Speaker 1 (00:11.732)
Welcome to Market Proof Marketing, podcast from the industry leaders at Do You Convert, where we talk about the current and future state of marketing and online sales for builders and developers across the globe. We're not here to sell you, we're here to help you and to try and elevate the conversation. Welcome to another episode of Market Proof Marketing. Today we have a very different guest, but I've probably not been more excited to talk to anyone so far this year. It's Nick Offenkamp, Realtor Gone Rogue.

and founder of DIY Home Buyer Academy and a licensed broker and founder of the Tartan team. Nick, welcome to the program.

Hey, thank you so much. I don't know that I've been so excited to be on a show or talking with somebody. So this is an honor, man. Thank you.

And in true little show prep fashion, I just discovered that things I should have known about Nick, that he worked for a home builder, New Tradition Homes. Shout out to Laura and team. He's been an online sales counselor, a new home specialist before. So is there any other hidden talents that we need to cover right out of the gate here?

No, not really.

Speaker 1 (01:24.302)
Okay, all right. I mean, if you start like doing doing juggling or talking about your interest in

I don't know some type of.

I yeah, or if I start singing responses to I mean at that point you might just need to shut it all down but

Right, right. OK, well, we're going to dive in and then we're going to circle back halfway through to kind of your background. Because Nick and I have been online friends for a while. He mentioned he's listened to the program. Why do I keep calling it a program? Now I feel old. It's a pod. It's not that serious, Kevin. He just showed me a copy of Presale Without Fail. So let's start with Zillow and ChatGPT.

So Nick made a post on LinkedIn. You should all follow him link in the show notes. Kind of give me your, your two cents and then we'll, we'll just have a discussion about it. Cause the whole world is losing their mind both from excitement and terror as usual in our industry. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:30.094)
As is usual, absolutely. And it's been funny to see the reaction. So of course I decided, well, I'm just going to go ahead and experiment with this new integration between ChatGPT and Zillow, which I kind of consider myself a power user of both platforms. So I spent a couple hours a week or so ago just playing around and gosh, the emotional arc of going through the

Zillow plus chat GPT integration. I was a real roller coaster. within the first 15, 20 minutes, I was like, this is dumb. Why would anybody ever want to use this? This is like Zillow, but worse. takes forever for things to load. it's not particularly helpful when it comes to like curating search responses. I don't know that I'm seeing everything that I want to see.

Some of that's because I'm sure like you and many in this audience, like I've got the luxury of I've spent so many hours on Zillow that I can fly through the search criteria menus with my eyes closed and know what's under all of the hidden dropdowns. And so I can dial in a search pretty quickly. And I don't like not knowing if chat GPT is setting the right parameters. And I don't like the possibility of missing out on particular homes and

When I was first experimenting too, was looking in Bellingham, Washington, and then some, for some reason, like five minutes into my search, it moved to Bellingham, Massachusetts. This is, this is not, this is not good.

That's just because the vector points stronger towards Massachusetts than Washington. Don't take it personally,

Speaker 2 (04:18.316)
I mean, there were some beautiful homes out there. I won't lie, but yeah, when it comes to like inspiring confidence and reliability, I was about 15, 20 minutes in and I was almost done. But then it got a little bit interesting, like where I found a couple of properties that I was interested in and asked for...

Zillow GPT to help me compare those couple of properties. And it was really impressive how quickly it was able to pull in like a side by side search, give me some data points on why one was about $75,000 more than the other, even though they were only a block apart, I was able to have it pull comps for me, add those to that table.

I was able to talk through negotiation strategies, even asking about things like would it be more advantageous to use $20,000 off of the purchase price, 20,000 as a closing cost credit, do a breakdown between the differences between a permanent interest rate buy down versus a two one or something like that. And while I was disappointed early on with it taking

20, 30 seconds to pull initial search results. Once we got more into chat GPT functionality, where it's just pulling these side by side comparisons and running numbers and scenarios, it was lightning quick. I was like, this is actually really useful. And then I was walking away after an hour, hour and a half or so of playing around with the platform. It like, okay, I can see the potential here. It's not there today where I think most

buyers are still better off going to Zillow.com and then bringing their findings over to chat GPT. But this is the worst that it's ever going to be and with how quickly AI is improving, it'll probably be by the time this podcast airs that it'll be incredible.

Speaker 1 (06:23.822)
Right. Well, at least it'll be marketed as more incredible. Just a quick aside there. I forget the gentleman's name. Oh, shoot. I I prefer to give credit. But he said is his tagline on his photo that he shared on LinkedIn was and they told me this that it would this is the worst it would ever be. And then he showed a photo from the latest version that he's paying $200 a month for.

