Would you like to hear how one guy and a ninja group of seven salespeople closed 200 transactions last year and 209 million in volume, but wait there's more they're already at 100 transactions year to date, with 125 million dollars in volume, brian ladd, in the house b, Money welcome to the show man. Thank you good to see you tom you too buddy, so uh so bend oregon, how's the market in bend oregon it's market strong, but the market's changing tell us. So what we're seeing is a a flight to relevant expert brokers uh. So the transaction volume is down, uh inventory issues are leading us there um, but i think this is one of those moments.

I was talking to my team the other day, we're kind of back in that february march 2020 era, where everyone's like. What's going on what's happening right and, and those are those moments i'm like guys. This is an all-in moment because the market's unsure and when i have conversations with agents, they're confused and no one's, delivering a clear message right now and i think now more than ever we're relevant in the market. So you know anybody could put a sign in the ground and sell home year and a half ago or a year ago, and there was more inventory - there was more absorption.

There was more clarity on the direction that it was going and it's changed, and so i think that we're really leaning into this moment so i'm stoked to have you on the show, because, unlike some of the team leaders right there's it's kind of bifurcated right. There's people that produce those people that don't produce. I see you as kind of a tom brady with seven wide receivers like you truly are the rain maker of the business. We want to unpack some of that today um, but i want to start first with a lot of your friends.

Have now 17 agents - 70 agents. You are intentionally like you, keep it tight. I don't want to say small because you guys are killing it from a per person productivity standpoint, but you're you're intentional about the number of people so for the person that maybe is thinking about building a team or they have a team. Talk to us about how you got here and what your process is.

So when i went back or when i had the moment, i said i want to create a team around myself was. Was it started with volume capacity? You know when you're doing 60, 70 million dollars a year on your own. You have capacity issues um, but when i went to create the team, i i had to look myself in the mirror and said who do i want to be as a team? Is it in me to go add 20 30 40 agents? If, if i were to put a sign out in our market tomorrow, saying hey we're welcoming agents, i would do my own brokerage whatever. I could have a stable full of talented agents, no problem, but when i, when i i said, am i right, you know i had to be honest with myself.

I said: am i relevant? If i add that many agents am i going to be able to create opportunity authentically for that many agents, am i going to be able to have that cultural? You know commitment to the team with that many ages and there are agents that can do that. But when i looked at my market and i said hey, i can be successful within this hundred thousand person, metro area and there's. There has to be a saturation point, and so i said the niche that i want to be as the knowledge broker. That's deeply committed to this town.

What's the model that works best and i very strategically chew - chose this seal team model yeah you know, but because, but we're relevant, you know our average volume per agent right now is 29 million dollars. That's bananas! Well, i think it's very good about a million dollar average sales price i mean 29 transactions is a lot of business, especially when you're talking about a team yeah right in your marketplace. How many agents are in the greater or serve the greater bend oregon marketplace? We're? It's it's it's insane, so we're at 3, 000 agents for a hundred thousand percent yeah and how many transactions would be done in a typical year. Well, so we have about 4 500 home sales um, and then you include land sales.

What not! On top of that, we're probably mid 5 000 transactions and and in terms of the mls ranking, where do you and the team stand number one by a long shot? Okay, so so we're talking about, i mean again - and i know like you know, there's you guys and then there's there's a whole bunch of other players that are serious players in the marketplace. Yep there's some great and then there's probably and i'm just guessing 2 000 of them that are basically fighting for scraps completely irrelevant right, so very typical, most mls's. So the one thing is you're very selective. What does it take to be on your team who gets in? Who doesn't well so so if i had one lesson of kind of going back and i have had very little turnover, um i've been blessed with very little turnover and the only people that have asked and you went through a rough spot for a while there.

We should we might want to unpack that yeah, i'm bringing you back to you know one of our early conversations sure and you know, and that was kind of probably where i really decided what i wanted to be because you know at the end of the day. I don't want to have a full-time recruiter and a full-time on-boarder and an off-order and and all that, and so i had to go to my skill, set and said. Okay, what do i really want to build? Do i want to spend my time creating all these systems for onboarding off-boarding? You know training um, or do i really want to bring in people that are there for the right reasons? And so when i, when i, when i, when people join my team, it's the biggest lesson that i've learned is. They have to be deeply committed to the team structure and what i do in exchange for that is, i am 100 deeply committed to them, and so i believe that people leave teams for the same reason they join teams.

