← The Brian Buffini Show
Loading summary
Transcript61 lines
- [00:04]
A
Welcome to It's a Good Life where it's all about helping entrepreneurs think, feel, and do better. Today we have a special treat for you, Brian, live on stage from a recent event. Let's listen in.
- [00:22]
All right. How many points do you think I have for you? How many points can realtors remember? Why does every speaker in real estate have 10 points? I don't know. I have three, and that's why I've been around for 30 years. So first, we're going to cover the state of the market. We're going to cover the state of the market. That's it. You can write down in your notes. So, state of the market. We're talking about the state of the industry. And then what I'm really excited to talk about is the return of the selling seasons. We're going to see something that works beautifully that we have set up for you. And we have a early Christmas gift. How many members do I have here today? All the members. Yeah. How many members remotely? Can I see your hands nice and high? I can take a look. Yeah. I got an early Christmas gift for all you guys today. State of the market. Here we go. So first and foremost, I want you to remember this. The real estate market will return to the rhythm of 2019. I talked about this in August at our last BCL here, but I'm going to share with you. The data is overwhelming, and I have a couple of points that are really going to bring it home. Okay. And I can factual. I'm telling you right now, Buffining company and all its investments are committed to this. I'm putting my money where my mouth is. And that's why we've just spent millions of dollars in the last 120 days to build a program specifically designed to take advantage of this market opportunity. So let's take a look right here. Here's what it looks like, people. If you watch the doom scrollers and you listen to the influencers and you hear anybody talking about real estate, it's all over the place. Just this morning, I was checking it out. And first thing this morning on Bloomberg, someone's Talking about a 50% crash in real estate. How many of you have heard this kind of stuff? Let me say this. All your buyers have. None of your sellers have.
- [02:12]
So we need to send those crappy clips to your sellers. But none of them have. So here's what I want to show you. People are like, oh, inventory's out of sight. Now look at 2019, we're at 1.2 million listings. We're back to 1.36. So it's not this insane amount of inventory. It's incredible. Now, we were bitching and moaning back here in 2021. All my poor buyers, my buyers, I show them house after house after house after house and I just can't get them home. Brutal. And now we're all bitching and moaning because we can't get back to 2021. Because we want the deals to close. And we want 27 offers on Monday after it goes. Are you guys with me? It's what we want. Now I want to show you something. If you guys can just take two concepts down in this first session, we're going to win. We had 566,000 available listings for a population of about 340 to 350 million people in 2021. That is called an artificial market. You will never see this again. In the history of this country. You'll never see this again. That is an artificial market. The problem with that artificial market for the real estate industry. People built their budgets and their lifestyle. And for companies, they're pro formas around it. The best way I can describe it is this. Has anyone here. I'd be curious. Has anyone here ever won a lottery of any sort? Anybody ever won a lottery all the way? No. No. That's why you're here. I get it, okay? That's why you're in coaching. You didn't marry well economically and you never won the lotto. I get it. Imagine winning the lottery and then the next three years, you expect to win the lottery every year. That is the real estate business in 2025. And people are waiting. People are waiting for that market to come back. What's the word with that market? What's the word? In pink. What's the word? Sorry, say it again. By the way, this is part of your conversation. In your dialogue with your customers. You're going to tell them we're going back to what year? Rhythm wise. Say it out louder. Okay. And with the market that we had was. What was the word? So 2019. Artificial. 2019 is what we're going back to. The market we had was artificial. Next June, June 4, will be my 40th anniversary in real estate. God help me.
- [04:40]
How in the world is that even possible? Good looking devil like me, 40 years in anything.
- [04:47]
So here we go. I've never seen that in 40 years. And I'm telling you the circumstances won't exist for it to happen again. And I'll go into that. That's an artificial market. Don't Build your budget, don't build your lifestyle. Here's the worst thing. We built our expectations on it in the back of our mind. In the back of our mind, we think it's going to happen again. Many of you know who are members. Four of my kids have joined the company in the last 120 days. My son Alex is with me now. And Alex is meeting with a lot of our customers and building relationships. And Alex has always been my guy. He's got like 6% body fat. Okay. It's not a good look for me. I went a different direction.
- [05:27]
But it's really frustrating traveling with him because I'll have. Oh, could I get the kale cut in half, please? And Alex is like, I'm gonna need two entrees. And by the way, do you have any sides? And how many desserts can I get on the table? And then he walks away.
- [05:50]
And I'm watching him. I can hear myself getting fatter looking at him.
- [05:57]
And I tell him all the time, dude, one day, one day.
- [06:04]
The fat reaper is gonna call you.
- [06:09]
I said, you know how hard I work out to stay in bad shape.
- [06:14]
I'm not waiting to go back to having a metabolism of a 25 year old.
- [06:19]
That would be a bad mistake. Would you guys agree if I start eating like a 25 year old, I won't make it for 5 more years? This market was, what's the word? And if you think it's coming back, you think your 20s are coming back.
