← Mortgage Marketing Radio
Mortgage Marketing Radio
13 Questions Every LO Must Ask Before 2026 - If You’re Serious About Growth
01:04:34
Loading summary
Transcript134 lines
- [00:00]
A
Hey, are you stuck in the same production level year after year, wondering why the needle isn't moving? Or maybe you're looking to make a quantum leap in your business in the coming year? Hey, if you've struggled at all, if you've hit the wall of resistance, if you've kind of questioned and asked yourself if there's, if there's a better way, well, it's not because you're not capable. It's likely because maybe you've stopped asking the right questions. Imagine if you had a framework to challenge your assumptions, elevate your standards, and scale your business with intention. That's what we're talking about today. My name is Jeff Zimfer. I'm your host of the Mortgage Marketing Radio podcast where we help you get more clients and close more loans by building a brand that becomes well known. So you attract versus Chase real estate agents and convert them into profitable long term referral partners. As a matter of fact, before we get into this episode, I have a win of the week that I want to share with you from our community of my agent classes, Loan Officers. This is where we help loan officers scale their reach and engagement with real estate agents by leveraging a one to many platform of educational content and classes that they teach in their local market, in person or zoom. And we give them everything. The content, the emails, the promotion strategies, the PowerPoints, the weekly coaching, the train, the trainer videos and more. And one of our longer time members, Greg Fisher, there's a concept we talk about in our group called five Mile Famous and well, Greg has actually leveled it up. Now he's talking about being 30 mile famous. He just posted this win in our community last week that says he took a call from our Director of Sales at a boutique real estate brokerage in an upscale neighborhood area. He has spoken to the training director at the local Board of Realtors, this Director of Sales at the boutique brokerage, that Director of sales spoke to the Board of Realtors looking for suggestions for someone to come in and teach Realtors relevant current topics that help them with modern marketing, with understanding how to leverage AI and more. And the Board of Realtors said that Greg was highly recommended. And what happened as a result of that call? Well, Greg got set up with an event at their next two day in house training and as a matter of fact the broker of that upscale neighborhood brokerage even offered to pay Greg for his time to come in. And so what is happening for Greg now? He because of applying the strategies we teach in the My Aging Classes platform, he's built a personal brand that has differentiated himself, that has outvalued his competition and has accelerated his engagement and conversations at a very high level with the right referral partners that he wants. And so now he's invited to be a trainer and presenter at a two day private in house training for an upscale boutique brokerage in his backyard. Now how does that happen? It happens with consistency of a process over time. And if you want to learn more about what we do, well there's a link in the show notes or you can go to go.mygintclasses.com you'll actually see Greg's video there as well as a bunch of other loan officers sharing the results they've gotten. And a brief overview on the back end of our platform at my agent classes. It's it might work for you, it might not be for you. Either way, yot yourself to take five minutes and check that out because there's a new way to get agent business in the new year and it's not chasing cold calling or paying for leads. So go check out go my agent classes. Com. Okay, so back to today's special guest. Today we're talking about a powerful self audit and I'm joined once again for the third time. This is rare air to bring back to the conversation. Matt Weaver ranked the number one mortgage originator in the US by units closed with over a thousand loans funded. Right. And Matt leads a team in Florida that runs like a high performance machine seven days a week, 8am serving agents buyers with a system he's refined since 2010. And Matt has 13 questions that every originator should be asking themselves to grow, scale and lead in the new year. So what you're going to walk away with is we're going to go through all 13 of the questions. But just a quick highlight of those is how about a blueprint to build standards so strong your business becomes impossible to ignore. What about the exact mindset shift that turns agents into loyal long term clients and a fresh perspective on what your brand actually is beyond the social media fluff and the posing how to build a brand that's rooted in performance, purpose and clarity. Oh, and there's something deeper we'll uncover. Imposter syndrome. Yeah, we all have struggled with it at different times, but what Matt's going to talk about is the hidden role of some imposter syndrome and how it might actually be your greatest asset. So if you're ready to raise the bar and redefine what's possible for your business in 2026. Then stick around for this episode of Mortgage Marketing Radio. Matt Weaver, welcome back to the show.
- [04:57]
B
It is an honor to be here with you, Jeff. Always a great time.
- [05:01]
A
I agree as well. And this is a timely conversation. Here we are, Wednesday, December 10th, when we're recording this. I think this is going to be very useful for people listening as they head into the new year, you know, close out 2025. I know our topic of conversation is what we're going to call 13 questions. Ellos should be asking themselves for more better productivity. But before I get there, I wanted to ask you and maybe this is relevant to the 13 questions, which is if it is, that's fine.
- [05:30]
B
But.
- [05:32]
A
Somebody like you, right, number one, mortgage originator in the country, units closed, obviously doing incredible volume, winning at a high level. What? Before we get into or maybe setting the context of those 13 questions, are there any frameworks or processes that you go through at a time like this, end of the year, preparing for the new year that you think might be relevant to share with those listening?
- [05:59]
B
Well, absolutely. And thank you again for the opportunity. So the way that I view my business is that I'm always questioning myself. Now, I'm not questioning myself to necessarily take myself off course, but I'm questioning myself to make sure that I'm improving in what it is that I'm doing. I'll give you an example. The highest rating we ever give ourselves here in the Matt Weaver team, whether it's a presentation, whether it's execution of service, etc, is going to be eight out of ten, Jeff. Because the truth of the matter is, is that we always leave that extra 2% margin. We'll say okay for improving. So we, we have a firm understanding that everything we do today can be improved upon. It's never going to be at a level 10. So I think questioning ourselves, okay, productively is something that all originators should consider doing. So I wrote 13 questions. Okay. That I asked myself and I shared these 13 questions originally with a group of about 250 originators. And you know, I say it humbly, the feedback and response has been really great. And then I shared it to an entire organization of about 2,500 originators. And a lot of originators had said that they found a lot of value in it in asking themselves these questions to better prepare for 2026. So it's exciting to be here.
- [07:23]
A
All right, well, I think that's timely then. Do we want to just start from the top and go from there? Number one.
