In this podcast episode, property management expert Jason Hull talks to Kal McDonough from True Submeter about how their product helps eliminate landlord-paid water usage and increase net operating income in rental units.
Kal explains how their product is different from competitors, how it works, and why property managers should consider using it to benefit both themselves and their clients.
You’ll Learn…
[01:18] Introducing True Submeter
[04:06] A Submeter that uses WIFI?
[08:48] Tracking Usage in Multi-Family units
[10:24] Warranties and Replacements
[11:25] Early Warning Systems and Alerts
Tweetables
“True Submeter eliminates a middle ground and coordination with the tenant and the city.”
"We have finally developed a significant product that is used across the country to eliminate landlord paid water usage and increase net operating income in rental units."
“A lot of owners are paying for their tenants' water usage.”
“It also eliminates you having to kind of coordinate with the tenant, coordinate with the city. That's completely on us.”
Resources
[00:00:00] A lot of owners are paying for their tenants' water usage. We have finally developed a significant product that is used across the country to eliminate landlord paid water usage and increase net operating income in rental units.
[00:00:17] Welcome Doorgrow Hackers to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder, and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.
[00:01:18] My guest today is Kal McDonough. Did I say it right?
[00:01:22] Yes, you did. Jason, I appreciate you having me here today.
[00:01:25] Glad to have you. So Kal, you are with a company called what? What's the name of the company?
[00:01:32] True Submeter.
[00:01:33] True Submeter. Okay. So can you explain to us a little bit of background on yourself and how you got really excited about submeters?
[00:01:43] Yeah, absolutely. I'm a recent grad from the University of Minnesota and we started this company, me and my partner, in 2016 because we got interested in real estate. Now being so young, we didn't know how to start investing with nothing. We didn't have the capital to do it. So we tried to figure out a product that real estate investors would like to have, that we could make that no one is really doing. And that's how we figured out a lot of people, a lot of owners are paying for their tenants' water usage. So we wanted to create a product to eliminate that, which is our True Submeter. It's a true submeter. We started this project in 2016 and we have finally developed a significant product that is used across the country to eliminate landlord paid water usage and increase net operating income in rental units.
[00:02:40] Okay.
[00:02:42] Yeah, so basically we have two major products. We have our main line meter and our point of use meter. And the main line is our biggest seller, as you only need one per unit. These get attached to the plumbing to each, and it remotely tracks bills and shows live coverage of water usage for each month. So if someone were interested in purchasing our product, we set up an account for you. We send you our product, you install it, and from there on we take care of all the billing that is necessary for your tenants to receive the water bills, and then they will pay you, the landlord, and it's completely covered from there.
[00:03:23] Got it. So people aren't using anything like this currently? Often?
[00:03:30] So we have few competitors, however their products do not do the same thing as we do. Most of the time. If you would like to buy a submeter, you get the physical submeter and it has readings on it that you can physically take. Most people will need to hire someone to go read those. However, ours connect to wifi and automatically trans mit that to your account and to the tenants. So it eliminates a middle ground there. And it also eliminates you having to kind of coordinate with the tenant, coordinate with the city. That's completely on us.
[00:04:06] Got it. How do you solve the wifi challenge, or whose wifi are these using?
[00:04:12] Right, great question. So we set up our own routers and ship them with each order. These are specifically only to connect to our sub meters, so no one else can use these routers. There's special wifi, username and password that only our meters get connected to and we completely take care of the cellular payments and everything. So this has nothing to do with the landlord. You don't have to set up a new wireless connection. And it's great that we can troubleshoot it knowing that it's our own wifi.
[00:04:42] Got it. Okay. So tell me, what are some of the big questions that people have about this and why should they do the extra work to get this set up and pay attention to this? Most property managers are probably thinking: how's this going to make me more money? How's this going to benefit my clients? Maybe you could go into that.
[00:05:01] Yeah, absolutely. I can start off with a pretty simple example. Just saying if a landlord that owns a simple duplex is currently paying for their tenant's water bills because the property only gets one water bill. A lot of cities have a legal rule where you cannot split it down the middle because one tenant is using less.
[00:05:20] Right.
[00:05:20] You can't have them billed for more than what they're using. And that's one of the key reasons why our product is so great is if you're now recording the specific usage for each tenant, now you're able to bill them. A lot of people question is it worth the money? Is it worth the investment? A great thing about our product is for a lot of the people that we sell to, this is a one-time investment that now you're saving all of this monthly revenue that you don't have to pay for your tenant's water bill. I would like to get into that a little bit more as we do charge a monthly service fee, which is $5.90. Per unit. So say you have a duplex $5.90 per unit, that's $11.80 per month. However, we are able to bill this to the tenant. So this could be a one-time investment for a landlord owner or a property owner or property management company. And I think that's really what sets us apart of from any competitor that we have as well is we minimize our costs of the investment there. There is no one else that is able to accommodate the pricing of this for an original investment. Like I said, we have two main products, our mainline meters, which I touched on a little bit, and then we also have a point of use meter. Now the difference between these two products depends on the plumbing of the property. If plumbing is separated between units our mainline option is going to work fantastic for you because you only need one meter per unit. And these come at a flat price of $79 each. Now if plumbing is not separated and it flows through the entire property, we have our point of use option, which gets attached to every single point of use in the unit.
[00:07:11] For example, a kitchen sink, a bathroom sink, toilet washer, shower et cetera. Now, this is a little bit bigger of an investment being that you need more meters and it comes at the same price per meter, $79 each. But it does the same function. They do the exact same thing. We group these point of use meters together. They all still connect to the same wifi router and still bill monthly. Now this is another reason why we are kind of special in that we are the only people that have this point of use option. Otherwise it's completely mainline meters from our competitors. And that's really something special that we set ourselves apart from. Although we recommend if possible, our main line meter is just easier and more affordable. We can accommodate those interesting plumbing scenarios.
[00:08:04] Got it. And so how difficult is it to attach the mainline meters or the point of use, meters? Is this something they need plumber to install or is this something they can typically do?
[00:08:16] Yep. So we do not do installation as we're based out of Minnesota and we sell to across the country. A plumber is recommended. Although we do know a few of our customers have a maintenance team on hand if it's a property management company or whatnot. We send an installation guide that goes step by step. If someone wanted to save money and do it themselves, they would have the opportunity to do that, although we do recommend a plumber on site.
[00:08:43] Right. That's probably a good idea for liability reasons.
[00:08:47] Of course.
[00:08:48] Alright, cool. So how do you justify this to people that have multi-unit properties and, they're low rent. How are you convincing, the property managers to do this and how are they convincing the owners to do this? Right, of course. Well, a great tool that we have, which is included on our website, is an ROI. This is a simple tool that you can plug in simple math equations and find out how much money you will be saving or how much return on the investment you will get from us. I think that's an easy way to, really show that we are worth it. And if that's not enough, then we just want to provide the simplicity of eliminating something like this for a property management company. What's nice for multi-home owners is that the account that we will set up for a personal owner, all of your properties in one are in one. It's easy to use. We, like I said before, we are very pleased with the simplicity of our website, our accounts, how they function. And along with that, I would like to offer my support and troubleshooting techniques to give any customers that we have an opportunity to connect with someone real instead of just looking up on our website and trying to find a solution.
[00:10:01] So Kal, you mentioned your website several times. What's the website address?
[00:10:05] It's simple. It's truesubmeter.com.
[00:10:07] Okay. And there's no clever spelling with True. It's t r u e.
[00:10:11] T r u e s u b m e t e r.com.
[00:10:16] Got it. Great. Truesubmeter.com. Okay. What other questions might property managers be curious to know about this or concerns?
[00:10:24] One question that we get quite a lot is, do we have a warranty? As our warranty is that if our meters break due to natural use, we'll replace 'em. We have a few to minimal to none replacements necessary in the time that we've been a company, which is quite impressive. We do know that some people have interesting tenants that will like to not cooperate in the ways that we would always like them to. And we offer a major discount based off of that if a meter happens to get tampered with broken due to outside circumstances. So that's one question that we get quite a bit.
[00:11:02] And they can pass that along, to the tenant. They can fee the tenant for damaging. You agree?
[00:11:08] Correct? Correct. We have had a couple of issues with some tenants that were not supposed to be there anymore. And we had to redo an entire project based off of that. And they weren't, they were not happy with that bill. But yes, we're very confident in our products which also I think sets us apart. And. . I'm trying to think of all--
[00:11:25] So curious, related to that, if a property is vacant, is there any sort of warning system that could be in integrated with this? Maybe in the future if somebody is flushing toilets or using the sink or something and no maintenance people and no tenants are in place like it's vacant? Absolutely. I mean, one of the key things to that is if the property is vacant and there is usage going. You will get a monthly bill saying there's usage. Obviously unless we know from the landlord that the property is vacant and there shouldn't be we're going to be assuming that it should be in usage. But otherwise-- another thing just to add on to that is our leak detection system where if we get weekly usage rates that show us if there's a abnormally large amount of usage at a property which will trigger us to contact the landlord and say, Hey, there's quite a bit of usage here. There could possibly be a leak. We know sometimes tenants do use this amount of water, but if not, this should get checked on. And then that's saving the landlord numerous amount of money as well. They don't have to pay the city for all the leaking.
[00:12:34] Got it. Okay. Yeah. Very cool. All right. Did we miss anything?
[00:12:40] Not off the top of my head. I think we kind of covered everything. Very cool. Leak detection. If it's vacant, you'll be alerted by the monthly bill. Like, Hey, what's going on here? You've got the main benefit. Why don't you sum up the main sort of benefit here and we'll wrap up.
[00:12:56] Right. I mean, like we've stated a couple times here, the main benefit of our product is to eliminate landlord paid water utilities. I mean, that's the main goal of our company. It's a small investment to a large return. And I think that's why people should look into our company and partner with us going forward.
[00:13:15] Cool. And this can be a profit center for property managers.
[00:13:20] That is a good question. This cannot be a profit center for property managers. As there is strict rules with how much tenants get billed for usage and utilities we make sure that they are only getting billed for what the city bills them. And that is due to legal terms.
[00:13:36] Got it. But they can charge a monthly fee for the use of this tool or service?
[00:13:42] Correct. That is correct.
[00:13:44] Okay.
[00:13:44] And this monthly fee is from True Submeter ourselves.
[00:13:49] Yeah. Can they mark that up?
[00:13:51] We have had a few customers in the past mark this up to combat the investment, and that is allowed. However, we don't recommend it as tenants most likely would not like to pay higher bills for, probably for something that they might not have wanted in the first place.
[00:14:09] Sure. Okay. But at least they don't have to pay the water bill for their neighbor.
[00:14:15] Correct. Correct.
[00:14:17] Okay. Very cool. All right, well Kal appreciate you coming on the show and sharing this. Everybody, check out truesubmeter.com. And thanks for being on the DoorGrowShow.
[00:14:27] Jason, I appreciate you being-- letting me be on here. Thank you.
[00:14:31] Awesome. So if you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, you want to scale your operations, you're tired of being frustrated with your team, then reach out. We would love to see if we could help you grow and scale your business, get the right team in place. You can check us out at doorgrow.com and we hope to hear from you soon.
[00:14:54] Bye everyone.
[00:14:55] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:15:21] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
Too many property management entrepreneurs fail to realize the potential for technology to increase the operating margin in their property management business.
Property management growth expert Jason Hull invites Lindsay Liu to discuss how property management entrepreneurs can utilize technology to make their lives (and the lives of their tenants and owners) WAY easier by automating administrative tasks.
You’ll Learn…
[01:39] Meet Linday Liu, the Technology and Real Estate Investing Expert
[03:42] The Ultimate Software for Multi-Family and Governance
[08:13] Diving into the Features of Super
[17:19] The Biggest Challenge in Property Management: TIME
[22:00] How is Super different from Other Software?
Tweetables
“When I think about what makes the property management industry so challenging… time is your biggest premium.”
“And at the end of the day, what are people best for? Dealing with the human side of things.”
“It's better to be extremely good at a small number of things than it is to be mediocre at a wide range of things.”
“The amount of care that needs to go into maintaining a healthy building is just inherently more complex when you have more stakeholders and parties in a multifamily set up.”
Resources
[00:00:00] Lindsay: When I think about what makes the property management industry so challenging, it really is time is your biggest premium, right? It is a very manual and people oriented set of tasks, right, that need to be done. And at the end of the day, what are people best for? Dealing with the human side of things, right? And so where can we come in? We can come in and help them with all of the other type of administrative, repetitive work that is not as high value from a people perspective, but is definitely very high value from an operational perspective.
[00:00:29] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to The DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you're interested in growing in business and life and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
[00:01:07] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management, business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.
[00:01:31] All right, today my guest is Lindsay Liu. Lindsay, welcome to The DoorGrow Show.
[00:01:37] Lindsay: Thanks so much for having me today.
[00:01:39] Jason: So give us a little bit of background on yourself for those that don't know Lindsay, which is me as well. So tell us a little bit about you and then maybe how you sort of got connected to your business, and then we'll go into your business.
[00:01:52] Lindsay: Great. Yeah, I can go back in time a bit. So professionally, I've been in the technology space for almost 15 years now. So building, launching digital products on behalf of and with companies. So I've done that for folks like Google, Amazon, Mercedes-Benz, the MBA. And then I've also been part of growing the businesses that I've been on that side of, right, really thinking about finding product market fit, creating value propositions that make sense through the lens of technology. And then more recently ventured into the startup world. So I was at a FinTech startup for a bit, actually launched a whole new stock exchange and a software platform around that. And then it finally felt like time to build my own thing out. And the reason that I got into the property management space is that kind of alongside that professional track of work. I'd also been investing in real estate and properties. So I have everything from short-term rentals-- so I've been kind of Airbnb, vacation homes-- to long-term leases and tenants to having done some flips over time. And the common thread with that for me was really just that when you are dealing with the maintenance, when you are dealing with an investment and you're really looking to make that place a home. And a home that's going to grow in value over time. There was just a lot left to be desired in the technology space. And so I thought, why not bring these two passions together? Right? My expertise in technology, alongside my passion in real estate, and start to solve some problems for the space.
[00:03:24] Jason: Awesome. And being passionate about real estate is one thing, but also being super technologically savvy and into technology is a whole different thing. And so that's cool that you're able to merge these two things together and why don't you tell everybody what you came up with?
[00:03:42] Lindsay: Yeah, so I'm the co-founder of Super. Super is a software platform really geared for property management and what we're building is for the multi-family residential space.
[00:03:54] Jason: Okay.
[00:03:54] Lindsay: So we're really looking to build tools that help with efficiency, productivity, streamlining communication, and transparency across all of the different players that exist in the ecosystem of maintaining a healthy building. So we have tools for property managers and their management teams. We have tools for sponsors and developers as well. And obviously for board members, owners, and residents of those buildings as well.
[00:04:19] Jason: Got it. So what makes this particular to multifamily instead of other niches in property management?
[00:04:27] Lindsay: Yeah, I think, you know, in my experience anyway, multifamily is a really unique situation, right? You have a group of people that are paying in for the shared maintenance and so things like repairing a roof, that decision becomes really difficult and more complicated when you're dealing with 50 or a hundred people that are part of making that decision and funding that. And so the governance and the amount of care that needs to go into maintaining a healthy building is just inherently more complex when you have more stakeholders and parties in a multifamily set up versus single family. And so we thought we would start with that pain point first. We definitely have big ambitions to continue to grow to support other types of real estate. But the multi-family space felt really like the place where we could solve some immediate pain points for folks.
[00:05:13] Jason: Got it. So when you talk about governance, this manages a little bit of the association sort of situation as well.
[00:05:20] Lindsay: Exactly. Yep. So homeowners associations, condos, co-ops, really thinking about the types of tools that are needed to help accelerate decision making and help gain alignment as. Okay, cool. Random questions then. Would this work for HOAs that are not multifamily? Absolutely. We have built the tool with that in mind, knowing that we would need to expand into that. In the case of, you know, for instance, homeowners associations, I think that the level of types of challenges really depends on that community and how healthy it is on its own, right? So the number of shared amenities that you might have, the amount that you're paying in for that shared maintenance and for your common charges. And so, you know, I think if it's just you're paying in for lawn maintenance, that's a different type of responsibility set than if you have, let's say a pool with you know, many common areas that need to be maintained for that homeowner's association as well.
[00:06:17] Jason: Now, is this a tool that a property management company that already has some sort of property management software, they have rent manager or they have Resonant or you know, some sort, is this something that they would use in conjunction or is this replacing that?
[00:06:33] Lindsay: I think we've really intentionally built the product to play very well and to play nice and be complimentary to whatever other suite. I think I deeply recognize that each management company already is going to have its own tech stack, right? Whether that's as simple as: we use email and we have a phone service and we use some out-of-the-box tools like, you know, maybe Slack or Trello or Basecamps, something like that. All the way to: we're using Yardi or we're using, you know, a number of other different types of software. I think our perspective on that is one of the challenges for management teams is how siloed a lot of these different solutions are, and the ability to really pull some of that data together and have that play nicely is pretty powerful on its own.
[00:07:17] Jason: Yeah, I think integrations are going to be a big deal here in the future for property management. I feel like that's a space that's kind of lagged and there's a lot of companies that will integrate with vendors' property management software. But the challenge is trying to get the entire tech stack integrated can be a mess.
