$120,000 Commission Check? How Lucian Closed This HOA Multi-Family Roof Sale

Alright, Lucien, welcome back. Trial two, take two, Internet stable. We are working. Welcome to the channel, Lucien.

Thanks, Adam.

Lucian, how many years you been in roofing sales?

Four months.

Four months. You wrote me an email that I woke up to that put the biggest smile on my face and I wish you could have seen it. I'm going to share my screen and share that with folks, but I'd love for you to share how this whole things started. You know what, I'm gonna wait before I share that. Why are we talking today? Lucien, share the story. Four months in. Let's start from the top.

Yeah, started about around the beginning of April, you know, last 10 years. Before that I'd been inside sales, millwork, distributor, just kind of getting burnt out of sitting behind a desk and Covid happened and I was just ready to make a change. So went out there, googled sales jobs, ended up at a really good company, did some training, googled how to sell roofs and videos and stumbled across your page and I don't know, eight hours later that day, sitting watching all the videos you've got up there and training kind of started me off and as I was doing it, you know, I said, well, our townhomes that I live in, they got hit with pretty good hail within a year before I started this and they had never called in a claim. So I started the whole process of finding out who's on the board, find out the property manager, sending emails back and forth and eventually was able to get in front of all the, all the people on the board, hosted a little barbecue, got them to buy into our company as opposed to another company is like two blocks away from the townhomes here. Long story short, we ended up securing the job. It's a little over 600 square, little over half a million dollar job and my commission at the end, it'll be a bit over $120,000. So unreal. What I would have made in two and a half years on my old job, I made in a week's total worth of work here.

What I would have made in two and a half years, you made in a week. This is the email I'm sharing my screen now. I'm going to read this if it's okay. I woke up to this. A screenshot from my phone says, hey Adam, hope all is well with you. Just wanted to let you know I was able to secure the townhome job because you and I, Lucian, have been emailing back and forth about kind of approaching this and getting in front of these folks. So 32 units over 600 square. Commission will be a bit over 120k. Can't thank you enough for all your support, sales training and tactics. If I hadn't stumbled across your YouTube channel when I first started, I wouldn't be where I am at now. I've now revised my goal to 225,000 in commission for my first year. I'm sitting at about 185 right now and we haven't even had a single storm. Not too bad for a little bit over four months in the business. I just want to say congratulations and I am so happy for you. Congrats, man.

It's pretty awesome. It's kind of weird. So, went in and opened my business checking account today and I had to ask a question I never thought I'd ask. I said, is there anything different I have to do if I deposit a check over $100,000? It's not a question you think you're ever going to ask generally in your life.

That's wild, man. That is really, really wild. The two and a half years to a week. And it's funny, we all say, you know, in a week, of course it's going to take some time to produce and these commercial deals are a big hog. But I know everybody listening is curious. Everyone wants to know how to land these whales. You want to walk us through kind of what you did and what, what you and I kind of had talked about and how you, what you ran with, because, you know, I'm just on this side responding to some emails. You're the one doing the work and deserves the credit, the praise and has the story to tell. So let's start with step one. What was the first thing you did to get this conversation going for the townhouse deal?

Well, I started by emailing the property manager here and at first she wasn't really interested. She said, oh, you know, we think the roofs are fine. So I said, well, you know, I'm not just a salesperson, I also live here, but why don't I go ahead and use my drone So I didn't have to get up on the roof or anything. So I put together some photos and video evidence and I went to the members of the board who live here. I didn't know where each of them live. So I use another app that you talked about, Onx Hunt, to find out which unit each of them were in. Kind of talked to them, went over it and they brought it back up to the property manager. And eventually me and one of the co owners of the company, Dustin, who hired me, we put together a little barbecue. We've got all the HOA members, HOA board members here. Kind of went over everything that we do as a company. How, you know, we're not just here for a dollar line amount. We're here to make sure the scope is correct, make sure everything is done correctly. As looking at the roofs, there was damage beyond just hail. There was a lot of decking issues that would get fixed during this process, too. One of them happened to be directly over the president of the board's house. You know, big, giant dip in the decking. So, you know, in Minnesota, you get a couple inches of snow up there probably next winter that was falling through. So he was really eager to get it done. So eventually the board approved us. The. So we had to go through. You know, if you go through some different things with. When you become a vendor for a property management company, you got to give them all your insurance information, stuff like that. Yeah, once we got all that squared away, just there was out here, we actually only got on one of the six buildings. He saw enough damage on the one building to approve it, which was great. He was one of those adjusters you dream about meeting up on the roof. Yeah.

Especially in a large loss.

