How to Handle Difficult Customers in the Land Business with Team Land Geek

Hey, it's Mark Podolski, the land geek with the favorite niche real estate website, thelandgeek.com and on this week's Art of Passive Income podcast roundtable edition, we have almost all the usual suspects. We've got Dude Buddy, the Nightcap OG Scott Bossman. Scott, how are you?

I'm doing well, Mark, thanks. Good to be here.

Good.

Good to see you. We've got Landon AI Harris, the aquatic investor. Landon, how are things?

Doing well, Mark. Not swimming.

That's. Yeah, There you go. Good to see you. You're better half Taria, putting in the reps. Harris, Trea. How are things?

Things are great.

Good to see you. Last but not least, I love it when you call me Big Papa. Tate Litchfield. Tate, how are you?

I'm good.

Happy to be on today.

Yeah, I, I missed you today. I, I actually got. Got into it on another podcast. Podcast. Guest and I were talking. Rap.

Me in. I had you.

Yeah, it was going to go off the rails pretty quickly, you know, but we, we, we found common ground in J. Cole, so that was good.

Okay, well, if you need me, you call me and give me that guy's address. I'll take care of this. I'll settle this debate.

Yeah, but you know what? I. But I think that's a really good segue into our topic today, which is how do you deal with difficult customers? Or that one rare oddball customer? Because let's face it, when you're working with the general public, you're going to get all flavors of human being walking through that door. And if you've never gotten the occasional difficult customer, you've never gotten the occasional oddball customer. Guess what? You're that person. Little self awareness test right there. Or you're just not in business. You're just starting. So it's guaranteed you're going to get it. So the question is, and why don't we start with dude buddy here? How do you handle or how do you instruct or coach your team to handle the difficult customer? The oddball customer.

Yeah, it's a great question to me. And this actually, it relates to patient care as well. Right. So I've been in healthcare for a really long time. You have, you have patients every now and then that are just difficult because they don't get it, or there's something in the process that they don't understand, or maybe they need a little bit more help or a little bit more instruction.

Right.

And those people, I, I'm fine with working with. Right. Like, let me, let me Walk you through this step by step. Right. And I think we've trained our sales people to do that pretty well, our intake manager to do that pretty well. Every once in a while, you're gonna have somebody who has a question about the process or they don't like the way we do it, right? Well, we'll modify the way we do it.

Right.

If they. If they absolutely refuse to send us the deed before payment, well, we compromise with a mobile notary and we explain that process to them or explain the title process to them, that type of thing. So there's the difficult person in that regard, right. Where they just need a little bit more hand holding or they make things maybe a little bit more difficult because they're not wanting to do things the way you do them. And to me, we can usually find a solution with that. Then you just have the rude people and you have this in healthcare as well. Like, I kind of like the rude people because I like to, you know, like, win them over. Right. And. But how do you win them over? You win them over by talking to them more, you know, conveying to them that you are a relatable, normal person. Right. And having a conversation with them to see if you can break down their barriers a little bit. So I'm not afraid to do that, get on the phone with them, have a conversation with them. That being said, if I'm not. If I'm not, you know, busting through those barriers in five minutes, I'm not going to waste my time either. You know, I'll just say to Mr. Seller or Mr. Buyer, you know what? I don't think it's a good fit. We're going to move on to the next person. And that's been a challenge in trying to educate our intake manager and sales manager about that. Right. Like, they want to do everything to get the purchase. They want to do everything to get the sale. But you come across instances where they spend 30 minutes on the phone with somebody and get nowhere, and it's a matter of just kind of educating them. Okay, well, you know, if you're not feeling it at five minutes, things aren't changing in five minutes. You need to. You need to cut ties and move on to the next deal. And obviously, if people are rude, rude, we just say, this isn't a good match. No, sorry for. Sorry for wasting your time, and we move on to the next deal. So. So that's kind of, I guess, the two situations that we see difficult people in our business. And yeah, it makes. It makes it challenging Right, Yeah, it absolutely does.

So as a follow up question, do you see more difficult people in healthcare or in the land business?

Oh, healthcare for sure.

Why do you say that? Because they're in pain.