[00:07:33] Lindsay: And I think that's exactly where I stand is from what we're trying to build the reason I've been pretty specific around that group that we're building for today, right? We're an early stage startup, is it's better to be extremely good at a small number of things than it is to be mediocre at a wide range of things as well. Right? So we really want to figure out what is the core that we're solving for? What are the biggest pain points that we should be building against, and be the experts in that. And then where we aren't, we want to make sure that we are playing nicely with the people that are the experts in that field.
[00:08:03] Jason: I agree. So tell us what Super does. Tell us about it. Tell us about the features...
[00:08:09] Lindsay: mm-hmm.
[00:08:09] Jason: ...and how you can use it and what problems does this solve?
[00:08:12] Lindsay: Yeah, absolutely. So at the core, I would say first thing is to really think about us from the lens of a productivity tool, right? So it's software that is supposed to help you save time, save money, and be more efficient. So from a property manager perspective, really this is about increasing your operational efficiency and therefore your operating margin, right? You'll be able to do more things in less time. And so to enable that, we built what we call like an operating core for sets of features and functionality that allow for that. So one of the main things that we're solving for right now is communication. And I think that is the piece that again, and again and again keeps coming up. When you talk to management teams and the residents it's a pain point on both sides, right? Where maybe a request is coming in and the resident is wondering "what happened with that? What is the status of it? Did it ever get done?" And then on the other end, the management team is saying, "I'm so busy getting the thing done. I just forgot to update you on that." Right? And so there's a lot of this unnecessary friction that is happening that we think is a great opportunity for technology to automate.
[00:09:19] And the other thing that we're doing quite differently is we believe that consumers today are quite tired of having to download another app or to learn a whole new experience in order to use something. And what we've realized is we should remove all of that friction and just use the tools that people like to use today and that frankly do work for that baseline communication. So people like to email, and they like to text. So we've built our entire platform around enabling communication around email and text. And what happens is our system is going to parse all of that information and give the managers a really nice dashboard that says "We recognize who this person is, they emailed in, and we're going to make that task automatically for you." So we're really kind of short-cutting some of those steps between if someone emails you today, you have to go look it up. Right? Which property they're in, who they're with, their history, and then you have to go and create that ticket. We do all of that automatically.
[00:10:11] Jason: Got it. So maybe to showcase this audibly, why don't you walk us through an example scenario involving all the parties and how it's facilitating the communication.
[00:10:22] Lindsay: Sure. Let's take a really common one. Someone's got a leak, right? And they think it's the most urgent thing in the world, right? So what they would do if they are using Super, is the resident would either email or text the dedicated phone number that property has. So let's say, you know, I don't know, 1 23 HOA , right? Is going to email and say, "I have a leak in my unit." They don't even have to say, "I'm in unit one A or whatever." We recognize who that user is and we're automatically going to create the task in Super. For the resident, what's going to happen is because they emailed it in, we will automatically send them the confirmation, acknowledging receipt as well, and say, "Hey, we got this," and it will automatically be assigned to the property manager that is responsible for that. That property manager, right, will then get notified that they have a new task that's been assigned to them and they can go in and they can say, "okay, maybe I need to reassign this to the Super that's on staff, right, to go and take a look at this. Or maybe I need to bring in an external vendor, right? I maybe I need the plumbing company to come by and see if this is happening from something that we knew was happening with the toilet upstairs, above that unit," right?
[00:11:29] So they can then bring in the appropriate parties and liaise with all of them within the platform. They can also update the resident within there. So they could just write back and kind of say, "Hey, we're on this. Don't worry, I'm going to send somebody out right now." And that resident's going to get an immediate paper trail of all of that communication. As soon as this issue is resolved, if the management team marks it as done, the resident's going to get feedback saying, this task has been marked as complete. So we're really closing those feedback loops, making sure that that communication, right, any of those gaps where we can automate with technology, we're using technology to do that. So it's just going to save you those minutes every single day on those repetitive types of emails and communication that have to be made so that you can just move on to doing something else with your day.
[00:12:14] Jason: Okay, now what you described is like a really cool maintenance coordination tool. Right? So it's helping to coordinate maintenance. Does Super go beyond maintenance coordination, or is that--
[00:12:25] Lindsay: Yeah, absolutely, and this is where things start to get really exciting, right? So think about in that homeowner's association example, you have a board, they have to run regular board meetings. They have the annual owners meeting. We have templates that allow them to support that governance. So think about a task. There's a certain type of task, right? That is just about board meetings and owners meetings. And so what we'll do is we'll create that schedule for them. We'll set a preset agenda. They can update that at any time. They can add all of the board members to it. And then once those minutes are in there, they use that right to log the discussion that they had and next steps. That is saved, and you don't even have to go and create a separate minutes document. It's already there for you to go and look at over time.
[00:13:07] For board members, we also have things like quick polling. So if you need to make a decision on something. I don't know about you, but the times that I've been on boards you're, you know, making a decision on an email thread that's already 70 emails deep, and by the time someone says, "Hey, can you all decide on this?" someone chimes in with something else, and suddenly you're talking better than a topic, and three weeks later, no decision has been made. So we're really trying to make everything very actionable and it's just, you know, it's the fact that if email is the most prevalent tool you're using, it's just not the right tool for creating actionable conversations, right? And so we're trying to build that tooling into a platform that is purpose-built for property management. We also have tools around, obviously all of your file management documentation and storage. That's I think, another challenge with email is you have turnover, you have, you know, for instance, board members that leave and all of that historical information today goes with them.
[00:14:00] I'm still getting emails from boards that I was on years ago being like, "Hey, do you remember that vendor that we used for that thing? Do you happen to have that contract somewhere? You can look for it." That should never be something that happens with good governance of a building, right? So we centralize and store all of that information on behalf of the buildings. We help them keep their contact directories really nice and clean and updated. And then we have a whole finances component as well where we help them visualize these really simple real-time dashboards for what's going on with the association's health, how much are they taking in, how much are they spending every single month? You can kind of look at that throughout the year, dive into transactions, and then the next thing we'll be rolling out is the ability to accept and receive those monthly payments as well.
[00:14:45] Jason: Okay. Very cool. All right, so the two, it sounds like so far, I don't know if there's anything else, but the two big components of this are maintenance, coordination, and then the HOA governance and board meetings and documentation, storage and dashboards.
[00:15:02] Lindsay: Yeah, I mean, if I think about the things that I wish I had as a board member in my previous-- and I've been on the board of three condos at this point, so I'm just pulling from those personal experiences. I wish that I had a way-- what was that?
[00:15:14] Jason: You're a brave person or a glutton for punishment. I don't know. There's a--
[00:15:18] Lindsay: I know
[00:15:19] Jason: --individual that chooses be on a board of an association.
[00:15:22] Lindsay: Well, you know, it's funny because the first time I joined, I remember a friend of mine being like, he was on the board of his co-op. He was like, "don't do it. Just don't do it. Like you're never going to have a life when you go home." And I was like, "I just feel like I'm really able to solve problems and I'm a really proactive person." then I got on and now I'm that person that tells people, I'm like, "I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. Like, good luck. Good luck to you," so when I think about the thing that I really wish that I had, right, it was that communication piece. I wanted more transparency and visibility into what the property manager was doing, the decisions that were being made, how things were going overall. I wanted that into our building's finances as well, right? How are we doing as far as our targets for what we wanted to be spending from an operating perspective versus how we are tracking? Do we need to think about doing things like raising the fees? Do we need to do things like leverage a special assessment, right? That type of planning. I really wish we had more visibility and transparency into that. Absolutely wish that we just had better governance around the documents, the history of the building, decisions that have been made previously, and tools to help us just operate in a healthier way as well. So we've really built around those cornerstones of what we think are the, kind of the building blocks, the foundation of what a healthy building.
[00:16:36] Jason: Okay. Very cool. This sounds really great. So if people have a property management business and they're managing a large building, a multi-family building, and they're dealing with some of this drama, this would be a great tool for them to systematize things, bring the communication together, deal with some of the maintenance coordination, approvals communication transparency, and then also making sure that the meeting stuff is all held in one place. And I would imagine if property managers are implementing this, then this probably is a really great selling point for these property managers that are doing this work that they have this repository that's been built up with the association's help.
[00:17:19] Lindsay: Absolutely. I think. When I think about what makes the property management industry so challenging, and I'm sure you have a point of view on this as well it really is time is your biggest premium, right? It is a very manual and people oriented set of tasks, right, that need to be done. And at the end of the day, what are people best for? Dealing with the human side of things, right? The kind of complex logic, the decisioning that needs to go into making sure that this group of people are happy and functioning. That's like totally something that you need a person to be able to manage. And so where can we come in? We can come in and help them with all of the other type of administrative, repetitive work that is not as high value from a people perspective, but is definitely very high value from an operational perspective, right? So where can we help streamline that? And I think that's a value proposition that resonates time and time again. If we say, I can save you minutes every single day on these 10 types of tasks, right? That ladders up to hours at the end of a week that you are saving and on top of that, your residents feel happier, you're going to have more stickiness and retention. These are things that will help the bottom line of a business.
[00:18:29] Jason: Now, I imagine when it comes to associations utilizing a software like this, rather than the property manager, so the property manager would just build this into their fee structure, I would imagine it's part of their services. They can say, "we have this cool tool and system." and they have an advantage because otherwise the association board members, there's always going to be the negative person that's going to try and like say, "Hey, we don't want to spend all this money on this technology or this software. Somebody can do this and we can figure it out ourselves." And how do you deal with that?
[00:19:03] Lindsay: Yeah. You know what's interesting is even though we don't specifically target the individual board members in HOAs, we get a lot of inbound from them.
[00:19:12] Jason: Yeah.
[00:19:12] Lindsay: People reaching out saying, "I really wish there was a better way. And so if anything, that gives me signal that the residents and the board members are looking for tools. They're looking for a better way to do things. And I think this is, when I think about technology in general and what's happening even in the enterprise space, we've been talking about this consumerization of IT, right? If I can get a Task Rabbit to come and fix a thing for me within 20 minutes and I can know every step of the way, and the payment's just settled, why can't I have that in every other aspect of my life? Why does that have to be so difficult when it comes to getting a plumbing repair done in my apartment? Right? That's the frame of reference that the resident is using is, well, I can get a card just to my door in five minutes with Uber. Like, why is this so difficult? I think more and more we're going to see that is the emerging expectation of residents. They're going to have these high expectations. They're going to expect things to just kind of feel like magic. And so the technology is a great differentiator, if anything, for these property management companies who say, "yeah we're with you on that, and we've already built that into our workflows."
[00:20:16] Jason: Yeah. Got it. Cool. So I see on your website you have pricing for associations and for vendors, but really it sounds like you're just targeting people that are managing their own building. And that would be either they own the building and they are the property manager, they're an owner operator or people that are doing third party management. Is that accurate?
[00:20:37] Lindsay: Yeah, that's right, and I think, you know, we're an interesting tool for those that are more on the self-managed side of things, right? So if you're kind of on that cusp of I need some help, we don't take in enough dues to be able to support hiring a property manager. The software is a great solution for that, right? Where it can come in, it can help you take care of, again, a lot of that administrative, operational stuff give you the peace of mind that we've got your back on the main things that you have to get done. And we'll be a fraction of the price of a management company. The audience that we're really focused on building and kind of finding mutual success with, I think is the property management companies though, because at the end of the day, they are the ones that are responsible for just, you know, some of the companies that we work with and talk to, you know, thousands of units and thousands of doors, right? Where that isn't something that we can help find just even greater scale of efficiency with them. And that's great for our business as well, right? To be dealing with one core customer that's highly motivated to pull this into their business and to find the results of it.
[00:21:40] Jason: Yeah. So even you would rather deal with one company instead of death by committee.
[00:21:46] Lindsay: Learning from the past. We're growing and evolving here.
[00:21:49] Jason: Okay. Cool. Any other major questions that people might or usually ask about this software, about your technology that you want to make them aware of here on the podcast?
[00:22:00] Lindsay: Sure. I think one thing that we hear quite a bit is: "how is this different from..." right? because there are other tools out there. I think one of the things that I would say is we're building for 2020 to 2023 even. Right? So we're really trying to bring best in class technology and engineering practices, thinking deeply about things like security, right? Like you've got information about where people live, about their roles in the building, about if they have kids and right all of their history here. That is really, really important actually, that you have a team that is thinking about the best practices for this modern age, where you've just got more and more kind of threats from a cybersecurity and digital perspective. So I would say that's kind of just one thing is just building best in class. Building from the ground up. And I think what we're also doing is we're really learning from all of those past experiences. We're learning from what has worked and we're also learning from what hasn't worked. We're trying to take a very user-centric approach there. And so even with our customers right now, I would say we are always co-creating. They have space to come and tell us what do they want in the roadmap? We feed that back to them. We kind of say, "here's the things we're thinking about," and we are shipping new things every single week. And that's like a really exciting time for us to be in where every single week there's something new to kind of go to a customer and say, "Hey, we now have this. We now have this." And it's a very rich and exciting roadmap ahead. So I think, you know, it's only going to get more exciting as we get into the next year and the beyond.
[00:23:25] Jason: Very cool. So some people might look at the pricing that might go, "you know, I don't know if we can afford this." How do you help people justify the cost?
[00:23:34] Lindsay: Yep. There's a few ways, right? So one of the key offerings that we have for New York City buildings specifically, and that's where I'm based and half of our team is based out here, is there's a lot of compliance work that needs to be done. So inspections, filings, just, you know, disclosures that need to be sent. And I just think there's a level of need to stay on top of that in New York City that is just even higher than other places. Even especially, you know, there's new laws rolling up for energy efficiency standards, right? New regulation that really adds a lot of extra layers of complexity. So one of the things that we have done is we've automated those compliance workflows. So we actually can look backwards sometimes, see when you last did a certain inspection and give you a reminder automatically for the next time it's due. So that value prop is really simple. The cost of an average violation, we're probably going to be less than that. So if we can save you that money and that time and that headache dealing with it then that's a really clear one.
[00:24:29] For the property managers, I think it really does come down to we're saving you time. I talked to a boutique management company. This week and the owner operator was like, you know, "minimum wage is going up and with inflation and what's happening in the economy right now, I don't know that I can justify to my customers like they're not going to accept a rate increase, but my costs are going up, right?" I think that's a very real thing right now. And so for these teams to be able to operate with the quality of service they want to continue to maintain and to be able to do so in an environment economically where there's some constriction, there's a lot of sensitivity I think from the residents around price, right? Even on the rental side, just the cost of rent has skyrocketed. And there's just a lot of different factors there. If we can provide you with the way to be able to scale the number of customers that you can take on without having to increase headcount, that's a huge value add for your business. And so those are the types of conversations that I'm really excited to be having with management teams where there's a very clear value exchange of the ability for us to help them build their business and to be there alongside them for that.
[00:25:35] Jason: Cool. So it's fair to say if somebody has a multi-unit building, they probably should talk to you guys.
[00:25:42] Lindsay: Absolutely. You said it here, so thank you for that.
[00:25:46] Jason: It sounds like you're doing some really innovative things, collapsing time, helping to systemize things. It sounds like it fills kind of a unique sort of gap in the marketplace between property management software and you know, what multi-unit buildings and associations over those buildings need and require. You know, the big challenge with associations though is the pet drama, like pets poop in places. Like that's the real stuff right there. That and packages, right? Those are--
[00:26:15] Lindsay: the packages... huge. Especially this time of year. That's something that I tell you, you know, I'm so glad we have such an amazing technology team. We want to figure something out there, because right now the only package scanning apps work. If you have full-time staff, right? If you have a porter there to actually scan the thing for you. So there's something interesting there that we're definitely trying to figure out. So maybe we can talk about that in the future.
[00:26:36] Jason: That'll be a future episode.
[00:26:38] Lindsay: Exactly.
[00:26:39] Jason: You've got the pet poop and the packages.
[00:26:42] Lindsay: I first heard about the doggy testing kits like years ago. it was a thing in one of the condos I was on the board of, I was like, whose pet is on the stairwell--
[00:26:52] a database of dog dna, pet DNA inside of your software
[00:26:57] See? That feels like priority number one. We'll get on that.
[00:27:02] Jason: That's funny. Cool. Well I appreciate you coming on the show. Thanks for coming and sharing this technology with the DoorGrowShow audience. And I wish you success.
[00:27:13] Lindsay: Thank you so much and thanks for having me on. Our website is hiresuper.com. H I R E S U P E R.
[00:27:22] Jason: Perfect. Cool. Check out hiresuper.com if you have a multi-family building. All right, thank you, Lindsay.
[00:27:29] Lindsay: Awesome. Thanks, Jason.
[00:27:30] Jason: All right, so everybody go check out Hire Super. And we appreciate you listening to our show. Please like and subscribe if you're following us on some channels that'll allow you to do that. And please leave us some positive feedback and review. We'd appreciate it greatly. And check us out at DoorGrow. If you're wanting to grow your business, we highly recommend if you are in the single family residential space, check out our DoorGrow Code. Talk to our team and find out about the DoorGrow Code, which is the journey for an entrepreneur going from zero to a thousand plus doors. And until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye, everyone.
[00:28:05] Jason Hull: You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:28:32] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
Leasing is one of the hardest aspects of property management. What if you had a way to offload some or all of your tasks related to leasing?
Today, property management growth expert Jason Hull chats with Ben from Sunroom. This service allows property managers to offload leasing to leasing professionals who care about property managers, owners, and tenants.
You’ll Learn…
[01:26] Offloading Leasing: What is Sunroom?
[09:01] ShowMojo, Tenant Turner, vs. Sunroom, oh my!
