A Realtor at a Coffee Shop

Have you ever said to yourself: "I'm going to work at Starbucks today?" Well today, I said that, and let me tell you it was the most miserable experience of my life. The reason to work at Starbucks is simple: you are too lazy to drive to the office, but you want to trick yourself into thinking you are being more productive in a public setting. My reason for working at Starbucks was also simple: I had to get out of my apartment before I blasted a hole in my computer with my 6-iron. I got an email this morning from some asshole agent that the offer I submitted yesterday was rejected. Chill. So, I decided to put on my sandals and head over to the Starbucks across the street to get some quality lead gen in. The second I got there I regretted my decision. The line was almost out the door, and the only place available to put my laptop was at a community table with a couple of actual aliens. Also, there was another agent sitting behind me with his bluetooth in obnoxiously yelling on the phone. How could I tell he was an agent? He literally had a name tag on with his brokerage tattooed across his collared shirt. I'll leave the brokerage open for interpretation.

After getting my pumpkin spice latte (yes, they are incredible), I opened up my computer and began poking around the MLS. After one sip I had to immediately use the restroom where the barista gave me some elaborate code that I forgot upon hearing. It was six digits long. Once I got back to my uncomfortable communal seat I put in my headphones to drown out: "April, you're venti iced with whole milk is ready!" every five seconds. After ten minutes of solid email responding, I decided to get one of those "Thai Chicken Wraps" to hold me over for another hour or so. I took one bite of it and almost puked up the entire thing on the fake author across from me. Once my computer died, I packed up my bag and went back to the comfort of my own home. In conclusion, the office might be better than a coffee shop.

Five Items That Are Okay To Take From Your Seller's Kitchen

Admit it. You have thought about eating something from your seller's kitchen at least once. Sometimes you just don't properly prepare yourself for three hours without food. We have all been there. So what do you do? You open the fridge or the pantry and decide what is "okay" to eat or drink. Obviously, you don't want to take anything that your seller would notice. So, I compiled a list of food and drink items that are  "okay" to take without feeling guilty. These are items that if you hypothetically asked your seller for, they would say it was okay.... I think.

1)  Water Bottles: If there are three or more water bottles in the fridge it is okay to take one. But, if there are less than three they might notice and get a little frustrated. They won't call you out on it, but I would suck it up and drink the tap if there are only a couple left.

2) Mixed Nuts: You are allowed to take four handfuls of mixed nuts from their pantry. This will provide you energy and will always go unnoticed.

3) American Kraft Cheese Slices: This cheese is inexpensive and always comes in a huge bundle pack. Take as many slices as you want. It has the nutritional value of eating your own shit, but a slice every fifteen minutes can hold you over.

4) Orange Juice: This is borderline. Juice is expensive and a valuable commodity during cold season. But, if you are dying of thirst and need a little caloric intake I personally believe it is okay to have a glass. Obviously, take the perfect amount that will go unnoticed. Never finish it. You have been stealing juice out of your friends' homes since college, you know what to do.

5) Cookies: Never be the first to open anything. You can take a casual cookie out of a large box. For example, a couple weeks ago I sat an open where there was a sleeve of thin mints poking out of the pantry. I crushed every single one of them. If you are in a situation where there are thin mints you are naturally expected to slam the entire thing. 

Realtor Flees Listing Appointment After Being Asked If He Has Sold Any Homes In the Area

Saturday morning, a Denver real estate agent named Ben Thorson had a listing appointment that didn't go quite to plan. Ben (27 years of age), got the referral from his younger cousin who put him in touch with a family he knew from high school. Ben had met the parents at a wedding six months ago and was under the assumption that it was "a lock" because he had "killed it with them" in their first meeting. Ben pulled up to the appointment in Cherry Creek confident and dressed to the nines. He had all of his comps printed out and a fresh new listing presentation laminated and bounded. He even had two of his business cards in the folder to emphasize his level of professionalism. Once they started talking about what to list the home for, the husband casually asked Ben if he had sold anything in the area. According to the husband, Ben started profusely sweating and began opening and closing different pages in his packet as if to look for the answer. Ben stumbled over his words and handed the couple a brochure of a house that he had listed over twenty miles away. After about ten seconds of deafening silence, Ben threw his chair to the side and dove head first out of the dining room window. Glass everywhere, the couple quickly slid to the window to see what had happened to Ben. They said they saw him sprinting at top speed down the street. A neighbor found his tie a mile down the road. He hasn't been heard from since. 

