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The Real Estate Addicts (REA) podcast is a must-listen for anyone interested in real estate development, investment, construction and entrepreneurship. Each episode dives into a wide range of industry topics and features conversations with savvy, successful entrepreneurs who candidly share their career paths, challenges, breakthroughs, and the stories behind the remarkable companies they’ve built. Expect big personalities, thoughtful insights, and conversations that both educate and inspire.
Co-hosted by Ray Hurteau, Dan Rubin (Instagram: @rhinvestgroup), and Marc Savatsky (Instagram: @choose_boston)
Follow the Real Estate Addicts Podcast on YouTube: @RealEstateAddicts
00:00
Welcome to the real estate addicts podcasts with your hosts. Oh, we didn't do this last up. Dan Rubin, our H investment group. no. Ray Herto, our HIG. Mark Svatsky with choose Boston. Hey guys. Wow. What's happening? I can't believe we missed it on the last episode. Well. Do you think my boot is on camera? everybody. I mean, I think your boot is sexy. I'm going to show my footwear off for a second. Do want to tell everybody what happened? My socks, yeah. In general, what happened is that my ego doesn't match my body's capabilities anymore.
00:31
Uh, AKA I'm old. Um, everyone like asks how I hurt myself and like, it's one of these, like, I wish I had like a sexy story. Um, like I was saving, you know, a child or something. Um, I lifted the car off of him and no, I went for a very long walk on the beach with a weighted vest and I woke up the next morning and it was just like pins and needles. Um, so I went to see an orthopedist and like,
00:58
technical parlance parlay. He said I pissed off like the tendon that stabilizes my foot and it's like just very, don't eat some shit. No little physical therapy and uh, think snowboarding should be okay in the next month. Oh man. Yeah. Bummer. Well, well anyway, was it a good experience though? Did you have a nice long walk on the beach? It was, it was a solid like three to four hour walk barefoot.
01:25
And what did me in was I think the angle and the fact that the sand is soft and that I was barefoot. So aren't you supposed to technically walk like closer to the water? So it's harder, like a harder sand you'd think, but it's also like really steep there. And the foot that got fucked, if you follow me as though downhill both directions off level. Yeah. Uh, so I just like kept getting pounded anyway. But did Jesse get hurt? No, naturally she works out. She wasn't wearing the weighted vest. Yeah.
01:54
This is cool though. This kid, this boot has a pump like Nike Jordans. it's like what back in the day, what was the name of the shoe when we were in? Pumps. Pumps. What was it? Yeah, it was pumps. What was it? Nike? I don't know who made them. I just thought I'd call them pumps. They're like the little basketball. If you squeezed it too much, it exploded and the powder went everywhere and you got, you know, your lungs. Did it really? Are you sure that was shoes? don't know. Could have been. Could have been some Yeah. Like, and then I got white powder all over my nose.
02:24
Welcome back everybody. Welcome back. Let's sit here we go
02:39
think today what we want, let's talk about brokerages. Talk about sales, marketing. Yeah, I think like we... You're both brokers, right? Yes, yeah, I think Mark and I both have our broker's license, but I think Mark, you started your brokerage, how long ago now? Three years. Three years ago, and then I think we started, we started ours or intended to start ours maybe about a year ago. Yeah.
03:06
but you've had much more success, I think, growing your team and brand. And I really kind of give you a lot of credit for kind of branching out. mean, I think as a developer, makes complete sense from a, you know, kind of having that vertically integrated business model, right? And Ray and I talked about this all the time before, you know, during COVID and stuff, it was like, hey, we like, you know, we're doing our own acquisitions.
03:35
We're doing our own general contracting or self-performing. I think at the end of the day, the disposition of an asset is kind of the last piece to the puzzle, right? Sure. When we were doing direct to seller marketing also, we would come across plenty of people that might be interested in selling, but the price they were looking for was the best market price. And as a developer, we have to get a certain number so we can make it work on our end.
04:04
And the thought process was, maybe if we kept doing that, then we could parlay that into sort of a brokerage as well. We'll list it if you don't want to. Sure. I mean, I just had an experience like that. Permitted Deal in Newton approached me. have the same bank we use and this group of sellers was looking to exit the deal and sell the permits. And I said, I don't think I'm your guy. I'm too busy right now.
04:30
This isn't something that I would really take on. It's fairly complicated adaptive reuse, but I know a lot of people who play in this market and would be great buyers and we lined them up a buyer and it was, you know, a $4.5 million sale. So, it's great. That's exactly the kind of thing you're talking about. Yeah. And I think the biggest fear from a developer standpoint is that you'll kind of be blackballed from like all other...