- [07:29]
B
Well, I have it all written down. Here. So here's the first question that I wrote down to myself, and I think that we should write down to ourselves and take some time later on either today or another day to answer these questions as an originator. Number one, what do I want to accomplish? What do I want to accomplish? So I'll expand on each question. Okay? For me, it was very clear going back in 2010, 11, 12, I knew what I wanted to accomplish, which was I wanted to be number one in my respective state, which I'm here in Florida, and I wanted to be number one in the nation. And the reason for that, okay, Jeff. Is my wife Nadia and I were expecting our firstborn, Alexander. Okay? Now, for those that have children, understand that there's just an element there that you get even extra more motivated because you have this human being coming into the world. Okay? And. And. And my goal was to show this child. And then, of course, my. My second child was stella. Okay, in 2013. But to show these two children that you can pick an industry, pick a line of work, and be number one at it. So I was determined to get to number one and to achieve that, okay? In my state and in the nation. So what I wanted to accomplish was clearly defined to myself. Now, what I share with the group is, is that what you're looking to accomplish might be different. Okay? You might tie it to how many transactions you want to close. You might tie it to number one in your city, county. You may say state. You may even be crazy enough to say the nation, because you have to be crazy to say the nation. I'm just going to give you that. Okay? But guess what? Everyone's goal is different. But I think it's so important for originators to ask themselves, what am I looking to accomplish in this industry? Okay, okay, okay, that one.
- [09:35]
A
All right, so what am I looking to accomplish? Let's go to number two.
- [09:38]
B
So number two, here's what I wrote down. What are my standards? What are my standards? So to expand on that, here at the Matt Weaver team, we have a lot of standards. A lot of standards, and it really dates back to 2010. You'll hear me reference 2010 often, because that was the creation of the Matt Weaver team. I've been in the industry longer than that, but that's when I started my team structure, okay? And I wanted to have a lot of standards because people that are own businesses and run businesses have to have standards, in my opinion. So here's a few of my standards just to expand on this. So, number one, I wanted to have an operation that operated seven days a week from 8am to 9pm Number two, we were 364 days a year, only closed Christmas Day. Number three, our pre approval process. I wanted it to be the most thorough and extensive in the industry, leaving no stone unturned and it being a step by step process. Number four, every buyer has to have a home buyer consultation regardless of their qualification or perceived qualification. So if you take a look at my process from the onset of the customer wanting to get pre approved through to funding, I have standards in between that we never compromise, regardless of frankly, real estate agent or relationship.
- [10:58]
A
Okay?
- [10:59]
B
So we have to ask ourselves as originators, when we look at our process, what are our standards that we want to operate at and never compromise.
- [11:09]
A
Yeah, I think that's very important. It makes me curious when I hear you say every, every home buyer gets a consultation. I know within that is its own individual standard as well as what is your version? Right. Of a home buyer consultation? Because as you well know, there's all different levels of the, the pre approval chat, the online app thing, you know, do you want to give a couple of little like what does that mean to you when you say home buyer consultation? What can a buyer expect?
- [11:37]
B
Oh, absolutely. So you'll find this interesting. One of our standards is we do not offer and promote an online application. Every home buyer applies over the phone. That's a standard. Okay? Now don't get me wrong, if someone's saying, no, no, please, I want to apply online, then we'll send them the link. But we don't promote it in our initial offering. We don't talk about it when we, when we walk the customer through our process. That's a standard. Another standard that we have, we never pre diagnose all calls go to application because that's what the customer, both agent and home buyer deserve. Okay? Pre diagnosing is the kiss of death. I mean it. Look, watch in the medical world, it's a medical malpractice, okay? And it's a malpractice in our industry, at least in my belief system as well. So we never pre diagnose. So once we take the client's application, gather the documents, have them reviewed in totality, regardless of their qualification. We have a home buyer consultation over the phone. We go over loan program closing costs, what to expect contingencies, if any, and overall process flow. And then we take that conversation and we send it of course to the agent and to the customer as well so they can understand where they stand in totality and by the way, Jeff, that's before we would ever issue a pre approval letter. That's another standard.
- [12:59]
A
Okay, I like that. I like that. And I know you're very particular about the customer experience. That's probably one example of that. It's very thorough, right?
- [13:08]
B
Correct. It's very thorough because that's what the customer deserves. Now, when I say customer, first and foremost, agent, remember, our job, okay, is to serve our customer, meaning the agent, to a high level. And the way that we believe serving them to a high level is ensuring their time for productivity, ensuring that the customer will close in funds successfully, ensuring that they don't have sticker shock when they go find the home. Okay. That's why we have our step by step process and we never compromise it because any time that it's compromised, then of course it breaks the flow of the process. But these are standards that we have. And originators should ask themselves, because remember, as an originator, whether you're closing one transaction a month, now, you got to start somewhere. 5, 10, 15, or 20. Okay. You have to start implementing and thinking about standards for the business that you're running.
- [14:00]
A
Yeah, absolutely. I think that's a missing element for too many people, especially as it gets even more competitive, you know, and the, and the, the herd has thinned out somewhat in terms of those who've left the industry and therefore. Right. Who's. Who's left? Probably the better of the, the crew. You know, I was going to say best of the best, but I mean, you're obviously in that category of best of the best, but, but let's just face it, it's. It's getting harder to win. Would you agree with that?
- [14:27]
B
Oh, it's, it's definitely getting harder to win. You had just have overall market compression. There's just no question about it. I mean, I think we're going to end the year at about 4 million transactions in the nation. And you're talking about 21, you know, going on 22. It was 6 million. So you're looking at a 30% reduction in overall market share. I mean, it's, it's condensed.
- [14:49]
A
Yep, good point. All right, number three, what do you got?
- [14:53]
B
Number three, what are my value propositions? What are my value propositions? And this is an interesting one. Okay. I would say to you, probably over 90% of originators cannot articulate or even have value propositions. And when you stop and think about that, it's interesting. But let me tell you why that is. Okay? Despite or regardless, I should say, whatever company you're with. You see, everyone runs their own kind of independent practice, even though they could be with a company. But because everyone runs their own independent practice, it's very hard for a company to drive down value propositions that universe that are universal. So what ends up happening is, is that an originator just really doesn't have value propositions other than humming and hauling and saying, well, I, you know, I can do this or that. Well, I discovered in 2010 the importance of being developing my own unique value propositions, which my value proposition wrap the agent sales cycle from beginning to end. Okay? So if an agent said to me, matt, what are your value propositions? I can clearly articulate what those are. So we always think about the old classic elevator pitch. Okay? You walk into an elevator, an agent walks in, they hit the 23rd floor. Can you go over your unique value propositions, okay, and show what you do differently in this industry by the time you hit the 23rd floor? That's the question you have to ask yourself. So for us, our four pillars of value have always been our value proposition, which is the foundation of our offering. So what I would encourage an originator to do is to ask themselves, okay, what are my value propositions? How do I put it together so I can present that? Okay. Whether you're presenting one on one at a coffee appointment in front of a small group, a large group doesn't matter, okay. Because I'm always going back to my value propositions with an agent. So I could be sitting with an agent and say to them, okay, so allow me to walk you through my process, what we do differently and my unique value propositions as to how I can help you grow your business. See, and that's the way that we have to consider conducting ourselves. Okay, so think about that one, Jeff.