[016:35] Better ways to do Property Showings
[020:23] How Sunroom Vets Tenants Better
[24:21] Integrating with Other PM Software
[31:30] Net Promoter Scores for Property Management and Leasing
[37:12] Learning to LET GO as a PM Entrepreneur
Tweetables
“Some of y'all entrepreneurs are control freaks. Let's be real, and you need to let go of some of this stuff and let somebody else do it a little bit better.”
“We have a lot of egos as entrepreneurs. We think our way is the best way all the time, and we need to see that maybe somebody else could do this better.”
“Property managers tend to do best if they just convince owners to do pets. You're going to get more tenants, you're going to get more money.”
“One of the biggest time sucks for a property management company is dealing with prospective tenants.”
Resources
[00:00:00] Ben: So what we do is we partner with property management companies and become their leasing arm. So if you're a newer property management company, you're focused on growing doors and you just mainly want to focus on that, right? One of the most important things is you got to get leasing. If you don't get leasing, you're not going to lease the doors quickly, which then your owner investors are not going to be happy about that.
[00:00:22] Jason Hull: Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the # DoorGrowShow. So if you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you're interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not bebecause you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.
[00:01:19] Jason Hull: All right. Ben, welcome to the #DoorGrowShow.
[00:01:24] Ben: Thanks for having me, Jason.
[00:01:26] Jason Hull: Good to have you. So Ben, why don't we start by you giving us a little bit of your background, qualify yourself. You've done some cool stuff and I'm in the market where you did some of this cool stuff. We just realized in the green room that we're practically neighbors in Austin, market downtown, and I'm up in Round Rock. Ben, tell us a little bit about your background and how you got into the, I guess technology space.
[00:01:49] Ben: Yeah, sure. Yeah, definitely. First of all, I mean we-- me and my co-founder Zach, we started working on Sunroom in right around 2017. And, the way that we had originally had the idea was, just being a renter for a decade and having a lot of interesting experiences trying to look for a place to lease. But prior to starting Sunroom, Zach and I had started a company called Favor Delivery, which is a small little delivery company here in Texas that grew to become the market leader in delivery. And we sold to H-E-B in early 2018.
[00:02:27] Jason Hull: And for people that aren't familiar with H-E-B, because I moved from California just before the pandemic because I wanted to get away from California and the taxes and it's poor political culture. But anyway, so I moved here, Austin and H-E-B was all over the place. I'm like, what a weird name. What is this place? But it's one of the, like America's top grocery chains. It's consistently rated as like one of the biggest and the best. So for those that are not in Texas, they are probably not familiar with H-E-B, but H-E-B is the, like one of the leading grocery stores, and it dominates everything.
[00:03:05] Jason Hull: Yeah.
[00:03:06] Jason Hull: I'm sure in grocery sales, it beats out Walmart, like it beats out any of the stuff that I'd heard about before and I'd never heard of H-E-B. And they offer delivery service.
[00:03:15] Ben: Yeah. H-E-B is an impressive company. And the crazy thing is they've been around for 115 years.
[00:03:21] Ben: Wow.
[00:03:21] Ben: They are the top employer in Texas. And when they acquired us, it was the only acquisition they've ever had in their history as a company. And even crazier than that, when we combined workforces at the time, we had the largest workforce of independent contractors. We grew to, now they're at a hundred thousand delivery drivers in Texas.
[00:03:44] Ben: Oh, wow.
[00:03:44] Ben: And H-E-B had a similar amount of employees. So when we combined workforces, it just became this really massive workforce supporting grocery and delivery of all foods. So yeah, it was a cool marriage that we had there.
[00:04:00] Jason Hull: Very cool. Yeah. Very cool. That's interesting history. So I've seen the Favor name when I'm doing delivery from H-E-B, so I was like what's this relationship?
[00:04:11] Ben: Yeah. So I can elaborate a little bit more too about, how we picked Sunroom. We had, like I said, I mean my co-founder Zach and I, we're actually best friends from high school and so we go way back. I think what you were saying about you wanting to support property manager entrepreneurs, I think that's a good mission because I just tip my hat off to any entrepreneurs who get any businesses working because we definitely know how hard that is. But anyways, our journey towards Sunroom was just having a lot of, I would call interesting experiences as a renter. And then we started calling-- once we were interested in the rental space-- we started making a lot of phone calls to, different rental listings. And we started asking the agents and property managers, "Hey, why are you doing this?" "why are you doing these leases?" And, we kept hearing the same thing, which was like, "oh, we don't-- I don't really want to be doing this lease. I'm just doing this lease. I'm helping this investor client buy more homes and so now I'm looped into to renting this place." And every once in a while you'd come across a property manager who really loved leasing, but a lot of the property managers we talked to too would be like, "yeah, I'm really focused on growing my door count. And these things are just something we have to do to get more properties in the door." And Zach and I saw that as an opportunity of: wow. No wonder why the experience is not that great for renters. A lot of the folks who are doing these leasing are not that excited about doing it. And so then that's how we started working on Sunroom.
[00:05:29] Jason Hull: Cool. So let's talk about then what-- you talked about the problem that you saw in the marketplace and experience wasn't super good, but a lot of owners and maybe even property managers aren't even super excited about taking care of the tenant experience. So it's not like their highest priority. Like, "I want to get more doors, I want to have more properties managed," so they're like, "what's my competitive advantage?" So when they're picking tools and software, they're usually-- they're trying to figure out: "how do I get some sort of leg up on the competition," so to speak, or "how can this lower my operational cost?" and these kind of things. One of the biggest time sucks for a property management company is dealing with prospective tenants.
[00:06:13] Jason Hull: Yeah.
[00:06:14] Jason Hull: These are not people that are paying them and they call them the most, and--
[00:06:17] Jason Hull: yeah.
[00:06:18] Jason Hull: --This is like the "garbage of phone calls," I've heard one of my guests call it.
[00:06:21] Jason Hull: Yeah.
[00:06:22] Jason Hull: So tell me about what does Sunroom do and how does it do it, and what's the benefit.
[00:06:27] Ben: Yeah, sure. So what we do is we partner with property management companies and become their leasing arm. So if you're a newer property management company, you're focused on growing doors and you just mainly want to focus on that, right? One of the most important things is you got to get leasing. If you don't get leasing, you're not going to lease the doors quickly, which then your owner investors are not going to be happy about that. And also I would argue equally as important is that renter does have a great experience because, that is really the beginning of your relationship with them, and what we've noticed of working with a lot of different property managers is that, when the renter goes into the home and they're really happy with their experience that led up to that point, they're a lot more-- how do I put this? They're a lot more quiet when they get into the home, right? They're just happy overall, which is going to reduce your maintenance requests and honestly going to make it more likely that they renew the next year, right? because that is just really first, and I would just say first impressions are, everything in life a lot of times.
[00:07:27] Ben: And so I think, leasing really is that first impression for that property manager. To come back around to what we do, yeah, we partner with the property management companies and make it so that they don't even need to have any leasing agents on staff. And we can really do the entire process of getting the home leased. But at the same time, we give the property manager the power over key decisions, right? Things like actually approving the applications, that's still going to be up to the property manager to make sure they choose the right applicant. And obviously if they want to use their lease that they prefer, there's all different ways that we allow them to customize what they want their leasing experience to be like. But at the end of the day, we're really doing the legwork for them and we have a combination of people and tech to do that.
[00:08:12] Ben: Got it. So
[00:08:14] Jason Hull: this combination of people and tech... are you able to do this in every market or is this like a local thing that needs to be done
[00:08:21] Ben: locally?
[00:08:23] Ben: Yeah, great question.
[00:08:24] Ben: So we started out just doing this in Austin and have partnered with several different property managers here. In town. But now we're expanding across the us. And I believe we're up to seven different markets at the moment. But pretty rapidly expanding to cover more markets.
[00:08:41] Ben: Got it. What's
[00:08:42] Jason Hull: the biggest limitation in expansion for those that you don't cover yet?
[00:08:46] Ben: We call ourselves a leasing only brokerage, so we're actually-- we're a real estate brokerage in each of these states. And so that's a blocker to getting set up in a lot of these places is actually establishing our brokerage in each one of these states.
[00:08:59] Ben: Got it.
[00:09:00] Jason Hull: Okay. Cool. I think a lot of property managers, they're aware of certain pools like ShowMojo and Tenant Turner and Rently and Knock Rentals and Turbo Tenant, so how does Sunroom differentiate from all these tools and these systems are already out there?
[00:09:20] Ben: Yeah, so some of those systems and tools you mentioned, I do think those-- they do improve the renter experience and at the same time. They do make it so that it's a little less work for the property manager to lease those properties. But at the end of the day, if you're a property management owner you're still going to need a leasing agent on your team. Or you're going to have to overextend the property manager that you have in order to use those, utilize those tools. Sunroom just takes it the next step where we have similar tools and systems. Obviously I'm biased, but I would argue they're better than those, but--
[00:09:55] Ben: You should argue that.
[00:09:57] Ben: We take it a step further. You don't even really need to have a leasing agent on staff in order to really execute everything you need to do for leasing. Whereas all these other tools or systems they're definitely completely reliant on still having somebody there behind the scenes catching the errors or all all the holes in those systems. And, if anybody has tried to. Integrate those different systems and tools, what they'll find is that they were built in a way that they had a focused goal. And there's a lot of different holes in that system. And I'm sure as operators see that, I think that's a big difference with what we're building, is that what we build, we actually use to operate. And so we're able to see all the different gaps and holes that those systems leave. And really between our systems and our team, we're able to fill in the gaps that those systems leave out.
[00:10:46] Jason Hull: All right. So I think people listening by now are like, "the wheels are turning a little bit," and they're like, "okay, how's this actually play out?" So could you walk us through step by step what-- how this process works with the property manager and the tenant from beginning to
[00:11:01] Ben: finish? Yeah, sure. So it usually starts within one of the property managers, property management softwares, right?
[00:11:09] Ben: We see commonly property managers are using App Folio or Buildium, so let's use App Folio for example. You have a property manager on your team that you have a home where the renter didn't renew. And it's a property that you're going to need to get leased. At that moment, if you were partnered with us, you would open up the Sunroom portal. We would already essentially have that home synced within our system. Because we're able to really pull data from App Folio and the Buildiums of the world. From there, they just really submit the property to us and say, "Hey, this home's coming up for lease." we would normally already have all of their settings. As a part of our onboarding, we're going to get them all set up in our system. So things like knowing what their tenant criteria is. Things like knowing when is this home actually available? When would you like us to touch the property? And then as soon as they submit the property to us, we actually will go out and touch the property. So we have boots on the ground. Those boots on the ground are going to get professional photography. They're going to set up a self showing lock system if that's what the property manager would like to. And then we're going to actually install a yard sign as well. And, we take pictures to really document everything that we do there. And then, we'll take it a step further, we'll get the marketing description written and then we'll get it listed online, and we do that entire process in an average about 48 hours.
[00:12:28] Ben: Nice.
[00:12:29] Jason Hull: Awesome. Yeah, that's very cool. So you actually have people come out-- swarm of people, and they get all this stuff done, right? In the description, getting it listed, doing all this stuff. Okay.
[00:12:39] Jason Hull: Yeah,
[00:12:40] Ben: and that's where our background in Favor obviously comes into play is that, I think if you think about Favor, there's a great consumer experience where the customer can order food, but then there's all these boots on the ground that actually go get the food and make sure that all happens in a timely manner. Leasing is similar in the sense that you need to have a great consumer experience for the renter to be able to see what they're shopping for and do the things they they need to do to see if they want to, lease that property. But then you're going to need boots on the ground to actually, handle the listing side of things.
[00:13:09] Ben: Very cool.
[00:13:10] Jason Hull: So is this totally Uber-like in that you're just pulling anybody in, or I'm sure you have criteria for the photographers and for all these different people that you're bringing in to do these
[00:13:22] Ben: little pieces.
[00:13:23] Ben: Yeah. Yeah. We don't just hire any random person. I'd say it's definitely not Uber-like in that I think, we use-- it's technology enabled so that we can do those things quickly and can measure how fast we do them, right? I think just the fact that we know we get those properties set up in an average of 48 hours, I think is...
[00:13:42] Ben: Yeah.
[00:13:42] Ben: ...more than your average property manager would know, but we know that the tasks we're doing are tech enabled, but no we care a lot about those people that we choose and we try to find folks that have a lot of experience with real estate photography and then we teach them the other aspects of what we're trying to get done at that property.
[00:14:00] Jason Hull: Awesome. Yeah. Very cool. When a property is going to become vacant, are they able to leverage a system or does it have to be totally empty and rent ready and everything
[00:14:11] Ben: else?
[00:14:12] Ben: No. So yeah, no, they're able to use the system. It sounds like you're asking about pre-leasing.
[00:14:19] Ben: Yeah.
[00:14:20] Ben: Okay. Yes, pre-leasing can be really important I think in some markets. Yeah, that's definitely something we support. And let's say it's tenant occupied and we need to act and do an escorted showing, we have different agents on the ground that we partner with that are some of the most active in the area touring homes and renters. And so we'll tap into that network to do some.
[00:14:40] Jason Hull: Got it. Okay. Now what if they want get the property listed, they want to get photos, but there's a bunch of ugly furniture in there and ugly stuff. Do you guys let maybe-- BoxBrownie I've had on the show before-- digital editors and they're like, removing all this
[00:14:55] Ben: stuff?
[00:14:55] Ben: Yeah.
[00:14:56] Ben: Take the photos.
[00:14:56] Ben: Yeah, we do have digital editing in that regard, but depending on the degree of how much that home is messed up. That's also something that we do is that if we go out to a home and we think it's not show ready we'll document that and share it back with the property manager. And I think we've seen property managers really love that aspect of what we do because oftentimes they have a tough time holding the make ready folks accountable or let's say they're doing a renovation on the property. In particular, I can't tell you how many times that a property manager said, "Oh yeah, this was supposed to be done. And then when we went out there we were able to collect evidence that it wasn't right. That's also part of our system is that if the home is not actually ready to be marketed, and then, we're going to gather that information, share it back with the property manager, and then essentially remind them until that's resolved and as soon as it's resolved, then we can make the listing active. But it's a pretty valuable system and checks and balances that we have in place there.
[00:15:55] Jason Hull: Got it. So you'll communicate with them. Then the property manager can send out maintenance, get things taken care of, dealt with, and then report back to you and you're checking in with them, "Hey, is this ready yet? Is this ready yet?" And then they're like, "we got it ready." And then...
[00:16:08] Jason Hull: exactly.
[00:16:08] Jason Hull: Proceed.
[00:16:10] Jason Hull: Exactly.
[00:16:10] Jason Hull: So you've sent up the people, you've got the photos, you got like maybe a lockbox on, you got the yard sign, you've got the description. It's posted online. It's probably pushed out to multiple channels.
[00:16:19] Jason Hull: That's right.
[00:16:20] Jason Hull: Then next come the showings, right? And scheduling and all this. So how does that work and are you doing one-off showings? Are you doing open house model? What would it be found to be the most efficient? What comes next?
[00:16:35] Ben: Yeah. Yeah. So what we do is we usually set these properties up with a self showing system, and then renters are able to go tour the properties seven days a week from 8:00 AM to 8:00 PM and, we also have, a support team available those same hours, so 84 hours, we're ready to quickly text back any renters or answer any phone calls if, folks are having a tough time actually, accessing the home for any particular reason. Our system is really good. I'd say renters have a really good experience touring homes. Like any system, we're dealing with real world stuff. Sometimes maybe it could be a really humid day and maybe the maybe the door frame swells a bit or something, right? So maybe the door gets a little stuck. So the renter needs a little help to understand how to get in. Those are all things that I think us, having support team there available to talk to them and actually pick up the phone. I think is a really important thing. So that's just one of the many ways that we support tours. But I'd say one of the most important pieces of tours is actually collecting that tour feedback and sharing it with the owner after the fact. And so we have a really great system in place for that as well where a lot of renters will leave feedback just right within the place that they tour. And then we're actually able to take that feedback and then give it to display it on a webpage where then the property manager is able to share that webpage directly with their owner so they can actually watch the tours that are coming in and the tour feedback in real time. And we white label that for them. So you can imagine as a property manager, you just share this white label page with your logo and the owner's able to get a bird's eye view of how their home is performing on the market.
[00:18:21] Ben: Got it.
[00:18:22] Jason Hull: So could this be a scenario that the owner says, "I don't need to do this," and like the property manager says, "you need to do this. Like it'll get you more rent. People will have an issue with this place if you don't fix this or change this," and the owner's like, "no." And then they say, "look at the page, here's the white label page. It's got our brand, our logo, XYZ property management, and it says like, consistently feedback. Like the floor is too gross, or whatever."
[00:18:47] Ben: Yeah, "I would rent this home, but does it come with a fridge?" Just one way I've seen owners trying to cut some costs is like not putting refrigerators in the home. And then they see, three out of the five renters that tour the home mentioned "Hey, there's no fridge."
[00:19:00] Ben: "have to buy a fridge and I'll go somewhere else."
[00:19:03] Ben: Yeah, exactly. And that page really helps the property manager make their case to the owner and also show to them like, "Hey, we really are showing this property and this really is what the renters are saying.
[00:19:14] Ben: Cool.
[00:19:15] Jason Hull: Yeah, that's really cool. I like the feedback loops. So then, what's the next steps? You're doing showings, you're doing tours. Then I guess people are being pushed to apply when they're doing these tours by the system?
