably because your priorities are not in the right order.

[00:00:08] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses.

[00:00:53] We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hall, the owners of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show. Okay.

[00:01:12] And so what we're going to be talking about today is we just had DoorGrow Live and DoorGrow Live was a success. It was a lot of fun and it was a little bit different this year. So how would you say it was different this year, Sarah?

[00:01:27] Sarah: So I think a lot of people were saying, "Hey, it feels like there was really just a lot of heart that went into this event."

[00:01:35] So usually when I think you and I run events, we're very tactical. How do you do this? How do you do that? And let's share this strategy and let's talk about this thing. And this year we changed things up a little bit and you were maybe a little hesitant to follow the formula that I put together, might I add.

[00:01:53] And so maybe on the podcast you can tell people that It worked?

[00:01:57] Jason: It worked.

[00:01:58] Sarah: And? Do you have anything else to say about that?

[00:02:00] Jason: Anyone that knows Sarah knows what she wants to hear right now. You were right. There it is! There it is. There it is. That's what she wanted. There it is.

[00:02:10] Sarah: So this year when I was putting together the schedule and the agenda, there was this whole plan that I had.

[00:02:17] And I was like, "Oh no, we need to order things like this and do things like this. And this is what I wanted." And he's like, " I don't know if that's going to work. And why are we doing this whole thing? And we're like putting this whole thing together. And like, you don't even know if it's going to work the way you want."

[00:02:30] Jason: Is this how I sound?

[00:02:31] Sarah: Yes.

[00:02:32] Jason: "I don't know if it's gonna work."

[00:02:34] Sarah: "I don't know if it's gonna work."

[00:02:36] Jason: That's totally what I sound like.

[00:02:38] Sarah: It was perfect.

[00:02:39] Jason: I'm shaking my head no, by the way, for the listeners.

[00:02:41] Sarah: See you probably, they probably didn't even know that was me talking. They just thought it was you.

[00:02:45] Jason: Oh, yeah.

[00:02:46] You do such a good impersonation of me. I know. It's really quite impressive. I'll go back to my normal voice so that you realize it's Sarah talking. Yeah, for the listeners, we need to make sure there's two distinct voices or they're going to be really confused why I'm talking to myself because you sound so much like me.

[00:03:03] Sarah: I know. I'm so sorry if I confused anyone.

[00:03:06] Jason: Nobody was confused. Okay. So...

[00:03:08] Sarah: so he was giving me a little bit of a hard time about it because I, like, made him sit down and map this out and I was like, "no, there's a formula that we're supposed to follow and this is what I want it to look like." And I think it worked out really well.

[00:03:21] Jason: Yeah, the event went really well.

[00:03:23] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:03:24] Jason: Things ran pretty much like clockwork. That's hard. It's hard to do that in events. Like speakers go over, people don't stop. Like, we had this big, huge red LED clock right in front of the speaker. So it was like super obvious, like, and we, I think we had conversations with all the speakers, like everything worked pretty smoothly.

[00:03:43] The general feedback I got from a lot of clients one of our clients, Ed Golding, came up to me and he was just smiling. He'd been to some previous ones and he said, "this was different, you know, what was different about this?" I said, "what, Ed? " He said, "heart, this one had heart."

[00:03:56] And it was an emotional event. There was lot more emotion at this event. Did we talk about tactics? Yes. I explained how I've been able to leverage social media and different tools and, I've made millions of dollars off social media. And I shared some really cool tools and very tactical stuff.

[00:04:12] That's how I opened up the event. But we got into a lot of mindset and what we've realized over time, that we talked about at the event that most of our clients are not winning or losing because they don't, or do have tactics. Tactics and the how can always be figured out. And I liked Jeff Garner's tattoo he talked about but....

[00:04:33] Sarah: he's funny.

[00:04:33] Jason: He's like, " can I say it? There's children present." I had my kids at the event.

[00:04:36] Sarah: They're my kids. Like they hear it all the time.

[00:04:40] Jason: Yeah, so he's got a tattoo that's FTH Which stands for "fuck the how" so and so a lot of times people are so worried about "how do I do this? How do I do this?" And we do share tactics. We do a lot of that at DoorGrow. However, It's not really the tactics that are the problem. It's almost always the mindset. And so whenever I teach tactics. I always am going into the why behind it and the mindset stuff. And when they start to understand this stuff, then they will actually do it usually.

[00:05:13] So there was a lot of mindset at the event. And then also, there's vulnerability. Like I openly shared how I've been reevaluating my priorities and what those look like and how how that looks. You were sharing about your upbringing and how like the difficult things in life are also the things that make us who we are and help us to enable us to help others and how to view it through a different lens, which I thought was really awesome.

[00:05:39] And everybody's crying. Sarah's making everybody cry. Like I was crying, like...

[00:05:44] Sarah: I made people cry in a very different way this time though. I'm usually making people cry because I'm yelling at them.

[00:05:50] Jason: That's not true.

[00:05:51] Sarah: It's a little true. It's a little true.

[00:05:54] Jason: Not our clients, just me.

[00:05:56] Sarah: No, I don't do, but I do give our clients tough love when they need it.

[00:05:59] And Kelly came to the event and she's like, "this is exactly what I needed." I'm like, "I know that's why I was on you for like three months."

[00:06:07] Jason: Yeah. I think some people had some breakthroughs, which that's the goal. Like we want to change lives. And so there's something just really beautiful about this DoorGrow Live.

[00:06:16] There was a lot of more depth to it and I just feel grateful to be able to be part of it and to see, our clients that believe in us and that, that came in just seeing their progress and, there are people there that have been in our program for years, which is just.

[00:06:29] It's really awesome to see. So, so I thought I would share just a little bit today about what I had shared and this will be a quick episode cause Sarah doesn't want me to go long. So this'll be a quick one.

[00:06:41] Sarah: Back to back today.

[00:06:42] Jason: You got a busy day. So what I shared is I talked a little bit about prioritization and I've talked about this previously, but what what was interesting, one of my breakthroughs recently was recognizing I was basically merging in my mind, the five basic needs.

[00:06:57] Which I don't know who put that out. We learned it from our friend Roya.

[00:07:01] Sarah: But maybe it was...

[00:07:02] Jason: maybe it's Tony Robbins. I don't know. So there's five basic needs and the five basic needs are love and belonging, power and achievement fun and adventure, fun and pleasure, safety and security.

[00:07:15] Sarah: And I'll see when you put them in a weird order, then I don't remember them. Freedom and flexibility.

[00:07:20] Jason: Freedom and flexibility. Freedom. There we go. Yeah. Okay. These are five basic needs and we all have one that's primary. For Sarah, it's power and achievement. Nobody's surprised, right? For me, it's actually love and belonging.

[00:07:33] And a lot of my achievement and a lot of the things that I do. Are to, that's what motivates that we're helping clients working with clients love and belonging and having that connection. That's why I like working with entrepreneurs because I don't feel like such a weirdo when I'm around other people that are that weird, that are also entrepreneurial.

[00:07:51] But what I've come to realize that if I make that my highest priority, I tend to get less of it. And I think this is true for anyone with their basic need. If you really think about it, if Sarah just went after power and achievement. And didn't prioritize like relationships and other things, it could be pretty destructive and it would likely have the opposite desired effect in trying to achieve power and whatnot, right?

[00:08:13] Because we need others. And then for me, if I'm just going after love and belonging, I would be less likely to get it. If I didn't have my own oxygen mass first, if I didn't have financial wealth and health, if I didn't have physical health then it wouldn't be nearly as effective. I wouldn't be nearly as present.

[00:08:31] I wouldn't be able to enjoy much love and connection or belonging, in relationships. I wouldn't be able to feed into relationships as much if I weren't taking care of myself. And so based on that I, I had everybody map out or stack or list their priorities in their life, and then I showed how my priorities were listed and then Like what my natural inclination is placing like love and belonging at the top.

[00:08:59] And then I showcased how I've intentionally consciously listed them and rearranged the priority and how that affects my decision making in my day to day so that I spend more of my time in my day to day moving towards the top priorities, which are not on my new adjusted priority list are not the love and connection related things related to family, sex, relationship, stuff like that. So above that, I've placed God at the top which is, for some of you that might be your highest ideal, whatever that is. And so I want to always be pointed towards my highest ideal. Second, I put power, achievement, impact, and that's related money status, all that.

[00:09:41] And that allows me to have impact. Which leads to me getting what I want. It's a leading sort of thing. And then the next is health. I need to be prioritizing health. And then it gets into more of the relationship stuff in the priorities. Whereas before I was putting family, friends, fun was probably higher on the list, but I felt like I wasn't ever able to do as much of that as I wanted.

[00:10:04] Because I was so focused on the other stuff. And so by reordering the priorities, it takes work. Like it takes effort to go towards what's easy and what's natural usually leads to a harder life. And so there's this stoic phrase that I like that is "hard choices, easy life. Easy choices, hard life."

[00:10:26] And the hard choice is to not go for what you immediately want, but to reorder and prioritize some things that are more relevant to the long term, playing the long game, doing what maybe I feel deep down inside I should do connected when I'm connected to God or focusing on my health, doing the playing the long game instead of doing the short term, right?

[00:10:49] The short term is like eat, Häagen Dazs vanilla ice cream, vanilla bean ice cream. It's like my favorite right now. I love that. Or whatever, right? When we're just trying to please our tongue and our genitals, we tend to have a much harder life, right? And this is the short term. We're just going for the short term gain.

[00:11:05] And so we want to make sure we prioritize the long game, the long term. and give up where that means sacrifice in the short term. That means work. That means effort. And a lot of people just aren't putting in enough work or enough effort in the lazy people in society are the people that are always trying to please their tongue and their genitals.

[00:11:24] Maybe it's crass, my crass way of saying it. Okay. It's a little gross. Okay. So that's what I shared at DoorGrow Live. And so I encourage all of you listening, like make a list. What are your priorities? And what I shared is your results reveal your priorities. So if you don't like the results in your life, write them down.

[00:11:43] Like, what are your relationships like? What's your business like? What are you doing in the business? What aren't you doing in the business? Or what are you enjoying? What are you not enjoying? And if you don't like the results, then it's probably because your priorities are not in the right order. It doesn't mean you give up or change your priorities, right? All of the things that were my priorities before are still priorities for me. I've just rearranged the order and by just rearranging the order, it changes everything. It changes the results that you get and you'll get more of the results that you really desire if you rearrange those priorities in a way that probably will take you more effort and more work, but will allow you to get everything that you want in the long run.

[00:12:28] So that was my message. That's the simple message. Rearrange your priorities figure out your basic need, put that lower on the list, and figure out what needs to come before in order for you to have as much of that as possible because I want you to enjoy your life, but you need to do make hard choices.

[00:12:41] And you need to do hard things.

[00:12:43] But it was an awesome event and make sure you are keeping an eye on doorgrowlive.com for the future and make sure to attend in the future.

[00:12:52] Everybody says our conferences are different than any other property management conference out there. And That's a good thing. Like we do it in a good way. So, I recommend you attend. So you can check out more details about future events at doorgrowlive.Com. And if you are wanting to grow your property management business and have success like our clients were showcasing at DoorGrow Live and grow your business, scale your operations, have a better lifestyle, enjoy your team more, enjoy your business, be less frustrated, have more peace, reach out to us at DoorGrow. You can check us out at DoorGrow.com. We would love to see if we can help you scale your business. And until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:13:36] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:14:02] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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As property managers you likely know a little bit about mortgages. But do you know about non-QM loan strategies and how your clients and investors can utilize them?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull sit down with Matt from Nexa Mortgage to talk about using non-QM strategies to unlock your portfolio’s potential.

You’ll Learn [05:46] QM loans VS non-QM loans

[16:14] Why Jason and Sarah went with non-QM

[22:07] Which one should you choose?

[26:46] Why should property managers know this?

[32:23] What about long-term rentals

Tweetables “If you have a great manager, it makes sense to get as many properties as you possibly can, knowing that they are in good hands and they are being taken care of because all you're doing is printing money.”

“If you have a way that you can help your investor clients get what they want, which is more deals, it's a win.”

“If you are a property manager, you should also be an investor in real estate.”

“It's great to manage properties and let's do that and build wealth ourselves.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: He said, "I am not joking. I had to submit over 100 documents to the company in order to just see if I'm qualified to get this additional loan. And he's like, I just feel like there has to be an easier way." And there is, but sometimes people don't know about that.

[00:00:20] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:39] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management, growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the CEO and COO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:23] All right. And today we're hanging out with Matt Dean of Nexa Mortgage, and we're going to have an interesting conversation about financing and loans and I don't know, and some other stuff, but Matt welcome to the show.

[00:01:36] Matthew: Good morning.

[00:01:37] Good morning. Thanks for having me.

[00:01:38] Jason: It's good to have you. So give us a little bit of background of how you got into the whole real estate industry and give people a little bit of background on you.

[00:01:49] Matthew: Sure. So, after I graduated from college, which I went to college in Missouri, I ended up moving to Austin, Texas, and one of the first jobs I got was with a commercial finance company and that landed me in Lakeway, which is where I reside now, and have been for over 15 years. But the commercial finance company that I worked with was was a fairly new company that came in from California. The owners Had a mortgage background and had gotten into this commercial finance division.

[00:02:15] They had sold off a couple of mortgage companies opened up this division and Lakeway. They were also land developers and commercial finance guys. So they saw a lot of opportunity out here and opened up this company. So anyway, I got in on the ground floor. They were relocating the company here and had a couple year run with that.

[00:02:31] And then in early 2000, the .Com kind of came in and blew up that whole industry. So what we were doing was commercial finance, equipment finance really, and at the time it was a lot of computer equipment and I was working with a lot of Dell sales reps that were taking over some of their overflow that Dell didn't want to finance.

[00:02:49] So, when all that happened, and it blew up the owners who had the mortgage background really saw that "hey, we're going to see a refinance run here. The market's going to crash rates are going to come down. There's going to be a run." And so they immediately just flip. They had a mortgage company here, but it wasn't early. It was dormant. Yeah. And they flipped it open and and just started building that company out. And so that's ultimately how I got into the mortgage business. And, right after that, we had this really big refinance run. We grew that company very quickly to about 35 employees where we were doing 300 to 400 loans a month with a fairly small company.

[00:03:27] And that just, jump straight in and learn the business. And so then in about 2007 ish, 2006 ish, I really got exposed to the investment world, so to speak. I got partnered up with a real estate brokerage here in Austin that focused on investment properties and primarily what they were focusing on was duplexes.

[00:03:47] And so that year in 2006, I believe it closed 152 duplex transactions, and it was mainly California investors coming into Austin. And it really just changed my whole perspective of the mortgage industry as opposed to first time buyers or veterans, which I enjoy working with all those folks, but the commercial or the investment world, it's a different animal in that it's less emotion and more about business. And so I really just gravitated more to working with investors, started buying properties myself managed a few properties myself and then, evolved from there. But I worked with that same group and Lakeway for about 12 years and then moved around a couple of places and work for a builder and and a couple other companies.

[00:04:29] But anyway, that's how I got in it, got started.

[00:04:31] Jason: Yeah, so you've seen it from a few different angles than the whole real estate investment industry, sounds like.

[00:04:37] Matthew: Yeah, I've been through a few of these cycles of ups and downs. Obviously the refinance run early on was, really interesting, but a lot of good, easy money on the table, so to speak, but then we had the crash, which was a very difficult time for a couple of years, although, Austin weathered that storm pretty well relative to a lot of other areas of the country.

[00:04:56] So, even though our volumes were down, our real estate didn't see as big of an equity loss and the job market here in Austin's always been really strong. So, it pulled us back out of it fairly quickly. We're in a situation now where rates are high and property values have gone up.

[00:05:11] And it's a challenge for some folks here to purchase. A lot of folks are just priced out of the market and can't afford it. And property taxes aren't helping that situation.

[00:05:19] Jason: Yeah,

[00:05:20] Sarah: It's so pricey here. So pricey.

[00:05:22] Matthew: But we're starting to see a little bit of pull back on the values and the houses. It's a little bit more of a buyer's market now, but it still needs to come down a little bit, I think in my opinion, it's to balance the market again.

[00:05:34] Jason: Interesting. So the topic today is unlock your portfolio potential, non QM strategies for real estate investors. And for those that don't know what QM is, which I don't. So educate me. What's QM?

[00:05:47] Sarah: So I handled all of this stuff and Jason got to the closing table and he's like, "I'm an owner in the LLC, right?"

[00:05:54] Matthew: It's like, yeah, I barely talked to you along the way, but anyway, yeah, so let's talk a little bit about QM and how that all started. So, after the real estate crash in the 2006, 2007, eight ish area the CFPB was formed a consumer finance protection bureau, which took over the regulation with the mortgage industry.

[00:06:12] It took them a few years, but in 2014 they implemented what was called TRID, which you may have heard that word, but it was where we got rid of the good faith estimate and integrated the new loan estimate and closing disclosure took over. And at that same point in time, the regulations came out and then classified conventional loans or reclassified them as qualified mortgages.

[00:06:35] What that means really is the CFPB was trying to put protections in place to protect consumers and also strengthen guidelines to make sure that people or buyers had the ability to repay. So what that really meant was additional restrictions on ability to repay, debt ratio requirements, reserve assets, et cetera.

[00:06:55] So, if you do a conventional loan, which is Fannie, Freddie. Those are considered qualified mortgages. They have additional protections in that you're maxed at the amount of fees you can charge a buyer. The APR has to be within guidelines within a maximum. So all those things are really for consumer protection, right?

[00:07:14] At the same time, what caused the market crash before was what subprime mortgages. And so at the time, subprime mortgages initially had a place in the market. They really were good for investors because investors were putting money down, they had good credit typically, and they had reserve assets.

[00:07:35] When the market shifted, and they started using subprime loans to qualify buyers for primary residences that really had no business buying homes is where it got in trouble. So after QM was announced or came out with CFPB, then they also had non QM loans. What that means is any loan that falls outside of the qualified mortgage guidelines, for whatever reason, can still be funded or it would fall within non QM.

[00:07:59] Non QM just meant if you're a lender who does those type of loans, you're now required to hold additional reserve assets in your bank or your mortgage company per loan to cover for the potential higher risk and default.

[00:08:12] Jason: Okay.

[00:08:13] Matthew: And it took a few years from 2014. The market started to come out with products in 2015.

[00:08:18] The industry was really not sure how to handle it. A lot of banks didn't want to even dive into it. And then it started to evolve. And "okay, there's a big market here." So now it's one of the fastest growing segments of the market and banks have realize or figured out how to meet the ability to repay guidelines with alternative methods, right?

[00:08:41] So you don't have to have W2s and tax returns and pay stubs, which a conventional QM loan would require. Now, they look at different factor, like, 12 months business bank statements. I can look at a CPA prepared profit and loss statement, I can look at just the rent income on the property and that's what's classified or called DSCR.

[00:09:03] And then also it's asset based loans where we just look at the asset and we turn the asset into a revenue stream. So that's really how non QM started and really what it is. It's just an alternative way of qualifying the mortgages that falls outside of the Fannie Freddie conventional type of loans.

[00:09:21] Jason: Got it.

[00:09:21] Sarah: So what does that mean for investors? Because we have some investors that listen to us and we have some property managers who work with investors. So what would that mean for an investor that is looking to get into more investment properties?

[00:09:39] Matthew: Yeah, absolutely. So, the challenge that a lot of investors run into is a lot of them are self employed and a lot of them start accumulating property.

[00:09:48] So if they fall into either one of those categories, either they're self employed. Or they've accumulated a lot of properties or both, right? The challenge becomes with qualified mortgages is from an income perspective, right? So good CPAs are going to try and shelter income for self employed borrowers and for investors by showing, minimal profits or minimal or losses on their properties.

[00:10:11] And so, as investors start to accumulate more properties, it becomes more challenging to qualify for conventional loans, because for every property on a conventional loan, Fannie and Freddie want additional reserve assets. So that means you start getting 6 properties, you need assets for each one of those properties on top of down payment funds for the purchase property and the reserves on that property.

[00:10:33] So, from two perspectives, either an income perspective, where we have a challenge again, a self employed borrower shows losses on his tax returns for the last 5 years by design, because he doesn't want to pay taxes, or we've got multiple properties also showing losses when I'm looking at income on a conventional loan basis, I have to use the income from the tax return.

[00:10:52] So losses can be a problem. Also, the reserve requirements, so, taking into those two scenarios, you've got a self employed borrower that, let's say they, they have gross revenue of half a million dollars, but they're showing losses of, 50-60-70,000 dollars. We're just looking at 12 months bank statements in that case, which gives us gross revenue and then we back out of a factor of say, 25 to 30 percent for taxes and we use that as revenue or income to qualify. If we have an investor that, let's say, not necessarily self employed they have multiple rental properties that are basically just, showing losses and now their income is diminished to where they can't qualify.

[00:11:32] Then we have the debt service coverage ratio programs. Like, we utilize with your property where we're looking at just the rent on the property. Right? So the rent the market rent or the short term rental just needs to cover the principal interest, taxes, insurance and fees. And so those are 2 products that we use and that's really how, I would say it helps investors in those scenarios.

[00:11:54] The other products that we could look at are P& L products meaning that ACPA provides a P& L statement, and then we can use that income, or if they have significant assets just in investment funds and whatnot, we can turn that into a revenue stream. But the bottom line is it just eliminates the need for W 2s, tax returns, or pay stubs, and we look at other alternative income sources to qualify.

[00:12:18] Sarah: It's funny. I was actually on Instagram the last week, I think. And there's this guy, he has a very large account and I can't remember his name. And he's very big on investing in real estate. And he said, "guys, like, I just need some help. I like I'm going through this whole process and you jumped through 10, 000 hoops." and he said, "I am not joking. I had to submit over 100 documents to the company in order to just see if I'm qualified to get this additional loan. And he's like, I just feel like there has to be an easier way." And there is, but sometimes people don't know about that. I still talk to investors and property managers and they don't know.

[00:13:02] They're like, "I'm just too conventional. That's like what you do. That's like the normal thing that we're all trained and used to doing." So just knowing that there are other options that don't require all of these crazy hoops to jump through and all of this documentation and lots of red tape and underwriting.

[00:13:22] It's not that it's eliminated. It's just that it's a lot easier of a process and especially if you're a savvy investor that takes a loss on your taxes, just because your tax return shows a loss, it doesn't actually mean that you're losing money, right? So there's a big difference there. So that plays a big part too.

[00:13:43] Matthew: Yeah, there are investors. Sorry. I didn't mean to jump in there, but there are definitely investors that lean on that from a documentation standpoint. Right? They've been down this road. They have multiple properties and more properties, you have the more documentation you need to provide to try and qualify for those conventional loans and it just becomes more and more challenging.

[00:14:00] And, even more so if you have a loan officer on the front end of that's trying to originate a loan, that isn't really versed in investment properties and doesn't know how to underwrite the tax returns, they can get in trouble. They look, "oh, I got good credit. I've got down payments." But when you try and pull together tax returns and the income from multiple properties and business losses and this and that, it becomes very complex. And it's honestly, a lot of loan officers don't even know how to look at that correctly. And so they just throw the file up. It goes to underwriting. And then 2 weeks later, they've got a problem. But I just closed a deal actually yesterday and it was ended up going non QM short term rental. And the gentleman is great credit owns his own businesses, owns multiple properties and schools here, but the documentation, because he owns, like, 8 companies and probably 7 or 8 rental properties, and he had a partner in this particular property that, It became so complicated with trying to pull some of that stuff together and also with the partner who wasn't necessarily as strong as him where it just made sense for us to go short term rental and move on.

[00:15:07] And that's what we did. So we just made it easy. He was happy that he didn't have to continue to jump through all those hoops. And we were able to get the property done and close in about two and a half weeks.

[00:15:17] Jason: You said it made sense to go short term rental. You meant to go non QM. Is that what you meant?

[00:15:21] Matthew: To go non QM. Yeah. We went short term rental income, which is non QM to qualify the income on the property. This happens to be a short term rental down on the Comal River and it's got great income. It just he had a private money loan on it when he purchased it needed to refinance the note was coming due and he just has a very complex financial situation.

[00:15:43] And he got involved with a partner on this property that also created some challenges with that particular situation and just made it a lot easier to use him and go non QM short term rental income only and just get it done.

[00:15:54] Jason: So, would that be a DSCR loan going on the short term rental income?

[00:15:59] Or is that different?

[00:15:59] Matthew: Yes, it is technically a DSCR loan, which means debt service coverage ratio. And this is what we utilize with your property as well, by the way. we're looking at either long term rents.

[00:16:10] Jason: We should tell that story, by the way, everyone listening has no clue.

[00:16:13] Sarah: I know, right?

[00:16:14] Jason: Why don't we have Sarah explain like why we went this route, how we ended up talking with Matt and like how this all worked out.

[00:16:21] Sarah: Okay, let's do that. So, Jason, oddly proudly, he's like, "I've never owned a rental property and I've never managed a rental property. And I do this now." And I said, "this is nothing to be proud of. Like you're 46, you should own things. You should have assets." So like I, on the other hand, like I had, in my twenties, I started investing in real estate. So, Jason and I for a while have been saying like, "when are we going to get one together?"

[00:16:48] Because we didn't have one yet and he never had one.

[00:16:51] Then also our circumstances in life have changed a little bit. And we thought " we need an additional property at this point." And we were in a unique situation where right now in Austin, I'll just start by saying long term rental is hard to make it make sense financially.

[00:17:10] You're probably not going to cashflow.

[00:17:13] Jason: Yeah.

[00:17:13] Sarah: Not right now. Anyway, it's just, it's really hard because prices are high. And interest rates are also high. This is where we are. So we couldn't have possibly done a long term rental anyway, because we needed the property to have some personal use on it.

[00:17:28] And we decided, "Hey, let's also use it for some of our DoorGrow events." Because every time that we do an event, We pay somebody else.

[00:17:37] So let's pay ourselves through that. So for that reason, it only can really be used as a short term rental property. So we decided, "Hey, there's these kind of three components."

[00:17:48] And I'm really big on asset protection, meaning I need the property to be owned and deeded and financed in an LLC. So originally I was working with another agent. We've worked with him before on our primary home. He's a really great agent. I had asked him about, "can we fund it in the name of an LLC?"

[00:18:09] And he said, "no you can't do that. It doesn't really work that way." And it seemed like he was just trying to talk us out of it. I even talked with that he typically uses and that we used on our, Home that we live in. And he said, "Oh no, yeah, we don't do properties in the LLC. It'll be in your name. And then after closing, we could do a quick claim and then like change the deed and put the deed in the LLC name." And I said, "okay, what about the mortgage?" And he said, "no. The mortgage stays in your name." And I said, "I'm out." Like that is where I'm out. You're piercing the veil.

[00:18:44] All of my personal assets would now be exposed and on the line. And that completely defeats the purpose of having an LLC. And he was like, yeah, we just don't do that. I really don't think that's going to be a problem. So I said, "okay, do you know anybody now he's been in this business for like 20 or 30 years?"

[00:19:02] "Do you know anybody that can do that?" And he said, "Oh, not really." So that was time to start looking for somebody else because I know that it can be done. I've done it in Pennsylvania. So there's no way that Texas can't do this. Texas is far ahead of Pennsylvania in a lot of different ways.

[00:19:19] Jason: So we found another agent.

[00:19:20] Sarah: So we found another agent who then referred us to Matt and he said, "Hey, I know a guy. He's really great. And I'm pretty sure he can do what you need." So I said, "great. What's his information?" I had a conversation with Matt and he's like, "Oh, well, yeah, we can do that." And I said, "so you can put the loan in the LLC. Not my name, the LLC. He said yeah, we can do that." Like it was easy. So it can be done. Sometimes you just have to look around a little bit. So that was how our deal was structured. So we went non QM and we ended up doing, since it is a short term rental, we went DSCR so that the rents would cover essentially your PITI.

[00:20:00] And this is how we made our deal work. So we closed PITI.

[00:20:06] Jason: PITI for the listeners is...

[00:20:07] Sarah: principal interest taxes insurance.

[00:20:11] Matthew: Yeah, so, I know that was how our conversation started was, " can we do this in the LLC?" And we walked through that and the pros and cons a little bit, I think, and that's one thing that conventional QM loans don't really not really, they don't allow that. You cannot fund in an LLC.

[00:20:25] Now, what happens is a lot of people like you were advised, "hey, fund it in your name, slip it to the LLC later." That can cause some problems because Fannie Mae does have due on sale clauses in their loan documents. So, technically, if there's an ownership change, that note can be called due. Typically, you can just flip it back into your name and stop that process, but it becomes a cat and mouse game back and forth if you have a servicer that's trying to, exercise that for some reason, it doesn't happen very often. It's not a very high risk, but it's definitely something you need to be aware of. On the non QM side, the lenders want these, or most of them prefer them to be funded into LLCs because non QM as a whole is considered business purpose lending.

[00:21:11] It falls outside of the consumer protection, finance protection Bureau oversight. So, it's considered or classified more of like a commercial loan. And so most of them require, or want you to fund into an LLC. There are some that will do them in their personal names. It's interesting. They follow more of a conventional loan program, which I'm not really sure I understand, because they issue a closing disclosure and they look at loan estimates, even though it's considered a non loan. So they just handle a little bit differently. Those companies will allow you to do it in your name and some of them are doing a lot of those companies are also doing primary residences under a non QM basis. So bank statement products for somebody who may be self employed also trying to buy a primary residence. That's where I see it more. Most of the the LLC stuff is for investors and those lenders are going to. Really prefer or require it to be in an LLC.

[00:22:07] Jason: Got it. Okay, cool. So what should investors know in order to make the decision as to which way they should go? Like, how do you make the deciding factor? Like, what are some of the things that kind of weigh into this?

[00:22:20] Matthew: Yeah, I think really it's a conversation initially of can they qualify for a conventional loan? Do they understand what non QM loans have to offer? A lot of investors aren't familiar with the details of non QM loans, how they work, how they can help them. So it's really an education conversation of, what options we may have available. Right? I would always start with the conventional loans typically and, see if we can qualify. If you can go that route and you're putting 25 percent down you're going to get a little bit better interest rates. And then you don't have some of the other key factors that come with non QM loans. So most non QM loans do have some sort of prepayment penalty because they're selling these to a secondary hedge fund investor that wants a minimum return. So, in most cases, you're going to have a prepayment penalty in a conventional loan. Stay out of point. A QM loan legally cannot have a prepayment penalty.

[00:23:14] So there's a big difference there. But as far as qualifying them, it's a really, like I said, an education and a conversation about what their profile looks like. Right? They self employed. Do they own multiple properties? Are they showing losses or profits on those properties? And then, really documenting that, 9 times out of 10, what I'm told on a verbal conversation doesn't match what I get on the documentation that way.

[00:23:38] "Oh, my business makes this," but they're talking about gross revenue, not net income. They're talking about gross rent amounts, not the net income they're showing on their tax returns. So it needs to go the next level. But that initial conversation may determine quite quickly that, hey, we need to go non for what reason or, because they want to fund it in an LLC, because the property is really a short term rental, but it doesn't but they don't have any history of short term rental management.

[00:24:07] And let's talk just a little bit about, how you look at the short term rental. I know that's what we were talking a little bit about before we talked about your loan, right? So there's 2 ways to look at that short term rental and it's either from well, the rental income short term or long term can either come from an appraiser.

[00:24:23] Or from a software program that some lenders are now using. So a lot of lenders will lean on a typical, appraisal to an appraiser to come up with whatever that market rent may be. And like, like, you said, it's difficult to cash flow properties in Austin or in Texas. On long term rents simply because the property taxes have escalated and now with higher interest rates.

[00:24:48] So a lot of times, the short term rental is really from a lending perspective an easier way to qualify the property for 1. But we do have the ability to look at it from two different perspectives and this is what we utilized on your loan. So I'll just talk about a little bit. So I have a couple lenders that will look at the short term rental from a software perspective.

[00:25:05] Right? So in your case. When we had the discussion, it was really a matter of, yeah, "I really want to put 20 percent down. I don't want to put additional money down. That would be more important to me than a little bit higher interest rate. Right?" And so, when we look at different lenders that may be leaning on an appraisal.

[00:25:21] I don't know what that number is for 2 weeks and me personally I feel like appraisers, especially in the short term rental market. Are a little bit lazy and sometimes they just don't have the data. So what happens is I submitted to the lender based on an 80 percent loan to value. And then all of a sudden, my short term rental income comes back low or lower than what we may have expected.

[00:25:42] And now that's requiring you to put an additional 5 percent down to meet their guidelines of a debt service coverage ratio less than one or go no ratio, right? We still have an option, but the option is going to require you to put a little bit more money down. And so. Again, we have two ways to look at it either an appraisals given us that number or with some investors.

[00:26:00] And this is why I like working with some of those in that case. Like I said, your most important factor is 20 percent down. so I took it to a lender that gave me that short term rental number within 48 hours. They ran it through their system. They gave it to me immediately and said, "this is where we should be." As soon as we submitted the loan to underwriting within 2 days, we had an approval and this was confirmed short term rental amount. We didn't have to wait on the appraiser and it didn't matter what the appraiser's opinion was. They already confirmed what we were going to use, which confirmed that I could get your loan approved with just 20 percent down. So, that's a preferred method in a lot of ways, especially if we're trying to keep that 20 percent down number.

[00:26:38] If we have somebody that's putting 25-30 percent down, then it's. A little bit less relevant and we can, decide what option might be best for them at that point.

[00:26:46] Jason: Got it. So why should property managers who are constantly wanting to do more deals, help more investors, why should they have somebody like Matt in their back pocket?

[00:26:57] Sarah: Oh, that's such a good question. Well, I want to think of it kind of twofold. One, I feel like if you are a property manager, you should also be an investor in real estate. Real estate agents just by having access to the MLS. No, that's not where all deals come from. I know that, but just by having access to the MLS and the connections that you have as a real estate agent and property manager, there's no chance that you don't come across amazing deals all the time.

[00:27:23] There's no chance. So capitalize on that.

[00:27:26] You should also be an investor yourself. It's great to manage properties and let's do that and build wealth ourselves. Yeah. So that's number one. But number two is if you're like, "well, I like, I don't know, I'm unsure, or maybe I have one property or two properties and I don't know if I'm ready to continue to build a portfolio."

[00:27:46] Or you're like, "Hey, I have X many properties and I'm happy right here. I don't want any more." I don't know why, but maybe you are. So if that's the case and you have investor clients that very likely would love to get into more deals themselves. And it would be great for you because now if you have an investor and they manage five doors, but that same investor can now manage 10, 20, 38.

[00:28:11] That's fantastic because now your business is growing. So if you have a way that you can help your investor clients get what they want, which is more deals, it's a win because yes, the savvy investors, they're always looking for more deals. Jason's hooked now. He said to me, we closed and he was like, "how do we do another one? like, how do we do another one?" He's like, "how fast can we do another one? Like Sarah, is it possible if we do like one property a year," right? And he did. Yeah, he did. There's a lot of investors like that because once you get it. Once you really get to see all of the benefits and just how freaking beautiful it is to be a real estate investor and make money and get all of the tax benefits that you don't get in almost any other sector.