04:59
agents will no longer want to work with you because you have your own brokerage and or bring it or bring a deal to you. They might bring a deal to you. a lot of times they won't bring the deal. They want conventional wisdom. want the back end. Yeah. I'll still give them the back end. First of all, like my phone rings, make that clear. Like, if you brought me this deal and it's not an MLS, um, sure, we'll work together. Um, but you know, if they're really
05:28
Like, I don't know, it doesn't ever happen to me, but just hypothetically, someone brought me the deal and I was like, I just don't trust you to sell it. I would give them a referral fee or just like pay them on the backend somehow. I wouldn't trust somebody who I didn't think was competent with my sales. Yeah. I mean, we've run into that before. It's like we've, someone's brought us a deal, an agent's brought us a deal. We didn't even, we did not agree to list the backend uh with them.
05:57
but I think they thought there was kind of some mutual understanding or like, just like kind of that was the rule, right? And they got pretty angry with us when we said that we weren't gonna go with them. I mean, it's... Seems like the world is bigger now. Like I think that conventional wisdom like probably holds very strongly in markets like Hingham or Wellesley. uh It's like a tight- It's very insular networks where...
06:25
Like unless you use like Susie Q who's like goes to coffee every morning with, you know, Janice or like does yoga. Like you're not going to get, you're not going to the four houses a year that come on and they're not going to bring you buyers and you're going to be excommunicated. think that exists still. It exists. to a degree. It exists much less in places like Boston. Like the market is just so gigantic. Like you're nobody. are no matter how big you think you are. It's just such a.
06:55
weird mindset. So I mean, I don't know if you guys had heard about Ryan Serhan opening up. Yeah. Rook Rich here in Boston. Um, I mean, do you think that he doesn't want to work with anybody? Do you know much about Hot Take five years from now, we're all going to go. Do you remember in 2026 that Ryan Serhan guy? Like, don't think this is, know, Corcoran real estate is probably the closest thing. And that's now a empire. Um, even if it belongs to Compass now.
07:24
Did they buy it? Anywhere Real Estate? Did just buy another emerge or I mean, that's the other problem with this argument about like, don't open your own brokerage. It's like, what are you kidding me? You work for a group that now owns Coldwell Banker, Compass, Keller Williams, uh maybe Corcoran, I think. Like you could keep going. Yeah. So like, what do you care? You're going to keep it within your family?
07:46
Six million agents like what you you're loyal to those guys. You don't even know their name. Yeah. Yeah, I get out of here. It's like yeah, it doesn't make any sense, right? So what are you saying? So are you saying Sir Hans gonna blow up here? Oh my hot take my hot take is that it's gonna fizzle you think that because he's expanded too quickly. Yeah, I just don't now he's in like I think he's in Florida. I think Texas I think he's he's he's like the hand like he's everywhere now. Yeah, every big market, you know call me back in 2030
08:16
But I think we're all gonna look back and go like that was 2026. they'll be like a sick acquisition. Well, that's the thing. Or he's growing to a point where then like a compass will be like, oh, we'll just buy it. I don't really get the appeal. Like, maybe someone should explain to me and I'm ignorant. But to me, it just sounds like somebody who's like a fanboy who just like wants to post selfies like the three times a year that he'll actually come to your office on Newberry Street and shake your hand. He's not gonna know your name. He's not gonna mentor you.
08:46
But they congrats. don't know what you're getting. Like if you're big on the hood ornaments on the car, then go for it. It's like, it's like, but that's most brokerages now. The ornament on the car. It's like Tesla when it was more popular. Right. It's like, I have a Tesla and everybody kind of that was elevated. But now, you know, I'm not saying he's going to go that way, but his name has some panache and it has, he has a system.
09:13
So I mean, you follow the system. He's only playing in certain areas. mean, they're- they all say they have systems. Compass is like, oh, we have the tech. We have the like, backed. The fuck are you talking about? Like every fucking buddy has tech backed now. It's like, you can go online and pay for 150 different CRMs that like, whatever. It's like tech, it's not like, I think technology is so, the use of technology is not-
09:41
what it was 10 years ago, right? It's like, when I can produce my own podcast video, I don't have to pay a videographer anymore, thousands of dollars to do it. Like any Joe Schmo off the street can do it. So in other words, you're saying that brokerage is almost more like a utility now where it's ubiquitous, doesn't matter who has it, because they're gonna be on certain platforms. Because I disagree. think there's still networks of people, there's still people that...
10:07
only want to work with certain folks on certain sides or they got a good referral. I think when you get to the like the uber wealthy high net worth individuals, I think that's a very like insular community where only certain agents are doing business with certain like, you know, buyers, reps and stuff like that. But like in general, like the masses that are buying real estate, like I think they're real estate agnostic. They don't give a shit who they're working with.