They're in pain. So there's that emotional distress. Right. That people are having. There's the psychological component of I'm never going to get back to where I was before. You got families breathing down your neck. You got doctors and. Oh, yeah. So it's much more complicated. I'd take a land issue all day long over. Over a complicated patient issue.

Yeah, yeah. And by the way, since I'm older than you, I'm expecting you as I get older to be like, dude, don't, don't be that grouchy old person that just goes out of the way to ruin, you know, the doctor's day or the nurse's day. And I get it. Like, you know, like, I think about my parents. Like, my dad's in pain, but, you know, he's got my mom constantly telling him, you know, filter, filter.

Right.

We, we get it. You're in pain. Like, you know, and it's a privilege to grow older. So, you know, she's like, you know, put on your big boy pants, tough it up. You know, don't, don't leak it out to the rest of us. So, you know, so you're so Scott, you're that person for me as I, as I grow old.

Sounds good. I'll be that guy for you.

I appreciate it. So, Landon, do you do anything differently than the dude, buddy, you know, when it comes to those difficult people?

Yeah, you know, I, I'll be honest. Like, there's a lot of things that, yeah, I do similar to what Scott does. And then, you know, I can piggyback a little bit off of what he was saying. It's like, you know, as a swim coach, I dealt with a lot of parents that were very unhappy sometimes. So there was a lot that I think I learned with that. And like, now we apply it to the land business. I, I learned one, to just listen. You got to listen to some people and just don't allow yourself to just go up. Because they go up, they get frustrated, they're a little off, a little different. Sometimes you just have to listen to them a little bit and let them talk it out and things kind of settle down. The other thing I learned was don't give too many chances. I took up three strikes and you're out. You know, if we came back, we tried to help you with this, and I Said, okay, well, yeah, we'll work with this. And then they come back again and they're still kind of disgruntled and. Or. Or having a problem. I'll try one more time. The third time, I think I've given you a few times, and this time we're out. So I don't allow it to go too far. And then as far as, like, training, you know, our team, like, I think one of the things that we've had that we've had over time, we've had. We've had some folks that have been a little challenging. And we've got voice recordings, and I let them go back and listen to. Here's how this handle. Here's how we handle this one. And maybe you might want to do this or are there any things that you see we could do better in this next time if something like this comes up? So we have some of those kind of video or video audios. I should say that we kind of went through with some of that. But yeah, just scrumtle. I. I definitely would take land over.

The swim Parents.

They can be tough, man. Expectations sometimes too high.

Yeah, I mean, three, I, you know, three strikes you're out. Seems like giving someone a lot of leeway. Like maybe two. Look at three is agreeing. Maybe two strikes.

Maybe I'm too nice.

I mean, me. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. I. I would disagree with the three strikes for sure. What is it? Fool me once, shame on me, fool me twice, difficult person, and our relationship's over.

It can be. It can be. But, you know, and I do look at it all. Money's not good money. Just sometimes it's just not worth it. So.

No. 100%. I mean, Mike McCallitz actually wrote an entire book on this called the pumpkin plan.

Yep.

Where you get rid of your small, worst customers so you have the time and energy to focus on your best customers and keep working on finding people that are like that. Those customers. Growing a giant pumpkin, if you will. It's a kind of cool metaphor, but someone who has less patience than you, Landon, is terea put in the reps. Sharia, what. What is your philosophy when it comes to dealing with the. The occasional difficult customer, the occasional oddball customer?

I'd say Landon and I meet in the middle sometimes. I. I do think I am quick to just nip it and move forward and you'll give a lot more opportunity in the beginning. Truthfully, we were just so hungry for deals until, you know, we would bend over backwards. Like, you know, no we don't want this deal to go, you know. No, we want the sale. We really want the sale. And then over time, we've learned that we have far more good customers than we do, you know, the occasional one that difficult. So what we've tried to train our team is to recognize ones that they feel are going to be difficult. If it starts off difficult, typically the relationship remains difficult. And I'll say the ones that we didn't go with our gut and just say no, refund them the money and move on, they ended up asking for a refund later anyway. So just being able to spot these people early on and then making sure that our team understood, especially our sales team, like Landon said, all money's not good money, and we're not going to subject you to any form of torture in order to close the deal. So if they're not being compliant or at least not berating you and being rude, then you don't have to do business with them. So that sign you see in many businesses, we reserve the right to refuse to do business with you.

