Selling 300 Homes from 1300 Miles Away - Part 2

Welcome back to the Business Freedom Podcast. This is Lars Hedinburg, founder of Real Estate B School. This next series, three part series. I interviewed John Mikish who lives in Bozeman, Montana and his business is in Charlotte, North Carolina. He sells hundreds of homes per year and he works about an hour a week in his real estate business. I had the pleasure of coaching John for a few years since to help him scale out of the daily grind of real estate and the evenings and weekends. And now he has complete freedom from his real estate business. So this is part one and later in the week there'll be part two and part three. This was from an intensive workshop that we held recently for members only. So I'm giving you an inside look into what we share inside our community. If you're at the point in your journey where you know you need help, you know you want to be our next case study. You want to be running your business from 1,000 miles away, working one hour a week, go to rebscasestudy.comrebscasestudy.com and check out our new offering. Maybe you can be our next case study. Stay tuned for part one of this interview with John Mikish.

And then we on the listing side, we had no structure, no accountability at all. So we put the listing appointment tracker in place and the listing inventory balance sheet in place. And these are things that I still have in my business today and still run my business with. So from an accountability standpoint, we got super hyper focused on buyer's agents weekly accountability and we use KDNA to track all their results and we still do to this day. And a lot of people have gone on to fancier and different solutions and I would agree that most of those new solutions look better, but they don't work better. And we keep using KDNA to this day because it works and if it's not broke, we don't fix it. And it's a very reliable solution for us to the point where we can guarantee an agent when they come onto our team how much money they'll make and if they'll sign that guarantee, we can tell them how many phone calls they need to make per week. Because we've been tracking it for so long and our numbers are so tight that we know if they do X, Y and Z right down to how many weekly calls they need to make, that they're going to hit their income goal. And we're willing to guarantee that in writing to match their income goal. And then on the listing agent side, we do our weekly listing meeting and we go over the listing appointment tracker. And I'll be honest, guys, I got away from this for a little bit because some things were going on and there's some transitions happening with my leadership and my leadership at the time convinced me that this was a waste of time and we stopped doing it and immediately our listing stats went, went down. So we went back to it. And you know, the listing appointment tracker meeting is so critical because it's where you check in with your listing. So if right now you're in production and you think you can't get out of production, this is a way that you get out of production because you're able to communicate your skills, your ability, your experience on how you would handle those listings and how you would have said what you said to get them to sign and, and go over every single listing appointment. What happened? Did we get it? Did we not? What were the objections? What did you say to that objection? How did you handle that? All of that is how you train your agents up quickly and transfer that experience from you to them so you guys can continue to get the result without being in production. And then traction. Probably one of the most impactful books that I've ever read in business brought to me by yours truly, Lars. And he shared this with me and it's just how I run my business to this day. So we did like an organizational tune up on the whole company. We put together our strategic plan, we revamped our core values, we improved our organizational communication. We run a weekly executive meeting which is the L10 format. We go over goal setting and we go over key metrics. So this is to this day and then I do all of that in Asana. So that's the way that I manage that is project management software called Asana. And I get my emails and like, so today's Monday. So I know that, you know, my operations manager who's running my company, he's going through and he's having his pipeline call with everybody and he's checking in with everybody. And every Monday I get like a complete pipeline report on every single agent that works for me. And that goes in Asana. And I can read that and I can before I go into my L10 meeting, which we do. Typically I'm not doing it today. I took it off because I'm actually in Florida in my vacation property. But I, I would normally get on a call with him at 3 o' clock Eastern and we would go till 4, 4:30 Eastern. And I come into that call knowing everything that's going on with everybody because of how he updates Asana, and that takes me a few minutes to read in the morning as they come in, and then I'm ready to go into that appointment, advise him, go over our goals, our key metrics, and that's how we run the company. So the crazy thing is it just worked. Like, it really, really worked. And to my surprise, like, you know, one of the things that I love about Lars is, is he so confident in the direction that he's taking you? And I was kind of like, all right, well, I've been doing what I've been doing, and it's been getting me this result, and super excited about what my life, my business looked like. So I'm just going to dispel my belief, and I'm just going to let him tell me what to do, and if it doesn't work, it's his fault. And that's just kind of how I looked at it. And the crazy thing is, it worked, and it, like, really, really worked. But there was something else that I want to explain you guys that I learned through this process. And, you know, Lars is coaching me, and he's got, like, real estate, B school and all the tools, and I'm like, okay, this is, like, really, really important, and I'm going to put these things in place. And some of them were easy, and some of them were not so easy. But it was this concept that leaders don't create followers, they create more leaders. And when I looked at my business prior to working with Lars, it was all about, like, me and the production and, like, how I would help people. But they were really following me. They weren't becoming leaders of their own. And one of the things that Lars did is he exposed me to Brendon Burchard. 