And he said, did you make up the numbers from that calculation from the Excel file? And then it said, you're right. I haven't even looked at it yet. He's like, they promised me it wouldn't get worse. So let's not give too much credit there. I agree with the sentiment. had the same experience. The filters in Zillow are great. But I thought, aha, here's the chance to use this endless.

Amount of energy. That's also ironic because it turns out that energy is extremely limited and prices are going up. But let's use this never retired, never ending intelligence in air quotes to like just remove all the commercial property. So I like to look at properties with acreage and without fail, there's these million dollar, five million dollar commercial properties that get into the mix. And so I get the search result from Zillow and Chachapi tea go full screen. I'm like, this is okay. I get it.

And I just say, Hey, first question, can you please remove all of the of the three bedroom homes? Sure. I did that. OK. Can you remove all of the commercial properties? No, I can't. Zillow doesn't provide that information. I know Zillow doesn't provide that information, but I'm asking you the artificial super intelligence that's going to control our entire lives to just like look at each one and determine if it says great for like it in the text in the field of every listing.

is this is a great commercial property. It's not hard for this to do. So I agree with you that the discovery part, I feel like, has mostly been solved. And that's what everyone's terrified of. But like you, I then looked at the home that I grew up in that has been on the market for almost two months now. I have this irrational desire to own it and rent it, not to make money, but just so that every two years when I

Speaker 1 (08:38.99)
switch tenants, I can go walk through the house I grew up in and touch the walls and reconnect with the past and then like cover my costs again. So it's still on the market. It's still overpriced. And I said, Hey, ignore this estimate. Tell me what this home is worth. Look at the comps. Give me like scenarios. And the, the Zestimate, uh, as we all know, it was high. The asking price was 489. It's come down from five 20. And it did an analysis for

to another point you made in your LinkedIn post, way too long, about 15 minutes of total working time. And then I came back and said, 420 is what you should offer. And I'm not pegged to the number. It was all of the justification, which again, as someone in the industry, can go through and be like, that makes sense. That doesn't, that's a good point. And this brings me to like the idea of ideas.

is one we're not talking about enough with this, is that it's like, that's what experts do. Like, have you ever, like, when someone asks me, hey, Kevin, I think you do something with real estate. No one knows what I do here. I think you do something with real estate and I want to sell my house. What do you think? What they're asking is like, can you give me some ideas to spur thoughts that I might be missing? Like, tell me what I might be missing. And I thought that was, that was a really interesting use case. And for the, I guess,

for fun, not because I'm looking down on them, for the normies who don't like work in our industry. Yeah. And they're just like every 10, 12 years thinking about moving. I saw what your post was saying, which is like, as us to the extent that I trust this resource, the Zillow chat GPT connection is like Zillow has to be there. They don't have a choice. are like, why would they do this? Because they're a demand generation platform.

They don't have any homes. They're like the Uber of real estate. And so like the customers for Zillow or any syndication platform are in this order, the end consumer themselves, and then the people paying them. And like, you remember that order, then everything they do makes sense. And I'm not like upset at them for doing that either. It's just, that's why they do what they do. So they have to go to wherever eyeballs are.

Speaker 1 (11:03.32)
consumers may be moving, whether they are or not. mean, for goodness sakes, they have an Apple Vision Pro app. That development time might have been wasted.

All 17 people that have the Apple Vision Pro are really enjoying it, I'm sure.

Right. So Zillow has to be there and they have to continue to go wherever the consumer is, be part of the discovery. But what ChatGPT was really smart at doing is saying once the consumer is there and the discovery is like, we're outsourcing the discovery, don't blame ChatGPT if you can't find the house, because it's an integration with Zillow. Zillow's app is running. Zillow's in charge of it being right or wrong. So I almost feel like ChatGPT is getting the upper hand.

like in the medium long term here.

Yeah. I mean, I actually really do wonder in what way Zillow sees this as part of their business strategy, other than like you're saying that they have to be there. But what was so impressive is using the rationalization of ChatGPT, exactly what you're talking about, where it essentially was serving the functions of a good real estate professional or realtor.

Speaker 2 (12:19.698)
where with the kind of questions that I started asking for actual property analysis, offer strategy, how much I should offer on a home based on comps. Like it, pulled some pretty solid data points and was good enough for me to think, like I could make a really good argument for why I should offer this amount on this home. And it's even given me the step-by-step guide on what it is that I need to do. Now I can still click the.

contact an agent or two or this home button through the Zillow chat GPT integration, but that feels a whole lot less necessary after spending 20 minutes talking back and forth with chat GPT. I mean, that all kind of goes into my DIY home buyer theory of there being a of a surgeon.

resurgence, insurgence of self-represented buyers that are coming down the pike. yeah, it will be interesting to see how

The reason I think Chachapiti is winning is because when you do the rationalization, when you're asking things, it's pretty clear, even in the way it speaks back to you, that it's not Zillow talking. That's what I'm saying is when you're asking questions, it's talking about Zillow as it's still this third party that I'm connecting with, but like you trust me, the LLM that you're speaking with.