- [06:37]
You have a false expectation. And by the way, it'll ruin your health, it'll ruin your financial health, it'll ruin your mental health. And I would say right now, the number one concern I have for the real estate industry is its mental health. When we talk to brokers, when we talk to leaders, the number one thing that I hear from people is apathy. I can't get the agents to come into the office. I can't get them to show up for stuff. We have training programs, we offer them this, we offer them that. They just, they're apathetic. They just don't do it. They don't show up, they're not coming in. And everybody's focused on the apathy. And I'm gonna get to the answer in this because the true answer for this industry is hope. Hope is not a wish. Hope, if you want to write these words down, is a confident expectation. Hope is a confident expectation. Here's what you're going to get today. Hope and a plan. Hope and a plan. That's what you're getting. You're going to walk away today with hope and a plan. Concrete, confident expectation and a plan of what to do. Not something artificial, not something based on whimsical. I won the lotto. I'm waiting for it to come back. I. Oh, I have the metabolism of a 25 year old and it's coming back. That baby's gone. That baby's gone. But wait, there's more. You hear all the doom scrollers talking about existing supply. And here's the monthly supply. 4.4 down to 2.6, back up to 4.7. By the way, six months is your buyer, seller, market. We've seen markets go down. We'll get into this with Dr. Yun. We've seen markets go up. There's markets that are hot, there's markets that are cold. But it's about the same as what year. What's the year? 2019. 2.6 months supply for 340 million people. What's the word for that? Say it out everybody. These are the words you need to be able to talk to your customers about. We're going back to the rhythm of 2019. That's for the industry. And you need to talk to your customers about an artificial market. An artificial market. Worldwide pandemic. A level of worldwide funding. Artificial funding. Trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions. Trillions and trillions of dollars. That's why it was never going to be transitory inflation, never impossible. Okay. You print money, you will inflate an economy. It's just the way it is and it has no political basis. Everybody's committed to spending money. Would you guys agree?
- [09:03]
So we want to make sure that we don't have an artificial business model and an artificial plan. Days on market to obtain an offer. And there's three different ways to do days on market. But this right here, 36 days in 2019, 34 in 2025. It looks a lot like what year?
- [09:20]
2021 and 2022. 18 and 21 days. What's the word there? Now let me say this. In coaching people in real estate, Buffining Co. Focuses on that stat more than any other. More than every statistic in real estate. We focus on days on market. Why do you think that is?
- [09:41]
That's when we get paid homes. Because days on market is how quick inventory turns into cash. And what happens is because most businesses, most agents are running off cash flow instead of profit and loss. Profit and loss is where we need to elevate people to ultimately we get them to balance sheet but when we're trying to take an agent into being a business person, we're trying to get them to go from cash flow to profit and loss statement. 90% of realtors live on cash flow. And if they have money in the bank, they're good. That's why they'll spend $10,000 a month on Internet leads and make less than that. Because if they bring in a deal and it's 10 grand, well, I'm breaking even. Are they breaking even? No, because we think in terms of cash flow. So days on market is a very important thing. The 18 and 21 days. What's the word there? Please let me hear it. When you're talking to a seller, what's that word? When you're talking to a buyer, what's that word? Yeah. Now, median home prices, obviously this is something that's different than 2019, because we had a big run up in prices, but different than you think it is. Now, this is new and existing combined. 2019, steady run up, obviously. Very accelerated run up. Okay. And now it's been pretty flat the last few years. Would you guys agree? Does it feel like that? No. How it feels and how it is, completely different. What happened is, boom, we jumped up. And you're going to see where this shows up in the numbers. I'm going to tell you that 99% of realtors, their marketing and their focus is set up for a market that doesn't exist.
- [11:22]
And that's what. Look, here's what I'm excited about. Do you know that this is the largest gathering of real estate agents in the world today? We have 35,000 people here today. Okay. Crazy. So I'm excited to kind of edumacate everybody and get us going. So the prices are different than 2019. And so are the rates. So are the rates. So we went from 368 down to 2731 and then climbed up this. They intentionally did this. They hit the brakes. It's like stalling an aircraft. Well, let me tell you, the Federal Reserve, because the market was overheating, so much inflation was happening, so they hit the brakes and they raised rates faster and harder than in the history of recorded real estate. That's what we've lived through.
- [12:07]
People are waiting for 2731. What would we say those rates are? What's the word? Artificial. Unless you're going to start another worldwide pandemic, which I don't recommend, we're not trying to get back to these artificial rates, but we'll talk today a little bit about Rates. And let me show you a couple of things here. If mortgage rates drop from 6, 8 to 5, 8, 5.5 million more people in the United States become eligible to buy. And including in that number, 1.6 million are renters. Is that good? Makes more people eligible, somewhere around 500,000 more transactions. Is that good? Is that a possibility with the rates? But wait, there's more. So let's take a look at demographics. Let's take a look at the profiler right now of a home seller. I have no social commentary on these numbers. I don't like what I'm about to share with you. But for the society, for the culture, I don't like it. But my job is not to like it or comment on it. My job is to prepare you guys on how to achieve in the market conditions. Okay? Are you with me? So here's the median age median for non economists. Half above, half below the median age of a home seller. What do you think?
- [13:27]
64 years old? 64 years old. Let me say this. 90% of the training of realtors right now is about being an influencer. You need to be a content creator. You need to get your TikTok game. These people think TikTok is a disease you get from walking in the woods.
- [13:48]
Fricking TikTok. We need to make sure that our marketing and our strategy is lined up to actually meet the people who are actually able to do business. My kids are like, dad, you're not on TikTok. I go, no, y' all are broke and of no use to me at all.
- [14:02]
I don't want to hang around broke people. I have enough of them in my own home.
- [14:09]
Get a job. And they did. Now they're on the frickin payroll.
- [14:13]
Beverly always gets her way.