10:37
It's like, don't, I mean, I don't know. We're probably going to piss off some people, like, no, I'm hypothesizing like what's in a name and what's in a brand and what makes us different than a big company. Yeah. Well, let me answer that. Yeah. I mean, to me it's like, first of all, I do discount the technology piece, just like you said, like, oh yeah, great. Your brokerage offers this, like go on chat GPT and just like plug that in. And also, you know,
11:05
We have a graphic design guy in in-house. My, agent that is selling three condos for us right now in Dorchester sent me a rendering yesterday and he's like, oh, I just spent the last hour using ChatGPT to like doctor this rendering up. What do you think? I was like, it looks really good. You don't have to spend money. You could spend $30 a month on ChatGPT or Gemini or whatever, and you can create whatever you want. You still have a class of agents that knows how to use it and doesn't.
11:35
and can elevate your list. I'm just starting out by saying that like, I think that the playing field has been leveled. Like there may have been a day in time where like you'd be like, no, I can't go to choose Boston because you don't have this technology suite that they have. It's like, oh yeah, it's right here. Like that's, it's more powerful than regardless. um know, my specific technology. My team, m I think that like by and large um we sell, we lease, we're good at it.
12:04
We're committed to it, but I think everyone in the back of their mind has some notion that owning real estate is long-term wealth. Like what we do every day is salary and, uh, you know, being able to add value to a property, um, being able to renovate, develop, um, you know, that's a seat that they'd like to get into. And so a few of my agents have gotten their construction supervisor's license and like the, the differentiator in a boutique small group like that is like,
12:33
Who's standing at the base of the tree, uh, pushing you up and helping you get to the next branch. And like, please tell me who that is at your massive corporate brokerage. Um, I've met these guys, they fly them in from all over the country. There's six levels of leadership and bureaucracy. Like with our team, it's like very well capitalized. say that humbly, very entrepreneurial. So it's sort of like, you have an idea, you want to just be cool. Like, yeah, there's no, like, let's run it by legal. Uh, it's like, yeah, yeah, here's the company card. Do it.
13:02
Let's have at it. And we're kind of in this, like from a value add standpoint, we were the same way. Like the guy that we, the agent that we brought on, he is interested, he's doing his first kind of flip, I guess, right now, a single family flip. And like, he was super excited because it's like, get to pick our brain whenever you want. We're here to help you. Like we're here to, you know, if you want us to help you run your numbers, if you want us to help you look at your floor plan, like.
13:31
We're an open book, you know? And he was super pumped about that. And not only that, it's like we're offering, like we're actually, like we're sourcing some leads for him as well, because he's a newer agent and he's growing and like we want to help him grow. And it's like, all right, well, we'll spend a couple bucks to help you like source some leads and kind of get your- He's we're successful. Exactly. Yeah. Also brilliant on his part to come join you guys early, because like you're in this space every day all day, you're veterans in some sense.
14:00
As we all are now that worry of gray hair. ah You can fucking up your foot. But the idea is like, just like that Newton deal just like kind of came to me organically. Like who do I call with that? It's like, oh, you know, my, my three top agents get that. Like this, this kid's going to get that call from you. And that those, those deals present themselves. Yeah. Not infrequently, um, opportunities, buildings, know, just got a, a text like, Hey, I have a buyer who needs a tax deferred exchange. Just pushed it to my team.
14:30
Um, like, so I think that, um, and you guys similarly, it's like the mouth of the funnel and you're just sending it down now. Like, don't, I don't want to have my name on the for sale sign on the bottom. Like I want your name on the rider and I want to be there to support. Right. Right. It's like where I'm at in my career. And you also have, you're also kind of almost running multiple businesses, right? At the same time, you don't want to get calls.
14:55
You don't want to, you don't have the time to do showings, open houses. Like you don't have the time to do any of that stuff. No, you know? But like, to my own images, like I will always get back to you same day. Like I might not just be able to pick up my phone at any given moment, but like by the end of the day, you'll get a call and we'll talk. Yeah. That's pretty reasonable. I think so. I guess the other side of it is, you know, not everybody can be their own brokerage because you obviously have to go through the licensing to become an agent first and then have more experience and take the test to actually get your broker's license. So.
15:24
a little bit of gatekeeping there in terms of like, there's only so many boats you can go fishing on. But also like, who's gonna join your brokers? Like, what is your differentiator? Like, your question is very apt. I mean, I think that's what we've had a hard time doing, and I'll be honest with you, right? Like, we found this, I don't know how, I think he reached out to me, but- It was either Instagram or LinkedIn or something like Lucas, his name is Lucas Clark. Okay. Yeah, so.