[00:19:27] Ben: Yeah, so we have a system, both to pre-qualify renters and to actually have them apply. As soon as they apply we're able to display those applications to the property manager. And we use the same page that we use to display tour feedback and also tracking the tours and the leads and everything. We use that same page then to actually show the applications to the property managers and to their owners. Because I know every property manager seems to have a different deal with each owner, right? Some of 'em, they want to run the application past their owner beforehand, or sometimes they're just the ones reviewing it. But either way, we display that information there so that both the property manager and the owner, are able to review the application before they decide to approve or not.
[00:20:14] Ben: Got it. So
[00:20:14] Jason Hull: they can either show this white label page that has the list of all the applicants or could they just say, "here's the one we recommend," and show that person's information?
[00:20:22] Jason Hull: Yeah.
[00:20:23] Ben: Yeah. It's usually the latter. Because it's trying to make it simpler. Yeah. It's usually just showing the one that they recommend. And at that point, we would've already done all of the vetting for that application. Even the manual steps of doing a verification of rental history, for example or a verification of employment. And we've actually seen just our application processing service. We've seen that to be so popular that we actually broke that out as something that a property manager could partner with us just on application processing, and that's also cool because we have a lot of tech to catch fraudulent renters. I'm sure you've probably heard about how fraud is on the rise especially with us entering recession. And I think it's just more likely that renters are going to try to fake pay stubs. Even some go as far as trying to fake their identity in different ways to try to get approved for a home that really are beyond their means. And so we've really, we've invested a lot into our application processing system. Doing things like being able to get their pay stubs directly from their payroll provider instead of having a way for them to upload their pay stubs, which could be photoshopped or something like that.
[00:21:35] Ben: Yeah.
[00:21:35] Ben: And then let's say a renter doesn't even have a job, or let's say a renter's, a self-employed or something, we have a way of actually pulling bank statements directly from their bank, instead of just receiving those bank statements and getting it uploaded. All that tech helps to really reduce the amount of fraud. And as for property managers as well, it's less work to actually investigate all those documents.
[00:21:59] Jason Hull: That's just technology and stuff a property manager can't do directly. They don't have the ability to pull directly from the bank their pay stubs, and it's not going to say, "here, let me give you my login to my bank account," and to pull directly from the employer. They don't usually have that ability really effectively either. There needs to be technology involved.
[00:22:18] Ben: Yeah.
[00:22:19] Ben: So we--
[00:22:20] Ben: --so what
[00:22:20] Jason Hull: about--
[00:22:20] Ben: oh, go ahead.
[00:22:20] Ben: I was just going to say, yeah, we recognize that you know most of what we've been talking about here is called our full service leasing, right? Where we actually become the leasing arm. But let's say, you've got leasing agents on your team and you think they're rock stars. You're happy with what's going on with your leasing. We could plug in and just do the application processing. We call that service, we call that Sunscreen, is what we call it. The idea is the quirky tagline that I came up with is, "Don't get burned by bad renters."
[00:22:47] Jason Hull: I like it. Little bit of sunscreen.
[00:22:51] Ben: Yeah, exactly.
[00:22:52] Ben: Okay.
[00:22:53] Jason Hull: So one of the questions I think some people will be asking is, what about pets? It's like a whole nother beast. Outside, inside pets and running pets and having pets, all this kind of stuff. Property managers tend to do best if they just convince owners to do pets. You're going to get more tenants, you're going to get more money. How do you deal with the pet side of
[00:23:11] Ben: things?
[00:23:12] Ben: Yeah, so at this point I'm sure most property managers have heard of pet screening.com. I think they're a great company. And so we actually integrate their data into our system. So if you're already signed up for pet screening.com. You can provide the pet screening.com login, and then we're able to pull that information into the application packet. So it's something that the owner and the property manager can consider as a part of the overall application. And, obviously pet screening.com does a really good job verifying things like our emotional support animal documentation. Is that legit? There's fraud around ESA documents. And that's just one of the pieces that they do. But yeah, that's something that we recommend whenever anyone is accepting pets.
[00:23:57] Ben: Very
[00:23:58] Jason Hull: cool. I like pet screening.com that I've had them on the show. I had another company that may be interesting to integrate with too on the show called our pet policy.com and they take things a step further on the protection side of things after the screening. So they go step beyond. So that might be interesting for you to take a look at integrating with as well.
[00:24:20] Jason Hull: Yeah.
[00:24:20] Jason Hull: Ourpetpolicy.com, they seem like a good group of people over there as well. So real quick, going back, you had mentioned AppFolio, Buildium, do you integrate with Rent Manager? Do you integrate with I don't know, there's some other things and some of these tools
[00:24:35] that
[00:24:35] Ben: people are using?
[00:24:37] Ben: Yeah. Great question. So it's pretty easy for us to get key information plugged into these softwares. And the reason is when someone partners with us, if you think about it, we really need to touch that property management software right when the home is when the home's coming up for lease, right? It needs to be listed. And then once the home gets leased, that's when that information needs to get back in the property management software again. So usually the way that our structure is, it doesn't really matter too much, which property management software you're. The system would be the same, where you would essentially create a user for us.
[00:25:15] Ben: So then once the home is getting leased, we know who's signing the lease. We're going to get their information set up within whatever property management software you use and make sure that it's set up for ongoing rent payments and things like that. It essentially, if you're using a property management software, but then you're going to use someone for leasing. But then once the home gets leased, it's going to be as if you had leased it through those other systems. And it's seamless in that way.
[00:25:39] Ben: Yeah. Very cool. So
[00:25:40] Jason Hull: you're PM
[00:25:41] Ben: software agnostic.
[00:25:42] Ben: Exactly. Yes. That's a much more succinct way of saying it. Thanks.
[00:25:47] Jason Hull: So that just means I've been doing this probably a long time. All right. So you've, you mentioned your solution. You've got the sunscreen that can be, pulled out just separately or if they're using the full leasing service. You've done the pre-qualification, you've got the applicant they can send over the white label thing to the owner. If the owner's like, "I really need to see what info you got." And you've tested out their pay stubs and their bank--
[00:26:11] Jason Hull: right
[00:26:12] Jason Hull: --stuff, and you've maybe connected the pet screening.com. What happens next? You've got
[00:26:17] Ben: a good applic--
[00:26:18] Ben: Yes. Yeah, so the property manager, the owner accepts the application. And at that point, we're going to reach out to the renter, say, "congrats, you've been accepted. Please now pay the security deposit." And as soon as they pay security deposit, then the owner or the property manager is able to connect their bank account, and that money will just automatically get deposited in whatever account that you specify. And then from a lease perspective, from really from the beginning of the process, we would've asked that you provide the preferred lease that you would like for us to use. We're going to get that lease drafted up and we're going to send it over to both the renter and the property manager. For some property managers, they like to review one last time before it gets sent to the renter. So we can fulfill that ask. And then the lease is going to get signed. And as soon as the lease gets signed, we will then dispatch our people back out to the property, do one final walkthrough, and also remove our yard sign and remove any other things that we had, any lock boxes or things like that we got setup. But we do one thing where we will leave a combo lockbox out at the property so that we can facilitate the renter actually moving in. So that's really the final and last step for our system, is facilitating to the renter actually getting the keys so that they have a smooth move in. And then the last step after all of that is we're going to survey the renter and make sure they had a great experience through the whole the whole leasing process.
[00:27:51] Jason Hull: And what's-- before we move on, because I'm curious like what difference you're noticing with these surveys, but let's say they don't accept somebody. What's the process? What happens to the rejects, so to speak? The tenants that didn't pass because a lot of times they're following up and bugging the property manager, "Hey, did you accept me? What's going on?" This sort of thing. What do you do?
[00:28:11] Ben: Yeah. So first of all, we shield the property manager from having to deal with all of that stuff. And I think for the position we're in, I think the natural thing is I think we would do what any other good property manager would do. We'd see if there's any other listings within that property manager that the renter would qualify for. First and foremost, we're going to recommend that of " There are these other listings for the same property manager" or, " do you like that?" And if the renter is not interested in any of those homes, then I think we would look broader to other listings that that are amongst our partners and say, "Hey, renter, maybe it would be better if you lease this property."
[00:28:48] Jason Hull: Yeah. That helps get the other properties filled. That's great.
[00:28:53] Ben: Yeah.
[00:28:53] Ben: Okay.
[00:28:53] Ben: And the renter's really happy too, because they don't have to pay an application fee again, so they're able to reuse their application.
[00:29:00] Jason Hull: Nice. Now what if you have two property managers in the same market and you get an applicant for one, are they completely segregated from being able to apply it to the other, or if they're in the Sunroom system,
[00:29:13] Ben: they can...
[00:29:14] Ben: Great question. Yeah. So we don't want to restrict where renters can apply, right? because that just doesn't make sense. But we have come across the scenario, it's been rare where renters have applied to multiple properties. And so what's really cool about our system is that we have a little disclaimer for the property manager where they can see, "hey, this renter's actually applied for multiple properties," and that way it's clear to them of " Hey, look, this renter is serious about your property, they are, they're hedging their bets," which, that's a common scenario especially in a hot market is if property managers are collecting multiple applicants on a single property, you can bet that the renters-- they know that. And so they're also applying to multiple properties. So I think we do our best to try to mitigate those scenarios. And I think one of the best ways to mitigate those scenarios is really just processing applications quickly and then, and working to get the renter and answer quickly around if they're accepted or denied. And, in most cases, I think renters are willing to tell you which one's their first choice. And so if you're able to process the application really quickly and drive it to decision, it doesn't happen too often where the owner comes back and wants to accept the renter and they've already decided to go somewhere else. It does occasionally, we try to mitigate that.
[00:30:28] Ben: Got it.
[00:30:28] Jason Hull: Okay, cool. So going back to the other path, I'm actually drawing this all out. I've got like a flow
[00:30:34] Ben: chart going on here.
[00:30:36] Ben: Sounds good. Keep
[00:30:37] Jason Hull: track.
[00:30:38] Jason Hull: So you surveyed the renter at the end, like you've got somebody in the property.
[00:30:43] Jason Hull: Yeah.
[00:30:43] Jason Hull: They've got a lockbox there. I think that's very cool. They can just go and "Can I move in on this day?" "Yep, here's the lockbox. You've got a code or however it works." And they can go get in.
[00:30:52] Jason Hull: Yeah.
[00:30:52] Jason Hull: And you don't have to show up. They can be there with their new U-Haul when they need to be there. That's super annoying, I think for property managers sometimes. And then afterwards you survey the renter. So I'm curious about the results of this. What's been the shift that people have noticed in the experience? This is why you started this in the beginning. You weren't having a great experience. Some people probably were like, "Drive to our office and you might get a key." Some people are like, "we can meet you maybe this day." It was like a mess. So what sort of feedback are you seeing on these surveys and what sort of shift are property management companies that are working with you noticing with your process versus trying to do this on their
[00:31:30] Ben: own?
[00:31:30] Ben: Yeah, great question. We collect what I would I consider a very important metric and I'm curious if it's come up before in this podcast. It's something called a net promoter score. Yeah. Have you discussed that before? I'm happy to--
[00:31:44] Ben: we
[00:31:44] Jason Hull: haven't really focused on that. But yeah, I think a lot of people are familiar. So net promoter score is when it says "on a scale of maybe zero to 10 or one to 10, how likely are you to recommend this company?" So a lot of people see this, the quick survey on software, different things like this.
[00:32:00] Ben: Yeah, that's right. And so when the net promoter score rank actually comes out, the scale is actually a minus a hundred to a plus 100. You could Google about how that works, but you're right. As a renter, what we would be asking them is, "how likely are you to recommend leasing a property to a friend through Sunroom or through x property management company?" And what we found is we just have a really good net promoter score. So if you could google this around, but the average net promoter score amongst property managers is a seven. And that's not on the zero to 10 scale. That's on the minus a hundred to the plus 100 scale, and. For the renters who lease a property through us, we have a 52 net promoter score.
[00:32:42] Ben: Nice.
[00:32:43] Ben: Yeah. So it's like what I said at the very beginning these renters are just a lot happier when they get in the home. For the property managers, they're seeing less really noisy renters when they first move in. I think that's a common thing that property managers are used to is that when a renter first moves in, that can be when they're talking the most or they're the noisiest. And so I think just anecdotally, property managers have said that, "Hey, these renters are just happier. They're just not causing as much commotion when they first move. And some of that has to do with our process too, right? Allowing renters to even self tour homes, it's a no pressure thing where they're able to really understand what they're buying before they move in. So I believe that helps as well.
[00:33:24] Jason Hull: This is the nerd in me coming out. So there's this really book called _Innovating Analytics_. And they put out this idea, basically the idea of the next generation of net promoter. They have used a lot of data to showcase and it's a little dry, but there's a lot of data to showcase the fundamental flaws of net promoter score, which is, has advantages over doing nothing, right? But then they talk about a new sort of score, which is the word of mouth index. And so we've incorporated that a bit into our business. It basically asks a second question, "how likely are you to discourage others from utilizing that?" Because what they found, just because somebody is not a true promoter, as they categorize them on the high end, like they choose like maybe a seven, eight, or nine or something, does not mean they're actually going to go hurt your business. And so a lot of big companies, they found were spending a lot of money to try and mitigate the people and pay attention to people and help the people they thought were detractors or people that would hurt their business when most of them really wouldn't. Just because it was a two or a three. They found that does not necessarily mean they're actually going to go actively try and destroy your business or hurt you. They just aren't going to tell people about it, because some people just don't want to talk about other businesses. Right? . So then asking a secondary question, how likely are you to tell others not to use this business or whatever. Then it gives you the true people to focus on mitigating or solving challenges for. Really interesting idea, but then they talk about the challenge of mainlining, where if they answer one question one way, first question, they'll answer it the same way, but it's backwards. Because they're just in the mode of answering questions like a zombie and they'll do it the wrong way or read it the wrong way. We've even seen this, so you have to put some questions in between and so it just complicates. But it's a really interesting book. You and I can geek out sometime and show you how I built this out so that it would work effectively, but it helps us identify which people are actually detractors that we need to take care of and focus on, and which people, they never rate anything positively and they're just, but they're quiet, which is fine.
[00:35:25] Jason Hull: Oh that's
[00:35:25] Ben: fascinating. I'll have to check that out.
[00:35:28] Jason Hull: I know, it's pretty nerdy. So_ Innovating Analytics_ is by Larry Freed F R E E D which is an interesting book. Cool. We've asked a lot of questions. You've explained the process. I think we've covered how it works unless we missed anything. But what else do people, property managers coming to you, what other concerns or things could we address here on the podcast before we wrap that they might have? Or what are the big FAQ questions that they ask before they're willing to explore giving up the leasing arm their business?
[00:36:00] Ben: Yeah. Yeah. I think a lot of the questions just evolve around how they can still control the process. And so we've invested an incredible amount into giving them those controls, right? Like I think the key is, the way we look at it is look like we're going to be the best at doing this leasing legwork. It's all we do. And we've built technology to really hold ourselves accountable to really high standards. But at the end of the day, like we still want you to have control over who's the right tenant for this property? Or, "how would you like the that application process to go?" For example. And I think we've worked hard to streamline the areas and that, we just realized, hey, this is the best way to do this. But also we recognize that hey, these property managers, they have pride to process for a reason, right, for their particular market that might be the right thing to do. And so we've invested a lot in creating different settings and things like that, that can make it so that they get to use it the way they would like.
[00:37:03] Ben: Cool. So it's
[00:37:04] Jason Hull: really a lot of the big concerns are just about the flexibility. "Do I have to go all in and use everything that you offer?"
[00:37:10] Jason Hull: Right.
[00:37:11] Jason Hull: "Or can I do, some of this and maybe I'll give up pieces later--" because some of y'all entrepreneurs are control freaks. Let's be real.
[00:37:18] Jason Hull: Yes.
[00:37:18] Jason Hull: And you need to let go of some of this stuff and let somebody else do it a little bit better. We have a lot of egos, entrepreneurs. We think our way is the best way all the time and we need to see that maybe somebody else could do this
[00:37:31] Ben: better.
[00:37:31] Ben: But we've also, from
[00:37:32] Jason Hull: experience--
[00:37:33] Jason Hull: I'm guessing you're going to say that Sunroom probably does it better than what most property managers are doing.
[00:37:39] Ben: Better NPS scores?
[00:37:41] Ben: Yeah. I would just say that, some of the property managers that we've seen are the most excited to partner with us are definitely probably the ones listening to your podcast or it's the ones that want to grow. And, we have some great examples of that, right? There's one property manager that we started working with in Austin a couple years ago, and they started with 300 doors. And now I believe they're up to 800 doors. And so by them being able to just, focus on other things, they were able to grow pretty quickly. And because we recognize this and we're starting to set up in these new markets, we actually just this week launched a new program specifically for trying to find these property management companies that are really focused on growth. And so we actually launched this new growth program. That we just put on our website where property managers can apply for the program. And essentially this program if we accept them will actually give them-- and they partner with us-- we'll give them $10,000 to grow their business. And they can, they could use that money for-- or I'd say up to 10,000-- they can use that money for helping them grow. And really the only terms of it is that you're willing to partner with us on leasing to do that. And so we have different ideas of really how to use that money to grow. I know a lot of entrepreneurs already have those ideas and so that's why we yeah, we set up this new program.