[00:28:54] It's amazing. So why would you not want more of that? So if you're a property manager, it would make so much sense for you to just be able to educate your investor clients. "Hey, have you ever thought of picking up more properties?" The answer probably is going to be "yes," especially if you're doing a great job for them as a property manager.

[00:29:14] Because that's a tricky part is, "well, I could buy a bunch of properties, but who's going to manage them?" If you have a great manager, it makes sense to get as many properties as you possibly can, knowing that they are in good hands and they are being taken care of because all you're doing is printing money.

[00:29:30] So if you want to grow your portfolio by adding additional deals to the clients that you already have. It's like so simple, right? Why would we not do that? So having options. that not everybody knows about. It's fantastic.

[00:29:47] Jason: So in short, this just gives them a lot more options to work with because investors want to invest, and they may think, "Oh, well, I've only got this much down or I can only do a conventional, I can only do it this way. I need to meet certain criteria" or "I've just declared all these losses."

[00:30:04] Sarah: "Like I have too much debt." Maybe their like debt to income is a little maxed out because we're, keeping up with the Joneses. This is so normal, right? So that and Matt's laughing. He sees it all the time.

[00:30:15] I bet he's like, "Oh, we went a little too high on that one."

[00:30:18] there's good debt and bad debt though as well, right?

[00:30:21] Correct. However, if you own five properties or six properties or seven properties, every additional property that you have that is leveraged, meaning that you have a mortgage on it, that's counting against you and your debt to income ratio.

[00:30:35] Jason: Right. So it gets harder and harder using conventional to get into more property.

[00:30:40] Sarah: Unless you're the Fed and you can just print money.

[00:30:42] Jason: Well, I don't know if they're buying

[00:30:44] Matthew: a lot of money.

[00:30:44] But you bring up a good point and just to clarify when we do a debt service coverage ratio program, I'm not looking at any of your debt.

[00:30:52] I'm not looking at a debt ratio calculation at all. And if you own multiple properties, I'm not even looking at any of those other properties for any sort of rent, income, verification, mortgage, anything. This one is a business, right? Correct. It's it. Well, it's just debt service coverage on that subject property, right?

[00:31:10] Does the rent cover the note? And do we have enough money for down payment and reserves on that property alone? We don't look at reserves for those additional properties like you would a conventional. So you got five properties. I don't care about reserves on those. I'm only looking at the subject property.

[00:31:24] So, yes, debt to income is a big factor and I think, if we're talking to property management companies, it's really just an education or a knowledge of what potentially could be out there. Right? Like you said, they have opportunities to buy all the time. I would think that the savvy property manager is going to scoop those up if they can, but are they aware of these programs?

[00:31:44] Or do they think that? "Oh, my debt to income is too high or I have losses on my tax returns that I'm going to have trouble qualifying." And then you also have your network of investors that you manage those properties for that potentially are looking for additional doors, but they're not aware of these programs in some cases.

[00:32:00] So, yeah, it's just a matter of, I think, education and just getting the information out there. So that some of these people know what options are available.

[00:32:09] Jason: Well, it sounds like it shifts the conversation from, "can we?" Yeah. Maybe it's a no, in their thought, in their mind to "how can we?" Like, there's other creative ways that things could be done instead of saying, "Oh, it's gotta be this one way we've always done it. That's the only way." So, what about for long term rentals? Which like some of the investors listening and a lot of our clients listening may not do a short term.

[00:32:32] Sarah: You can still do a non QM on a long term, especially in Austin. Now, other markets, you might find a cashflow. Like I have a cashflow property in Pennsylvania.

[00:32:40] It's a rare gem guys, but in Austin, it's hard to get something to cashflow, especially right now.

[00:32:47] Matthew: Okay, so there's two ways to look at it again. There's, or I guess, multiple ways to look at it. Not just two, but bank statements if I'm looking at it. So, if they're self employed, and they have a business that we can lean on the bank statements, right?

[00:32:59] That's my income qualifier and no longer care about that negative potential cash flow on the property in the rent. Right? So that's one way. If I'm doing debt service coverage and I'm looking at long term rental, I have a client that wants to long term rented. They're not going to be comfortable stating short term rental on the application.

[00:33:17] They really have no desire to do that. Then I have to look at the short term rent. Now, what that's typically going to end up, at least in Austin, what's typically going to end up happening is that property is going to have a problem cash flowing at 20 percent down or 80 percent equity. Right? So what happens is it now pushes us to.

[00:33:34] A bigger down payment, a larger down payment, 25 percent 30%. And then we have the options with those lower loan values to do either no ratio or lower debt coverage ratio loan programs. Right? So. If it falls below 100%, meaning 100 percent rent coverage with PITI coverage which principal interest taxes, insurance and HOA fees all come into that play. But let's just say it's a little bit short. I've got a PITI of 2000 dollars of my rent's 1800. well, the lender is going to do one or two things. Are you going to say, "well, we need more down to get that to 100%." Or "we're going to reclassify it as a higher risk and we'll do, some of them will go down to 75 percent debt coverage, but it's a little bit higher rate."

[00:34:18] Or "we have to go to a little bit larger down payment and go no ratio, right?" No ratio means we just eliminate that altogether. And it's typically 30 percent down. So, we have options to look at but it is definitely a little bit harder if we're looking at long term rents simply because it's harder to cash flows at 20%, unless again, unless we have larger down payments or larger equity positions, for refinances to soak.

[00:34:42] A lot of these let's talk about that too, you have some of your property management clients that may want to purchase more properties where they could extract equity out of these homes to use to purchase more property. So there's a lot of the refinance going on with those properties to under a non QM basis, because they again, they can't qualify for a full doc for whatever reasons.

[00:35:03] Right? But there are options to pull cash out under a non QM basis and utilize those funds to reinvest.

[00:35:09] Jason: Got it. So say they've got five, 10 properties, it's getting really difficult for them to qualify for a QM loan. They could maybe pull some equity out of their existing properties, do like a cash out refi, and then use that money to fund a bigger down payment to do a non QM scenario.

[00:35:28] Matthew: Absolutely. Absolutely. The challenge right now in the market with refinances in general is a lot of these people have really good rates on those properties. And so they don't necessarily want to refinance and lose that low rate understandably. Right? So. In other states, you have a the ability to do HELOCs or he loans, which are second liens, Texas, it's a little bit limited.

[00:35:47] There's not as many products available, especially on the investment side. There are ways to extract some of that equity and reposition it to be reinvested in other investment opportunities. And I will say that we do have the ability to do the same type of loans on small commercial properties.

[00:36:04] Like, up to I've got one lender that kind of specializes in that small commercial that goes up to 24 units. So, between 5 and 24 unit apartment buildings, we're also looking at a non QM type debt service coverage loan, which is what commercial loans look at in general anyway. Commercial loans are based on cash flow, right?

[00:36:23] It's all debt service coverage based on that. But in that small apartment complex arena, you've got a lot of these kind of more residential lenders that are focusing and specializing in it. Because it's a piece of the market that's left out, right? Your commercial lenders don't want to touch something that's a few 100, 000 dollars. They have minimums of 5Million dollars, 3Million dollars. And so you have these smaller properties that are great investments in some cases that also have challenges getting loans, not because of the property, but because of the size of the loan.

[00:36:55] Jason: It's just not big enough for him.

[00:36:56] So Matt what areas do you cover personally? And then how do people find somebody like you, how did they find somebody like you? Like, this was a challenge we had to ask around what do people look for to find somebody that can help them with some more creative options?

[00:37:11] Matthew: That's a good question. I wish more people would know how to find me. So maybe you can help me with that. But yeah, it's just, it's interesting. There's a lot of loan officers that just don't, I guess maybe they're scared of the non QM space. They don't understand it. They're scared of change, so to speak, and so they just go, "I've never done that. And I don't know anything about it and they don't want to learn about it." it's the fastest growing segment of the market right now. Fannie Mae is pushing a lot of the paper towards non QM from a risk perspective. They want to get away from it. They're making investment rates in terms unattractive, so to speak, so they're offloading it that way. But, I think it's really through the real estate agents is probably the best way to get in touch with somebody like me, if they're familiar with it. But what's interesting is even your agent from McLean that I work a lot with Brett.

[00:38:00] He wasn't 100 percent versed in these products either. So. Fortunately, he got me, right?

[00:38:05] Sarah: Yeah. Thank you, Brett.

[00:38:07] Matthew: But, yeah, as far as if you have somebody that's questions, I'm always available to potentially educate people in regards to these programs. As far as where I do business, I'm legally licensed in Texas and Arizona, meaning national mortgage licensing, which is the, the CFPB license.

[00:38:22] Now, with non QM loans about 35 states don't require you to have a license within that state. So I can do non QM debt service coverage all these type of loans that we talked about in about 34 different states. Just with my national license and because they consider a business purpose use, it's classified as a commercial loan in those states, and they don't have these overbearing laws like California does or Nevada. So there are some states that it's difficult unless you want to jump through a bunch of hoops to do it. And unless there's enough volume, there hasn't made sense for me to do it.

[00:38:55] I just focus on the ones that I can, which is a big piece of the country and we can help folks in those 30 some states, 34 states, whatever it is.

[00:39:03] Jason: So there's maybe 15, 16 states that you can't cover.

[00:39:06] Matthew: It's the New York the Pacific Northwest and California, most of the middle of the country around Texas we can do.

[00:39:14] I know you, you referred me to somebody in Utah the other day, they happen to be a state that requires licensing, but their licensing is pretty reasonable. So, if there was an opportunity or a reason, for some volume to come out of there, I could get licensed fairly quickly.

[00:39:28] And some of these states, because I already hold a national license within them. I passed the test for that, which means you just have to take the state piece of that exam to then get licensed. Be able to do loans there, which is fairly simple. And as long as you're not in New York or California or somebody that has these crazy laws,

[00:39:44] Sarah: What's to invest there anyway, come on, like squatters and all this, like?

[00:39:48] Matthew: I know, right?

[00:39:49] I don't know how everybody does loans in New York. I hear it takes 90 days to close a loan.

[00:39:54] Jason: There's plenty of investors in those markets. I'm sure people listening. All right. Cool. Well, Matt, it's been great having you here on the DoorGrow show. Appreciate you being our guest. How can people find you or get in touch with you?

[00:40:06] If they're wanting to reach out and find out if they're one of those 34 states.

[00:40:10] Matthew: Well, my number if you want my phone number is 512 415 6142. You can Google Nexa my name. I think if you Google my name and Nexa mortgage that come up quite a bit on the Google nexahomelending.Com is my personal website.

[00:40:27] That's probably the two best ways to reach out to me just text or email and I'm more than happy to help you in any way that I can.

[00:40:34] Jason: Perfect. Well, it sounds like this is at least a key or just a tool or an idea that every property manager listening should probably have in their back pocket.

[00:40:44] You should have some sort of connection to a more creative lender than you may have currently. And so, connect with Matt or maybe, I don't know, start Googling non QM lenders in your market. I don't know, but find somebody or ask around to some real estate agents, but see if you can get somebody that can help with getting some of these deals because investors, they have money, they have equity and, but they're not doing deals and they want to probably do more deals and they just need somebody creative enough to help them find some solutions or interesting ways to make it happen.

[00:41:13] So, all right. Well, again, Matt, thanks for being on the show. Appreciate you.

[00:41:17] Matthew: My pleasure. Thank you very much for having me.

[00:41:19] Jason: All right. Well, everybody, if you are interested in growing your business, your property management business, reach out to us, you can check us out at doorgrow.Com. And until next time, everybody to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:41:30] Matthew: Great. Thank you. Talk to you guys soon. Bye.

[00:41:32] Jason: you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:41:59] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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If you have been struggling to grow your property management business, you might have been prioritizing the wrong things…

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss how having the right priorities and getting support helps with business growth.

You’ll Learn [01:30] Are you prioritizing the right things?

[08:30] Why you CAN’T do everything yourself

[20:20] How prioritizing safety might hinder growth

[27:30] Why you should be willing to take risks

[30:50] Prioritize results and get those results

Tweetables “You may have all the right priorities. They're just in the wrong order.”

“I think a lot of times we hold onto things simply because ‘we want it done right’ means ‘done according to my set of values.’”

“Pain's an inevitable scenario if you keep trying to do the same thing and expecting a different outcome.”

“You can either have your excuses or you can have results, but you can't have both.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: Isn't that the definition of insanity? It's doing the same thing over and over and over and then expecting a different result.

[00:00:06] Jason: I think that's what creates insanity. Like, pain's an inevitable scenario if you keep trying to do the same thing and expecting a different outcome.

[00:00:14] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:56] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management, growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the founder and CEO and the COO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:25] I did the intro right this time I think. I didn't screw it up. We could just have it prerecorded, people. You never know what you're going to get. Okay. So I was thinking about what we could talk about this morning and I've been doing some reflection and some study and the topic that just keeps coming up in my mind is prioritization and priorities.

[00:01:44] In fact, I'll probably talk a little bit about that and do an exercise with some of the cool people that are coming to DoorGrowLive. Cause I really think if you're not experiencing growth and you're not having the success that you want, you're not getting the results that you want in business and life, then it's pretty simple. It's just that your priorities are out of alignment with you getting the results that you want. And you may have all the right priorities. They're just in the wrong order. And so you're prioritizing something over the thing that if you prioritize would give you the results that you actually want in your life.

[00:02:20] And so I was thinking about this question and I threw it out to Sarah while she's getting ready this morning. And I said, "what are people prioritizing over growth?" Because the people that come into our program, the work with us, they get great results. They are different. They're prioritizing growth over certain other things.

[00:02:39] And so people that don't work with us, why do they not spend money on coaching? Why don't they invest in coaching? And so why don't we go to Sarah and find out, what do you think? Why are people not spending money on coaching? Like where entrepreneurs at in their journey that mentally that's preventing them from spending money on a coach, moving the business forward or working towards growth?

[00:03:05] Sarah: Well, I think there's a few reasons that this could be the case. And one might be that people don't even know what a coach would do, right? Like, "how would a coach help me?" And some people might not even be aware that that's an option.

[00:03:22] Jason: Got it.

[00:03:22] Sarah: I wasn't for a very, very long time. Even when I was running my business, I didn't know, "Hey, there's people that will help you."

[00:03:30] Jason: Okay. That's fair enough. So what cracked your mind open to the idea or possibility of coaching?

[00:03:38] Sarah: Well, honestly, it was you. You're really big on coaching. I had never had a coach in my life. Ever. And when you and I had moved in together, you are so big on coaching and you do a variety of different types and styles of working with coaches.

[00:04:00] And some of it is mastermind style and some of it is one on one and some of it is event type. And I realized, "wow, this is really great." Like, I just did not make that connection and realization that there are people who genuinely want to help other people succeed in life and in business.

[00:04:21] Jason: So I want to clarify what you're saying.

[00:04:26] Clarify something. Some people listening will hear, "Oh, Jason's into coaching. Yeah, we know he coaches people. That's what he does. It's what he's trying to sell." And what you're saying is you saw me getting coached.

[00:04:38] Sarah: Oh yes, working with coaches.

[00:04:39] Jason: Working with coaches, joining masterminds. Like I'm the student.

[00:04:43] Sarah: I knew what you did when obviously when I met you.

[00:04:45] Jason: Yeah.

[00:04:46] Sarah: But I also saw you embody that and you work with a lot of coaches yourself. And in seeing you and the business, our business, work with coaches, that was something I was like, "Oh, wow. Okay. That helps a lot." Because coaches, especially when you work with a coach that's been there, done that... because there's a lot of coaches that they don't really know. They're like, "well, this was a great theory." But when you work with a coach that has. done the thing and gotten the result and had that experience and now they can talk about it and they can share their experience and they can share their knowledge and they can say, "Hey, I tried this and it didn't work. So avoid this," and "Hey, this got me in some hot water, so definitely don't do that," And, "this was really successful and here's how I did it and here's why I did it this way. And I kept testing and refining." And then they can share that knowledge with you. And when I started experiencing that in DoorGrow, With the coaches that we worked with, that was something that I was like, "Oh, well, that would have been nice to know."

[00:05:52] Jason: And Sarah learns super fast. Like I've always been super impressed by how quick you adopt new information or new ideas. Like most people I think it takes a while for people to absorb certain things, but some things you're just like, "yeah." And you're like, "let's do coaching."

[00:06:05] And we've tried lots of different coaches out together. Like some not good.

[00:06:09] Sarah: Some are not good.

[00:06:10] Jason: Right. It's like a...

[00:06:12] Sarah: colossal waste of money.

[00:06:14] Jason: Some really good.

[00:06:15] Sarah: Some really good.

[00:06:16] Jason: Some we weren't ready for. We just like didn't have the capacity or the bandwidth to work with them.

[00:06:21] Sarah: Mm hmm.

[00:06:22] Jason: We just had so much going on.

[00:06:23] Like we took on too much. Maybe we had too many coaches at a time, something like this. Right. Even right now, like I'm onboarding and I'm coaching and training two new sales team members, plus my son in learning setting and sales. But I went and got outside help. So I have a coach right now that's coaching me and them.

[00:06:45] And then I'm spending each day coaching them, but each week we're meeting with a coach and he's an expert in sales and he's helping us go to another level and work on scripts and work on our communication, work on language. And that's been really helpful. I'm always leveling up my skills.

[00:06:59] And I think it's important to never get comfortable. And I think for me, I just try to imagine like if I didn't have coaches or mentors and I'm every day trying to like coach people and sell coaching to me, that would feel like a gross lack of integrity. Feels like I'd be grossly out of alignment, and a lot of the coaches that we have, I found them through coaching programs that we were in with them. Right. And so I know that they believe in coaching and they're in integrity. And I know that they're in the areas, at least that I am seeking help in, they are ahead of me in that game. And and so I can trust them.

[00:07:39] There's evidence they can help get results and they've given some value already. And so I'm like, "okay, I should, we should work with them." And I think that's one of the challenges. And so everybody out there, if you're like, " why am I not spending money on coaching or why don't I have a coach?"

[00:07:52] I think there's a lot of reasons for that. But I think just as a side note, if you're going to get a coach, don't work with a coach that doesn't have a coach , right? If they went through one program one time, they're like, "I went through this coaching program and got a certificate one time." Then do they really believe in coaching?

[00:08:10] No. They just believed in getting the appearance of being a good coach and they're not actually a coachable person. I believe in order to be able to coach others, you have to also be coachable and being able be able to learn. I learned a massive amount just by coaching, coaching clients and supporting them.

[00:08:29] And so let's get into what people maybe are prioritizing instead of growth. If they're not growing. Because some people are listening to this and they're like, "well, I've been stuck at the same number of doors I've been at for like two, three years." So what priority might be off or what are they prioritizing that's different?

[00:08:45] What might be off? What are some of the things they're prioritizing?

[00:08:48] Sarah: I think one of the big things is this need to control everything. And I understand because I am a control freak. I get it. And for a long, long time, I had always said, "if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself."

[00:09:08] So, why would I ask somebody else to do this thing, and then I'm just going to have to go check and see if they did it the right way? And "oh, they made a mistake, so now I have to... it's just easier and faster for me to just go and do it myself!" Right? Instead of teaching somebody or training somebody or just asking them to do it, but then really secretly I'm going to go and check and see if they actually did it.

[00:09:28] So delegation for me was very hard for a very long time. Because I am very detail oriented, and very OCD, and very organized, and I'm very particular in how things get done. So, I believe there's a right way, and a wrong way to do just about every task that there is.

[00:09:49] Jason: Yeah, that's very, very INTJ thinking of you.

[00:09:53] But I'm not incorrect. Most of the time, you're not, right? And so, if you want it done right, you do it yourself. Is that true? Sometimes, right? Like there's a lot of situations where that's true. The challenge is: could it be possible that if somebody else did it, it could be done better than you?

[00:10:12] Right. That could be true too. And so I think getting a coach is you start to recognize where you might have gaps and the ultimate evidence is our results. If we're not getting the results that we want, then maybe we're not the person that should be doing that thing. Because we're not getting the results and we're doing it.

[00:10:29] So it's us, right? But yeah, I think that's a belief that a lot of people have in the beginning. "I want it done right." And I think a lot of times we hold onto things simply because "we want it done right" means "done according to my set of values." There's lots of different ways to do something and the outcome could be similar or could work or could be positive, but we have certain values that we want it done in a certain way to be the right way.

[00:10:54] The right way. Yes. And INTJs very much feel there's a right way and a wrong way for everything. The challenge is a lot of times, if we're super rigid and believing we always have the right way, we can't see around corners. There's certain personality types, though, that can see a lot more opportunity and a lot more variety of options.

[00:11:13] And they usually can crack those strong J's brains open, that are judging, to some new ideas and new possibilities. And eventually they'll adopt those, right? And so that's, I think where we have a nice balance in our relationship is you're usually right. A lot of things and very strategic brain and can figure stuff out and you're like, something's off here.

[00:11:35] You're very intuitive. And and usually right when you're like, "something's not right here." And then also, I'm very good at seeing alternatives, other possibilities, and exposing you to some other options or some other ideas.

[00:11:48] Sarah: Yes. And you're also very good at human emotions.

[00:11:52] Jason: Oh.

[00:11:52] Sarah: I'm not good at human emotion.

[00:11:54] Jason: Right.

[00:11:55] Sarah: You're like, "well, you can't do that because it'll make people feel like this." And I'm like, "so?"

[00:12:01] Jason: Yeah, yeah, this is a constant frustration. You're like, "why won't people just do what I told them to do when I just tell them one time in a very succinct way, exactly what I want?

[00:12:11] Sarah: Right? Like I have all the answers, just listen and then do what I tell you to do! That's it. Like, it's so easy. I feel like life would be so much easier if you just listen.

[00:12:22] Jason: And so the one advantage, one of my maybe few advantages over you cognitively maybe is the idea that I can empathize a bit more with other people and I can figure out what would it take to get this installed into their brain?

[00:12:38] What would make this digestible for them? What would make this palatable? What would make them able to adopt or absorb this idea or to remember this idea or for this to work? And you're like, "just tell them!" Because I can just tell you and you get it. And you'll get annoyed if I start to explain and use analogy.

[00:12:53] Sarah: I got it, I got it.

[00:12:55] Jason: Yeah.

[00:12:55] Sarah: Give me the thing that I need.

[00:12:56] Jason: Those things are very effective. I got it. Other people.

[00:12:58] Sarah: And now I'm going to go and do it. That's how I work.

[00:13:01] I think other people work like that too, but sometimes they don't and it's crazy to me! I don't... crazy!

[00:13:07] Jason: So I think one of the things that people prioritize over growth sometimes is that self struggle. Like there's people that value doing it themselves.

[00:13:17] Like even as a little kid, my daughter, Madi, I would try to tie her shoelaces and she didn't even know how to do it! And she would say, "no, I do it! I do it!"

[00:13:25] Like she wouldn't let me do it.

[00:13:26] Sarah: Hey Madi.

[00:13:27] Jason: Madi edits our podcast, so she'll see this. She wanted to do it. And I'd be like, "okay."

[00:13:32] And she's just sitting there struggling. But she was determined and eventually she figured it out and eventually she might be frustrated enough to allow me to help her. Right? And sometimes we have to allow people to struggle, but a lot of times we're self struggling and it's self imposed and we're not having success in our business or success in growth or adding doors or making more money or retaining clients or whatever it might be. And we're so stuck on this idea of self struggle, which is DIY, right? "I'm going to do it myself." and I've been this guy. I'll watch YouTube videos. I'll read books. I will figure it all out on my own.

[00:14:06] " I'm smart enough. I can do this." And what I want to say to everybody listening, that that's you. You're right. You're totally right. You are smart enough to figure everything out eventually, it's just going to take you probably a decade longer than somebody that goes and gets coaching or gets helped. And I've been that I've done that.

[00:14:24] Jason: I've spent like a decade doing stupid stuff. I'm in my forties. I've spent at least a decade doing some things and struggling with some things before I got help with it. And the amount of time somebody that already has succeeded at this or knows what works can collapse for you in the experimentation, in the struggles, in the financial risks, in the time wasting is pretty significant, like dramatically significant.

[00:14:48] I've had mentors... I have one mentor. I paid him three grand a month and it was the biggest expense ever. Like I signed up for this coach and I immediately was like in a short period of time was making 30 grand more a month. That's a pretty decent return. Right? And I would have been stupid to not have done that, but it was a calculated risk.

[00:15:07] At the time I was in a dysfunctional marriage and my wife at the time cried when I told her I was spending three grand a month, and we've spent a lot more than three grand a month on some of our coaches and mentors.

[00:15:19] Sarah: At the time three grand was a lot and it was scary.

[00:15:21] Jason: Oh, yeah.

[00:15:22] That was my first dive into high ticket coach. Yes. Working with the coach.

[00:15:26] Sarah: Yes, and I think the other thing to point out too about working with someone else is that It's not always about, "well, I must be bootstrapped. I must do it myself. I'm going to figure it out. I'm going to do it all. I don't need any help."

[00:15:40] Sometimes it's not even that sometimes it's, you just think things are really good because we hear that sometimes. Not all the time, but sometimes like, "Oh, things are pretty good in the business," but you don't know what you don't know.

[00:15:51] Sometimes you just don't know what you don't know. And you think, "well, if things keep going the way that they are right now, that's okay. Like, maybe it's not my dream situation, but I'm also not really hating my day to day. And I'm not in this massive struggle." So I'm like, "things are okay. So do I actually need help? And do I need to reach out and work with someone?" And a lot of times, even if you think things are pretty good, and " maybe I don't need help." And you're right. You maybe don't need help. Perhaps you just need help to see what else is possible for you.

[00:16:31] Jason: And they may not need help. They may not need it. If you're smart and you have big goals and you want to move forward quicker, then maybe you would want it, right? You would desire it instead of feel like this needy energy, like, "Oh, I need this." I think that's sometimes what limits us is we don't want to feel like we need something.

[00:16:48] We don't want to admit we need something because it's a gross energy to be needy or to need something. It almost feels victimy to some people. I think when we have goals and we know what we want and we see that other people can help us, it becomes a little bit more natural for us to be able to do that.

[00:17:03] Sarah: And I also think, this is another gripe I have with our lovely education system, is that in school, you are taught, "do it on your own."

[00:17:13] "Don't look at other people's. Don't cheat. Don't ask your neighbor." If you're stuck, you pretty much ask the teacher. Refer back to your lesson and figure it out. When you're taking a test, you can't go "hey Joe, I don't know what number 13 is. You know what number 13 is?" You're not allowed to do that.

[00:17:32] Yeah, like getting help is wrong.

[00:17:33] It's wrong, right! So just have it memorized and regurgitate it. So take the information in, memorize it, and vomit it back up on a piece of paper, and then I will give you a passing grade. In the middle of a test, are you able to raise your hand and say, "Hey teacher, I had a question. I'm stuck on this. I don't really understand this. Can you please help me arrive to the answer?" No! No, you cannot! So in school, they teach us the self reliance. And I do believe that that is a very positive thing in one way. And in another way, it hinders our growth. Because in business, you should rely on other people so that you can get better results and go farther faster.

[00:18:17] Jason: So I think also what school teaches us, the way school is set up is there's this one guru expert at the front of the room that we have to listen to all the time.

[00:18:27] And so we learn to be reliant on the leader for all the answers. And sometimes the leader doesn't have them, right? Sometimes they don't know. Sometimes they have blind spots. Everybody's been a student when they've called their teacher out on something that was off or wrong, right? Or seen that happen, and they lose that credibility. And teachers just usually don't tolerate that very well. They don't like being seen as having flawed thinking. Having a wrong idea or being wrong. And so there's this sort of authoritarianism that's like involved in schools. It's like, trust the authority, trust the leader, be this blind, dumb beast and let them lead you around. And that's like the Bible and book of revelations talks about the mark of the beast and the hand and the forehead. And maybe it's just your thoughts and your labor just being controlled by outside unearned authority. And people should earn. their authority, right? I work with coaches because they've earned authority, not because they just told me like somebody like put a gun to my head or forced me or I was in a school system and they said I had to do it this way.

[00:19:30] So I think the irony of self struggle or DIY is that A lot of you are frustrated and thinking "I've got to do everything myself," but then you are probably because of that energy that you are being and creating in the universe and just how you show up with other people, you probably are really triggered and really frustrated with all the people that you encounter that think they could do a better job themselves.

[00:20:00] Because you have the same energy or problem as them, and so they trigger you. So if you're running, you're butting your head all the time with these DIY people in the industry, people that are trying to self manage their properties or people that are trying to micromanage really self manage through you to get you to do the work, it may be because you're carrying this belief of self struggle or doing it yourself.

[00:20:22] So just something to chew on. So another challenge that I think why people don't spend money on coaching or what they're prioritizing maybe over growth is there might be prioritizing safety or ease or comfort. And so what do you have to say about that?

[00:20:38] Sarah: So you have to get uncomfortable if you want results.

[00:20:42] If you want results that are different than what you're currently getting, you can't take the same actions you're taking now and expect to get different results. I think, isn't that the definition of insanity? It's doing the same thing over and over and over and then expecting a different result.

[00:20:57] Jason: I think that's what creates insanity. It stresses people out and makes you start to go crazy a little bit. That's a pretty painful. Pain's an inevitable scenario if you keep trying to do the same thing and expecting a different outcome. Now, everybody, as we age, we tend to move towards more and more comfort.

[00:21:14] I saw a video the other day. I think it was Gary Brecka, this health guy. He said that after the age of 30, most people will never do another sprint again in their life.

[00:21:24] Sarah: Well, I don't want to sprint. If I'm sprinting, y'all better follow me because...

[00:21:27] Jason: right. That's what people are saying. Like, they're like, "yeah, I don't want to. That's uncomfortable. I don't want to be cold. I don't want to be too hot." Comfort is he like described as is what leads us towards death ultimately. We want to be comfortable. We don't go work out at the gym. We don't build muscle, which affects our cognitive functioning later in life. It makes our bones more brittle. We then have a broken bone and like like we're hospitalized till we die right in our later years if we don't do the right things And so we're always seeking comfort and ease, and when we're always seeking comfort and ease, we shift the weight towards others. We Become, what I would kind of phrase as a victim or a blamer. We're a victim. We blame other people. We're complaining about our circumstances constantly, right?

[00:22:17] And instead of doing work or taking action or doing the things that are uncomfortable. And I think there's this stoic phrase that from, I don't know, one of the cool guys that is involved in stoicism or whatever, but the idea is "hard choices, easy life. Easy choices, hard life."

[00:22:34] And a lot of people, I think could go, "that's true." I've seen some people make some easy choices, choices towards comfort, choices towards ease and their life's pretty difficult because they've avoided doing the hard, uncomfortable things, having the hard, uncomfortable conversations with people they should have, doing work, working hard to get the outcomes and a life of greater ease and comfort, right?

[00:22:55] And so I think if you prioritize ease and comfort over growth, what's going to happen?

[00:23:00] Sarah: Not much.

[00:23:01] Jason: Well, you're not going to grow, right? Because growth isn't necessarily about ease and comfort, right? And so, even in nature, if we take a fruit tree or a bush that produces some sort of, fruit, whatever, if we cut that, tree and trim it, it will then yield a bigger result.

[00:23:19] And sometimes if it's overgrown, it can't even produce fruit very effectively because it's too busy feeding everything else, all the branches leaves. So trimming it allows it to produce more fruit. And we're similar in that we need some friction and some intentional discomfort in our life and action in order to produce or bear fruit, in order to get the things that we want in life.

[00:23:42] Having uncomfortable conversations creates greater peace in our relationships. Being willing to take action in our business allows us to have more freedom, more revenue financially, and to be able to take care of our team and ourselves better. And so we can't be a victim and a blamer and complain about the market and complain about COVID and whatever your stupid excuses are, whoever's listening.

[00:24:04] If you've got all your excuses why you're not growing, you can either have your excuses or you can have results, but you can't have both. So which one would you rather choose? Right? And there's a lot of people that would rather choose their excuses because it allows them to not do anything. It allows them, "well, the market's tough, so I just might as well not do anything."

[00:24:23] Like right now, real estate agents, some are like, "oh, real estate market's tough. Can't get deals." Right? And then there's people that are still closing a bunch of deals and making plenty of money. And so our beliefs and our mindset and how we prioritize things shifts things. And so are you prioritizing ease and comfort?

[00:24:40] Sometimes it's not even about our own ease and comfort. Well, maybe it is. Sometimes people won't join a coaching program because their spouse doesn't want to spend the money or their business partner doesn't want the business to grow. We see that like they're an operator personality type.

[00:24:54] They're not really focused on growth and they're like, "no, we have good, stable, residual income. Like why rock the boat? And I'm getting 50 percent of the revenue," or whatever I've seen. And they're like, "why change anything? Don't disrupt my comfort here." And the other person's like, "let's have more doors. Let's go crazy. I'm a visionary."

[00:25:12] And the operator personality type's like, "yeah, but that would make my life worse. I don't need more money. I'm comfortable. Don't mess up my comfort."

[00:25:21] And sometimes the business visionary, or if it's with your spouse, we're not having that uncomfortable conversation with them because it means rocking the boat.

[00:25:31] It's uncomfortable. It means there might be a fight. It means you might get screamed at or get some angry emotion thrown at you. In some scenarios. And so I think it's really important to connect with deep down. Like, what do we really want? And what really should we be doing that we just know is right for us and being willing to step into that discomfort. I made some very uncomfortable choices in my day in order to get to where I'm at now. And sometimes it involved me having to look stupid in front of a group in a mastermind. Sometimes it involved me having to have uncomfortable conversations in relationships or even to end relationships.

[00:26:10] That's super uncomfortable. In order to move forward and do what I felt I was called to do or what I felt deep down. What I think is also interesting is more people are a lot more comfortable with those that are willing to do uncomfortable things and speak uncomfortable words.

[00:26:29] It makes everybody feel safer because they can trust that person. You can't trust people that are always focused on ease and comfort. I don't think they're as trustworthy of people because part of life in order to have integrity, in order to be honest, in order to work hard, in order to benefit the people that you have a fiduciary duty or responsibility to benefit like clients, you have to be willing to do the uncomfortable things.

[00:26:53] Otherwise, you're shifting all the discomfort on to everybody else. "Everybody else around me has to be uncomfortable so I can have comfort." And that does not create great relationships, safety, or create a good client or business relationship in the longterm. So that's my soapbox about that. All right.

[00:27:09] So, another reason people don't prioritize that they don't prioritize a growth is they might be looking at the short term. Maybe it's related to comfort. Maybe it's related to just, "I need to make sure I have cash now and they're giving up the longterm, maybe more cash later, maybe a bigger business later." Any thoughts about that?

[00:27:28] Sarah: This was your thing.

[00:27:29] Jason: I've run into this where I've talked to people and they're like, "well, I don't know. I don't have a lot of money right now," I think this is where you need to be willing to take a risk and bet on yourself.

[00:27:37] Find a system that's proven. We've got plenty of case studies and results to show that our stuff works. It's all proven. It all works. What I find is the only real question people need to figure out is, are they willing to work? Do they trust themselves? Are they willing to bet on themselves? And a lot of people don't.