- [17:15]
A
Oh, I am. And I'm thinking that a lot of originators get stuck there.
- [17:20]
B
Yes.
- [17:21]
A
To your point. They don't know beyond delivering a product on time. Right. At a quote, competitive interest rate, like a lot of people. That's all they have. That's my value prop. I'll close on time, no surprises at a competitive rate. What, what do you, what do you say to that?
- [17:38]
B
Oh, well, that's not even within my value propositions. I mean, listen, speed and execution and having a good rate is important. That's kind of a prerequisite. You take a look at my value propositions, I'll give you an example. My first pillar of value is my pre approval process. It operates seven days a week, 8am to 9pm, 364 days a year leaves no stone unturned. All customers go through a thorough review process and have a home buyer consultation. My second pillar of value is my offer process. Okay? My offer process consists of my seven elements of structuring a winning offer. Whether you're looking to eliminate buyer competition in a multiple offer or if the home's sitting a little bit longer and you want to, of course, increase your negotiating skills and power by using my seven elements. That's what agents do and use. Okay? See, I can clearly articulate, okay, my value propositions, and that's what we have to consider doing. But here's the deal. There's one catch to it all. You ready for it? Yeah. You gotta know who your customer is first and foremost.
- [18:39]
A
Okay?
- [18:41]
B
You gotta know your customer.
- [18:43]
A
Who is that for you?
- [18:45]
B
My customer is the agent. It's very clear. It's very concise. Now, most people can say that, okay, but not really understand what I mean when I say that. And let me give you an example. Most originators speak to agents as if they're a peer or an equal. They don't speak to them as if they're the customer. So I want us to think about that one. So, for example, if you went to a restaurant tonight, Jeff, okay. Would you want the server to be speaking to you, like a peer or an equal or you as the customer?
- [19:17]
A
Right? Yeah. Me as the paying customer.
- [19:20]
B
Yeah, that's exactly correct. That's what a real estate agent is to us. So, for example, if you were an agent. Hello, Jeff. Thank you so much for the opportunity and working together. I know that you're calling to. I'm just using an example. I know you're calling to find out the status of the appraisal. Allow me to look into that, and we'll get back to you right away. Rest assured that our process. Okay, we'll meet all of its timelines, but certainly I'll be getting back to you. You see how I speak. Now, here's a question. Do you think I talk like that at home? No, of course not. But watch. My wife is not a customer. My children are not customers. Okay? So you don't speak at home as you do to a customer, and so on and so forth. But see, a lot of originators don't think like that, okay? When you know who your customer is, you know how to speak to them as a customer. And that's what scales do you say.
- [20:15]
A
To agents, Something to the effect of, you are my customer first and the buyer second. You do?
- [20:24]
B
Oh, all the time. In fact, if you go to one of my seminars, you'll see a sign that says, dear Agent, without you, there's no me.
- [20:32]
A
Okay. I bet that's very refreshing. And probably this, what we're talking about here. Multiple things go into your success and impact that you have with the real estate agents, but just. Just the sheer fact that the level of professionalism that you deliver, that in and of itself is a differentiator.
- [20:49]
B
Well, absolutely. And no matter what. Now, here. Here's what's interesting. I want to give a little bit of an analogy or metaphor here. Okay. Our children. Okay.
- [20:58]
A
If.
- [20:58]
B
If you have a child that plays sports. Okay. Both of my. My children are in competitive sports. Okay. You'll see from time to time. Let's use Alex.
- [21:06]
A
He.
- [21:06]
B
He plays basketball. And every now and then, they're going to go ahead and face a team that is, we'll say, not as competitive as their team. But what we always stress to the kids is you never want to play down to them. Do we agree? So no matter how unprofessional my customer can get, every now and then, when you run into an agent that, let's just say, is very unprofessional because it happens in all industries, I'll never play down to them. My level of professionalism will always remain the same. This is the way that we have to consider thinking as an originator. Watch. Here's the standard originator. Hey, Jeff, how you doing? Let's close a deal next month.
- [21:52]
A
Yeah, I've heard it.
- [21:54]
B
Two words the Matt Weaver team never uses, and they both have the same letters. You ready for it? Leads and deals, never use those words. But that's a standard, you see.
- [22:06]
A
Yeah, yeah. I mean, there's a lot to unpack there. I know we have to go get through most of these if we can, but, man, there is so much for you listening right now. You need to think about your standards around communication and your value proposition.
- [22:20]
B
Yes.
- [22:21]
A
Minimum.
- [22:21]
B
Always enhance your vocabulary. Always enhance. Remember, every presentation is a performance.
- [22:28]
A
Yeah, I love that. I've heard you say that many, many times. All right, number four. What do we have for number four?