[00:39:02] Jason Hull: Awesome. We should chat because we're really good at growing property management companies and yeah, I think there would be a good-- there. We'll chat later. We've also negotiated with most of the top vendors where we've got a hit list, but a lot of the top vendors we're negotiating best in class discounts just for our mastermind members.
[00:39:21] Ben: There you go.
[00:39:21] Jason Hull: So maybe that's something you and I can do with the Sunroom as well. So
[00:39:25] Jason Hull: Yeah .
[00:39:26] Jason Hull: If you're open, that's--
[00:39:27] Jason Hull: yeah. Cool.
[00:39:28] Jason Hull: We've got some big players on board already for some of these things, but I think it'd be really cool to see this is something new and I think it's innovative and it seems really exciting. So we'll we'll chat afterwards, cool. Is there anything else you want people to know before we go and if The last thing maybe is how do they find you? And how do they get in touch and how do they start working with Sunroom?
[00:39:49] Ben: Yeah. Just go to our website, Sunroomleasing.com. Fill out a little form. Be happy to have, someone from our sales team reach out and have a conversation and kind of explain more of these details about what we do. I'm an engineer at heart, so I think for some people, maybe I went into too much detail. But at the same time, knowing I've talked to a lot of property managers they love the details. If you want even more details yeah, go to our website, sunroomleasing.com. Reach out to us and someone from our sales team would love to dig into those details with you.
[00:40:18] Jason Hull: Perfect. I think the last big question everybody would have is be, is going to be what does it cost? Is this affordable? Can we do this? That sort of question. So--
[00:40:29] Jason Hull: yeah.
[00:40:29] Jason Hull: Anything to say about that?
[00:40:31] Ben: Yeah, so we're going to charge, similar to what I would say like other leasing agents would. So we're going to charge like a percentage of first month's rent. That percentage of first month's rent that we charge. It's going to be different depending on the market and depending on what kind of volume that you have. Normally, the way we are setting this up is that we usually make it so that the property manager can still make good money on leasing while still utilizing us for all of it. Property managers can charge a percentage of first month's rent to their owners. That could be different by market. We're usually going to charge, call it 10- 20% less than that so that they're able to still make money on the leasing, but still know that they have a best in class service for that happening. And so that's just for full service. For Sunscreen, that's actually free for property managers to use. And we just charge the renter an application fee. And so that's really the easiest way. If we said a lot of stuff today, people are like, "wow that's a little scary to adopt that big of a, have a company owning leasing." a great way to start to just build a relationship with us and start seeing what we could do would be to start utilizing our application processing system, which, really, it's going to be a really a low risk thing. Even if want to test out having us do one application on one listing or something, we'd be happy to do that.
[00:41:48] Ben: That's the
[00:41:49] Jason Hull: gateway drug. A little bit of Sunscreen, and then you're going to be like, "I want a whole room. I want the Sunroom now."
[00:41:54] Jason Hull: There you go. There you go.
[00:41:55] Jason Hull: "I don't want to deal with this anymore. I'm tired of putting the Sunscreen on. Yeah. Okay.
[00:41:59] Jason Hull: There you go.
[00:42:00] Jason Hull: Cool.
[00:42:01] Jason Hull: Yeah.
[00:42:01] Jason Hull: All right. Ben, it's been great having you on the show. Check out Sunroomleasing.com and then if you come up with some major developments or big shifts or changes, we'd love to have you back on the show. So thanks for being
[00:42:12] Ben: here.
[00:42:13] Ben: Thanks so much, Jason. And yeah, we'll have to meet up in Austin sometime.
[00:42:16] Ben: All right.
[00:42:18] Jason Hull: All right. Cool. Thanks, Ben.
[00:42:20] Jason Hull: Alright. Everybody, if you've been listening to this, we appreciate you listening to our podcast. We would really appreciate it if you left us a review in exchange. If you got value from this, that would mean a lot to us at DoorGrow and my team. We have been innovating and creating a lot of new stuff at DoorGrow. We've got some really cool stuff coming out. So if you have not been familiar with DoorGrow for a while, we've got some really cool things coming down that we are working on. You should get connected to do a sales call. Check us out at doorgrow.com. Reach out to us. You can reach out to us on any social media. And we would love to connect with you and share with you. We just released the DoorGrow Code, which is the first roadmap that really showcases how to go from zero to a thousand doors in as short of time period as possible. It shows you which things you need to do at which stage, at which door levels, and what questions you have, what major problems you have at each stage, and what you need to do in order to do things in the right order to get to the next level.
[00:43:22] Jason Hull: So if you've been at a similar door count for the last year or maybe two years or three years, maybe even kind feeling stuck or maybe even backsliding a little bit because of property selling off or whatever. We have clients that are adding a lot of doors. Andrew Rocha just chimed in on one of our mastermind calls. He's one of our clients. He added like 50 doors in the last month. We've got clients. One of our clients added 310 doors in a year. We've got another client that added a hundred in gosh, they've doubled their doors. Like we've got clients that are growing really rapidly and they're not spending any money on advertising. I want you to be clear, like our methods are not focused on SEO, pay per click, content marketing, pay-per-lead lead services, social media marketing. Our methods are what really work in the marketplace, and most of them are zero cost, like they cost nothing. It just costs time and effort, and it actually takes less time and less effort than doing cold lead marketing like seo, pay per click, content marketing, social media marketing, or pay per lead services that exist in the property management space. So I highly recommend you check this out if you're wanting to grow. And we are now helping really significantly. We've built out the best systems and processes and we've been stacking the best coaches in the industry. If you've heard of certain coaches in the industry, we might have them on as experts in our program. We'll be announcing more of that later, but we've got some of the best in the industry that we've brought on as coaches. So it's not the Jason Show. I've got an amazing team of people coaching and we have systems for operations. We have systems for process. We have systems for sales, and our clients are crushing it. Nobody in the marketplace is doing all that DoorGrow's doing or can compete with us. And so if you think you know DoorGrow and you've looked at us or judged us in the past, it might be time to take a new look because your competitors might be working with us or they might work with us, and you're going to wish that it had been you.
[00:45:33] Jason Hull: So until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.
[00:45:37] Jason Hull: You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:46:05] Jason Hull: At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
Wouldn’t it be nice if you could sleep at night knowing that you don’t have to worry about pests in the properties you manage?
In this episode, property management growth expert, Jason Hull interviews Nick Drzayich from Cover Pests to learn about dealing with pests in property management.
You’ll Learn…
[02:00] Cover Pest… It’s like Insurance for Pest Control
[03:59] Dealing with Pests as a Property Manager
[07:48] Dealing with the Different Kinds of Pests
[13:13] How Partnering with Something Like Cover Pest Works
[16:02] Eliminating Having to Figure Out Who is Gonna Pay the Bill
[17:15] Using Pest Coverage as a Selling Point for Property Management
Tweetables
“We want the tenants to feel good about where they live and have it clean. We also want the owners to understand that their property's being taken care of when it's needed.”
“It's nice for the property manager to have someone else get some eyes on the property every once in a while.”
“It's increasing the visibility. It's decreasing some of the potential costs for the owners. It's protecting the owners.”
“We go out, and we take care of it.”
Resources
[00:00:00] Nick: We want the tenants to feel good about where they live and have it clean. We also want the owners to understand that their property's being taken care of when it's needed and then obviously the property management companies, they don't have to hassle with the back and forth and who's paying the bill.
[00:00:14] Jason: Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently. Then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
[00:00:53] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry. Eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host property management growth expert Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.
[00:01:13] Now, let's get into the show and my guest today, I am hanging out here with Nick, and Nick, you got to tell me your last name. I should have asked you before the show.
[00:01:25] Nick: No, that's okay. I tell everybody to just say "does your eye itch?" And that'll about cover it. Okay. It's pronounced (dur zye ich) Drzayich. It's a Serbian name, and it's way too many consonants in a row.
[00:01:37] Jason: Nick Drzayich. All right. From Cover Pest. Cool. And is it Cover Pest or just "Cover?" Website says "cover."
[00:01:45] Nick: Yeah. Cover Pest. Yeah.
[00:01:47] Jason: Cover Pest. Okay, cool. Well Nick, glad to have you on the show. So tell me-- give us a little bit of background. How did you-- and I'll just say for those listening, it says, "pest control solution for property managers," like on your website. So tell me a little bit about Cover Pest, and how did you get into this?
[00:02:04] Nick: Come from an insurance background actually. 13 years or so ago, I started and grew a independent life insurance agency, and so that's kind of been my background. Right. And so within insurance, you're obviously taking a big cost in life insurance. There's a death benefit with other insurances. There's big expenses that come at some point throughout the life of a policy and you're taking the cost of that and you're spreading it out among all the policy owners.
[00:02:34] Jason: Mm-hmm.
[00:02:34] Nick: So kind of with that mindset. I was chatting with my business partner who lives north of me, and he actually runs a pest control company and has for several years. We kind of got to chatting about this combination of life insurance and kind of sharing this cost, spreading the cost out and how you could potentially do that with pest control. And that's how we kind of landed on this idea of using that model to help property management companies take care of their pest control issues, which we know are just a hassle whenever they happen. Yeah. And solve that issue for them and allow them to take that off their plate and add a little bit of revenue in the meantime. Got it. And what areas do you guys cover? Is this a national business? Or is this local? How does this work? Yep. So this is a national business.
[00:03:21] We obviously have the ability to go anywhere in the country. We have, we started it here in our home state of Idaho, which is where we have the bulk of our clients. But ultimately, yeah, we we work with vendors across the country to be able to help take care of the issues that, that property managers are seeing.
[00:03:37] Jason: Cool. So help me understand how this works. Like why would a property manager decide, Hey, I should work with Cover Pest instead of just use some pest control vendors locally and connect with and have these people in as a feather in my cap. What advantages do they have with working with Cover Pest and why would a property manager choose? Or why do they choose to work with you?
[00:03:59] Nick: Yeah. Great question. So. As soon as you mention pest control to a property manager, you're probably going to get just a lot of heartache right there. Whenever an issue comes up, it's technically it's a tenant responsibility. Yeah, but ultimately it's going to come back to the maintenance manager. It's going to come back to the property management company or owner every once in a while. And so they're having to deal with finding a vendor. Vendors got to contact the tenant, get the service done, and then you got to figure out where you're sending the bill, and there's always going to be a fight there. The tenant's not going to want to pay it, the owner doesn't want to pay it, and you, as the property manager, you don't want to pay it either. And the benefit here is that, we work best with companies that have some kind of resident benefit package. So what our service does is it kind of slides right into that resident benefit package, and for a very nominal fee compared to what you would normally pay for pest control, your tenants are able to have all their pest issues covered, and when they need service, they put the request in online-- goes to call. We send a technician out and take care of it. There's no additional cost on top of what that monthly fee is.
[00:05:03] So like I mentioned, we kind of slide in the benefit packages. We also work as a standalone amenity for those that either don't want to put us in a benefit package or don't offer a benefit package.
[00:05:13] Jason: Got it. So what are what are property managers typically bundling in along with Cover Pest in, you know, in addition to Cover Pest in their resident benefits packages that you're seeing?
[00:05:26] Nick: Yeah, so oftentimes we'll see-- a big one is filter service, so furnace filters that are shipped--
[00:05:31] Jason: mm-hmm
[00:05:32] Nick: --every few months. There's a lot of times some kind of a credit building aspect to the benefit package. There's usually some kind of a maintenance, a 24 or seven maintenance benefit that's inside of that package. And then a lot of times there'll be some kind of perks. You get a free maintenance request once a year on something that would normally be charged to you, or you have late fee, late payment protection. Once per year, you can make a late payment and not have to worry about any kind of fees. So those are just some of the things that we're seeing inside of benefit packages along with our service.
[00:06:03] Jason: Got it. And what are you typically seeing property managers charge for this resident benefit package? And I would assume this is something that they're convincing the tenants to buy as a product.
[00:06:15] Nick: Yeah, so ultimately, what we've seen is that the benefit package just rolls right along with the lease agreement. There's not an option there for the tenant to either pay for or not. It just is what it is and you get it. Yep. And they range across the board, right? From, you know, 20 bucks all the way up to 75 plus dollars per month, depending on what's in the package.
[00:06:41] So when we were designing our service to be able to slide into a benefit package, we wanted to be super conscious of increasing that at all right because any increase in a benefit package cost is going to come with some kickback initially. And so there's got to be some good value there. So we had that in mind for sure, but they definitely range. They kind of run the gamut of, you know, pretty cheap all the way up to some pretty expensive packages, depending on what's offered.
[00:07:08] Jason: Got it. Now you said kickback, but I think you mean push back, right?
[00:07:13] Nick: Yeah.
[00:07:13] Jason: Okay. All right. Just making sure. People are like, "is there an affiliate thing going on here?" right. Okay. Yeah. Right. The tenants are going to be a little frustrated if it's too expensive and they're going to say, "Well, why am I being forced to do this? I don't know that I need all that stuff." Okay. So then, can you give us an idea of what this would cost? How do you price this with companies? Is this like on a per unit basis that you work out a deal with the property managers? Are there certain rates? Is this something that they just can do on certain properties that they can convince the owners to buy into? How does that typically work?
[00:07:48] Nick: Yeah. So when we onboard a company. It's pretty much an all or nothing deal. Right. We want to make sure we cover all of their properties regardless of where they're at and if they have current pest issues. We do work individually on a customized basis with each property management company to decide: "all right, what are you seeing typically pest issue wise? What package makes the most sense, and do we need to customize a package to best fit?" So, at a broad level, we have a couple of different packages. One of 'them is more of a basic package that covers the things that don't typically happen a lot, but when they do happen, it's a real hassle.
[00:08:25] So a good example of that would be bed bugs, for example. They don't happen a ton, but when they do, it's a pretty severe cost.
[00:08:32] Jason: Right.
[00:08:33] Nick: Yep. And and then going up from there, our upper package is a little bit more of the common stuff that people call on a regular basis. Your spiders, your ants, wasps, bees, that sort of thing. And so we do have a couple of packages that we work off of, but we do customize with each company and make sure that we're covering what they want and making it specific to them.
[00:08:56] Jason: Got it. I'm sure it differs. Like here in Texas, we have some big bugs and a lot of mosquitoes here in Austin, but yeah, in some markets, I would imagine you've got certain issues that are just typical to that market and then other markets you don't, and it might also have to do with sometimes-- unfortunately might have to do with the class of the property or the area of the property that it's in, how well it's maintained, stuff like that.
[00:09:21] Nick: Yeah, for sure. And I mean, ultimately we don't want the tenants to hesitate to call because that's what normally happens, right? They know that they're responsible for it.
[00:09:30] Jason: Yeah.
[00:09:30] Nick: And so, they don't call and they just kind of sweep it under the rug either literally or figuratively and the pest issue goes untreated and it can get out of hand, and so we want to eliminate that from happening. We want the tenants to feel good about where they live and have it clean. We also want the owners to understand that their property's being taken care of when it's needed and then obviously the property management companies, they don't have to hassle with the back and forth and who's paying the bill.
[00:09:57] Jason: So let's make this a little bit real. So let's say you've got a tenant. They've got some pests. I don't know what kind of pests would be a serious issue, but they decide not to call. Give me an example you've heard of, and then it's incurring additional damages that then the owner's going to have to pay for. Can you think of something like that?
[00:10:17] Nick: Well, I can tell you that, for example, like an average bed bug cost to remediate is going to be anywhere between 800 and a thousand bucks.
[00:10:25] Jason: Okay.
[00:10:25] Nick: So right there, you know, our average package is probably around 10 to 12 bucks a month. So if a tenant is paying 10 to 12 bucks a month, they have a bed bug issue, they're paying substantially less than what they would have to pay to have that remediated through just a general pest control company. Those obviously become much bigger issues when you're looking at multi-family situations where units are connected and those bugs can travel. So I've seen that stuff get pretty out of hand, but ultimately we want to get it controlled as, as quickly as we can so that doesn't happen.
[00:11:00] Jason: Yeah. I hate roaches. Really don't like those things like yeah. I remember being in some houses, like some just not really nice areas, like visiting some houses and stuff in upstate New York and high humidity, and there were some units that I went in that had some really nasty infestations with cockroaches and some of them are really freaking tiny. They're just running around all over, so. Yeah, I hate those things.
[00:11:27] Nick: It's rough. It is nice. Yeah. It's nice for the property manager to have someone else get some eyes on the property every once in a while because typically if you're seeing a lot of bugs, there's a reason. The bugs want to eat. And so there's some cleanliness issues there. So it's nice to be able for us to be able to report on what we're seeing and if we're seeing multiple calls on the same property that's a little bit of a red flag to maybe send someone out there to take a look at the property and have a chat with the tenant.
[00:11:52] Jason: Got it. Yeah. So one of the key benefits then is it's giving you greater visibility into some of the problem properties as to what's going on.
[00:12:02] Nick: Yeah, absolutely because we're going to track every time we get a service call, and you're going to see that report as well. So we can both kind of keep eyes on it.
[00:12:09] Jason: Got it. Okay, cool. So this is something they can build into, you know, along with their leases as part of their resident benefit package. It's not going to increase their costs. Does this become a profit center in any way for property managers or is this just mitigating costs?
[00:12:26] Nick: Yeah, we've had property managers use it just to kind of mitigate those costs. No additional revenue.
[00:12:32] Jason: Mm-hmm.
[00:12:32] Nick: Most of the companies we work with as with everything in their benefit package, they're going to add some kind of a mark up there or an admin fee just for them for kind of doing the work and yeah and setting up the relationship. So it makes perfect sense, so that's what most of them will do. And it's kind of up to them, how much they mark it up, but yeah, there's definitely an additional kind of profit stream there that can be created through using Cover.