15:52
So he reached out, I think he reached out to me. He either saw our post on link. Oh no, you know what he saw? He saw our video with Ennis that Ennis posted. Oh yeah, that's right. Uh oh. Oh, whatever. He saw our video with Ennis that Ennis posted um and then he reached out because he saw the video and he was interested in learning. Cause I think we pitched the brokerage on that video. So it's like, I don't know. mean, it's.
16:21
Other than that though, it's been hard for us to find people. How do you typically find your agents or how did you find your we also haven't really been like pushing and advertising all the time. It's a funny business because it's one where success begets success. And like, I think I was super lucky that like Alan Wynn, uh the first time I posted anything, I just got my license. He's like, dude, I follow you. I love your work. I believe in what you're doing here. And I want to learn from you and work with you. And like, so that was my first agent and he does. oh
16:50
tremendous volume per year. helps a ton of families. So that's some social credibility within the community. And then shortly thereafter, two more very qualified agents followed and they pulled some junior agents with them. And now you have- Like critical mass. Yes, that's exactly what I'm trying to say. I we also had kind of a couple starts and stops with folks that didn't make it to the finish line. And one of them was going to bring a team. So we've-
17:16
had that model in our mind too. Like, oh, do we give up a little bit of equity to have somebody bring on a team? then- And like, basically run, kind of run it the day to day. I'll tell you, it's tough too in brokers because like the splits aren't for a good agent. You're not going to bring somebody over for like 70, 30, you know? Right. So it's not like, you know, it's nice, it's great, it works. The business is profitable. I think that, but that attracts other agents. think that-
17:45
Yeah, there was an element of that for sure. Let's talk about just like sales in general, like especially new construction sales. What about just pre-sales kind of thing or? Yeah, pre-sales. I really like consider myself kind of a pre-construction sales expert. I've just done a ton of that. You've done it In so many different respects. many units have you closed, would you say, before, well not closed, know, had under contract?
18:10
before you got that certificate of occupancy. I mean, if I'm going to count my work with like new Boston Ventures, especially it's hundreds. I've worked with like agents all over the city who are the best at what they do. And like, I think a futurisms that stand out to me are like one, obviously floor plans matter most. Like the layout of your unit can't spend enough time early optimizing your floor plans. Yes, I agree. a difference.
18:36
and what like renderings and marketing material and that sort of thing. Well, that comes second. You know, can have the best marketing material you want, but if your unit sucks. no. I agree with you but I'm saying like in terms of getting to the sale now, you you've got a good play out, price is fine. Is it, are you walking them through the construction site? Are you giving them a virtual tour that you took on your phone? Like how do you? So then timeline is interesting because there's, are these golden moments during construction.
19:02
that like you can attract a buyer. used to say that it was actually site work through framing. It was a good period of block of time. It's a little harder now because buyers are a little less eager. But if you have something that's really unique, that's still a good time. The problem becomes when you're too close to the finish. You know, when you're two months from CFO and a buyer walks through, they're just sort of like, it kind of looks dirty in here. So what if it's like right after boredom plaster is a good time? Right after boredom plaster is still a good time. And also because you can offer like
19:32
There's things that are really important to you. Like maybe I can work with you on changing some of these finishes. They're not installed yet. Yeah. That we haven't already bought. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. If we have short money compared to, Yeah. Um, so the timing, um, you know, even down to like a small tip that I once got from like Ricardo Rodriguez was just like, when you're leading somebody through a new construction project, don't ever step through a wall. Enter the unit where you should enter the unit and walk around the unit.
20:01
Don't pretend to be Casper the friendly ghost. That's a pretty, that's a good, that's a good, that's good recommendation. Yeah. And I think the why is really important when you're selling new construction. know, someone once said to me like, if a buyer comes back with their partner, their significant other, and you can step back and let them lead the tour and have them show and repeat, uh, you know, the certain decisions that were made during constructions or the floor plan review. Um, you know, why you chose this, why you.
20:30
optimized for that. like real examples of that might be like, you know, storage under the stairs that was otherwise going to be completely cordoned off, but like you were framing and you're like, fuck, that's great storage. Yeah. So we had a sprinkler head and put a, we built this custom door. I think also that little things, think to your point, even if you're walking them through when the walls are still open, actually gives you more of an opportunity to point out things that you've focused on or that you've like things that are
21:00
are thoughtful that you've included that people like behind the walls that people can't typically see at the end of the day when it's done. Soundproofing is huge. All that stuff, right? Like running HDMI cables or running like the tech and stuff that you can actually like physically show them is I think is very important. Yeah, think that's cool. Do you, are you still, now that you have a team, are you still
21:31
doing your own pre-construction sales or do you let your team do it now? My team takes the listings and I show up uh for a second showing if the team thinks I can be helpful in closing it. You're the closer. The closer. Because you're the baker and the salesperson. So you can show them how the bread's made. You know how it's made. There's that level of confidence that they're talking to.
