Chris Prefontaine teaches agents how to ask sellers about their mortgage to structure creative deals. The key is sequencing: explore owner financing or lease options first, then ask about the mortgage. When sellers object that you don't need to know, explain that mortgage data is public and necessary to tailor financing structures.
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Are you in a hurry to get the cash out? Do you need the cash out, or do you have time if you got your number? Something like that. He said, "No, I don't need the money." Like he was very clear. I definitely do not. If they come back at you, usually they're not motivated. If they say you don't need to know that, but John brought this up and said, "John, how'd you say to me? You got it throws you off a little bit if they say you don't need to know that." Is that how you said it?
Yeah, I kind of— I've heard it so much, like when I start really starting to hammer them with some of those questions, the tougher questions that, I don't know, it seems to almost shut the call down for me a little bit too quick. So I actually kind of backed off a little bit and kind of save it for maybe the next follow-up, you know, to dive a little bit deeper. I don't know if, you know, that's the right thing to do either, but—
Well, if you guys want, we can roleplay a little bit. Does everybody Does anyone else feel that way when they get asked or pulled back? Kyle? Steve?
Okay.
Oh, I definitely do. Yeah. Okay. So why don't we— okay, we gotta sit on this then a little bit. No question about it. So a couple things. First of all, from a time standpoint, when they're not interested, you should be off that phone within 1 to 4 minutes. You should know. You should be able to ask the questions and know they're not interested and move on. I had several yesterday. One guy was just like thinking the world was against him, and I my opinion was he's never ever in a million years going to do anyone with anyone anything with anyone creative. So I just killed him. If they're interested, is ten minutes a long call? Not really. I've I sometimes you guys see my calls, and I think one went in the teens. If they're interested, I want to I want to get to it. And they're gonna take that, probably the 7 to 12. So that's your criteria. When you say to me, hey, I put a long call on this, sorry, but they're interested, I go, good job. We can probably trim it a little bit, but good job. If you say it's a long call I put in there and I find out in 9 minutes they weren't interested, not a good call. So you get there by asking that question. So let's talk a little bit, let's role play a little bit about Mike and Rusty and Rick, about when they say you don't need to know that. Let's start kicking around some things on that script, and then I'll give you my opinion too. I usually just say, it's no problem.
I'm just curious.
I can get— I put that off till later if I need to do that. Is that relative to mortgage, Rick?
Yeah.
Okay. So before you say that, let me just tweak that a little bit for everyone. That's kind of what I say, but I usually precede it when they say, why do you need to know that? Or how'd you get this? Look, everything's public. I can get it later, but I was just trying to speed things up. Let me give you an example by giving you hypothetical numbers. That's all you gotta do. And then it loosens it up. They know you're not, you know, barking down their throat to get their mortgage info. But you also can use the fact is, well, no, I do need it 'cause we buy a few different ways and no matter what, I'm gonna need to know how to structure around the existing financing, but I can get that later. And it's also public knowledge. A couple different scripts for you. Mike and Rusty, anything different or thoughts?
No, that's exactly it. I always say, I do need that information to structure my formal offer to you, but we can get that at a later time. And then just kind of pull back. That way they don't feel like you're really pushing them for information and you can go on to the next subject, right? So great point.
And saying that the way Mike said it and Rick said it confidently though, guys, right? Yeah, I say this all the time. It's more about how you say what you say than what you say, because it's— your confidence comes through the phone tenfold. And the opposite is true too. Um, Rusty, you pretty much hit it, or you got to talk?
Yeah, it's similar. It's just, you know, it's, you know, yeah, I'm gonna need that information, uh, sooner or later, but we can cross that bridge when we get there.
And you just reel with them. Steve, I saw Kyle taking— any thoughts on that or questions on that? We can go deeper.
Yeah, I got a question for you, Chris. I mean, do you bring that up on like on a first call thing when you start asking, you know, do you have a mortgage and stuff like that? They're not expecting that because generally you don't need to know that information when you're buying a house if you're buying it traditionally. Nobody knows that information about what the rate— so right off the bat you're kind of saying, well, I'm buying it non-traditionally, so That's where my problem comes in. They say, why do you need to know that? Because in their head, they're thinking traditional mortgage, traditional bank, you don't need to know this.
Let me hit why that's happening. Okay, I'll use a real call and then I'll go back to yours. Yesterday, I did a follow-up. Guy's name was Leon. Didn't record it. He said he had a fire a year ago, explained to me that it's habitable, said that the realtor was gonna list the next week. So before I got to mortgage, Because then it fixes what you just said. I said, are you in a hurry? He's already moved. Like, he moved a while ago. Are you in a hurry to get the cash out? Do you need the cash out? Or do you have time if you got your number? Something like that. He said, no, I don't need the money. Like, he was very clear. I definitely do not. And I'd rather not listen to a realtor. And my girlfriend was sitting right next to me there on speakerphone, said I was listening too low anyway. So then I said, if you, if you're open to that, then I could buy 2 different ways. And I went through the ways. And then I said, do you have a mortgage? So now I already went through that's creative. If you're doing it before that, you are 100% correct. You asked the questions in the wrong order.
Okay, that makes sense.
My opinion. Coaches, chime in if you want, but that's my opinion. Because I ask right at the beginning, usually, if I can get you to your number, or some of you use, if I can get you to full market, I haven't seen the house yet, but if I can, are you open to owner financing or lease purchase? Only after that would I be asking the mortgage question.
Okay. That makes a lot more sense.
Yeah. So Leon, back to Leon said, sorry, Leon said, yeah, definitely. I said, okay, let me give you an example. Do you know roughly how much you owe? And he gave me a rough amount within a range. I said, okay, perfect. Let me use this. I just rounded it off and then I told him how it works. And that's the one I told Deb we maybe go on it next week together. It just flowed the normal, the normal searches. If you guys look at the lead sheet that was built years ago, The question about the mortgage is not before all those other questions.