2018, 2019. I went to High Performance Academy, I think six different times. Even became a certified High Performance coach with them, because I wanted skills to be able to become a real leader and build leaders within my team. And I saw that Lars was doing that. I was watching him create leaders through people like Stacy Peterson, and just the change that was happening before my eyes. And when I looked at his organization and mine, mine being, hey, I'm copycat. I'm following everything you're telling me to do. But his was further down the road. He had more leaders in his business than me, and that's what was giving him the leverage and the freedom. So I was like, I need to be a leader that creates other leaders. And that became something that was really a byproduct to what I thought I was signing up for with Lars, that really, really impacted my. My business and my life to this day. And, you know, you gotta, once, once you walk the walk, you talk to talk. You gotta walk the walk. So I got this crazy idea and I was like, my business is totally leveraged. Like, I don't need to be there day to day, but I am there day to day. So we said, what if we just tested the model and really, really left. So we got this crazy idea. We bought this van outfit it. We were going to go visit all the national parks in the United States and Alaska and then end on the last one and go to Hawaii and do the national park there. So that was our goal. I think we got through 26, 27 national parks before COVID hit. But we traveled the country for 14 months. Really didn't have a stop date. But while we were traveling, we went all over these places and guys, just so you know, there's no, no amount of money that could, like, replace that. Like, there's no climbing the ladder further, selling more homes, making more money that, that could have been more important for me than this, in this life, at this time of my life. Like, I unfortunately lost my dad at this time. Like, like to have the freedom and the luxury to completely unplug and have this experience because of some coaching and some people that invested into my life to help me get there where I couldn't get on my own. This is why you have to do it. You can't not put these things in place and operate a business that depends on you, where you can't pass the bus test because you could die tomorrow. And what are you going to leave your family with? What are you, like, if I die tomorrow, my wife could continue running this company at a high level. And that's because of the leverage that we put in. So I just encourage you, like, there's something that you got to work on right now. There's. There's a real estate b school tool that you need to focus on as your next thing and just get that in place. Because once you get there and you have true leverage, it's unlike anything else. So we were traveling the country and we found this crazy town called Bozeman, Montana. Before we had ever watched Yellowstone on Netflix or anything like that. And we were just like, wow, it's like, so amazing here. And we fell in love with it and we just decided we can run this business from here. And we moved to Montana. So that was August of last year. It's an amazing place. We absolutely love it. Most people think we're crazy, but we love the snow and we love the cold. And when it's summer, it's just unbelievable there. But we're still selling houses. My company's probably running better today than it was running when I was still there and I was, like, there but not needed. It forces you to do the right things in your business when you only look into it for an hour to an hour and a half a week. It forces you to be focused on the decisions that really matter and not get caught up in all the busyness. It doesn't really do anything. So that's what we do. We do it on Monday. I'm definitely available to my manager the rest of the week. You know, if he needs me, he'll call me or text me. You know, he might call me, like, if he's thinking about letting somebody go and just talk through that with me. But it's pretty rare, and it's not uncommon for him to call me and me to get back to him, like, within 24 hours. Like, it's not immediate. So that's really my story. That's where I'm at right now. I've established multiple pillars of income. Lars has helped me not only do this in real estate, but take these things that I've learned in real estate. And I run L10 meetings for other businesses that I have, too. And it's been awesome. I work less today than I've ever worked, and I make far more money than I've ever made. And that's really, I think, what we're all after. Like, when you look at a coaching company, you shouldn't want to do coaching because you want to sell more houses, because I promise you, there's not a number of houses that you can sell that's going to make you happier, that's going to make your life better, and certainly not the life that you have with your family better. So be focused on where that ladder is leaning while you're climbing it and what's important to you. Get really clear on what's important to you. Because my business goals might be different than Lars's business goals might be different than yours. But I got crystal clear on, like, what I wanted my lifestyle to look like, and I made my business serve that lifestyle, not the other way around. Awesome.