21:56
I'm talking to the manufacturer here. I'm not talking to some salesperson. Yeah. I think there's some, there's some weight to that. There's some weight to that. Yeah. I mean that, that's real. Um, but like, think the most important word you used was like thoughtful. Yeah. So like, think, you know, build it like it's your own. There's so many decisions to start a build where it's like, Hey man, if you were going to live here, would you have fucking done that? Or it can't believe you didn't put an outlet there. Right. Right. You know, well, code only says every six feet or 12 feet. Yeah. It's like, well,
22:25
That's the minimum. go in that closet and you're going to plug your vacuum in, Like you can put an outlet in there. Well, exactly. Exactly. Like, you know, just it's, it's short money or not money, no money at all. It's like your electrician is not going to charge your ex to put an outlet in. Or like, like, like a switch placement, think is one. That's very important. quickly. There are these little shortcuts to me when I walk a build. I love going to open houses. Um, when I walk through someone else's product.
22:52
that I can like mental shortcuts to say like, this is a good product or like, this is a hack job. Yeah. And like one of them is light switches. Light switches. Not only, not only light switch placement, but also which, what the light switches control. Like what actual circuits they control and like.
23:12
are there three ways, are there four ways? Because it's like, I've walked into builds and it's like, I'll turn a light on and I'll walk across the room and be like, how the fuck am I gonna turn this light off? It's like, what the fuck? I think a lot of the times it's like, I spend a lot of time with my electrician walking every job and laying out, if it's not done by an interior designer, I will walk the job and lay out all of the light fixture locations, what loads they control.
23:41
all of that stuff with my electrician. Cause the last thing you want is for your electrician to do what they think is right. Because a lot of times it's not necessarily the best. Like, you know, like, I center these lights here. I put them, staggered them this far apart. um Knowing what the finishes will be. And I guess specific to the lights, you know, we've had so many times where we're doing like a full size fridge and then you've got all the lights lined up. You have them right over the counter.
24:09
but they didn't bump it out for that light. And so then you're scrambling to move it, you know, a foot and a half afterwards. it's just, rework stuff drives me crazy. I like, I like to look at plumbing fixtures and showers. like, am I going to have to, like, oftentimes you can just put the valve where it's easily accessible when the glass shower door opens or otherwise you can have to go get blasted by cold water and like hover in the corner while it heats up. did you think of that? Costs no difference. No difference. Yeah.
24:38
Is there a niche in the shower? Did you at least put shelves? Is there a place for shampoo to go? The other thing I look at too is like if you do a wall-mounted faucet, if it's not like, is it like off from the sink drain? It looks weird, you know? Ken, uh are there any drawers in the kitchen? We know that doors are cheaper than drawers. So is there at least a drawer stack? Like where's my junk drawer? I need a junk drawer. Yeah. Where's my silverware gonna go? Where's your silverware gonna go?
25:07
It's like just things, thoughtful things that you can integrate into your build that don't cost a lot of money. I know we've kind of gone on a tangent. Is there enough closet? Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. Be considered storage. Closets are a big thing, I think, because I think it could be a big differentiator now, right? I think you can get closet storage solutions very inexpensively these days that look really, really good.
25:37
and it's the same quality or the same stuff that you're gonna get from a much higher end Or the delta between good and better is missing. Yeah. It's almost like you're paying for the name. And you and I do this, like you've used the same systems, I use the same systems, and people have walked in and be like, holy shit, like this looks really good. And you know. I'll tell you one recently where like I F'd myself and I'm just like,
26:06
pissed because I didn't have to do it. Uh, but so I did some landscape lighting on my last project. like have all the pathways with these like led pucks that come on and they're on a dust to dawn sensor. And, um, uh, you know, it's I've gotten more callbacks on those effing lights, anything else on there. working. Yeah. This one's too dim. That one isn't coming on.
26:31
They're not all coming on at the right time. No one reset the programming. The power went off and now they're not coming on. So I come over and program the thing. It's just like one of these things where like, you buy them on Alibaba? No, I them on Amazon. ah Maybe it's that, you know, regardless, it's like an example of something that no one expected. I didn't promise it to anyone. My landscape guy and I at the very end of the job were like, dude, for a thousand bucks, like, yeah, let's put that in. I think that's going to be cool. So I got like the low voltage lights and the transformer.