You know this is the mantra. You've been preaching for years, and if, if my commitment is that i'm 100 in on them and that i'm sleepless at night, unless i have enough opportunity for them that they're only going to want to leave the team when that commitment goes away right. And so the p you know. So how do you? How do you find someone like that, though? Like you, you got to kiss a lot of frogs sort of metaphorically.

I would think yeah to find someone that, like you and i run at a very different level right like we're. You know, there's like good great, unstoppable, like we're kind of in that unstoppable group of people like whatever it takes yeah. How do you find people like that, or is that even the model? Are you just looking for great well? No, so i have. I have unstoppable great people on my team, but very different skill sets.

So so my what i am is 100 business creation. Opportunity creation lead creation, relevancy creation within my market right and then the exchange that i need on my team is the ability to continue that story and to convert and close, and so what i can promise my agent is. They have more than enough at-bats, yes, they're getting put in that rotation and they're, getting big at bats, they're, getting my neighbors at bat. When you know when my trusted neighbor who's been friends with me for a decade said.

I want to sell my three million dollar house yeah, they say great aaron yeah go for it and they have to be able to maintain that equity and be able to convert and perform on that. But they don't have to do the work of getting those at bats. They just have to be able to take that swing. So, like you're like like you're running the pga or you're the you know, it's like you you're, you are the tom brady right like just catch the damn ball.

Can you tell my wife? Yes giselle? Yes, but, but i mean think about it like again, there's so many different team models and that's the beauty of sort of our ecosystem, there's always ways to do it. Yeah. The big thing i hope, is you're listening this. I hope what you got is he decided how he wanted it to be based upon you yep right what matters to you.

So so one of the things i know about you, you you've always sort of been aligned with me on businesses, math yeah. So the other side of this is like how you manage your people yeah. So one thing is: it's clear: you generate opportunities for them and the expectation is you got to close sure you got to take it over the you know over the finish line. How are you measuring that? How do you know when they're effective well so so obviously track and measuring is everything um, but we are not as much of a visual scoreboard conversion team as as one might expect, and that's that we have meat on the bone and and what's interesting, is as I meet all these wildly successful agents of your ecosystem.

We all have our soft spots and and if you and i were to say, hey, let's turn the table and pick you apart a little bit. You could have me crying in 10 minutes for sure, but so so we need to work on that a little bit um, but business is math and and the way i track it is. You know, from a 30 000 foot view on my business is structurally. What is my break-even point? You know and, and i asked a lot of agents that i'm like what is the break-even point of your team, they're kind of unsure, though yeah you know at what point? Is it not worth running a team and most agents can't answer that for you quickly um.

I also understand my variable and fix fixed expenses and you're speaking my love language right now. Yeah and it's like you know, it's like hey. This is business and how much are you spending uh variable and mixed and fixed, and then you know i i you know i i guess um, you know that boils down all the way to my farm. So so my farm is that you know i've got.

You know i'm doing a quarter billion dollars of sales a year in 800 homes and - and i understand the conversion within that farm - and i understand that i have to be absolute saturated market. You know i want saturation marketing within that, and you know why expand beyond that when i can do 250 million dollars of sales in an 800 farm, and you know we study the conversions and ratios and all that within that farm. So so you know your break. Even you know like when we talk about like net effective sales person like hey, you have to do x, amount of transactions or it doesn't really help us around here sure, so so the the cost to entry to answer your question, for my agents is 10 million.

A year, but my average volume on my team right now is about 30 million yeah. So so, let's talk um. You started talking about the farm and i know i'm sure a lot of people's ears were like perking up like whoa a quarter million dollars in sales. In a farm of 800, why aren't why don't you have eight thousand? What are you having 80 000 for sure it's, not a people in your town right, but let's, let's, let's go super analytical! There's one person listening right now, brian that is like i'm buying online leads.

We work our sphere, you know we're doing open houses. You know: we've got all these different ways, but man farming, like as a team as a team, really like you, timmy smith, josh, rubin and dc jill biggs, a bunch of you, kill it in your farms, how many homes are in the farm? How long have you been doing it and then what tactics and campaigns work to be that relevant, go-to agent of choice so uh to answer those questions? I've got i've identified, so i have a larger farm that i tend to monthly. That's about 4 500 homes, but my real farm. You know this is the home plot that we take care of on a daily daily basis.