How Realtors Should NOT Use Instagram

Instagram is a social media outlet that many realtors are beginning to use to improve their personal brand and marketing. Because the majority of realtors are relatively new to Instagram, many of them have absolutely no clue how to use it effectively. Below are five DO NOTS of Instagram for realtors.

DO NOT: Do not post a picture of your workspace.  Gramming your laptop, a strategically placed notebook, and a Frappuccino will not to convince your 35 followers that you are doing any business. In fact, it will have the reverse effect. You are showing your audience that you have absolutely nothing to do besides arrange inanimate materials on your desk like a wannabe Andy Warhol.

DO NOT: Do not post a high definition picture of a beautiful home with an inspirational quote captioned across the bottom. First off, this house is not even close to being your listing. Second, saying “Challenges are what make life interesting, overcoming them is what makes life meaningful” is completely pointless. Not only does this quote mean absolutely nothing, but also it is completely unoriginal. Anybody can Google image a house and a quote. Please do not litter people’s feeds with this trash unless you want to lose some followers and all of your friends.

DO NOT: Do not post about how much you love being a real estate agent with a picture of somebody else’s listing that you took caravanning. We are very lucky that we get to see beautiful homes and work our own hours. But, we do not need to shove it down everyone’s throat. This type of picture is almost as useless as your decision to go see that house for a client you don’t even have.

DO NOT: Do not post a generic image or gif that complains about how you have to work weekends. Nobody cares.

DO NOT: Do not. I repeat. Do not ever take an in-car selfie with a caption that reads: “on my grind.” This is the number one mistake any realtor can make in their Instagram career. Despite what the caption may say, you are not actually on your grind. You are stuck in traffic on the way to In N’ Out Burger in between the one showing that you had and cocktail hour.

Avoid all of these DO-NOTS of Instagram and you will temporarily maintain your audience before alienating every single person you know. In case you can't read. Watch this video that basically says the exact same thing!

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Unsolicited Erection Forces Agent to Cancel Open

Celebrating his biggest closing of the year, Jeff McAdoo took a couple buddies from his brokerage to Nick's steakhouse for some prime rib and scotch. Bill Dovey, who was also at the dinner, said that Jeff was extremely hungover the next morning and was planning to host a broker's open. Instead of giving Jeff an Aleve to help with his splitting headache, Bill accidentally gave him a 50 milligram, instant release Viagra pill. Jeff said he noticed blood rushing to his meat scepter the second he put out the sign-in sheet. He thought it might have been caused by the friction from his dress pants. But, it failed to subside as guests began to arrive. Jeff said he desperately attempted the "bend and tuck technique," but followed that up by admitting: "mine can't really do that." After an hour of holding a pillow his crotch, a female agent asked him to show her where the property line ended outside. Panicked, Jeff decided to place his hands in his pockets in an attempt to camouflage his raging flesh missile. Once he got to the backyard, Jeff pointed to a mesquite tree in the distance revealing a detailed outline of his tube slinky. She freaked and sprinted out of the house telling everyone what had happened. Embarrassed and defeated, Jeff closed his open house an hour early and returned to the office to confront Bill. 

Poem: Buyers Are Liars

Buyers are liars — we all know this is true,
My real-life examples I will share with you.
Let’s begin with a man who I met in the fall
At a sunglass kiosk in the back of the mall.

I showed him eight homes in the month of November;
When I followed up, it’s like he didn’t remember.
“Hey, Jon! It’s me; are you back in L.A.?
Do you have some time to see that listing today?”

A glimmer of hope — but already I know
His voice mail picked up three times in a row.
He never left; he has been dodging my calls …
What a waste of time and a kick to my balls!

