List $95,000 Lower, Net More: The Net Sheet That Proves It | Steve D. Valentine

If you're a real estate agent and the playbook seems to be broken, something that I've learned over 27 years, I could go to a listing appointment and show the seller that they could net more money by listing $95,000 less than where they start. It's not a sale, it's a strategy. Today we're gonna create income over earn income in the real estate business. Look, if you're a real estate agent and the playbook seems to be broken and the industry just is constantly regurgitating the same shit and the gurus are telling you to do more rather than less. I'm gonna show you how to do less and earn more right here, right now. Let's get into it. Would you believe me if I said that I could go to a listing appointment and show the seller that they could net more money by listing $95,000 less than where they start? You see, on my call, Bill Not Bought, this week, we broke down a couple of different net sheets. And what we did was we used the net sheet to show the cost of overpricing the house. And it's a mathematical way to really show the seller that, hey, If you decide to do this in this market, it's gonna cost you X amount in price reductions, X amount in cost, X amount in repairs. And then there's a dollar value for motivation after there's so many days on market and the condition of the house. So this is how we're going to create income and opportunity in every appointment. And it's something that I've learned over 27 years. And what's awesome about it is it will change your career and allow you to do less with more and with better people. So if you're looking again to change your life, join me on Wednesdays. The link's down below. Built Not Bought. Uh, get into our community call for real estate agents. It's an amazing place of ideation and storytelling and a way that you can learn different ideas to apply to your business and your personality for what works for you so that you can define your own version of success. So what I did was I took a call and I took a property randomly from MLS, and this property is shown here. So when you look at it, the seller wanted $635,000. That was their Zillow guesstimate, Zillow guesstimate, right? And then you get into what my opinion was, which theirs was $635,000. My opinion was $540,000. And then there's the creative option. And I'm not talking about creative financing, I'm talking about create income option, which is the opportunity option that most of us miss for a couple of reasons. And we'll get there in just a second. So when we're sitting at the table and we're talking to the seller and they're, they're telling you all the reasons that their house is worth $635,000. And based on what they've seen and based on their ideas, and you're going through all this conversation and then, you know, at that time they, they're, they're in the wrong place. So you wanna ask them a lot of questions. And then when you get to the point of, great, you have all that information. Now you want to be able to digest it away from the kitchen table. When you digest it away from the kitchen table, you're gonna truly take your opinion and you're gonna formulate a new math problem to show them a side-by-side comparison. So you're gonna use the net sheet to prove a financial fact. So when you create a net sheet and you show them at $635,000, based on the market and the average reductions in the current market is about a 10% price reduction. Mm-hmm. By the time the house sells. So on the net sheet, you start at $635,000 and now you have a line item of price reduction, $60,000. And then you have another line item because it was in the MLS that the roof's in original condition, another $20,000. And you start working your way down. And then what we usually miss is the seller's mortgage payment and holding costs in this. So the cost of overpricing the house in this situation is a holding cost of $3,500 a month. So if they try their $635 for 3 months, which they did, they've paid $9,000 to hold on to that higher price that they didn't get. So now they're $9,000 plus the reduction in the hole. So every month they go by, it's a reduction rather than sitting down with somebody and saying, look, with these math problems you have, it's outdated and it's a clean outdated, but it's still outdated. Yeah. $635,000 to $650,000 because the Zillow guesstimate is really showing them more of a renovated price. So that's an ARV or an after repair value price. Well, when you move through that, as you can see here, and you tip it over with all these reductions, it comes down to a $540,000 list price, which would look below market, but it's actually at market for the current condition it's in. And so now you're below pricing it, which is probably going to create maybe some multiple offers, might be a little bit of confusion, still not certainty at the $540,000 number, but much more certainty that you can sell this house in 30 days. So what would you rather do? Would you rather take a house and sit on the market for 90 days and be frustrated with the seller, frustrating calls, frustrating text message? By the way, this house is vacant. All the pieces that are happening, right? Right. Or would you rather have a straight up conversation and say, This is my opinion. We may disagree, but let me show you the facts and how I got to this conclusion. Not my gut feeling. It's not a sale. It's a strategy. So through the math strategy, you show them here's the difference. And what's interesting on this is that after 6 months of holding costs, after $60,000 in reductions, after repairs, after all the what-ifs versus listing it at $540,000, they would have a net difference of $50,000 higher listing at $540,000. Than they would at $635,000. It's crazy math, but when you take all that stuff out, you're not dealing with realistic numbers. But now you are when you show them the