- [14:17]
The average tenure in a home is 11 years. When I got into business, it used to hover between 5 to 7. Now that's pretty consistent where it's been the last few years. People are living longer in their homes. Does that make sense? By the way? A lot of people are living in a rate, not a home. There's a lot of people don't love their home. Now what you're going to see, and we'll talk about it later, you're going to see a big increase in home improvement next year. So some people are taking the I'm going to fix up the house rather than move because I still want my rate. A funny thing happens when you fix up your house. Every time I fixed up my house, I ended up selling it. My House never looked as good as the day I put it on the freaking market. What is that? And that's going to happen, baby. That's going to happen. So guess what? Little tip, Little tip. Make sure you're in contact with all of your contractors. Make sure you're taking them for a coffee. Make sure you're doing little popeyes by all your contractors, your painters and your plumbers and your designers and all those people. Some of you have relations with people who own the goods, like the appliances and stuff like that. Make sure you're staying in contact with those people because that's the early warning detection signs. Like a first time buyer, they go out and buy a car before they buy a house. Is that true? I'm 40 years in real estate, Nothing's ever going to change. So I used to have a couple of relations with car dealers in town. And if they ever mention they're thinking about buying a home, let me know. Why are people moving?
- [15:38]
To be closer to family and friends. How many of you remember who are members that we did our kit and we did the Do it now campaign? You remember that we did all this exhaustive research on the market? Well, guess what? It's just been even more compounded. It's 22% of the reasons to buy or sell a home is to move closer to family and friends. And you're going to see how this plays out. Older people are liquidating their homes to be closer to their kids and especially their grandkids. My wife, she doesn't buy jewelry, she doesn't have clothing, she doesn't do anything else. But she wants grandbabies living close. So we have to help buying fricking houses in San Diego and put the kids on the payroll at the same time. I just, none of this has anything to do with you. I just need to get it off my chest. She's not tuning in this morning.
- [16:23]
50% of these folks purchased a newer home, 34% purchased a bigger home. Hmm. Okay. See that stats. When you see these stats, you've got to be able to understand these stats to adjust your philosophy, your approach and your marketing. So when you see 34% of these sellers purchased a bigger home, what's the first thing that should come to your mind? 66% bought a smaller home. Does that make sense? Yes or no? So that's the downsizer, by the way. The downsizers also have equity and some of that equity they're going to give to the younger person to help buy a home. If that makes sense, say aye. Second thing. So on purchasing a bigger home, almost half of those people listen. Multi generational purchases. Now I have enough money where I'm not moving them into my house, but some people are doing this multi generational thing. Sounds kind of cool in some ways. It has increased threefold in the last six years. People are buying multi generational homes. Here's the thing. Food, shelter, clothing, people are going to live somewhere. Now let's take a look at the profile of a first time buyer. Big deep breath here. Big deep breath. I don't love any of this, but we need to adopt our market and our strategy. Profile of a first time buyer. Median, median age half above, half below. How old do you think they are? 40 years old. How old were you when you bought your first home? Not that I don't love that stat. And what's happened? Here's the Trend. It was 28 when I got in the business. It held for 33 for a number of years. 36, 35, 38, 30, 40. And I wouldn't be shocked if it's even older than that next year. It's not great for the society, it's not great for household formation. It's not great. Rental demands is not great for so many things. Here is the the purpose of what Buffini and company and what I exist for is to help you in your business. Not to try to make societal change like that. And don't you try to do it either. Your job is to feed your family, serve your clients and do an awesome job. So we need to make sure you're a first time buyer. Your mindset, they're going to be 40 years old. 32% had children under the age of 18. Let me tell you, having babies is one of the reasons you get houses. I got two grandbabies on the way in March, both due on St. Patrick's Day.
- [18:42]
That's why they got houses. If you produce, you get rewards. In our family.
- [18:47]
21% share of all home buyers. First time buyers. Again, much lower percentage than what I lived in in my career typically. Let's go back to 2019. Take a look there. Case 33, 31, 34. This is percentage of first time buyers. 26%. 28%, 24%. Do you see a trend here? Yes or no? And again, it's not good for anything. It's not good for society. It's not good for having babies and families and all those kinds of things. And I just want you to know like you need to prepare for 20, 26. Your job is your responsibility. To your family and your customers. Does that make sense? You need to make sure that you're in that game. Some of the stats that line up here, the share of the home buyers, like I say, 21%. And who's buying? Married couples. 50% single ladies, 25%. 10% single men. All the single ladies. All the single ladies. Right. Instead of putting a ring on it, they're putting a doorbell on it.
- [19:47]
So what's happening to young men now? Again, people of our age, many of us, it's a long list of suck it up, boy. Well, let me tell you this hope and a plan is a big deal. And if you come alongside young people and show them away how they can actually save, how they can get ahead. I never comment on other people's social media stuff, but there's a couple of big influencers who've been pounding young people not to buy it's smarter to be a renter. And I'm like, I'm on the war path. And so I've started getting in the game. So you'll see a little more frisky. Some posts out there just be understand I'm fighting for the real estate business and for these young people to not give up on it. It's hard, it's difficult. Maybe help is available from a family member. But grind it out, work it out, suck it up, figure it out. The best you can get in the door. Home ownership is the key. So what are young men doing? They're in their mama's basement playing video games. Not true. They don't have hope. So they think they need to make a big hit. So they're doing things. Cryptocurrency and online gambling. This is how they're trying to raise a down payment. Cryptocurrency and online gambling. Let me show you the numbers just on the online gambling as we're in Vegas. I might get shot during the break.
- [21:07]
Sports betting in 2018, look at this, was $5 billion. That's seven years ago. Today, $150 billion. Oh, by the way, remember how none of the sports would allow any gambling? Not until they got a piece of it. Not it's on every freaking ad of every single show, on every little thing. And now they get it on their phones where they're living all day long and they give them free money to start gambling. The demographic is 18 to 30 year olds. Isn't that the demo to try to help people to first get on the wagon to buy a home? So we have to educate. This is where we can help One of the things I would do if I were in real estate today is I would do a first time buyer seminar and I would entitle it to my entire database. First time buyer seminar for your kids and grandkids who don't think they can buy a home. I'm going to show them how. That would be a great thing to do. You guys are all masters at what you do and with these stats you'll be able to articulate. But wait, there's more. How about the old profile of a repeat buyer? I made my bones this way. My core client in real estate was this. I had sold them a first time buyer house. They had more kids, they needed more room. I would list this house, I would help them find another house and I would find a buyer for this house. And I would turn every client into three transactions. And that was my particular specialty, to do a hell of a lot of transactions in a low amount of time. Now revealing my age as a grandpa, let me share with you the profile of a repeat buyer. The average age 62.