Just a week to this day, my friend hit me up.
He wanted a condo for his girlfriend and pup.
I sent him some homes … and two hours later
He’s repped by his cousin, who is also a waiter.

At my open last Sunday, this couple waltzed through:
A nice older lady and her husband named Drew.
He wanted to write; his words cut like a knife.
“I don’t make decisions; talk to my wife.”

Drove this woman around for a couple of weeks
With a kid and her beagle, cleverly named “Squeaks.”
My whole weekend was wasted on this pointless hunt;
She was six months in debt, plus Squeaks crapped in the front.

I have one buyer left for a six-month lease,
So I picked up the phone and dialed my niece.
She answered and spoke the words we all fear:
“Thanks, but I’ll wait until the new year.”

Broke Agent X Soundcloud

From now on I will constantly be updating and curating the perfect tunes for your various Real Estate activities (if you have any). Your client will get the illusion that you stay up to date with fresh new music and your street cred go up.

Butt Naked Man Destroys Open House Signs With Baseball Bat

It was not your average day on caravan this Tuesday. At 1:30 PM, a butt naked man ran through West Hollywood destroying every open house sign in his path with an aluminum baseball bat. A witness said she saw him sprinting up La Brea to the corner of Sunset screaming out the word, "ass!" repeatedly. "He was helicoptering the bat over his head like a complete maniac. He also had the smallest d*** I have ever seen," she said. Hank Gherity, a fellow real estate agent who was hosting an open house in the Hollywood Hills, said he heard screams coming from down the street around 1:45 PM. "I ran out to see what was going on and saw the naked man smashing my open house signs to pieces. He was screaming: 'if I can't sell it, nobody can!' He also hacked down the telephone pole that my 'For Sale' sign was attached to," said Hank. Police are still in the process of trying to find the culprit who they believe to be a "jealous real estate agent." He was last seen discharging an alarming amount of feces on a bench advertisement of another agent. 

Ten Reasons Why Real Estate Agents Smoke Weed

1) Because it makes searching the MLS a hell of a lot more interesting. Get high and do a map search on the Malibu coast from $10-30 million. You will feel powerful with your MLS privileges. 

2) Because it makes your property descriptions a lot more creative. Ever wonder why agents use words like "picturesque, tranquil, and desirable" to puff up their listings?  It's because they're high.

3) Because it helps you fall back asleep after your seller texts you at two in the morning to ask you if you left on a light in the pantry.

4) Because it cures your hangovers before your early showings and opens. 

5) Because it's cheaper than other drugs and it makes you need less booze.

6) Because it could be the one thing you have in common with your clients. People bond over vices. If your seller is a stoner I guarantee you they will appreciate you more if you bring up the fact that you have a one-hitter stashed in your glove compartment.

7) Because it makes the stale cookies at opens taste amazing.

8) Because your seller has a drawer full of it in their bedside table (just kidding). 

9) Because your buyer just called you and told you he's going to rent after six months of showings. 

10) Because there is no better feeling than rolling up a massive blunt after a closing.

11) Because it makes you cooler. 

Monday MLS Search Music

Dire, Dire, Docks from Super Mario 64 will make searching for condos feel like you are going for 8 red coins again. Enjoy the throwback. 

Gary Vaynerchuk: Get on Snapchat

This guy invested in Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and basically every successful app out there. He is also speaking at Inman Connect in SF. He knows his shit. After watching this you better start snapping your next open house. 

This Week: What to Talk About with Your Clients

As real estate agents, we are constantly put in situations where we have to talk to people. Sometimes it can get awkward. So, every Monday I am going to give you a list of five conversation points to discuss with your coworkers, clients, or whoever you run into. 

1) Market update: San Francisco Giants pitching coach puts Los Altos Hills home on the market for $5.9 million.

Who cares? 

2) The NBA Playoffs just started. 

It is the first round of the NBA Playoffs. The Golden State Warriors finished with the best record in regular season history at 73-9. They look to continue their dominance in the Playoffs with a potential intriguing second round matchup with the Los Angeles Clippers. Steph Curry has a delicate ankle. 

3) Coachella was this weekend.

