And welcome. Good morning to April 19th, the week of April 19th, and of course, it is Mike Ferry TV. I’ve got a three by five card in front of me. I’ve got four of them that I’m going to share with you guys and gals today. And this one says in capital letters, the great dilemma, the great dilemma. And quite honestly, I think we are facing a very interesting and great dilemma and that great dilemma I wrote on the card, how can we have five million plus sales and not have any listings? Now, I know that sounds strange, but I want you to think about it for just a minute. Most of the markets in North America, the number of transactions is increasing. And if you look at year over year, naturally last March was tough because the culvert in April was tough. But this year, January, February, March, April had been at best fantastic, if not phenomenal in most of North America. How can we have such a good market and not have any inventory? And of course, that’s to me the great dilemma. See, the truth is everything we’re listing is selling at many times before it hits MLS. So they’re coming soon, are being sold. And we’ve shared this before, before MLS ever registers them. So they show up as not being a new listing. A lot of agents. And again, I question the authenticity of this and sometimes probably the ethics. But a lot of agents are getting a little addendum signed on their listing, allowing the agent three or four days from once they listed to get it sold through themselves or their team never shows up on MLS.

So the truth is, we’re really talking ourselves into a bad market and we’ve been doing that nonstop since probably last June or July. Now we know there’s no question that the covert effect on all of us has been real and very difficult and challenging to deal with. But one of the covert effects is we get a little negative in the mind and it’s very common. You know what if and I can’t believe it and oh, my gosh. Well, you know, there’s no way that a positive mindset, OK, is ever going to hurt anybody mentally, physically and emotionally. And the truth that I see all the time is the negativity among brokers, managers, agents, support to the Real Estate industry. There’s no inventory, Oh, my gosh. What are we going to do in November? Trying so well, how can you have record sales month over month over the last year and month over month this year if there’s no inventory? So I wrote down one, two, three, four, five, six, seven thoughts that just for your consideration and then I have some really good news. I’m going to write down good news. I want to share something with you guys, I don’t want to forget. Well, here’s the first thought.

The majority of agents and Real Estate today do not d o n o t do not prospect. Pretty hard to find a potential seller if you’re not talking to people. And I know every I’ve heard every excuse imaginable, especially in this last year. I mean, I had heard a lot before covid because it’s my business to listen to what agents have to say. But the number of excuses and the whining and moaning and complaining. And as my friend Alan Dalton has said many times, whining, moaning and complaining are not methods of prospecting. All they’re going to do is destroy your career from the negativity. So the problem we really face is we can’t get agents to prospect. I did a seminar in the Northeast many years ago. It was a four day event and it was an interesting event because, you know, I walk in, there’s three hundred and fifty people in the room, and this was a predominantly, probably 60 percent male. And they’re all sitting with their arms crossed in their coats buttoned up tight, and they’re frowning at me. And finally, after lunch, the first day of a three or four day event, I said to the owner at lunch, I’m not coming back after lunch. You don’t have to pay me. I’ll pay for my own flight home. You don’t have to pay for my expense to be here. But if you think I’m going to spend the next three days talking to that group of people, believe me, I am not going to do that.

And I don’t care what you say about me, you can try to destroy my reputation. But you have the most negative people I’ve ever seen in my life. He looked at me and said, let me make an announcement to the crowd. I said, OK. He stood up after lunch before I came back on the platform and said, You are the most negative people I’ve ever met. You work for me. I can’t believe this attitude behavior. This guy is the best at teaching you what to do. You can get listings. I mean, he just ripped his own Salesforce said, come on up Mike. Well. Believe me, this guy was a very strong personality and everything I said from then until four o’clock when they’re writing notes and they’re pretending like they like it. So at the end of the day, I said, I’ve got a little challenge for you. What if all three hundred and fifty of us went out and talked to ten people today and said, would you like to sell your home? That’s all you ask. Would you like to sell your home? So three hundred and fifty times ten is thirty five hundred. I’m going to challenge you to do it. And then I said to the president, who is in the front of the room, would you allow me to challenge him? And would you support that? He stands up and says, you’re going to go talk to ten people or else.