math. But here is where we're going to create. So we just earned income by proving the fact and showing that this is what this model is and this is what your net could be. Now we're going to do one step further and we're just going to simply show them the easy button, which is where we're going to create income. This is where a cash offer comes in. Now, some of you As real estate agents are probably getting nervous, like, I can't offer cash, our brokerage doesn't allow it, all the pieces. That's fine. Some of you may not be able to do this, and that's okay. If you aren't, you should consider moving real estate brokerages. If you need a recommendation, click the link below. So here's where we are now. We're going to offer an opportunity for somebody to press a button. We're not saying we're going to come buy your house cash. This is all the options we have. Take it or leave it. We're simply showing them the factual numbers. From path A, which is their Zillow guesstimate, our market facts and proof through data, not emotion. Now we're just gonna take the same facts and say, what if? Is this an option? Because what happens if we don't know enough about the story, or we do know enough about the story and where they are, they might not need as much money out of the house. And they may have an inheritance and may have something you don't know about. But if we don't offer it, then they can't choose it. So now we have these two numbers, which this may offend you. You might have gotten punched in the throat by now, but that's okay because you didn't want the higher price listing. You might have offended somebody, but you're not offending them. You're simply offering them an option and an opportunity to work with you. Do I need to repeat that? You're simply offering them an opportunity to work with you because you are the expert in this. And this is the opinion that you have, and it may be right or wrong, but it's yours and it's theirs to say yes or no to. And it's your job to figure out like, is this the quality person that I wanna work with? And if they wanna list it 80 grand overpriced, you probably don't wanna work with that unless you want a career in how many listings you took without selling. And last time I checked, that's not a good stat. So moving on to the creative side, We get to creative. This is where the fun is. This is where your career changes. This is where your ability to create wealth changes. This is where your ability to get out of the rat race of trying to sell yourself. This is where you get out of the rat race of starting to understand how investment principles apply to people's day-to-day life and understanding that there's only one thing standing between you and offering this. And it's your ability to be confident in your numbers and your ability to be confident in your resources. So where do we get those? How do we get to a cash offer? So baseline, real quick, down and dirty, 70% ARV, right? That's a down and dirty. So $635,000 takes it down to $444,000 real quick. Now our list price was still $540,000 and there was still a 7 to 10% cost of sale and some potential repairs. So if that's our baseline, there's still no certainty that somebody isn't going to want to negotiate for that roof or anything else that they uncover in the inspection. So now there's just one more step of giving them a $450,000 offer. It's a cash net. Now you have 3 different versions of net and 3 different versions of timeframe and 3 different versions of holding costs because now what you just did is approach this as an investor. And when you can step back and take the emotions out of it and realize that the house is simply a financial asset, based on its condition to move the needle. And it can be moved several different ways. That depends on how much effort they want to put into it. Not you put into it, how much effort they wanna put into it. Because any one of these options, two of them, the first presentation, you earned income. The third one is where you're gonna create it by giving an option. Now, if you create it and they agree that yes, $450,000 based on the numbers, these are all the things we could do. Mm-hmm. But they're like, we'll take the $450,000 and make it easy. Then you sign a contract, they agree to sell it for $450,000. And you explain to them, either you're going to close on it or you're going to sell it to a partner. Most of the time we close on these or we wholesale them or we find a partner that wants to buy it for a rental and we connect the dots. Here's where agents tend to stray off. Wholesaling can be done above board with a real estate license. Through conversation. It's just being transparent. Because all that happens in a wholesale is they've reduced the price to a price that they're guaranteed the cash with no inspections. And then if I sell that house for $470,000, it still makes a good opportunity for somebody to buy. The $20K that they paid— that I made is about the same as what they would have paid me in a commission. So it doesn't change anything there. But we did give them the easy button. It also created a simpler, faster, speed up conversation for them to know this one's gonna take me 6 months, this one's gonna take me 60 days, this one's gonna take me 2 weeks. These are the numbers I get. And when you offer those numbers and you are stern with your numbers and your opinion, it's simply just to take it or leave it. And not from an ego standpoint, but it's your opinion and this is your business and this is how you operate. So this is how we create income, but we also create control over our business and what business we're currently doing. Because this is also a little bit potentially an interview process of, do I want to work with this person? And do they want to work with me based on my opinions? And it's okay if they don't agree with your opinions. You didn't lose out to another agent. You probably