- [22:33]
B
Number four, what is my process? What is my process? So for me, Jeff, what I wanted to do is I wanted to have a scripted process which then will deliver consistency to the agent. And so what do I mean by scripted? So not only verbally, but in its actual steps. So, for example, if a customer calls today. Okay. They're going to go through the same scripted process. Okay. That's been for years. Okay. The Same process for years. So what I would encourage originators to do is if they don't have a process from beginning to end, from the point of, hi, I'd like to get pre approved through the funding, pull out a whiteboard. Okay. And whiteboard out the process on what you want that to look like. Okay. Every part of my process is a scripted process. Here, ready? Every great business has a scripted process. Every sports team follows a scripted process. And then when it comes to originators and a lot of agents, they just wing it. Okay. And you can't deliver consistent results by winging it. Okay, let me give you an example of this. So I just recently took on an advisor. We have advisors on my team. Okay. Now, he was a new. He's a new advisor. And so he ended up dealing with a client, meaning he in took the application. Okay. And an agent texts me one night and she said, matt, we just got the pre approval letter. Okay. But the customer doesn't know the closing costs. So can you quickly call them and tell them what the closing costs are so we can submit the offer? Now, for me, knowing my process, that's not possible. So of course I pulled up the file and I saw that this new advisor handled it. So now watch. I could do one of two things. I could quickly call the advisor and say, can you do me a favor and call the buyer and just let them know their closing costs so they can make the offer? Or I can call them into my office and say, okay, let's go over the 1, 2, 3, 4 step process we have with our pre approval process. And let's talk about the fact of how we skipped the third step in the process. So I'm not interested in remedying that really quickly. I'm interested in remedying the mindset of missing the step so his next 500 applications don't, don't. That doesn't happen there.
- [25:12]
A
Right.
- [25:12]
B
You see, see the difference between the two?
- [25:16]
A
Absolutely. You know, and I mean, there's, there's some other elements in there as well, is that, you know, you mentioned bringing on an advisor. I'm thinking of people have a team or a junior or something like that. You know, it comes down to, again, the importance of a process. But, but also knowing that you're dealing with humans and they may screw up, they may forget a step. They may. This gets back into kind of mentorship and, you know, training. And I'm sure you have a process around that as well for onboarding a new advisor.
- [25:45]
B
Yes, definitely. But see, here's the thing. Now we, you know, just like, if you made a bad pass or, you know, didn't execute on a play on the court, okay, we take him off the court.
- [25:55]
A
All right?
- [25:56]
B
We have a conversation, but we got to put them back on the court, okay. Because we have to build each other's confidence. Okay, that's great.
- [26:02]
A
Coaching tip.
- [26:03]
B
Watch the next. Watch the next question.
- [26:05]
A
Let's go.
- [26:06]
B
How is my service? How is my customer service? So the school of thought that I have always had, and it's an old Earl Nightingale quote, which is, if you want to increase your reward in life, you have to increase your service to the customer. Okay? So the way that we look at it is closing on time and so on. These are all prerequisites. The question becomes, how are we giving the customer? Which in. For me, it's the real estate agent. How are we increasing our service to them? So, as I had mentioned a little earlier, we never rate ourselves greater than an 8. So if you ask me, Matt, how is your service today? I'd say at Most it's an 8, because I have to increase, okay, what it is that I'm doing, because it's never going to be a 10. So I'm relentlessly always trying to figure out how I can increase my service. Now, it doesn't just mean process flow. It means thought. You know, thought process creation. How are we helping them sell a little bit more real estate? So as an example, today I'm doing the top, or actually tomorrow, okay. I have an incredible audience coming in. We'll have about 180 agents in the room, and I'm going to be going over the top 11. Okay? Home buyer and seller objections agents face in today's market. Okay? The idea behind this is to help them sell a little bit more real estate. All right? That's how we increase our service to the customer. That's one of the ways I should say, so asking yourself, how is your service and how do you continue to increase your service? But remember, you got to know who your customer is first.
- [27:45]
A
Yeah, I'm just. I'm just hanging out for a second on the whole, you know, you'll all. You'll never rate yourself above an eight. I like that, because that forces optimization is the way I would say it.
- [27:59]
B
Correct.
- [27:59]
A
You know, because if you're like, oh, we're a 10. We're rocking it. What do you do? You. All of a sudden, you get lazy?
- [28:04]
B
Yeah. Yeah. I'm never satisfied, ever. I'm happy. I'm happy, but never satisfied.
- [28:10]
A
What do they. They used to say, what was that? Constructively discontent? Something like that. All right, what do you have for number six?
- [28:19]
B
And highly paranoid.
- [28:20]
A
Highly what? Yeah, that's a hallmark of a lot of high achievers.
- [28:27]
B
That's right. Okay, so now I have. Watch this one. Oh, this is gonna pierce the originator.
- [28:33]
A
And.
- [28:34]
B
And by the way, I'm doing this because I want them genuinely to get better, because I believe if I can do what I'm doing, I'm no better than them. I just want to put that out there. Okay? But we just have to learn from each other. Okay? How's my delegation? How's my delegation? I saw you'll get a kick ass. I said to the, to the group of originators, there was, I don't know, maybe 250, 300 in the room. And I said, okay, could you imagine an originator owning a pizzeria? They would be the cashier, the cash. They'd work the cash register. They'd knead the dough, they'd serve the slice. They'd actually probably be the delivery driver, okay? But every now and then, an originator says to themselves, wait a minute here. What if I got someone to work the register? And what if I got a pizza maker in the back? And what if I hired a delivery driver? Can I sell more pizza? So we have to ask ourselves whether we're closing one transaction a month. 5, 10, 15, 20, whatever that number is. We're always having to ask ourselves, how is my delegation? So for me, okay, I have high delegation in the process because I'm supposed to be doing the part of the process that I'm supposed to be doing because that's what. That's my fiduciary to my team, okay? So delegation is critically important. So then here's the question. How does an originator, okay, figure out how and what they should delegate? Well, it's real simple. Think about the parts that you don't like doing, okay? When you have that whiteboard out about writing out your process, think about the pieces that you'll need to let to have someone else do it. Now watch, you might not be in the financial position, okay, to hire that person, okay? When I first started doing it, I wasn't, so I was having to do it all. But as I was building, okay, I was hiring for those lanes and those roles, okay? I wasn't afraid of it. Now I was, of course, walking them through each part of the process because I was very paranoid about having someone handle certain functions. But don't let the paranoia eat you alive, okay? To where you're not delegating at all because you're capping your potential.
- [30:59]
A
Okay. Hey, are you tired of cold calling realtors and feeling like you're getting nowhere? With my agent classes, you don't have to chase agents anymore. We hand you a done for you system of ready to teach presentations, plug and play marketing, and even 200 producing agents to invite. So you can double your agent referrals in 90 days or less. Plus you'll get weekly coaching and a community of loan officers sharing exactly what's working right now. Here's a quick win from one of our members.
- [31:24]
B
Been part of my agent classes for a little over a year and totally changed my business. I grew at least 25% and that was during a pretty down market and have only grown every single month that I've kept doing it. Community is great job to the Friday calls. It's awesome. Have fun with it. Teach as many classes as you can. Just do more. Do better.