That.

That's our motto, and we make sure that our. Our team understands that as well. If we're a good fit, we're a good fit. If we're not, you know, then we just. We. We won't do business with you.

All right. And I think it's important that we sort of parse this out a bit, because when it comes to a relationship, we're talking about a terms customer because we're going to be living with them for the length of the term.

Correct.

But now when it comes to a cash deal, which I know none of us really want those cash deals, but we're going to get them, would you say that you give a little bit more leeway or the team gives more leeway? Because once that check clears and the deeds conveyed, they're kind of out of your life.

I'd agree.

Do you agree?

I shake his head.

Definitely.

More leeway.

I. I don't tolerate jerks, regardless of how you want to pay me. If you're a jerk, you know, here's Landon and Teresa's number. They're more patient than we are. I don't have time for it.

I don't.

I don't want your money. I don't need your money. I don't even want to talk to you if you're mean. I don't. I don't need that negativity in my life.

Yeah, I mean, you're taking a really hard stance here, but I actually I, I love it, though.

Like, I protect the team. The team is way more valuable than any deal, than any person. And, you know, I'm not saying these other great land investors don't protect their team. It's just I don't want to have a team member get so angry that they say, that's it. I'm out of here. I'm never coming back. Right.

Like, yeah, but, Tate, don't you think it's nuanced? Maybe your team member is having a bad day and then somebody says something very, you know, normal and, but they were triggered because of something, and then, you know, like, I guess, you know, like, dude, Buddy's a very difficult person.

Right.

And he might say something to me that would trigger me, but, like, to you, because you might. It might just totally be like, oh, yeah, I didn't see any issue with that at all.

Are you saying I don't have.

We all have different histories.

Are you saying I don't have, like, emotions? Is that what you're saying, Mark? I'm saying I'm not an emotional guy here, because I am.

No, no, I'm not saying I have. Also defensive.

This is turned into a hard time.

I'll tell you what, we're, by the way, we keep going, like, this ch is going to have us all go up to a relationship retreat and work on our issues.

No, I get what you're saying. I guess it comes down to the fact that I've worked with my team.

For a long time.

I really trust they're loyal, they're good at what they do, they are professionals. And if they come to me and say, look, this customer is being mean or jerk, I'm gonna side with them every time.

Always.

Yeah.

The tree is agreeing. 100. Shaking your head. Landon's shaking his head. Scott's shaking his head.

Because do I really want to take the time to figure out if they're just being sensitive? No. If you tell me the guy's being a jerk, well, they've got a more tolerance for small talk and, and that kind of stuff than I do. And if they can't tolerate, there's no way on this good earth I'm going to be able to deal with it. There's just no way.

So, yeah, I, I, I think it's nuanced, though. I. Because, like, you know, as, as Scott Bossman had said earlier, it could be that challenge to turn them around and to give them that time, that space to maybe, you know, okay, like, here's an example. And this might not Be a good example. But how many times have you heard where a couple meets and she couldn't stand him at first? Right. And then they fall in love or vice versa. I mean, first impressions can be tricky if we don't give someone enough time. That being said, I think when, like, I think there's that boundary. Right. I think there's, you know, there's certain boundaries you just don't cross. Like, you know, I might not love cheese and Tate loves cheese. Doesn't mean we can't find common ground somewhere else. Right. And I might insult his favorite cheese, not knowing he loves cheese. That would just be not having enough information.

Sure.

Where.

If I just come out and, and I'm just generally unpleasant to, to work with and deal with. That's. I think, I think it's very nuanced.

Yeah.

No, I'll give it to you. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not disagreeing. And I think that, you know, to go into these situations, especially in the sales role, you need to go into every situation saying, I'm not sure if this is the person who is going.

To buy this property.