And this is all the value that it was providing and the depth of the expertise, in air quotes, that it was providing. I found myself saying, OK, why wouldn't, and we won't spend too much longer on this because it's still an evolving thing. so like you said, in two weeks it'll change. But it made me wonder, wouldn't the MLSs be best served to give access? So this actually, again, like,

Speaker 1 (14:22.382)
The order of the customers is what I think is important to always be aware of. It tells you where people's motivations are, why they're doing what they're doing. And on the face of it, you'd be like, wait, wouldn't the NAR and MLSs say this is our chance? Like, can get the most value for this content that we're distributing all over. And we've got this endpoint that would pay us an ungodly sum of money for, you know,

access to that data and yet we're not going to do that, even though it's pretty clear that data wants to be free, to be fully searchable and indexed by the latest AI programs. It's like, no, that's not our... So who is NAR's customer? Who is the agent working for? If I'm trying to get my home sold, I want every AI tool to have intimate level detail of each property.

Yeah.

Speaker 2 (15:21.422)
I love those questions because it leads, you know, the other big thing I was thinking about as I was using it was that this would be a whole lot more helpful if Zillow GPT was really able to curate the list of properties. Whereas right now it just pulls up the same sort of Zillow map that we're used to and there doesn't seem to be any real rhyme or reason as to the order the properties get presented in. Yeah.

But if based upon my search criteria that I want to be in this school district and within walking distance of this particular coffee shop, and I want these amenities at this price point, if it were to say, yeah, there's 35 homes that match your criteria, but these are the top five because of XYZ, that would be really useful. as much as Zillow is a for-profit company,

I don't know how much I'm going to trust the Zillow curation because I don't know who's paying to get their listing in front of me and prioritized. But I think that you're right. If the data was fed directly from the MLS and agents were instead optimizing the ways that they're writing their listings for this new form of search, if that's even what you call it.

I do think that that could be an incredibly valuable tool because once again that's really what the best of the best agents do is they're curators of what's available for their home buyers.

Yeah. Yeah, it's something to keep watching. But I think the biggest long-term disruption, like I don't think consumers, and I tell this to AI fanatics all the time, like I believe that it is a great tool and it's a tool that will continue to gain effectiveness, but it's still a tool. It's like the fanciest screwdriver of any screwdriver ever.

Speaker 1 (17:32.582)
And yet, like I say, when will you let the AI choose your your kid's spouse? Like you feed in all the information on your kid and you just say, tell me who Kevin Oakley should marry little Kevin. And it says Sally in Idaho Springs, Idaho. And that's the one like what parent is going to say, that's it. And yet we're like, consumers will definitely just pick.

and only look at the homes that are the top three recommendations or the top 10 recommendations. I think we've seen home builders do this where they've had search criteria that will remove homes available. And as soon as the consumer, like, hey, it looks like you're only looking at three bedroom homes. You want us to remove all the other ones? Click yes, and then they immediately regret it and they undo it because there's too much on the line. You just want to make sure that you're seeing

kind of everything until you finally decide that no, for sure, like these are out. So I just don't think the answer, I think the expertise is more important than the answer. And that's where Zillow and Chachiputte might kind of wedge in there. So let's talk about your background and DIY home buyer and why you call yourself a real Trigone rogue. What's all this about?

Yeah.

Speaker 2 (18:58.12)
Yeah. I mean, it really comes down to trying to find better alignment in my career and what it is that I'm doing and building. It was interesting in moving from Minnesota back out to my home state of Washington and getting started in the new construction world. I got my real estate license and started working with

bunch of home buyers while representing the builder. was close to a third of the home buyers that I worked with that didn't have buyer agents. so very early on in my real estate career, I recognized that there's people that are closing on homes as unrepresented buyers every day all throughout America. I realized new construction's a whole different animal in a lot of ways from resale residential. But

not so fundamentally different that it didn't at least create the plausibility structure for me that, huh, people could represent themselves in normal resale transactions as well. And then with all of the changes in the NAR lawsuit settlement,

nothing changed, Nick.

I hear that all the time. All you got to do is read the comment sections on almost anything I post. Nothing's different. Nothing to see here. But my theory was that, gosh, as buyers and buyer agents are going to have to sit down and discuss compensation, some buyers are going to raise the question of, wait a second, 3 % on $700,000 is 21 grand.