- [31:48]
A
Are you ready to stop chasing and start attracting agent referrals on demand? Book a call at MortgageMarketing, Dot Pro or hit the link in the show notes. Now back to our show. Let's say somebody, what is that sweet spot where you think the loan officer needs to hire help? Or whether it's five loans or four or eight, and what is the first hire they should make?
- [32:06]
B
So how fast? It depends on how, how, what their financial position is and how much they want to fast track that process. So let me give you an example. The bottom line, okay, is that if you want to scale, all right, you're going to at some point as a business owner, have to dilute yourself, okay? That's just the name of the game. So the question becomes if someone needs the immediate cash flow, then the, of course hiring process is going to take a little bit longer versus if someone says I'm going to take this next year, reduce my income so I can hire ahead of my volume, ahead of what it is that I'm looking to do, then they're going to get there faster as long as they understand what part of the cycle they're doing. So for example, for me, I'm a rainmaker, so I'm involved in business development activities every day. So I was always very confident, Jeff, that I was going to stay in, that I wasn't going to just go to the beach. I was always going to stay in, of course, high levels of rain making, which then in turn I was confident about hiring others and of course getting more units funded to offset the hiring. So when you think about it, everyone's pain point is going to be a little different. The question, because we think about who's that first person? Okay. Usually it's someone who's taking your applications over the phone. Sure.
- [33:33]
A
So you're going to focus on the rainmaking. Okay. Love it. Let's keep going. Number seven.
- [33:39]
B
Okay. Number seven. Watch this. What is my role? What is my role? This is a big one.
- [33:46]
A
I want to hear more. Yeah.
- [33:48]
B
So I discovered years ago that I'm passionate about, about procuring the relationship about rain making at a high level. So then what I decided to do is I decided to build out the Matt Weber team system so I could go out and do what I do best, which is to sell the system. Okay. I don't go around selling myself. You see, if I sell myself, I'm going to sell myself. Okay. But if I sell my system, then we can, of course, duplicate, triplicate, and get to high levels of scale versus me being the value proposition. Okay. An originator would say, yeah, but I go to my closings for now. Okay, okay. That's not a scalable value proposition. Okay.
- [34:38]
A
Right.
- [34:39]
B
Well, I answer every single one of my phone calls for now. Okay. That's not a scalable value proposition. But when you build out the manufacturing plant and a system that's consistent, that's a value proposition. But you got to figure out what your role is. You got to identify with who you are as an individual. Are you really a rainmaker? Got to ask yourself that question. Okay. Because guess what? Based on my research, about 10, 15% of originators are true rainmakers at heart. Okay. Which is why we created Originate for Life, the podcast. It's. It's. It's literally designed for an originator to understand that there is a platform for you. Okay. That you can plug into. Should you like dealing with buyers directly or should you like rain making only? Or should you like. See, there's various lanes that we talk about. Okay. But getting back to it for this podcast here and for this purpose, have a heart to heart. What is your role within your structure and what is it that you want to do and you want to build around you to make sure that other. Those other parts and pieces are delegated off to others? Yeah.
- [35:51]
A
I think that's interesting. And I know you know this as well. When you look at the figure you referenced, what was it, 10 or 20% are actual rainmakers. There's a lot of tactician tacticians, right? People like. There's a lot of loan officers who like to Solve problems and structure deals. Right.
- [36:06]
B
Correct. And. And. And that's. Okay. That. That serves a great purpose. Knowing who you are is important. Okay.
- [36:14]
A
Yeah.
- [36:14]
B
Knowing. You know, because most. Go ahead.
- [36:19]
A
I was just gonna say it gets back to what we've been talking about here. So if you. If you self identify, you realize, hey, I'm not a rainmaker. I actually love structuring and putting together deals and making all that. Well, then that means you need to find the rainmaker. You need to find the biz dev person. So. So you can stay employed and stay busy. Right?
- [36:35]
B
That's exactly correct. But you gotta have a heart to heart with yourself to know it. That's a big one.
- [36:40]
A
Good point. The last thing I'll say about this, by the way, in terms of you selling the system. I don't want to leave that. That's a really key point. Selling. Not selling you yourself, but selling the system. The thing. Right. Think about McDonald's, right? I mean, they have a system. Um, what that also gets you out of is the trap of it. And you kind of alluded to this, is always being dependent upon you. And as you've heard, I'm sure, through your career of the realtors of like, you know, I thought I was getting Matt Weaver. I want to work with Matt directly. Well, from the beginning, if you're selling Matt directly, you're pigeonholing yourself instead of selling the Matt Weaver system.
- [37:20]
B
Yes, but you have to have that same consistent process through and through. And that's the. That's the catch to all this. That's why, if you see the order and the questions we were asking, okay, we want to understand what is our process? What are our standards? What do we believe in?
- [37:36]
A
Yeah.
- [37:37]
B
Okay. And so. So. So it's very well received from the audience. Okay, Watch this next question. Jeff.
- [37:45]
A
Sure.
- [37:46]
B
What are my present? How are my presentation skills? How are my presentation skills? Okay. And this right here, all of us, myself included, have to work on relentlessly our presentation skills. Okay? A strong presentation makes the sale easier. Presentation skills can be adopted by anyone should they have the desire. If you had the desire to get better at it, then you're going to get better at it. But watch. Okay? For me. So most people don't know this, but, you know, I stopped school at age 15. Okay. So my education level is about eighth grade. Okay? So I'm a dropout. Not necessarily, you know, promoting that, but that's just the way that my life was organized, I guess. Long story short is this. I KNEW at age 18 when I got into the industry. It was important for me to increase my vocabulary, increase my presentation skills, because I was very self conscious of the fact that I didn't have any real formal education. So I think you can agree probably right now that as I'm speaking to you during this podcast, you wouldn't think that my, that I dropped out of high school at the beginning of ninth grade.
- [39:12]
A
No. No.
- [39:14]
B
Okay. And the reason, the reason why you don't think that is because of my presentation skills and the choice of words that I use. And the way that we do that is we are ferocious learners. Okay, listen, I love audiobooks as well, but it's not going to help you with your vocabulary. You got to read as well. You'll get a kick out of this. I have never opened Chat GPT. Do you want to know why?