lost out to another personality or another person's opinion. Right? Because we've all had those opinions. Some agents said, well, I can sell this for $700,000. That's cool. You can list it for $700,000 all day long. But the real question is, what is it going to sell for? And in times of uncertainty, it's better to be realistic because as we know, in 2026 or go back to 2022, the market and interest rates can shift really quick, which makes a huge difference. Because in this particular one, had they listed at the beginning of the year at $540,000 when the rates were a percent lower, it would've sold very quickly. Instead, they missed the mark. The interest rates are higher. They've already had to make a price reduction, and now they're losing money on a daily basis with a vacant house, and now they're becoming more motivated. So the higher price in the conversation, by letting people go to that, that nature, or letting people to go to that conversation, that list price, they are damaging themselves. And in the same sense, it's kind of damaging your reputation because you're the one they take the frustration out on. So here's a secret for you. Whenever I have a seller like this, after we do the financial data, I do like to put a little humor on it. And I say, look, here's the cool part. I would rather you know this upfront. We can agree to disagree than to listen to you bitch at me every week for the next 6 weeks that your house hasn't sold. Nobody's seen it. You want me to do an open house and you want me to spend my time chasing your price. I don't want to chase your price. I want to sell your home. That's what you asked me to do and that's what I'm here to do. And now we've had a serious conversation. You've kind of set a boundary and a tone for what you can and can't do, but we've also done it very respectfully. And so I just like the nature of building the relationship and saying, this is what we have to offer, rather than what do I need to do to earn your business? Because your experiences, your expertise allows you to earn the business. It also allows you to attract the right business because every time you go down this road, where you're getting creative and there's these options and somebody doesn't respect who you are or what you do and they think you're a salesperson, you're never going to get through to them. It's kind of like the wife that thinks they're going to change their husband over 20 years. It'll get better. I'm just going to love him through it. All the things. And things don't happen. It's the same thing with a lot of sellers. If you get those red flags at the beginning, it's okay. They're just not for you or you're not for them. Nothing personal. Move on. We don't have to win everything. I know that's not what the industry tells you, But I'm telling you, I don't want to win everything. I want to win the people that I know that I can win with, that are vested in me, and that I'm vested in their success. And that's a true collaborative partnership. And I'll finish with this. It's a saying that I learned, that I taught myself through the pain of watching my father work for an investor the last 10 years of his life before he died broke and almost owning no real estate. Steve D Valentine. And leaving some things behind that just weren't great to deal with. But my dad learned to rely on an investor or investors as his source, kind of like we try to rely on our database and our leads as our source. And what happened is at the end of his life, he looks back and he realizes that he should have been the source of the knowledge and the guidance, and he should have taken that once he learned it, and he should have applied it to himself rather than continuing to sell himself. And so I leave you with this, this saying. I tell all of my clients that I will work with you, but I will not work for you because we have to have an equal exchange of energy. And this is a team sport. You have to clean up the house in order for me to make a good presentation to somebody. You have to stage the house in order for me to get the price you want. We have to do these things together or agree to disagree and go part ways before things get ugly. And it's harder to say no than it is to say yes. But the minute you take control and you say no and you walk away things, you are now in control of where your business goes, where your calendar flows, and the conversations that you have. Because the minute you choose to do business because you need a commission check or you need to sell a house is the minute you get yourself into trouble because you end up working with somebody that you really don't like and having to bite your tongue when in fact there was somebody right around the corner that all of a sudden you didn't have time to serve because you took the quickest, easiest thing to make money even though you hated it. So if you're looking for change today, like, don't, don't join if you're not looking to change. Like, honestly, I am not looking for 1,000 people to just dabble in this. I'm looking for 1,000 people that truly want to make their life change in real estate and join me in Built Not Bought on Wednesday mornings. And take this information and learn how to twist it into your personality and make it your own so that you can create income while you're earning income and creating the freedom for your life. I'm Steve D Valentine. I just love giving to you in the moments that I've shared. And I think what's interesting about the guru side of things is that most of them in the space have never really sold real estate. Most of them are not selling real estate. And most of them are not very plugged into what's really happening. I am because I'm here with you on a daily basis. So if you want to follow a guru, go do that. If you want to follow somebody that's leading through the industry while it's happening, that's what you're getting here.