I'm not sure if they're able to buy this property. I'm not sure if this is the right property for them. Right. You do have to ask those questions and you have to be open to maybe a little bit of tension, because I think tension is needed, especially in the sales situation. So I'm not saying tension, but I'm just talking about the person who's a grouch. Right. Like, if you're just a mean person, if you're disrespectful and, you know, I don't need that money. I don't want that person's money.

And.

But if you're, if you're driving a hard negotiation, that's fine, right? Like, if you're playing hardball, that's fair. That's all's fair in negotiations like that. I just. Yeah, I think we're talking about two entirely different customers. Right. I'm talking about just a beanie, just a jerk, just a guy who, you know, sits down next to you and you're like, I've lost my appetite. If that person is on the phone, I'm.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But I, I've. I've seen you reject the high maintenance customer because the property is inexpensive and they want Neiman Marcus service at a Walmart price. And I've seen you turn that money down. And I think that, you know, that person is not belligerent. They're just asking too much of you and the team. And as Landon said, that's bad money.

It's bad money. Yeah.

I mean, not all money.

Remember that lady Mark?

Yeah, I remember. She wanted to meet you and like.

You know, you wanted to hang out and.

And it was like boundaries.

No.

That's a no.

So I have a question, because what we have also done is allow the sales manager to make that call. Because my patience is not quite there, right. So I would say I'm out. However, you have the opportunity to hang on with this customer. Just know you're going to deal with them or you can let them go. So there's no pressure to keep. There's no pressure to let them go, but just allow the salesperson, the person who's going to have to deal with them, to determine whether or not they want to do it.

Yeah. Scott, what, what are you going to say?

Oh, I'll do. I. I agree with that approach. The only issue is if your sales manager is only here another year and they're here another five or six years, that's what it becomes.

Yeah, I was going to say that.

I guess I think of it like, I think of it like I'm the gatekeeper, right? On those, on those sales. Because I can see the conversations my sales manager is having, right? And if she's had five 30 minute conversations with this person and they don't want to do geek pay, but they want to do a check in the mail and they, you know, there's all these red flags, right?

There's these.

There's five red flags and three yellow flags and no green flag. Then, then I would probably say to my sales manager, you know, on paper, this just doesn't look good. And here are the reasons why. And we've had a few of those sneak through, right? And then they ended up not good. So that was case in point. Oh, look what happened, right? So do you remember back when you had 10 conversations with this person and, oh, we got the sale, but man, it was like pulling tooth and, you know, pulling teeth to get the doc fee out of them and then it was pulling teeth to get three payments out of them. So use that, you know, case in point. You're going to learn as you go on that what these individuals look like, right? And whether or not they're. They're a good sale or not. So I think it comes with experience, right? We've all been doing this a long time. It's going to be easier for us to see a nightmare on paper. Than it is somebody who's maybe new or somebody who's like, they really, really want the sale.

Right.

So I think it's just a continual kind of analysis that you have to go through as a business owner.

Yeah, I think we should do like a lightning round and, like, we should say the phrase that we know is the big red flag. And we should not. We should not be work. Like, we're giving. Like, here's our years of experience, dear listener, so that if you hear this phrase, you know, this is not a customer you probably want to work with. So, Sharia, we'll give you the easy one and let you start first.

Fantastic. I'm not giving you my banking information.

All right, Landon.

Oh, you may have to come back.

Dude.

Buddy, you're gonna be.

I want this land so bad. I need to live on it tomorrow, but I don't get paid till next Friday. Can you hold it for me there?

There, there? Yeah, Can I. Can you hold it for me?

Like, three good ones all in one.

That's true. Sorry I stole a couple.

Yeah, I was, you know, the person who. And this is just a Tate Litchfield thing. Like, the person who doesn't have an email address that we can send documents to, to me. That's just a problem. It doesn't mean you can't do the deal. It's just a red flag. Like, I don't do email. I don't use the Internet. It's like, this is gonna be hard.

That's a pass. That's a pass for sure. If they. And I'm not saying this in a self serving way, but if they can't do geek pay, it's a pass. That's a red flag.

No, I'm.

I'm a total agreement with you there. It's like, okay, then here's your money back.

Is.

This is going to be comp. It's going to create a nightmare for bookkeeping is what it creates.