What carrier was it?

Is it. Can you share what insurance company?

It was American family. Wow.

That is rare. Usually those large loss adjusters need to take pictures of the dang near everything because they've got an audit trail. So clearly enough on one. That's great news, man. You talk. Talk to us a little bit about the vote on the board. You know, it's. Correct me if I'm wrong, it's politics, isn't it? I mean, you got to figure out in popular vote, you got your board there. Got to figure out who already likes you, who doesn't like you as much, who's got questions, who's your swing vote, and you literally just need a majority vote. So share with us how. Or share with me how you approach that whole, you know, sitting there hosting a barbecue to get drilled with questions and presenting them.

Yeah, I think having the opportunity to be able to actually host a barbecue, you know, something a little more informal, not just 100% business, business, business right in your face, but actually sit and get to know each other and talk and have questions come up casually, really worked for us. Well, it. You know, by the end of it, every single member of the board was good to go with us. And the other companies that have been out and looked at it had Kind of said to them that there wasn't as lot that much damage and they didn't think it was worth pursuing. So us being able to provide drone videos, drone footage, getting up there, showing them the actual damage, showing them the additional issues that while not storm related, would get fixed, really helped bring it along. And yeah, the biggest thing is, yeah, just, you know, pinpointing the two biggest people you need to convince are the board president and the board treasurer. Yeah, I want to. President and the treasurer is the same on this one. So where they go, it seems that's where everyone else is going to go because they're kind of the leader. So.

Awesome. I want to recap for everyone. Tuning in the key points you offered a barbecue, informal time. Always do it over food. It's so much easier, even if it's bringing breakfast or donuts and coffee to a meeting. Number two, you figured out who you need to win over. President is numero uno. That is your number one focal point. And then you need the other votes. I love it. The other thing that I love that you had done is explained that there were other reasons to do the roof. This is a big deal for commercial or multifamily. You didn't say just hail damage. You found the other compelling reasons to take action on this because the problem is greater than just the hail damage. We, we have all these other things that you can fix at once. This is needed. Otherwise people don't want to do the roof because my roof's fine. It doesn't leak. So I just wanted to highlight that for everybody. How did you bring up the barbecue? Like walk us through. Did you just knock on someone's door and say I want to host a barbecue or how did you do it? So we're going to cut that. So anyway, we're tuning back in because my wife was sitting in bed waiting for a Zoom call with her friends and jumped into my Zoom room. So backing up. Lucien, how did you start the dialogue to invite them to this barbecue?

I kind of hit it three different ways. I went and talked to each of them in person, you know, let them know, hey, want to do a barbecue on Friday? You know, we'll have a little more information. We sit down, I'll grab some good food, have a couple of, you know, adult beverages possibly, or some sprites, whatever you prefer. Just kind of informal process, sit down and talk. And then also sent out an email. And then I took my, I have seven year old twins, took them with me and we posted little, little notes on the doors Too reinviting them to make sure, you know. So we hit them three different times and ended up getting everyone to show up.

That's awesome. Way cool. So you do the barbecue. How did you open it so they didn't feel like they were being sold to. Like how did you. What was like the framing or the purpose of the barbec barbecue?

Well, we probably didn't even talk business for the first half an hour. We just talked about the day, about the week, the weather, you know, just chit chat. It kind of helped that I had, you know, I probably have a leg up in this one, whereas, you know, I live here. So we were able to talk about other stuff and my wife was there to help kind of guide the. Guide it. And then once the co owner, Dustin, he got here, we kind of got into talking. We just opened it up to them for any questions. You know, we kind of went over who we were as a business, what we do, you know, what hail damage is and what it can lead to. And then kind of opened it up to them, let them ask any questions they had answered, anything we could answer, you know, let them know about the other issues that were on the roof that would get fixed at the same time. And that was pretty informal. It actually we probably talked business for an hour and then half an hour before just chit chatted and then chit chatted for an hour and a half later just hanging out, which was I think really helped. It kind of really helped secure that personal relationship with them.

Yeah, yeah, Awesome. I love that you approached it casually. You didn't talk work, by the way. I mean you probably have seen this. That's like the number one thing I teach in sales. Appointments, first thing, connect, don't talk work. And I love that it dragged on. You just built a connect and that you opened yourself up to questions. Just like, I'm here to help drill me. And I often tell folks, you know, make yourself the human punching bag. Say I'm here to be the punching bag of all questions. The treasurer is going to have a question, the president's going to have a question, the CFO is going to have a question. You guys just dump it on me. I'm here to help. So awesome, awesome work. Next question. Did you have the contingency agreement signed before you met with the adjuster or after?