- [39:44]
A
Yes. I'm very curious.
- [39:47]
B
It's gonna, it's gonna numb the brain.
- [39:52]
A
Now you won't, your brain will atrophy. Won't have those well defined brain muscles.
- [39:58]
B
Well, watch. Okay, so it doesn't mean that we don't use technology. It doesn't mean that I. Okay, I'm not, not, not knocking any of that. But what I'm saying is that when I write a newsletter to my group, when I write a newsletter to my agents, when I, I don't go anywhere near it. See, I'm constantly challenging myself to think. Okay, I was talking to an originator the other day and we knew they weren't the right fit for F13 consulting. But watch what he says to me. Says, well, you know, I like to do poster for agents in this one group. So I just go on Chat GPT and ask great posts for real estate agents. You see, I got to tell you something. You got, you can't take yourself out of the thinking process. Yeah, okay. Yeah, so just.
- [40:43]
A
I totally get what you're saying there, 100%. Yeah, we could go on about that. I love that you said that, though. All right, let's go to number nine.
- [40:52]
B
What is my brand? What is my brand? And this is a big one here. Yeah, this is a big one here. I said to the group, as they were all listening very carefully, I said, do you want to develop a strong brand in the industry? And they're all looking at me and of course they're saying yes. And I said, do you want the answer? And they all yelled out yes. And I said, here's the answer. Win. That's it. Winning makes your brand. Now you can sit here and fake it on social media. You can sit Here and do all these things and show all these little achievements and all that. But the real. Understand that there's just too many phonies out there. Okay, I'll share this little story with you. In 2008 and 2009, in the Florida market, of course, residential lending was basically seized at the time because of the, you know, the. The mortgage meltdown. So anyway, I was, of course, in the industry. So what I had to do is I had to also help with some commercial lending to offset the actual loss of the residential business. So I was handling some commercial financing for this rock star of a restaurant broker in South Florida. This guy here was the man. I mean, he was in every major publication. He was the brand. And it's ironically, I knew his family for a long time. His name was Tom Paris. So I'll never forget Jeff. I was sitting talking with my father, may he rest in Peace, in 2009, and I said, dad, you got to understand. So crazy, you know, this guy, Tom Practice, I mean, he has got such a brand here in South Florida. You think of a nightclub, when you think of whatever it may be, that's who you think of. And then I said to him, watch what I said to him, jeff, I said, and then on top of it, his name is Tom Crackus. I said, look at me, dad. What could I do? My name is Matt Weaver. What did I do in between? If I have somewhat of a brand in this industry? Only thing I did in between was win and continue winning. So I want us to think about that. When you're. When you're more focused on what you're doing on the court, how you're increasing your service, your process flow, serving your customer to a high level, your presentation skills. When you're more focused on really a lot of these questions that I'm asking you to ask yourself, you're going to win at a higher level, and then you're going to have a brand. The idea is not to talk about your brand. The idea is to have others talk about your brand.
- [43:49]
A
Yeah, exactly. So just win, baby. That's the brand. But to make sure, I'm clearly understanding that winning is not just about closing transactions.
- [44:02]
B
No, no, winning. Winning is about the whole package of who you are. Should you have this goal, by the way, who you are in this industry, what you represent, your standards. Okay. And what you want to do differently. Like, I wanted to intentionally accomplish some great things in this industry, and so many originators out there can do the same thing. Okay. This is why I'm sharing this with you. All right, now it's to challenge yourself a little bit. So Michael Jordan was recently interviewed, okay, Just the other day. Watch what he said, Jeff. He said, I. I built my entire brand around what I did on the court. We all know that his name could have been Michael Brown and that name would have been synonymous with winning. Okay? It's what he did, how he performed, okay, that built the brand. He didn't sit there and do posts to you to make you think he's a brand. Okay?
- [44:54]
A
Yeah. All right.
- [44:56]
B
That's about something to consider. Watch this next question. What is holding me back? What is holding me back? Okay, listen, a lot of the times it's confidence. And I got news for the audience. There is nobody for years that has been plagued with low confidence than this man right here. I have no problem admitting it. And every time I say that, I always get an interesting response, okay? Because first, most people think, no way. What is this guy saying? And it's just the truth, which is why I'm always fully prepared. That's a confidence, okay? Knowing what to say. Okay? So confidence comes, of course, with accepting the losses along the way. You know, the countless months where you wanted to be number one in that office and you lost it, you know, right. By one or two units. The countless years of trying to climb and losing. But then when you're winning as well, it builds confidence, okay? So confidence is. Is a big one. Worthiness is another big one. Okay? We know that when we climb a little bit, sometimes we can really ask ourselves, am I worthy of this? Which is why you hear about a lot of artists, a lot of people that hit higher levels of income end up having, you know, substance abuse issues, sadly, because really, it stems from unworthiness. But what also holds us back in a lot of ways, okay, is the cost of perfection, which is just way too expensive. So for me, I'm rolling out new things all the time. Do they all, of course, succeed at a high level? No. Do we have to course correct along the way? Yes. Is it coming from good intention to try and help the agent or to try and help the consumer? 100%. So we get one time at this game. We all know that, okay? Life is not a dress rehearsal. So what's holding you back? Okay. What's holding you back? It's a good question. I think ourselves.
- [47:04]
A
Well, yeah, that's one that people need to probably sit on or sit with for a while because there's a lot of things that, you know, can come up with that which we don't have enough time to go into here deep. But I would. I would suggest somebody to be real, be authentic with yourself. And what. What. Also, what story are you telling yourself that's probably not true?
- [47:23]
B
If this is for.
- [47:24]
A
If it's appropriate for a quick second on your YouTube podcast, originate for life, which we'll link it up in the show notes a dotted line. Is this. Is this relevant to kind of what you're alluding to? There is. You have a video that says your real superpower is imposter syndrome.