So this is a really good opportunity to ask questions of someone that's been through the journey. If you can unshare your screen. And then I definitely have questions.

Yeah.

So it's been a while since I've heard you tell your story in this way. What do you think? I mean, most people come into real estate B school and they have. How big Were you in 2000? Whichever year you came in, what the team looked like.

When I came in in 2015, we were doing 50. We did 50. We went from 53 million and then the first year we coached, we went to 82 and a half million. So we, we almost doubled in size because our price point actually went down that year. So, like transactionally it was like almost doubling. But we went up in profitability with that production increase too, because we just made some hard decisions and. And we were like, hey, we're not going to pay out 50% on the listing side anymore and we're going to pay out 25%, but it's going to be great. And it was great. So it just allowed us to do things like that.

How much of the 50 million or so was your personal production?

That last year where we did 53 million and I was in production, it was like, like 15 to 17 million of that was personal production. Like, there was a couple appointments that I didn't really count towards personal production, but I was still sort of involved. Like, they called me constantly, even though I sent Andrew out on the appointment. But yeah, it was like 15 to 17 million, depending on how you quantify it.

So. Question from Derek. If you were starting over, what's the first tool you would implement?

Starting over from scratch? I would just get any, any CRM or platform that was available to you. I wouldn't really be super particular about which one it is. It's like the one you have to work. Like, I think I thought about this a lot, like during COVID where, like, we didn't know what direction this was going to go. There was just like that two weeks of like, is real estate even going to exist anymore? And I was like, man, I could take this thing down to the platform and like, no office space, no anything else. And, and I think we could just make enough money and everybody could continue to go business as usual. It would look different, but I think the first thing I would need is a platform and I would work that platform.

Awesome question around. Check in with the entire team. So you do that one call, but what do you do with the entire team? And then how do you facilitate team culture?

Yeah, so I don't, I don't talk to the team. I facilitate team culture through my operations manager. There's at this point maybe two or three people on my team of 18 people that would even think to like reach out to me with a call or a text. Most of the people are new. I went back to my office in September of last year because we had going out to the end and half the people in the room had never met before and had never talked to. So one of the things that we do like in our organizational structure is we built a company and we started the company and my manager is very clear about that and edifies us well but the structure is in place and he is there for them. And, and my, one of my leadership mistakes that I made in the past was like I wanted to feel important and feel like I was available to them and they could come to me. But I was also trying to put another leader in place to, to lead and run them on the day to day and that created some conflict where sometimes they would go to him and not like the answer and then come to me and I wouldn't know that they had gone to him. So it would just create like dissension and like you know, it doesn't make my other leader feel valued. They go to, they go to Jamie for everything now and he's their leader, he's their guy. And what's crazy is I'll share this. I got this text a couple of weeks ago so one of the three people that might still reach out to me is Kim Butler because she's like a close personal friend of Jennifer and I and, and she lived near us but she sent us, she sent us a text and I gotta find it. So good. She said this was not last Monday but the Monday before. She said good morning. I hope all is great with you guys again. I know you know this but really need to share. Jamie is truly a blessing to me and Roost. He has taken the Roost team to a whole new level. As you are aware, the market is challenging right now and it is Jamie's guidance and encouragement that is steering the ship in a positive direction. Hope to see you guys sometime this spring. Like when, when you get, when you have a leader that's running your company at that level and I feel like that leader is not going to show up until you become the leader that's going to attract that leader. And I believe that the way, the reason he's able to do that well at his job is because I give him the respect and the authority to run that company. If he wants to let somebody go, it's his decision. Like we've made it so that the, the compensation plan we're so mutually aligned that you would think he's an owner of that company if you went there and he's not. And we can talk about that comp plan and, like, how we structured that if that's where the direction of where this call goes.