In case you don't have Instagram, Weekend 1 of Coachella finished last night with a performance from Calvin Harris. The other headliners were Guns N' Roses and LCD Soundsystem. Contrary to the rumors, Daft Punk did not make a surprise performance. 

4) Silicon Valley Season 3 starts April 24th.

The hilarious HBO comedy series covers Pied Piper's journey through start-up life in the tech industry. Highly recommended. 

5) The Jungle Book gets a 94% on Rotten Tomatoes.

The Disney remake has already done $104 million. Go see it with your kids if you have any. 

Real Estate Agent Fired For Wearing Wrinkled Shirt

Early this morning, a Brentwood-based real estate agent named Van Maynor (29 years old) was fired by his seller for wearing the same shirt to every single showing. The owner of the house, Monty Rosales, said that he could not trust someone who had such a poor taste in fashion. "It was a pink, Ralph Lauren dress-shirt that barely went to his wrists," Monty said. "It was always wrinkled and didn't even go with his pants. He also wore an undershirt that made it look even worse. I no longer wanted him representing my home." We caught up with Van back at the office who seemed relatively cavalier about the issue. "I probably should have gone to the dry cleaning because the shirt was ripping my nipples to pieces. That's why I started wearing a white-tee underneath it. I honestly thought Monty (the seller) never noticed. It was definitely a d**k move of him to get rid of me." We asked Van if he plans on expanding on his wardrobe in the near future. He said he might get a new Polo with the Amazon Gift Card that his sister gave him for his birthday.

Is Faking a Buyer Ethical?

As agents, we all have our tricks to get in front of a potential client. One of the oldest tricks in the book is to call an expired listing and tell the owner that you have a "client to preview." However, you probably don't have any client in mind.  The goal of this tactic is to act like you have someone interested in the house in front of the owner, and then slowly work your way into asking their future listing goals. If all goes according to plan, you will conveniently whip out a listing presentation out from under your arm and give the pitch why they should list with you.  The question is... is this ethical? The foundation of an agent-client relationship is built on trust, and the first interaction you have with them is a lie. I personally think this tactic is uncomfortable because I am not a good actor. I have trouble making up fake buyers and I feel like the owner knows what is going on and does not want to be pitched. But, that's just my opinion. What do you think? Am I giving too much away?

Should Agents Wear Name Tags?

No. They shouldn't. Because it looks moronic. However, I just did an Instagram post on this and it sparked a lot of controversy. Some people were saying: "my name tag brings me like five leads a year!" Or, "it helps buyers identify the agent when they walk into the open!" Another way to identify the agent at an open is to look on the damn sign in front of the house! But, if your face isn't plastered at the entrance, you can also shake the buyer's hand and tell them who you are. This isn't summer camp, so nobody should be wearing name tags. I am willing to sacrifice "five leads a year" for my appearance and dignity.

Five Questions Millennial Agents Hear

As a young agent, I have observed a certain level of skepticism amongst the "older" people in the industry toward millennials. I am hesitant to call it "disrespect," but there is definitely a noticeable feeling of distrust aimed at less experienced agents. I have noticed this at listing appointments, open houses, and even showings with other agents who were at one point in my position. A month ago, I was "previewing a home for a client" and the seller showing the home looked at me like I was from a different planet. He immediately asked me: "how long have you been in this industry?" I wanted to respond with: "long enough to know you are a prick." However, I didn't want to jeopardize a potential sale so I answered accordingly. I don't want to call myself a "millennial agent" because that word has such a negative connotation and is overused. But, as a "millennial agent," I can tell you that where we lack in experience, we make up for in motivation and persistence. I'll explain more later. For now, here is a list of five condescending questions younger agents get asked.

1) Why did you get into this business?

2) How long have you been in this industry?

3) Oh, were your parents in real estate?

4) How are you supporting yourself?

5) Have you sold any homes yet?