Right?

Like the paper check. I used to be like, hey, I'll take money any way you want to send it. But now I'm like, that paper check's gonna arrive late, and then I gotta remove late fees, but should I remove late fees? And then you're gonna call me about those late fees.

I don't want to do that anymore.

Right. Then. Then you're bothering your va. Hey, can you manually, you know, log this pay?

You don't want to update it until the fund's clear, and then you forget like I did, and then it's like, they're Getting, you know, it's just problems.

It's just not worth it.

Yeah, Landon.

So I'm thinking the one that goes, can I build on it today and cut down trees? They want to just immediately start this process. I'm like, I'm not a little worried about that, but, you know, everybody's got their own ideas.

Yeah, Yeah, I think those. Those are. Those are really good. Those are all really good. All right, well, I thought this was a really great podcast, and hopefully the listeners are going to get a lot of value on, you know, should you even work with the difficult customer, the occasional oddball customer. And again, it's nuanced. It's. It's going to depend on you. What's interesting about that in. In human relationships is that what would bother me might not bother Tria. Right? Why is that? It's how I interpret it. Because if we lined up 100 people and they watch the interaction, maybe 50 would be like, oh, that's a real jerk. Maybe 50, like, no problem. Right. So you have to sort of see for yourself and give a little bit more time and, And. And think about, okay, is this something that's within me or just objectively? This is a difficult person. But to Tate's point, it might not even matter because you're still working with them and you get to choose. And so, again, to Landon's point, like, not all money is good money. We can always make more money. We can't get more time. And we want this business to be joyful if they're just not enjoyable to work with. And it's a relationship, you know, buyers are like the bus. There's another one right down the pike that's going to be way more pleasant and way simpler to work with than the one that you're. You're wrestling with. So don't do it. All right, Landon, what is your tip of the week? A website, a resource, a book, Something else actionable for our passive income listeners to go improve their businesses, improve their lives. What do you got?

Okay, so for the past few weeks, I've been going in, trying to figure out ways to kind of just grow our YouTube subscriptions to our. So that can generate a few more leads. And I kind of stumbled upon this video, and I'll put it in the chat, but it's. It's basically, it's eight surprising habits to get a million subscribers. But what I liked about this video, it's kind of a short video. It's only 10 minutes. But what I liked about this video is it kind of reminded me and brought back some ideas that we originally started in this business. And what we, I don't know, just reinforces some things that we really started thinking about. Some focusing on your. On the journey instead of the destination. That was one point he brought up that I thought, yeah, that's definitely something to remember. I loved how you talked about taking a step back from your business and just, just look at where you've grown, look at the things that you've done and look at just kind of everything that you've just kind of picked up and how far you've come. And then he has some other great habits. But it's worth watching. It's quick. The quick listen if you're. You can't watch it. But I thought it was kind of cool.

Yeah, I mean, I don't like to take YouTube advice from anyone that doesn't have at least 5 million subscribers. And this guy only has 4.87 million. So whatever he says, you know, take it, take it with a grain of salt. He might not be a expert yet. Please get in there. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I want to thank the listeners, remind them the only way that we're going to be able to keep cajoling these amazing roundtable coaches to keep coming back and dealing with my shenanigans if you do three little favors. Follow rate Review the podcast, send a screenshot of that review support thelangic.com I'm gonna send you for free a signed copy of Dirt Rich. And yes, Dirt Rich 2 will be coming out sooner than later, hopefully. Still working on it, just the finishing touches on that. And if you are looking to build your passive income without renters, rehabs, renovations of rodents, look at flight School. Go tolandgeek.com Training Schedule A call and I know what you're thinking. Oh, the investment. The investment ain't gonna cost you nothing. Guaranteed you'll make that money 180 days or less. Learn more landgeek.com training all right, are we good? All right, let's do this. 1, 2, 3. Let's let.

Freedom, freedom, freedom.

Pretty, pretty awful, but yeah, I don't know how that's possible.

Well, are we supposed to repeat or say it with you?

You know, I think we need somebody to like, tap out the words so we say them all.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. We're gonna work on it.

I'm watching Mark's lips mood.