Well, let me ask you a question before that. So. So how important was. Was the vision you had for the. For the business and your role in it, in achieving it? Like, so. So I feel like, you know, you'll. You'll work with buyers as long as you're. You're going to let that commitment go. Yeah, right. So I committed to not working with buyers. I will never work with a buyer. It doesn't matter if you come into town, you have $10 million of cash, and you're going to buy a property. Today. I made a commitment to not work with buyers. It's not happening.

Yeah.

So how much of it was like, this is my vision and it is happening?

Well, we had a conversation once, and, you know, I was probably showing up at that conversation thinking, like, hey, this thing's 80%. Like, tell me what to do in what order to do it in. And you came back to me and were like, this is 80% between your ears. Like, until you decide to do this, you're never going to do this. So I think it's probably like, you have to be 100% all in. And I've seen some people get so close to being out of production, and then that $2 million buyer comes in and they're back in it. Not only does that. Does that communicate the wrong thing to your family and your own psychology, but what does that say to your people? Like, I'm out, and you guys can have all this, but if this good thing comes in, I'm going to take it. Like, I love giving my agents those big deals. And we've had this past year, we've had several new agents start and, like, right out of the gate doing $1.52 million deals up at Lake Norman. And I love that. Like, I think everybody should get the same opportunity. And that's one of the things that. That I've. I really made sure in my business that, hey, everybody here gets treated the same. Yeah, we're going to feed the hungry, and if you get after it, you're going to have some extra opportunity. But that's very clearly spelled out. But we don't. Nobody cherry picks at my office. Everybody gets into the opportunity, gets up to speed, and everybody has the same opportunity.

So let's talk about Megan has a question. So her name is in her brokerage, so Foss or fast results.com as challenging as leads request her. And so there's, there's differing opinions on this, like, do you take your name out of it or do you just work with scripts or, you know, there are businesses where you can't get in touch, like McDonald's, you can't go into.

McDonald's and like, I want to talk.

To the McDonald's brothers. I'm furious.

Well, that was my point. It was like, you know, there's that school of thought that says people do business with a person, not a brand. Yet the biggest brands that we have are Apple, Amazon, McDonald's, Walmart. And I'm like, well, the name's not in there. And I just think that if you give somebody an avenue to get at you, there's always going to be those people that want to go right to the top, that want to deal right with the decision maker. And you're that person if you put it in there. So, you know, it's, it's probably a more lengthy discussion. But change your name because at the end of the day, we talk about this all the time. Nobody cares about the name of your business. Like, they're doing business with you because you're doing things to put yourself in front of them at the right time through marketing. And you know, we were talking about this the other day, but like, prior to the Internet, like we could have a conversation about brand and name being significant in a marketplace because, like, people see it and they associated with it. But now when, you know, 90 plus percent of the people are going to the Internet to start that process and most of it's unbranded on there anyway. It doesn't matter.

Yeah. And I would say there are risks in thinking that that is the way to get you out of it. So it doesn't need to be. So I was at a production. We were the large group for, I don't know, 2012. January was my last time I was in production. And then we weren't hprea until January. So five years we ran as a large group and I didn't do any production. And so most of it is mindset. I just, I wouldn't say lead with a name change is that's going to be the thing. It's just like Dave was sharing it with us earlier. Like, I'm John's business partner.

Yeah.

So the reason why, like you don't need to talk to John is like, I'm his partner.

Right. I'm in that position and being okay with like. So let's say it's, you know, John Mikish real estate, and I get myself out of production and out of that day to day, and I have a good gatekeeper. Well, you just gotta be okay at the end of the day with not pleasing everybody because you're never gonna please everybody anyway. So, like, if somebody wants to get you and you have a good gatekeeper, then just set the rules and that and the expectations that you have for your team. And if somebody wants you and they can't get you and they go somewhere else, be okay with that.

Yeah. CC has a question. So being your own broker, being your broker and your own brokerage and being the broker or keeping it with another brokerage, it's really a question of value. So there aren't many brokerages that have a decent value exchange. So the reason you went independent and since I've gone to exp was when you left, was it KW? No. ReMax.

ReMax?

Yeah. You left RE MAX to go independent. The value exchange was not there. You didn't feel like a good value exchange, right?