27:00
And we just ran the speaker, essentially speaker wire. And like, I just wish I never did. The dust to dawn, but they should learn how to program a dust to dawn. Like, it shouldn't be on you. Like if the power goes out, right? mean, what's the alternative though? It's like, it's on a dust to dawn timer, right? Yeah, or like a manual timer. But point remains that you can go too far.
27:23
and just create a nuisance for yourself. That's very true also. It's like, oh, this is going to be really slick and fancy. you try to go- Providing a solution. Try to go above and beyond, right? Like would they, would the buyers have not bought because they didn't have the little puck landscape lights? No. Oh man, we do that all the time. Like is somebody really not going to buy it because of this? Yeah. I mean- How often do you have that discussion, you know, going back to the brokerage side of things, like how often have brokers had those discussions with you where they almost try to play the role of interior designer?
27:53
And then does that become too contentious or where do you kind of? Yeah. If you're not selling your own product, like we've gotten into this situation before where like to raise point, a agent or a broker tries to like instill their design wisdom on you and be like, well, no, going back to that value proposition, right? Like what makes somebody different than a good realtor 100 % offers that. Do they provide useful design decisions?
28:23
that don't break the bank and also help you get like a really, you know, help you get those sales. Hit the optimal point in the curve. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Without a doubt, if I'm hiring a new construction realtor right now in today's market, like I expect them to have strong opinions. Nothing pisses me off more. They're like makes me think less of a sales agent when they just have wishy washy opinions on everything. It's like, no, Ray, whatever you want. Dan, if you think that the gold is good, I would say just do gold.
28:52
You know, it's like, hired you to bring thoughts and value. Don't just pander to me. But have you ever come across agents that will give you their thoughts, but they're not good ones? Yeah, I mean, that's a bad agent, too, and I have, yeah. You know, it's like, there are a lot of agents that will love to give you their opinions, but they're not necessarily the best opinions. Look, I love Ricardo. He's very strong opinions. uh And things have got great taste. So I value...
29:21
his feedback a lot. There are other agents that have strong opinions and I don't like their take. Well, that's problem with finishes is that it's obviously so subjective. so, you know, that's why the color palettes have been so muted lately because it's the least offensive to anybody. If you pick like a cherry red wall, you're going to immediately cut out like 90 % of people that don't love cherry red walls. And the same is true with any other finishes. So
29:45
I mean, to a degree, I mean, maybe it depends on the buyer, the price point. But I think that's where a good agent comes in and a good agent should know the balance and they should know what will attract the biggest buyer pool. Yeah. Right? And what finishes and where you can maybe push the boundaries a little bit on like maybe going a little bolder in an area. you like put-
30:13
Yeah, powder room, or maybe you put like a little bit of a cool little pop of color of a tile somewhere that like, you know, might be like, all right, but those are all differentiators that set you apart from other developers or other builders. Yeah. So there's a fine balance between, want, so in other words, a good broker, that's a developer's broker, we'll call them that, or agent, they'll have that mindset where they want to.
30:41
provide good and valuable feedback. They also don't want to try and plow their ideas into your plans. Because you may not want that either. So I don't know how you balance the two, right? Because you may have an interior designer and the two of them also butt heads. it's a lot of decisions that need to be made between developer, broker, designer, in some places architect. And balancing that, I find, can also be like too many cooks in the kitchen. Of course. And add to that that like,
31:11
The easiest thing in the world for a realtor to tell you is to like constantly choose best when you're thinking of good, better, best. Yeah. Like a good agent is going to be able to say like, it's not market expectation. Like nice that you want to use sub zero, appreciate that, but don't, save your money. Right. Fisher and Pikell is. And that's where they should, that's where they can provide like huge value. Yeah. And in today's market, um, I expect a realtor to be my interior designer on small projects, two, three units.
31:41
Like I'm going to call you and you, we're going to go, I'm paying you one way or the other, the same fixed fee. Like I'm going to get some value and I'm going to be smart about it. I'm going to hire you early and we're going to go tile shopping together. We're going to go to Ferguson. We're going to look at plumbing fixtures. Like I want you invested in this and I want your feedback and your thoughts. it also gives also, yeah. I mean, they're not paying for it, but they have skin in the game now, right? Because they say, well, the buyer like.
32:09
you can say, well, you fucking recommend, you told me to do this. You know, I hear- That's the downside, that's the risk. I hear that, I hear that. And that would certainly be a reason that I probably wouldn't work with somebody again. Yeah. Just keep that note in the back of my mind. But like, to what end, unless you're going to fire them, like I can't, even contractors, find this, this is a tangent, but it's something that came up recently. Just like, say someone gives you a preliminary budget and that like when the dust settles and all the pricing actually comes back, it's double what they told you it was initially.