Usually I, I want to haze like own Alaska, you know, broadband. But you know, it's. Maybe it's San Jose. By, by the way, I I have. I have a moral question for you guys, because I. I just want to know, because I'm very curious, because today is Halloween. Even though, dear listener, you're. You're listening to this after Halloween, I'm just curious, at what age are you too old to ask strangers for free candy?

Oh, yeah, 14. Oh, 15.

15.

You're done. You're done.

15 today, I think, like, eighth grade. Eighth grade, you're after that, you're out.

Eighth grade is like 13, right?

Yeah, 13.

13. What if you haven't hit puberty?

I mean, I'm not gonna know. So if. If you're 18 and you look 13, I'll still give you candy.

You start caring.

Look, if you dress up, you're getting candy. I don't care.

You dress up, you're getting candy, you don't care.

But I'm not giving it to you, like, to parents.

No way.

Oh, that's c. Okay, now that's even better. How about the parent that goes out with their kids? They're dressed up. They also have a bag.

Yeah, I'll skip that.

They can't bring a bag. I mean, if. Yeah, if they want to bring a bag, they're up.

Yeah.

If they're like, oh, let me get a Snickers, it's like, yeah, of course you deserve one.

It's.

You're putting up with this. But, like, I'm about the kids. Let the kids have fun. You know, they'll. They know when it's time to be done. And at the same point, makes no difference to me. Like, just don't egg my house.

Right?

Like, that's what I'm worried about is retaliation. Don't egg. Don't toilet paper.

I'm sitting on the front of the hose.

Yeah, I mean, I mean, look, let's say, let's say a 13, 14 year old comes and knocks on the door, I'm gonna give them candy, but I'm also giving them that look, like, really.

I don't want to see you next year kind of look, you should.

You should probably be handing out the candy and you know, and you know, and then there's also like, sort of that candy allocation dilemma. Because let's say you get a bunch of Costco candy, right? And it might be a slow night on your block for whatever reason. How much candy do you give out before you're like, okay, that was just obnoxious amount of candy I just gave that kid. Or that was really. That was really stingy amount of candy I just gave. Because I. I I didn't allocate correctly in the beginning of the night, then it's the end of the night and I got nothing left. And now I'm handing out, like, you know, kale chips like Landon and Teria, kind of.

What happens then? Then you get a for real.

Then you get a for real. Do you guys think about this stuff? Am I the only one who thinks about this?

Yeah, I think you're putting way too much energy into these Halloween dilemmas, Mark.

Yeah, you might.

I mean, if you run out of candy, turn off the porch light, shut the door, go watch a movie.

Lights around, it's out. It's dope.

You have too much candy. Leave it out there in a bowl. Just leave it.

Just leave it, people. Okay?

And the good thing about doing that is it'll be gone within one to two trick or treaters and problem solved.

Yeah, I mean, don't we have a serious epidemic in this country with diabetes? Should we really, should we be even completely rethinking Halloween and the whole sugar thing? Am I ruining it?

You're ruining it right now.

You're ruining it.

I'm really, like, being a fun sucker, right? Like I don't care. You dress up, you get candy. You can do it until you're old if you dress up. Come get some candy when the lights are off. Stop knocking.

Go wild.

All right, fine.

We all did it. And we're, I mean, we're, we're in decent shape, right? So we should be able to entrust the children of today to control their, you know, sugar urge. We did it.

I, I, I think, I think you've got a point there. I think, I think you're right. I think I'm, I'm not going to, I'm not trusting them enough. Yeah, I mean, don't trust my kids, though.

Don't trust them is their out control. But mom's got it sorted. She'll take care of it. She knows when to pull the plug. That's enough. She knows.

Yeah, absolutely. All right, well, I'm glad you guys let me indulge in these questions while you guys have way better things to do with your time, so I appreciate it. All right, make it a great one. Have a safe Halloween and we'll see you, buddy. Later.

Right?

See ya.

Thanks for listening to the Art of Passive Income podcast. Are you ready to learn how you can start building a passive income without renters, rehabs, renovations, or rodents? Schedule a free consultation@thelandgeek.com forward slash training. Let freedom ring.