Speaker 2 (20:47.554)
That's a lot of money to be on the hook for. And for decades and decades, you know it all too well, the idea of having a buyer agent, like there's the sleight of hand that it's a free service to the buyer because it's covered by the big hearted, generous sellers of the world. That is correct. My hypothesis was just that, all right, I think now that...

buyer agency disclosures are in place and people are having to really reckon with how much it costs to have representation, there's going to be a growing segment of buyers that want to figure out how do I do this on my own? Just like there's always been the for sale by owner segment of the market, there's gonna be that mirror image on the buy side. But what shocked me is that there's almost no real resources for self-represented

buyers. You search YouTube and pretty much everything on how do I buy a home without an agent is videos by agents where the final punchline is you'd be an idiot to buy a home without an agent. Be like performing your own root canal or representing yourself in the court of law or you know all kinds of other ludicrous. Oh yes I've got a whole greatest hits album of these kinds of comments.

Sound like you've heard these things before.

Speaker 2 (22:10.84)
But I, so I started just building content, recording videos, courses, guides, and giving everything away really for free. Then offering some one-on-one consultation coaching, not as an agent, but as just educator and coach and started making connections with people all over the country. And over the past 18 months or so have seen, wow, like this, this really works. Like I've.

on average, I'm helping the people that I work with save over $18,000 in transaction fees, I think is the best way to frame that because they're finding ways to get credits back for not having a buyer agent. and it's something that I really love being a part of because I think, for a lot of buyer agents, if they're honest, you, take your $20,000 check at the end of a transaction. You're like,

And I spent six, seven hours on that thing, especially in the new construction world. So I like creating something that I feel like has real value, really helps people. And that's the main driver behind what I'm building.

Love it. And this is classified as a nonprofit venture or I'm just kidding. Just a joke.

Right now it is.

Speaker 1 (23:38.83)
No, love it. love it. And as someone who's and purchased multiple homes myself without an agent, I think this is just how life is. so there is this like simplicity part of it that I understand. If you just don't want to, if you can't be bothered and you just want to concierge convenient experience, not that it can actually be delivered as

perceived, but I understand why people go that route. whenever someone says, I'm thinking about selling my home, what should I do? And I'm like, oh, well, you should take pictures or have someone take pictures. You should clean it up a little bit. You should pay a couple hundred bucks, put on the MLS or just run ads to your listing on Zillow. then like, however, as soon as I don't get past take pictures and they're like, oh, no, I'm out.

I gotta find, I don't have time. Someone's gotta help me with this. And so that is kind of what you're creating. It's like, will give you kind of, just describe a little more detail. Like you give them step-by-step instructions, you help on calls, so talk to people. What is it that you're doing?

It's really as much as an individual feels like they need. And so there are some folks that they'll just use my YouTube channel and short form videos. And that gives them the confidence that they need to go for it on their own. Others want a bit more guidance. And so I've got a course and downloadable guides. And then some people just, they want to have someone to talk to at the most critical moments of a transaction. And so that's where I do the one-on-one just hourly.

consulting to help them work through putting together an offer negotiation strategies, reviewing an inspection report. But it's all dictated by the consumer and the level of service that they feel like they need at any given moment throughout the transaction. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (25:38.274)
Very cool. All right, I've got two questions that are kind of similar to kind of dive into this, the deep end of this pool. The first is from a LinkedIn message that I got a couple days ago, and it says, I'd be interested to hear your feedback or input to what I've experienced with buyer agents after the NAR settlement last year. To preface, I live by the phrase, put it in the offer when an agent asks me about commission.

Often I then have to explain that all agents have varying rates and there's no set commission for them to reference what their buyer agreement has listed. Constantly agents are put off by this, keep asking what the commission is. It seems many agents in my market are not using buyer agent agreements or are doing so after the fact. This is interesting. I've had agents tell me they had assigned buyers agreement with someone only for the buyers to be adamant that they haven't signed anything. I've caught on to three of these already so far. I had one agent.

take out a tiled shower option for a client unbeknownst to them so that she could afford her commission that she was owed because their budget was maxed out. And then he basically goes on to say like, I'm lost here because it just feels like nothing has changed. And so the end of his question is how do I operate around so many agents who refuse to work by the settlement rule change and want to hide commissions from their buyers? Like they're just not having this conversation. I've warned others that they're

treading on thin ice to hide commissions and that it may even put their builders at risk or their company or themselves. And so I think in the context of a tougher market for builders, the question is like, but everyone else is doing it, Nick. What am I supposed to do? So we start, we're starting with the easy ones.

Thank

Speaker 2 (27:23.67)
Yeah, yeah, totally. Like you said, shallow end, It's so unfortunate. I every week I'm talking with home buyers that are running into issues with agents that are trying to protect the old system. And you see it both with listing agents and with buyer agents. And I think that there's really two drivers of

change, like one is going to be more lawsuits, like brokers and brokerages are just going to keep getting hit with lawsuits and where state regulators are really going to have to get more involved here looking into these kind of scenarios and situations. this is where sellers and probably builders in particular who have a upfront and personal

experience with particular agents that are playing these kinds of games. They need to report that kind of stuff. And I know nobody wants to be the tattletale within the industry. But that's the top-down sort of approach to making change. But then the other side is really change at a consumer level.