32:39
And you're like, that mother fuck, like great, be angry. Yeah. Yeah. They did tell you that they're not going to eat it now. Like, what do want that realtor to do? Who told you that that thing's going to make the sale? Now it's not like just apologize or bow down and say, I was wrong. You were right. You're where you are. So what's the point? Like, I'm not going to call that contractor for high level schematic estimates on my next project, but if he's still the cheapest horse.
33:06
And the best one to ride to take this job through the finish. Like I, I'm where I am in the third trimester and I'm going to build the thing. So, know, I what's in my best interest. I agree. Yeah. I agree with you. Yeah. I think too many people want to like kind of guilt the contractor or the realtor. Oh, big time. Yeah. I mean, it's human nature. I'm sure. Yeah. And it feels good to say like you said to pick the gold one and I did. And the buyer feedback has been terrible, but like, you want to change it to silver?
33:36
Chrome or we're to stay gold. Like what are we going to really do here? Am I going to fire you now? Right. Right. guess parlaying on that, you know, where do all about, it's also ego type. Yeah. Well that's, that's in everything. Yeah. Especially with developers. Where do you guys fall on, on staging? Uh, when to do it, when not to do it, who pays for it at what, like, is there a unit count that.
34:03
things kind of change, like let's, let's rip some band-aids off here. I'm a big proponent of staging. Yes. And are you paying for it through your brokerage? Or is it a developer expectation? That's a developer cost. is there a unit count where it kind of flips like, you're getting like 30 units here. Give us a staged unit.
34:23
That's a unit counting. would say unit counting. Or price point thing. Like if you're selling, you're selling three units and each unit is $3 million, it's like a $9 million sellout. The agent can supply the station. And the other nice thing like with being a small brokerage, collectively ours, it's like, maybe the brokerage will pay for that staging fee. Like, oh, you brought in a 14 unit building and uh our split is whatever it is. like, we are in a good cash position.
34:53
Don't worry when your commission comes, um, either we'll split it, uh, maybe pay back or I pay for it, depending on the size of the thing. But like, it's just a discussion between us and there's any number of things like that. But I think on a three unit building or something like that, I don't think, uh, an agent is, you know, that's not kind of on the agent. I would just love to like, yeah, that's the builder. That's an owner cost, but you see these like corporate brokerages and it's like,
35:23
Who are you going to go to to approve that expense? Yeah. Yeah. I've also, I've also really struggled to find any actual data showing that, you know, stage units help. Everybody says like, it reduces the time. does this. does that. No, there is data. say that without knowing what it is. found it locally here to say like, Oh, it's giving you this price premium. We just stage a unit and sold it two days later. And prior to it being staged.
35:51
Had it been on the market for a while? No, so I don't have a. Yeah. See it is one of those things where like you kind of need to do it or like, well, instead of paying for the staging, we'll virtually stage it. So someone can get an idea of what it looks like. don't hate virtual staging. What's that? I don't hate virtual stage. Well, you can do that for free now with chat GPT and Gemini and stuff like that. Totally. And it's definitely good for pre-con pre-construction or sorry, pre-CO like before the dust is settled. There's something really nice like.
36:19
Look, unless your staging is going to extenuate, going to exacerbate like a bad feature. Like say your room really can't fit a king size bed and it's super tight. Like, I don't know, maybe you are better with virtual staging and you know, a little bit of. But if there's an instance where it's like, oh, everyone's coming through and they're like, oh, there's no way I'm going to be able to fit a dining room table there. But in reality, you can fit a dining room table there. That's where staging makes a big difference.
36:47
because you put a table there with chairs and be like, oh wow, I can actually fit something there. So it's like, I think there's definitely pros and cons. Yeah, similarly, not of course. like floor plan scan. uh Sometimes I don't want that. Sometimes I just want my, like, I took this picture from this angle to capture that view. And like, if you're just clicking around at home, you might notice that the hallways are really long or that the, you know, the ceiling heights are really compromised in some part of the unit.
37:14
Um, I don't want to show off that we're just a bad general. So I'm going to give you the things that I want you to look at and you're going to make a decision whether to come see it on Saturday or not. And I hope you do. Yeah, that's fair. Right. Cause I, everyone pushes from Matterport now. Yeah. And I don't think it's always. I I did once we once did this thing called floored. It was like a big project. was thousands and thousands of dollars, but you wore these goggles. It doesn't seem so high tech in 2026, but it was when we were doing this, it was like six years ago.