[00:27:53] A lot of times we've struggled to even do the little things that we've told ourselves that we were going to do. And so we're out of integrity and we don't trust ourselves anymore. Like, "I'm going to work out at the gym tomorrow. I'm tired." Right. We've all done that. I've done that this week. Right. I did work out this morning though. But we've done that. We've all done that. And so it's the making these little movements of taking action towards our own integrity. Like I'm going to do this. And then I do it learning to trust ourselves again. And the one person you can control is you. And so when you have strong trust in yourself.

[00:28:28] Very few things are supremely risky because you're betting on yourself, especially if you're getting support to become better. And so, it may be a cash investment now, but if you can see there's a system and you can see there's results, then maybe the risk is worth it. You should get an ROI if you do the right actions, if it's a proven system. So I think those are some of the things. So why don't we look at the reverse real quick, and then we'll wrap up.

[00:28:54] The reverse would be what are our clients like? What's different about our clients? What do they prioritize that made them decide to work with us? What are they prioritizing differently that said " why would I not spend money on coaching? I should totally do this."

[00:29:08] Sarah: Yeah. Well first I think they believe in their ability to do it.

[00:29:13] Jason: Hmm.

[00:29:14] Sarah: Because if you don't believe in yourself, there's nothing that you're going to be able to do. No coach can help you. You've got to figure that out first. So they believe in themselves and they are also committed.

[00:29:27] And I think that is something that sometimes people are lacking. It's, they're just lacking a actual true commitment.

[00:29:37] Jason: So commitment, I feel like is, maybe it's a choice, but I feel like it's also an outcome of choices, right? So what are they choosing to prioritize? You think that maybe makes them more committed?

[00:29:49] Sarah: You're so cryptic today. You're like, " what are they choosing?" Like...

[00:29:52] Jason: well, I don't know, this is an interesting question I think to chew on.

[00:29:55] Sarah: What makes people more committed?

[00:29:56] Jason: Why are some people committed and some people are not? We're talking about priorities today, so I'm thinking, what are the priorities that they have that leads to being strongly committed?

[00:30:05] Sarah: It's either you're in it or you're out. It's like a pool. You're either in the pool or you're out of the pool. Yeah. That's it. You, like, you're either wet or you're dry. That's it. You can't like, "well, I've got a toe in the pool." Like it doesn't work. It doesn't work in business.

[00:30:19] And if you're finding that, "well, like I have my foot in the pool a little bit, I'm going to pull it out if I have to pull it out," that business will forever be hard. You have to either go all the way in or go all the way out. Because if you're in the middle, it is difficult and it will remain difficult.

[00:30:37] Jason: Yeah. It's really painful to be in between.

[00:30:40] Sarah: So either jump in the pool or jump out of the pool. Neither one is wrong.

[00:30:45] You might go, "I hate this pool. I don't like it." Great. Then find a different pool.

[00:30:50] Jason: So in chewing on this, I think in looking at myself when I'm fully committed to something, it's because I have prioritized the outcome.

[00:31:00] The outcome is clear enough and important enough and motivating enough that I will do whatever it takes to get that outcome. That's when I'm fully committed to something. I'll do whatever it takes to get that outcome because I know what I want. That's one of the things is our clients know what they want.

[00:31:17] Like they know that there's outcomes that they want. You mentioned, they believe in their ability to do it, to learn, to take action. And so they are a hundred percent committed. If you're committed to something and you don't know how to do it, you'll figure it out because you'll do whatever it takes.

[00:31:34] You will struggle. You'll do go through trial and error. You'll fail. You'll make mistakes. And I think that's another thing is our clients believe in their own themselves enough to be willing to make mistakes. Whereas some people prioritize not looking bad or not making mistakes. And so they don't take the action.

[00:31:51] They were like, "I need it all to be perfect and to know how to do everything before I do it because I don't want to be embarrassed or look stupid." And so I think some of our most successful clients are willing to just try stuff. They're just willing to do it. They don't have this need that they have to look so smart or whatever.

[00:32:07] And sometimes those people struggle the most, right? Sometimes they are super smart, but they have to look good and look smart all the time. So I think in short, our clients prioritize growth, they prioritize learning, they prioritize taking risks, experimenting, and this is why they are able to move forward.

[00:32:26] So hopefully this episode helps you reassess some of your own priorities. Like if you're not getting the results, make a list of what your priorities are and figure out like "what am I prioritizing currently that's leading to my current results?" Because if you can't see that, then you can't change it.

[00:32:40] And as soon as you can see it and you shift your priorities, "well, I need to start prioritizing this." Maybe you need to start prioritizing action. Maybe you need to start prioritizing your health more. Maybe you need to start prioritizing learning more. Whatever it is, in order to get the outcomes that you want.

[00:32:55] But if you're not getting the outcomes you want, your priorities are off. And hopefully this is an opportunity and an invitation for you to introspectively figure that out. And I hope that was beneficial.

[00:33:05] If you're struggling with any of this and you want some help getting clarity figuring out your priorities figuring out what you need to do in order to grow, you have a blind spot, you can't see it... like you need some external perspective, we all have problems we can't see.

[00:33:20] And if you're not getting the results, you lack some knowledge. You lack some insight. And so reach out to us at DoorGrow. One of our growth consultants can help you figure this out, help you figure out where you might be stuck, what you need to get to the next level.

[00:33:33] And you probably have some garbage or junk beliefs that are preventing you from being able to take things to the next level. And once those are out of the way, you're golden, right? So until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:33:46] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:34:12] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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Maintenance is often the most challenging area in a property management business. What if you could automate your maintenance workflow with an in-house, expert AI maintenance coordinator?

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with David from Vendoroo (formally Tulu) to talk about AI maintenance coordination and how it could revolutionize the property management industry.

You’ll Learn [05:25] The AI Revolution

[10:51] What can AI Maintenance Coordination Do?

[20:58] How Vendoroo Handles Work Orders

[27:56] Why You Should Have in-House Maintenance

[37:30] Where do Humans Step in?

[41:37] Handling Worst-Case Scenarios

Tweetables “Property management is a very human business. It's a very relationship-driven business.”

“Is it scalable? Is it burning you out? Is it pulling you away from other duties that you need to be? Are you spreading yourself too thin? Great questions to ask if you have growth objectives.”

“Residents don't want to talk to a computer. They want to feel that they have a connection to their property manager.”

“The first offense creates a little crack between the relationship. The second one, you're losing trust with your owner.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] David: Even people who had in house maintenance coordinators or VAs, good ones, always still feel that they needed to second check all the work. And now when they're seeing the justification and they're seeing the education behind it, they get this sense of like, I can let go. You know why? Because this system is doing maintenance exactly the way that I'm asking it to do maintenance. And they feel that now they're actually back in control.

[00:00:24] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow Property Managers to the DoorGrow Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate high, trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:01:05] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:25] And now let's get into the show. All right. So today I'm hanging out with David Normand and Reza Keshavarzi. Did I say your last name right?

[00:01:36] David: We always say it sounds like the great sauce that you would put on a steak. Keshavari. So delicious.

[00:01:41] Jason: All right.

[00:01:41] David: Yes. Cool.

[00:01:43] Jason: So David and Reza are from a company called Tulu, which we'll be getting into, which I think are probably revolutionizing maintenance related to AI and our topic today, we're going to be talking about AI and maintenance coordination, maybe getting into some of the current maintenance challenges, what AI could help with, what should be automated, what shouldn't be automated because I think that's a very important thing to cover and how to turn maintenance into a profit center. Before we get into that, why don't we get into some background? So David, why don't you give us the journey? How did you two get into this? How did you event like, how did you start your journey in the property management space?

[00:02:24] David: Yeah, great. It's crazy to think about it. It just all started probably about 15 years ago. Like many of you, started a property management company with a buddy of mine. I remember we started off with 80 doors. Got our 1st client, was excited. He left his job at Verizon. I was actually in the banking industry, bidding on subprime auto loans and the 2008 crash happened. And so we all knew what happened after that. And so anyway we actually had some tremendous success and in just over four years we added over 600 doors. Which was a phenomenal growth in our market. And we had a lot of people going, "Hey, what's your secret sauce? what are you guys doing?" Right. And the reality was, is that we just cared, right? We cared harder. We had fiduciary duty. And all of these owners were leaving their other property managers and saying, "Hey, Maybe these guys have it figured out," and we were getting conversions and our close rate was like 80%.

[00:03:13] It was really crazy, but something happened and just like many of us, owners started getting frustrated feeling like, the magic was wearing off because at the end of the day, no matter how hard we worked. Those owner statements and those maintenance invoices at the end of the month, I realized were the main source of friction between those long lasting relationships and the same reason why somebody left that previous property manager to come over for the hope of more transparency and maintenance was the same issue that we ran into.

[00:03:41] Right. So that led me on this journey of trying to figure out, how do we standardize our fiduciary duty to owners when it comes to maintenance and help them bring transparency and education and understanding to what I feel is really the cornerstone foundation of what a great relationship is? Because no, the building can be full, the mortgage can be paid, but those maintenance bills still come in and there's still the questions.

[00:04:06] "Why does this cost this much? So I had some great opportunities to work went on with Fannie Mae helped them manage their rental portfolio, but still in the back of my head, wanted to try to solve this issue. And all these years later, I get a phone call from somebody that said, "Hey, you need to meet this guy, Reza. He's in the HOA industry. And he's seen a similar issue with lack of transparency. And I think that you guys are trying to solve the same issue. Hey, why don't you meet up?" And I'll, and I'll preface this. This was the fourth introduction to a guy in a fourth type of tech or a company that we try to part with.

[00:04:40] And it just shows you the journey of an entrepreneur. Like you never know when that right connection that's going to align with your passions, resources, and understanding happens. And I actually had three other techs that didn't work out before. And I didn't want to bring them to market.

[00:04:52] Right. So that's our story. We got introduced to each other and the synergies have been fantastic. And I'm really excited to talk about what we're doing here in the space. So it's been a crazy journey. It's been exciting. Maybe one day I'll write a book down the road about all the things not to do.

[00:05:04] Jason: I think every entrepreneur that has a little bit of success could write that book. I'm sure. So cool. David, where do you think we should start? Like there's a revolution right now, this AI revolution, like it's AI everywhere. And and it's moving fast.

[00:05:21] David: Yes.

[00:05:21] Jason: Like really fast.

[00:05:22] And it's a bit crazy. And. Everything's changing. There's a million software tools and companies coming out. Maybe AI is making all of them. I have no idea, but like...

[00:05:31] David: 85 percent of all content written online is written by AI these days. So yeah, definitely.

[00:05:35] Jason: Right. There's the fake internet theory that like the majority of the traffic and communication and comments on the internet isn't even real. So it's like we're walking around this fake ghost town online. And we're consuming content and we're like none the wiser in a lot of instances. So my quick take, for those listening, as we're going through this AI revolution, it's exciting. There's a lot of change happening.

[00:05:57] We don't want to be left behind. We want to make sure we're paying attention to what's new, what we can use. Everybody's probably used chat GPT once or twice or keeps hearing about it from other people. "They've got a GPT, that thing that you use." Yeah. I used it this morning, right? Like I was trying to figure out something in my Chevy Tahoe.

[00:06:15] And I was like, "how do I do this thing in my Tahoe? Like, can you just tell me?" And it can collapse time, but sometimes it's not useful. I think my take on this is that human interaction is going to be a premium. It's going to be at a premium. It's going to be something that really sets people apart because we're moving away from humanity to some degree by leveraging all this tech and AI and all these tools and property management is a very human business.

[00:06:43] It's a very relationship driven business. And and I think we'll get into this today. We want to be careful of using technology where we shouldn't or trying to trick people. "Well, look, I'm pretending like it's me, but it's AI. Haha. I tricked you." And what's funny is there's little indicators, like, and we know that this stuff's being used in a lot of different ways, like governments are using this now, like, we don't even know what's real on the news or what's like deep fakes or AI, like they're showing people's like doing interviews and people are zooming in and noticing their rings are disappearing and like weird stuff, right?

[00:07:20] David: Yeah.

[00:07:20] Jason: And stuff's going viral on like the internet. And so we're living in this world where we're super skeptical and we wonder if anything's real.

[00:07:28] David: Yeah.

[00:07:29] Jason: Sometimes people are even asking, like, is this AI on a phone call?

[00:07:33] David: Yeah, well, you can't tell the difference now. I'll tell you, our tech team and AI guys they actually played around with me a little bit and they actually use my voice and had me doing work orders and no one could tell it was them.

[00:07:44] Not me speaking and giving triage and doing that type of stuff. And I actually I tested it with my wife and I sent her a message over it and she didn't even blink an eye. Didn't even blink an eye. It was crazy. It was that first like aha moment that really when we talk about our fiduciary duty to our clients and ourselves about the power of this and where it's going, right.

[00:08:01] And to that point. So when it comes to AI, I think people need to understand that really, the way that we look at chat GBT to me is just the new Google, right? It's Google on steroids. Okay. And so, yeah, for sure. Do we use some chat GBT to understand like, how to write the perfect sentence structure? For sure.

[00:08:18] But the cool part about this, Jason, is that what we're doing is: how do we use these models in this education that teach it about fiduciary duty to your owners? That's what gets me excited, right? That's what gets me excited to understand and to think intelligently and to think with thoughtfulness to the owner's pocketbooks when it's considering a decision of how to dispatch for maintenance, right?

[00:08:42] Like, isn't that what we're all looking for? That we need a system that every work order that comes in that it goes to a expert maintenance coordinator that we know what that costs. I'm talking expert maintenance coordinator, a person's been in this job for 15 to 20 years that you can send a work order to and they don't make an error.

[00:09:00] They're intelligent. They're able to educate, they're able to be client facing. Like there's a real skill set there if you put that on a CV for somebody, right? But that's not what this industry is filled with. Actually, this industry is filled with individuals who are under pressure to find the most affordable maintenance solutions and the most affordable ways to try to find people to run those maintenance solutions. We're allocating the least amount of resources to handle what I consider the highest probability of owner dissatisfaction in the property management relationship with the owner, right? So I have a VA who's 2000 miles away that's responsible for spending a thousand dollars in my owner's money.

[00:09:38] And there's all types of potential errors and things that are happening as a result of that. So the way that we look at AI and actually in our business, we just use the word smart a lot. And we try to use that word, that intelligent instead of artificial. Because you know what? There is a lot of human input that has gone into this to teach it how to be smart and to teach it how to consider the fiduciary duty.

[00:09:59] So at the end of the day, I would encourage all the listeners here that are going on this journey with us today to understand, not to be skeptical, how to maximize its value, right? And that's really what we're going to be focusing on today and to show you how we're maximizing its value to help us achieve what we call our dream outcome when handling maintenance.

[00:10:18] Our dream outcome is as a property manager, I'm starting a company or I'm looking to grow, or I'm hitting those next growth objectives, or I'm looking for ways to be more profitable. What is my dream outcome? And that all circles around having an expert maintenance coordination in my office that is reducing trips costs and considering the fiduciary duty to my clients.

[00:10:40] Right? So that's what we'll talk about here today and how we're using AI to achieve that.

[00:10:43] Jason: Got it. Well, let's get into it. So what can AI do and what can't AI do? Like, well, specifically what can Tulu do and what can't Tulu do?

[00:10:54] Where's the line drawn?

[00:10:55] David: Yeah, that's a great question.

[00:10:56] So first of all, I always tell everybody this out of the beginning: we are not an outsourced maintenance coordination solution. We're not an outsourced company. Yeah. We are not a vendor. Okay. We're not bringing vendors to your marketplace. Okay. Tulu is your expert in house maintenance coordinator.

[00:11:13] So if you're thinking of "I'm hiring a maintenance coordinator" or "I'm building a property management and I need a maintenance coordinator," you now have that. That's that ability to add this onto your software, your system. It's a simple plug and play. You get to remain inside of your portal, you don't have to leave it.

[00:11:30] There's not another new portal, all updates, all things are pushing to Buildium and we're pushing to Appfolio. That was a big part of it. There's no new app for the vendors. There's no new app for the clients because we know what's important for them to live inside of there. So what can it do? Well, first of all, it's a leader.

[00:11:43] Okay. And being a leader means that it is going to use the information that we capture about your company to lead your VAs, to make expert triage decisions that always consider your fiduciary duty to the owner. So let's give an example right here to break that down. Right. Say a hot water tank comes in.

[00:12:03] Okay. Hot water tank's leaking. Okay. First thing it's going to want to understand is what time of the day is it and where is the hot water tank leaking from?

[00:12:09] Jason: Okay.

[00:12:10] David: And then it's going to determine based upon the location of the hot water tank, the type of the hot water tank, which type of vendor at which time is the right one to send out. That is the most cost effective that has the greatest probability of resolving that issue for the best price and meets the satisfaction of the resident. Right. Now that was a mouthful right there. Okay. And if you think about all of the potential errors and data points and things that are involved, the smart maintenance coordinator considers all those and it brings out a triage and it tells the VA "here's the pieces that you're missing. Here's the information that I need. And here's what my suggestion is for you to move forward." So it's amazing at being a leader. And then it's amazing at being an expert about creating communications for the resident and to the vendor to direct them. And then it's also an educator and at the bottom of every work order.

[00:12:58] And I hope to be able to show some people it's really cool. We don't believe in just telling people what to do. We should educate them and tell them why they're doing what they're doing. Right. So imagine if you had the best expert maintenance coordinator leaning over the shoulder of every VA that you have standing there and telling them every work order, every time, here's what to do, here's how to do it, and here's why you're doing it. Right. And as a result, we're finding that VAs that come over that are dedicated to the account in two weeks, they're educated. And in six weeks, the majority of them are executing as a high level maintenance expert within six weeks. Of after sitting down and learning the training system, because just as much as it's leading, it's also training and educating.

[00:13:38] That is a wow moment for somebody who's been in the space, who's been here for 15 years, managing hundreds and hundreds of people for government entities and stuff and understanding the amount of time and effort and training that goes into somebody. And then all of a sudden they come and they tell you, "Hey, by the way, I got a new job. Thank you for all the training. I'm going to go make $30,000 somewhere else," right? How many times has this happened to me? Hundreds of times, right? And so that's a big part of what we're solving here.

[00:14:02] Jason: So in order to be effective and operate as an expert maintenance coordinator so that your VAs that don't have this knowledge can function as if they have this knowledge, then this has to be programmed, right? Maybe it'd be helpful for, the viewers or listeners of this podcast to find out what are all the inputs that go into this? What did they have to provide and what do you guys provide, so this AI, they can trust it?

[00:14:29] David: Yeah. Yeah. Great question, Jason. So first of all, I want to put it on point two to make an emphasis that in this journey that we're all learning about these smart technologies and AI, there's still a big part of human component, right?

[00:14:38] And it's like when you chat, when you write something in chat GBT, like you just don't send it without looking at it. Right. You're reviewing it and making sure it's still saying that you want it to say. Right. So everybody rest assured this thing is not, living on its own and there's checks and balances.

[00:14:51] But the onboarding on average takes 30 to 45 minutes. Okay. And one of the things that we did is number one is, when it comes to triaging and best practices, there's literally probably about 500,000 work orders of data points that it's considering. And it's an expert in that thing that's saying, "Hey, listen, this is how you should handle every work order that comes in because I've seen this, 20,000 times, and this is the best outcome."

[00:15:18] Right. But then what it does is it allows the property manager to talk in natural language. Like you want to talk like a robot. We don't have to write weird code. Just say things. "Hey the owner of one, two, three main street really loves Tom." Tom works on his properties. Comes in 123 main street comes up. It understands what Tom's capabilities are. And it says, "please use Tom to use this." The owner prefers that Tom works on his properties. They have a great relationship. Cool. And so those little tidbits for example, if the heat goes out in unit number one, understand that access has to be in unit number two basement to the HVAC unit, right?

[00:15:52] So that's good to know, but why is that important to know? Because most VAs would make a mistake. They say there's no heat. They don't check property notes. They send out the plumber. Plumber is knocking on the door at unit number one. Person says, I don't know where the HVAC unit is. Tenant next door is not home.

[00:16:06] Now you just charge your owner for 250 emergency call to go out. The resident still doesn't have heat. They think that you're unorganized. It shows you're unorganized on your owner statement because there's two invoices. "Oh, no, wait, you want to cover that? You're unorganized." So you just ate 250 that you're already not marking up on maintenance and you do that 10 times a month.

[00:16:25] Okay. And that's what's going on.

[00:16:27] Jason: And this is where then the owner's like, "I might as well just do it myself because I know everything and it's in my head." So how did they get all of that out of their head? All the little things they know about each property, each multi unit property, what's in the basements, what's..?

[00:16:40] David: We have a cool onboarding process. And again, most times about 30-45 minutes, they sit in, it's called building your AI co pilot. Actually, a lot of people dig it. It's cool. It's a cool process. And we will be first, we go into your system and we're able to pull out all your work order data and it organizes all your vendors, and we can tell who all your vendors are and what you're doing based upon the work order types.

[00:16:59] We can tell if you're a preferred guy is here. Number one guy is, "Hey. This guy always seems to be working on these properties." So there's a lot of information that we gather. And then you just come in and you're like, "yeah, he's my primary. He's my secondary. Oh, here's this little information about this property."

[00:17:13] So you really don't have to get like, like crazy. Like, like, the mailbox is located, like. You can add that stuff later, but in the beginning, it's just like, what are those important rules? I remember this one that really jumped out at me as impactful, a classic mistake, this owner had a lady living in the apartment for 35 years.

[00:17:31] Okay, and she's getting old and one of the rules is that no matter what maintenance ticket comes in, "don't ask her to triage. Don't ask her. It's the tenant's responsibility. I love this person. Please send her out and just take care of her. Right?" What a great rule to put into your system that shows the owner that when that work order comes in, He's not getting a call from, and I forget what her name is.

[00:17:51] And like, they're asking me to change my light bulbs again. And then he's like, I told you twice not to do this. And next thing he's looking for another property manager. And I always love that example of that rule. So that's what you're looking as far as the information you're giving us takes about 30 to 45 minutes.

[00:18:03] For people who have anywhere between, 150 to 350 properties. If you start having, 500, 600, a thousand, I would definitely allocate up to two hours and onboarding for sure.

[00:18:13] Jason: Okay. That's really fast when it comes to rolling out a new technology. Yeah. It's ridiculously fast.

[00:18:19] David: Yeah.

[00:18:19] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Extremely quick. So basically you have all this learning and understanding that's going into who your preferred vendors are. We know how to handle the maintenance work orders. There's no like integration that has to happen. And so as this triage is coming through, you're getting this expert level triage and you can add things down the road.

[00:18:38] You can add it, but how to handle the work orders as we say, there's really nothing new in maintenance. What's new is: "what's the NT for the property? Are there any special conditions that we need to know? Right? What are your residents' responsibilities and what are you responsible for?" Once you have those four questions answered, how to handle the hot water tank, at what time to hit on the hot water tank, how to, how to repair this door, how to do that.

[00:19:02] Those true principles of maintenance are true for everybody, if that makes sense, right? So, so that's a big part of the value that you get that You're hiring an expert maintenance coordinator. If you were to hire him, you wouldn't necessarily be telling him. "Hey, this is how you replace a doorknob."

[00:19:18] He should already know that when you hired him. Right. So think of like it that way when you're considering us as a technology.

[00:19:24] Jason: So, a human maintenance coordinator, the challenge would be, there's no way they can remember every detail about every property, right?

[00:19:32] David: Yeah,

[00:19:32] Jason: it's not. Which means they would have to keep notes.

[00:19:35] Let's say they've already got a decent amount of notes somewhere. Might be in the property management software, maybe they've got their own, I don't know, database of something. Is there the ability to pull in all that information?

[00:19:46] David: Yeah, a hundred percent. Yeah. To grab those notes out. A lot of people have the ability to export it.

[00:19:51] They have a good note file or something like that. We get those, we take that information and it can just be pushed up into the system for sure. So yeah, the onboarding it, it can be, again, some people come in and say, "all I have is single family houses." Everything's pretty straightforward.

[00:20:03] Other people send over an Excel list. "Here's my property notes at the property levels" and upload them. So that's the cool part where. You ingest into the system. There's not a lot of data, manual input. It's reading it and assigning it. And that's where we're using technology to help even improve the onboarding process that you talked about, right?

[00:20:19] You think about people wear t shirts, like, I survived the Yardi onboarding process, right? Like, technology has come a long way to help improve that process, and that was a big part that we focused on.

[00:20:28] Jason: Yeah, that's wild. So once you've got them onboarded and they're in your system, the AI knows pretty much everything about the property, but maybe it doesn't, maybe there's some things it doesn't know.

[00:20:41] And so work order comes up. You're working on something and it's still just in the property manager's head or it's still in the business owner's head or maybe they don't even know yet, but it runs there. It runs into an issue. It's like it has a question maybe, or it doesn't. It needs to know some more stuff.

[00:20:57] I don't know. What happens in those scenarios?

[00:21:00] David: Yeah, this is a great one. So, all right, so let's talk about the life cycle of a work order. Right. And let's everybody just understand that there still is a human component involved in this, right? Every property manager has a dedicated, we call them a remote team member, who's now this expert maintenance coordinator at the cost of a remote team member.

[00:21:16] Now they're able to execute at a very high level. But there are going to be things that they're faced that they don't understand. So they have the ability to communicate with you one on one, or we also have this process internally that they have this ability to go, "I need a request from the expert in the loop" and the expert in the loop is you know, invoice review, complication that they're saying that the AI is not clear on them and it's asking for additional support. And so they can bump that up to individuals, myself, and there's other members of the team members that are big part of this and they can get expert level triage inside of there, to say, "Hey, listen, I'm facing with this vendor issue. They need 25 percent upfront. The job is only 500. I'm not understanding what to do here. The building is located and they're saying access is weird. They need to bring something in." There are complications that still involve human understanding. And so that expert in the loop solves that piece in there.

[00:22:07] And also speaking of humans, we believe that residents and vendors still need to speak to a human. Okay. Super important. Okay. So the value that we have is that we're able to create expert level triage, According to their specifications and the training model and all the great things and the automation and the text messages that are written for them and the codes that are written for them the emails, all those things.

[00:22:31] So, if we can automate at a very high level and free up our people to be able to provide support on the phone to the vendor on the field, or to actually talk to a resident, everybody knows this and I talk to everybody, guys, residents don't want to talk to a computer. They want to feel that they have a connection to their property manager and that when they call in, a lot of people have not even adapted technology for anybody who has, residents have been with them with a while and they're used to talking to Janet, they're used to talking to tell him inside and next thing you can say to them, "Oh, we have a new maintenance system. And by the way, you have to talk to the system." They're like, "okay. This is lame," right? Like, so that personal connection and we have a saying inside of the office that we keep your residents and your vendors within arm's length of you, right? It's communicating. They're using your property management name.

[00:23:20] They're speaking on your behalf. This is an extension of your office. This is your maintenance coordinator. Don't think of this as a vendor. Don't think this is an outsourced maintenance solution that you're setting all your maintenance to some company that's sourcing vendors or bringing them in and doing every, this is your in house maintenance team.

[00:23:38] So always consider that when you're thinking about Tulu, real people. In house maintenance coordinator just powered by AI enabled execute at a crazy high level.

[00:23:46] Jason: So, yeah. So how do tickets get into the maintenance system? Like how are they initiated? Do they still have to be answering their own phone calls?

[00:23:56] Are they just putting it into their property manager software? And then Tulu is going to like start taking some action. What communication does Tulu facilitate or take over if we're going to be having still needing some humans to be in Tulu allows us to increase the amount of communication and care that we show.

[00:24:13] Where do we draw the line? Like, where is Tulu stepping in and doing some communication and where do we need team members to be doing communication?

[00:24:21] David: Yeah. Yeah. Great question. So let's just go through the life cycle of a work order for everybody. I think that's what everyone really understands when they're all thinking about this.

[00:24:28] Okay, let's give me a work order from start to finish. Right? So no change to your residents. No change to anybody. They log into their portal, Buildium, Appfolio, RentVine, whatever they're using. They submit a maintenance work order, that maintenance work order through their system is dispatched to the Tulu maintenance coordinator, expert maintenance coordinator.

[00:24:46] All the magic is happening, all the triage, everything is taking place, and inside of the property management software, they're going to see. Work order.

[00:24:53] Jason: And is that dispatched through via email? API? Yep.

[00:24:56] David: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Just through email? Yep. Set up as simple. You can set it up as a maintenance coordinator and as the maintenance coordinator is set up and the email comes in and it pings out and that creates the work order and starts to process through the, yeah.

[00:25:08] Yep. Cool. And then the property manager will see that the work order has been it's in triage on the status of their system. Then it's assigned, then the vendor will be assigned there. And then from there, the updates, when it's scheduled that we call it the who, what, and the why, right?

[00:25:25] What's going on, who's doing it and what's being done to progress this for. That's a note. You're constantly getting those notes. Now, the cool part about this, Jason. is behind the scenes. All of those text messages and phone calls and emails that we call the noise that are between the residents and the vendors and everybody are all being captured in a system behind the scenes.

[00:25:45] Right. Super value there, right? If a resident is a little bit upset about something or you have some questions, "Hey guys, can you hand me the phone call this one to show me the text messages," right? Communications are big part. So we capture all those communications inside there at any time that the owner of the property manager wants to pull them.

[00:26:00] That's great. Then the work order is completed. The completion, quick question. So

[00:26:05] Jason: all this communication between tenants and vendors, unless they're using some sort of magical system That the vendors have to be in and that the tenants are logged into. And it's like seeing all this, how does Tulu capture that?

[00:26:18] How does it know that the vendor is communicating with the tenant or the tenant? Okay. So it would be any point.

[00:26:24] David: Yeah. Good point. Any point that the the tenant. Is communicating or the vendor or just communicate with two of those. So if the vendor happened to communicate directly with the tenant, it would not capture that part, right?

[00:26:34] That's their phone to phone with that part, right? So it's when the resident or the tenant is communicating with the maintenance coordinator. And as we all know, tenants and vendors love to communicate by text message, right? That's their number one thing to do. So, it's really cool for vendors too, because as we know, a bunch of vendors, they hate. "I don't want to work in another app." Vendors can take pictures from their phone. They can upload estimates from their phone. The estimate comes in and it's actually turned into this really pretty estimate because we know vendors estimates are notorious for being on the back of a paper and hand scratched, right?

[00:27:06] So it actually creates into a brand new Tulu estimate. And so your owners get transparency into pricing and labor. And it's standardized and everything looks clean. And so yeah, vendors love it because they're not lazy, but they're busy guys. And instead of going home and trying to do a whole bunch of paperwork, they can now just generate an estimate, take a picture and shoot it right through.

[00:27:22] So, yeah.

[00:27:23] Jason: Because the challenge that there's a lot of communication involved. And so usually to decrease the amount of communication, they're trying to figure out how do we get the vendors to just talk to the tenants directly to collapse time? But if you have AI, then my guess is that Tulu will still just act like that middle person because the vendor can communicate with them, they can immediately text you, then Tulu texts the tenant, then it's just doing it real time.

[00:27:45] You don't have to wait on a human being in your office to like make this communication happen. So you're like, "well, we're so slow. Let's just get them to talk to each other." The AI is making this happen. Is that accurate?

[00:27:56] David: Huge point right here is, and man you really hit off the nail on the head on this one point here.

[00:28:01] The amount of people that we are seeing that they're using vendors to perform triage in this space is actually alarming. Okay. Alarming. All right. Vendors should not be performing our triage. They should not be the ones trying to figure out what is going on. They're not our client facing people. Maybe some guys are good.

[00:28:20] your in-house guys, goods or whatever. The majority of people are using this, right? The beauty of the system is: Do we have enough information that is captured? From the resident, the property manager that considers the needs of the owner to formulate the correct direction to the vendor so that they can show up with the resources that they need to fix the job the right time or show up educated about what they're there to fix.

[00:28:41] Jason: So let's talk about this real quick. Like vendors should not be doing triage and why not? Like, like what are the obvious ramifications here? Well, vendors, that's like asking a surgeon if you need surgery, right? That's how he makes his money.

[00:28:55] "That's the solution is surgery. We should chop that out, like, let's cut that thing out and I get paid thousands and thousands of dollars."

[00:29:02] David: Or how about this one, Jason, on an owner's report. I see a cost for so many times you see a cost for a maintenance guy, "unable to resolve expert needed." well, why? Because the maintenance vendor was sent out to do the triage.

[00:29:15] That's not fiduciary duty to the owner. If we had the right information, we could have avoided that one trip. So we have some really cool case studies. I'd love to show people that out of like 260 work orders, we have one right here, a client that signed up with us. And so out of that thing here let's see.

[00:29:31] They completed 194 work orders. 17 unnecessary trips were canceled. Wow. Okay. 17 unnecessary trips and 15 of those work orders had an immediate reduction in price because they said that the wrong resource was assigned to that. So think about that. 17 different numbers.

[00:29:48] Jason: So if that, if they have an in-house maintenance team, you're decreasing your your cost deploying these texts, going out and doing stupid work, like significantly. If you are using third party vendors, then there's always an expense. If you're sending anybody out, unless you're like, go do a bid, or something like this, but that's costing the vendor, which they're going to be more frustrated with you.

[00:30:09] So you're freeing that up or they're charging you for it. "Oh, well, if I go out, I charge, right?" Yeah.

[00:30:15] David: I'll give you an example. We just saved owner of a pad split property who wanted to replace the refrigerator. The request came in and they asked for three estimates, okay, to replace the refrigerator.

[00:30:28] Okay, the suggestion came back that basically said in a nutshell, summarize this, "why are you sending three different appliance vendors who are all going to charge a trip fee to go look at a refrigerator when a Home Depot program should be used and the cost of refrigerator should be 860? To factor all those costs in, it would have been about 1, 400. I don't understand why you're doing this. Please explain, right?" Talk about fiduciary duty to the owner.

[00:30:51] Jason: This is why owners get frustrated and they're like, "I might as well just do it myself."

[00:30:55] David: " Because I knew better. I would go to Home Depot. Everyone knows to order a refrigerator from Home Depot, right? Unless there's special circumstances." And now imagine this, and this is where we're going with this, Jason. At the end of each month, these owner reports go out to all these owners, and owners sit down and they call up the property manager, and we always hear people talking about this at every conference.

[00:31:14] "Oh, I don't want to answer that phone call. I know what this is about, right?" And the property manager is scrambling at the end of the month to call the maintenance coordinator, dig into work order notes and justify why did this cost this much? "Explain this to me," right? So we have this really cool report that's coming out that basically, including in the property owner, It would let you know that, Hey, you had six jobs that were able to send a handyman this month.

[00:31:38] Here's what's going on. You had two emergencies, two replacements, little asterisks that said, "Hey, this trip fee was 120. Why? Well, it required two people because there was a toilet that was being replaced on the third floor so they requested an extra hour of labor to be able to bring that toilet up because it was too like..." intimate details so that your owners are feeling like they're getting this like this whole transparency, unbelievable transparency, this report, the property manager doesn't have to waste at the end of the month, which I used to send away two to three days at the beginning of each month, just to answer phone calls and questions.