There's no weeds in it. Um is 800 homes um and we've. I've really honed in on that over the last four or five years uh it began with the project. I i was uh fortunate enough to earn a resort community project where i took over developer sales down in the downturn in 2010 2011.

It was toxic. No one wanted to touch it. It was an incredible community, prime, for a comeback, and i was able to sell you know 350 home sites in there and then you know i was immediately relevant and and there's - and i always when people are asking me, what should my farm be? It's like, where are you relevant? Where do you live? Where have you had the most dominance, et cetera and it expanded from that um? But it's this swath of of west side of bend of about four or five upscale communities - and you know our tactics in that is probably best described as absolute saturation marketing. So not only we're huge in the mail, but this is not the just sold postcards.

This is something of value arriving in their mailbox every single week, something that was carefully thought out. That was very strategic. That has a call to action, delivers value to them without seeming uh, too cheap or ascii. Give us an example.

I understand all those words but, but i'm creating in my own mind what i think that is so tell me like give us like an example of like in a month. We might discuss this topic. You might hear information about this, so you might read about that or or am i off base and even that? No, no! No, so it is um. So you know we have a whole calendar on on.

You know: there's a ying and a yang to it. There's a little bit of hey: this is what we've done. This is how we do it. This is how it benefits you, but a lot of what we do is education based and so so so my relevancy, and what i'm shooting for is absolute market expert within the community and - and i hang my hat on that - and we do that for them as Well, we do a lot of market updates.

I do a lot of video market updates. I do a lot of print market updates um. I do state of the markets um, but you know our state of the market is in a few data points. It's a you, know, tri-fold that goes out.

You know what's three times eight and a half, you know it's 19 inches right. You know of a beautiful stats on what's happening in the market. How does the national economy tie into this? Does the economy plan it play into housing? How do recessions play into it? You know et cetera, et cetera, so you know, obviously a certain demographic is going to respond better to that sure um. But then what i do is i tie all my marketing.

I i buy you know i bifurcate, i i segment that up into a bunch of different pieces and create lots of different avenues back to that through my print, my social and you know all those online channels as well. It's so i mean for the person. That's listening right now, you might want to go to my youtube channel just to watch how animated he is as you subscribe like. I could see you like what was that the movie with, like the genius guys he's just pulling numbers from the sky like that's what i just saw right there.

You know it's like this huge giant piece with all these different correlations, so just to be clear. Absolute market saturation means weekly just sold. How we did it, which you know we've been like stop just doing just listed and just sold do case. Studies show people how you show them your process yep.

So it's not just we hit enter in the mls and we got a great price right. Um market education, i think, is key. If you want to be the knowledge broker, you have to do that. You have to deliver.

How often if i was on your youtube channel or if i was on social anywhere facebook insta whatever it may be, how often am i going to see these market update videos or content like that, because you mentioned off-camera like you, don't do restaurant guides? You don't do around town, you do the real estate business and the market yeah. So so i i don't. Do tick-tock dances yeah, you know um, but would i team we got to get them on tick tock and get them dancing just for fun, yeah just playing but but you're right. But but what i do do is i do i i i deliver value um monthly.

So what i, what i do is uh one big market deep dive every month, and this is the stats of the market what's happening, um and then i have an amazing marketing director who she cuts that into a bunch of different pieces, so that probably every three To four days at least once a week, we're we're cutting pieces of that buyer tip seller tips how to be relevant in this market. What's going on et cetera. So it's it's coming at you quite a bit, but it doesn't mean that i'm on video every other day, you know it's. We we have a couple days a month where we go really deep film, all of our video and and go from there.

That's what most of the best are doing now, one day get it all done, yeah and then the rest time, i'm a real estate agent selling houses. Yes, and the other thing is this - gives you legs, though, because when i'm putting out video content every two or three days, everyone thinks i'm working 24 hours a day of course, and and and and that perception is, is out there. So we definitely work hard uh, but that video has legs and the other thing that i do that we haven't gotten to yet is my relevancy within the market and where i found that my skill set can best deliver leads and opportunity, for my agents is becoming Relevant on a bigger scale, so what i've done is is really leaned into the town and issues affecting it. So, housing, affordability, a huge deal for most towns and agents, shy away from it.