And that's certainly where I see myself, right? talking directly to consumers, trying to do more on the consumer education front. And it's, we may get into a conversation just about builders and how they offer compensation to agents. But I do think that it would be interesting, like if a builder is used to offering two and a half percent, like on top of whatever other incentives they're offering right now.

There's just a pool of credits that they're offering to a buyer of that, hey, you get a 5 % and if you have an agent, 2.5 % of that can go to the agent. If you don't, you can use that 5 % however you want. But what it does then is it really starts to get the consumer thinking through how their agent is compensated because still, going back to what I said earlier,

Speaker 2 (29:38.19)
That sleight of hand is all too common where buyer agents are still finding ways to say, you don't pay me, the seller pays me. So you don't even need to think about my compensation. And that's what I think we really have to work hard to get away from at all sides of the industry.

Yeah, I think the consumer going straight to the consumer is if I was a builder, what I would be leaning more into and that's because of my core belief that realtors and agents can serve a valuable purpose to their to their customers. There's no doubt about that. The question is about transparency and understanding and anytime as a business, especially because all businesses, I don't care what industry you are in. There's a certain like

I'm not working with a person. I'm working with a business. And so anytime a business can say, we're going to be more transparent and make a different kind of connection. But I think everyone's nervous that that agents control their customers in a way that I think the general argument in the last 10 years or so has been that consumers are the ones finding the homes and then saying, I would like to see this one most of the time.

And that means that the consumer is in control. And I think that's why we started with Zillow and ChatGPT and AI in general is this idea of like, that that's just going to give them more insight into like, wait, there's more to it. But I think like, I haven't seen a builder yet go straight to TikTok or YouTube shorts and start running campaigns about like,

This is out of fear of how the industry locally is gonna respond to that.

Speaker 2 (31:33.592)
Yeah, it is interesting because like you're saying, trajectory wise, information is only becoming more available to consumers. It's only becoming more self-directed, not less. so this whole idea of, a lot of it even kind of goes back to like procuring cause or the idea of a buyer agent being the one to bring a buyer, fundamentally misunderstands what agency

even really is or representation really is. It's why I think that for all sellers and especially builders, like you get into a dangerous spot when you're starting to increase your offer of buyer agent commission as a way of competing or standing out.

Well, that takes me to my next question, Nick. You walked right into it. Hey, Kevin, we noticed that builders like beep are offering $10,000 agent bonuses. I know that there are some ways that that make that legal. But is that what builders are doing after the settlement? We haven't been doing it, but we're getting a lot of pressure to do so from the onsite agents in the model homes who also happened in this case to be agents themselves. I don't feel like it will make a difference.

It seems like agents will sell anything buyers want right now because of the market condition. Would love to hear your thoughts.

The word bribery comes to mind. And I know that one can be harsh, but it's like the buyer agent is supposed to be representing the best interests of their home buying client, financially and otherwise. And so to try and financially incentivize a buyer's agent,

Speaker 2 (33:29.486)
to steer them towards your home, your community, versus another community by financially incentivizing the agent? That seems like a legally dangerous place to live when the we're not working on No, no.

We should stop at of the show, it seems like that's an odd place to want to go.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. And you put yourself in the consumer's shoes and it's not hard to understand where, you know, six months after closing, the buyer is talking with one of their best friends that purchased in another neighborhood a few blocks away with a different builder. And they hear about the different incentives, the wonderful amenities and features. And they're like, well, I would have liked to have known about that.

My agent didn't even show it to me or talk to me about it. Could that have had anything to do with the bonuses being offered to my agent? And yeah, that's a gross sort of feeling for a consumer.

Yeah, I think what I tell people is exactly what you just said. And then I also say what I tell everyone's like, you don't pay me to make decisions for you. You pay me to tell you the pros and cons of any decision you're going through and the trade-offs you're making. then you make the decision. And I think the biggest picture here is what you perceive as risk, which is because like not getting a sale, I understand that's risk. Getting potentially sued is risk.

Speaker 1 (35:10.028)
I look at risks secondarily to saying, what is reality? And the reality is, that I agree with you that if builders went more directly to consumer with messaging and it doesn't have to be super overt. Again, we're not trying to cut out. Like it's wild to me, the number of people I know who do wedding photography on the side or like family photos on the side. And you would think with the power of the iPhone and

and the latest Samsung phones and all of the AI technology to make photos better, like there would be way fewer photographers offering like family portrait sessions. And if there were, you'd think it would be like 20 bucks a session or something like, and yet like people still want that service. So that's, think what everyone always hears this conversation. They're like, you're trying to put people out of business. No, like I don't think that at all. There's, it's just,

the transparency of understanding that you are making a trade-off of, would like this service for less of a discount or incentive, or maybe if you are maxed out on affordability, an option that you can no longer afford. Like there are trade-offs and that's all we're trying to explain.