- [47:39]
B
Oh, 100%. Which imposter syndrome stems back to worthiness issues. But watch. I ended up using that liability or turning that liability into an asset. So I'll give you an example. I was asked for years, Matt, would you coach me? Matt, would you consult me? Okay? And for years, I would never do it until I hit number one in the nation in 2023, because there's no way I could physically. Okay, Tell you what. What to do or share with you what to do if I didn't hit number one myself. It's a mindset. Well, Matt, but you hit number two or three or four. What are you crazy? No, you see, so imposter syndrome was a major issue for me. It still is to this day. Now, F13 Consulting, which, of course, we have 35 incredible members. Okay. Part of that group, I have the good fortune, of course, consulting them all over the country, which is an incredible opportunity. But watch. I ask myself daily, I look at the transactions in the units we're closing to ensure that I can get on that next call. Okay, Interesting. And that's a. That's a real issue for me, But I've converted it into an asset because I can't. I could not. I could never share on an open platform unless I highly succeeded at it myself. There. There's a quote that I can never erase from. From my mindset, which, again, may sound negative, but I really do think it's a positive, which is to inspire someone, you must first become someone. And it's something that I really live by through and through.
- [49:18]
A
Oh, yeah, I don't. I don't disagree with that. You know, it talks a little bit back to what you're saying with confidence. I mean, you know, results breed conf. Thing to have this confidence and then do it over and over again repeatedly. I love it. All right, number 11, sir, what do you have?
- [49:36]
B
What is my motivation? What is my motivation? And motivation is an interesting one. So one of my mentors, Mike Ferry, would always say that if you take a Look at the word motivation. It's really motive to action. Okay? Motive to action. So he would always say that a lot of people don't have a lot of. They don't have a strong enough motive to create the action. Okay? So what I want to share with everyone, this is so important, okay. Because there's some things that don't really get talked about. And I did this in our podcast, Originate for Life. We talked about this both Max Fish and I on our podcast, which is. And when it comes to motivation, there's really nurture and then there's nature. Okay? Now my whole life I have and I still believe to this day that most things are nurture. In other words, if that 5, 8 basketball player wanted to get in the NBA, I believe they can get to the NBA. I really just believe it. Okay? So I really do think nurture plays a, you know, plays a big role over nature. But then nature does also kick in. And let me explain with what I mean. So motivation, people can have it naturally or they have to manufacture it. Either or is not better than the other. But it's important to know which one you are. Okay, so here's a prime example. I was sitting with a top producing real estate agent. He sells 750 homes a year. So this guy is highly productive. So he sits down in his mastermind. First thing he says, Jeff, is, I'm wondering what I have to buy to motivate me through year end.
- [51:26]
A
Wow.
- [51:27]
B
You see, he knew that he has to manufacture his motivation. Nothing wrong with that. Then he turns over to me and says, Matt, what are you going to buy to keep you motivated by year end? Now what he doesn't know, Jeff is, I've been in the Same House since 2010. Okay, I live a great life, but I don't necessarily need to do that for motivation. Not saying one is right over the other, but here's where what I want to drive home to people is some people have it more intuitive. So I am a motivated person. Intuitively. I don't know how you get that. Maybe I was born with it and some need to manufacture it. So I think it's really important that you find out which one you are and feed into that. It's okay. Okay? So if it's where you have to manufacture it, go out and take an expensive beautiful vacation, go buy yourself a really nice car and get on the phone.
- [52:24]
A
Yeah. And by the way, it doesn't even have to be something material like that. Your why could be something else, right?
- [52:30]
B
Absolutely.
- [52:31]
A
Whatever it may be, yeah, like your children, your family. Right. Making an impact, those things.
- [52:38]
B
Correct. It could be that if you have to manufacture it in some way or some degree, go do it. Okay. I just wouldn't want someone to think or to not know why someone has more motivation than others. So I wanted to. I wanted to touch the person that may not know this and says to themselves, wait a minute. Maybe I have to create a different motive that would get me to do more action. Okay. Yeah, so. So that's my. That's my thing. Because I know there's probably so many out there that may feel that maybe just I don't have motivation. Right. Well, there's pretty. Pretty much two. Two rules on that. Maybe you got to manufacture it in a different way. I just want you to think about that. The next question I have here is, who do I hang with? Who do I hang with? I have to tell you something, folks. It is a lot easier. And I'm not saying I'm at the top, but it's a lot easier to swim at the top. The bottom. The bottom is where it's. It's just. It's sludgy. People don't want to help each other. People are angry, they're bitter at the world. It's just not a fluid system down there. But at the top, everyone's willing to help everyone else. I'll give you an example. A dear friend of mine that I value to a high level, okay? His son is 21 and just started a business, okay? I got a text message from him the other day, and he said, matt, you know, I want to thank you. You know, I helped him get a. Get a mortgage. I want to thank you for helping me get a mortgage, et cetera. I just want to ask you a question. Would you be okay mentoring me one or two times on the new business that I just started? So here's where I'm going with it. Smart enough, and I'm not saying that I am, but he was smart enough to ask for that mentorship, okay? He's smart enough to try to go to somebody who's doing something, okay? At a. At a. At a decently high level. And of course, the response to that from me to him is, well, I'd love to help you. Now watch. If, let's say, he asked somebody who's necessarily not doing that well, they're bitter, they're angry, they don't want to help. So who you hang with is so critically important. Your circle, it's so cliche, I know, but it is really so important. Okay. For growth on who you hang with.
- [55:05]
A
100%. So true. It's cliche, but a lot of cliches are true. But yeah, I mean, if you're. It's all about who you're around in terms of, like you said earlier, standards, inspiration, you know, you've got to choose that very importantly. I guess the last note on that is I always come back to my mom when I was probably in my teen years, and she probably needed to get my attention. Hanging around with the wrong crowd. Right. So she used to say to me all the time, show me who you go with and I'll tell you what you are. And. Right. We used. You know, I would disagree with that. But now, obviously, being a mature adult, in Hindsight, I'm like 100% who you. We've all heard the quote. You're the average of the five people and all that stuff. So very, very important who you hang with as well as real quick who you choose to partner with on the real estate side, too. Right?
- [55:53]
B
Well, you know, for me, it's a little different. And let me tell you why. I have a system.
- [55:57]
A
All right?