[00:12:54] Jason: Got it. And certainly some advantages to taking greater care of the property. Cool. So what are the big questions besides the ones you've already touched on that when people come to you, they're really curious to know because I'm sure some of our listeners are probably thinking, "Hey, maybe this is a good idea."
[00:13:13] Nick: Yeah. Yeah. So one of the main questions I get is how do we roll it out? Yeah. And a couple different ways. Typically what we'll do is it's a kind of a slow rollout and it's upon lease renewal or a new lease creation. So as you're working with a property management company, they have new leases come up. They'll send us that batch for the month. That's renewing and we'll get them added into the service catalog. We have had companies that have gone in and asked their tenants, "Hey, do you want to opt into this right now in the middle of your lease?" and that option is there as well.
[00:13:44] Jason: Have you seen much success with that, with them doing that? What percentage do you see typically? I don't know if you have that data, but...
[00:13:52] Nick: that are opting in?
[00:13:54] Jason: Yeah. If they put it out to all of their residents for opt in, I'm just curious what the typical response rate is that people are like, "yeah. I'll go ahead and do that." Maybe 10%?
[00:14:05] Nick: Yeah. It's not high. Not high--
[00:14:07] Jason: yeah
[00:14:07] Nick: because--
[00:14:08] Jason: I would imagine it's like, "Hey spend more money. Do you want to?" And they're like, " yeah."
[00:14:11] Nick: exactly. Yep.
[00:14:13] Jason: Okay.
[00:14:13] Nick: So most frequently, most commonly, it'll be rolled out as leases are renewed and as new properties or leases are assigned, that's the most common way that it's done.
[00:14:23] Jason: Okay. Got it. So they sign up with you. You've worked out the pricing based on what sort of package they need, you implement, consult them and help them figure out how they're going to roll this out, and they're probably building this into their lease with some verbiage. You typically provide some verbiage for them to add to their lease as part of this.
[00:14:41] Nick: Yep, absolutely. We have some stuff that you can throw in.
[00:14:44] Jason: And then they get this rolled out. So then they've got this new maybe profit center, but at least it's being paid for by somebody. It's increasing the visibility. It's decreasing some of the potential costs for the owners. It's protecting the owners. If something gets really bad it could cause a lot of damage. And I'm curious, like, you've mentioned bed bugs, and I mentioned roaches, but what else are you typically seeing causes a lot of damage? I mean, termites, we hear a lot about. Is this something that is checked for or like relevant?
[00:15:13] Nick: Yeah. wood destroying bugs like termites are a completely different animal.
[00:15:18] Jason: Yeah.
[00:15:18] Nick: That's not honestly a part of what we do. It's another specialty altogether. As far as damage is concerned, mice and rats are another one that are--
[00:15:28] Jason: oh yeah.
[00:15:28] Nick: --they're out there, and we hear about them and we treat for those. Those ones will come in and cause some real issues. If nothing else, just scaring the crap out of people.
[00:15:37] Jason: Yeah, that's true. Yeah. And then, you know, safely doing the cleanup because--
[00:15:42] Nick: right.
[00:15:43] Jason: --You know, some issues with some of that stuff, so yeah.
[00:15:46] Nick: Yeah.
[00:15:47] Jason: And so no on termites, but yes, on bed bugs, roaches and mice and and rats. Okay. Got it. Any other questions that property managers might ask that would be curious about your service or that you'd like them to understand or know?
[00:16:02] Nick: Yeah, maybe just to, again point out that sometimes when we go out to do a service the property management company will expect another bill from us or think that there'll be another bill coming, but it's all taken care of. Just in that monthly subscription that's paid for by the tenant. There's no additional fee, no additional cost. We go out and we take care of it. And so that's a common question, common concern. One other one that comes to mind is sometimes they'll be rehabbing a property or making some significant changes to one of their properties and they'll want to stop the service or pause the service. We're definitely open to doing that and have done that. So pausing service during a rehab or big remodel is definitely something we can do. That's one question that has come up in the past as well.
[00:16:44] Jason: Unless they potentially could uncover something in the walls during that room.
[00:16:49] Nick: Right. Right. Yeah. And that's another thing to mention. Yeah. Another thing to mention is the service kind of runs with the address, not necessarily the tenant, so--
[00:16:59] Jason: okay.
[00:16:59] Nick: --if you have a property that maybe sat vacant for a couple months, and you had a maintenance manager out there to check on something and he notice a pest issue. He can just give us a call and we'll go take care of it. Even though there's not a tenant in there, because it kind of runs with the address.
[00:17:15] Jason: Got it. And that justifies including it as part of the rent as well. So if you're saying, "Hey, this. This property, in some instances like in California, like you have to usually pay for lawn care if you want the lawn to be maintained because some people just won't do it sometimes, right? So there's certain things you would include. So this would be included. You could then-- that could be a selling point to the tenants. Like this comes with a resident benefit package where it includes this and this, you won't have to worry about pest control. You won't, and these other things.
[00:17:46] Nick: Yep, exactly.
[00:17:47] Jason: Okay. So potentially as the benefit of helping, sweeten the deal a little bit on a potential rental property for a potential resident, so.
[00:17:55] Nick: For sure. Yeah.
[00:17:57] Jason: Cool. Well, I think we've covered most of the highlights. This sounds like-- it sounds like a no brainer. It sounds like a good service. Let's tell everybody how to get in touch with you and how to find you.
[00:18:10] Nick: Yeah, super easy. Our website is CoverPest.com and you can call me anytime. My number's (208) 477-1330. That's my cell. And you can go on to CoverPest.com, submit a form, and we're happy to chat about creating kind of a custom pricing model for your property management company.
[00:18:29] Jason: Cool. So I want to ask one more question. So when they hear you say, "you'll call my cell" and "here's my number," they might be thinking, is this a scalable business? What if somebody has 10,000 doors or they're a big conglomerate, you know, or they're a small property manager. Is this a scalable model for you? Can you handle different size property management companies?
[00:18:50] Nick: Yeah, what's nice is that our portal, our backend portal that's a part of our website makes it really easy for property management companies to go in and add their properties to their list. So every time they have a backed upload of lease renewals. They go to the service portal, they put it in there and they're added and they can see exactly which properties are covered in that month. And then, yeah, we work with a network of pest control companies that we use as vendors to service accounts that we get with property management companies in different states, if that makes.
[00:19:23] Jason: Got it. So you've got this all figured out really well. I appreciate you coming the show, Nick, and it's been great hearing about Cover Pest. So thanks. Thanks for coming on.
[00:19:33] Nick: Yeah, thanks so much for having me. I appreciate it.
[00:19:36] Jason: All right. Cool. So check them out at coverpest.com sounds like a good service. And as always give me your feedback. I want to hear... those of you that work with Cover Pest, let me know how it goes. And those of you that are tuning in for the first time, and you got some value from this episode, or if you're not tuning in for the first time, give us some feedback. If you find us on YouTube, The Google play store, or you find us on Spotify or iTunes, give us some feedback. We'd love to hear what you think of the show. And we may even give you a shout out on a future episode. So we appreciate that. And if you're interested in growing your business, check us out at doorgrow.com, and if you want to join our free community of property management entrepreneurs, you can go to doorgrowclub.com and that will get you to our Facebook group.
[00:20:23] Join that community. We've got some great people in there and you know, a rising tide raises all ships, as they say this will allow you to connect with some other property managers and have a resource you can go to to ask questions. And we'd love to hear from any of you inside there, so make sure you join. And until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.
[00:20:49] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:21:16] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
At DoorGrow, we aim to expand the property management industry and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. We love gathering new strategies and ideas to help savvy property managers grow their businesses.
In this episode, property management growth expert Jason Hull interviews Tommy Chambers from Chambers Theory about the secret to his success.
You’ll Learn…
[02:08] The Secret Power of Trust Equity for Improving Churn Rate
[08:59] Keeping on Clients… Even When they Don’t Really Need You Anymore
[15:09] Benefitting Homeowners and Investors with Ongoing Management
[21:02] Why Recognizing Your Team Matters
[26:07] Systems Every Business Should Have
[31:23] The Importance of Establishing Company Culture
Tweetables
“It's not just about growth. It's also about keeping the ones you have and the clients you have satisfied. So our strategy has been to take care of our people.”
“If your churn rate is high, that means you then have to replace all the doors you are losing every single month. If you're replacing every door that you're losing constantly, then you have stagnation.”
“It's far easier to keep a client than to go acquire new ones... and far cheaper.”
“Hiring is hard. One of the hardest transitions I see entrepreneurs go through is solopreneur to having a team.”
Resources
[00:00:00] Tommy: We said, "Hey, your services don't have to stop when you come back to live in your own home. We can still be your property manager even if we're not collecting rent.
[00:00:08] Jason: All right. Welcome, DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently. Then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high-trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
[00:00:46] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry. Eliminate the BS, build awareness, change the perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.
[00:01:11] Welcome to the #DoorGrowShow.
[00:01:13] Tommy: Yeah, thanks for having me. It's a pleasure to be on.
[00:01:15] Jason: Yeah. Glad to have you. So you've been doing property management for how long?
[00:01:20] Tommy: 21 years now.
[00:01:22] Jason: And how long ago did you start your business?
[00:01:25] Tommy: We started Chambers Theory in 2018. This was on the heels of my former company selling to a bigger broker and saw the opportunity to start fresh and bring my theory to the market of what property management should and could look like.
[00:01:42] Jason: Cool. Well, welcome to the show. So you guys reached out and wanted to be on the show, I guess you had been listening to the podcast for a while. We've never worked together, right?
[00:01:52] Tommy: Not yet.
[00:01:52] Jason: Not yet. Not yet. Right. So cool. Well, I'd love to hear how many doors do you guys have right now.
[00:01:58] Tommy: 717.
[00:02:01] Jason: All right. That's a nice number since 2018. So what's your biggest strategy to add doors? How have you grown the business so far?
[00:02:08] Tommy: You know, there's a lot of different ways we've approached that. There's a growth strategy just from organic growth. All of those doors have been organic growth. Of course, we look at acquisitions as well. And then, there's also the client retention. It's not just about growth. It's also about keeping the ones you have and the clients you have satisfied. So our strategy has been to take care of our people, use and try new tech, be early adapters with some new tech, and when we take care of our people and lean into some cool new products and leading-edge technology, the word gets out and when we're effective and take care of our people, people like to follow that. Clients like to follow companies where they have consistency of people they're dealing with and especially if they're happy with their jobs, it really works out well.
[00:02:55] Jason: I love what you said. One of the big things that a lot of businesses fail to look at is churn, you know, and retention. And your churn ratio or churn rate is basically the number of clients you had at the beginning of the month. And then, you divide that by the number of clients you have at the end of the month, basically is how you calculate churn. And so if your churn rate is high, that means you then have to replace all the doors you are losing every single month, if you're replacing every door that you're losing constantly, then you have stagnation, and a lot of business owners try to increase growth, increase lead then, and they don't focus on churn at all or retention at all. And they wonder why they're not making any progress. And it's kind of like trying to run uphill while somebody's pulling you backwards. So what are some things you've done to kind of decrease the churn rate and prevent clients from leaving? And one of the clients that tends to leave the most are accidental investors. Do you avoid those or are you good at convincing them to stay longer?
[00:03:56] Tommy: I love the analogy too. We actually use the analogy of pushing a rope uphill is when you have a high churn rate. Just doesn't make a lot of sense in that it takes a lot of energy to both reintroduce a new client to what your program's like and set expectations and agreements on that, but also to find them, so keeping the ones we have and keeping the ones we have happy is critical for us. And we actually have a high churn, natural high churn type of client base. A lot of our clients are military and US foreign service, which means typically we know when they sign on with us, they're gonna be back to their house in three years, which makes a really interesting... Mm, I'll call it calling or genre of residential property management. When you know your client's gonna be back in three years. You know, you have to plan for that replacement, and you also have this higher calling of care where: geez, this is not just somebody's investment property. This is their home they're going to come back to and the judgment is often a lot more meticulous when they come back and say, "How did you do taking care of my house?" not just, "How much rent did you earn me?"
[00:05:08] So some of the things we do are really to increase the level of care and communication the client feels during the period of time that we know we have them, and we call it building or losing trust equity in every interaction. So the way we describe trust equity is like having gas in your tank and you're going on a trip. You're only gonna go as far as you keep fueling up that gas in that tank. And for us, that gas in that tank with that client is trust equity. So in every interaction, we either see ourselves as building rapport, building trust equity or losing it, or losing the opportunity to build it. So a lot of our practices are focused on: how do we build up trust equity all the way through their journey and make it the full three years? And the positive side of the community that we're working with is: even though there's a high natural churn, there's also a high referral rate from one landlord client to another to utilize our services if we've done a good job for them.
[00:06:11] Jason: Yeah. I like that. Yeah. You know, refueling the tank or recharging the cell phone or, you know, anything. Like nothing just continually runs forever. Right? And I love the idea of trust equity. I've said many times on the show like I really believe sales and deals happen at the speed of trust.
[00:06:29] Tommy: Hmm.
[00:06:30] Jason: And, you know, retaining clients also happens related to trust. Like you're gonna keep clients if they trust you, and that trust is everything that you do in your business, everything that your business puts out there is either creating trust or taking it away to some degree with your clients. And so, one of the main things we focus on at DoorGrow with clients is taking all the major leaks that exist in their sales pipeline related to trust and helping short those leaks and that's always the language we've used around that is to try to make sure they're reducing the leaks. And there's lots of things in the sales pipeline that can destroy trust. It could be the brand. It could be maybe they're not destroying, but they're leaks in trust. Like they might trust a property management company over a real estate company when it comes to branding more.
[00:07:21] And so that could be a leak just at the branding stage there's leaks when it comes to your sales process, there's leaks when it comes to your website, there's leaks when it comes to your pricing, and all of these different things that exist throughout their experience in the sales pipeline can either add value and add trust and build it, or it can take it away. And this is why when we talk about cold leads versus warm leads, or going from a cold interaction or lead to close, the difference between cold and warm is trust, right? We're trying to nurture them through this sales process and through follow-up. And eventually, they get warm enough, they trust enough that we can close the deal, right? And then the trust cycle continues. You have to then onboard them effectively. You have to then make them feel safe because everybody has buyer's remorse after they purchase something. There's an initial dopamine high. When we make a purchase. And after that purchase, after we spend money, there is natural lull. Like it comes back down and that's where people kind of freak out and they look for the problem, and if they see one they're like, "Oh crap, did I make the wrong choice?" So making sure there's this smooth experience through the sales pipeline and then bridging over into onboarding and into their client experience.
[00:08:39] And if you onboard them well, and they have a good experience, you're gonna have a much higher retention rate. So now you've got people that are leaving most likely after about three years. So you've got like this three-year cycle. How do you deal with that? Because every three years you help that churn rate and that's better than some that are taking on accidental investors that are only gonna hang out for a year.
[00:08:59] Tommy: Yeah. So one of the ways we deal with it is-- which I think is unique, is we said, "Hey, your services don't have to stop when you come back to live in your own home. We can still be your property manager even if we're not collecting rent. Often, we were getting calls from clients that came back anyway saying, "Hey, you know, I was your client last year or two years ago. I need a recommendation on an HVAC company," or, "I need a recommendation on a plumber for Thanksgiving before my family comes to visit," or whatever it is. And it was like, well, oftentimes we were getting these calls back from clients anyway, saying, "I just need a contract recommendation," or "I'm going to be away from my house for three weeks on vacation. Can you just check on it once for me if there's a storm?"
[00:09:46] And what we decided to do is instead of treating it like a clumsy process to make it a formal process and organize that thing that was happening anyway, and we said, "Hey, when you come back, you don't have to close out your account. And you can continue to use us for anything related to your house and you can run your expenses through your escrow operating account in property management, and we'd be happy to be part of that for you and give you contractors when you need them." And we made the expense for that minimal, and it's not a profitable activity, yet it kept the connection and it also told these clients, "Hey, you know, we can trust this company even when they're not really making money from us, right, they're truly in it to serve us."
[00:10:32] And what happened is when they got their next assignment, whether they're military or foreign service, but they already had their account open with us, they didn't have to decide, "Oh, who do I want to interview?" Or "Who do I wanna start with this time in property management?" we made it easy for them to just keep going with us and recommend other people to start with us. So that's one of our nuances and I welcome other property managers to do it too. You don't stop serving them when they stop becoming a client, especially if they could become a client again or refer somebody else, you know, continue to offer them some kind of value even after you think that they're done.
[00:11:07] Jason: Yeah. That's fascinating. That makes a lot of sense in a military market. Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. Do you find that it is more of a loss leader or are you doing this at cost at least?
[00:11:18] Tommy: So I guess you could call it a loss leader if you tried to start a business that way. I mean, once you have a certain scale... our scale of our business, right, is we keep close track of how many property management hours per property we're spending throughout the year, and, you know, we have it down to a science exactly. You know, how many doors to our staff, not just per property management lead, but overall support staff. How many hours are dedicated to these properties? And what we find was keeping these accounts on wasn't costing us a lot of time, but it was giving us a really good return on trust equity. So we were building more trust equity when the client closed out their account, their normal rent collection account, and kept going with us from what we call a heat account or a home escrow account and the home escrow account, you know, we're charging $360 a year, a dollar a day, less than that, really. And oftentimes it was not profitable for us in terms of the hours we spent, but we'd spend, you know, five or six hours a year on those accounts, making recommendations, handling their expenses through their property account. So it wasn't like a money maker, but it really had a return in terms of these clients came back to us and they recommended other people to us because we were building trust in the process, not just cash.