37:41
And you could like, walk around. Yeah. You got like a little dizzy. And after spending like 12 grand on it, uh we threw it away. Have you ever done the ones where, where you like, you're in a big warehouse and they have like a projector on the ceiling and oh it puts the layout, the floor plan and you go like in like, fully scaled floor plan. So you can like walk the actual floor plan in a warehouse. That's crazy. That's.
38:10
It's cool. Have you seen the big floor plans? The ones where you print them and they're like on a basketball court? No, I haven't seen that. That's kind of cool too. But where would you, where do you like, you like it's a business? Like, yeah. I mean, guess if you're building, um, you know, in the burbs and you want to just like pin the corners of your 50 by 70 plastic floor plans on the ground and see it. That's a thing. Interesting. like that idea of the warehouse where you walk through with the goggles and that's pretty cool.
38:37
It's not even goggles. It's like, literally is a projection of the- thing. It's a 2D thing. But they do have the floor plans that would, I mean, I think what's really going to happen is the augmented reality, I think, is going to really change the game where it's like, okay, if the building is framed, but there's nothing there yet, you come into the building, you put on a piece of- Those are what Mark was talking about earlier? Well, no, but this is like, no, but like, you're not-
39:07
physically walking the building with the goggles. You're like offsite somewhere. You're offsite somewhere. No, I'm saying like the building's framed. Oh, I see. You're standing in the living room. You put on these glasses and then all of a sudden you're in a finished space. Like, well, we have all the finished materials and here's their textures and everything. That's what's a game changer. But even that, like, I would argue almost that that will become table stakes when buyers just expect it. And if you don't offer it, they're going to...
39:35
question or roll their eyes. I don't know that it's in the seller's interest to be the first to offer that at all, that type of thing at all times. just think sometimes sell the dream. think, think going back, think technology is really going to change the game. Renderings are perfect. I mean, I see people selling off renderings after their building has a fuck, it has a CFO. uh Um, why? Because there's no imperfection in that rendering, you know, in real life.
40:03
the crown molding joint is separating or there's a crack coming down. um, it's true. people like to sell the dream and that's fair. And it makes me question if, like, if I don't have the, at some point, sometimes it makes me question. It's like this building was already finished. Why are they still posting just renderings? Yeah. And, and some of them, I think you'll have that question at some point in time when they don't give you the goggles.
40:29
to look around the unit and to actually experience the whole thing. Once it comes, like once it's like mass adopted. Yeah. I think that's Then we'll say like, oh. Why aren't they doing it? Yeah, it's because their ceiling heights are seven feet. Yeah. Cool. So where do we fall on the, I'll give another one to you real quick. So where do you fall on like the broker open houses and that kind of networking where.
40:50
It's almost like an industry insider. like throwing the big parties for launch parties. I feel like it's been a while since, you know, you see like a coming soon, join us for an exclusive pre-listing event kind of thing. Yeah. Light bites provided by our mortgage broker. Yeah. Insurance company for mortgage guys. Yeah. Look, I think it helps. You know, there's no two ways about it. Do I think like a client who's like super upset that you haven't done a broker open house yet is like correct.
41:20
Probably not. Have you hosted at yours? Yeah. Yeah. We've done, we've done broke open houses. It's good to raise awareness. Sometimes I feel like agents just want to know where their next free lunch is coming from that Thursday. um But you know what? That's fine. And it's much like networking. It's like, you never know show up to the thing, bring your person. Cause all of a sudden like, know, you meet someone else at the next cocktail party and they're like, look over at townhouse somewhere outside Boston.
41:48
And you're like, I had free lunch last week at Dan's townhouse. Well, let's parlay it into the start of the conversation. Have you ever gotten a deal from a broker open house? Like, I love the product. I don't have a buyer, but like, got this other project. What do you think? Like, you know, would you be interested in? Have you ever gotten a deal or, or lead or something? don't, don't, maybe leads for sure. think, I think, I think in general networking and like marketing yourself and putting yourself out there is such a big part.
42:17
of this industry now. It's like people want to know who you are. They want to know what you're doing. They want to know that you're active, that you have experience and that you're someone that they can trust where if they bring you a deal that you can actually close on it if you are serious about it. And I think that's a very big part of being a builder and a developer nowadays. Yeah, and realtor. And realtor. And realtor.
42:45
Well, congrats on the success in the brokerage. Thanks, man. I genuinely look up to you. No, I think you guys are doing awesome. And the first like couple, like successful agents really know what they're doing, who hitch their wagons to you guys think are going to crush it too. So this pie certainly big enough for everybody. Cool. Yeah. All right. Well, thanks guys for leaving reviews. That's been really helpful. Yes. Reading, reviewing, subscribing. Yes. Raise, raise, whipping us. Let's go guys. Quick.
43:15
See you on the next one. Later.