[00:32:12] Jason: Right. Yeah. It's like "why did it cost us much? Why?"

[00:32:14] Like they can just see it.

[00:32:16] David: Yeah. "Why didn't you send Tom?" "Well, I did send Tom to snake the drain because it was clogged in the master bathroom. We set his limit at an hour. He used a 17, 25 foot power snake. And we said, if you can't get this done within an hour, then we need to send Roto Rooter." "Oh, I get that. You really did try to save me money in the beginning. Yeah. And Roto Rooter found that 35 feet down the thing was a clogged diaper or something like that." That's what owners need to understand. And to break that down in every work order is a tremendous strain on property managers and our system in V2 that's coming very quickly.

[00:32:52] I was actually working on this morning. Those owner reports will be generated then if every month that explain intimate details about the thought process. and the costs and any decisions behind breaking it down into category for every maintenance work order type for their owners. Huge value. Imagine going to a client, a new client, and you're presenting against somebody else and they say, "Hey, how do you handle maintenance?"

[00:33:14] And you pull that report out and you put it down on the table.

[00:33:16] Jason: You're like, "like this is the level of detail. Nobody else is doing this." The maintenance coordinator get on the phone every time and saying, "let me walk you through all these charges and why they happened and what did." And like, how many people listen to this right now?

[00:33:31] I'm like, I know you're listening to this going, "if I never had to do that again, that would be the best thing ever. Ever. Like I've never had to have that uncomfortable conversation with the owner." Like it's all in there. It's all there. Like it makes sense.

[00:33:43] David: "Here's why we are your property manager. And here's the value that I'm giving to you in the transparency to maintenance."

[00:33:50] That's a huge burden. It's a significant pain point. And we know this Jason, the first offense creates a little crack between the relationship. The second one, you're losing trust with your owner and they're beginning Googling "other property managers around me." The third one. You're just waiting for them to look and to go somewhere else.

[00:34:07] So the relationship is falling apart. Right. And we are trying to know that

[00:34:11] Jason: You got a 600 door business in four years.

[00:34:14] David: Yes.

[00:34:15] Jason: Like, and so, and you have probably heard countless stories of people if they're switching companies, it's really rare that people switch companies. Usually things have to be pretty bad and maintenance that's in communication.

[00:34:27] Those that's number one factors, communication and why people leave. And so this allows you to free up a massive amount of time so you can actually be on the phone with the people when you need to be on the phone and stop wasting time with all of these repeat calls, repeat requests, what's going on with this, and yeah, this would just save so much time.

[00:34:44] David: Well, think about growth, Jason, right? So the three things that we're solving for, number one is we're protecting fiduciary duty to the owners, justifying maintenance costs and reducing the cost of expert in house maintenance coordination and making it scalable. Yeah. Okay.

[00:34:58] So now if I can have an expert maintenance coordinator that I add to my office, there's a fixed cost to it. I can scale infinity and not have to worry about hiring and training and staffing and issues and all these problems in global, right? My fiduciary duty to my owners, I got reporting and transparency.

[00:35:17] Maybe my property manager now, instead of being able to manage 250 doors, maybe they can manage 350 doors. Isn't that cool? Like that's where we're going with this stuff for sure.

[00:35:25] Jason: Yeah, it definitely would make a business as maintenance coordination, maybe infinitely scalable. So, okay. I know somebody that's listening, that's very detail oriented and their brain doesn't think like a spider web, like mine is going, "Hey, you guys never finished the example scenario because Jason derailed it."

[00:35:43] And so we've got the maintenance request. It's come in.

[00:35:46] David: Yeah.

[00:35:47] Jason: So take, let's go back to that.

[00:35:49] David: Okay. Yeah. Maintenance request comes in the triage takes place. The information is gathered once the information is gathered, and it fills the requirements of what they believe is the right decision.

[00:36:00] At that point, the scheduling takes place. Okay.

[00:36:03] Jason: Okay. So which pieces of Tulu doing?

[00:36:05] David: All of this.

[00:36:05] Jason: Okay. Okay.

[00:36:07] David: Okay. Okay. So then we're scheduling and then the work is completed. Quality pictures are received. If the resident is satisfaction, you have happiness received, vendors invoices received, and that's all uploaded into the system.

[00:36:20] And then at that point, the property manager can pay the vendor directly if they have a great relationship and maybe they want to pay them in whatever way they do. A lot of people like paying their vendors, that's fine. Or they can reimburse the Tulu system. If they just want to pay one vendor for the rest of their life, and then Tulu will pay the vendor for them directly.

[00:36:38] So it is from intake to vendor payment, all updates, all communications, all triaging, everything.

[00:36:46] Jason: Tulu does all of it. Does it all.

[00:36:48] David: It is your perfect maintenance coordinator. What we call the dream scenario. It has the ability to triage, troubleshoot, knowledgeable about vendor pricing, it's client facing and experience and client facing means that you can even set the parameter that said, "Hey, if anything is over my NTE, I would actually like you to generate your justification as to why think about this and send it out to my owner." Now imagine your owner getting this super email that's like, "Hey, listen, we have this problem. So the five to fancy, here's the steps that it took place to do."

[00:37:15] Jason: So like the amount that's in the agreement that says like anything under 500 in a single month, like we have a right to just take care of it. Right. Or something like this property managers having their agreements. Okay. So, so where do they need humans then? Where do humans come in all of this?

[00:37:31] David: Humans need to be there to provide expert level, the same expert level triage that the system is providing, we need humans in there to make sure, first of all, it's accurate. There is a component of that, right? We're reviewing this and training it, learning it, but as we talked about before, humans need to be there.

[00:37:47] We love that they have a great relationship because they're an extension of the office with their RTM, right? With their property manager and that RTM, they get to know each other. Humans are needed to talk to the residents and humans are needed for vendor support. Okay. Vendors don't want to call into a robot when their hand is in a sewer line from the field asking about, "Hey, I need help and direction. What's going on?"

[00:38:07] They don't want to hear "press two if you're unhappy with this service," like they don't want to hear that. That's where humans come in.

[00:38:13] Jason: Got it. Okay. So what are some of the results that you're seeing when you're installing in this into businesses? Like what's shifting? Because I'm hearing some things like it's going to decrease the time you're spending on the phone with your owner.

[00:38:25] So it's going to decrease the amount of time doing communication. You won't have to spend time doing triages. It sounds like a large piece of maintenance coordination is going to be taken care of. It sounds like staffing costs can be reduced. You tell me what are clients noticing once they get this installed over their previous systems of using a stack of tech tools to try and get their team to be able to handle this stuff?

[00:38:47] David: I think in the beginning and I think that it's cool in our relationship is just to hear people come back after the first month and go, "I can't believe it. Like I went an entire month and like, I was not involved in maintenance the way that I feel that I needed to be to make sure that all these things were taken care of. And I'm finding myself with like 20 hours extra a month." And we're like "yes, go grow. Go add more doors. Go show greater value to your clients. Maybe call your client that you haven't been calling in a month because you've been so busy." Right. So, so those are really cool. I think from a cost perspective, they are appreciating.

[00:39:24] And I'm believing that. Even people who had in house maintenance coordinators or VAs, good ones, always still feel that they needed to second check all the work. So even though you're giving to somebody, they never were able to detach themselves from me.

[00:39:37] And now when they're seeing the justification and they're seeing the education behind it, they get this sense of like, I can let go. You know why? Because this system is doing maintenance exactly the way that I'm asking it to do maintenance. And they feel that now they're actually back in control. If that makes sense. Or they're giving it away, but they're actually feeling they're in more control, if I'm making sense there. That's one of the coolest things is that they feel now they have their pulse on every work order where versus before they have to dive into search. Now they know that their requirements are just laid over every work order. So those are some big ones that I'm seeing, especially for those people who really show their value to their owners in the fact that they say, "I'm involved in every work order, every job." That's a great value prop. It really is. Is it scalable? Is it burning you out? Is it pulling you away from other duties that you need to be? Are you spreading yourself too thin?

[00:40:29] Great questions to ask if you have growth objectives, right? Scalable solution. And basically what we're doing is we're allowing the best in the business who are property managers who have created great relationships to duplicate themselves. And that's exciting for them to see. I think that they're like, "wow it's thinking like me."

[00:40:45] Jason: This really sounds like a serious competitive advantage for a property manager that adopts this over any other competitors that don't

[00:40:54] David: Jason, I'm going to a new client pitch and now I'm knowing that the guy next to me is sitting down showing him, "this is how I handle maintenance. This is how I'm keeping your cost down. This is the process. And that new report's coming in our V2. I was actually working some funnels that this morning. And if you're laying that down and then you're walking in behind them and the person says, "well, how do you handle maintenance?"

[00:41:15] "Well, I personally call you on every maintenance ticket." We're witnessing the greatest generational movement of wealth and real estate properties from retiring baby boomers to the next generation to their kids who are all grown up in a technology world that are demanding transparency and reporting and it's just going to be the new standard, Jason, a hundred percent.

[00:41:34] It's going to be the new standard for sure.

[00:41:36] Jason: Okay. We probably got somebody listening. They're super skeptical. They're like, there's no way. And they're going to throw us some crazy scenario that came up recently. And I'm sure you've heard some of these. So how would you address that? Like some sort of like, "well, what if it's like this and this," and it sounds like worst case scenario.

[00:41:54] The AI just says, expert in the loop. Like it's, it raises his hand in some way and says, "Hey, I could use a human over here."

[00:42:00] David: Here's one that actually, as a guy who in my history, we had portfolios, like 30,000 properties.

[00:42:06] So I've done probably over 500,000 work orders. In my career. Okay?

[00:42:10] Jason: More than most of the people that are probably listening to this. Yes.

[00:42:13] David: Yes. And as a result, just because of the size of the inventories that we used to manage the other day, a resident submitted a maintenance work order in and said, "my microwave is not working. And I assume it's because my gas stove is not turned on. And does my gas stove need to be turned on in order for the gas to flow up to my microwave?" Okay. True. True. Okay. All right. True maintenance work order. The the smart system picked that up and now imagine a VA facing that without any knowledge or an experience that's going to be an email to the property manager, a phone call to somebody, or maybe they make a mistake because they're 2000 miles away and they don't have any contacts and they sent out a plumber to go investigate. And the owner says, "why are you sending out a plumber for this?" Right? Right. Okay. The system picked up and it literally educated and trained. And it said that gas has no relevance whatsoever to a microwave solution. This is an incorrect thing, right? And that, when I saw that one, it makes mistakes.

[00:43:04] Don't get me wrong. It's not perfect, but when I saw it pick up on that one, I said, man, I said, this is getting exciting that it picked up on that. So I would ask that person to come and just experience it and look at a little bit and understand guys, right? This is exciting. This is new. It's learning.

[00:43:19] We're developing and it's improving daily. There's still a lot of human oversight. There's still a VAs that involved. We're getting expert maintenance coordination down to a price point that is affordable for everybody, scalable for everybody. And the biggest point at the end of the day, your owners are going to feel that every maintenance work order comes in, it's being handled by the best maintenance process in the industry.

[00:43:39] And that's what you're going to be able to offer them as a property manager to compete against other competition you have in your market. And I think that's a good value prop. So.

[00:43:46] Jason: Yeah, definitely. So is there anything else related to turning maintenance into a profit center that we should cover?

[00:43:52] David: Yeah the first step going into a profit center is realizing that the average person is paying between 16 to 28 dollars per door to manage their maintenance, right? If we get that down to the correct number, and I'd love to have anybody come through and we'll run the analytics for them and we'll give them a pricing model for that just off the bat, the first profit center that we're creating is what if I'm able to reduce that by 50 percent your cost, that's an immediate profit center, right?

[00:44:16] That's profit center number one. And then we can look at profit centers number two, that like, all right, now I can add on if I want to add on to my markup or we have some other ways that we can show them how to. But the first profit center needs to be is what do you know how much you are paying per door to manage maintenance?

[00:44:34] Take all of your staff, all of your VAs, all of your systems, all your after hour services, take all those pieces, add them all up and divide them by the number of doors that you have. So every door that you bring on, it's costing me $27 to handle maintenance emergency services. Okay. Know that number, and let's have a talk.

[00:44:54] Jason: You got to build that calculator on your website.

[00:44:56] David: It's coming.

[00:44:57] Jason: A lot of calculators like that to help people calculate their cold lead marketing costs or whatever. And as soon as they fill that out, they're like, "okay, I'll sign up. Like this is ridiculous. What I've been doing?"

[00:45:06] David: We have that in product right now.

[00:45:07] We have a couple of pieces. We did the finish on it, but that's coming out where people can just understand what they're paying per door. But give us a call up. We'll walk you through the exercise. We'll show you what you're costing. Think about that as your first profit center, Jason. And then we can talk about other ones and we help give some people some advice still.

[00:45:22] Jason: So David, you have a lot of knowledge and experience. How much of your knowledge and experience has gone into bringing this AI up to understanding what you know?

[00:45:32] David: I've been working on this for 12 years. Of putting the data and the learnings. And again, I've been fortunate guys where it was just my path.

[00:45:39] It was my journey through this, where I've got to work for some huge outfits. I had my own consulting company for seven years. I was working with some of the biggest SFR groups in the nation, guys with 10,000-20,000 doors. And I'm just fortunate to understand the amount of data. So, I've put my blood, sweat and tears into this, but at the core of that Jason, my blood, sweat, and tears.

[00:46:00] Is that, 15 years ago when I was brand new in this property management space, I had a broker tell me one time that after the sale of the property is done, the success of the owner is no longer your business or mine. And it's up to them. The sale is done. And they told me that when they walked away and that bothered me to this day, it bothered me that the fiduciary duty that individuals are giving to us to manage in some cases, millions of dollars of their money and assets and portfolios, right? And what type of products or services are we demanding of this industry? That we would demand of, let's say if I gave 50,000 to my broker to invest in the stock market for me, what type of services and technology and platforms am I demanding of that person, education, schooling, name brands, right?

[00:46:45] But yet, are we demanding that same of us in our fiduciary duty to somebody that's giving over maybe their retirement to us their kids', future, college... you hear all these people, "why'd you get into real estate?" "I want to create a college fund for my kids." And after two years, the guy's like, "this is not what I signed up for. This is the worst mistake I ever made. And I'm backing out of, buying more properties because of challenges," right? That's what I'm driven by. And I've always been driven by that. It's my curse. And so I'd have to say there's a hundred percent of me in this Jason, for sure.

[00:47:13] Jason: Awesome. And it, this will outlive you like AI doesn't die.

[00:47:17] And this is this not to be grim, but this is the concern. Like anybody has when they're signing up for a business, they're like, all right, "how much is reliant on just this one person? How much is reliant on that key person I'm interacting with?" Right. And the AI is not a person. Right?

[00:47:34] And so, yeah, so that's really fascinating to think about. Like you've built all that into it and it has immediate, instant expertise. It's not like, "Hey, well, let me go call Tom and let me go check with Fred or let me..." like all the data it has, it's there and it's instant.

[00:47:54] David: What's the difference between an emergency of a hot water tank that's leaking in a basement with a permeable stone floor versus emergency hot water tank that's located in the utility closet on the first floor?

[00:48:04] One doesn't have to necessarily require a person to go out because there's no damage to prevent with water leaking down there. But the other one is leaking onto the floor and damaging your drywall. So these conditions have to be taking place. Locations of hot water tanks, like there's, I can nerd out in this and I'd love to sit down with anybody and drink beers and talk about all the millions of different maintenance things that I ran through.

[00:48:24] But at the end of the day, when you're able to show your owner, "we acted as an expert." That's the guy that's going to say to his buddy when they're just having a drink, "call these guys up to manage your property because they're an expert in the thing." And that's what we're trying to bring to the industry for sure.

[00:48:37] Jason: So this brings a level of expertise that the business owner, the property manager, the maintenance coordinator, and certainly the VA's just would not possess.

[00:48:48] David: You're talking 15 years, over 500,000 work orders worth of data points, learning and understanding from commercial, multifamily, single family across the board, best practices.

[00:49:01] And it's for somebody who wants to imagine now a person can start a property management company tomorrow onboard Tulu. And they're immediately a veteran in the maintenance industry. Immediately.

[00:49:12] Yeah. No learning curve. You're operating and executing as the best maintenance coordinator in the industry starting tomorrow.

[00:49:19] That's amazing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's really cool. Really cool.

[00:49:22] Jason: This is really, it's really wild. So now my brain's like, how can I get experts, how can I clone Tulu, but make an operator version of Tulu for running a property managed business. Or I can make it.

[00:49:32] David: Yeah there's, there, there are offshoots on this.

[00:49:34] I would have to say, and I do want to tell anybody that in this space that we always say that property managers are safe because you know what the property managers do a great job of doing. You guys do a really good job at building relationships and creating value in your local markets.

[00:49:46] Right. Focus on that. Don't get pulled into maintenance, right? Maintenance and that stuff can be automated. There are best practices. Don't struggle to have to be an expert there. Show your value and the resources and tools that you have. Lower your overhead. Produce better results. Be at networking events.

[00:50:03] Shake more hands. Talk to more people. Sell more homes. Add more doors. Shine where you shine. Brokers shine when they're out in front of people shaking hands and having expensive salads over a nice glass of chardonnay and closing deals, right? Let us flip the toilets and do it well for you.

[00:50:18] That's what I say.

[00:50:19] Jason: Awesome. Okay, cool. David, if they're interested in Getting started. How do they find out about Tulu? You can go right to our website

[00:50:26] David: at trytulu. com. And if anybody wants to email me personally, david.norman.trytulu.Com. I'll connect you with our sales team and set you up on a personal demo. I'll walk you through it. I promise I won't bring so much energy. I'm an energy guy. It's just my calling this space to be in the maintenance and I love to doing what we're doing and seeing owners go "yes!" Seeing property managers go "yes!" And we're not trying to replace anybody. We're just trying to help people honor their fiduciary duty to their owners. And that's my mission. That's what I'm driven by.

[00:50:56] Jason: Yeah. Fantastic. So try Tulu, T U L U. Dot com.

[00:51:02] David: Yeah.

[00:51:02] Jason: All right. Try it out.

[00:51:04] David: All right.

[00:51:04] Jason: David, thanks for coming on the DoorGrowShow podcast. Appreciate you.

[00:51:08] David: Yeah. Yeah. Thank you, Jason. Always great. Looking forward to the show. Until next time.

[00:51:11] Jason: All right. So if you are a property management entrepreneur and you are wanting to add doors, you get maintenance off loaded, off your plate, and you want to focus on growth and figuring out how to get more doors, you want to join the DoorGrow mastermind, our growth accelerator is all about that.

[00:51:29] We are really good at optimizing businesses for growth using our rapid revamp class, where we clean up quickly, all of the front end stuff that is causing you to like kill trust and leaking trust and preventing deals. And then we give you the right strategies. We've got at least seven different growth engines that we can help build into your business that you can stack that will feed you unlimited leads without having to spend any money on advertising or marketing expense.

[00:51:55] You just need people and it actually decreases the amount of time those people will spend If they're following working on the warm leads and the stuff that we would get you to do instead of cold leads, which take a lot more time. So we also have our super system level of our mastermind. This is where we're focused on ops, operations, helping your operator. That key person that's going to run the entire business for you, Mr. or Mrs. Visionary Entrepreneur, and they will help take your business to the next level. We can coach and support your operators, your BDMs, your salespeople, or you, the business owner to make this business infinitely scalable so that you can go to the next level and add a lot of doors. So reach out to us, let us assess your situation and see if we can help.

[00:52:36] You can check us out at doorgrow.Com. All right, that's it for today. Hope everybody found this episode useful. I think it's super fascinating and until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:52:47] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:53:14] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

View Details

As a property manager, you are likely always looking for better ways to connect with real estate agents and investors to get more deals.

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert, Jason Hull sits down with DoorGrow client Galo Naranjo to talk about DoorGrow’s ROI Calculator tool and how it helps you talk to investors and agents.

You’ll Learn [06:46] What is the ROI Calculator?

[14:11] The power of being able to see the outcome

[25:35] How does this benefit realtors?

[30:31] Benefits to using this tool

[35:44] Other ways to use the calculator for growth

Tweetables “Sales take place at the speed of trust.”

“People only can trust you if they know that you have their best interests at heart.”

“You should be an advisor to investors. This is really where you set yourself head and shoulders above the competition.”

“If you want to target investors, go where investors hang out.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Galo: I think paying for the calculator, I get 10x the rate of return on what I'm paying monthly to use the calculator. It's a no brainer for me to use it because 10 minutes of my time is worth however many deals I'm getting out of it. So it's great.

[00:00:16] Jason: All right. Welcome DoorGrow Property Managers to the DoorGrow Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:36] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:54] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:12] Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:15] And today I'm hanging out with one of our clients, Galo Naranjo. Did I say your last name? Right?

[00:01:21] You got it right.

[00:01:22] All right. Awesome. And what's the name of your property management business?

[00:01:25] Galo: A property management business is Assurance Property Management. We're here in Columbia, South Carolina.

[00:01:30] Jason: So Galo appreciate you coming on the show. So you're doing some really cool things with the ROI calculator that we've built out for clients. And we wanted to showcase that. But before we get into that, why don't you give everyone a little bit of background? How did you get into real estate property management?

[00:01:48] How did all this start for you?

[00:01:50] Galo: Absolutely. So I was in the military. Actually, I just retired about four years ago And as I was in the process of retiring from the military, my background is in finance. I was a finance office, so I have a great affinity for numbers. I like numbers I managed large budgets when I was a resource manager in the army as an officer. And I had one of the folks that was my neighbor, who was a major guard.

[00:02:11] We used to ride almost 45 minutes to work. And he was in the process of moving to Tennessee. And he was like, " I think I really want to rent my property. Do you think you can help me out? Just, keeping an eye on it, and I give you a hundred dollars a month?" And I said, "sure, that doesn't seem like a bad deal."

[00:02:28] So, sure enough, he left. He will write some leases, he will place tenants, I will show the place. Every once in a while, we had to do some maintenance, and he will literally every month give me $100. And I said, "this is not a bad deal." So I started doing a little bit of research, and I found out what I needed to do to become a licensed property manager.

[00:02:46] I said, "I'm just going to do it and see what happens." And then from that point forward, I just started telling all of my fellow military folks there at the bases where I was at. Most of them, normally in the military, you expect it to be at a place for like two to three years, sometimes sooner than that.

[00:03:01] And then they'll PCS. So it was my job at that point to tell them that they can leave the properties with me, and I will keep an eye on them.

[00:03:09] Jason: What does PCS stand for?

[00:03:11] Galo: PCS stands for Permanent Change of Station. That is when you move from one location to another. In military terms, they call it PCS, Permanent Change of Station.

[00:03:20] So most of the time, they're transitioning period from one location to the next. And I started doing a lot of research on a lot of the benefits, especially here in the state of South Carolina, for military service members to keep properties, especially when it comes to property taxes. And so, as I started pretty much gathering my clientele, I went from 1 to then to 10 to 15, not really doing much.

[00:03:44] But I started getting that extra income and I said, "well, this is not a bad gig." At that point it was easy for me to do it by myself, although that I didn't really have all of the systems in place, but 15 properties wasn't really much that I needed to do. And as I was delving into real estate. My time for transitioning out of the military, I was close to my 20 years and I started looking into real estate just to see if that was something that I may want to do. And so I started listening to all the podcasts, reading all of the books. And then I said, you know what, this is something that I want to do.

[00:04:15] And with our business partner, we started to analyzing deals to basically do flips. So we started flipping back in 2018, 2019. And from that point, since we were very analytical and very driven by numbers, we started just acquiring properties and flipping properties. And we do so very successfully without losing any money on any of our deals.

[00:04:36] And that was also at the peak of COVID and everything else. So we were doing very well during that period of time. And so when I retired from the military, I just basically transitioned directly into doing real estate. And as I was positioning myself with other real estate investors here in Columbia, people started to get to know me and all I'm a true believer that I like to tell everybody what I do and what I know and little by little started just placing fillers that, "Hey, I'm a property manager in charge. I have a license. If you have some properties that maybe you want me to take a look at, I'm also a real estate investor. I understand numbers. I understand what you're going through as an investor, what you should be looking for in a property manager."

[00:05:19] And then the conversations basically started producing some fruit and therefore started getting more properties under management.

[00:05:27] Jason: Yeah. I love it. It sounds like a really good pitch. You're, you come from a military background, finance background, investment background. There's a lot of reasons I think people would trust you to be their property manager.

[00:05:38] Galo: And one thing led into another. And little by little, just through word of mouth from one investor to the next. That has been my niche. My niche has been 100 percent investor because investors tend to trust other investors, especially when you have conversations and that they know what they're talking about.

[00:05:55] And a lot of times they will run things by me. "What do you think? How much do you think I can get in rent or what do you think this and that?" So I will we'll do those favors here and there a little by little they'll start to giving me their property so I can manage them and lo and behold I started shifting my focus from the flipping business into kind of growing the property management business to what it is now.

[00:06:15] And I think ever since I started DoorGrow and a little before, I saw exponential growth implementing a lot of the things that I've learned. And also I think in my opinion the ROI calculator is a key to the success, to my success in adding doors as of late. 100%.

[00:06:32] Jason: Well, you like the numbers, you like finance, so it's no surprise. John Chin who helped me develop that ROI calculator also loves numbers and it's no surprise that you would resonate with it and find it really useful. So that's really cool. So you've been doing some of the stuff with us with DoorGrow, you've been working on this ROI calculator, explain to those that are not familiar with that tool. What is it?

[00:06:57] Galo: Okay. So the ROI calculator in layman's terms is basically allowing someone that is thinking about buying a property, what could be the rate of return and what will be the cashflow that they will receive on a monthly and yearly basis. So if I'm an investor thinking about buying a property, we'll basically run a pro forma of the potential how well that property could do.

[00:07:18] Jason: Yeah.

[00:07:19] Galo: And if I'm an investor and I have someone that's running the numbers with all of the expenses included, and I can have my rate of return after tax and before tax, and even if I buy cash, so me as an investor, like, "hey, it's a no brainer. Why wouldn't I buy a property?" And so, once again, it's just a pro forma of a property that displays in a very simple way: what could be the rate of return for a potential on a property? That in layman's terms, that's basically what it is.

[00:07:47] Jason: And I would add, it outputs a single page document for each property that you can give to agents.

[00:07:53] It's branded with your business, your property management business in the numbers calculated, the property management fees and they're your fees, it's already included in the investment. And this is something you can give to real estate agents so that they can showcase these properties and what they could do, but it has your branding on it.

[00:08:12] And so how are you leveraging this as a tool for growth?

[00:08:15] Galo: Well, I have used it in different ways. So I've used this tool as a tool for me to buy properties. So I run those properties for me if I'm thinking about buying because I still pay myself a property management fee.

[00:08:28] So that's an expense that I'm still going to take into account. I am also going to run this for realtors, which I think that's a really good target audience that will greatly benefit from this, especially in the state of South Carolina. And I will say that fiduciarily speaking realtors can not talk numbers. Realtors can talk about a listing amount and how much do you, do they think they should offer on a property, but they don't really get knee deep into the numbers. As a property manager, there is nothing in any law, at least here in South Carolina, that determines that you can't. I also like that on the bottom of that form, you have a disclosure that, "we are not tax experts or anything like that, but the numbers at the end of the day are pretty close. And if you want to get a very close estimate, this one page form is a no brainer." So once again, I use it potentially for me to buy properties. I use it for potential individual clients that a lot of times I also get as leads And I'll tell you what I do with this like something that Jason says is that sales take place at the speed of trust So I think that this calculator helps you establishing that trust because in my market there is no one that does that and it doesn't really take that long to, you know put the numbers together and have a conversation with a potential soul client as to what are the benefits of me running these numbers for you even if they already have the property, that's fine, because what we want at this place doesn't make sense for them to rent the property.

[00:09:58] And that's where the trust piece comes into play. Because I said, this is at least my pitch. I said, "look, Mr. Potential Client. My goal is not to simply manage your property. My goal is to establish a relationship with you. So that you can make the best decision with your property. If it doesn't make sense for me to manage your property because you're going lose money You need to know that. You need to know that and I am okay not managing your property if it doesn't make sense for you numbers wise," and then I stay quiet so they'll be like, "Oh, wow. I mean, what is there to lose?" There's nothing to lose because I'm basically telling you, look, "I want to manage your property if it makes sense, and I want to establish that relationship with you and I want to give you the peace of knowing that the numbers are going to work, or no, they are not going to work."

[00:10:46] Jason: Yeah, I love it. I love it so much because one of the things that I teach is "needy is creepy." And when you frame it like that, you're basically saying, it's not like, "Hey, I really want to get your business. Yeah. Like do this, like work with us." You're saying, "let's see if it even makes sense for you to even have this as a rental property," without even focusing on trying to get their business directly. You're just earning their business. They're going to then lean into you. And this is that customer satisfaction pyramid I talk about sometimes you're now immediately in at the top of that pyramid in customer service, it, which is advice. You're in that advice giving role, which puts you in a superior position to them to lean in and to trust you. And it also shows partnership was, which is that next level like, "Hey, let's figure this out together. Let's look at this. I'm here with you trying to help you figure out if this makes sense."

[00:11:38] People only can trust you if they know that you have their best interests at heart and if they know what you want and we talked about the golden bridge and whatnot, but I love this frame in selling is: "let's just see if the numbers even make sense for you. And if it does, then we can have a conversation about whether you should be a client or not."

[00:11:57] So I think that's a very powerful frame.

[00:11:59] Galo: Yes. And that has paid a lot of great dividends. And I even use the calculator as a way to show that I am giving you more than any property management company in Colombia is providing because we have had conversations in which is like, well, "I've already talked to somebody and they're going to charge 7%."

[00:12:18] So I listen. And once again, I think the education piece has to come into play. Yeah, and I will simply say, I said, "okay. And did they run the numbers for you? Do they know whether or not this property is going to make money for you or lose money for you? Do they even care if they go if this property loses money for you? Because at the end of the day, most people are going to care about getting the property management fee. I'm simply telling you that I'm going to give, from the get go, I am providing a service free of charge. That all it's going to do is going to bond us together in this tiny relationship that I want to produce for the long term."

[00:12:55] That's my position in this. And then I stay quiet. And I let them think, get a little uncomfortable, and then they start talking. It's like, "yeah, you know what? I didn't think about it that way." That's it. And then we start talking a little bit about the property and rental rates. And I like to really educate folks in understanding the numbers.

[00:13:13] This is the part where other property managers that are not investors that don't understand the numbers can get a little uncomfortable explaining the form, right? Because if you don't understand the numbers, and this is something that we used to say in the army, you're shooting from the hip and you're not taking, aimed shots, the client can potentially read and be like, "hold on a second, like, I'm more confused now that you're telling me about the numbers than before even I sent you this form." so I think that we need to have a really good understanding on how to navigate the form and how to explain the numbers of the form in a way that is easy for the client to understand.

[00:13:47] Jason: Yeah, I love it. I love your question. "Did they run the numbers?" It's such like, cause there's almost no chance that they did like it's super uncommon and this is what you should be.

[00:13:57] You should be an advisor to investors. This is really where you set yourself head and shoulders above the competition. "Did they run the numbers? Oh, they didn't. Oh, okay. Maybe we should take a look at this." Yeah. So I think that's really clever. So, I'm curious, when you are going through the ROI calculator, you're showcasing this, you're asking these questions how Do they still say they're talking to other companies? Most people that are prospects probably have talked to another property management company before they talk to you.

[00:14:29] Do you find that starts to change after you go through the numbers with them?

[00:14:33] Galo: I say yes, 100%. I have had clients that have already talked to other property management companies, but they have never gone through the process with me. That they have never gone through the process of going through the numbers.

[00:14:45] Commonly speaking, most property managers are going to talk about. " Okay, you can get this much in rent." I said, "well, that's fine. I can go in Zillow and find that out pretty closely on what the rental rate is going to be." I said, "but what about property taxes?" I tell you as an investor here in Columbia, the number one deal killer is property taxes.

[00:15:05] 100%. Because if you purchase a property that is going to be non owner occupied, that your taxes exponentially go up. Exponentially! But what happens is that when you buy a property, you're going to maintain the previous owner's tax rate, at least for the remaining of the year. Now New Year comes and that your property taxes went up through the roof and you're like, "whoa!" Yeah.

[00:15:32] "I am no longer cashflowing. I'm losing money! How did this happen?"

[00:15:36] Jason: "Well, why didn't anyone tell me this?"

[00:15:38] Galo: If I run the numbers for you, that is not going to happen because that is the number one thing that I check. And Jason, at least here for my clients, I said, when you send them the form for them to fill out, 10 out of 10 times, what property tax rate do they use? Owner occupied. So that is a place for me to say. See, if we had used your numbers, which right now is public record, you can go and public record and say, yep, property taxes is 1600, I'll say, but that is the wrong number because this property is a non owner occupied property. And now your taxes are going to go to 5600. So divide 4, 000 by 12. That is how much on a monthly basis you have to pay. So therefore your expenses are wrong from the get go. And then I just sit back. And let them think through it. Now, what I do also, I don't just talk. I like to either do it personally or I like to do it through Zoom or through Google Meet.

[00:16:35] And I like to show them. I said, "look, if you give me a second to educate you on property taxes, given the tax rate that you chose, because it's probably recognized as a very common mistake." I said, "let me show you." And I go in there on the county records and I show them, I say, "this is how you calculate it. This is how I got my number. And this is what you will be paying sooner rather than later."

[00:16:55] And I stay quiet. And I stay quiet and I let them absorb. And normally, you get the deer in the headlights look and you're like, "oh wow, like This is big like I did not know that." Nine out of ten are going to be like "I did not know that, and I said, "That right there is the number one deal killer here in the state of south carolina because taxes are high as a non owner occupier." So that's just the way that I educate and they automatically start seeing, "okay. Well, I start to see even more value now."

[00:17:23] Yeah, even more value So those two pieces of information are key.

[00:17:28] Jason: Property taxes, and what's the other?

[00:17:31] Galo: We talked about property taxes is one. The other one that I also like to focus a lot is on renovation. So I also since I flip houses, I have a pretty good understanding on renovation costs.

[00:17:43] So what I like to do with a lot of homeowners is if there is a possibility that I can meet you in the home and mind you that although they may already have the house or they will be in the process of buying a property, I can still give you a pretty good idea what your renovation costs could be.

[00:18:00] Because nine out of 10, someone's going to say, "well, yeah, I have a I don't know, 1600 square foot home and I'm going to put that maybe to paint this house is going to be 1, 000." And I'm like, "yeah, 1, 000 is not going to cover you painting the house." But that is also an avenue for me to introduce my other business to say, "look," And once again, it's an education piece.

[00:18:20] So "look, I want to show you some comps in the area on how much they are charging for rents. I want you to physically see what those properties look like. And compare them to yours and then give me your opinion on which one looks better." So we will pick some houses that are similar in size and number of bedrooms and bathrooms And they'll pick and choose and say like "yeah, I see. Yep. Mine has carpet that one doesn't. Yep This one has this mine doesn't." I said so "The fact that those properties look better and have 'nicer things than yours,' it gives them the right to charge more. Now, the good thing is that we can use that property as a comp for rent because if you want to get your property at the same level, not saying that you have to, we can earn the right to charge more.