Speaker 2 (36:31.18)
Yeah, I think exactly right. Like even as the realtor gone rogue, I see the valuable work the agents, I'm still a practicing agent and believe I provide value to my clients, believe it or not. But I think that the business model for agents certainly is one that is going to need to change. so yes, the transparency is a big piece of that.

And really even then finding ways to better align the incentives between a buyer and their agent. Where the agent really gets paid for how well they're able to serve their client, not just how expensive of a home they're able to get them into and how quickly they're able to get them close, which is currently the traditional commission model.

what it's optimized for is high dollar prices and fast closes, which is not always what a buyer wants.

I'm going ask you this, because if you're living in the world of facts, potentially, it's more helpful. So the first question about, these agents are just not getting what I'm trying to explain to them, which is that we're happy to work with you. Put it in the offer, and we'll review. And we love working with agents. We have a long history of agents. I wonder about saying a data point of, if I'm a builder, hey, in the last 12 months,

on average, we've partnered with agents, we've been like, if you're talking about what has happened previously, and then you're saying put whatever you want in the offer. Is that a is that like trying to go to down the middle and not following the idea of the settlement? Like you're not promising what you're going to pay them on that transaction. You're just saying, hey, in the last 12 months, we've paid agents. Maybe just say the dollar amount. We paid agents $300,000 in the past three months.

Speaker 2 (38:39.382)
Yeah, I like that. putting, I think it's best to stay away from any sort of percentages, even if we're averaging out what the past 12 months are. But I mean, the big bold number, whether it's over six months or 12 months, we've paid out several hundred thousand. it does show that there is a good spirit of working together.

I think you can try to address both things of saying this is the program that we use now. And yet there's this clear history of partnership of this total amount or hey, 60 % of our sales have agents representing buyers. like giving them, cause really, again, I try to give the benefit of doubt for the good agents out there. They're not necessarily, I mean, you could argue good agents aren't asking that question, but.

Let's say a good agent is asking that question, hey, how does this work? Because they're used to dealing with so many people doing it the wrong way. And you say, we're gonna do it the right way. And they're just looking for a little reassurance of like, am I getting cut out? That's really what they're trying to ask. And I think builders have to give them something concrete rather than, no, it'll be fine. Because they have too many scars of being cut out of deals improperly or whatever in the past.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think that that, can be really valuable. And I, I appreciate a lot of the efforts that, uh, builders locally near me make to build relationships with the agent community. I know that this is not like groundbreaking kind of stuff, but doing the different lunch and learn, um, kind of deals. And I don't know how well attended a lot of those are, but,

Creating the inroads of being able to arm local agents with knowledge about your product. And maybe that's finding ways where you're not having to make agents come and spend time in your model home. But the agents like to be able to speak intelligently to their clients about what's happening in a house or with a particular builder or in a community that helps them build trust with their clients.

Speaker 2 (40:56.716)
and is a way beyond just finances to be able to help them speak positively of you as a builder. And for them to have confidence that, yeah, this builder does respect what I bring to the table as a buyer's agent because they're proactively trying to form those relationships.

Okay, you also, as predicted, opened up another great door here, which is like getting data and access to homes to real estate agents. Is it also a tough challenge for builders? In a lot of ways, as I've watched with Compass and the private listings and the back and forth there, there's obviously a lot of parallels to how builders think about their own, you every community is essentially

150 pocket listings that the builder has, these are mine. And they choose when to expose them on the MLS and when not to for various reasons. But it strikes me that with, especially once Compass announced the acquisition or merger with Anywhere of needing a way for builders to get data. The argument has always been, and this is again why I think the MLS has to keep adapting to how they're

using all of the information they have is now Compass is saying, well, like, wait, you've got a third or some large percentage of your listings that are not on the MLS. And it just hit me like, well, then wait, what is the tool that those agents are using to look for homes for their customers? It can't be just the MLS. There has to be this layer of something else internal at Compass and anywhere that says, here's the other thousands of homes that aren't on the MLS. And I think

that other thing, whatever it is, is an opportunity for builders and developers to say, we want to be on that. Because now you can prove, because consumers can't go to it directly without going through the, they can create an account, whatever. You don't have the days on the market hit that builders freak out about with the MLS. What do you think about that idea?

Speaker 2 (43:10.318)
Yeah, I'm smiling a little bit because of the book that Compass announced when they... That's what every builder needs in the model home.

read an actual printed book too.