We got it signed before. It's kind of actually we got it signed like the morning of, but they had already made like a verbal commitment and a commitment through email. But then we got the contingency agreement signed before we met the adjuster. I just told them, you know, just need this signed if you want to look it over. They looked it over for a day, you know, read it through every line, made sure, you know, they were comfortable with it. And yeah, I got it signed and then met with the adjuster.

Just amazing, just amazing.

And you mentioned that, you know, moving.

From this, this product is obviously huge. This is life changing, literally life changing money, two and a half years worth of income. Like, how does one's mind get even wrapped around that? But before this deal, you were starting to get some pretty serious traction in the business. So let's start at the very beginning. Did you succeed right away out of the gate or did you have some struggle to get moving?

I've always been pretty good selling and talking to people. Probably my biggest struggle, struggle at the beginning was actually identifying what hail damage was. And it still seems, I mean, I know what hail damage is, but it seems like my definition and every other adjuster that you meet, definition is totally different.

Yeah, that won't change, by the way. That's.

I do have a funny story. So literally the first roof I got on there was marking all, you know, I thought it was hail damage. So get it signed. Customer signed, ready to go, get a. You know, our owner, he gave us a thousand dollar bonus when we got our first one signed. He said, if you can get someone signed, I know you can do this. That's the biggest thing, you know, getting on the roof and getting them signed. So like, sweet. A thousand bucks. It took me four days to get to that first part and that was great. Fast forward three and a half weeks later when the adjuster comes out. Now I've been doing this a little bit longer. We get up on the roof and I'm looking at it and I look at the adjuster and I say, I didn't know what I was doing when I did this, but yeah, there's no damage on this roof. But it was kind of nice because the adjuster liked that I was honest with him at up front and he kind of sat there for 45 minutes going over what he would be looking for as an adjuster.

So he trained you up.

So, yeah, I've learned something on every adjustment I've been on. I ask questions, I, you know, be nice, cordial, stay out of the way. But every time I've been on an adjustment with an adjuster, I've learned something new.

Yeah, that's great. I love that you shared the embarrassing story. Everybody has one and when I did this meet and greet down in Houston, one of the reps there, he says, you know, my embarrassing story because I told mine. And he says, you know, I think it was his first day in the field. He was doing an addict and attic inspection, and he slipped. He came through the ceiling in the kitchen. Luckily, he was okay. The guy that was training with him caught him, but they put a hole clean in the kitchen, and he said that the son was in there of the household, was in there, like, cooking himself a meal or preparing a meal. And all of a sudden looks up scared, and sees this dude's leg dangling down. I love it, man. Everyone's got their. Their embarrassing story, and I'll save mine for another day because today is about you. But. So four days. Took you four days to make your first deal, Is that right?

Yeah.

Wildly fast, by the way. Awesome.

And from there, you know, we're just kind of working old storm damage out here because in Minnesota, we haven't really had any real storms in the metro area. There's been some outlier storms, but they're all not very populated. So we're working in the city. And this is when I started implementing some of the things you had your leave behind. Letters. Sending letters in the mail. And I got onto a block there, and these are all pretty big houses, you know, 25 to 35 square roofs, steep nine, 10 pitches, nine to 10 pitch roofs. And complicated. Well, I got onto a block where I signed up. One guy got my sign in his yard. Two days later, I get a call from another guy. Hey, I got your letter in the mail, and I saw your sign over my neighbor's yard. Can you come take a look at my door, at my. At my roof? Look at his guy. Next day, I got a call from the person next door to him, then a call from the person next door to them, and then call from the person next door to them. All from your multi touch stuff, you know, knocking on the door, leaving a letter, sending a letter in the mail, all of that. And then a couple blocks away, I had, you know, run into the old no soliciting sign. And I had made the mistake once of knocking on a no soliciting door in that neighborhood and just got chewed out. So I was like, all right, well, I have this awesome leave behind letter. I can leave. So I'm not knocking on the door, bothering him. Leave the letter, get a call the next day. Hey, I really appreciate that you didn't knock on my door. Could you come take a look at my Roof for me.

You never shared that one with me.

Man.

Thanks for Lucian.

That's great.

And it's. You know, even today, I was on Instagram and I see someone bragging on their story, and it was a picture of a no soliciting sign with the ladder set up, and there's this badge of honor for people that are like, they had no soliciting, but I still got the sale. And there's this mindset of, like, grind or die. And I know that it works sometimes, but it's just disrespectful, you know, for the times. Like, when you got chewed out, you were like, I respect people. Oops, mistake. Let's not do that. You know, it is people's homes, after all. So I love that you were respectful. You got a call, it was an easy, hot lead, and the guy already liked you out of the gate.