- [22:44]
This is median. Sorry, median age. Yeah. 22% had children under the age of 18 in the house. Why are they moving? Same reason you should know this. What is it? Closer to family and friends. By the way, your marketing should reflect it. How many of you get the kit from us every month? You're going to see all of this data show up in the marketing materials we're giving you. You need to know it, own it, follow up, communicate it. 79% share of home buyers are in this space. 79%. You got to fish where the fish are. All I see is training that is designed social media, TikTok online influencer, content creation. These people are not on that stuff. They are in a verification way. They're not spending nine hours a day on that stuff. Your marketing, your messaging has to apply. They need to know how a they could help out a family member. They need to know what it's like to move closer to a family member. What the pros are, what the cons are. They need to know how to generate perhaps a down payment for someone they love. If they want to keep somebody closer. So what's happening? They'll list their home, downsize and have one of their kids or grandkids move closer to them. If that makes sense, say aye. We need to know this stuff. We need to be able to communicate this stuff. Our marketing, our messaging and our methodology has to all line up. This is 79% of home buyers crazy. Next thing. How many of you think the market will get better if the rates go down. Can I see your hands? What if I told you that this giant swath of buyers, 30% of all the deals are cash? They don't care what Jerome Powell is talking about. They don't care what's happening in Ukraine. They got cash. One of the reasons they got cash is many of us sold them a house that moved them up into giant equity. And now that they're downsizing, that cash is available to do something with. One of the things I'm helping and trying to lobby for is a little bit of room on the capital gain stuff. And I'm working with Shannon McAn and NAR, as well as the Secretary for Housing and Urban Development on that plan. Stay tuned. Is this helpful at all? Is it confirming how many of you would say there's some tweaks and changes you might need to make? Let me see your hands. Yeah. Now we got you. And you'll see more of that in a minute. So let's talk about the state of the industry. Where are we at? You know the state. I like the state. It's not the state of the union in Ireland. The state of it. Look at the state of your man. Look at the state of your man. The condition he's in. Look at the state of him. So mine is more like the state of him. So we have real estate mergers and acquisitions in 2025 so far. Have you heard about any of these? I mean, Wild Kingdom. Wild Kingdom. And more to come. Wild Kingdom. This always happens when a market. Listen, listen. When a market bottoms out. When a market bottoms out, this is what happens. Companies have run out of cash. We had stupid lawsuit that cleared out a bunch of cash. People were vulnerable. Here comes Rocket. Here comes Rocket. The reason Rocket's able to do this stuff is they got 100 companies. And so their mortgage companies may be losing money, but they could take from Peter Pay Paul, boom, do their stuff. So all of these different kw, privately held for years, had to bring in investors. And we all compass anywhere. Bunch of companies there, 350,000 agents. So this is no small deal. More of this to come. But wait, there's more. One out of every seven listings have been withdrawn. How many of you have had a listing withdrawn? Let me see your hands now. It's kind of frustrating, right? And some of these sellers are dug in, waiting for what type of market. What's the word? Artificial market. Now, let me tell you a little secret. All the data points and has been pointing for me for a year that 2026 was going to turn to the rhythm of 2019. But I'm going to tell you right now, we've paid some money and done some outside research. The vast majority of these people we've surveyed plan to put their home back on the market in the spring. We're going to get back to a spring selling season. What we have not had since 21 out of 7 transactions have canceled. How many of you have had a transaction canceled? How many of you have had a transaction canceled? And the agent on the other side wasn't exactly stellar. Can I see your hands?
- [27:08]
Okay. It's tough when you're the surgeon and the anesthesiologist is high on their own supply.
- [27:16]
And the problem in real estate is we are cooperating. So let me give you good news, different news and other news. A guy I greatly admire is a guy named Kevin Sears. This guy stepped into a very difficult circumstance in the national association of Realtors when National association of Realtors getting pummeled, they had leadership change after leadership change, some very public things that happened. And this guy came in, took it on the chin, went on not only an apology tour, a listening tour, he just finished his term. I think he did 18 or 19 months. Very few people I admire in real estate like this guy because he had the chops to do the right stuff. And I had a meeting with him not so long ago, and here was what he said. Here's our budget. We are planning on losing 240,000 members leaving the national association of Realtors next year. Now, the reason why you can believe those numbers is because it's in the budget. So when people budget accordingly, you might say, hey, those people weren't selling houses anyway. But let me say this. When the Aunt Mary who takes one or two deals away, or the Uncle Jimmy, those people, you come along, you do all the work, you get the effort, you bring it along, you do all the professional expertise. And then Uncle Jimmy swoops in at the end. Are you guys with me? The Uncle Jimmy's are out the door. Aunt Mary's out the door. 240,000 less people. Now, again, when I share that, people get real nervous. Scary.
- [28:34]
So I'm going to match this up with something Dr. Yun and I are going to talk about in our third section. Here's the math. 20% less agents in the business in 2026. 14% more sales. 20% less agents. 14% more sales. 20 percent less agents. 14% more sales. Now, the silence is interesting. Do I have any capitalists in the room? Do I have anybody watching online who needs to make any more money. Could I see your hands nice and high? Does anybody watching, do you need to make any more money? Let me ask you. But here's what an economist from Ireland will assess the market as. These conditions look like this. More beer for us.