[00:12:45] Jason: So this three-year cycle that you mentioned where they will go off for maybe about three years, and then they want to move back into the property. Do you know how long they're typically staying before they go off again?
[00:12:57] Tommy: Yeah. I mean, it depends on which government agency or department they work for. There's different requirements for each, which we've come to learn quite well. Sometimes they'll come back for, you know, let's say they work for the U.S. state department. They'll come back for one-year language training. So they're, you know, they're coming back from Bangkok and they're gonna be transferred to Nairobi, Kenya 12 months from now. So they know they're coming back just to learn the language of the next place they're going and all the more reason to just keep their account active, right?
[00:13:31] Jason: Yeah.
[00:13:31] Tommy: Often--
[00:13:32] Jason: So they're only back for a year and then they're probably out for maybe another three years?
[00:13:37] Tommy: Exactly. Yeah. So, you know, it tends to be a one or two-year return depending on the nature of their return assignment, domestic assignment. And then, another three years out tends to be.
[00:13:49] Jason: Wow. Okay. So, I mean, so the ratio skewed so that they're gone more than they're back. So by maintaining that relationship, you have built-in future clients.
[00:14:00] Tommy: Nailed it, yeah. Oh, and that maintaining the relationship is where the secret is, as we said. Not doing that turns growth into pushing a rope uphill. If you maintain that relationship, it makes it really easy for that business relationship to continue and that trust equity to grow.
[00:14:18] Jason: Yeah, it's far easier to keep a client than to go acquire new ones... and far cheaper. And it takes a lot less work and if they have a good experience with you, they already know you, trust you, like you, so like it's super easy. Next time they need it, they're gonna go with you as long as they had a good experience, and if that relationship has been maintained, they're still a client. Yeah, no-brainer. It's like, "Hey, we're going out again." "Cool." So pre-framing that from the beginning when you onboard a new client and letting them know, "Look, you're probably gonna go in some cycles. We're used to this. This is how we handle it. This is what we do," they'll just plan on staying with you forever.
[00:14:54] Tommy: Yeah, I'll tell you at first, it's an awkward value proposition, right? It's like, "Well, I'm back. Why do I need to keep a property manager?" And the answer is: you don't. You don't need to. You don't need us nearly as much as you did when you were on the other side of the world and we had a tenant.
[00:15:09] Jason: Yeah.
[00:15:09] Tommy: However, this is why every connection and communication is an opportunity to build trust is when they start to see, "Oh, I'd much rather call my property manager and have them deal with the contractor," or "call my property manager, see if they can check on this after a storm," or, "call my property manager..." whatever it is. The more that they see there's value in the process in the chain, then the more likely they are to say, "Wow, I actually wanted this. I didn't realize you guys even offer when I came back, I could just keep using you at a lower price." So, it's awkward at first because you're used to saying, "Well, these are the reasons we are worth property management: rent collection, and dealing with tenants," and you just have to change that and recognize that actually, we're valuable for a lot of things that the clients trust us on and including, you know, managing, making it easy for them to manage their home escrow account or their expenses related to their property, or we make it a lot easier for them to not call some contractor out of the yellow pages or Google somebody and get lucky. They already know that we have a tried and true stable of contractors.
[00:16:17] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. It's frustrating trying to find contractors and having to do the research, so I think that's a great selling proposition and property managers don't like giving out their vendors generally. So if they're a client and you're like, "Hey, let us handle this." If they come back to you... so what do you do in the situations where they're like, "Nope, I don't need you. And I don't want to do this. We're back. I got it handled. But then they call you up and they're like, "Hey who you got for me? You got a contractor that could do this or this?" Do you say, "Well, we have this great program," and you try and get them on the program?
[00:16:50] Tommy: Yeah. We try to reintroduce them to the program, and the reason why is because when you're out of the system, everything it's that much harder to translate the information to what needs to happen, right? Like, okay, you have something that needs to be done, but we don't have all the information in our system and as close anymore, and also our contractors, they like to know that if they bill a property manager, they're gonna get paid in two weeks. We build trust equity with the vendors too, not just the clients. So these contractors would rather get a call from us and say, "Okay, yeah, I'll be happy to do that job tomorrow or Monday, whatever it is because I know you're gonna pay me in two weeks when I send you the invoice," versus, "Oh, I've gotta deal with some homeowner that's calling me. Maybe it's good. Maybe it's not. I don't know if they're gonna pay me on time or if I am going to have to do an accounts receivable issue."
[00:17:43] It's just all smoother through our network when we have the account open. So yes when they call us back, we say, "Hey, of course we can give you the contractor's name and number, happy to do that. We're not gonna block you from that. However, the contractor's gonna prefer to hear from us anyway. So, you know, we're happy to set your account back up." we really put their account on pause if we think they're gonna be going back overseas in a couple of years, but yeah. I mean, we do reintroduce the concept, even if they closed out thinking they didn't need it.
[00:18:13] Jason: Hmm. Got it. So I'm trying to figure out how could this apply to non-military markets if at all possible. So I'm just spitballing here, but I'm wondering if property managers could present this as an actual product or service to just typical homeowners, like, "Hey, we'll handle the vendors, we'll handle maintenance, whatever," and they charge them for that, but they just, they charge some sort of fee and, "We'll take care of all this stuff and handle vendors, and we have the best contractors and we're organized and sort this out. I don't know if people would go for it, but...
[00:18:43] Tommy: Actually, I think it's a growing market and it is happening. A good friend of mine, Lisa Wise, who owns Flock DC, she's trying to build almost a franchise concept, but a series of this very thing where all they do is home management for primary homeowners. She's pursuing this market in high urban markets with really busy professionals who just don't know how or don't want to take the time to take care of their own house. And she's got a great program set up for that. Again, we're not doing it on the scale she's pursuing it. We're offering the service as. Let's build the relationship with the client that we have for rental management before they need us.
[00:19:24] Jason: Sure. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. But yeah, I think there's an opportunity there for the people in the non-military markets to make that maybe a profit center or something. You cut out the whole tenant side of things, but there's the whole maintenance coordination piece and home management piece, lawn care, grounds, pools.
[00:19:44] Tommy: I'll tell you, I actually think investors would love this, and it might be something we pursue more as we work with investors that'll appreciate this that is to be able to do not just, oh, any expenses related to your personal residents, but to do an analysis like, "Hey, typically for a house your size you're spending two X the amount of water on your water bill that you should be. When you can start to do some financial analysis within their expenses, instead of just saying, "Oh yeah, like you can pass through your expenses through your account. So it's all in one place," but to add value by saying, "This is out of our standard deviation for this expense," or-- and again, you can always add value by saying, "You can call five contractors if you want, but we're buying in bulk as a property manager and we can get you either better pricing or better value of service."
[00:20:33] Jason: Yeah, very cool. So what else would you like to share with people about your business that might be beneficial to property managers listening? You've grown fairly quickly. I think you have the advantage that you're in that military market where you've got people leaving, which is great as long as they have awareness, you're going to be adding doors, which I think is really powerful. You focus on trust equity, which I really like that phrase, and what else do you think really kind of sets you apart, makes your company unique from the competitors in your market?
[00:21:02] Tommy: Yeah, thanks for the question. That trust equity is a strong theme at our company. And what I do is, it's not just with the contractors or with the clients, we're also building trust with one another on the team, and we call it the Camelot principle. So yeah, after you've done battle enough on our team as a property manager, you've been through a couple of tough summers. Summers tend to be the hardest time of the year in our market. Then we award that person with a sword, a sword with etching on it for chambers theory, and we welcome them as a knight of the round table. And what we really want to do is we want to build this interdependence of trust with one another as a team, and part of my promise as the employer and the business owner is to keep the job manageable for them, right?
[00:21:53] Like most of the time as the entrepreneur, like we're trying to get the most out of our teams so we can get more profits and grow and it's healthier. And sometimes it's great. Some of us are, "Hey, we'll pay our people more," which is a wonderful way to look at it, yet sometimes people want their job to be more manageable. Like we can call them to a higher standard, yet we also shouldn't overwhelm or burn out our employees, and it was really telling when we saw right after it was the end of 2020-2021 market, they call it the great resignation. There's a lot of people saying, "Hey I'm done working," seems a lot of it had to do with burnout. People are like, "Life's short, why am I burning myself out for this or for that?" And to really lean in on how do we build trust with one another?
[00:22:37] How do I serve my team by making them part of that round table of strategic decision making, making them part of that process where we say, "Hey, we're serving one another as a team, and then we serve our clients and we build trust with our clients and our contractors after we build it with one another. I have a high respect for these different elite teams in the world, in any industry. I love the new movie Top Gun Maverick. They take the top 1% of 1% of pilots in the Navy and they build this elite team, and yet still the part of the theme of the movie was: how do you take these elite individuals and turn them into a gelled team to accomplish a mission? And that's part of what we're trying to do is it's about believing in one another to accomplish the mission, not just going for the mission at all costs and burning each other out.
[00:23:30] Jason: Yeah, there's a lot of truth to that. I think one of the big mistakes I've seen, having been able to see inside of probably thousands of property management companies and work with lots and lots of entrepreneurs is I think it's a common misconception and a common belief that entrepreneurs carry that their team members want more compensation and that compensation will increase output. And the reason for this is entrepreneurs, we're money motivated, but most people are not. Entrepreneurs and salespeople typically are the two categories of people that are money motivated. But what I find is most of our employees, most of our team members, most of the people on the planet are not actually money motivated in that if you give them bonuses, commissions, incentives, financial incentive, performance doesn't really get better.
[00:24:24] And you can see this if you give team members a disc assessment. The more advanced disc assessments have what's called values index. And one of those values is the economic score. If the economic score is low, they're not money motivated. And if the economic score's high they're very money motivated, but entrepreneurs usually are money motivated, so they by default think, 'That's what would motivate me, so I'm gonna try and inspire them by offering money to get better output, and it backfires because if they're economic score is low and say, for example, their charitable scores high. Some of them have guilt related to money. So you pay them more, the performance actually goes downhill and they get worse. And so if their economic score's low, here's what you do instead, you give them recognition, they're recognition motivated. So I love the idea that you're giving 'em a full sword. You're probably like in front of the team. Recognition, generally, even the people that are money motivated is appreciated, so.
[00:25:28] Tommy: Yeah. I learned that one the hard way, just hearing you talk about it. I was like, oh yeah. I took me right through the past scenario where it's like, "Why am I not getting more? I'm paying this person more," and what they really needed was to be taken and given the opportunity to be believed in more. And actually, they wanted more responsibility, not more compensation. They wanted to show that they're capable of more things, and then the compensation piece made more sense, but they almost really felt like they needed to earn it first, which is beautiful, but I tried to do it the other way around and it didn't work so well.
[00:25:59] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. I think it's a lesson everybody that runs a company eventually has to learn. And some of us are pretty hard at learning it, but I think another thing having a system in place allows recognition. So our planning cadence at DoorGrow, we call it DoorGrow OS, our operating system and it allows our executive team members to see what each other got done in the previous week or for our monthly goals or for our quarterly goals, and everybody gets to see the wins and gets to see that somebody contributed to the team goals. And a lot of businesses don't even have goals or it's the business owners pushing a goal onto everybody, which is very different. So having a really good operating system like that can really make a difference.
[00:26:46] Tommy: So I really like that system. I wanna talk to you more about that offline.
[00:26:50] Jason: Yeah. We'll chat with that. There's systems out there like EOS and Traction, and some of these, but really shameless plug, DoorGrow OS is better than those systems. Those have some fundamental flaws because they're still either entrepreneur centric and that's not as effective, like any business owner that's ever gotten burnt out or tired it's because you're doing too much and you're probably the biggest bottleneck in your business, and it's because you don't have a good operating system to really leverage your team effectively. And most entrepreneurs, we generally are the biggest bottleneck in our business. That's how it works.
[00:27:25] Tommy: What's interesting is I was gonna add, you said, what else would I offer property manager and other property managers out there from what I've learned and embracing technology. I can tell you, I researched the heck out of all my competition. I researched the heck out of property managers all over the United States, and I love learning about what are their best practices. What are they doing? How's their model set up? How do they value their company? Are they doing this new client retention thing? I love all the best practices and learning from it, but I almost always see, "Oh, we utilize technology," and I'm so curious. And then sometimes when I dig deeper, it's: "We send our clients digital pictures," like digital pictures isn't new technology. That was new technology 15, 20 years ago, or, "Our accounting platform says they're the latest in technology," and there's a lot of different platforms out there. And man, when some of these things came out, they were great platforms for being the latest and greatest at being more efficient in organizing your business.
[00:28:22] To say we utilize technology because you have email or mobile phone, smartphone, or a platform that came out 10 years ago. It's got some updates since... no like I'm interested in the DoorGrow operating system because you guys are leading edge in how to use that to make my business more efficient and grow not because it was something you came up with 10 years ago and you've made a couple of updates since. I'm fascinated by being an early adapter and new tech, not claiming I've got tech because I use email.
[00:28:54] Jason: Yeah, there are. There's a lot of property managers that feel like, "Hey, I used to doing spreadsheets and now I have AppFolio or Buildium, so like we're high tech, so.
[00:29:02] Tommy: Right. "I got a website!"
[00:29:04] Jason: Yeah. They got a website now. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm probably more tech-savvy and geeky than most people on the planet, but yeah we're doing some really cool things at DoorGrow that we really feel like add some serious value to the industry. I think two of the most challenging systems for our clients, once we get them growing that they need that we've built out is a really good planning system. Have project management or task management system, sort of system to assign tasks, but that's tactical work. They don't have anything related to strategic planning, and some have EOS, but there's some fundamental flaws with EOS, but the company that puts out the idea of EOS, the entrepreneur operating system, their goal is to sell coaches for that system, which they call integrators.
[00:29:52] And so they create this org chart in which you have the visionary, which is you usually, the entrepreneur, and then they have the integrator, and then they have the entire team. A fundamental flaw in that is if you have somebody that could run your entire business like that, and you're once removed from it. They could walk away with your business and that's not really a safe place to be, and that's not really how anybody actually does it. So you need a planning system though, and EOS DoorGrow OS, most systems out there will have annual planning, quarterly planning, monthly planning, maybe weekly, maybe some sort of daily things, but that's pretty typical of any business planning system, but you do need a business planning system.
[00:30:30] The other system that every business needs is a really good hiring system. So we just partnered with an AI firm for hiring because our clients always screw this up. Like it's hard. Hiring is hard. One of the hardest transitions I see entrepreneurs go through is solopreneur to having a team. And this is the transition from maybe about a hundred doors into that two to 400 door range, and usually they build the wrong team around the business owner, doing the wrong things, to where the business owner gets maximum lack of fulfillment and misery and being the biggest bottleneck and so really our entire system is built around the entrepreneur, like identifying what they most enjoy and don't enjoy doing, building the team around them and then build a hiring system to bring in the right team members that you actually can trust. Trust equity can only exist if there's culture in a business. And culture can only exist if it's defined so that you can bring in people that can look at that cultural material and say, "Hell yes, I want to be part of this where some people might just want a paycheck and there's a massive difference in output.
[00:31:41] Your team members, it sounds like you have good culture, and so you're probably getting three times the output of companies that have bad culture, and by bad culture I mean they hire team members just based on what the business needs. It's based on skill. And so they have people that are maybe a skill fit. They can do the work, but they're not the personality fit for the role, which means they'll never be great at it or they're not-- the most important-- cultural fit for the role, which means they actually share your values and you can trust them and let go of pieces of the business. So if you have team members you trust, but they can do the job, but they're always coming to you asking questions, you're always having to micromanage them, it's because you lack culture in your business. And you need to get that defined...
[00:32:21] Tommy: I hope-- you can't just have it. It's a continual build. It's just like trust equity like it's a continual... continue to work on, continue to define, continue to build. I would define our culture as that Camelot culture, Camelot principle, which is the heart of it is the saying "In service to one another, there is freedom."
[00:32:40] Jason: Love it. So yeah, service is one of your top cultural values. I love that. We have one at DoorGrow. Ours is called Care ROI, like care, and similar to your trust equity, like we wanna let people know that we care and if we invest care into people, then you know, we're gonna get a return on that investment. Tommy, it's been great connecting with you and chatting. It sounds like you found some cool little ways to facilitate and decrease churn. Appreciate you coming on the show and looking forward to connecting more in the future.
[00:33:11] Tommy: Yeah. Jason, looking forward to also following up with you and chatting, talking more about how you can help us grow.
[00:33:18] Jason: Absolutely. All right.
[00:33:19] Tommy: Cheers.
[00:33:20] Jason: Until next time, everybody, if you're curious about how to grow or scale your property management business, you're curious about DoorGrow OS or some things we mentioned on this show or how to identify culture, or you're just starting to experience that burnout as a visionary, and you don't feel like the visionary anymore. You feel like your best employee, which sucks. We would love to help you get out of that. We have processes to take you through to systematically help you offload, help you feel safe offloading, and helping you have great people to offload to that are actually better at those things you don't enjoy. And you, and a lot of entrepreneurs listening, if you haven't experienced that, you're like, "No, nobody's better than me." Believe me, it's an ego thing. We can kill that real fast. So reach out. We'd love to support you. Check us out at DoorGrow.com. Until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye, everyone.