Yeah, it was actually hurting me. We had. We had a very large REMAX office that I was a part of. And I was branding myself as the Micah team at that REMAX office. And what I was coming up against with more often than not was trying to convey the difference in working with me, a REMAX agent, then working with their past agent who was a REMAX agent that they had a bad experience with. So I was looking for complete differentiation where they couldn't put me into a bucket of mediocre agents. And we were saying, this is what we do and how we do it. And that's why we. We left ultimately, because we didn't see any value. We actually saw the value being it was hurting us to continue to be at REMAX at that time.

Yeah, Chris has a question about. I'm not really sure. So was there a person who was with you in 2015 that you would ever have considered partnering with, elevating them in the role and as lead agent and split profits or higher splits, rewarding in some way?

So through. Through a lot of circles and conversations and, and ideas. I don't believe in partnerships. The only person I'm going to ever have a contract with on this earth is my wife. And that's. That's the end of that story. So not saying that people can't have them, that's just my belief. And I think, you know, part of this conversation needs to be the understanding that you have to create your business. And everybody on this call is a different person with a different personality with different circumstances. Like, that's just where every time I went down the idea of a partnership, it got messy and unclear and just didn't make sense. So for me, like, I like simple. Less is more. I want more life, less clutter. And business partnerships are a lot of clutter for me. So I'll tell you this too. From 2015 to now, there's not one person that was at my company in 2015 that's with me now. And yet it continues to produce very consistently. I have some people from 2016 that are still with me now, but nobody from 2015. And I had people that I invested a lot in and I continued to enhance their, their compensation in order for doing the same thing in hopes that by giving them more, they would be more bought in and stay. And it never worked out that way. I either had the right person and the comp was fine, but increasing the comp didn't get me more from that person. And I think that people are with you for a reason for a season, and some people are with you for a lifetime. And it's all those, all of those options are good. Like, I coach with some people for a reason. I coach with some people for a season, and some people I coach with I feel like I'm going to be friends with for the rest of my life. And that's just the way it is. Like, there's not an answer to that that's going to serve all of you because it's all different. But I would just be very weary of the partnership because if we start asking ourselves the question, why do we want to partner with this person? It's also because we think that the partnership is going to solve a pain point that we have in our business that we haven't addressed because we haven't put processes and systems or comp plans in place to solve that problem. And we think just partnering is going to be the end all easy solution. And more often than not, it creates more pain and hardship.

Yeah. And the reality of it, it's over 80% of business partnerships overall fail. So even if there was a good reason to dissolve a business partnership, I was in a business business partnership and I decided to step out of it on good terms. There was no bad sort of breakup. It just ended. You know, And I feel like people, like you said, try to solve a problem in the business by partnering with someone, and that is like the worst you Know, unless there are obvious superpowers, you know, where you, you can. Each two, you know, two plus two really does equal five or six then.

And Jennifer Hollister said, partnership is trust. And I agree. That's why I want to just have a partnership with my wife. But it's more than trust. It's, it's, it's, yeah, it's trust, but it's also the direction of your life. So you're not going to want to run your business at the same intensity and same level forever. Like, at some point you're going to want to make less and do less, or maybe at some point you're going to want to sell that business or you're just going to want to take it in a different direction. When I was, before I got into real estate and I was, I was running this interior design company and we had four different investors. It was like four different partners all wanting to go in different directions at different times. And I saw the pain that that created. It created a divorce in one, in one case. And I just think that if you're in a partnership today, what's it going to be like in 15 years? If you want to retire? If you've hit all your income goals and you've saved and you're able to retire and that person doesn't want to retire. Like, everybody that I've ever known in real estate that has a partnership, that partnership is either ended or is currently in trouble without exception. So that's just, that's enough for me. That was enough evidence for me.

So a couple of questions about Jamie, probably in particular, how do you choose that leader, experience and skill set, and how do you compensate them and have them feel like they have ownership?