Speaker 1 (43:23.47)
For those of don't know, just explain what the book is for people who might not be paying close

Well, I mean, at first it felt like we're all getting memed here. It's kind going back to the 1980s of where brokerages would publish all of their listings in a book, an actual physical book that buyers could come in and they could browse through the book of listings. And Compass said that, hey, our private

exclusive listings. They're not that private. If you and your agent who's outside of Compass want to see what we have, you can come into any one of our offices and you can browse our book of private exclusive listings.

And that in theory gets them around some specific rules and laws about how this all needs to work. there a, okay, it's not hidden. Anyone can come in. They don't have to be a customer of ours or have a signed agreement. They can just come look at the book. Okay, so sorry, back to the original question.

So yeah, right. And to some extent, I suppose every builder does kind of have their book. The building industry is, there's so many different models. so whether you're able to pick a lot and then floor plans that fit on that lot or whether you're buying a home that's closer to being a spec, know, kind of depends. But

Speaker 2 (44:59.406)
I do think that this is an area where.

builders should be investing pretty heavily into having, leveraging their website for like what you had suggested, potential buyers being able to create an account where they have more access to every

Yeah, well that's another great point. And we have data to support that argument for sure from the minority of builders who are brave enough to go that route, because that seems like the opposite of what you should be doing. So I understand why Compass has that strategy, whether it's best for Compass or the consumer again, but the idea of all that data that builders have on their website making it easier for agents to search on their own platforms that are not necessarily the MLS.

And that's where, again, my assumption is that Compass has some other digital platform where you can go look for these private exclusives that builders could dump their stuff in there too, just like they're feeding this indication to any other portal.

Yeah. And I don't know if that is a way of, I mean, all of this is kind of just shooting from the hip and thinking through just based on general feel. But for so long now, builders have had their relationships with preferred lenders. And it would be interesting, like for some builders to experiment with having their preferred buyer agents where

Speaker 2 (46:37.454)
These are the agents that like the compass agents that have the access to the exclusive listings where it's like, Hey, if you really want to know what's going on with us as a builder, then these are the people. funny thing is though, right? Is that you already, most builders already have that with their sales agents, whether they're licensed or not. Like that's, that's who those people.

are hired to be. So, you know, there does feel like where it's different with a lender, there's only one lender in a transaction, usually. Right. The idea of having both the listing representation and the buyer, that's where it can start to feel a little bit redundant. But I do think that if builders want to make some of those inroads and not burn bridges with buyer agents and they're trying to find ways to do so,

that don't just become a competition of how many incentives can we offer financially to buyer agents, trying to give them exclusive access.

Some one layer deeper level of insight or information and anyone can get it. But in order to do so, you have to be willing to have your office go through this training program about how Happy Acres is different as a community or as a builder and kind of your needs. And then we're going to, once you get certified or approved, then we'll give you access to this. It doesn't have to be a lot, but something that they can then tell their own audience. Like, again, I'm an expert and I have access to

actual home site dimensions on properties that is not standard in other syndication platforms or whatever. I just think there's something there. Again, finding a way to partner with the people who are providing value both to the builder and the customer in that way.

Speaker 2 (48:37.72)
Yeah. Yeah. I've got a question for you, to take over or derail things, but just, we talked a fair bit about the relationship between builders and buyer agents. I'm curious what you're seeing as you're talking with builders about working with unrepresented buyers. Have you noticed there being more questions or issues?

there has there been an uptick in an unrepresented buyers or people that are looking for rebates or incentives because they don't

Interesting because when you, as soon as you asked it, I thought not in the real recent past, but for sure in the window of like five, six months after the settlement, there was a lot of questions. And again, that's where I think the excitement's not necessarily right, but there's a lot of noise, a lot of activity, a lot of having to train a new home specialists and onsite sales reps of how do we talk about this? Because

We want to be transparent and also not do anything the wrong way. And it seems to have died down more so, but I think it's going to come back. I also just think the number of new entrants into the market who are asking these questions again, essentially with the market being frozen for a while and interest rates being high and afford, there's just, we still have

Folks Nick who are selling homes to customers who have been in their CRM for three, four and five years that they're like, okay, now is fine at the time. So I feel like there is a surge of multiple years of people being like, wait, I need clarification here. And again, the other question I just had is like, there's still, it's coming up later in the process. That was the question that I mentioned. It's like, wait, I've already had three instances where the buyer's like, wait, wait, who is this person? Like I didn't sign anything for them. Like I want.