And, you know, and he’s ranting and raving. Well, the next morning, the sales management team, Ron Cronin, collected how many people each person talked to and they talked to like thirty two hundred. They generated more leads in two to three hours than they’d ever generated probably in the last five years. Prospect, I know everybody tells you you don’t have to prospect in this kind of a market. You prospect you know how rare you’re going to be a person, whether it be calling, knocking on doors, doing something to generate some leads I wrote down. Second, agents aren’t following up on the leads they have. I mean, you’ve got legitimate leads from potential sellers and you’re wondering, should I, shouldn’t I? I mean, get a grip here. Call these people. I wrote down third, we don’t we’re not or don’t call people who have high equity because of the market. You sold somebody a house three or four years ago. What’s happened to the appreciation on that house straight up? Would they like to have more money in their pockets? Probably. Well, they can’t find a home to buy. Wait a minute. Your job is to sell their home and find a home for them to buy. Don’t give me that nonsense. There’s no homes to be bought because there’s people buying homes every single day in your market.

I wrote down, we keep thinking that selling and working with the buyers are easier. I wrote in capital letters. No, it is not easier to work for the buyer because you are going to be one of five, 10, 15, 20 potential offers and you may be one of three people working on that listing. You can beat and be you can be the winner and one of three going against 10, 15, 20, 50 offers. That’s tough. Then I wrote down, you know, and this is always fun. We’re waiting for buyers and sellers to find us and we’re waiting for sellers to contact us or we’re buying business through our advertising, social media marketing, and we’re not getting a lot of response. Well, hello. Haven’t you figured out that that isn’t the way to get the fastest response? I wrote down, you know, we’re looking for the magic pill. And let’s be honest, I mean, there are more magic pills in the market place today than I’ve probably ever seen in my forty six years. Watch. We are in the people communication business. You can’t list and sell Real Estate without people you can’t list. And so Real Estate without communication, talking, conversation. Call it what you want, but if you’re not in communication with people, you can’t make it happen. And then I wrote down, too many agents are still taking the path of least resistance. You know, I’ll I’ll do a postcard mailing.

Oh, wow. Now, yes, postcard. This can get you a result. But if you were to follow up on every postcard mailing, if you do a hundred a week and you follow with the phone call, did you get my card? Did you have a chance to read it? And when do you plan on selling your home? And then I wrote down, the best agents are getting more and the masses are getting less. Or as you’ve heard me say, the gap is getting wider and wider. So I wrote down The Choice is yours. Find listings or you’re stuck with buyers. Now, I know some of your buyers agents and it’s your responsibility and you’re doing a good job because homes are being sold, but it has to be sold because there’s inventory. So here’s the good news. We’ve got a word of mouth announcement that our governor of the state of Nevada on June 1st is going to lift almost all the restrictions, which means our lives Superstar Retreat in July is on. And that’s going to be confirmed. I think on may second or third, but we’re over 90 percent sure that’s going to happen. So if you buy a ticket to the retreat and you spend the three hundred and ninety five bucks for a ticket or you’re with an elite broker and you spend one hundred ninety seven because you get a big discount, and all of a sudden you’re saying to yourself, well, what if the retreat doesn’t take place? Well, we’re taking fifty percent of any money that you use to buy a ticket.

And we’ve now had I think we’re at nine hundred and thirty seven tickets sold as of today. Now, we didn’t know if we’re going to be allowed. One thousand, two thousand, three thousand, four thousand. It looks like we’re going to be allowed a big crowd. We’re still taking 50 percent of all the money people buy a ticket with putting it in a trust account, which is already established and already quite large. And then if by chance we have to do this, virtually will reimburse your 50 percent back to you and let you watch it virtually. We’re very confident that we’re going to have a live retreat. Now, of course, people are saying I’m nervous about getting on a plane. I understand and I’m nervous about staying in a hotel. I understand. But at some point, we have to come back to life as an industry and we’re being offered an opportunity to come back to life in July at the Superstar Retreat. So we’re excited about the opportunity. But I’m more excited about the fact that you’re an agent that is determined and disciplined and powerful and excited, enthusiastic and energetic because you’re going to go out and take a listing this week, which is almost a guaranteed paycheck. I want you to get more paychecks by getting more listings. Talk to you next week.