Okay, so having a leader like that in your company is a big deal. So you want to, you want to try to have as much information and knowledge about that person as possible. And you probably need to build that position out in such a way that there's some trial periods and some targets along the way that if you achieve this, it'll look like that, and if you don't, it'll look like this. So Jamie, Jamie and I have a. Have a special relationship. Spiritually connected, financially, business wise, connected. And he came into my life at just the right time. And I felt like I could, I could work with him. I felt like I could explicitly. Like, I don't worry about my office when I'm not there. I don't worry about the right thing being done at all. Like, I know he'll do the Right thing. I trust him as much as I would trust anybody I could have in that role. And the person that I had in that role before him, I also trusted and I trusted to that extent. And I believe that if you, if you can't trust the person that you're going to bring into that role, irregardless of a lot of other factors, you cannot have them in that role. Like they need to go tomorrow. Like, if you wouldn't just turn your back and expect that they would take care of your business just like you would, then they're not the right person. And there's people out there now, compensation wise, I look at like, what's a market based wage for the role? I like to be generous. So if a market based wage for the role is, let's just say it's 100,000, well then how can I make enough money scale my business enough to where I can pay that person150 as an example? Because if I can pay him generously, he's not always looking over the other fence to see what there is out there. And then I say to myself, okay, what is it that we need to obtain? How many contracts do we need to do? What's the objective in order for me to make sure that that 150 isn't hurting me and I'm okay with it. So what profit do I expect to get out of the business for my time? How am I going to cover his expense? And what is it that I'm looking to do scale wise? So I look at it like the comp. So the comp plan that I have for Jamie is right Now, Jamie makes $150,000 a year. He has a BMW lease that I pay for. And the insurance, he has a boat club membership that I pay for. So you can go out and in Lake Norman on any boat. And the reason that I think those things are important is because when my guy gets in his car every morning and goes to the office, he's driving a car that makes him happy. And every day when he gets done working and he's stressed out and he just wants to go home and like relax, he's getting in that car. That makes him happy. And he's a car guy. So like he's exceedingly happy about this. But I also want to bring in the wife and I want them to have experiences because they're working for me that they wouldn't maybe get for themselves. Like, I know Jamie wouldn't go out and buy a boat or a boat club membership for himself. Like, he would just, he would just not do that for himself. But because I did it every weekend that he goes out and he's with his wife, they're thinking, man, I love working at Roots. Like, it's just amazing. Like, I love what John does for me. And those things don't cost a lot. So, like the bm, the BMW lease and the boat club membership, both, both of those things will cost me less than $15,000 a year. And I promise you, they have way more impact than if I were to give them an extra 25,000 a year. It's like stickiness. So I like some component of the compensation package being an experiential component because they're not going to want to give up that experience to go somewhere else. And then we have goals, we have goals for the company. So, you know, our goal for the company this year is that we do 100 million in sales and we're on track to do that. And if we do that, and along the way, each quarter we have different bonuses based on our production, on what it's going to take to get us there. So if he just crushes it this quarter, he could make an additional five or $10,000 cash bonus. If we hit our $100 million goal, he'll get a bump in his annual salary compensation next year. And none of those things are going to hurt me because if we do the things that he gets paid extra on, it means that I'm making more money and I'm willing to share a portion of that with him in order to do that.

If you enjoyed the interview with John Meikish and you want to learn more about how he got the results that he, he was able to achieve, go to rebscasestudy.com we actually have a new program that we just launched. It allows you to work with us risk and, and cost free. Yeah, no risk, no money to get to work with us. Go to rebscasestudy.com for more information. And really it's just a conversation about your business, where you are today, where you want to be in the future. And then we'll plug you into our case study program and see the results that you'll get. So go to rebscasestudy.com and we'll see you over there. Thanks for listening to the Business Business Freedom Podcast. If you're getting value from the podcast, would you please leave us a five star review and share it with others who might benefit from the content I'm sharing? And if you're ready to scale your real estate business sustainably and profitably. There are a couple options for you. If you're doing under 500,000 in annual GCI, our business foundations Program is for you. Head over to get businessfoundations.com that's get business foundations and learn how you can make the shift from overwhelmed real estate agent to true business owner. If you're doing more than 500,000 in annual Team GCI, there's our graduate program designed for top producers and team leaders who want to grow their team and scale their business. If that's you, go to realestatebschool.com and apply for a free Business Growth Strategy session. No matter where you are your business growth journey, we have the tools, systems, strategies, training and coaching to get you where you want to be. Remember, only you can create your future, so take action now.