Kudos. That was really nice. His sign is one of the. I mean, it was a funny. No soliciting said, you know, don't knock. Don't make it awkward.

That's good.

But this guy, come to find out he had tried the year before to do a claim, but State Farm, who has been kind of difficult lately, just flat out denied him. So I told him, well, you know, that's something we kind of specialize in, is. Yeah, showing all the damage that's there and getting your claims approved if we feel they're valid. So we went through the process. State Farm came out, the guy went up there, said there was no damage. We said, well, we don't agree with that. We asked for a reinspection. There was actually a shingle that had been blown off and a roof vent. And these are on discontinued shingles. So you can't replace just one part of them. You got to replace them all. So this guy is, like, head over heels happy now that he's getting a new roof after having, you know, tried fighting it for a year through a different company who had not gotten where he wanted to be. Wow.

It's amazing how some of these things work out. And then the funniest part is when you help someone who really needs help, they love you. So I got to ask you now, now that you, you know, you are getting this momentum and having success, what's more rewarding? And be honest, is it the money or is it help? Is it the pat on the back? I'm just curious what your perspective is.

I like them both. I'm in it for both. I love being out and talking to people. I love getting a roof Replaced. For someone that needs their roof replaced, especially we pay tens of thousands of dollars in home insurance throughout our lifetime. So when it needs to be used and it's a legitimate reason to use it, it's great, you know, so. And yeah, the money isn't bad either.

It's wild. I'm glad you answered both, by the way. I. I mean, anyone. So many people, like, it's all about the money and it's like it's not. The money is definitely there. But at some point, especially once, you know, once you have cash in the bank, the motivation changes. It does. I mean, I was sharing this when I was on Dimitri's channel Roofing Insights. You reach a point that you need a greater challenge and a greater why. But believe me, at first I know what it's like to be broke, you know, and then struggling. And I can't imagine, you know, if you just did so 122 and a half years. So at your old incomes, supporting two children, I mean, I can't imagine there was a whole lot of cash left over for lifestyle to things were there?

I mean, we weren't like broke, but it was, you know, like most Americans, paycheck to paycheck, maybe enough in the bank to cover a few months if something happened. But yeah, I kind of. I grew up extremely, extremely poor. Like my parents, neither of them finished high school. They didn't. They didn't own their own home or anything. So I kind of learned how to save and pinch and scrimp and do everything I could. So, you know, we weren't living badly. My wife, funny enough, is a massage therapist.

I know what that's like.

So, you know, we had the dual incomes, but yeah, this is. I mean, at this point I told her she can cut back to part time or if she doesn't want to work at all, she doesn't have to, which is nice for her to have that option. And we'll be able to actually go on a family vacation, which we've only done once, and that was for my daughter's Make a Wish trip when she was younger, so. So now we actually get to go on a real family vacation, which will be awesome.

Yeah. My Lucian, my. My heart goes out to you. And to be able to provide that for your family, like, that's what it's about.

You can make all the money in the world, but it's about having the. It's about using it in a way that's meaningful and providing the opportunity and. And you deserve it.

And.

I'm Speechless, man. I just want to say.

So my dad, he was a painter, so he grew up, you know, interior, exterior painting, up and down roofs all the time. Well, a little over three years ago, he fell off a roof and completely shattered his elbow to the point where it took 10 surgeries for them to repair it. So he lives with us now and he's kind of forced retired, which he doesn't like, but it's kind of nice. We got a built in babysitter and the kids like having grandpa around. Right. But it's kind of nice because I'm going to be able to buy him a new vehicle, which he's never had a brand new vehicle. So we're going to surprise him with getting him a new vehicle because he drives around a 1999 Ford Escape that more rust than car. Wow.

I'm going to make sure that this putt doesn't publish till after the gift has been given so there's no chance of a spoiler. Unreal. You know, hearing what you're doing in your why to do this. To provide for family and to take care of your dad and just to do right by people and enjoy life and clearly you're taking care of customers the right way. Should be an inspiration for everybody. I know it's an inspiration for me, that level of generosity, man, just kudos. And not that you're doing it for this reason, but it comes back around. It really does.

There was a lot of times, you know, being younger, growing up that others generosity helped us. So it's kind of one of those want to give back, put back out good into the world. Yeah.

Just amazing. Just amazing. Lucian. So if you were to look back at yourself, getting started and you could be your own coach, what would you tell yourself to help yourself succeed even faster and do even more from the very beginning.