They have a target on their forehead. Everyone blames the realtor. Everyone blames the developer um and i was like let's address this, so i've dove deep. You know in my podcast that i do.

I've interviewed the housing manager for the city of bend. I've interviewed the biggest developers, i've interviewed the homeless um. You know one of the homeless charities, you know, and and so i address those issues head on one to build - respect for our for our profession. I think a lot of people um shy away from having those hard discussions, but it creates relevancy for me within the community and they don't.

I always don't have my hand out when i'm out talking to my clients, i'm delivering value, i'm giving you a handout but you're handing them something well yeah, but but i'm trying to help solve some of the bigger issues in town and it creates relevancy. So i'm part of the conversation from a different angle and say: yes, i agree housing's too expensive right. How are we going to address this? I understand the growth is tough. How are we going to thread that needle and create the community that we want? How long ago did you start your podcast? No, so i started it just before covid, okay um, i i it it stumbled, and i and i took about 18 month hiatus and i've got back on it, but we're about 10 episodes in right now, good um, but we're getting thousands of organic listens in a Town of a hundred thousand people, so i think there's i mean you again everything points back to the word.

You've now said 15 times relevancy. Why is relevancy so important and and for the person that's listening like what do they need to be thinking about, because obviously somebody listening right now is going yeah. I want a business like that yeah i want to be tom brady and have seven you know gronks. I'm just throwing touchdowns to over and over again what does that mean relevancy and how do we create it beyond what we've discussed already? Well, there's no faking it.

You know it's um, you have to it's authentically who you are, do you want to be relevant? Do you want to be deeply committed to those issues and - and i did um and i i figured that if i'm out there to serve the real estate community and to serve our community in general, there's no better way for me to do it than through this Industry, this is this is what i understand. I grew up on construction sites. I understand housing issues, i understand system development issues and i can add relevancy to the conversation and by doing so um you know i can help serve people in real estate and that's the byproduct of it, but you also become known for more than just a quarter. You know quarter billion in sales and you know look at all the success but you're like rolling up your sleeves in the trenches, helping to solve some of the fundamental housing issues.

Yeah and then it's you know it's. You do good by doing great, you know, or you do great by doing good or whatever the saying is um, but i i think it's more rewarding for me and it has legs yeah um, because you know i've reached that point in my career commission dollars. Don't excite me, you know what excites me is helping my agents grow, helping them create a financial plan where they're going to be able to retire and create wealth for their family yeah. But beyond that you know, i want to serve the community and - and for me it's not about politics, it's not about these other things, but i think that i'm very myopic, but the lens in which i see the community.

I see ways we can solve problems and it's mutually beneficial. It makes me relevant and it makes you know, provides trust of of people working with me. Could you be the mayor possibly, but i don't want to be yeah today in this world. There's absolutely no way.

Yeah exactly piece of ego sure that you're like do. I want to scratch that or not um, but i love my kids. I love my family and and and one of the reasons i've chosen. The model that i have as well is that i could probably make more money with a different model with more supporting staff, less agents.

However, i wanted to share them um, but it would be a time trade-off and - and - and i look back and my son is now 15 years old and i the first 10 years of his life - i was all in and - and i have three kids and they're - All wonderful i'm deeply committed to all them, but i'm already looking at him and i'm like i'm in the eighth inning for right for that chapter of his life and i'm like gosh. First, through the seventh inning - and i was i was pretty distracted and so i've made that commitment and be like i'm all in on my kids and there's no amount of commission dollars that that will you know that will offset that commitment that the whole highest and Best use brian and how many people i talked to that you know, even even through the last 24 months have finally said. You know time over money, yeah right, like i'll trade, i'll trade, more money, sure to get more time to get more freedom to be. You know when you and i talked, and you were like literally like it's a ski day yeah and i got five minutes yeah like because then i'm going right back out of the mountain right, i was like yeah right.

Exactly hang up, hang up with me and go enjoy yourself. Can you believe i turned down a call with you to go skiing with my daughter. I was like that's a good idea yeah, but how for the person? That's listening to that there there's the one person listening right now who is uh, and i say this with love and respect they're, a control freak yeah right they're like, but nobody else can do it and i i i tried to hire somebody once and they were Horrible and i hated it and they you know the dog bit me. Therefore, all dogs bite yep help that person.