- [55:58]
B
Okay. So for me, I want to serve all. Whether you sell one home a year or 400 homes a year, my system is designed to serve the buyer seven days a week from 8:00am to 9:00pm See, you know, the originator that has to be very guarded with their time. It's because, of course, they're probably a sole practitioner. They don't have a system in place. So they have to ask themselves, you know, who am I doing business with? Is it worth it for me? Where. For me, of course, the philosophy is very different because I have a system. It's a manufacturing plant that's operating for all buyers. You know, how does that translate into something tangible? We're here. Ready? I'm in Boca Raton, Florida. That would be considered. That's where my office is. That would be considered the ritzier area of South Florida. But you want to hear something interesting, Jeff? Even though it's the ritzier area of South Florida, because of the philosophy of serving all, I'm honored to say that I've issued the most down payment assistance programs over any other originator up and down the entire Eastern seaboard. East Eastern Seaboard, per Fannie Mae. So you see where I'm going with that, because, you see, we're open for everyone. So it's a big difference in thinking and thought process. But the last question I have here. Yep, ready for it. Who can I Learn from. Who can I learn from? And this is a big one. There's a great quote. If I've seen further, it's because I've stood on the shoulders of giants. Sir Isaac Newton. And if we think about this, okay, what I would suggest to originators is this. Find who you admire in this industry, okay, and figure out how you can learn from them. Because it's going to, of course, expedite the learning process. It's going to expedite, you know, and accelerate your business a lot faster. But here's the catch. The catch is, is that, sadly, there are too many imposters out there. There are too many people that's. That. That are selling programs that never have really accomplished greatness themselves. And so that's a big one that we have to be very mindful of with social media today. Everyone's a rock star, okay? Which is why my particular program, which is really not for everyone, but F13 Consulting, the premise behind it, okay, is the world needs more imposter syndrome. In other words, you know, I'm on the court, so what I'm sharing is what I'm doing today. Not, hey, you know, 20 years ago, this is what worked, okay? So the great group that. That. That I'm consulting on, of course, is an honor, and I'm sharing with them every single thing that I do, every process flow, every procedure, okay? To which it's so fun, because the number one motivational factor for me in creating consulting. Jeff, you'll get a kick out of this is because I wanted to create my own competition, okay? 100. So watch. I. There's a few members that are coming close, and I'm consulting them on how to beat me. Jeff, isn't that great?
- [59:18]
A
That is great. Yeah. That. That's an abundance mindset.
- [59:23]
B
Yeah. Well, I knew. I knew it was going to force me to get better.
- [59:27]
A
Yeah, yeah. Because, yeah, if you see people nipping at your heels, you're like, I gotta level up, man. What's next?
- [59:32]
B
But, you know, so, you know, for those that are interested in hearing a little bit about our program, they can visit think13.com think13.com which, of course is our site. We have two forms of membership. We have floor 13, which is the full membership, and we also have club level that just recently got rolled out. Max Fish, another top originator. Close to 200 million a year, okay? He's spearheading club level, which, I have to tell you, he's doing an extraordinary job. He has this interesting program on how to multiply Your agents turning one into three at each interaction. It's fantastic. So everyone who speaks on behalf of F13 is on the court and performing at a high level. No imposters here.
- [60:25]
A
Yeah, I, I would agree with that. So we're going to link all that in the show notes every. The website you heard, think Thirteen.com and then of course, your podcast, which is on YouTube. You can look, look it up right now if you're listening. Originate for Life podcast, but we'll link that up as well. Man, there's just so much here. I wrote down every single one of these. And, you know, each one of these could have been its own podcast as a standalone. So.
- [60:48]
B
Yeah.
- [60:48]
A
How would you. How would you. Last question ask and then let you go. So people have these 13 questions.
- [60:54]
B
Yes.
- [60:55]
A
How would you. How would you advise they take these 13 questions? Get some alone time heading into. Right. The new year.
- [61:03]
B
Yeah. Yes, I would. I would highly encourage someone to take 30 to 45 minutes and really honestly ask them. Answer these questions. It's going to stimulate thinking. Okay. Don't put these 13 questions through chat. GPT. Okay. Really honestly answer them yourself. And I think it's going to provide a lot of clarity. Okay. To you and your. And your business. My. My hope, Jeff. Okay. After doing this for as long as I have been doing this for, okay. If I can touch one person out there that may have a little bit of low confidence, that may think high levels of origination is not attainable to them, that may think that maybe I'm not a strong presenter or whatever it may be. I have to tell you something, and I don't speak ill will about myself when I say this, but I'm being very genuine and sincere. If I can do it, believe me, you can do it. And you just have to believe in that, in yourself. Okay. Because I am proof of it now. I'm not anywhere near where I want to be. Okay. Because I'm constantly trying to improve myself. But you got to start here with a premise.
- [62:16]
A
Yeah.
- [62:16]
B
And look to build something differently. Look to build something where you're creating a standard. Okay. And setting a bar that's really higher than anyone else in your local market.
- [62:28]
A
Absolutely. I think this has been really great. Very reflective. Some of these questions are deep, actually, and they might need a little more than 30 or 40 minutes on some of them. And for those ones there, you know, you'll know whoever's listening, you'll know which of these you know, out of the 13, three or four that you, you know, they'll rise up for you. You'll, you'll feel an emotional connection or, you know, resonance with one or one to three or however many of those questions. And that's probably your signal to yourself to go deep and do the work that's required. Right. To work on that one thing. So, Matt, I can't thank you enough, man. Really, really appreciate this a lot.
- [63:00]
B
Of course. Thank you so much, Jeff, for the opportunity.
- [63:03]
A
Everybody, you know what to do. Check the links in the show notes. Go learn more about Matt's programs. Think 13 club level. Go follow his podcast on YouTube. And by the way, if you like this episode and there's one or two main takeaways that you got from the 13 questions, we'll also put a link to Matt's Instagram. Just DM him on Instagram and let him know. What's the one question for you that really hit home for you? You would like to probably know that, wouldn't you?
- [63:27]
B
Anytime.
- [63:29]
A
Okay. All right, listeners, appreciate you tuning in. We'll see you on the next one. Bye for now. Okay, that's it for today's episode. Before we wrap up, I just wanted to remind you about my agent classes. Your proven system to double your agent referrals in just 90 days. Imagine never having to cold call again. Instead building real lasting relationships with top producing agents who want to send you business with done for you presentations, marketing automation, weekly coaching. It's all done designed to make growing your business easier and fun. So if you're ready to take control of your agent referrals and grow your income, visit Mortgage Marketing Pro or check the link in the show notes. And while you're there, don't forget to check out the success stories from other mortgage bros who've already seen incredible results. Thanks for listening and I'll see you on the next episode.
- [64:19]
B
Sam.