[00:19:08] So renovation costs this big, property management costs... this big

[00:19:13] Jason: Okay. Love that. I love that you're connecting them to reality because everybody's dealt with the property owner in property management that like thinks they should get way more rent than they probably should and they want you to list it at some high rent rate and then it's going to sit vacant for a long time.

[00:19:29] And so connecting them to reality, are you actually walking them through some other properties?

[00:19:34] Galo: I, well, if I get a chance, but a lot of times, I like to have a lot of face to face. If I can meet them at their house, at the properties, even better because I can welcome and I can show them, I said, "look, this is a property, although this is a property that I own."

[00:19:50] So one of the things that I do is try to connect with them. I said, "look, I am not your traditional property manager. I own properties. I am an investor. I know what it's like to how to pay for an HVAC unit out of pocket. I know, I understand that." And because of that, I try to once again, earn that trust that I've been there, done that before.

[00:20:09] And I understand that other property managers may not be investors, but what I'm trying to really to share is that we need to think alike investors to be able to connect with that, with our audience, 100%. You have to think like an investor. And for me, obviously, because I've been there, it comes out more naturally.

[00:20:27] That's all.

[00:20:28] Jason: Yeah. I love the idea in showcasing and connecting to reality. And then you can feed that into the ROI calculator. Like here's the actual cost.

[00:20:37] Galo: 100 percent I try to be as closely as possible to all of the numbers. And I like to start the conversation with saying, okay, he's like, "well, I want to make some money. I want to earn a few hundred dollars every month." And I said, "how much do you make? If you don't mind how much do you make a month?" They say, "okay, I make x." I said "Do you think that extra 100 or 200 dollars will make a huge difference in your income now?" Stay quiet. It's, " well, I don't know."

[00:21:02] I said, "well in this particular property and every property is going to be different with some properties. You're not going to cash flow with some others. You make cash flow. It all really depends on the numbers," I said, "but just because you don't cash flow doesn't mean that is a bad property. Because hold on a second you have this tax advantages that I think you're overlooking," and I said, "so do you rather make two hundred dollars or do you rather write off ten thousand dollars a year?"

[00:21:27] Right. I rather go with the latter So what i'm trying to do is i'm trying to identify whether this is someone that needs income Or whether this is someone that makes that needs deductions From their taxes.

[00:21:39] Jason: Yeah.

[00:21:40] Galo: Because my pitch is going to be slightly different But I need to know that from the get go is good that the form has both. There's very few folks that will buy cash.

[00:21:50] I always try to say, "Hey, but why are you going to buy cash? I think you need to finance it. It's just better in terms of return." I try to educate them with that, but most of my larger clients are looking for write offs. I need to write off. I need I don't need income. Income is bad. I need to write off and so if they think of a property that they want to purchase, they'll give it to me and I just write it.

[00:22:13] I say, "Hey, yeah, this is it." And same thing. Public record is when you look at the land value, you can see. "So look, this is where I'm getting this number right here. Right now your land is X. That is something that we cannot depreciate. But the house itself, you can depreciate it at 27.5 years, which in a year, you can deduct X amount of dollars just in depreciation alone."

[00:22:35] Right. And then, "oh, by the way, you also get the appreciation of the asset year after year." And so now they started the wheels start spinning like, "Hey, I didn't really think about that because non investors don't think that way. Investors do think that way.

[00:22:51] And I think it's key to understand who you're talking to from the beginning. So that you can tailor that conversation in the form more towards their end goal.

[00:23:02] Jason: Yeah, I love it. So, do they need deductions versus needing cash flow? What's your quick way of determining that as quick as possible for those listening?

[00:23:10] Galo: Well, when you run the form, the form is quickly going to tell you whether you're going to have a negative cash flow. So if negative cash flow, basically that means that you're basically coming out of pocket. After all expenses are taken into account. It's costing you a little bit of money for you to basically own this property, right?

[00:23:25] Or on the bottom of the form also, it'll tell you, "well, you can deduct X amount of dollars on year one." And then you can explain the fact that is taken into account that we're depreciating the asset 27. 5 years, right? Then not only that, on the bottom of the form, it will also take into account: how much are you paying in interest?

[00:23:45] And all of the other I guess debt that you have to pay for that you can also write off. So all that is very easy to explain on the bottom of the form. So I like to pretty much go on the form on the top, which are the inputs. Those are the knowns. And then I run down on the finance piece. And then the bottom part, when we're talking about the tax position, once again, cash, there's very few people that are willing to buy cash.

[00:24:09] So I haven't really used much of the bottom left quadrant is primarily the top L that I use.

[00:24:16] Jason: Got it. But if somebody comes to you and they're like, "Hey, we're going to buy all cash." You might talk them using this into a finance purchase.

[00:24:23] Galo: Right. And once again, all that does is like, "Oh man, I didn't really think about that."

[00:24:27] It's like trust. Right? Boom. It's like, "Hey, I didn't really think about this. Hey, don't buy cash. Buy three properties instead. Just put down payments and buy three properties. And we will include all of the expenses and everything. I will be glad to manage three instead of one."

[00:24:40] Jason: Yeah. This really helps investors see that because a lot of them just think it's so simple. "I just need to make sure I have more cash I'm collecting than when I'm paying on the mortgage. And then I'm set." But they're not taking into all the other benefits that could exist and they could be building equity. They could be like being able to get into more properties, maybe that cash flow better if they were looking at the other benefits, tax depreciation, their equity, all these different things that come into play. So, cool. And I love that it has real simply, like, here's your ROI. There's like a percent sign next to it.

[00:25:15] Galo: That is very impactful. It's very easy to read.

[00:25:19] It's right there. So, there is no way when you see that double digit rate of return or even something that exceeds the traditional, I don't know, S& P 500 return.

[00:25:30] Jason: Yeah.

[00:25:31] Galo: Automatically, you realize, "wow, this is great."

[00:25:33] Jason: I'm going to put my money in a mutual fund.

[00:25:35] Galo: Exactly. And is good once it is the education piece. Something that I haven't really touched much on in which this calculator is primarily geared towards, you talking to real estate with realtors to connect with them and get some benefit from them.

[00:25:50] I've had pretty good success. Now, what I like doing when I call it recruiting realtors is, "all right, let me run you through the process." And I said, "do you own a house?" He's like, "yeah, I own my house." I said, "well, let's run the numbers on your house," and I explain it to them and they see automatically, they see value automatically.

[00:26:11] Jason: Like, "Oh, I can now I'm educated in a way I wasn't before. I can see something I couldn't see before. I can see how you would be able to benefit my clients in a way that I just couldn't." Yeah.

[00:26:20] Galo: And what I like to say is I said, "look, all I'm trying to do is I am trying to create to increase trust between you and your client." And I always say it's like, "look, that client is yours. All I'm doing, I am the super glue that will help you stay very close with that client." And I say, "it will always be your client. If they want to sell, I'm calling you. If they have more friends that want to buy properties, I'm calling you. They are your clients." I said, "but let's also set something straight, although I don't have a fiduciary responsibility with them. If they send me properties that you're helping them look," I said, "I am going to be very honest. I am not going to say, 'Hey, yeah, buy everything.'" I'm like, "no," I said, "that's not who I am." So we need to ensure that we see each other eye to eye, but once again, are going to learn to trust us more as a team. Because I'm saying the numbers don't work.

[00:27:15] Jason: And if the numbers don't work, some agents that don't get like the long game might think you're a deal killer, but the agents that get it, if the numbers don't work, you can make changes to the numbers.

[00:27:26] Like, "Hey, if you bring your like down payment up, then the numbers magically work, so this property could work." So now people get to make better educated decisions instead of mistakes.

[00:27:35] Galo: 100 percent and that is something that we've done in the past and I salute the only way that this numbers will work is if you put 50, 000 down now all of a sudden you're good and then if you're okay with that, then yeah, numbers will work, but when you fill out the form and you put "this is how much I want to put down," if the numbers don't work, I'm going to be the first one that raises the red flag and say, "yeah. It's not going to work." so long as there's a mutual understanding with the realtor that I am not a deal killer. I am a deal enabler, but we just need to understand that a lot of the leads are not going to give you instant gratification. Some of them, you're going to have to work them until they buy the right property.

[00:28:15] But the key thing is that when they buy that property, and everything seemed to work as planned, they're going to feel more comfortable to buy more, and that's when the magic happens. We just need to be disciplined enough to be patient and wait for the right deal. I mean as an investor I'm not just going to go and buy everything. Numbers have to make sense.

[00:28:34] Jason: Yeah, got it. We got a couple questions. One question was posted: "how do you reach out to agents?" So this is something that we talk a lot about at DoorGrow. We've got our referral secrets training and we get into that on our growth accelerator call each Wednesday. But how are you reaching out to real estate agents to create these connections and showcasing this?

[00:28:54] Galo: So I belong to a lot of real estate investor groups here in Columbia, mostly on Facebook. I have been a speaker in a lot of them as well. I think it's about putting your face out there so people know what you do. So if you want to target investors, go where investors hang out because more than likely you're going to have a lot of realtors that attend those events.

[00:29:14] Why? Because they want to serve investors and while they're there, I will always pass on my information. I will get cards from them and then I will simply send a simple email or text and say, "Hey, this is Galo. I just provided a pitch last week or whatever about X, Y, or Z, and I would like to meet with you just so I can tell you a little bit about what I do for realtors so you can increase your chances of selling more properties to investors. Let's grab a coffee next week at X time." A lot of them will reply. Some of them won't. And that's okay. That's just like anything else. You just got to place feelers out there, but the key is going to be getting that realtor to see with you and for them to be able to see.

[00:29:57] So bring in a ROI calculator as an example and say, "look, this is what I'm doing right here. Hey, I want to establish a relationship with you. What's in it for you? We all want to know what's the pay pro quo, right? What's in it for me? I want to know what's in it for me. And I'll be very clear. So this is 100 percent what's in it for you."

[00:30:14] And I said, "wouldn't you agree that if you establish that trust with that investor, that potential client, wouldn't you agree that they will be more inclined to use your services are as the realtor? Why? Because no other realtors are doing that. I'm just that link. Let me get a link."

[00:30:30] Jason: Yeah, I love it.

[00:30:31] As you use this tool, what's also cool about it is we built it on a database system, so it stores each property as you run it, you can duplicate them if you need to, like you can have multiple of the same property with some different numbers, but then you have this database of examples. So you can print out a few of the sheets and like take them to a presentation with a real estate agent. You're like, "here's some examples of some deals that we worked on," or "here's your property," and so then you have a bunch of things to refer back to, and now you can connect stories. And when you start sharing stories of how you've helped investors, how you help prevent them from making a financial mistake and show them this there, they might not even understand everything you're explaining to them, but what they will understand is that they feel a lot safer with you and they trust you and that you understand this.

[00:31:21] Galo: Yes. 100%. 100%. And that's why when the first meeting happened, even running them through the properties, taxes, even running them through some key information that they may overlook maybe they know but that's fine, at least they know that you're looking and that you're thinking about it is there is no risk involved. Yeah, there's always going to be risk involved in real estate transactions, but the risk is always much lower when you're taking into account all of the things that you should be taking into account so running them through the whole process running them through the sheet helping them understand because If they start thinking in terms of the form, now that also gives some ammunition to be able to reach out to potential investors and say, "Hey, I know you're a high earner."

[00:32:06] Have you thought about what real estate can do to minimize your tax exposure? Hey, I think I have some ideas for you. Let's meet. And I think I even have some properties that may work for you." Just like that. And it, it doesn't take very long to run the calculator. It doesn't, it takes me maybe 10 minutes to look at the numbers, plug in the numbers and have the form ready.

[00:32:26] It doesn't take time. I think paying for the calculator, I get 10x the rate of return on what I'm paying monthly to use the calculator. It's a no brainer for me to use it because 10 minutes of my time is worth however many deals I'm getting out of it. So it's great.

[00:32:43] And the fact that it's very easy to use is just a form. You send it to them. Yeah. They plug it in. It doesn't take very long for them to plug it in. Immediately you get a message, an email saying, "hey, someone filled out the form." Great. If you get that form filled out, you just got to make sure that you close the deal at that point.

[00:32:59] You just got to close the deal because they're already thinking like, "man, I've never seen anyone doing this form thing. Like, what am I doing? But I'm interested to know." And when you deliver the content of the form, that's when you're like, yeah...

[00:33:12] Jason: it's at peak right then.

[00:33:14] Galo: It's a peak it's 100 percent at peak.

[00:33:16] And I do this with all of them. Now I don't do it with investors. Once again, I do it with even leads that say, "Hey I belong to the Facebook page here where I live." And people will say, "Hey, I heard that you're a property manager." I say, yes. Why don't you send me your address? So they send me the address.

[00:33:31] And then I just replied to them. "Hey, how about we grab a coffee here at the local coffee shop?" They said "sure." So we grab a coffee and then I just start talking a little bit about the form and I talk a little bit about what I bring to the table. I said, "would it be okay if I just send you the form, fill that out and that way you have nothing to lose? Let me just see whether or not this property is right to keep it as a rental. Let's start there." Once they fill out the form, that's like you've already hooked them. Yeah. Now you just got to deliver.

[00:33:58] Jason: Yeah, you're showing the value of them completing the form and what you're going to give them as a lead magnet And that's the bait Right and yeah, they're going to then give you the info and then you have all their info And I have never not expertise.

[00:34:14] Galo: I have never not have Anyone not fill out the form. Let's put it that way. Every form that I've sent is being filled out. Every single time. Never, because what's there to lose? It doesn't cost you anything. You're not putting social security numbers or anything on there. It's just public record information.

[00:34:31] There's nothing for you to lose. The only thing that I would say, Jason, that is important for people to understand is that the way that I use the form, especially with someone that's already, well, that already bought the house, you need to make sure that you do a little bit of math, understanding that, okay... hey, they bought the house in 2019, we're in 2024, so five years have already elapsed.

[00:34:52] So you need to correct the numbers in terms of years that they put, because yeah, I had a 30 year note. No, right now you have a, 24 year note because six years have already elapsed because if you don't do that, the numbers are going to be out of whack.

[00:35:05] Jason: Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Because when you fill out the numbers, it's as if it just happened.

[00:35:10] Galo: As if it just happens. You have to adjust that for sure. You have to adjust that. But for someone that is thinking about buying, then yes, 100%, 30 year note, whatever it is, but someone that already has the house, you just have to adjust that. And then for me to validate the number say, "okay, what is your payment interest taxes? Just send that to me so I can compress it. Yep. We're pretty good there. We're within dollars," so I said "hey, we're good But we got to make that check because otherwise just like this can help you it can hurt you If your numbers are totally out of whack, so that's something that we need to keep in mind when we're talking to someone that already has a house.

[00:35:44] Jason: Ooh, yeah. So, yeah, this is really good stuff. The other thing, some of our clients have done, I don't know if you've done this yet, but they've been providing these sheets to agents listings so that they can add these as a PDF or as an image to the listing in MLS so that people can see how this could also be an investment.

[00:36:03] And so investors, they can be lazy. They can look at this property and go, "Oh, this could cashflow. I would get this return. Look at my tax benefits. Like, wow, this is amazing. I'm going to talk to this agent and it has your branding on it, not the agent's."

[00:36:17] Galo: No, huge. I'll tell you something that I did that is similar, but I use it to my advantage to get financing for it.

[00:36:24] So what I did is I just sent the proforma to the banker that I work with. I said, "look, there it is."

[00:36:28] Jason: The bank loves this. Yeah.

[00:36:29] Galo: It's like, "Oh shoot. Hey, good. Let's do it." It was simple. They know numbers. So it's like, yep. Look, hey, numbers work. Let's go. So that's also something that you can use, but yeah, I don't see why you couldn't, I don't know if there would be anything legally speaking that will prevent them from post that. But I think at the request of potential buyers, I say, "Hey, look, we have a pro forma for you to review.

[00:36:50] I

[00:36:51] Jason: think that should be a legal disclaimer at the bottom. That's like past performance is no guarantee future results. Rental properties are subject to financial risk, including the possible.

[00:37:00] So there's a disclaimer there so that anywhere you post this, like you're not going to be legally liable. And it says, "please seek legal counsel from a tax professional." Or something like this, right? So it has all that at the bottom. So agents can throw that out there and not worry about risk.

[00:37:16] So, John Chin, who I worked with for like a year, him and I worked on getting this thing just to works as well as it does and getting it put together. He's going to be presenting at DoorGrowLive for those that are watching the show. I highly recommend you get your tickets right now to DoorGrowLive.

[00:37:33] John's going to be talking about how when people are bringing properties to you, and you may be able to even leverage this tool, but how to turn them into, instead of property management clients, to get them to give you their properties.

[00:37:48] And how to do a seller financing deal without doing subject twos, which break the loan, but how to leverage a trust and to keep that owner in the trust and how he helps people set this up.

[00:37:59] Galo: That's cool. That's very cool.

[00:38:00] Jason: He's getting properties. He's getting more investments, which is a much better prize than getting a property management contract.

[00:38:07] Yeah, 100%. Right. So if you want, if you're a property manager and you believe in investing, come to DoorGrowLive and learn how to turn these potential clients into investment properties for you and make even more money and amass your own real estate. We've got one of our clients Ed Kirch, he got rid of all of his third party contracts that he didn't have ownership stake in. He has hundreds and hundreds now of properties that are just, he has ownership stake in and he's making way more money.

[00:38:40] So he now uses his whole property management business just as bait to get more investments. People call him up and say, "Hey, I was thinking, could you manage our property?" He's like, "well, let's get together and crunch the numbers." And then he scares the shit out of them. Okay. When it comes time to sell it, what the tax liability would be.

[00:38:56] And then he's like, "well, there is a way to maybe get around this. Let me think." Right. And so there's deals that could be happening. And I think a lot of property managers are leaving a lot of money on the table. When sometimes the best thing you could do is not take on a property. Sometimes the best thing you could do is to take on that property management.

[00:39:14] And sometimes the best thing you could be doing is to take over that property and own that property. And a lot of investors, property managers that should be investors are not eating their own dog food. They're not believing in that. So.

[00:39:29] Galo: And along those lines to Jason once you start building a pool of investors and you have potential leads that, hey, you know what?

[00:39:36] I know someone that if a numbers don't work for whatever reason, I can definitely connect you with someone that will buy the property and you can get an assignment fee out of that. And that assignment fee will more than likely be a year's worth or more of property management fees without doing anything besides spending. 30 to 40 minutes with a potential client that is 100 percent valuable. One of the things that I would like to say, because I understand the pitch for this calculator can be a little daunting for some folks, but one of the things that I did when I went to Austin and I watched John I watched it just to see the deliver, but then I had to add what we call in Spanish Sazon. I had to add my little, I need to sprinkle a little bit of my flavor to make it mine. Because if you sound robotic, you feel like, man, this is 100 percent rehearsed, but it did help me watch John deliver.

[00:40:26] So I'm a little bit more structure on how I can be structured and organized on how I deliver that. So 100% if John is going to DoorGrow live, which I can't, unfortunately, because of other commitments. But otherwise, I think that you will get your money's worth and then some from that experience and just learning from John and how he delivers and how much he knows because he's a real estate investor too.

[00:40:46] So he'll give you a lot of nuggets for you to own how to deliver this ROI calculator for sure.

[00:40:52] Jason: John's super smart. And so in building the calculator, we added a lot of notes and things on the form and things to clarify stuff. I, that took days to go through and just pull things out of John's brain and then ask him to rephrase it for a, like, As if he's talking to somebody that doesn't know that was like, you could see it because he uses really big words. He's very sophisticated in his language. And I'm like, "how can you say that, like to grandma or to an eight year old, so they understand it," but we were rewrote everything. So there's a lot of energy went into just making this understandable to the property manager and understandable to the agents or to the investors that are filling out the forms.

[00:41:32] And so that it makes sense. And it's still a little bit, challenging, to understand some of this stuff, but it's a lot easier because there's explanations to create some clarity on all of that stuff otherwise, and so some of y'all will learn just by running the numbers, putting some stuff in, figuring out where to get the numbers on a property and plugging this in, you're going to learn to be a better assessment of an investment.

[00:42:00] Galo: I had someone from the DoorGrow group. I forgot his name from Tennessee. I'll remember his name, but I had a pretty long conversation with him about this very thing. So Sarah put me in contact with him. And it was the same thing. I said, "look, I'm going to run it like I run it. If you're ready one day to pitch it to me, I can listen to you and I can maybe give you some feedback." But I think that's what the DoorGrow community brings to the table.

[00:42:23] You will connect with other folks that are willing to help you. And then he was like, "hey, what do you need help with?" And I said, "well, I am way behind on all my DoorGrow stuff. So let me look at your website. Let me see what you have, cause I may have to copy some of it," but it is good to know that you can get support from like minded folks.

[00:42:39] And one day is about me. Next day is about you and you can help each other. So I'm all about it, yeah. Yeah.

[00:42:45] Jason: That's why it's a mastermind. And so those of you that can attend DoorGrowLive, come experience some of our clients. Like just the caliber of the people that we attract at DoorGrow is next level.

[00:42:55] I think in this industry, they're growth minded people. You could tell just by looking at Galo, military disciplined, intelligent, like we attract really amazing people. And if you want to be more amazing, you are the sum of the five People that you hang out with the most so for your business come hang out with at least five property managers that are badasses like Galo, so And we'll have them in DoorGrow live.

[00:43:17] So Galo can't make it this year. But fortunately, but we've got some really cool people there. And we've got some really cool speakers. So make sure you attend well Galo, I appreciate coming on anything else you want to add about the roi calculator or maybe to share your experience of what it's like being in DoorGrow before we wrap up?

[00:43:35] Galo: I really think that everything that DoorGrow offers is phenomenal.

[00:43:40] And I think that you definitely have to prioritize doing the things that you need to do to make sure that you implement to grow your business. And in a short period of well, during the time that I've been with DoorGrow, just the ROI calculator some of the things that I've used and abused because I immediately saw great value.

[00:43:57] But there are so many other things that you would just apply yourself and take the time to apply. There is no reason why you cannot have your property management business succeed. The blueprint is there. Six years ago when I started learning this, I had no blueprint and it took me a while to grow.

[00:44:12] Had I had then what I have now? I could have exponentially grown much, much faster. It's a little hard, but you just got to put yourself out there with all of the sales calls and the revamp and everything else that the DoorGrow provides. You just got to be part of it and you just got to get after it.

[00:44:28] You have to let people know what you do. 100%. The ROI calculator is nothing if people don't know that you have it, if people don't know, there's like, "man, Galo has this very neat thing." you need to have people talking about it. There's a lot of engagements here in Columbia from different real estate investors.

[00:44:46] And next thing that I'm going to pitch is going to be this. I say, "Hey, let me explain this to a forum of investors from Columbia and other places." Because what that does is, all it does is just project your image out to the world so they know that you exist. The moment that you exist, even if you get two, three people, those three people will connect you with people.

[00:45:05] Some other people you just need to put yourself out there. You can go and do call calls, but calls are not really that good. When you get referred by people, your chances to close that deal are much higher than then kind of rolling the dice and hoping that they'll pick up a phone call.

[00:45:19] Now just start with people that you know, and let those folks bring you warm leads.

[00:45:23] Jason: Awesome. Well, Galo, appreciate you coming on the show. Thanks for hanging out with us and appreciate you as a client. And I can hear in your voice, you're like, "man, I haven't done all the DoorGrow stuff. I've gotten these benefits," and I think all of our clients feel that way. Like there's a lot in the program and as entrepreneurs, we never feel like anything's fast enough. And so some of y'all listening are probably like, "well, man, I haven't done all the DoorGrow stuff," if they're clients, or I'm working on this, or "I've struggled to be on a call" or whatever. It's progress over perfection and you're making progress and that's what matters and it never feels fast enough for us as entrepreneurs.

[00:45:58] Like we're in the fast lane, wishing everybody would get out of our way. But you're making progress, you're moving stuff forward and I'm excited to see what you do.

[00:46:05] Galo: 100%. I was excited to be here and look forward to being part of their growth.

[00:46:09] Jason: All right. All right, cool. We'll let you go. So if you are a property management entrepreneur and you're wanting to finally experience some success, you're wanting to grow significantly over what you grew the last year or the year before that, maybe you've been stagnant for years, you just know that if you had more doors secretly, it's going to make your life worse personally as a business owner, because you have more questions from your team, more people bothering you, more problems, more drama, that means your business isn't scalable and we can help with that as well. So make sure that you reach out to us at DoorGrow and we can help you out.

[00:46:46] And if you have questions, Galo posted his email address. We'll include that if you want to reach out to Galo. And we appreciate him coming on the show. So reach out to us at DoorGrow. We would love to help you grow your business and get to be part of a community where you're hanging out with people that are doing some awesome things like Galo.

[00:47:03] So we we wish you all success until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:47:08] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:47:35] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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As a property management entrepreneur, you know how stressful day-to-day work and life can get. Over the years, we’ve noticed that property managers often neglect their own health until they burn out…

In today’s episode, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull chat about the importance of taking breaks and relaxing periodically as a property management business owner.

You’ll Learn [01:36] You’re stressed out! Now what?

[07:44] If you’re burnt out, you aren’t effective

[15:32] Why you need to take a vacation ASAP

[17:37] Take a break… or else

Tweetables “Just because you're working more or working harder does not mean you're productive or you're effective.”

“The thing that will give you more productivity is to stop and take a break.”

“Cars have both the gas and the brake. You need to realize that in your business, there's a time for gas and there's a time for the brake.”

“If a vacation seems crazy to you, schedule one.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: If a vacation seems crazy to you, schedule one. That's exactly when you need one. When you go, "I just don't think there's any chance that I could be taken away from the business. Like everything is on me and there's no possible way that I can do it."

[00:00:15] That is exactly when you need to do it.

[00:00:18] Do it. Book it. You have to. Otherwise this is your life forever.

[00:00:23] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:01:04] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, and expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow.

[00:01:25] And now let's get into the show. All right. So today's topic Is what?

[00:01:30] Sarah: Relaxation.

[00:01:31] Jason: Relaxation.

[00:01:33] Sarah: Yay. You know that thing that you guys never do?

[00:01:36] Jason: So, property management can be a little bit stressful. I've talked to thousands of property managers and this is a common theme. It can be a bit stressful.

[00:01:44] And I can't tell you how many I've talked to that said they haven't taken a vacation in like years. They're not taking breaks. They're not taking time for themselves, like things like this. And so I think it's important to recognize that just because you're working more or working harder does not mean you're productive or you're effective.

[00:02:05] And so it's important to make sure that you are taking breaks. So I think I shared on an episode recently at a client that I was coaching. And we had him do a time study, which is one of our tools we use to help clients figure out stuff. And he realized it was taking him like an hour to do things after three o'clock that took him 10 minutes to do in the morning.

[00:02:26] And so that's a clue to take. a break that we need to take breaks. Yesterday I was working on some tasks and I was getting a lot of stuff done, but then I eventually hit a wall where I was trying to work on something and it just like, was really hard. Like it was just felt really difficult for my brain to work on it at that moment.

[00:02:43] And I realized, "Oh, it's like in the afternoon I haven't eaten lunch yet and I probably should take a break." And so rather than forcing it and pushing forward, which I used to do in the past and do less productive work. I went and took a break. So, all right, what else should we say about taking breaks?

[00:03:01] Sarah: All right. So I know that it seems like the opposite thing that you should do when you're very busy And you've got a lot on your plate and you've got 10, 000 tasks to handle and you just have to push through and keep going and get it all done. And that if you stop, it will get harder because then you'll fall behind and then you'll have more to do and then it'll take longer and then you'll be going until midnight or later.

[00:03:26] And. It's really crazy, but it is backwards because if you are just pushing through and you're trying to just get it done and dig your heels in and keep going, even when you're tired, even when your body is telling you like, "Hey, I'm tired and I need a break." Then you're still able to keep going, but you're just not efficient and you're being less productive.

[00:03:50] So the thing that would give you more productivity is not to just push through and say, "I'm just going to keep going until I get it all done." The thing that will give you more productivity is to stop and take a break. I know it sounds wild, but it's true. So you need to figure out what can you do in that moment to then get some space, remove yourself from the situation and actually get into a state where your brain and your body can start to relax.

[00:04:19] Jason: Sometimes breaks are not enough. A quick break's just not enough. You're right. So especially if you've been in burnout for a while.

[00:04:25] Yeah.

[00:04:26] Sarah: We've been working really hard. I talked about this on the scale call last week. There are seasons in your business where you will be because maybe you are bringing on a whole bunch of new units. Maybe you're hiring a new person. Maybe you're implementing a new system or changing softwares or working with a new coach. And there are definitely times for that. But you also have to realize that there are times for breaks and rest and relaxation.

[00:04:52] Cars have both the gas and the brake. You need to realize that in your business, there's a time for gas and there's a time for the brake. So you must have both.

[00:05:04] Jason: Yeah. So we've been working really hard lately and I think we're both getting to a place of burnout. We were outfitting an an Airbnb that we're going to use for some client events and stuff as well.

[00:05:14] And we've just been working on the business. We're onboarding new sales people in the company too. And it's just, it's a lot, right. And so we just a week's vacation basically. We did a cool training. If you missed it last week, it was really cool. So we did do some work but we took a break and I think it was well needed, especially after that marathon move that we did moving all that furniture into that rental.

[00:05:38] Sarah: So I was pretty burned out physically, and I was nearing burnout. I was just, my stress level was through the roof. I was telling Jason, "I am on the verge of a breakdown, could happen like any little thing" and little things, little stupid things that I would normally not care about as much were setting me off like big explosions over a little stupid things.

[00:06:03] Jason: Every married guy can resonate. We know when you women get like that.

[00:06:07] Sarah: Well men get like that too, though, in a different way, I think sometimes when the little things that they're an annoyance, they're a slight frustration, but it's not the end of the world. But when your body reacts to that little stupid frustration as if it is the end of the world, that's a really good cue like you need a break. So we took one. And we pushed ourselves probably to the limit and just about every capacity as business owners often do, we're like "go, hurry up, get it all done, make it happen. So we set up we set up an Airbnb in 26 hours. Everything. We cleaned it and we had no furniture.

[00:06:48] We moved everything in, we assembled it, we decorated it. We got decor, silverware, dishes. There's five beds in there.

[00:06:55] Jason: Five beds.

[00:06:56] Sarah: And everything. And not just like beds...

[00:06:58] Jason: purple mattresses and stuff ready.

[00:07:00] Sarah: Yeah. It's ready to be rented out right now. And we did all of that.

[00:07:04] Jason: And it's two story.

[00:07:05] Sarah: In 26 hours.

[00:07:06] Jason: All the rooms, all the bedrooms are upstairs except one. It was a good time. Hudson, my son, and I were the heavy lifters.

[00:07:12] Sarah: Yes. I wasn't going to break a nail. These are like, it's 75 to get a new set! I'm not... you do that. So we did all of this. And then we actually had this trip booked for a while.

[00:07:24] It was booked last year. But the timing just worked out really well. Yeah. So we got done Sunday evening. late Sunday evening. And then Monday morning we flew out to a property, very rural in Arkansas, in Bentonville, Arkansas. It's actually Decatur, but there's like three properties in the city of Decatur, I think.

[00:07:44] And then that week, it wasn't that we didn't work at all because we did, but I only worked for maybe a few hours a day and it was selective work and it was focused work. So instead of doing everything that I would normally have done, I had to then prioritize. And say, okay, "if I have two hours to do everything because I'm only going to work for two hours today or three hours today, then what are the things that I must get done today in that time?"

[00:08:15] And those were the things that I focused on and anything that wasn't that I either didn't do it or I delegated it to the team. Because the thing that we also don't realize is sometimes things can wait and that's okay. We're in this era now of everything is instant. It's, "I want it right now. I want this now. I want an answer now. I want to talk to somebody now. I want Amazon right now. Like, I want everything instantly." And that has trained us to instantly respond to everything and then to be in this mindset where, "Oh, somebody needs me and then I must drop everything. I must handle it right now." It is okay to wait.

[00:08:55] Jason: It's okay to say no. It's okay to say, "Hey, no, I'm not doing that today, or that's going to be done next week." Depending on the situation, you don't always have to be reactive. you should be in control in your business, right? Where you're not reacting to everything. So.

[00:09:10] Sarah: So I'll share what I shared on that Scale call is I challenged everybody to give themselves Megan Cuthin talks about this.

[00:09:18] And so if Megan ever sees this. Megan, we love you. So Megan is our friend. She's out in Nashville, Tennessee. She's great. And she coaches on operations. And one of the things that she had talked about is she was noticing that every so often she would just get exhausted and then she was no longer effective.

[00:09:35] And she was just like, she had no more gusto to her. She didn't want to do things. And that's because she was hitting a burnout cycle. So she was realizing her burnout cycle was happening pretty often, like every other week. And then what she needed to do when she was like that is just take a break.

[00:09:53] So what she started doing is just building these little like mini breaks in. So what she does is she just chooses a day. And she blocks that day out so that she doesn't do anything that day. She has no calls. She has no appointments. She doesn't wake up at a certain time. She just treats it like a vacation day when she's at home. So she'll wake up whenever her body feels like waking up. If she wants to just read a book or watch TV or go take a nap or meditate or take a walk or go bowling or do whatever that day she does that. And then when she feels pretty well rested. relaxed and pretty well rested.

[00:10:35] Usually what happens then when we start to feel that way is then our brain starts going "Oh, I should take care of that. And Oh, what if I did that? And Oh..." and we start to get pulled back in to the idea of work and then work seems now exciting again versus, "Oh, I have to do that, but I really just don't want to do it."

[00:10:55] There's a big difference between going, "Oh, you know what? I could probably just do that. Oh, you know what? I had this great idea. We should do that." Then you feel excited and energized about it. That's your cue now to go back to work. And it might happen. It might take a day. It might take a few days if you're, especially if you haven't done this in a while, it might take a few days.

[00:11:12] It only might take a few hours. So you might be on like this burnout day for like three hours and that's it. So that's it. My challenge to everybody on the scale call last week was to schedule yourself a day like this, where you don't do all of the things that you would normally do and allow yourself that time to relax.

[00:11:31] And then my other challenge was to do this regularly. Also, don't just do it once and be like, "Oh, I'm good now." You're not, you have to continuously do this thing. And we had a client actually Josh, he closes his office every single week now on Friday early. And he's His whole team goes home early.

[00:11:48] Can you imagine that? So they have about like a four and a half day work week now instead of a five day. And the whole team gets everything done. They appreciate having that extra time in that extra afternoon. And instead of going "Oh, well I like, I can't not work on Friday afternoon because then all of this stuff won't get done."

[00:12:08] They get it done. So they're getting the same amount of work done, but in a shorter amount of time because they're properly motivated and they get extra time now to relax. So essentially they're getting a longer weekend. So I would challenge you to do the same thing, pick a day. And if you're like, "there is no chance I could do that right now!" That's fine.

[00:12:27] Do three weeks from now. Pick a day and close your office early. The nice thing is you don't actually have to do it. You just have to tell your brain that you're going to do it. So say, "I'm going to close at one o'clock today." And then what you'll subconsciously do is start filtering all of the work and all of the things that must get done.