So you got to release yourself from that and and how, when you you've got to admit you're, not the smartest person in the room, there's a lot of hidden talent. You know you may be the most charismatic. You may be the biggest visionary, but if you think you're the best at every aspect of your business, you are absolutely the pinch point in your business and when you can trust the outcome of the people that you've brought on board, you have to look and if They, if you don't trust them, they know it right and when you fully trust them and allow a screw-up to happen or a delivery of a message or something that you wouldn't have done. But you still stand shoulder to shoulder with them and say text.

You know you text them on the side and be like this is a crap show, but i've got your back yeah, don't worry i'll, take the arrows for you. Let's learn a lesson from this and go on. You have them for life yeah and and if you can take the slings and arrows for your your agents but to go more relevant or to go back to your question of of how do you remove yourself from that? It's it's just about finding the right people that you trust and when you remove yourself from that and go do the ski daughter with your day, you're, going to find out that some business gets done without you and new ideas, and only when you give them the Room to kind of foster and create their own ideas and run with it is that's where you're going to have real growth and all of a sudden growth starts happening without you, because you've empowered them. But if you're the top down - hey, i'm everything to everyone - and you do this and you do this - you do this you're going to get 30 outcome from those people, because they're now doing your to-do list, it's not theirs and they're not inspired to do it.

But if you can kind of empower and cajole and inspire and support and just kind of that servant leadership and come you know what i've learned is. My biggest value is to go to yoga, go, do a mountain bike ride and come into our our meeting, fresh and full of energy, because i'm contagious for that two hours. I am you know creating opportunity by entering that room with that mindset. But if i come in they're burnt out, because i'm trying to do every aspect of my business, i can just feel the energy leave the room as soon as i open that door.

Yep yeah, it's i mean, look at you. Yes, i'm just gon na say. Yes, okay, one last question: how do you manage your team or maybe maybe let me ask additionally, if i'm on your team, what's my role, what do i do every day as an agent? Yes, so i i'm trying to figure out at what level i address this, but it's really the continuation of who we are as a group to the opportunities that i have. I don't have a mandate of number of calls.

I don't have the mandate of conversion um. What i, what you have as a responsibility on my team, is to meet the opportunity. That's put out in front of you with the with the you know, the the importance that it deserves and that that can mean a lot of different things for different agents. On my team, whether they're, listening focused or buyer focused or project focused um, but it's it's it's just it's more of a cultural commitment than it is a specific number, and i know that sounds soft in the business of measuring numbers.

I actually listened my uh my i had an adjunct coo, who was the youngest senior executive at ups sure who, when he retired, he went to become the third base coach for free at his alma mater okay, because all he really wanted to do was play baseball. Sure right - and he told me the story once and you've heard me tell this - he said i'm a freshman, i'm on the team, i'm sitting on the bench the coach comes out, tells us what we need to do and everybody jumps up and runs as fast as They can yeah and he's like running out as fast as he can right, yeah every day, every day running as fast as he can, and he finally turns somebody goes like hey man like. Why do we jump up and run as fast as you can? The guy goes, i don't know man. This is how we do it around here.

This is the way we do it. So so is that just your cultural like be lad, hands you something you got to get over the finish line, yeah, it's just how we do it yeah and and whatever what i talk to my agents about is just towing up to the start line or meeting Me at the 50-yard line right. What i can't keep doing is i can't keep walking to the 50 and you're not there and walking to the 40 and go find you at the 30 and pull you back to 50.. What i have to be able to do is say: okay, here's opportunity.

I've worked really hard to create the credibility to have this as an opportunity for you. Yeah run right and i'm going to trust you i'm going to support you, i'm going to do whatever i need, but but then we're going to reconvene the week and we need to tow up the same line. Okay, that's what i wanted to get to so so what is the there has to be some follow-up sure i mean you know is it it could just be. You know like hey man, where are you at with the smiths yeah yeah right and but how do you do it? So you know we've got weekly accountability.

We have our weekly meetings and uh - that's big yeah, it's it's tough to do, and and and and the cultural buy-in from the team. It's always a dance yeah, because no one wants a job. No one wants to be told what they you know have to do on a daily basis, because if they did want a job and they did want daily accountability, they wouldn't be an agent yeah. And so it's just it's kind of the nature of the beast of how you inspire and get them to own it for themselves right and so some of it's behind the scenes you know come to jesus, let's go get a drink at six tonight.