- [29:13]
Okay, folks, hello. 20% less competition, 14% more sales.
- [29:23]
Let me try that again because I might be hard to hear. 20% less competition, 14% more sales.
- [29:31]
That's the reward for the pros that stick it out. That's the reward for the people who've made this their career. That's the reward for people who do the fundamentals. And I have any Canadians here. I have a little bit of love for you, a little bit big heart love, but a little bit of good news. Pricing is going to go down 3.7. Many of your markets become very unaffordable and sales are going to increase 3.4. So prices are going to come down, sales are going to increase. So can I get a little woo woo from the Canadians? Okay.
- [30:03]
And in a recent survey that was just done, this is huge. 10% of all Canadians intend to purchase in the next 12 months.
- [30:10]
Hello. Hey. Oot in a boot. Hey. That should pay a few bills. And so we have a different. We did get a Canadian to help us with these stats. And so this was what they said. More beer for us up north. So, okay, now there's the six pack. We're on a keg.
- [30:31]
But it's all beer. Here's the solution for 20, 26. You ready? Hope and a plan. If you're a broker, manager, hope and a plan. If you're a leader of teams, hope and a plan. You have to have the hope. What does the word hope mean? I gave it to you early. Two words. It's a confident expectation. Say it with me. One, two, three.
- [30:55]
We're going to talk to you right now. You can have a confident expectation. These are the facts, boys and girls. This sucker's bottomed out. It's grinded out. And what happens is when the market lifts, the clients get easier because all of a sudden they know they're not the only game in town. They need confidence. I don't know why it is. I'm a pretty skilled realtor, but when I showed somebody a house and no one else was looking at it, they seemed disinterested. But when eight people are looking at it, they get really interested. Is that a true statement? I can't convince people otherwise, but the market will. So let me say this. We are Going to help you with the hope. So how many of you have enjoyed these Buffini coaching live series? Okay, well we're going to continue on with these and our next one for all of you watching into the VIP or you come and watch us virtually is really all about personal growth and development. It's about having that hope. Now these guys are coming in live to help me. Anybody know who John Acuff is? Okay, anybody know Dr. Henry Cloud and Ken Coleman, world class interviewer. So he's going to do an interview and here's what this is all about. We want to get people to get their year off to a great start. So what we're going to do is this. I'm going to walk through a system I developed years ago called a rest run cycle. We're going to do some goal setting together and then we're going to do a dynamic of this program right here is going to be designed specifically to help people have breakthroughs.
- [32:22]
We're going to work by referral, boys and girls, because that's where the muscles get strong. Let me say this. I had a good friend, met with him the other day, been doing a lot of work on Buffini and company and changing some things, getting back to our fundamentals. And he just, he's been in business for like 60 years. And he said, brian, I've been through this my whole life. He goes, the first thing to go is always the fundamentals. It's always the first thing to go. And so as I'm listing where I'm at as a company, it's like we were all just trying to keep up with when the market's that hot, you're just trying to keep up with it all. And so what happens is the fundamentals go away. The fundamental of building relationships and providing value. Building relationships, providing value. Building relationships, providing value. And in my case, it's building relationships, providing value and pouring myself into my staff. That's the, that's all I gotta do. And even with that, our members are doing great. Okay, now again, this is gross commission numbers. I got a little refinement on that this year. So National association of Realtors 417 and the thousands of Buffinian company people this year the number was 354. Not as high as we've had in the past, but still pretty good. Most companies would take that, wouldn't they? And they averaged eight weeks off. So what we do in coaching is production and time off. Now one of the things we did, we started doing this in April. We said we're going to provide value, invest in people. And here's the deal. Buffining company's had the best August, September and October it's had since 2019. Why? Because early in the year we started investing. We started giving people quality experiences for free and building relationship. So August 14th was the last time I was here. I offered this for the first time. It was like, hey, we're the gold standard in coaching. We've been doing this for 30 years at a higher rate than anybody close. And a lot of companies and organizations have jumped into coaching and now they found that maybe not as easy as they thought. So what we've done is condense down the best of what we have. So we have a free coaching session for people. Now I offered this in August 14th thinking, oh, you know, a certain number of people would take advantage of this. And it kind of blew up the phone system. So a lot of people weren't able to avail of it. So if you're not in our coaching program and you'd like a free coaching session before Christmas or maybe just after, here it is. Go to buffiniancompany.com bc get clear on your vision, uncover what's holding you back, see what's working for others and discover your next steps. Gold standard. Best coaching company in the world. Gonna give you one of those. Our gift. And here's our goal. We want you to have a great experience. We want to set you up to win. We want to get you going into the new year. And we want at some point in time in the future when you're ready to roll, view us as the source that gave you the value and maybe we can come and help you. Is that a good idea? That's working by referral. But wait.
- [35:06]
And this is a kind of a brand new thing. Here's our numbers from people in leadership. So the average leader in real estate broker manager team leader made the 87. 6 last year. The average Buffinian company leadership coaching member made 915 gross and eight weeks off.