Speaker 1 (50:42.86)
as they're getting informed later in the process and they don't have a signed buyer agreement, now it's causing more conflicts kind of after the purchase, post purchase of like, wait, what happened? And now buyers are getting a little bit more frustrated by like, wait, why didn't I know this sooner? So I think the way the internet and information flows is just like,

You can see the content being created online on all these platforms about, you know, and can you believe this? And like the outrage that, that goes off to her, like, I was shorted a chicken nugget by Chick-fil-A. you believe this? just, all of the content that's being created by frustrated home buyers who are discovering this after the fact or in the middle of it. I feel like eventually that, that feeds all of these other tools brings us back to the beginning of the program of like,

If you're searching and asking questions, Chad, GPT, Claude, none of them are gonna have a hard time being like, yeah, here's this long history of people who are frustrated like you are. And eventually that's going to break at some point, it feels like. But it does seem like it's quieted down a little bit.

Yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:58.86)
Yeah. Yeah, no, that's, that's really, really interesting. And I think to some of it generationally, and I don't have the data in front of me. but I, I imagine a lot of the market right now is, just from my own anecdotal experience, lot of retirees boomers that are downsizing, lot of move up.

buyers that have good equity in their home and But not a whole lot of first-time buyer activity because rising affordability is just so difficult

And if they do, they've got their parents who already are friends with nine other agents. so the agents are, and I think, yeah, I think you're right.

And millennials and Gen Z, Gen Alpha, as they come, whether it's millennials, get the financial footing to buy, hopefully one day they'll be there. Gen Z, Gen Alpha, those, these generations too are just so much more comfortable with the idea of using.

online platforms to guide them through. mean, for instance, like, I have never, I've always been able to file my own taxes through TurboTax. Like I've never had to work directly with a CPA and that's even as a self-employed business owner. Now, maybe I could save a little bit if I did, like I just, generationally, I've never talked to a travel agent. I never will. The idea of, buying a car on Carvana doesn't

Speaker 2 (53:43.406)
That's good.

That's a really good analogy because that's an example that gets used a lot related to AI tools is it'll find the best flight and book it for you. And I'm like, yeah, no, there's no way I'm trusting anyone ever again to book anything related to travel for me except for me. Yeah. And so I think that one has completely turned. I do think the word of the next five years will be agency.

where you and I might be the minority, which still means that there's a valuable service for you to provide for the minority that want this little extra assistance and support to work through the process. I think the idea of AI is like the people who are using it a lot are asking way more questions than they ever have. And they're asking it because they want to know. Whereas even you look at the way that the tool has changed is it no longer gives you an answer.

Cause it realizes that if it just gives you an answer, too many people go, cool, got the answer done. And they want you to stay there as long as possible. now every time it finishes an answer, it's like, would you like me to do this next thing? Would you like me to do this next thing? Because it's like the average human. And again, I shop at Walmart, so I'm, I'm not, I'm not making, calling anyone names. It's like Walmart is the United States. So if you, if you ever worried or confused about who

Like the average consumer is you need to spend time. was, it's one of reasons I still go is like, need to, I, it's great pricing and I want to be reminded of like, this is the average person. So I think most people don't have the agency to say like, and maybe that is a generational change out of necessity of like, it's not a, it's not a thing like I desire to do more myself. It's this thing that, that younger generations are being built in of like, no, you can't afford to do it any other way. So you better figure out a hack.

Speaker 1 (55:37.398)
or an approach or some way to, like that's, my kids probably from too much YouTube and I need to just get them more on your channel is they're always looking for an angle. Like how do I just get an edge on everything all the time?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, there is a, there's definitely a positive side to that in terms of the potential for empowerment and that sort of self-reliant spirit. But yeah, it does create then a lot of questions, I suppose, for, and it's not just real estate agents who are dealing with this. hearing a story, gosh, it might've even been

from one of your podcast episodes, but of lawyers who are having to raise their hourly fees because it used to be that the questions that their clients would call in and ask about, they're not calling in for anymore. They're using chat GPT. And so now when they call with a question, it's because they need a real answer that's vetted and reliable. And now lawyers are realizing, yeah, well, they got to pay extra for that because we're not getting nearly as much.

billable hours.

Yep, exactly right. Wow, okay, I feel like we could have gone a lot longer, but Nick, thanks so much. As expected, one of my favorite conversations of the year by far. Link in the show notes to his LinkedIn profile, YouTube channel. Nick, we will talk again.

Speaker 2 (57:14.326)
I love it, man. Thank you so much, Kevin. Appreciate you.

Absolutely.

Thanks for joining us for another episode of Market Proof Marketing. Can't wait for the next one? Or looking to connect with other new home marketers? Become a member of our private community, DYC All Access, which is 100 % free and always will be. Get exclusive content not shared anywhere else, access to private events, and the ability to join a marketing impact group with other marketers like you around the country. Visit our link in the show notes or members.duconvert.com to join. All opinions expressed by Kevin Oakley,

Russell, Julie Jarnigan, Jackie Lipinski and their castmates are solely their own. Now get to work and make sure your company is market-proof.