What's going on yeah, you know, i can see your numbers are down yeah. You know you've taken a couple trips where's, your head at you know, and and some of that's that some of it's public, some of it's - you know you know, but but generally within the team, it's it's more positivity than anything and the come to jesus meetings. Are you know off to the side of saying hey i care about you? Have your goals changed? I saw that you had 30 million dollars. You know last year and you're at 8 million year to date.

Do you not want to retire? You know, what's you know? What's going on personally how's the healthier family right, and so it's it's it's you know and that's what i love about this seal team size. Yes, is it can be even more informal and you know it doesn't, and you could say, let's go get a drink on tuesday and it doesn't you know it's it. Like 30 other people go home, i didn't get about a drink, yeah, yeah yeah. So that's the tom brady thing i mean, like i nailed that first thing as soon as we started - and it i think, was the actual perfect anchor, because all these all these great you think of like all the great athletes, all the great business people right, you Know it's it's the gal who says: hey, hey, what's going on some something's wrong with you, let's go, let's go in my office, let's go for a walk.

Let's go. Have that conversation you're doing that, and - and therein lies the accountability there and lies the culture. They know that you care when you say i'm all in it's, not cliche yeah and it's it's one of those things. If i become a team of 30, can i do that yeah and and there's ways for you to do it and there's there's ways to authentically care and, i think you're.

The perfect example of this, who you are right now, is the same person as who you are off stage on stage and you've been able to maintain that deep commitment and connection with everybody yeah but you're, operating on 100 level. 100. You know i'm operating down at level, let's call it 10.. I don't know tom brady you're pretty high up there.

Yeah! That's very nice, you, but you know it's not my skill set or nor my passion to go. Do that on a mega scale, yeah um. So it works for me right. I think that's the.

I think that really is the message of the day. It's like know, thyself right, know, thyself and then just go out and execute yeah. I mean my grandfather used to say compel events to conform to plan right and say that again, uh compel events to conform to plan, and so just make it happen. You know so much of this is about folks and one of the big things, and i don't mean to digress.

I know you're trying to close. No no go is i had this moment, um 2009 yeah world's a different place. I'm not sure i'm transitioning from developing a building to just saying, hey, i want to go all in on sales. I've got two kids.

I've got one in a crib. I can see the bottom of the barrel for my savings and i'm like am i all in on this? Am i good enough? You know et cetera, et cetera, and i met with a mentor friend of mine, who was a life coach and he's like brian you're, good enough, like if you're gon na do everything that you say. You're gon na do take a deep breath like you're good enough, and i know that's like days back to the saturday - live skit of the guy. Looking at me and saying smiling right, yeah gosh darn it people like me yeah, but you know it.

It took that, and i would love to express that to the agent out there that has down, because guys, if you're newer to this industry or you're at a moment, you're not sure you can do it. The formula is here yes, and so much of it is just about delivering and staying focused like if you're going to do all the things that are delivered in this ecosystem. It's not, are you going to be successful, you absolutely will the big secret is 80 of the people won't, and it's just compelling events to conform to plan and just keep grinding because you're going to look up every couple of years and everyone that you thought was Competition, you look around you're like they're, not here anymore, right and you're, going to look around and be like. Oh there's, a new one.

Here too, they scare me i'm going to change a little bit. You look down for a year or two. You look back up and they're gone yeah and it's just that plotting along day in and day out, you're in europe, gritty baby gritty, i'm glad you kept the podcast going. That was awesome.

It's a lot of fun hey! So if somebody wanted to reach out to you and connect, what's the best way for them to connect our website, instagram website yeah talk to us, then property source, instagram, facebook, uh url property source for people who don't know yeah so or just lad group in oregon. You'll find us love, it love it. So hey make sure you connect with them. If you got referrals, you want to go deeper.

You want to ask a question he is like you can see. He is all in so make sure you like subscribe, hit that notification button. I can't wait to see your comments on every channel that you're at and hey maybe send this to somebody that needs to hear like you're good enough brian thanks so much for being on the show. Man thanks tom, appreciate your everything all right, we're out you.