- [35:25]
So for brokers and managers now, we did not have this up until we've been working on this since August and literally we're just ready to go. So I don't have hundreds of these available, but if you have a broker manager who needs a little help or if you're a broker manager team leader watching, we have now a free leadership business consultation. And it's different because you have a different job and it's how to get clear on your vision for you and your team. Uncover your natural leadership strengths, see what's working for other leaders. And then this is really cool. Teach your team how to sell like you. One of the biggest frustrations of people who are in leadership is like, how do I get my team to do it the way I do it? And so for those of you who want to do one of those leadership things, buffini.com BC leadership. And that's all there for you. Again, provide value, Invest in people. Build relationships. Stay in touch. Build relationships. See if they want to do business with you or see if they want to refer you. Does that make sense? Say aye. So now let me tell you what I'm really excited about. Been working on this for six months. Today is the grand unveiling and we are going to help you make your year. And I'm really excited. This basically is 30 years in the making. So I'm going to first talk to you about the concept. What year are we going to get back to rhythm wise? In 2026, 2019. And you're going to see this. And since 1952 and we started this research and we've been working with Dr. Yoon's group, we work with Bob Barr over at Wells Fargo. We did all this stuff for years and years. We're going to walk through this. So I have three things for you. The seasonality of the customer. So the customer is now going to get back on season. Spring selling season is coming. It'll be the first time. So it'll be the seasonality of the customer. So let's take a look at it. So this is the rhythm spring selling pop in the summer. This is the back to school buyers and sellers. Okay, we got away from that because people weren't even doing school for a while. Right? And now a bump at the end of the year, okay, that has been the rhythm since 1952. We had 67 years of unbroken spring selling bump in the summer. Finish the year strong. And then along came Covid and all hell done broke loose. Now what did this typically mean? Well, homes listed look like this, this green line right here. 40% of listings happened in that spring season, 20% in the summertime, and then 25% at the end of the year. Okay. And so these were concentrated seasons and concentrated times. Homes listed for sale. So this is what the Customer's done for 67 years in a row until Covid. And what year are we going back to rhythm wise? What is it? This is what the year is going to look like. By the way, this is going out to 35,000 people. This is on record. And Buffining companies invested millions of dollars to back it up. So I'm putting my money where my mouth is. Come and check in next year. And you go, he was right again. Which I never get tired of hearing.
- [38:26]
So you have the seasonality of the customer. Then you get into the rhythm of the actual business itself. Now this is where things are going to tweak up a little bit for people who've watched us over the years. So you need to generate your leads during this season. Okay? So if that's the listing season, if that's when people are listing, that's when you need to generate your leads. It's like, I'm not a hunter, but there's like hunting seasons. There's seasons when you go fishing. Okay, the fish are biting now. Well, that's when the fish are biting, is when you want. You have your hook in the water. Make sense? So we need to make sure a. I gave you a profile of who's buying and who's selling, the demographic, how old they are, their main motivation for selling and buying. First time buyers, repeat buyers, sellers. Make sure our marketing and our process and our mindset's aligned. We know it's back to the rhythm of 2019, and that was an artificial market in the middle. So what happens during this time? Well, this is where we do all the lead gen stuff. This is what we've been teaching for 30 years. This is when you're doing your calls, your notes, your Popeyes, your mailers, all that stuff. This is when you're doing that stuff in a concentrated effort. In a concentrated effort. How many of you remember the blitz program? Have you remember the blitz? We had the little handy dandy blitz book, remember? And we had the technology, the CRM tool behind it, but we ultimately had what to do. Every single day for 75 days, go hard, generate a bunch of leads. Summertime, 45 days, go hard. And then to finish the year off, 60 years, go hard. And that was a system we had. And it worked beautifully for five years until Covid came and then everything went out the window. We said, fine, but watch what's about to happen here. The process here was to try to help people generate 85% of their leads in 180 days a year. That was the goal. That's what this was built to do. 85% of your leads in 180 days. So the blitz program as built was purely and simply a lead generation tool to help you. How many of you use the blitz? Good to see your hat. Was it helpful? So what we've done. And now this is during the course of the last number of years, the coaches kind of on the low key were still utilizing it and they were still utilizing it. And they also utilized some other tools that we had. And having spent more and more time with the coaches and more and more time with the analysis of this market, what we have now is an all new blitz program. And for all you members, you are in for a real treat. And those of you who are about to become members, you're in for a treat too. Buffini and company blitz re engineered and reimagined for 2026. And what this looks like is this. Okay, we always focus on the lead gen. Well, if you do lead gen, what do you end up getting?
- [41:09]
Let me try that again. If you do lead gen, what do you get? Leads. You get leads. Hello, I love my job. I'm gonna have job security forever. When you get leads, it's listen, it's the trailing effect of lead gen.
- [41:26]
Now that didn't happen when 2021 and 2022, you got leads without doing anything.
- [41:33]
So what happens is this, you get this trailing effect. Now you get busy with showings and listings and negotiations and closings and re closings and reclosings. And so what happens when you're busy with the transaction to the lead gen? Honestly, Come on. So what happens is we get busy with the transaction, we drop off on the lead gen and then we have the telltale enemy of all success in real estate. Peaks and valleys. I have closings and I have cash, but I have no leads in the pipeline. Why? Because I had to do the work of the real estate agent. The realtor, the business owner was doing lead gen. So lead gen goes, transactions follow, and then what happens? Big dip. Aha. Aha. But our coaches behind the scenes have been working a different program because they know they can't push the clients to do the lead gen while they're busy doing all the transactions. So over time we developed this little process called the Duplicare system. And the Duplicare system is what you do. You get your transaction, you do all your lead gen, then here's the transactions. And it's a systematic approach to generate referrals from your customers during the transaction. Only now we've systemized it, elevated it, to make it simpler, sweeter, and easier to follow. What's the goal? The Duplicare system is designed first and foremost to provide superior customer service. So instead of sometimes, oh, I'll docusign this over or I'll send This over, which is more efficient. It's more effective to go see him in person. So we're going to pick our spots during the transaction where we have four interactions during every transaction, where we'd make the extra effort to go see somebody, take the time, invest, go to them, build even deeper relationships, and generate referrals. So we're going to utilize the transaction interactions to generate referrals. Does that make sense? You got to do it anyway. We're just going to allocate your time, elevate your skills a tad. We have a couple little cool tools. And while you're doing transactions, you'll be getting business. Here's the goal. Every buyer, two referrals prior to close.