The Three Worst Spots for a Buyer Consultation

Getting a potential buyer's contact information is simple. Getting in front of that buyer for a second time is not. A buyer consultation is how an agent collects all the necessary information that will enable them to find their client the perfect home. This is most effective when done in person so the agent can get a feel for what the buyer is looking for and how to interact with him/her. Okay, great. So, if you actually trick a buyer into working with you, where should you meet with them? Assuming your office is either an ice box or a sauna like mine, you probably want to meet with them in a public setting. Where are the best places to do this? Glad you asked! Actually, let's flip it and do the worst places to meet because why not.

1) Skydiving

It's important to have a table to take notes on. So, unless you are a professional or can strap yourself to the ass of the buyer, skydiving is probably not the best location to do a consultation. Also, there is no place to plug in your laptop because it's the sky.

2) Long John Silver's

Can you name one person that has ever actually gone here? If you can, you probably should stop being friends with them. If you really want to mess with a potential client, tell them to meet you at the local "LJS" and see how they react.

3) My House

Unless the client is a degenerate alcoholic with a kid-like obsession for Star Wars and the New York Yankees, my house is probably not the best place to meet. However, I do have a Brita water filter that is filled up a majority of the time.

Open House Dank: Jam-Stuffed Peanut Butter Balls

Here are the ingredients:

Makes 8-9 balls.... because let's be honest, you aren't going to get more people than that!!! HAHAHAHAHA!

Here’s what you’ll need:

1 cup peanut butter (we use creamy, but chunky could also do the trick)
1 cup quick oats, plus more for coating (make sure they’re quick oats and not old-fashioned)
1/2 cup powdered sugar
strawberry jam (or whatever your favorite jam is)

Directions:

Using a small spoon or a teaspoon measuring spoon, scoop out balls of jam and lay them on a sheet pan or plate lined with parchment paper. Pop the jam balls in the freezer for around a half hour, or until they’ve firmed up a bit.

In a mixing bowl, combine the peanut butter, 1 cup of oats, and powdered sugar, and mix them all together until they’re well combined.

Grab a palmful of the peanut butter mixture (around the size of a golf ball) and then, using your hand and fingers, shape it into a mini pancake. Grab one of the firmed-up jam balls and twist it around until it’s even more of a sphere, then lay it in the middle of your mini peanut butter pancake. Using your fingers, lift up and pinch the edges of the peanut butter so that they’re coming up around the jam ball. Continue this until the peanut butter mixture totally encloses the jam and you’ve created a ball. Roll each ball in your hands so that it’s nice a smooth.

Once you’ve created all of the balls, roll each one in oats and then pop in the refrigerator or freezer to chill. (If you’re freezing, make sure to bring the balls back to room temperature before serving).

The Dream Brokerage

This is a list of what would make the perfect brokerage:

A Therapy Dog: Dog-friendly offices are fantastic. It makes the atmosphere more relaxed and provides a much needed cuteness factor. Every brokerage should have a white, fluffy therapy dog that walks around and loves to be pet. It would relieve stress and make everyone happy. No cats.

Ping Pong Table: How great would it be to take a break from doing nothing to kick the shit out of your coworkers in table tennis?

Catered Gourmet Food for Office Meetings: The only thing that gets me to "mandatory office meetings" is free food. However, it has to be good. Stale bagels and dated cream cheese won't cut it. Hell, I would sit through MLS training for five hours if there were free double doubles.

Reserved Covered Parking for All: At some offices, only the top agents have reserved parking. I am not a top agent. But, this doesn't mean I should park a mile away or pay ten bucks at a meter to check my mail.

An Invincible Printer: Imagine a printer that never breaks and is never in use? Heaven.

Sound Proof Cubicles: Some agents talk on the phone like they are constantly communicating with their deaf grandmother. I don't want to hear the dude next to me scheduling his prostate exam when I'm trying to call some expired listings.

A Destruction Room: Every office should have a room with a baseball bat, a punching bag, and a bunch of shit agents can destroy when their 3:00 PM cancels at 2:59 PM.

Delegated Lead Equality: Imagine an office that actually cycled the leads evenly amongst all the agents?!

No Desk Costs: Last year I think I paid more money to be a realtor than I actually made. Parking, MLS dues, desk costs, and everything adds up. I shouldn't be paying that much to do my job. Cover it for me!

Open Bar: I would never leave the office. Ever.