Get Adam's battle pack right away, not a couple months into it.

Thank you. I didn't ask with the knowing this answer for whatever it's worth, but thank you for saying that. I'm very honored.

I mean, that really did change a lot. You know, seeing the different, you know, before it was just knock on the door, no one's there. Okay, well, I guess keep going. Now it's knocking on the door. Oh, no one's there. Leave a letter. Send a letter in the mail. Follow up next time in the neighborhood. So that's really helped change a lot and you know, learning the different, different ways to overcome the objections throughout your sales processes and it's, you know, there's always Room for other people's advice when you're doing it. So I really take in as much advice as you can and put to use whatever you're comfortable with using.

I love it. What's fantastic advice? You know, use what works. Don't reinvent the wheel. And the key thing is be efficient with the time. You know, you mentioned knocking the door, leaving a letter, signing the letter in the mail. I wish I'd learned all that sooner. The amount of gas, money, time, days, feeling like nothing was accomplished. Before we wrap it up, is there any advice that you'd leave with anyone who is watching today or listening that you feel could inspire them? I mean, I don't care if you've been in the business for two weeks or two years or two decades. We all have things to learn from each other. You've covered a lot of ground in a very short period. And that perspective we often lose. So I'd love to hear from it. What advice would you leave someone in your shoes? If you were having new guys join your company, what would you tell them?

Be persistent, be friendly, and just be personable. If you're those three things, you're going to succeed. There's always going to be hail damage, storm damage, retail roofs that need to be sold. You know, everyone has a roof over their head, and that's what protects their home. So as long as you're personable and persistent, you're going to succeed. Sometimes it may take a little longer, sometimes it may come sooner. It really depends on where you're at in the sales cycle at the moment. But I think anyone who can talk to people can do this.

I love that. And I told you that was gonna be the last question. But what you just said inspired just one more. You said to be persistent because it is a matter of time till you experience success. And I find that a lot of reps, the biggest mistake is quitting too soon and not giving it enough time. I use the analogy that it's like trying to push, like a concrete ball up a mountain.

And.

And all you got to do is get past the peak. It's this hardest part, getting started. Once you do, the momentum carries. Like you mentioned, calls from neighbors, calls from neighbors, calls from letters. And it just all of a sudden it blows up. But it is so hard when you're in the thick of it, pushing it uphill. So I got a wonky finger. Don't go straight pushing uphill. How do you keep yourself motivated through the times? In the tough times, either personal or days where you don't get traction. Like, what's the. What's the fuel that Lucian taps into to keep. Keep that level of persistence high?

Mine's probably a two part, two part answer. The first part that keeps me going is my family. You know, I'm doing this to provide for them, make a better life for them so my kids will have a better life than I have, and so on and so forth. The second thing, you know, I just got my first actual commission check because the way we pay out is at the end of projects once they're done. So, you know, I had to keep looking. You know, this sold back in April. It's now July, so it took a while, but I knew it was coming. But now they're all starting to come in a pile. So it's really. Don't get down on yourself in the beginning when the money's not coming in right away. You know, most companies will let you take a draw. I had luckily built up enough to where I didn't need to go into that. But when it starts to hit, it's life changing. I mean, even a small job commission is. You know, once you hit, if you hit profit commission, it's. It's nice.

Yeah. Yeah.

It changes things. I always say roofing sales is like a drug. Your first hit is free, and then you're hooked. And that hit is the commission check hitting your account and being like, I got to be out in the field with people solving problems, not in an office.

Yeah.

And that's what happened. Where do I get more?

Exactly. So, yeah, watch the watch. You know, I never really paid much attention to the weather other than is it going to be snowing or is it going to be cold in the middle of winter? Now every night I'm like, all right, did we get hail? Oh, that's. That's on a lake 200 miles north where there's only five. Okay, I guess we're not going there. But you become kind of the weatherman's follower now. I follow quite a few weather people now.

It changes things, doesn't it? Changes your perspective on everything. All right, I've lied. I've lied twice. It's truly what we're gonna close on. What was your biggest breakthrough in roofing sales?

Just getting that first sale. Once you get that first sale, that first contingency signed, then I went, all right, yeah, I can do this. This isn't that hard. You know, I can talk to people. I can do this. Yeah, let's do this. I don't need to go back to the old job and ask for my job back. I'm good.

That's awesome. Competence breeds confidence. Thanks for sharing that, Lucian. Lucien, thank you again for being here, and you've inspired me. I'm sure you've inspired others. So appreciate your time, and I'm really looking forward to hearing about the rest of this year and what's to come.

All right. Thanks, Adam.