[00:12:43] In that time frame, because you're going to close at 1 o'clock, and you'll get them done, and then, even if you don't close at 1 o'clock, you don't have to, but you just tell yourself that you will, if you then don't close at 1 o'clock, and you say, well, now I have an extra 4 hours in my day, what can you do with those extra 4 hours that your brain wasn't actually planning on having?

[00:13:03] Jason: Yeah.

[00:13:03] Sarah: So you can trick your brain, but you really, you have to do a little bit extra to like trick your brain. Because if you go, "Oh yeah, but I'm not actually closing at one o'clock. I'm going to be here until five anyway." Then your brain will give you until five o'clock to get all of your crap done.

[00:13:16] But if you're like, "I am closing at one o'clock, I am stopping at one o'clock and that's it." No exceptions. Then all of a sudden you work in the capacity that you have, you get all of your stuff done, and now you have some extra time in your day. And you might then decide to reinvest that time back into the business and go, "Oh, you know what? I think I'll go take a quick lunch. Maybe I'll go take a quick break. Maybe I'll take an hour break. Maybe I'll take a two hour lunch." I don't know. And then if you want to come back, you can always come back. It's your business. You can do whatever you want, but you have to actually trick your brain into, hey, "I need to get everything done by one o'clock or 12 o'clock or two o'clock or whatever time, pick a time, close early and get everything done by then."

[00:13:55] And then all of a sudden, you will be a lot more efficient that way. And you'll prioritize the things that need to be done because a lot of the things that you're doing, They don't actually need to be done.

[00:14:06] Jason: So this concept is Parkinson's law, right? Is the idea that the more time you get for something, the more time it's going to take.

[00:14:14] And so things will just always fill up whatever container you make available. Related to that, because work expands to fill the time that's available for its completion, things become harder. The more time you allow. And so sometimes by collapsing the amount of time available and having deadlines or having requirements.

[00:14:36] And this is one of, I think the brilliant pieces of our planning system, DoorGrow OS, by collapsing the time allotted in order to achieve something, people actually like work more efficiently and it's less hard to accomplish and they get more innovative And they start like looking for all these other alternatives and options and whatever and they do what's most effective.

[00:14:58] And so we've seen this with team members like they might spend way too much time on something if we just say this is when we need it's like we need this by next week and They we could give them a month And they would take an entire month and spend a ton of time and more time doing it. And that doesn't mean it's more effective or that we're getting a better result necessarily.

[00:15:17] So, same thing for you. Like set a cutoff. I'm done with work at this time. I'm going to take a break at this time. I'm going to take a vacation at this time. And then you will find that things become more and more effective. So Parkinson's law. Cool.

[00:15:32] Sarah: If a vacation seems crazy to you, schedule one.

[00:15:36] Yeah. That's exactly when you need one. When you go, "I just don't think there's any chance that I could be taken away from the business. Like I can't take away from my team or I am the team. I don't even have a team yet. Like everything is on me and there's no possible way that I can do it."

[00:15:52] That is exactly when you need to do it. So just do it.

[00:15:55] Jason: Yeah.

[00:15:56] Sarah: Do it. Book it. You have to. Otherwise this is your life forever. This is what you want. Do you want to be stuck? Doing all of this stuff every day, all day, burned out, exhausted, tired, miserable? No, so you have to get out of that. And sometimes to get out of that, we have to physically remove ourself from the situation because I know you guys out there, you'll go, "Oh yeah, I'll take a break."

[00:16:20] And then you'll bring your cell phone with you and you'll be doing stuff anyway. Actually take a break and remove yourself.

[00:16:28] Jason: So at one of our DoorGrow Live events, we have brought in an expert trainer that trains pro athletes for the San Antonio Spurs and some other pro teams that are around Texas.

[00:16:41] And she talked about how is part of their training mechanism and what she coaches on and supports them in recovery is a big part of that piece. It's a big piece of all of that. And if you don't have recovery, then you're going to have more injury. You're not going to perform as well. And so she talked about how the recovery piece is usually this most neglected piece because they're super driven.

[00:17:05] And a lot of entrepreneurs, you're high D in a DISC assessment. Like you're very driven. You want to like get things done. You're motivated, but you may not be giving yourself the recovery you need to be effective.

[00:17:16] During the recovery stage, it's built during those early morning hours where you're sleeping. That's where muscle's built. You do the work and break the muscle and tear the muscle and whatever doing the workouts, but it's built during recovery. And so if you're not giving yourself what you need and setting aside the recovery time, you will inevitably burn out.

[00:17:35] So you have to find that balance. So.

[00:17:36] Sarah: And You need to take a break before your body does it for you.

[00:17:40] Jason: Right.

[00:17:41] Sarah: Because that's the other thing, if you've ever noticed that when you're just tired and you're exhausted and you're stressed and you're like, that's usually when all of a sudden you straighten your back or you twist your ankle or you get this weird cold or bronchitis or whatever.

[00:17:57] It's because you're not listening to your body. Your body is giving you clues and telling you what it needs. "Hey, I need to eat Hey, I need to sleep. Hey, like I'm not relaxed. There's way too much cortisol in here. What are we doing?" And if we just keep pushing through it will break down And something will happen either a sickness or an illness or an injury And then you have to take a break because it will force you to take a break.

[00:18:24] But then the problem with that guys is then we're not taking a break that's fun. We're taking a break because we're sick and injured.

[00:18:31] Jason: Yeah. So we don't get to really enjoy it. Yeah.

[00:18:34] Sarah: So you're not enjoying it now. You're going, "Oh, I feel like crap." Of course you do. So you should choose to take a break before your body chooses it for you.

[00:18:43] Jason: So I think, one of the things I'm noticing is it's really important for entrepreneurs to become attuned to their nervous system. They need to be familiar with how they're feeling and just check in with themselves. And for entrepreneurs, we usually operate at a high stress level and not all stress is bad necessarily, right?

[00:18:59] The stress of working out actually gives you more runway and gives you more time, productive time. But we need to make sure that we're paying attention to our nervous system because we'll get preloaded and then we'll get like really like heightened and really anxious. And then to the point where we're exploding at that team members and like freaking out and like we're really heightened and we might then some entrepreneurs will get to the point where they're having panic attacks and they're not sleeping at night and they're having.

[00:19:25] Heart palpitations, right? And so we need to make sure we are honoring the body and our body will give us clues, nervous system. So go take a walk, take a breather, take a vacation, take a break, but start listening to your nervous system. What's it telling you right now that you need right now? Maybe you need to take care of your body.

[00:19:41] So, all right. Anything else?

[00:19:43] Sarah: I think if you need to take a break, then take a break and you can take a mini break. You can do that. So just get up and walk around the office. Even if you pace around the office. We have a couple of clients who do that. Like Yair every, I think it's four o'clock every day, he plays the Rocky theme in his office. And then he does like pushups and like burpees and like jumping jacks and lunges and stuff. Now you don't necessarily have to do all of that, but Schedule it throughout the day, put it right on your calendar, and then every so often get up and go walk around, even if it's just walking around your office.

[00:20:23] Rest your eyes, close your eyes for a few minutes, look away from your screen. Don't take a break from your screen by looking at your cell phone. That's another screen. That's not a break. Then your eyes are strained all day long. So actually look at something that's not a screen, rest your eyes or close your eyes or do some eye squeezes.

[00:20:40] You can meditate, you can listen to some music, you can start to read a book. And even if it's only for a few minutes throughout the day, that few minutes is going to help rejuvenate your body. So then you're not just feeling like you're constantly drained. And when you need a longer break, take a longer break, even though it might seem impossible.

[00:21:02] That's exactly when you need to do it.

[00:21:04] Jason: Okay, cool. So there's a cool app that I used for a while called Rise Sleep and it shows your circadian rhythm and there's usually a big spike in the morning where you ramp up and then it dips down in the afternoon and then you get a littler spike in the in the evening and where you get a another boost.

[00:21:24] But that lull in the afternoon, that dip can be pretty severe if we're not taking care of our health. And you can be really fatigued. And so that's a great time to maybe go for a walk or take a break or do something to wake yourself up or go do a workout or something like that. So, all right, well, hopefully this was a helpful and effective for you to honor your nervous system.

[00:21:44] Get some breaks in. towards burnout. We know that if you're not burning yourself out, you're going to be a lot more productive, a lot more effective, and we can help you grow your business a lot faster. And if you'd like to learn how to get your business growing faster, how to lower your stress levels and make the business a calm workplace, and get more effective and efficient team members, get better systems in place, this is what we do at DoorGrow. We're able to help grow companies dramatically, and we would love to help and support you. So reach out to us and talk to our team and let's get you going. So until next time to our mutual growth, bye everyone.

[00:22:17] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:22:44] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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Property management business owner, do you have an assistant? We’ve talked before about how important it is to build a team around you and get support as an entrepreneur.

In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull discuss why property management entrepreneurs need to hire an assistant for themselves.

You’ll Learn [01:14] The Most Important Hire in Your PM Business

[02:41] How to Get a Really Good Assistant

[04:57] Two Types of Team Members

[06:42] When Should I Get an Assistant?

[08:17] Benefits of Having an Assistant

Tweetables “I think the very first person that somebody should hire. is an assistant.”

“If you continue to build the team around the business, you will end up more and more miserable instead of helping yourself more and more, which actually makes you a lot more money.”

“Nobody's good at being two or three different types of people.” “I've seen business owners have team members that they've gotten assistants for and they don't have an assistant for themselves.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: I've seen business owners have team members that they've gotten assistants for and they don't have an assistant for themselves.

[00:00:07] That always just drives me crazy because it's so obvious that there's a problem there.

[00:00:13] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you're interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers, love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings.

[00:00:40] Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull. And let's get into the show. All right.

[00:01:13] So today we're going to be talking about assistants, right?

[00:01:16] Sarah: Yes. Why don't you have help yet? Okay.

[00:01:20] Jason: So one of the challenges that we've noticed with our clients and with other property managers is that a lot of times they don't have an assistant for themselves. And so they'll have some team members even, but they won't have an assistant that supports them.

[00:01:36] And I think this is a common trap entrepreneurs fall into. I think the very first person that somebody should hire. is an assistant. You start getting yourself some help instead of just helping the business. And if you continue to build the team around the business, you will end up more and more miserable instead of helping yourself more and more, which actually makes you a lot more money.

[00:01:58] That's like everything in a nutshell.

[00:02:00] Sarah: There you go. We're done. There we go. We can wrap up. Have a great day. So get an assistant.

[00:02:03] Jason: Goodbye. Alright.

[00:02:04] Sarah: Madi will edit this one and she'll be like, "oh wow, that was so fast."

[00:02:07] Jason: "Wow, that was the shortest one ever." Kidding! So let's talk about this. I have an assistant.

[00:02:12] Giselle's sort of your assistant. I think. Somewhat. Operationally? No, you don't think so? Okay. All right.

[00:02:18] Sarah: She's really good at really anything because she asks people on the team and she's like, "Hey, is there anything you need help with this week?" She always usually messages me at the beginning of the week and she says, "Hey, is there like anything I should be aware of or any special projects that you need me to work on this week?"

[00:02:34] And sometimes I can't think of anything until later. And then I go, "Oh, you can help me with this." And she's like, "great. I'm on it."

[00:02:41] Jason: So how do we get people really good assistants? Well, we have them do one of our DoorGrow time studies to figure out which things are energetically their plus signs and which things are their minus signs.

[00:02:51] And then we build out a job description, but it needs to be one personality type, not two or three different personalities that like that human being doesn't really exist.

[00:03:01] Sarah: And if they do, they're hard.

[00:03:03] Jason: There's people that can do everything.

[00:03:04] Sarah: They have like multiple personalities in one.

[00:03:07] Jason: Yeah.

[00:03:08] Sarah: Let's think about it if we want to hire them.

[00:03:09] Jason: No, we don't. We don't want that person. We want somebody that's good. At being one person, right? Like in, because nobody's good at being two or three different types of people. Right. You're not going to have somebody that's like, "man, I'm the salesiest person ever and super salesy. And Oh yeah, I'm a really brilliant detail oriented operator."

[00:03:27] Like it's just, for example, so we need to get you your ultimate assistant. We also then like to figure out your personality, figure out who you are. So when we get into our DoorGrow hiring, and if you need help with hiring, reach out to DoorGrow, we have a really great hiring system called DoorGrow hiring, and it's going to cost you a lot less money than working with a placement agency where they charge thousands of dollars and you'll probably get better results.

[00:03:48] Not probably. You'll get better results typically because their job is just to get somebody into your office and get paid. But we assess people, we make sure they're the right personality fit. We help you make sure you have the right culture fit and the right skill fit, which I've talked about many times, the three fits.

[00:04:06] So, I've had lots of assistants over the years. Lots. I've had some really amazing ones. I've had some okay ones. I haven't really had, well, I guess I've had a few like bad ones as well, right? So I've had lots and lots of assistants. And what I usually look for in hiring an assistant is I need somebody that I can trust their judgment and their intelligence to do things so that I don't have to do it. Right. And so my assistant Mar, she's better at several things than I would be. She has more patience. She's willing to like get frustrated at people if need be to like get things handled, whatever it takes.

[00:04:46] I think it's really important. A lot of people think, "well, I'll go get a VA and I'll go get some low dollar, low wage, cheap sort of worker in Mexico or the Philippines, and that'll be my first assistant."

[00:04:57] So there's two types of people you're going to hire in your business. Some are people as process. People as process are basically like people you hired that function like a robot. Just do what I tell you to do. Don't get cute. Don't be clever. Just follow the checklist.

[00:05:10] That's not a great assistant. It's not really a good assistant to have because you're going to have to do all the thinking for them and then give them tasks and you, then you're gonna have to show them exactly how to do every task and that's going to be really frustrating for you. That's not the ideal assistant.

[00:05:25] So then there are people that are thinkers or decision makers that you can trust to make decisions without you and to make judgments. And so that's the type of assistant that you want. You want somebody that is intelligent. Intelligence is the big differentiator here. And you can tell when you're talking with people, are they bright?

[00:05:46] Are they quick? Would you trust them to do things over you on the things that you're going to give them to do because they're better at those things? So you want to hire people that are intelligent, not people that just can follow tasks That's not going to be a really good assistant for you. Now later on if you do have some low level work or tasks in the business that you just want to offload, you can hire some people as process we have people on our team that are people as process.

[00:06:11] They follow things. They do the same sort of work each time. They're not really involved in making a lot of decisions in the business. They don't come to our weekly meetings. They don't come to our monthly meeting, planning meetings, stuff like this. They're just doing their work and they're valuable and we appreciate them.

[00:06:28] However, if you need somebody close to you, that's going to help you double your capacity and help you get accomplished a lot more, they need to be next level. They need to be higher level from that. So anything you would add to that?

[00:06:41] Sarah: I would say, let's talk about: when should I get an assistant?

[00:06:46] Jason: Okay. When do you think they should get an assistant.

[00:06:48] Sarah: Like now? Now. Usually somewhere and it's different depending on your capacity, typically, it's somewhere in between the 50 and 100 door mark. It may be a little bit sooner depending on your market and is this your full time thing? Are you trying to run eight different businesses at once?

[00:07:07] Like, what is your focus like? Really how much time are you spending in the business and willing to spend in the business? All of that will be factors in when this happens, but typically it's somewhere between the 50 and 100 doormark, which is why if you're in the DoorGrow mastermind, then the belt level requirements in order to reach the orange belt, which is your hundred doormark, you need to hire an assistant. It's one of the things on there and most people skip this step and they'll hire other positions in the business. They just don't hire an assistant. And I ran my business, that was the only person I had was an assistant and she was boots on the ground. And then that way, all of the stuff I didn't want to do, I didn't have to do because I had somebody else who could just take it off my plate and do it for me. So it was great. Without her, man, I don't know how I would have been able to do it. I would have had to work probably double or more. And I would have had multiple other positions in the company going at the same time. It just would have been really hard to do everything, especially the way that I did it without somebody there boots on the ground.

[00:08:17] Jason: Yeah. So for me having an assistant has like been hugely beneficial so that I can free up my time like it's completely gotten me out of email. I don't look at my email. Do you email me? I probably won't see it, but I'll be told about it.

[00:08:33] Sarah: We closed on a property and he didn't see any of the stuff. Yeah, we were at the closing table and he's like, "hey, I got questions on this."

[00:08:40] I'm like, yeah, that's all in your email. He's like, "oh, I don't look at my email."

[00:08:43] Jason: Yeah. So, yeah, I don't like dealing with email, right? It's not like my favorite thing in the world. So I was able to offload email. I don't have to like worry too much about my schedule. I just show up and live and do what my calendar tells me to do.

[00:08:57] So, having an assistant has just made things a lot easier so I can focus on higher level tasks and working on the stuff that I more enjoy doing and my assistant enjoys doing all those things. Those are things that drain me and my assistant loves it Like she messaged me last night saying how much she loves her job and how much she loves doing all this stuff for me And i'm like, "that's great because I would hate doing it." I just don't want to do a lot of those things that she does. So when to get an assistant? I think most property managers, yeah, certainly once you get up to 50, 60 doors, you're probably feeling a little bit overwhelmed as in that solopreneur sand trap, that's a great spot to get your first team member. They could be a part time assistant, but get somebody that can take some load off your plate.

[00:09:40] Maybe you can graduate them the full time as you add more doors, but it's going to double your capacity. Getting a really good assistant can double your capacity overnight, especially if they're taking off your minus signs because you'll have so much more energy, so much more mental capacity, so much less decision fatigue.

[00:09:57] You'll be able to get more juice out of the second half of your day if you can get those things offloaded. And so we've got some great resources for how to leverage an assistant that we can support you in at DoorGrow and how to know what an assistant should be doing, which is unique to you. And yeah, and how to make that relationship really effective.

[00:10:17] So, so reach out to us and check us out at DoorGrow.Com if you're curious about any of that, and if you don't yet have an assistant, what I think's really wild to me is I've seen business owners that have hundreds of doors, hundreds. And they have an entire team and they're stressed out and they're frustrated.

[00:10:34] And this happens a lot, especially in the two to 400 door range, they'll just be burnt out and they wonder why they can't get to the next level. They keep stopping their growth and adding doors and then focusing on trying to get their systems and processes dialed in and they don't have an assistant and they wonder why things are so stressful for them.

[00:10:51] And it's cause they're not taking care of themselves. They're not taking care of the most important person in the business. The one person that should have the most support, they're not allowing that person to get support, and it's you, the business owner, like make sure you have an assistant. I've seen business owners have team members that they've gotten assistants for and they don't have an assistant for themselves.

[00:11:12] That always just drives me crazy because it's so obvious that there's a problem there. And when I'm talking with them, they're like burnout, they're frustrated, they're hating their business, and, "oh yeah, my operator has an assistant or this person has an assistant or my property manager has an assistant property manager, but the business owner has no direct support."

[00:11:32] I'm like, "'well, everybody in my team supports me,' but you didn't build the team around you. You built the team around the business." And so they're just burning themselves out. So this is your invitation. If you're listening and you don't have an assistant right now, and you have any other team members, this is your invitation, or maybe you don't have any team members yet. This is your invitation to go get yourself an assistant. I'm giving you permission that you can go get yourself an assistant. Not that you need it, but you deserve it. Like go get yourself an assistant. You can definitely afford it because if you were able to take half of your time off your plate of the crappy stuff you don't want to be doing, you could easily make a lot more money.

[00:12:11] You can spend a lot more time doing revenue generating activities and growing the business. It's almost never an excuse that you financially can't afford an assistant. Because it just means you just have to spend the time doing the stuff that makes money, and you know how to make money and if you don't for some reason know how to add doors or know how to close more deals or know how to make money, we can help you do that dramatically and very quickly reach out to us at DoorGrow. So anything else we should say?

[00:12:37] Sarah: I don't think so

[00:12:38] Jason: Okay, so what's the core message?

[00:12:41] Sarah: Go get an assistant. Do it.

[00:12:43] Jason: All right. Do it now. That's it for today. So until next time to our mutual growth Bye everyone. Oh and get your tickets to DoorGrow live.

[00:12:51] This is gonna be an awesome event So go get those you can go to DoorGrowlive. Com. Be there. It's going to be be cool

[00:12:56] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:13:23] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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Are you a property manager? Do you hire property managers? Can you answer the question: what is a property manager, and what do they do?

In today’s episode, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss what a property manager is and what they should be doing in a property management business.

You’ll Learn [01:14] Million-dollar question: What does a property manager do?

[06:25] Siloing information to protect your business

[10:26] Hiring specialists instead of people who can “do it all”

[12:20] What should a property manager's role be?

[16:31] Property managers as client success experts

Tweetables “There's a lot of confusion as to the definition of a property manager in the property management industry.”

“When your company grows, what we're going to hopefully have you do is shift into specialists, so that you won't have a property manager that just does everything.”

“Effectively cloning yourself or duplicating yourself in the business usually means getting 10 people, not one.”

“It's not hard to be exceptional in property management.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: Business owners, we need to stop trying to find people that can do everything. We need to find people that are really good specialists.

[00:00:08] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives. And you are interested in growing in business and life. And you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:28] DoorGrow Property Managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses.

[00:00:56] We want to transform the industry, eliminate the B. S. build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management, growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:13] All right. So one of the things that's come up, we just did a DoorGrow boardroom event.

[00:01:18] And one of our clients that was there was like, "I need to hire a property manager." And we're like, "okay." And what we noticed in talking there and going deeper and digging in deeper is that there's a lot of confusion as to the definition of a property manager in the property management industry.

[00:01:37] Sarah: Yeah, it's like a catch all.

[00:01:39] Jason: So the challenge is it can mean just about anything.

[00:01:42] Sarah: Yeah. The definition of property manager is: "do anything and everything that the company needs."

[00:01:49] Jason: And so I've noticed this for a while. we've had a lot of clients and they'll say, "Oh, I need another property manager," or "I need to hire a property manager."

[00:01:56] "I need to get a property manager." And it always means something different. So like some people think a property manager does everything, and this is the portfolio style property manager. They're like, "they need to go get business." And so they're a BDM, they need to handle and do some of the bookkeeping accounting stuff.

[00:02:17] They need to do maintenance coordination. They need to do the leasing. So they're trying to find somebody that's basically an entrepreneur. They can do everything that's probably going to run away and steal half their business. Right. Which happens. It's happened quite a bit. I've seen it. And that's, I think the wrong way to build a property management business, it's the wrong way to hire and build your team.

[00:02:36] So let's figure out. What is a property manager? What is it?

[00:02:41] Sarah: Love it.

[00:02:41] Jason: What are your thoughts?

[00:02:42] Sarah: Well, so I think that there's an important distinction, especially when it comes to the size of your company. So in the beginning, When it's just you do everything. It's all you, you, and then you some more.

[00:02:58] And I think this is why then when they go to hire a property manager, they're like, "Oh, well I did everything and I want to replace myself. So I need a property manager to replace myself and then they're going to do everything because I did everything." So in the beginning. When you are in the day to day and it's just you and you haven't built a team yet and you're functioning as the property manager because you're in the day to day and the tactical work, yes, you are technically a property manager.

[00:03:26] And then when your company grows, what we're going to hopefully have you do is shift into specialists. so that you won't have a property manager that just does everything. You'll have people who are really good at the one thing that they do and will be able to then segment the business and split that out into multiple roles instead of just having a property manager that does everything.

[00:03:56] Everything. Yeah. So I created a Facebook post, cause

[00:04:00] There was some heat on that post. Well, I like this. I don't know if you read the comments.

[00:04:03] Jason: I like to stir the pot a little bit. For those that are watching this on video, this is what it looks like, right? So join our Facebook group, go to doorgrowclub. com, get in there. So I said, if the property manager role on your team is not your maintenance coordinator, operator, bookkeeper, leasing agent, then what is their role? And so people are like "define operator, like what's an operator?" So then I was defining what an operator was, but Michelle Miller, shout out to Michelle, she commented. She said, "in other words, if they aren't doing everything, what are they doing?" Right. Brian Nelson said "delegator." And I like that. That's I think

[00:04:39] Sarah: I don't like

[00:04:40] Jason: that.

[00:04:40] I like the idea that they are not the person that's doing all this stuff. Maybe they're orchestrating, maybe that's what they're doing.

[00:04:47] They're maintaining the relationship with the owner. Sean Foster, he says "PM's number 1 job is to be the middleman between the owner and the tenant advising and the correct path of the most profitable investment."

[00:04:56] And "but that one responsibility branches off into another 20, doesn't it?"

[00:05:00] And then, "depends on the systems." There's a little dialogue going back and forth there. So if you do property management, you manage the property. And to manage the property, you're doing leasing, maintenance, inspections, all this stuff. But that doesn't mean that the property manager in your business is doing all this stuff or should be.

[00:05:17] Usually you don't want somebody that's a jack of all trades and a master of none trying to do stuff. And if they're actually good at everything, they'll probably just go start their own business. And I think that's the other challenges that we often mistakenly fall into this clone myth. And this was what was going on with our client at the DoorGrow boardroom event.

[00:05:35] He thought, he's like, well, "I was a property manager at another company for a while. Now, I have my own business and I'm doing all everything and I need to go hire a property manager and I was doing everything at that company. I'm doing everything in my own company. Now, I need to go find somebody else to do everything."

[00:05:50] And when we finally identified this. I call it the clone myth. We think, "I just need to go find somebody just like me. I need to clone myself." Effectively cloning yourself or duplicating yourself in the business usually means getting 10 people, not one. Like 10 different hats, 10 different specialists in the business.

[00:06:07] And so just want to address the clone myth real quick. So I think we want to find a way, I think in the industry, it might make sense to eliminate the term property manager. If they're not actually the one doing all of the little pieces, unless you're portfolio style. So what are your thoughts on that?

[00:06:25] Sarah: Well, I think the other thing too, that I want to bring up about him at the boardroom event is he's like, "I need a property manager and they're going to do everything. And I do everything. And I also did everything at my other company when I worked for them as a property manager. So I need one. How do I make sure that they don't just steal my business and steal my clients and walk away though, because they're going to be doing everything?

[00:06:48] Jason: Yeah.

[00:06:48] Sarah: And that's a really good reason to not have them doing everything.

[00:06:52] Jason: Most business owners eventually figure out you need to silo information. So for example, when I ran a web design agency, I had an intranet where all the information was stored and I had how I sold, how I found clients, like all this was built out in the intranet.

[00:07:07] All the sales related stuff. And then I had all of how we build the websites, how we put them together, all this kind of stuff. And I would hire web designers to build the websites and to do work and they would get access to the intranet. They would read the sales stuff and then figure out how to get their own clients and then they would quit.

[00:07:25] I kept having them leave and they're like, "Oh, well, I've got so much business. I don't have time to do your projects now." And I was like, "what?" it happened over and over again. So I was like, "okay, something's going on here." So then I realized I needed to segment the information because the stuff that I figured out was pretty effective and pretty valuable.

[00:07:40] Sarah: And essentially you were paying them to train them to then run their own business and not work for you anymore.

[00:07:47] Jason: What a deal. So, okay. Yeah. So then I started siloing that information. And so I think I think I shared a TikTok or a reel or something with you where a guy was talking about siloing the information and he was talking about sales and manufacturing and a product business.

[00:08:02] And if they know where to source all the manufacturing stuff and they know how to acquire business, they don't need you anymore. So he had to segregate that information. I was like, that's the same thing. You need to segregate knowledge in your business. Your goal is to hire specialists on the team, not generalists that can wear multiple hats.

[00:08:22] You're the business owner. You have to wear every hat in the business that is not currently worn by somebody or is not being done properly. You have to step in. It all falls on you. That's the job of the CEO, right? You have to do it. If you have a good operator, then they step in and some of that stuff, too.

[00:08:40] You have to do stuff that's uncomfortable.

[00:08:43] Sarah: Well, let's just pause for a moment. Your operator is not going to do your day to day stuff in property management.

[00:08:47] Jason: They shouldn't do your day to day stuff. It sounded like. A lot of people get confused.

[00:08:50] Sarah: I know what you were trying to say, but people are going to hear that and go, "Oh yeah. And then my operator is going to do everything."

[00:08:55] Jason: I just wanted to include you. I didn't want to say you don't do the hard stuff too.

[00:08:59] Sarah: I do the hard stuff when I have to.

[00:09:01] Jason: Yeah.

[00:09:01] Sarah: Until we can hire somebody else to do it. Because I hate doing it. I hate certain parts though, then we hire somebody and they do it much better.

[00:09:11] Jason: Yeah. So I think it might make sense unless you're portfolio style, which I'm not a real big fan of. I think there's a lot of downsides to portfolio style management. I think it's really rare that people are good at everything. And so I think it's a lot more effective to get somebody that's a really great maintenance coordinator that can handle maintenance for probably thousands of units, right?

[00:09:32] If they really know their stuff and have the right systems and tools and you can take that off of your property manager's plates. You need probably accounting or bookkeeping or a team that helps with that kind of stuff. There's vendors that can help with some of those pieces, especially if you don't enjoy, or aren't good at that piece, there's a lot of available resources, but if you get specialists that are really good, they will surpass your ability in that particular category.

[00:10:00] Sarah is much better running the planning system that we have DoorGrow OS, running the operations of the business than me, I just like, when I was doing it between having operators I just stopped planning. I didn't want to do the meetings. It was, "anybody stuck? Let's move on. And now it's meticulous and it's detail and we're moving forward.

[00:10:19] And everything's focused and we're hitting all our goals and we're making progress. Right? Because I have a good operator. So I think the business owners, we need to stop trying to find people that can do everything. We need to find people that are really good at specialists. So, I met with this entrepreneur a while back named Joe Abraham.

[00:10:39] He gave this cool Ted talk that I liked and I checked out his book and I took his online quiz and he has a book called entrepreneurial DNA and he created this score similar to an assessment like this, but it's BOSI. B O S I. And it talks about the four different types of entrepreneurs, which are builders, opportunists, innovators, and specialists.

[00:11:01] And you need to figure out what you are, the book talks about, and then build the right team around you. So, historically, I was more of a specialist, which means I'm dedicated my craft for over a decade to coaching and supporting property managers, right? And like figuring out how to grow businesses and then I'm an innovator.

[00:11:17] I like to take in lots of ideas and formulate new ideas and create stuff and that sort of thing. So more of a specialist, innovator and specialist, and most of the coaches and mentors I've hired have been builders. Builder, innovators, stuff like that opportunists are always looking for the next way to make money or the next vehicle or this sort of thing.

[00:11:38] Think like Ray Kroc, who took the McDonald's brothers', intellectual property, because they were innovators and specialist, and he blew it up and he was a builder and an opportunist so, opportunists make great salespeople. For example, builders make good CEOs. And so I wanted to be a better CEO.

[00:11:56] And so I've worked with a lot of coaches to become more and more of a builder to develop that skill set. And I'm getting better. Better and better. So, so I think we need to as entrepreneurs figure out what are our strengths and then what are we lacking? If you need to get around maybe coaches that can help you with with some of the gaps that you have in your own personality or your own knowledge base, then that can help you get to the next level.

[00:12:20] All right, so I think if we could eliminate the property manager term from those that are not portfolio style, then what would a property manager that people typically think is a property manager do if they're not the maintenance coordinator, they're not all these things What do you think?

[00:12:34] Sarah: Yeah, I think you can still call them a property manager.

[00:12:37] I'm not against the term like you're like, "eliminate! Anti property manager term and industry!" I just don't think that's going to happen Okay. I do think though once your business grows and gets large enough you can have one person or team to do the maintenance coordination, and then that piece is handled by the maintenance team.

[00:12:58] Then you can offload the leasing part, right? They're going through, maybe doing showings if you still do those, or at least going through applications and moving people along doing the move ins. Dealing with move outs and starting that whole process, kicking that off. You might have a leasing person, or a leasing team, and then the accounting piece, like your property manager probably should not be doing accounting.

[00:13:20] You should have somebody who is really good at accounting to do the accounting. And if that means you need to have a service, do it for you. That's fine. Just make sure that they're a really good reputable service. And there's someone that can hopefully like triple tie out your books and make sure everything is correct.

[00:13:36] And then you, here's the big thing, you still have to monitor it. Don't just hand it off and say, here, please go do this thing. And then just sit back and never look at it and hope that it's right. Because I've seen that a lot where people go, Oh, like I haven't done the bookkeeping. I have somebody else do it.

[00:13:52] And then they start investigating because there's a one little issue and they start to pull the thread. And it's like, when you pull the thread of the sweater and it just all unravels. Okay, so don't do that. Don't do that. But then your property manager can be more like the person that deals with the relationships of between like clients and tenants.

[00:14:13] Right. So we're bridging a gap.

[00:14:15] Jason: So then technically they're more of a relationship manager, right. They're managing relationships. I think a big gap that we don't see a lot of in the property management industry, that's super common in every other industry is the category of client success. And the category of client success, their whole goal is to retain customers to keep customers, make sure that they're happy.

[00:14:38] And so I think that's the role that some people might say, "oh, that's the property manager" is they need somebody that's just focused on client success, loves on the clients, takes care of the clients, makes them feel valued. Maybe meets with them annually to make sure that everything's looking good financially.

[00:14:53] Sarah: Portfolio review calls.

[00:14:55] Jason: Portfolio reviews.

[00:14:56] Sarah: I love those. I will harp about that all day long. If you're not doing them, do them.

[00:15:00] Jason: Yeah. So, client success in a lot of industries. I've heard some of our coaches and mentors describe as your other sales team. Right. You've got those that sell people in, like your business development, your BDs, your business development managers, your BDMs that bring clients into the business, but then they are not responsible for retaining the clients.

[00:15:22] And you think you retain clients just by doing maintenance coordination and just by doing leasing, but these things don't really develop or solidify or build the relationship. If you screw those things up, then you're bound to probably lose clients. And so that's the bare minimum.

[00:15:36] Sarah: No one is going, "Oh my God. This leasing team is so amazing. I'm never going to leave."

[00:15:41] Jason: Right.

[00:15:41] Sarah: They just expect the leasing to be good because it's what they signed up for when they hired a property manager. Right? They're not going to go, "Oh my God, I can't believe they got this maintenance thing done so so fast. And it was done in two hours and it was amazing. I'm never going to leave."

[00:15:57] Jason: So Gallup organization wrote this book called first break all the rules. And then it has this customer satisfaction pyramid. And at the lowest level, there's the lowest two levels are availability and accuracy. So these are the two things that if you're always available and you're always accurate in what you say you're going to do and you do it, people just don't even notice. And so it's not hard to be exceptional in property management. If you do that, it's expected and demanded.

[00:16:24] Sarah: So this is like all the tactical stuff that we do.

[00:16:27] Jason: Yeah.

[00:16:27] Sarah: It falls into this.

[00:16:29] Jason: Yeah.

[00:16:29] Sarah: It's just expected.

[00:16:31] Jason: So the next level, if you really want to have great client, customer service and great client interactions is partnership and then advice.