- [43:42]
And every seller, one referral post closing. Why is that the case? Well, a buyer will refer you because of the act of helping them buy. So they can tell their friends, oh, they're great. They're helping me. They're showing me houses. And they can refer you right away. A seller typically, not always, but a seller typically will refer you when you either got them in escrow or closing them because they asked you to sell their house. So now they can tell you, they helped me sell my house. After that, they refer at the same rate. Now stop for a second. Think back to 2025. Every buyer you did a deal with, every single buyer gave you two referrals before that transaction closed. What would that do for your business? What do you think? Would it be efficient? Would they be in referrals? Would it be better than an online lead? What if we just made your transactions more effective? So while you're doing the deals, you're getting the leads. What about every seller? What about every seller you closed last year? Think about them. They gave you at least one referral post closing. Would that help your business, yes or no? So the good news is we've been doing this a long time. The blitz program produced an extra transaction a month. That was before we did this to it. So now this is what the blitz is going to look like. This basically mirrors the journey we take our coaching clients on. Now, this is obviously at a much higher level in coaching, but this right here is you have a season of organization. So right here in January and also right here, right now, where we are, this is a really important season to do three things. Reevaluate, reorganize, and plan. How many of you working with your coach? They're already working with you on this stuff. Can I see your hands? Yeah. Okay. Because we got to refine, reevaluate, reorganize, and plan. I'm going to show you. I'm 40 years in the business. I don't know why it took me so long to get here. Maybe because I was just keeping up like you were just keeping up. And now I needed the right market conditions, which is a back to a 2019 market. And be candidly, a market where people would listen to us. Let me tell you, what an easy market to be in the coaching business when people are like, yeah, I know you want me to do all this stuff, but I just got 12 offers on the house. Yeah, I know you want me to write these little notes, but you know, I'm influencing right now.
- [46:04]
Have you seen the eight viewers on YouTube what they say about me? Great comments.
- [46:11]
Here it is. This right here, ladies and gentlemen, is the ultimate year in real estate. This is what it looks like. Seasons of organization blitz programs to generate leads, transactions to go and do superior customer service. And while you're at it, my mother used to say, make your trip work for you. And in a small little house with six kids, when you were walking upstairs, you were carrying clean clothes. And. And when she could hear you at the top of the stairs, Lord have mercy, that woman had bionic hearing. She could hear your foot on the wooden staircase. Hey, make your trip work for you. You're bringing down the dirty clothes. That's how she got five boys. To be somewhat functional, this is how we get Realtors to be somewhat functional. Here's the deal. When you're busy doing deals, you do better service and. And systematic care. So you get referrals during the transaction. This is something everybody can do. If you can close a deal, you can do the duplicate. And then we're going to add a couple of organizational pieces to the piece. So we actually are business people and not chickens with our head cut off. Does this sound good to you? So now let me share this. I have 35,000 people here today. I take my role very seriously as a spokesman to the industry and on behalf of the industry. And I know buffining company's not everybody's cup of tea, and I'm okay with that. Because we're looking for people who are our cup of tea. And we can be your cup of tea. But I'm gonna tell you right now, I'm 40 years in this business. The industry is completely focused on the wrong things. The entire industry is focused on the wrong things. If I see one more article about clear cooperation and private freaking listings. I did 1147 real estate transactions one time I had a client ask me to haul their house off the market one time. It's not what they're asking for. We have companies and organizations attacking the National association of Realtors. NARA's made a lot of mistakes. But let me tell you this. My mother in law, she used to say, you don't miss your baby till she says goodbye and you don't miss the water till the well runs dry. People have no freaking idea what this industry looks like without a fully functioning national association of Realtors. No idea. And we have organizations and companies at war with nar focused on the wrong things. We got mergers, you got to be influencers. You got to be this downlines multi level marketing in real estate. Here's the thing. I don't care what anybody's business model is. We serve all companies. Let me tell you what Buffinian company does. We help people do more transactions and in our coaching program, we help them do more transactions and have a good quality of life. That's it. I'm interested in helping people have more transactions, a good quality of life and have a better story. So, and you can tell I'm a little worked up on this because at a time like this we don't have time to screw around. The market's tough. 20% of our industry is leaving the business. Now, just so you know, no matter what, that's not good for the industry. When someone's at a Christmas party this year and go, oh, you still in real estate? No, I got outs. By the way, we're the only industry that talks like this. I got out. Yeah, I'm getting out. I'm getting out. I'm tying the sheets together, I'm going over the wall, I'm getting out. And you walk into the office and someone, they just walk in. It's an empty desk. Hey, what happened to Harry? Oh yeah, Harry got out last night. Little Shawshank. You know.
- [49:48]
That'S not how other people leave other industries. They have like retirement parties and going away. No, we just, it's like a mob hit, just disappeared. Chu Chu gone. Don't forget the cannolis.
- [50:02]
Here's the deal. The program we built prior to 2019 gave people one extra transaction a month. This thing is now 70% beyond that. And I'm still going to say great. Market's tough, a lot of work. One extra transaction a month. Here's the average price in the United States. Here's the average commission. I don't tell people what you charge, but oh, by the way, post lawsuit, did the commissions go up or down?
- [50:27]
Average commission, ten grand. Now how many of you have a higher average sales price than that? Let me see your hands. How many of you lower? I know there's some people from Arkansas, good investment properties. So you adjust your average sales price. One extra deal, an extra 128 grand. Would that cure a lot of ills? Would that take a bit of pressure off? Would that pay a few bills? Would that make you a little more attractive to your spouse?