[00:16:40] And this is where I think a property manager can really add value. This is where they are really a client success role where they're retaining clients. They're improving the relationship and the value that people see in the relationship and in the longevity of staying a client of your particular business, when there's plenty of others that could do it, they can manage their property.

[00:17:00] You have team members that are managing the relationship and focusing on client success. So maybe there should be some client success managers in property management and less property managers. As far as terms go.

[00:17:13] Sarah: He's really trying to get rid of that term.

[00:17:15] Jason: I don't know. It's just, it's so ambiguous.

[00:17:17] Sarah: That's why. So when we were creating R docs, like all of the job descriptions for different roles, he's like, "I want there to be an R doc for every role in property management business." And I said, "okay, I can create it." Here's the problem. The problem is that if I create one for an assistant, it's going to be different from company to company. If I create one for a property manager, there's going to be some similarities, but there's always going to be things that are different from company to company. So there are great templates, right? And it's they're, it's amazing. And then you just delete the things you don't need and add anything you do need from there. There's nothing that's uniform. There's so much that's different from business to business. We all do the same thing. We're all property management entrepreneurs, but the way the ins and outs, the inner workings of our business, there's a million different ways to do it.

[00:18:10] Jason: We did define those Rdocs though.

[00:18:12] We have Rdocs for each of the major roles. I think yeah, I think having recognizing that. You need a client success person to maintain the relationship. You need a maintenance coordinator. You need if all these things are segregated and you get really great specialists in each of these areas, then yeah, you're going to have a much stronger lifetime value of your client.

[00:18:33] You're going to make a lot more money. So I think that's important. Anything else we should talk about related to property manager?

[00:18:39] Sarah: I think that covers it.

[00:18:40] Jason: All right. So figure out and I'm curious, go ahead and find my post in the DoorGrow club group, or go post or comment in the DoorGrow club community.

[00:18:51] I'd be curious to hear your thoughts. What do you feel a property manager is if you don't do portfolio style? What are your property managers doing? How do you define that role? And are they really managing properties? Are they really managing people? Are they really customer success? Are they really supporting and taking care of owners?

[00:19:08] Or do you think they're taking care of tenants and like maintaining a relationship there? So, all right, I think that's our interesting conversation for the day for the DoorGrow show and do you want to give them a call to action? That's a good call to action for the end of the show here?

[00:19:23] Sarah: Oh, well, we have a few events coming up. So go and check out our events that we have coming up. Don't miss DoorGrow. It's going to be a big one.

[00:19:31] This is like our big conference. We do it once a year. It's here in Round Rock, Texas on it's a Friday and Saturday, May 17th and 18th. And our theme this year is creating opportunity from uncertainty. So we have a lot of great topics, a lot of great speakers lined up for you guys. And I've got something special in the works that I haven't really released yet, but It's gonna be really cool because we've never done anything quite like that before

[00:19:57] Jason: Yeah, all right.

[00:19:59] Cool. All right. Well on that note Until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:20:03] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:20:30] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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If you are a property management entrepreneur, you have likely been your own salesperson or BDM at some point. Eventually, every property management business owner will need to hire a salesperson and develop different growth engines.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull talk about their BDM Bootcamp event

You’ll Learn [01:52] What is a BDM?

[03:00] Get your BDM Ready for BDM Bootcamp

[08:42] You Need a Sales Pipeline!

[14:26] Benefits of In-Person Events

Tweetables “It's not the growth strategy that's the problem. It's that there's multiple stages in a pipeline for each growth engine, and you are not identifying the leaks that exist in this pipeline.”

“Your pipeline will literally never ever work if you don't even have one.”

“If you're not working the pipeline and you don't know the different stages of a pipeline, you’re just guessing, and you’re just hoping.”

“You need to get to the real pain and related that you need to get to the real pleasure, like what they really want. Nobody really wants property management”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: It's not the growth strategy that's the problem. It's that there's multiple stages in a pipeline for each growth engine and you are not identifying the leaks that exist in this pipeline or you're tolerating drop off at one of these stages.

[00:00:17] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing a business and life. And you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:36] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management, business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, Jason and Sarah Hull.

[00:01:15] Now let's get into the show. All right. So today we're going to be talking about BDMs.

[00:01:24] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:01:26] Jason: In honor of this event that we have coming up, which is. Going to be super cool. I don't know that there's been anything like this. That's been as cool as this that's existed in the property management space, maybe ever.

[00:01:39] There's a lot of people that talk about BDMs, but there's very few that are actually getting BDMs to get great results. And we're going to be hosting a BDM bootcamp. And so Before we go any further, every time I start talking about BDMs, as if everybody knows what it is. I just talked to a guy with, I think, 800 doors the other day.

[00:02:00] He's like, "what's a BDM?" I was like, man, okay, I need to make sure I explained this. BDMs are business development managers. Sometimes they're called BDs, business developers and they're salespeople for property management. That's what people will call them, right? Business development can happen in any industry.

[00:02:18] But the reason we use the phrase BDM in property management is because property management is closely connected to real estate. And whenever you mentioned sales, people get it confused with real estate brokerage sales type of stuff. And that's why. Now everybody knows what a BDM is, and we're going to be talking a little bit about that today.

[00:02:37] Sarah: Okay.

[00:02:38] Jason: So anyone listening to the show, you better know what a BDM is from now on. That's it.

[00:02:43] Sarah: There's a quiz at the end.

[00:02:44] Jason: What is a BDM? Did you get it right? If not, go back and start this episode over.

[00:02:49] Sarah: Try again.

[00:02:51] Jason: Okay. All right. What do we talk...? Do you want to like tell them about the event?

[00:02:56] What do we want to talk about?

[00:02:58] Sarah: Yes. Tell them about the event. So we are launching a BDM bootcamp. So there's a lot of companies that promote getting BDMs. And there's a lot of companies that promote getting BDMs and then spending a bunch of money to run ads and get leads and pay for leads and then have the BDM work the leads.

[00:03:21] And then if you just want the BDM to close more deals, it's simple. All you have to do is spend more money and buy more leads. Which is really expensive and wildly ineffective. So we have strategies that BDMs use...

[00:03:35] Jason: that actually work

[00:03:37] Sarah: ...that are free, or at least very inexpensive.

[00:03:40] You might have to pay for lunch. That's okay. You get something out of it too. And we've decided that we're going to launch a BDM, aka salesperson, boot camp. It's going to be a one day training. And we've never done anything like this before. For those of you that are current clients, there's some trainings on DoorGrow Academy.

[00:04:01] We run every wednesday, our growth accelerator calls, but it's hard to amass all of this information that Jason and I have learned about sales over the last, what, 20 something years and put it in a course. Or talk about it on a one hour call. It's darn near impossible, right? So what we wanted to do is we wanted to take some of this information and spend one day going over all of it.

[00:04:31] Now, this is very likely going to end up being a series because we can probably talk about sales and strategies and tactics and how to improve your scripts and what to say and like NLP language and filler words and all this good stuff, we can go over this for probably days on end. So what we're doing is this is very likely going to end up being a series, but we're going to launch the first one in April, so for those of you that are watching live, you all have a chance to get in on that for those of you that are watching this recording is will probably be released after the event, but don't fret because

[00:05:11] Jason: you may have missed it.

[00:05:12] Sarah: You might have missed it. Oh, man.

[00:05:15] Jason: Maybe you should get in our Facebook group and pay attention to the live streams.

[00:05:19] So you don't miss stuff.

[00:05:20] Sarah: Sometimes we do some cool things that you need to know about right now.

[00:05:23] Jason: The Facebook group, go to doorgrowclub.Com apply. We reject 70 percent of the applicants, which is why the group is good.

[00:05:31] Sarah: Okay.

[00:05:32] Jason: Okay.

[00:05:32] Sarah: Anyway. So that was our shameless plug. All right. No, right. Go ahead.

[00:05:36] If you've missed it. Yeah, we don't have a word from ourselves yet. That's a great idea. Who wants to sponsor this podcast? We'll plug you on every episode. Talk to me, baby. So anyway, if you've missed it. Sad for you, but don't fret because there's going to be more of these. This won't be a once and done thing.

[00:05:55] So for those of you that are listening now and or hear the information before the event, then this is going to be for you. So here's the information. It will be Thursday, April 11th. So this is also open to anyone on your team who handles sales, meaning it might be you, it might be somebody else. You may have multiple people on the team who handle sales. So if you would like Jason and myself to train your salespeople for a day. This is a really great opportunity for you because that's exactly what we're doing.

[00:06:33] So do you want to tell them a little bit about what we're talking about? Or do you want me to do that?

[00:06:38] Jason: I'll go ahead. So we've seen a lot of problems with businesses growing. And so if you, have a BDM or if you are the BDM, you're the business owner, you're the one that closes deals and you are not adding at least a hundred orders a year, hopefully through organic methods instead of wasting a bunch of money on advertising to get cold crappy leads, we're going to give you the strategies, we're going to focus on some different growth engines talking about those. We're going to get into specific pipeline stages because what I often identify is that it's not the growth strategy that's the problem. It's that there's multiple stages in a pipeline for each growth engine and you are not identifying the leaks that exist in this pipeline, or you're tolerating drop off at one of these stages. And not making progress and so we're going to help you identify where the leaks are if you've started building some of these growth engines, you may have started doing things like trying to do realtor referrals and it's not working very well.

[00:07:39] You're not getting easily 10 doors a month from that. You might maybe you've heard of our neighbor strategy and you're not getting referrals from that. Maybe you've heard of some other of our strategies, it's not working. And if you haven't heard of these, then you might want to show up, but we're going to talk about the different stages.

[00:07:55] We're going to talk about what maybe is affecting things at different stages. This will be very tailored to those that are in attendance. We want to help you move your business forward significantly. And sometimes there's very simple tweaks that could be done at each of these stages that opens the floodgates.

[00:08:10] So you have a lot more flow through the pipeline, which means more deals and more money.

[00:08:15] Sarah: Yeah. So back up because you skipped to topic number two, which is cool. We can do two and then one and then three and then four, but that's fine.

[00:08:21] Jason: They're not numbered.

[00:08:22] Sarah: They're not, but they are in order on the document.

[00:08:24] Jason: Okay.

[00:08:25] Sarah: Yeah.

[00:08:25] Jason: So Sarah's an operator and everything has to be done a certain way. There is a right way for operators.

[00:08:32] Sarah: There's a right way to do literally every task on the planet.

[00:08:34] Jason: I'm talking to the business owners and they care most about what is interesting or different, but...

[00:08:42] Sarah: yes, and I understand, but your pipeline will literally never ever work if you don't even have one.

[00:08:50] Jason: That's true.

[00:08:51] Sarah: Or you don't know the stages of a pipeline because a lot of times, and I bet this happens to you too, but it happens to me when I ask people, okay, "what does your sales process look like?"

[00:09:00] " Oh, I talked to somebody." "Okay, great. And then what?" "Oh, and then I send them some information." "Great. And then what?"

[00:09:05] Jason: "I wait."

[00:09:06] Sarah: "Oh, then I wait." "Oh, okay. Like, do you call them again or do you check in or do you like set up another call?"

[00:09:13] Jason: "Or I follow up in a way that I look needy and creepy?"

[00:09:16] Sarah: Sometimes the answer is yes. And then sometimes the answer is no, but even if they do follow up or have another call or check in again, somehow, then my next question again is "okay, and then what?" And then they go, "oh, and then I just wait." So essentially what happens is you have no pipeline. Okay. And you don't know that you don't have a pipeline, but you don't have a pipeline.

[00:09:35] And that means if you're not working the pipeline and you don't know the different stages of a pipeline, we're just guessing, and we're just hoping. We're going, "I don't know. I keep talking to all these people, but nothing seems to be closing. And I don't understand why," because you don't have pipeline stages.

[00:09:49] Jason: Okay.

[00:09:49] Sarah: So you got to need a pipeline.

[00:09:51] Jason: So we'll teach you how to build out the pipeline. We'll talk about the different stages that need to exist. And then it'll be a lot more clear and we'll talk with you about how to build that out in your CRM of choice. So you'll understand the principles.

[00:10:04] You can go apply this to whatever CRM you use, whether it's DoorGrow CRM or lead simple or whatever else is out there. Okay, I'll go to number three now that we're back in order. Okay. All right. Number three,

[00:10:19] Uncovering your client's pain points. So superficially people think they know the pain of their target audience. So they want their property manager. They don't want to have to deal with managing the rental property. That is not the real pain that gets you to close deals that you have to go a lot deeper than that.

[00:10:36] And so we're going to talk about how to disarm people, how to not come across as super salesy, how to create authentic communication and an authentic relationship where they believe that you can help them and how to get them to open up about what the real pain is, the real stress of the real emotion that might be motivating them to have a conversation with you.

[00:11:00] And one of the biggest problems we see in sales is that a lot of people don't take time to identify what the real pain is. The pain often has not really anything to do with the rental property. It's something going on in their personal life. And so you need to figure out how to connect to that.

[00:11:16] And for some that's like, "Whoa," that's like, "I don't know how to do that. That'd be weird or awkward," but you need to get to the real pain and related that you need to get to the real pleasure, like what they really want. Nobody really wants property management, right? Just like if you're booking a trip to Hawaii.

[00:11:34] Property management is the flight to Hawaii. It's not the paradise. It's not the outcome that they're hoping for. It is property management. So we want to sell the trip. We want to sell Hawaii, not the flight there, right? Which is property management. So we'll talk about also getting towards the, not just the pain, but the pleasure.

[00:11:54] Those are the 2 ingredients you really need to know and uncover in order to close the deal. And so if you're not closing deals, it's probably because somebody else is better at that than you. You're one of your competitors, or they're just going to go with the cheapest company because you haven't really created a connection.

[00:12:11] And so they think you're a commodity. You do everything everyone else does. And so that we'll get into that. All right. So good?

[00:12:18] Sarah: That was good.

[00:12:19] Jason: Number four, reviewing and improving your call scripts to book more appointments and close more deals. So we want to like, take a look at what are you saying? And you may think, "I don't have scripts.

[00:12:30] I'm just awesome. I just wing it every time." I guarantee 90 percent of the time, you're saying similar things, dealing with objections in similar ways. And so you have a script. It just probably isn't a very clearly defined one, which means it's probably not a very good one because you haven't taken an objective look at it to optimize or improve it.

[00:12:50] And so we're going to take a look at some scripts that are effective and figure out ways to improve your scripts. And sometimes it's not even about what you're saying. It's about how you say it. And so we're going to focus on some of the magic that comes with how you communicate with people. I've got clients that are not salespeople, like no real training in sales, terrible at sales. And they're crushing it because they know how to be authentic. They are communicating in a way that's disarming and they're just being helpful. And so we're going to talk about some of that stuff. How to close more deals. Some of you that are so good at sales, you're super salesy, you like cut your teeth as a baby in real estate and like you're a shark, like we're going to help you figure out how to undo a lot of that mess so that you can create more trust and sales and deals happen at the speed of trust.

[00:13:44] And so we're going to help you close more business, which will make things a lot better. Okay.

[00:13:50] Sarah: That's what we've got. All right. That's our agenda. And if this sounds interesting to you, now, our hope is that once you come to this event, you'll obviously get a lot out of it and learn a lot about sales that we just typically can't cover on a one hour call.

[00:14:07] It's just, it's too much. I can talk about 1 of those things for more than an hour. Right? Once you come to this event, you'll learn a lot and you'll be able to immediately implement these things so that very quickly, you will start seeing some changes and some positive results and momentum.

[00:14:24] Jason: So why do this in person?

[00:14:26] So let me talk about that. One of the things we've noticed in DoorGrow's, I'm starting to call it the real bubble. And so there's this mentality, I think, unconsciously in our brain. So when we're doing stuff on zoom calls and zoom meetings, which we do a lot of cool stuff that way DoorGrow, but we've noticed that when we get people in person for the first time they meet Sarah and I and realize we're real human beings.

[00:14:48] We're not just something on video and that we're real and they can like hug us. And like we touch right? Like then something shifts in their brain that everything else they're saying is real. When they start to meet clients that they've seen on some of the Zoom calls, sharing their wins and talking about crushing it and adding doors.

[00:15:07] They're like, "Oh, these are real people." And then the brain shifts and they start to connect that, "Hey, if they're real, and this is real and they're getting real results and they're like me, I'm a human, like I can do this too." And all of this stuff is actually true, impossible. And so we've noticed a shift in clients once they come to DoorGrow live, which is coming up in May, or they come to one of our in person events.

[00:15:32] And so we want to do this in person because there's something magical about in person that content and information is absorbed. A lot more easily. There's also that sort of kinesthetic aspect that we're there physically but the learning is a bit more experiential. We'll be able to maybe even role play, go over some scripts, talk, like, say things.

[00:15:52] It's just a bit more real than just seeing something on video or watching a video replay or something like that. And so come pierce the real veil with DoorGrow and realize the real magic that exists.

[00:16:03] Sarah: All right. Yes. And at this point you guys might be wondering all right, so this sounds pretty good.

[00:16:09] I think I might be interested. What do I do? Contact me. Don't contact anybody else on the team. They're not even going to know what you're talking about. Just contact me so you can get in touch with me. It's Sarah S-A-R-A-H. If you go to our website and you end up talking with somebody else on the team, they will point you in my direction and you can get registered that way.

[00:16:29] Now, tickets for this will be 1k per person. You can have as many people on your team attend as you would like. So if you have 3 BDMs and you want to send all 3. If there's just one or two, maybe that you want to send or you want to come check it out yourself, go ahead. But you'll need to let me know now spots are going to be limited. I don't even have 20 spots. I actually need to go back and confirm how many I have left because I know we had some people interested. But the price for this will be 1k per person. And I know that the price will not stay. At that rate.

[00:17:03] So we're launching it and we're doing something special with the price. So for now, take us our one case. So get in while the cost is low.

[00:17:12] Jason: There you go. All right. You will easily offset the cost of doing this. For most of you, that's like getting one more deal, right? So lifetime value for most of your clients, probably a lot higher, like maybe 10 times.

[00:17:27] Maybe 20 times higher if you can keep them a while, right? So this is a no brainer. This is very easy and we can get your BDM adding a lot more doors. So just like some client results, we've got clients that are easily some BDM are adding 200- 300 doors a year organically without paying for any SEO or pay per click or content marketing or social media marketing or pay per lead services like APM and they're able to grow and scale their business quickly through organic methods.

[00:17:56] Sarah: And we have some clients that turn business away every single month because they just cannot.

[00:18:02] Jason: Get pickier and pickier.

[00:18:03] Sarah: Yeah, they're backlogged. And then they ask us on the calls what do I do? Like, "I don't want to say no, but then I can't take on this many." And we're like, "now you have a waiting list and you can take on X money per month."

[00:18:14] And if they can't come on this month or they missed that deadline, then roll them over to the next month. If they qualify.

[00:18:20] Jason: Okay. All right. So that is BDM bootcamp. So check out BDM bootcamp, reach out to sarah@doorgrow.Com. Sarah with an H.

[00:18:28] Sarah: Yeah, if you spell my name wrong, I'm not talking to you cause I won't get it.

[00:18:32] Jason: Okay. That's your punishment.

[00:18:34] Wow. Okay.

[00:18:35] Sarah: So don't forget my H because everyone does.

[00:18:38] Jason: Just email me. I'm nicer.

[00:18:40] Sarah: He never checks his email. Don't email him. That's true.

[00:18:42] Jason: My assistant does. Don't do it. All right.

[00:18:44] Sarah: You'll never hear back the black hole.

[00:18:46] Jason: No, my assistant's good. She'll take care of it. I just won't see it.

[00:18:51] She'll tell me about it if it's important. All right. For those of you that are wanting to join a community, be part of something awesome, reach out to us. And so you can learn more about DoorGrow Mastermind. You get access to some of the coolest stuff and to be part of the coolest community of the most growth minded property management business owners in the industry.

[00:19:11] And we can help you get your business to the next level. So whether it's scaling operations, whether it's figuring out how to grow, whether it's cleaning up the front end of your business, getting your website and your pricing, right, all this kind of stuff. So we can help you. All right. Check us out at doorgrow. com until next time to our mutual growth, everybody. Bye for now.

[00:19:33] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:19:59] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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If you are a property management entrepreneur who is always looking to grow and scale your business, you are open to new ways to automate processes in your business.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Tom and Diego from Calvary to talk about new maintenance coordination and manager trainings to scale property management maintenance.

You’ll Learn [01:28] Property management maintenance bootcamp and trainings

[06:07] How to manage a maintenance team

[08:12] Trainings for a maintenance coordinator

[12:04] Making sure things don’t fall behind

[15:51] Maintenance teams at no cost

Tweetables “The more involved you can make the material with all those different elements, the better the results are going to be for everybody.”

“It's about preserving the property, but it's also about tenant satisfaction, of course, owner satisfaction, and then building a strong relationship with vendors.”

“What you say and how you say it matters.”

“When you get overwhelmed, especially during high season, it's very easy to let things fall through the cracks.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Tom: Why is maintenance important? Everybody thinks they really know, but it's about preserving the property, but it's also about tenant satisfaction, of course, owner satisfaction, and then building a strong relationship with vendors.

[00:00:16] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, are are on a mission a to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win.

[00:01:10] I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:17] All right. So today I'm hanging out with Tom and Diego from Cavalry. Call in the cavalry.

[00:01:25] Tom: Yes. Once again.

[00:01:26] Jason: Talking about what today?

[00:01:28] Tom: Maintenance as always, but I'm super excited, Jason, because we're finally launching our training programs.

[00:01:36] It's actually our in house training program that we use for our own employees. Our own maintenance coordinators, and we're making it available to the public. So super excited about that. Yeah. And the reason why is because we gotten a lot of requests from people outside of our service areas. We're about 18 months into our business now, so we're not covering the whole of the U S yet. And therefore we found a way to still help those property management companies outside of our service areas. And that's what we're doing. Yeah.

[00:02:07] Jason: Awesome. So this training is pretty in depth, I would imagine, right? This is your best stuff. Because this is stuff you want your people to know to represent you and showcase your business.

[00:02:19] Correct.

[00:02:19] A lot of business owners might not want to do that? Like you're giving away your secret sauce.

[00:02:23] Tom: Yeah. So the reason why we're giving it away is, our main mission is to help property management companies.

[00:02:30] And of course this one is also paid. Then the main reason for it being paid is because it's a fully guided course. So it's a cohort course. So it's not just like, "here are some videos go ahead." No, we're actually guiding the students through the whole process. We have two courses, one for the MCs and one for the managers. For the MCs, it's a 30 day bootcamp plus 365 guided throughout all of the seasons because-

[00:02:56] Jason: MCs meaning maintenance coordinator.

[00:02:58] Tom: Yeah, correct. Correct. Yeah, the maintenance coordinators. So that's 30 day bootcamp plus 365 guidance throughout all of the seasons. And then for the maintenance manager course, it is 60 day bootcamp and then also 365 days of guiding and implementation.

[00:03:14] Jason: Got it. Okay. Very cool. We spoke earlier and you're like, "I've got a course." And I was like here's what I've learned about courses. And so what we've learned at DoorGrow it's a lot more effective to do what you're now thinking of doing, which is have a cohort, have people move through a class together, which is great.

[00:03:30] We've just found we get so much like bigger results with our clients instead of just giving them videos, which we used to do. They still have access to some cool video material. But when we take people through a class with their peers, and they're working on it together, it feels like they're actually doing something with other people.

[00:03:48] They tend to get a lot better results. They actually get stuff done. They have homework, they have deadlines, they have completion timelines for getting things done. And so we just found that they just get way better results because the completion rate on most courses is pretty abysmal. A lot of people like buy a course, but then they don't do it.

[00:04:05] And I'm sure everybody listening, you bought a course before and just didn't do it like myself included. Yeah. And so we've learned at DoorGrow, coaching clients for like over a decade now that this is 1 of the best ways to get results is the hybridize everything. It's like we give them, a little bit of the ability to ask questions and have, that little 1 on 1 sort of accountability aspect.

[00:04:30] There's the cohort where we're moving them through a program course material. Then there's the training material that's video course material. They can move through. And I've noticed also that people learn in different ways, right? Some people need to learn visually. Some people are more auditory.

[00:04:43] Some people are more like kinesthetic, which means that it's more about feelings and the physical state in doing things. And so, the more involved you can make the material with all those different elements, the better the results are going to be for everybody. So I love that you've developed this program.

[00:05:02] So why don't you tell us a little bit about. These two programs and how they would know which one should I have my maintenance person do? What's the difference between a maintenance coordinator and a maintenance manager?

[00:05:14] Tom: Yeah. So I would say that the maintenance coordinator course would, I would recommend those for maintenance teams that already have a maintenance manager in place.

[00:05:24] Jason: How do you define that?

[00:05:26] Tom: A maintenance manager does it all and maintenance coordinator coordinates maintenance under the guide of a maintenance manager.

[00:05:33] And that's why I wanted to say, I feel like if you have a one team person, they should follow the maintenance manager course. Why? Because it's so complete and you can build that person to then hire later on other people, them become under their guide.

[00:05:47] Jason: Got it. So if the maintenance person has an assistant or something like this, then they would do the maintenance manager thing.

[00:05:54] And that assistant maybe could go through the maintenance coordinator course.

[00:05:57] Tom: Correct a one person team, 100 percent go with the manager course, because it's much more in depth. Hiring, vendor onboarding, it goes a lot deeper into all of that.

[00:06:06] Jason: Got it. Okay. So tell us about the maintenance manager course.

[00:06:10] What are some of the things that you're going to cover so that you can turn these people into effective maintenance managers?

[00:06:17] Tom: Yeah. So it's going to be how to manage a team. So there's a lot talk about leadership, one on one meetings, evaluation of the team. What also sets it apart is the vendor onboarding aspect of it, how to find vendors, where to find vendors, what the process looks like, how to do it very time efficiently.

[00:06:37] And yeah the manager's course goes a lot deeper into the training as well and how to implement our maintenance system as a manager and how to daily uptrain your team maybe not necessarily every day, but that's what we do. So that's what we recommend.

[00:06:53] So it's really how to manage the team within our system. So the idea is that if you have a larger team, then you would just give the MC course to the maintenance coordinators and then the maintenance manager course to the manager and it all works in harmony.

[00:07:08] Jason: Got it. Okay. Now, a lot of people are like "I don't need my maintenance person to manage a team. I just need one person. I've only got a handful of doors or maybe a hundred or maybe 200 doors. Maybe I just need the maintenance coordinator one," or what if they don't have a maintenance person yet?

[00:07:27] Which one should they do as a business owner? It sounds like maybe the maintenance manager one would make sense because they need to hire somebody.

[00:07:33] Tom: Exactly. 100%. If it's 1 person, it's the maintenance manager. Why? Because we also give a vendor agreement example, an owner agreement example, a maintenance coordinator agreement example.

[00:07:46] So it's very complete. And again, if you have a 1 person team you go with the manager course.

[00:07:53] Got it. Okay, cool. The reason why we made the maintenance coordinator course shorter, it's just because there's stuff in there that they don't really need to know.

[00:08:03] And if at some point they want to become a manager or you just feel like that person should know everything then you can just give them the manager's course.

[00:08:12] Jason: Okay. So what does the maintenance coordinator course material cover? And what's left out?

[00:08:18] Tom: Yeah. Let me grab the modules here.

[00:08:20] So we have eight modules in the maintenance coordinating course. It is an introduction of course, and then understanding property management maintenance. It is about maintenance ethos. It is about why is maintenance important? Everybody thinks they really know, but it really highlights every single detail.

[00:08:39] It's about preserving the property, but it's also about tenant satisfaction, of course, owner satisfaction, and then building a strong relationship with vendors. Then we have a module about vendor management, so how to communicate with vendors, how to explain to them what the NTE means and how to implement it or how to use it.

[00:09:03] We have how to assign work orders to vendors. We have a day in the life of an MC. That's another module that is one of the most important ones. It is rather short, but it is super important because it talks a lot about time management, how to schedule your day and how to be very efficient with your day, because this is one of the biggest problems we see when we hire new MCs or maintenance coordinators is that they start by reading their emails, for example.

[00:09:32] Classic mistake. No, you should never start with reading your emails. You should start with the open emergencies, then the new work orders, and then you go through all of those, and then you can go to your emails, right? So it's it's one of these small details that make a world of difference.

[00:09:49] Okay. We also talk about the snowball effect. That is, for example, when you're a little bit slow and you get complaints, now those emails and those phone calls come in, right? So that means that now you have to spend a lot of time because when emails or complaints come in, you have to always go and dig a little bit, search a little bit further.

[00:10:10] And that takes a lot of time. All that time that you're then spending on that. Now you're delaying all of the other work. So that's what we call the snowball effect. Another module, for example is communication. What you say and how you say it matters. We have leveraging chat GPT to write perfect emails to give great responses, troubleshooting, big one for chat GPT.

[00:10:32] And then we discuss occupied service requests. And then the most important module is all of the flow charts. So the service request flow chart. So we have a full flow chart for every single type of work order. So emergency, normal, recurring vendor, owner, home warranty, or warranty job.

[00:10:49] Jason: Got it. Okay. So Diego, how involved were you with all this stuff?

[00:10:54] Diego: Pretty involved when it came to creating the systems. Yeah, I'm sorry that I'm not talking so much today. I'm feeling a bit under the weather and and that's why I asked.

[00:11:04] Jason: I just figured you're probably the brainchild behind most of the processes and systems. Yeah, we better make sure that you get some credit here.

[00:11:13] Diego: So, yeah, thank you. Yeah. No I'm sorry you guys. I do feel a bit under the weather, but I didn't want to miss this podcast. One of the things that I wanted to add with the maintenance scores and the manager scores. Is what we've seen is with new property management companies that we're working with a lot of times just looking at the KPIs, and looking at how many work orders you have open and how many you have closed and so on, which the course talks about, what happens a lot of times is that no one's really following those numbers. And as a manager, one of the reasons why we recommend the manager course, especially if you're looking to become a manager and how to manage your team members.

[00:11:58] Is taking a look at those numbers and making sure that things don't fall through the cracks. You would be surprised by how easy it is. I've seen it countless times with multiple companies where work orders just get left behind. They were opened. Somebody sent a couple of messages, trying to gather more information, but no one actually followed through with those particular work orders with these type of courses and having those flows the SOPs, it allows you to truly follow up on all of your open work orders, making sure that they're closed out correctly and that nothing else is pending. When a maintenance coordinator, or even a property manager, when you get overwhelmed, especially during high season, it's very easy to let things fall through the cracks.

[00:12:46] So the course does go through that in detail. Tom touched a very important subject about every different flow. Sometimes we tend to want to handle every work order the same way. When they're very different. So, for example, you cannot handle an emergency the same way that you would handle a recurring type of service request.

[00:13:08] And so it does go into detail of yeah, pretty much every flow, how it's broken down and why it's so important to take specific actions depending on the type of service request that it may be.

[00:13:20] Jason: Got it. So you guys probably have certain systems that you use internally with your team. So, property managers, they all have different tools, different software different property management, back office accounting.

[00:13:33] So is this system specific or are they able to use whatever system they have and apply these principles? How does this work? Is that an issue?

[00:13:43] Tom: Yeah, so there's a difference between systems, processes and SOPs, right? So the system is a culmination of all the processes with human intervention and technology, processes is what needs to happen. The SOP is how it needs to happen. It's by the company. So we recommend that every company writes their own SOPs. Now, of course, our courses do guide you on that, but everybody works differently, have different software, all of that. What we will be expanding on is tutorials for the different PropTech software. So Buildium, Meld yeah, whatever. And we also have a community available along with the course. So there's a chat where we discuss the course, but also a price estimating chat, troubleshooting chat, and, I'm sure we'll come up with other chats that we can leverage the community for.

[00:14:30] Jason: Very cool. So it sounds great. I'll be interested to learn more about it. Maybe see it myself. I think this would be great. I think there's definitely clients that we could send your way that could use some support on the maintenance stuff. So how do people get started with this and what would be the next steps for those listening?

[00:14:48] They're like, "Hey, I think I might be interested in this. How do I get more info?"

[00:14:52] Tom: Yes. So you can go to cavalry.works. That's our main website, or you can go to courses.cavalry.Works. That's the landing page for both courses. And we have a special promo for the DoorGrow community. We're actually giving a 50 percent discount for all DoorGrow members.

[00:15:10] It's a way to thank you for inviting us into your community.

[00:15:14] Jason: Okay. Very cool. So DoorGrow people like here you go. So, all right. Very awesome. We appreciate that. That's really cool. The discount code is DoorGrow. It's a difficult one to remember, but I know everyone will be able to do it.

[00:15:26] All right. The discount code is DoorGrow. All right. DoorGrow is the word. All right. Very cool. So, Diego, Tom, I appreciate you coming on the DoorGrow show. Thank you for sharing discount with DoorGrow people. And I love seeing what you guys are doing to recap for those that didn't see the previous episode that I had them on, they do free maintenance coordination.

[00:15:47] Do you want to just plug what you do real quick for those that maybe haven't heard the previous episode?

[00:15:51] Tom: Yeah. So honestly, I should have started with this because the reason why we're even qualified to teaching this is because we do this for a living. So we offer free maintenance teams to any property management company at no cost to you, the way that works is we get paid through a vendor volume discounts on the backend. But if you want more information about that, you can go to cavalry.works.

[00:16:14] Jason: Sounds really awesome. So, all right. Thank you, Diego. Thank you, Tom. Diego. Hope you feel better. I'll let both of you go.

[00:16:20] Appreciate you coming on the DoorGrow show. Thank you so much.

[00:16:23] Diego: Thank you, Jason. Thank you so much.

[00:16:25] Jason: All right. Bye bye. Bye bye. Okay. So if you are a property management entrepreneur, you are wanting to get maintenance, check them out. You're dealing with maintenance. It's one of the most difficult and earliest problems that you need to deal with as a property manager.

[00:16:39] You've got to figure out maintenance, got to figure out leasing. These are some of the basics. If you're struggling though, to add doors, you're like, "I just, I need more doors. I need to get more business. I need more leads. Or I need better processes throughout my business. I need to get like my systems going. I need a better team." Then these are the things that DoorGrow can help you with. So if you're struggling and you're not scaling your business, you're not adding minimum, at least a hundred doors annually, maybe two, maybe even 300. We have clients doing that and we want to help you do that. If you are not getting at least 50 percent profit margin in your business, we can help you get there and help you like implement some of the biggest profit levers that you'll ever implement in your business. So if you are struggling and you've got a handful of doors or you've got hundreds of doors, but you're not making enough money because your profit margin is low. Why are you even doing this crazy business? So let's get you some money.

[00:17:35] Let's get you paid. Let's make sure that this is worth it for you. We've got clients that are able to close more deals more easily at a higher price point because we're optimizing all the different leaks that exist in their sales pipeline. So reach out to us at DoorGrow. We can get you to the next level and we can do it fairly quickly.

[00:17:52] So check us out at doorgrow.Com. Hopefully we're working together soon. Bye everyone.

[00:17:57] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:18:24] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

View Details

We get the question all the time, “What does DoorGrow even do?”

In this short and sweet episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management entrepreneurs Jason and Sarah Hull share what they do, why they do it, and how to get in touch.

You’ll Learn [03:09] Most property managers suck

[05:03] Don’t kill your momentum!

[08:35] We can make the industry better together

[10:43] You might be the problem in your business

Tweetables “We want to make sure you have a business that you enjoy doing stuff in.”

“If you are not adding at least minimum a hundred doors a year, your business is broken.”

“If you're doing what everybody else does, you're probably getting the same shitty results that everybody else is getting in this industry.”

“The bar is so low in property management that, the phrase ‘a rising tide raises all ships,’ I think a rising tide would just drown several ships.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: If you're doing what everybody else does, you're probably getting the same shitty results that everybody else is getting in this industry.

[00:00:07] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow hacker... or property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income... and to becoming a better investor yourself and getting rental properties. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win.

[00:01:02] We're your hosts, property management growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:10] All right. So we're going to make this a short episode today because I just didn't want to do it. I didn't want to do it. Like, honestly, like there's some days that I'm just like, "I don't want to do the podcast. Like, can we just get on with doing the stuff that I Like we need to get done in the business, right?"

[00:01:26] Sarah: Let's be realistic. There are some days that we don't feel like doing anything. That's normal.

[00:01:31] Jason: Right? That's business, right? I'm sure a lot of you wake up sometimes and you're like, "I do not want to do this today."

[00:01:37] Yeah, so we want to make sure you have a business that you enjoy doing stuff in. So we'll have a quick conversation. So what we were going to talk about is what?

[00:01:45] Sarah: Oh, why do you do this to me?

[00:01:46] Jason: Okay, what we were going to talk about, we're going to talk about just real quick. Let's answer the question.

[00:01:52] What does DoorGrow do? So we get this question all the time. Cause they're like "DoorGrow? You help grow and we grow doors? And like, what does that mean? How do you do that? Do you guys get us leads? Are you an advertising company? Like, what do you do? So what we do, the shortest answer I could give you is we help companies grow rapidly while eliminating their marketing or advertising expense and budget.

[00:02:15] And I know that sounds crazy. So we're helping you not have to waste time doing cold lead marketing or advertising. You might think SEO or pay per click on Google or content marketing or social media marketing or whatever is the secret to getting all the business and growing your business and getting your hopes and dreams to come true.

[00:02:35] And a lot of you have been spending a lot of money doing that, and it's not really working super well. And so what we do is we help you figure out how to grow effectively. We also help optimize businesses for growth. So a lot of times you're trying to grow, you're trying to do a bunch of stuff to get leads and to get doors and to get business, but you have all these blind spots that are eating up and causing you to lose and miss out on deals that you can't see.

[00:03:01] It might be that you have your branding is off. Your reputation stuff is off. Your sales pitch is off. Your pricing stuff is off. If you're doing what everybody else does, you're probably getting the same shitty results that everybody else is getting in this industry. And most property management companies suck.

[00:03:17] Most of you listening know this is true. You look at your business and you think, "we're pretty good, but all the other companies suck." And most property managers I talk to that are starting a property management business. They, I say, "why are you starting a business?" And they say, "I'm an investor, and I've tried to use other companies in my market, but they all suck." The bar is pretty low. The bar is so low in property management that, the phrase "a rising tide raises all ships," I think a rising tide would just drown several ships. Like I think they would just sink because they're just sitting on bedrock.

[00:03:48] There's a lot of bad companies. And there's a lot of miserable property management business owners. This is not an easy business or industry. I know this is true. I've talked to thousands of property managers. I talked to property managers every week that are miserable every week on sales calls. They like get on a call with me and they're like, "I am not enjoying my business. I am struggling. I'm frustrated," and it's because they are trying to wear all the hats or they have team members that are not really making them feel safe, not really taking everything off their plate in particular roles. And so they still have to be involved and wear hats they don't enjoy it. They don't want to keep doing so. We help you get your team in alignment. We help you get your ops in alignment. We help you get your profit margin healthy. We are helping our clients crush it. And if you are not adding at least minimum a hundred doors a year, your business is broken. You do not have effective growth. That is not difficult to do. We've got clients adding a hundred to 200 to 300. And if any of my clients are listening, if you are not adding at least 100 doors a year, you're not listening and doing what we tell you to do. So we've got clients that are crushing it. The other thing that we do is on the operational side.

[00:05:03] Like, if you keep stopping your growth and adding doors because you're like "we've got a whole bunch of business coming on. And now I got to focus on operations." You have to stop pausing. And so you have to stop stopping growth in your business. I see this all the time, even with some of our clients, they start growing really rapidly.

[00:05:19] And they're like, "Oh my gosh, I got to like, stop growing. It's too much. I'm adding too many doors. It's getting painful. It's getting uncomfortable." If you stop, here's the challenge, what I've seen. What I've seen is that if you stop growing right now, you then cannot get things going for at least a quarter or two.

[00:05:36] And then like a sales slump takes about a quarter to get out of. So you lose almost a year of momentum and growth just by stopping growth to focus on ops or to focus on fulfillment or focus on onboarding all these new clients, right? So you have to stop stopping because if you do this, you start growing, it gets uncomfortable and then you stop.

[00:05:57] And then it's months to a year of growth, and then you start trying to build it up and get growth going again, and then you stop again, I see companies that do this, and what happens is your churn rate starts to match your growth rate, and so you end up with a business where you've been stuck at 50 or 60 units for like 3 years, or you've been stuck in the 2 to 400 unit range for like 3 years or more, and you can't figure out how to grow or get ahead.

[00:06:24] And if you aren't stopping and you're still stuck at these stages, then your business has some serious leaks in it. And these are so solvable, like on the other side of this, it's so solvable. You could have such a better life. You could have more time with your family and kids. You could feel like you're actually making progress and not burning yourself out.

[00:06:46] You could be getting out of the stuff that's burning you out and you could start to like have a real impact. You can have the day to day that you want to have. This is all doable. You can be miserable in a business with a thousand doors. You can be miserable in a business with 50 doors or 10.

[00:07:05] Sarah: I'm totally overwhelmed. I'm like, "Oh..."

[00:07:07] Jason: or you could like be having like space and time and taking care of yourself at any stage or level at 50 units or at a thousand plus units. And we need to shift your mindset and build the right business around you. So if you're dealing with some of these challenges, you've been stuck in struggling for a long time, you need to stop doing what I've done in the past and being stubborn and thinking you can solve it all on your own.

[00:07:33] If you just watch enough YouTube videos or read enough books or go to enough NARPM conferences, and you think you'll just figure it out when all you end up doing is heaping more ideas that are just wasting time. And distracting you from what you actually need to do, which you can't usually even see.

[00:07:51] You need some outside perspective because you're too close to the fire and you just keep burning yourself. All right. That's my soapbox.

[00:07:59] Sarah: There. Yeah. Tell us how you really feel today, would you? Don't hold back!

[00:08:03] Jason: Don't be stupid. Get help.

[00:08:05] Sarah: I was talking to you.

[00:08:06] Jason: People! Okay. All right. Yeah. And I've talked to so many property management business owners over the last decade, even the last week.

[00:08:14] And I get really excited when I talk to people with problems because I know how easy it is for us to help them solve these problems. And if everybody knew how easy it would be for us to help them make progress and get their business moving forward, every property manager be signing up for a mastermind.

[00:08:31] Everyone would because I bet a lot of you are frustrated and not happy there shouldn't be as many crappy property management businesses in this industry as there are. There just shouldn't. There's no need for that. We need to make the industry better. If we make it better, it gets better for everyone.

[00:08:49] If your neighboring property managers all start doing a great job, your business and you start doing a great job, you will get more business. There's only 30 percent market share roughly. There's tons of available potential market share. There's no scarcity. There's no like, "Oh man, like there's nobody I could get as clients."

[00:09:07] There's none of that. There's tons of available business, but the bar is so low and property management has such a bad reputation because there's so many crappy companies because they're doing stupid stuff that is not helping them grow, have revenue, have profit margin, and they're making lots of mistakes.

[00:09:24] And because everybody else is doing that, it's like normal. So it's not hard to be exceptional in this industry just by doing a decent job. It's super not hard to be exceptional. Like there are so many companies don't even answer their phones. There's so many companies that don't even communicate with their owners ever.

[00:09:45] There's so many companies that like don't even do inspections. There's so many companies that have their trust accounts, like absolutely mismanaged, right? That it's so simple and easy. You just need to be accurate and available and you would surpass 90 percent of the property management companies out there.

[00:10:02] And then if you're one of our clients, we go way beyond that. We then start to make you a really great legitimate business that would be a great business in any industry, right? But in property management, the bar is really low. So if you want to be exceptional and start stealing all the market share and getting lots of business, that's not hard to do because the bar is so low in almost every single market.

[00:10:23] It's not difficult to be exceptional. So that's my message for today.

[00:10:27] Sarah: So give us a call. If you aren't happy in your property management business, if you feel like you can be doing less of the day to day, if you feel like you're overwhelmed and you're stressed, and maybe you're just not really in love with this business, we can help.

[00:10:42] Jason: Yeah. If you're not growing fast enough, there's something wrong in the business and the problem is probably business owner. It's probably you. And that's the thing. Like, we have to take extreme ownership as business owners. We have to recognize that. "Oh, the business is a problem." If you're blaming your team, you pick that team, right?

[00:11:01] If you're blaming your systems, the problem is you pick those systems. If you're blaming the market, then you're just making excuses because I'm sure somebody else could crush it in your market. We've heard all of the excuses. The only real honest thing that you can do is take ownership. Extreme ownership,

[00:11:18] it's a great book, read extreme ownership. The problem is you. And if you own that problem, then you can actually change it and solve it. And we're here to help you do that. And we will help you see that this is all fixable stuff. All right, I think that's our episode for today.

[00:11:33] Sarah: All right.

[00:11:34] Jason: Anything you want to add?

[00:11:35] Sarah: Nope.

[00:11:36] Jason: Okay, then reach out to us at doorgrow. Check us out at doorgrow. com. Get on a call with me. I want to talk to you. Like if you're struggling, I will show you how we can help you solve this. And if we can't, then we won't take you on as a client. If you're not coachable, then we won't take you on as a client.

[00:11:50] Like, but if I can help you, I want to help you. This is what we do every day. I love helping people grow their business and helping change their life. I want you to have a better life. I want you to have more time with your family. I want you to have more money in your bank account. I want you to have the freedom to take vacations and to do things that really matter.

[00:12:09] Life is too short to be in constant suffering and pain and to live for a business that takes ownership of your life. And now you're like a slave to it, right? The business should be serving you. So let's get the business serving you instead of you feeling like you're waking up every day, serving your business.

[00:12:27] All right. Until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:12:31] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:12:58] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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DoorGrow Live 2024 is upon us! If you have been in the property management space for a little while now, you’re probably familiar with DoorGrow Live.

In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah explain how this year’s is expanding upon previous DoorGrow Live events. This year’s theme focuses on creating opportunity in times of uncertainty. Be there May 17-18 in Round Rock, TX.

You’ll Learn [01:20] DoorGrow Live, the property management event you don’t want to miss

[03:58] 2024: Creating Opportunity Through Uncertainty

[05:48] Using these hectic times to your advantage

[07:07] First glance at DoorGrow Live topics

[08:32] Networking with growth-minded people

Tweetables “The market is very uncertain right now, but that is such a great opportunity to do something with it.”

“It's not hard to step up and showcase leadership and become a leader in times of crisis.”

“There's all sorts of craziness that's going to be happening, and this is a big opportunity for you to get more market share to get more investments.”

“This is how some of the largest companies were built were during like recessions or depressions or time periods where they decided to double down and to focus on growth instead of scale back and be a fearful like everybody else. This is when winners are made.”

Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind

DoorGrow Academy

DoorGrow on YouTube

DoorGrowClub

DoorGrowLive

TalkRoute Referral Link

Transcript [00:00:00] Jason: This is when winners are made. And so we want our clients and those that are close to us and attending DoorGrow Live to be those that capitalize and succeed in this industry.

[00:00:11] Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the DoorGrow show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently then you are a DoorGrow property manager.

[00:00:29] DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.

[00:00:49] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We're your hosts, property management, growth experts, Jason and Sarah Hull the founder and CEO of DoorGrow and the operator COO of DoorGrow.

[00:01:13] And now let's get into the show.

[00:01:16] All right, we'll get that figured out eventually.

[00:01:18] I always love it.

[00:01:19] Okay. So what we're going to be talking about today is what, Sarah?

[00:01:24] Sarah: DoorGrow Live

[00:01:25] Jason: DoorGrow live. DoorGrow Live! Yeah, so DoorGrow Live is our premier conference that we do once a year and it's pretty great.

[00:01:35] So what do we want to say about it?

[00:01:37] Sarah: All right. So let's get them some of the information first. You can get all of this information at DoorGrowlive.Com. So that's the first thing is Just go to doorgrowlive.Com. Everything is on there except for our agenda, which we have not yet released.

[00:01:53] We've got so much good stuff planned for you guys, but we're keeping the agenda a little close right now. So the dates for the event. It's a Friday and Saturday. It's May 17th and 18th, and it's in North Austin, Texas. The city is actually Round Rock, but no one knows where that is, so North Austin, Texas.

[00:02:13] Okay, and where are we holding it this year?

[00:02:17] Jason: It's going to be at the Kalahari Resort in Round Rock, Texas So this is a really cool resort. it's really large and it's brand new. It's just built in the last several years.

[00:02:28] Sarah: 2020? Bad launch date.

[00:02:30] Jason: Yeah, they launched it not knowing there was going to be a pandemic.

[00:02:33] Sarah: Yeah, I think they opened and then the whole world shut down.

[00:02:36] Jason: Yeah. And they have I believe the United States' largest indoor water park. It has this big indoor water park. Which could be fun. Yeah. If you're into that, or you can bring the kiddos maybe with you, but and it has several good restaurants and it's right in the heart of Round Rock.

[00:02:51] Round Rock is just such a cute, cool town. The downtown area is really cool. There's all sorts of, great little restaurants and, bars and whatever you're into. So it's a fun little area and you're just hop, skip, and jump to get to downtown Austin. It's, Flying into Austin, one of the easiest, best airports.

[00:03:09] I love being close to be able to get places through that airport.

[00:03:13] Sarah: Yeah. And they have a lot of flights. Yeah. They really do. They have flights from everywhere. So it's very central. It's easy to get on into. And the airport is really great.

[00:03:22] Jason: And then it's a quick drive over to the Kalahari resort where you can book your room and stay. And we've got a special group rate for you there so.

[00:03:30] Sarah: We do.

[00:03:31] Jason: We negotiated, so.

[00:03:33] Sarah: We do. Jason's assistant Mar, she always negotiates really great deals for you guys. If you want to just go ahead and book, you can, but if you'd rather get the discounted room rate, go to doorgrowlive.Com and then click on the link to register.

[00:03:48] And that will help you get registered for the event and it will help you book your room at the discounted room rate. So that way you can get... I like saving money. I like it. It's great for me.

[00:03:59] Jason: All right. So what else do we want to tell them about DoorGrow Live?

[00:04:02] Sarah: Oh, okay. So this year's theme is going to be Creating Opportunity Through Uncertainty.

[00:04:09] It's a weird year. So I really don't know what's happening with the market. There's a lot of talk. Is it going up? Is it going down? Are interest rates going to change? What's happening with property management? Right now it's a little bit harder to rent things out, whereas before, you could find a tenant in about a week or two.

[00:04:26] And now that has changed and slowed down. And I'm hearing from some people that they're worried about their competitors or new companies are popping up that want to leverage AI and All kinds of technology and not have a lot of humans involved and, all the good stuff. So it's just a weird year and the market is very uncertain right now, but that is such a great opportunity to do something with it.

[00:04:52] So we want to talk with you guys about how you can actually grow your company right now. This is not going to be well, "Hey, this might be relevant in three years if the market does this," this is relevant right now. So we're going to talk about actual strategies that you can implement today.... the day after the conference... if you attend.

[00:05:09] And that you can just immediately implement them and start growing because we have some really amazing things planned for this conference.

[00:05:18] Jason: One of the things that I've noticed over the last several events that we've done and our plans for this one, just to give you a little bit of a teaser is we have a focus on those that want to be involved as investors.

[00:05:32] And most property managers are investors and they're serving investors. And so some of the people are bringing in some of the conversations we're going to be having are how did structure, creative deals especially in this environment where we've got high interest rates and things are a little crazy.

[00:05:48] And what Sarah said is true. 2024 is an election year, right? Every time there's an election cycle, the most powerful people and decision makers that control our lives to some degree start making things crazy. And there's opposing sides and it gets wild. So there's a lot of uncertainty that happens every election cycle.

[00:06:06] Look at 2020, look at four years before that, look at 2024. There's all sorts of craziness that's going to be happening, and this is a big opportunity for you to get more market share to get more investments. There's going to be a big opportunity, I think, for you to establish yourself as a leader in the marketplace, and it's not hard to step up and showcase leadership and become a leader in times of crisis, like during the pandemic. And there's people that failed during that. And there's people that succeeded during that and made a lot of money. And we want to make sure you're prepared because there's patterns to this.

[00:06:42] This is how some of the largest companies were built were during like recessions or depressions or time periods where they decided to double down and to focus on growth instead of scale back and be a fearful like everybody else. This is when winners are made. And so we want our clients and those that are close to us and attending, DoorGrow Live to be those that capitalize and succeed in this industry.

[00:07:07] Sarah: So I'm not saying that this is definitely going to happen. I'm just saying that there's a pretty good chance that we might be talking about things like some creative ways to structure deals. Maybe some seller finance stuff, maybe some subject 2, maybe looking at your portfolio to see if any of your investors start to panic sell.

[00:07:32] If you can capitalize on those opportunities, we might be looking at your profitability. We might be talking about some different business models and growth engines. There's just a chance that those are some of the things that we might talk about, being that we're not releasing the full agenda yet

[00:07:50] Jason: Okay, so yeah, there's gonna be some cool stuff Some of the things we might be talking about is a lot of people have been really curious about how we've been Able to make millions and millions of dollars leveraging Social media, and it's not something I usually want to share because I feel like it's a distraction in a lot of instances, but there are some ways to do this.

[00:08:12] That can make you money as a property manager. And so there might be some conversation around some of that and how to leverage AI and some of the tools we use a DoorGrow to collapse time and cost on getting out to all the social media platforms. And so Yeah, there's several other things that we can tease, but it's going to be a really great event.

[00:08:32] I think the best part about DoorGrow events that's really different from every other property management conference that I've been around or attended is the type of people that are there. They're just, they're a different crowd. The DoorGrow crowd is a different crowd. These are growth minded people.

[00:08:47] These are contribution focused people. These are people that want to make a difference. These are people that are experiencing a different level of mindset, a different level of freedom and fulfillment in their business. These are property managers that actually enjoy what they get to do. This is what we do with clients.

[00:09:02] We get them to the point where they're enjoying their day to day. And we've gotten all of the uncomfortable stuff onto other people's shoulders on their teams. And so we're really good at helping our clients get out of the cycle of suck, getting out of the day to day suck of stress and overwhelm. This is not a conference where everybody shows up and they just want to go hang out at the bar and pretend it's a vacation and get wasted.

[00:09:25] Right. And if that's you, sorry, if I offended you, go do that. That's if that's what you need.

[00:09:30] Sarah: Do that after the event.

[00:09:31] Jason: Yeah, sure.

[00:09:32] Sarah: Go drink in the water park.

[00:09:33] Jason: Go do that. You can't.

[00:09:35] Sarah: I think there's a bar in there.

[00:09:36] Jason: I don't know. Maybe. But our clients are there to connect. They're there to get to the next level.

[00:09:41] They have a growth mindset. And they're there to network. And so the connections made at these events are some of the biggest game changers. People are making friends. And if you want to be part of a community, if you want to come just taste some of the DoorGrow magic in person and see what's DoorGrow about? How is this different?

[00:10:00] Why aren't they going to all of these other conferences and doing what everybody else is doing? How are they unique? Come experience it, come see it, and we'll share some things with you. And you'll get to talk to people that are having phenomenal growth. People that are like startups that are adding a hundred doors in like six months, like people that are adding two, 300 doors a year without spending any money on advertising, like this is real stuff that our clients are doing.

[00:10:24] And you can come rub shoulders with some amazing people. I think that's the thing about DoorGrow is we, I think are attracting the cream of the crop, the best people in the industry, people with the strongest and healthiest mindset, people that are attracted to growth minded people. If you want to be around growth minded people in this industry that are doing innovative and new things like this is the place to be is DoorGrow Live.

[00:10:47] So go to doorgrowlive.Com right now, get your tickets. We do have limited availability. This is not a massive event yet. And we have, we sold out. We've sold out at these events. If you want to get your spot, I recommend get in now because we know what you're going to do.

[00:11:05] Sarah: What happens at every event is we always have more people and then they're like, "can we just grab a chair and maybe put it in the back? Like I'll stand in the back. I don't care." And that has happened at the last three of our events where we've had more people try to show up.

[00:11:20] Jason: And then you stress out my assistant Mar and

[00:11:24] Sarah: I'm like just grab them a chair take a chair from the lobby I don't care make it happen

[00:11:28] So let's make sure that you have a place at a seat at the table.

[00:11:32] Let's do that.

[00:11:33] Jason: Yeah get make sure that you get your tickets early get your tickets soon.

[00:11:38] Sarah: There's early bird tickets on sale right now.

[00:11:40] Jason: Oh, Yeah, so at the time of this recording there are early bird tickets for sale So if you're watching this live right now, or you see this soon There are early bird tickets and the tickets we're not trying to make this some crazy profit center The tickets early bird tickets are what 197?

[00:11:57] They're 197

[00:11:59] Sarah: 197!

[00:12:00] Jason: And what does the room cost?

[00:12:02] Sarah: It's probably somewhere around two to three hundred.

[00:12:04] Jason: We're not trying to make this some big expensive thing.

[00:12:06] We probably make $0 off the whole event.

[00:12:10] Sarah: Oh yeah.

[00:12:10] Jason: It costs us a lot of money to put these events on, but for us, it creates community...

[00:12:14] Sarah: It's an investment that we're willing to make so that we can do cool things in the industry and for our clients and for those who are just interested in being better and leveling up their business and their life.

[00:12:28] Jason: Okay, cool.

[00:12:28] Sarah: So go to DoorGrow Live, grab your early bird tickets. You can do it after the early bird sale too or wait longer, which I'm cool with. Do it now. If you want the sale do it now. And. You'll get there's a whole section on there with frequently asked questions, all of the information that you need is on there, but if you've got any additional questions, just ping us, reach out to us, you can really reach us just about anywhere and our team will be able to help you and answer your questions.

[00:12:55] And then I will also say we still have a few spots. I don't know, exactly how many right now I'll confirm for sure for VIP I want to say there's at least four left right now, and that is tentative, but at three or four, maybe spots left at this point for the VIP. So if you're interested in upgrading to VIP, again, you can do this at doorgrowlive.Com. There's a button that says upgrade to VIP. And if you upgraded VIP then on I think day two, you'll go to lunch. We'll do a little VIP lunch. You'll be able to have lunch with all of the speakers at the event.

[00:13:34] Jason: And us.

[00:13:34] Sarah: And yes, and me and Jason our team is going to be there and you'll get priority seating at the event.

[00:13:41] Jason: Cool. Yay. All right. Okay. That's it. Go to doorgrowlive.Com and until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.

[00:13:49] you just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!

[00:14:16] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

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As a property manager, you know how stressful the industry can be. It’s often a difficult and thankless job. On this podcast, we like to share ways for property management entrepreneurs to take care of their physical and mental well-being, but the importance of sleep is often overlooked…

In today’s episode, property management growth expert, Jason Hull sits down with Bijoy John A.K.A. Dr. SleepFix to talk about how to achieve high-quality sleep to reduce stress and improve overall health.

You’ll Learn [01:47] Why sleep matters more than you think

[06:43] Mythbusting sleep hacks

[16:19] How stress and worrying is slowly killing you

[20:52] The 7 proven sleep strategies

[27:51] Daily planning to reduce stress

Tweetables “Sleep is a superpower.”

“I've never seen anybody sleep better by having too much information.”

“Worrying about anything is probably not an effective way to get to sleep.”

“You cannot data mine yourself to sleep.”

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Transcript [00:00:00] Bijoy John: People say "I can sleep when I die." But I tell people, "if you're going to go on this path, you're going to die."

[00:00:07] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow property managers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow property manager. DoorGrow property managers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings.

[00:00:34] Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.

[00:01:11] And I have a special guest today. This is Bijoy John. Welcome to the show, man.

[00:01:17] Bijoy John: Hey Jason, how are you? Thanks, man.

[00:01:18] Jason: I'm great. So we met at a mastermind because we both invest in ourselves and work on growth and he builds himself out as Dr. SleepFix I saw on Instagram. And so we've got Dr. SleepFix in the house with us today. So we're going to chat about sleep and I'm excited to get into this.

[00:01:38] Because you know, we geeked out talking during the mastermind about sleep a bit, but this is something I've put some attention on because it has a serious impact on us. And why don't you give us a little about your background? And tell us a little bit about how you got into focusing on sleep.

[00:01:55] Bijoy John: Thank you, Jason. Thanks for having me. So sleep is a superpower. We don't take it seriously because it doesn't hurt like a toothache or grow like cancer, so we put it off, but with years, it just catches up with you, right? So my background is in pulmonary critical care. I've been practicing sleep medicine for over 25 years, there are patients who have pulmonary problems and lung problems takes precedence.

[00:02:16] To see me was like six months wait to see me in clinic. So finally I decided, as time goes, you change your perspective and, I thought we'll do something preventative for people. So I saw many problems, like blood pressure, diabetes, memory problems, people are in a fog, which can all be prevented by sleeping better.

[00:02:37] So I left my the whole shebang of the ICU, the big flying critical care doctor and started my own clinic three years ago called Sleep Wellness Clinics and then I wrote a book and then I started by a company called SleepFix Academy to reach the masses. So sleep is the superpower. We pay a lot of attention on diet and fitness, but sleep is the foundation on which the other two are built.

[00:03:01] So I just want everybody to find it within themselves and discover the superpower and be the best version of ourselves. That's my goal.

[00:03:08] Jason: Got it. That must have been frustrating to see all these problems in the medical industry that could have just been prevented by sleeping better.

[00:03:17] It seems like such a silly, simple thing that we don't even pay attention to sometimes. Like we just take it for granted. We're like, "yeah, I sleep every day. No big deal." But the difference in quality of sleep can be pretty dramatic.

[00:03:29] Bijoy John: Especially when we talk about mental health, sleep and anxiety and depression have a bidirectional relationship when you don't sleep while you're in a fog, and then you feel anxious, and then you feel depressed. Then when you're more anxious, you don't sleep. And then it's just a vicious cycle. So a lot of people can feel better by just focusing on their sleep. You feel more vitalized and energy. You know how it is when you wake up after a good night's sleep. You're ready to conquer.

[00:03:56] I had my own struggles. I was terrible sleeper in medical school. And then as a father raising children and then my career. And then of course when I lost my mom and then when I started my business, but I have found a way. I found the joy in the power of sleep.

[00:04:12] So I just want this foundation to be built and I want to share this information to as many people as I can.

[00:04:18] Jason: Got it. So you mentioned mental health. What are some of the problems that people might be having that could be prevented by better sleep? Because a lot of people are thinking, "I sleep all right. And it's probably not that big a deal," but then they're dealing with all these health issues and these challenges. And they're like, "yeah. Sleep probably isn't even related to this.:

[00:04:36] Bijoy John: Like I mentioned, we don't have, like a pain, if you have a pain, we're going to take care of it. So what happens is if you wake up in the morning after like seven or eight hours of sleep, if you feel good that day, then mostly you're doing all right. But if you're still feeling tired. then you have a sleep problem. And of course, if you snore, then for sure you have a sleep problem. So this is my simple question I ask people, "are you tired? Or do you snore?" So once I have that answer, then we can go into the depths of what might be causing the problem.

[00:05:10] Jason: Got it. Okay. So snoring is basically choking, right? While they're trying to sleep.

[00:05:15] Bijoy John: Snoring... it's like water going through a pipe. And if I'm going to narrow the pipe.

[00:05:19] The water creates turbulence. Same thing with snoring is air going through an obstructed pathway. So your back of your throat when the tongue falls down is narrowed and then air is not able to get in. And the reverberation and the vibrations that happens around it is the cause for the snoring. Of course, men snore more because the larynx or the voice box it's like a trumpet. So your sound is amplified in women is smaller and it's the, so women don't report that much snoring. So we have to pay particular attention for snoring in people.

[00:05:52] Jason: Got it. Okay. So what are some of the simple hacks that people can do to quickly improve their sleep? And how do they know when it's time to reach out to Dr. SleepFix?

[00:06:07] Bijoy John: So the two complaints that is "I don't sleep enough" or "I sleep too much." So these are the two common complaints in the world of sleep. So if you do not sleep enough, that's the condition called insomnia, right? So that's a time to reach out. People get all the information from the internet most of it is not right and then they try to do half of it and then they get stuck right and then also like I mentioned snoring is a main issue you have a very serious condition called obstructive sleep apnea if you're snoring.

[00:06:39] So what are the hacks? You want me to get right into it, Jason?

[00:06:43] Jason: Yeah. How about I share some hacks I've learned and you tell me if they're valid

[00:06:47] Bijoy John: Correct.

[00:06:47] Jason: Yes. Perfect, man.

[00:06:48] Yes. Because I've geeked out on some of this stuff.

[00:06:50] One of the things, I wear orange glasses at night to block blue light.

[00:06:55] Bijoy John: You wore it during the meeting.

[00:06:57] Jason: Yeah, my eyes were getting tired, so I put them on during the meeting. Yeah, you remember. I wear them at night or in the evenings after sundown so that I'm not being exposed to artificial light, which has blue light in it. Which I've heard disrupts sleep patterns and causes your circadian rhythm to get off track and causes you to have poor sleep.

[00:07:17] So what I find is when I wear the orange glasses, usually within maybe about three or four hours, I start to naturally feel sleepy if I wear them. So if I put them on during the day, I have to be careful because if I forget and I have them on for like three or four hours, I'm like, man, I'm starting to feel tired.

[00:07:33] Right, which is, I think melatonin starting to get produced naturally, which is like the brain starting to clean itself naturally, and then body's getting ready for sleep, right? So am I correct on that?

[00:07:46] Bijoy John: Your hack is right. So we are creatures of light. We wake up because of sunlight.

[00:07:51] If you look at small children, they wake up at the crack of dawn. And so in the evening, we don't want that much sunlight or especially at night, I should not in the evening sunlight is actually good for sleeping, but the night. So what are we doing? We are having our phones, especially with COVID people are bringing the work into the bedroom and the light from the electronic devices. Maybe it's the tablet, it's a phone, the computer. Especially in the bedroom where there's no ambient light. It's just, it sends a signal through our eyes into our brain saying, "Hey, it's not time to go to sleep." So that's one major thing, especially in the bedroom. So melatonin, melamine is darkness, right?

[00:08:30] Melatonin is only secreted in darkness. So we have our own tons of melatonin, which does not secrete because the exposure to light. So you're right. That hack is right.

[00:08:40] Jason: Okay, got it. So that, so the other thing that I do is I have my phone's home screen change to... I can change it to red. I set up a hack and you can set this on your phone where like if I click on it three times, one, two, three, it changes the red. So if I'm in the dark, because sometimes before bed, I'm looking at my phone in the dark or something before I fall asleep, but it's then not affecting my sleep. I also have lights in my room at night, like when I'm going to go to sleep where it's just red. So I can just make it red. So then if I put on the orange glasses or take it off, everything looks exactly the same. So then I don't need to wear the glasses as I'm going to bed. Because it's hard to fall asleep with glasses on your face. I don't want to do that.

[00:09:25] Bijoy John: Yeah. So the bedroom has to be dark.

[00:09:27] So that's an, again, an indication for our body. "Hey, the body is taking the cues from the external environment and from within." See that the pressure to sleep is building throughout the body, but it is counteracted by. But the external influences, the sun, the noise so that's what, sometimes around 1:30-2:00, we feel that lull because your inner body is in a natural lull because of the, the sun goes down a little bit and the noise level is not that much and your body's pressure to sleep is building up.

[00:09:56] So that's why we are tired sometime in the afternoon. So that's a good hack. You're doing great with that with what you're doing there.

[00:10:02] Jason: So as far as the bedroom some of the things that I've also focused on doing is like you mentioned light. Besides light hitting our eyes, let's say our eyes, like we're wearing a sleep mask, we can't see any light, which I have done, like I'll sometimes travel with a sleep mask so I can block out all the light if I'm in a hotel room that it just doesn't have good blackout curtains or whatever. So with our bedrooms Where we're sleeping regularly. I think it's important to kill all the led lights So there's black stickers that you can put over led lights I've used a paint pen to black out some leds on some of the things that are in my room because a lot of these things Like are just and they're always they always make them blue.

[00:10:39] I don't know why but all the leds of all the devices they put in your room. It's like they're trying to give you blue light and hurt your sleep I don't know if there's a conspiracy there. What do you think?

[00:10:49] Bijoy John: No, see Jason, you know why the cops lights are blue There is a reason for it because blue is the first thing that our eyes sees and the lights in the stoplights is red because the red is the farthest you can see. So there is a science behind it. So blue light in the bedroom in the color blue in the bedroom is not good. Yeah. The blue lights is terrible idea to have in your bedroom. So anybody who's listening bedroom blue is not good.

[00:11:15] Jason: Yeah. So related to this orange glass in the evening, the other hack I've heard if you want a lot more energy and you want to get your circadian rhythm in sync is to just get sunlight at the beginning of the day. Is to get a decent amount of sunlight like expose your eyes to the bright blue sky and the sunshine and like be outside for the first maybe 20 30 minutes of the day if at all possible

[00:11:37] Bijoy John: That's a great hack because you're telling your body, "hey is ready to go." So you're putting all the sun in the morning So see I said we are all creatures of the sunlight without modern invention we just revolve around the sun, right? So that is a great hack. But you have to be careful here. There are some people whose circadian rhythm is completely malaligned, and they should not be having sun in the morning.

[00:12:01] Especially, this is a syndrome I call advanced sleep phase syndrome in people who are 70 or older, who tend to sleep earlier than the, accepted norm. They go to bed around seven, eight, and they wake up at three for those people, you should not expose sunlight in the morning. It's going to have an opposite effect.

[00:12:20] So they have to get much more sunlight in the evening. So I see a lot of people walking in the evening. They feel like they're doing really well because they exercise. It's also not only the exercise that makes them sleep better. It's the sunlight. The evening sunlight is really actually really good for people to go to sleep.

[00:12:35] Jason: Interesting. Evening sunlight. Okay. Yes. And then I guess because the evening sunlight triggers a different response in our brain.

[00:12:43] Bijoy John: Yeah, the radiation is a little different. The wavelengths of the light in the evening is is not only the exercise, it's the rays that helps you to fall asleep. Especially people who are in the 60s, retired, they walk more. Our older adults tend to walk in the evening. That's the time they do. That's actually great for them. So yeah, they actually moving the clock forward. So you have to be careful when you get exposure to light.