- [50:51]
We rebuilt this whole thing. We've been working, boys and girls. We've been playing around daddy's home. So we built a brand new Blitz program for 2026. This is going to kick off January 19th. We're going to get the ball rolling right at the peak time. The little prep module. We're going to talk about the referral recipe. We're going to talk about dialing for dollars. Practice makes perfect. How lunch, how to cash in on old leads, moving buyers off the fence, leverage your listings, getting down to business. Lights, camera, action, how to use technology, how to use video and then how to cross the finish line. And yes, we brought back the little old blitz book along with all the tech. We also have some brand new for 2026 specific dialogues for this market that we used actual agents in the field to use real life dialogues in real life situations. And by the way, give those folks a few referrals when you see them, okay? But this thing is awesome. It's built, it's structured. So here's what you need to do. Every day is laid out and we have blitzes where we do Legion and then we switch into the duplicare system and then we have a little blitz again in the summertime and then we switch into the Duplicare system and then we blitz at the end of the year and then we do some organization. Then we get ready for the start of the year and we're off to the races. How many of you are in coaching? Let me see your hands. You're not only going to get this blitz program, you're going to see a brand new. We haven't done this since 2000 but we're coming out with a complete specific coaching manual that you're going to go through with your coach. Phenomenal. We have a series of upgrades. We're going to blow, we're going to blow our customers away in 2026. That's our commitment. So if you are in leadership coaching one to one coaching or referral maker pro, I have an early Christmas gift for you. This blitz program is going to be an individual program and a membership called Core. 1200 bucks. You guys are getting it for free. So we're going to invest in you. We want you to grow your business. All you got to do is go to the membership area, maybe refamiliarize yourself with where that is.
- [52:52]
Go to the members area in Buffini & Co. And log into the members area and you can do so today. And you'll see right there, look, it's live as of now. And so this is your first Christmas gift of the season. We're giving you the gift of an extra transaction, what to do each day, the duplicator system and the reorganization piece, which is then going to get built for you. Coaching members do an entire manual and coaching process for you. Okay, does that sound good? And here's what we want. We want you to do well. We want you to prosper. We want you to do more business. And oh, by the way, as you do well this year, send us a referral. Is that fair? So Buff goes back working by referral. Now, for those of you who just haven't been blessed by God sufficiently to become a Buffinian company member, now's the time. And so what we have for you is a brand new membership. It's called the core. And in our 30 years, we know what's going on for a lot of people. A lot of people are like, they want to be doing referrals. They want this. And money's tight. So we built the least expensive, most effective program we can to get people started. 99 bucks a month. And so what does it come with? Video trainings. The CRM is there. You get the three blitzes, and then you get all the digital marketing assets. Now, if you want the actual things, you got to get those. But this, you can print them off, you can send this stuff out. And if you're interested in starting, 99 bucks. Dan, you've been with me how many years? 24. A lot of you. How many of you are 20 years or more with me in this room? Look at this. Oh, that's why we had such a great night last night. You've never seen that like this from 30 years ago. Because we understand the situation, we're going to provide value, we're going to do it cost effectively. Our goal is to get people going, get them working, get them successful, help them do well, and then they grow. In our system, we obviously, I want someone who starts out at a core membership, ultimately become a coaching client. And we believe that'll happen as they get more business and need more organization and more balance. Does that make sense? So Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas to the real estate business. Here it is. Real quick. Here's Brian Buffini's boa predictions. Number one, the rhythm of the market will mirror the 2019 market. Did you guys hear that? Enough. It'll mirror 2019. The market we had was. What was the word? Artificial. 240,000 agents are leaving the business with 14% more sales. Can I get a woot woot?
- [55:18]
Come on, Dr. Yoon. Thank you. And then people who use the blitz will do an extra deal a month. An extra deal a month if you have a team. An extra deal a month if you have a brokerage. Imagine getting your people involved in this. An extra deal a month. Do you know what the numbers are? Do you know what the average agent is doing? Do you know what the Buffining company numbers are? Wildly outstrip everybody out there.
- [55:43]
This is it. It's the time to do this. I got two cool things to finish with you. Because the mind can only absorb what the bladder can hold.
- [55:52]
And I don't want any of you guys virtually going to the bathroom just yet. Just hold on this. In 30 years of doing business, this might be one of my favorite stories I've ever experienced. Her name is Kimberly Stevenson. She's from Cary, North Carolina. I think her group is watching this today. We have hundreds of people meeting in groups today. She set her goal in 2025, in January that this is something I would do to 8.4 million in sales volume. So she entered in all her data and how many of you used the CRM? Okay, so she entered in her goals and the goals spits out based on your average sales price. Based on this, here's how many calls, notes and popeyes you need to do. Well, unbeknownst to her and her coach, she put the wrong information in and she set her goal for 11.4 million. So she has a goal for 8.4. She puts in 11.4. So based on that, it spits out the activities for her to do every day. So all she did every day is did the activities that it told her to do every day. Right now she is right on track to close 12 million in volume.
- [56:57]
She didn't know she screwed herself up.
- [57:02]
She didn't know what she was capable of. Just like you don't. We're going to do it in balance. We don't want you to lose your life and lose your family and sell your soul. But let me tell you this. You're capable of a hell of a lot more. The apathy. It's over. Covid is freaking done. 2019 is back into 2026. No more artificial markets. Now it's a market that rewards people who are actual pros, who do what pros do every single day. And when you do what pros do and you focus on transactions and not all the other garbage, focus on your customers. Blow them away. Exceed expectations. Expectations. Provide them value. And then. Oh, by the way, do you know anybody who'd like this? That's what you're facing.