[00:34:10] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:34:37] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
As a property manager, do your clients and owners allow pets? Do you encourage them to? There is an opportunity to create an additional stream of revenue and avoid fraudulent ESA letters by doing something so many owners are afraid of… allowing pets.
This week, property management growth expert, Jason Hull is joined by Logan Miller of OurPetPolicy to discuss the ins and outs of animals in rental properties and why allowing pets can actually be more beneficial for owners and tenants alike.
You’ll Learn…
[01:31] OurPetPolicy’s Mission and Why they Started
[04:00] The Big Issues with Not Allowing Pets in Rental Properties
[08:06] Reducing Fraudulent ESAs and Creating Better Tenants with Screening
[11:46] Keeping Track of Pet Problems with Mapping
[14:53] The Financial Gain for Property Managers
[17:02] Creating Effective Pet Policies and Rules
“It doesn't seem to make a lot of sense if you're gonna cut out two-thirds of the potential client base in one fell swoop by not allowing pets. You're not gonna be able to get as many qualified candidates probably for that property now.”
“When, you know, there's less of a pool of tenants and a little sparse, it could take an extra month on average to find that right tenant, you know, if you're not allowing pets and that feeds back into the return on investment for the owner.”
“Either you allow pets or they will just bring pets or animals into the property and hide it from you-- is a very common scenario-- and most people would rather be honest.”
“It's just another revenue stream that property managers can add is to make sure that they're tacking on pets and people are very willing to pay pet rent or to pay additional fees for a pet.”
Resources
[00:00:00] There was a property manager who had like over a thousand doors, and he said, "My best secret is I'm really good at convincing owners to allow pets." All right. We are live. Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others impact lives, and you are interested in growing in business and in life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
[00:00:46] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.
[00:01:07] So today ,my guest is Logan Miller of OurPetPolicy, which you can check out at ourpetpolicy.com. Logan, welcome to the show.
[00:01:17] Hi, thanks Jason. Thanks for having me. Excited to be here.
[00:01:21] Cool. So Logan, give us a little bit of background on you as an entrepreneur and your journey into how you kind of got to the point where you decided to start something called OurPetPolicy.
[00:01:31] Yeah. Yeah, so it all started, um, back when I was 23, I purchased my first house and it was a duplex and rented it out and became my own property manager of that. And even rented to college couples, and I was surprised at how many of them being, you know, kind of poor college couples, had pets. And a lot of 'em, you know, would say it was an emotional support animal, and because I lived on the property, I didn't have to accept those. And so, they'd end up paying a $300 pet fee to have it. And typically they're, you know, six or 12 months. And it surprised me that they were willing to pay that, but they did. And eventually between me and family members, grew our portfolio and yeah. Actually just before COVID, you know, we had a no pet's policy on those properties as well, and it surprised me how many ESAs we had-- emotional support animals that we had.
[00:02:19] And we got to a point to where, you know, we really looked into it and there were over three fourths of our rentals-- it all had a no pet's policy-- had animals in them and it's like, man, there's gotta be a better way to verify these emotional support animal letters, and so we talked with other property managers, most of them, you know, just accepting the ESA letters. We found online there was lots of websites that sell these letters and we went and got the letters ourselves and surprised at how easy you can get 'em. Just check a box: "I sometimes feel stressed" and they say, congratulations, you qualify for an ESA letter signed by a licensed health professional. And so we, you know, worked with some lawyers and said, "Hey, there's gotta be a good way that we can shut these down, you know, as they're not legitimate" and figured that out and I was like, "Hey, I'll bet other property managers would like this as well," and so just started a business.
[00:03:08] Okay, so our topic today is allowing pets versus not allowing pets. So why don't we chat a little bit about that, and then we can talk a little bit about how you sort of helped solve this problem. But, I remember being at a conference and there was a property manager who had like over a thousand doors, and I asked him what, you know, maybe his secret is, right? If he has one. And he said my best secret-- and I think he was a property manager in Hawaii-- and he said, "My best secret is I'm really good at convincing owners to allow pets." And I said, "Really?" And he's like, "Yeah, I'm good at convincing them to allow pets because usually children cause more damage than pets do."
[00:03:47] And he said, "So I'm able to talk people into allowing pets, which allows us to rent out more property, more easily at a higher price point and just facilitate things. So that was kind of like his big secret that he wanted to share with me. So, what have you noticed about allowing pets versus not allowing pets? So let's chat about that.
[00:04:06] Yeah. Yeah, no, I a hundred percent agree. If you look at the statistics out there, they say between, you know, two thirds and even as high as 90% of renters have a pet-- or if you're being technically correct-- have an animal because you know, assistance animals aren't considered pets, right? So, over three forces of the renters are gonna have an animal, and you know, I think a lot of times owners are hesitant to allow those animals, you know, on their properties as they've seen, you know, worst case scenarios. But the reality is, looking at the tenant pool, so many of the tenants have animals that if you want a quick turnaround and be able to, you know, charge-- like you said-- a higher monthly fee, you know, you have to accommodate that.
[00:04:50] Yeah, it doesn't seem to make a lot of sense if you're gonna cut out two thirds of the potential client base in one fell swoop by not allowing pets. You're not gonna be able to get as many qualified candidates probably for that property now, but a lot of owners are really afraid of pets. They might not be somebody that has pets or maybe they're just a really terrible pet owner, and they've seen the damage they've allowed their pets to make, maybe. I don't know, but they're afraid or have this fear that: 'if I allow pets in this property, it's gonna be absolutely destroyed.' They're imagining worst case scenarios, cat lady house, full of cat urine, or, you know, dogs with some sort of razor claws like shredding everything and chewing up everything. Right. So with your clients in the past, how did you persuade them to like, let go of that fear or to help mitigate that risk?
[00:05:45] Yeah. And we see this with property managers that we work with. They've, you know, for 20 years have had a no pet's policy but will still have animal issues, you know, as they're getting lots of assistance animals, emotional support animals, service animals, and see that, 'Hey. We're really fighting against this and what, if we move to allowing pets, you know. More than half of them have animals in them already,' and so we go through and, and show 'em, "Hey, you know, first of all, you wanna have really good, specific animal rules and we can talk about those later, but you wanna make sure that those expectation levels are set high so that the tenants know what they're expected to do and to help mitigate that damage potential.
[00:06:28] And then we'll, you know, show 'em the return on investment that they see for allowing animals, which part of it could be renting out faster. Lately, with the rentals, especially around here in Idaho and where, you know, we're helping at, there's a large tenant pool and a lot of applications, and so they haven't seen that here in the past year or so. But when, you know, there's less of a pool of tenants and a little sparse, it could take an extra month on average to find that right tenant, you know, if you're not allowing pets and that feeds back into the return on investment for the owner.
[00:07:02] Yeah. Something else that has come up on some of our group coaching calls in relation to pets is that, you know, either you allow pets or they will just bring pets or animals into the property and hide it from you-- is a very common scenario-- and most people would rather be honest, but they're not gonna give up, you know, having a good place in a lot of situations just because of a pet, right? And they're not gonna get rid of their animal or their pets. And so, what ends up happening is they just hide them, and if they're hiding it. Maybe you won't even see the damage. Maybe there's no damage. Maybe they're able to hide everything really well, but also you're not able to charge pet rent. You're not able to make more fees. You're not able to maybe get some sort of additional deposit or whatever you might do to kind of maximize your fee structure and to reduce risk for the owner and the animals are still in the property. All right. So let's talk a little bit about OurPetPolicy. So what problem does this really solve? I'm curious.
[00:08:06] Yeah. And so like I mentioned earlier that first part where we started off with is, you know, those emotional support animal requests, right? And we see especially with, you know, the younger generation coming and renting, and they're used to finding all their information online and there's so many blogs and posts about emotional support animals, all these websites that are selling these letters, you know, have blogs, YouTube videos and say, "Hey, why pay pet rent?" "If you have a no pet's policy, you know, see if you qualify for an ESA letter and 95% of people do." And so it's really so easy to go get an ESA letter that they're coming in without the pet policy. So we solve that issue and we're able to flag those letters and say, "Hey, you know, would you like to turn it into a pet and pay that pet deposit" or, you know, for the owners that are like, "Hey, I absolutely don't want animals in my property." we help keep their pet policy and go that route, but we do see a lot more and more switching from a no pet policy the pet's allowed.
[00:09:08] And so that's kind of the one, the initial pain point we're solving. But the other thing too is, you know, as tenants come in, a lot of times the damage that their animals cause is because they're naive to their damage potential of a dog or of a cat and they don't know those best practices, and so our goal is to help educate those tenants, and so we have, what's called 'pet curriculum' for those tenants. So it goes through, they're getting a dog, maybe it's for the first time, maybe they've had a dog forever, but they'll go through this interactive training course that says, "Hey, here's the best practices for having a dog," and the common ways that they do cause damage and how to prevent it. And so our goal is to, you know, educate the tenants and make sure that they are responsible animal owners, and I think that, you know, for the owners makes them feel a lot better about having an animal on the property.
[00:09:56] But then it's good for the tenants too, because less damage to the rental is good for the tenant. It's good for the property manager, and it's good for the owner. So that's another way that we're--
[00:10:05] Probably good for the pet.
[00:10:07] So, we've had petscreening.com on our show before, and so I know lots of people listening have probably been using them or have used them before. So how does that compare? What's interesting to me that stood out is you have training material and education, which I don't know if they have that. But that's an interesting take is to also just level up the quality of the tenants in relation to pet care or taking care of their pets or the animals. I don't know if you've done some competitive research. I don't know if these two tools might be complimentary or if they're competitive. So maybe you can just touch on that real quick.
[00:10:40] Yeah. They've been around for a lot longer than we have. We've been out for about two years now, and they started in 2017. And really, you know, in January, 2020, HUD came out with, you know, new guidelines around emotional support animals and those online website letters. That was kind of really our pain point that we were seeing, and so we really took off after that to start with, and then, you know, we were like, "Hey, you know, there's a lot of other issues we'd like to solve with software, our goal is to help manage those pets, you know, from a to Z. So not just the screening side of it, you know, when they're applying, but we wanna have a relationship with those tenants all the way through with the property managers. We do a lot of consulting with the property management companies on best practices and what we're seeing as far as data.
[00:11:25] And like you said, the pet curriculum, we have a pet mapping tool to easily identify the animals. And so, rather than just being on the initial screening side, you know, we try to have a complete a to z pet management system. And so there's a little similarities between us, but in the end, a completely different business model and things that we're doing.
[00:11:46] Got it. So you do do some screening of the pets for prospective tenants and prospective, you know, animals in the properties. What is the mapping tool?
[00:11:59] Yeah. So it makes it real easy to identify the animals that are on the property, and so like in multi-family housing, you get a tenant, take a picture of an animal, send it in, you know, and that's part of our tool as well. The tenants can send in complaints on other tenants in the multifamily housing and it says, you know, "Hey, this dog was digging up the landscaping," or, "Hey, they didn't, you know, clean up after their dog. Here's a picture," and then you can, you know, search that dog real quick, put in the color of the dog, the breed of the dog, whatever, go through all the pictures of, let's say it's a black and white dog. It'll show you all the pictures of the black and white dogs, and you're like, "Oh, they belong in this unit. It's this tenant." And you can attach that complaint right to them, so it makes it quick that way.
[00:12:40] If it's single family housing, what's really nice about it is you can share that with the owners as well. And so if you've got an owner that, you know, maybe that was their house they raised their kids in, you know, they're renting it. They drive by, they keep an eye on it. Instead of them calling you saying, "Hey, I saw an animal in the window. Is it supposed to be there? Is it not supposed to be there?" Going back and forth, you know, they can have access to that, to the pet mapping app and they can look on there and see if that animal's supposed to be in there. If it's not, they can take a picture, submit it directly from there. And so what we're trying to do is, you know, cut down on, on the time spent needed for property managers to do that detective work and figure that out, so.
[00:13:15] That's clever. So if there's an owner that's like going to the property all the time, they probably should just be fired as client, but... all right. So that, that's really interesting. So the mapping tools probably could have been called the snitching tool, which is totally interesting. So I think that's cool. So you're able to map or connect the pet problems to a particular situation or like a particular unit. And now this doesn't expose-- allow neighbors to figure out which neighbor they are or where they're at or anything like that. It just allows the property manager to an identify who has the problem pet.
[00:13:51] Yep, exactly.
[00:13:53] Okay. Cool. Right. We don't want vigilante tenants taking action against a unit.
[00:14:01] Right. Yeah. Right.
[00:14:02] Okay, cool. So yeah, no, this sounds really interesting, and so do you have a background in technology? How did you decide, like, "I want to do this software stuff."
[00:14:11] Yeah, so actually my brother that is the co-founder and he's had a lot technology, you know, startup-- software based startups and businesses and exits. And so he had the software team already built out, and so he's the co-founder with me. So I pitched the idea and and he's like, "Hey, this should be, you know, easy to do. And there's a large market out there and let's go for it."
[00:14:35] Cool. So, can you tell us anything about, roughly about how this works financially, like pricing? Like, does this generally make property managers more money? Is this off set? Like, is this hard for you to sell? Is this easy to sell? Like tell us a little bit about that. I'm sure people listening are curious, so.
[00:14:53] Yeah. Yeah. So our basic fee, like a software fee is 75 cents per door per month. And we go back and show the return on investment with that. And obviously if it's a no pet's allowed policy, you know, it's harder to show that return on investment. But, when the owner looks at it and says, "Hey, it kept this many animals outta my property that I didn't want in there," you know, "Hey, that's well worth it," and especially the education aspect of it, you know, if they are gonna have animals in the property, making sure there is less damage, you know, is gonna turn into that as well. And one thing I also thought'd be good on here talking about allowing pets versus not allowing pets: one of the common discussions we get in with property managers is, you know, what do you charge for a pet deposit? What do you charge for a pet fee? What do you charge for monthly pet rent? And anyways, that's kinda where we go back to that return on investment as well. You know, as we're turning these fraudulent requests into pets paying pet rent is-- you know, if they do charge a pet rent, pet fee, pet deposit, that's where the return on investment, you know, Is huge.
[00:15:58] Yeah. Yeah. Cool. Yeah, it's just another revenue stream that property managers can add is to make sure that they're tacking on pets and people are very willing to pay pet rent or to pay additional fees for a pet. They would expect to, right? They just expect to. If they don't, they're like cool, but you know, they're willing to do it, so. I generally haven't heard people mention challenges or pushback from residents on having to do anything for each individual pet. So, yeah, and if you don't do it, I really think people are just gonna sneak 'em in anyway. They're just gonna do it. So I think there's a serious advantage for people being able to be skilled. So maybe something you wanna add in the future is since you already have the educational platform is you have some sort of video or educational material to sell property managers on the benefits of opening up that pet policy to allow pets and animals in the properties and something they could give to owners to convince them like, "Hey, this is a better way to go because if you don't, this is what generally happens and this is a better way to go and there could be more money involved."
[00:17:02] Yeah, and that's part of what we do, you know, helping 'em go from a no pets policy to allowing pets is we give the property managers all of that data and we go through and build out a custom animal addendum with them to show 'em, "Hey, here's what, you know, the tenants are gonna be required to do the rules that they need to follow and I think all property managers should have that, you know, in their animal addendum and have every tenant go through and read through those and sign it. And one common thing we see that's a problem with property managers is they'll have, you know, pet rules in there and those pet rules don't apply to assistance animals. And so assistance animals, you know, if it's not in there as an animal rule, it's called a 'pet rule,' then it doesn't apply to them. So make sure that all the rules that should be followed, whether it's an assistance animal, you know, or a pet, are listed out as animal rules.
[00:17:54] So, and you will help them put an effective pet policy in place that mentions animals.
[00:18:02] Correct. Yep. So we'll have, you know, there's a pet section that talks about the pet fees, you know, pet deposits and all that, and then pet restrictions, a lot of times, you know, dangerous breeds. There's a lot of, you know, maximum weight limits and et cetera, but then there's a whole nother section that's called 'animal rules' that all animals are expected to abide by.
[00:18:21] All right. So I'm looking at the FAQ on one of your sites here. So what are some of the questions that people typically have? This seems like a big one: do you have pet policies for every state that are applicable?
[00:18:32] Yeah. And so we're moving across the country, so we're available to be in every state, and we work with lawyers in every state, you know, as we go into 'em. So far we're in 20 states across the country, and it typically takes us just a couple of weeks to add another state, you know? And like you said, we go in there. We have the specific rules in there cause it's state by state, they'll have rules saying, "Hey, if you represent in an assistance animal fraudulently, you know, there's a fine for that, and we make sure and put that, you know, in the pet policy as well.
[00:19:04] Okay.
[00:19:05] And go through state by state, make sure we found some specifically cities or counties that have specific rules around not being able to charge pet fees and et cetera. And so we work with lawyers in each state to make sure that we're abiding by all those rules.
[00:19:22] So basically you're leveraging the rules and laws that are in each state. You're able to make the policy sound as scary as possible and leverage the rules and penalties that are possible or applicable.
[00:19:38] Yeah. We want to, you know, educate the tenant as well. Right. That, "Hey, there are laws against this."
[00:19:44] Yeah.
[00:19:44] And you know, you wanna be-- they should be honest, but then also know, "Hey, if you, aren't honest, you know, here's the possibilities of recourse, so basically another educational part of it.
[00:19:55] Right. So if they're gonna take the risk to be fraudulent or do the wrong things, they're more educated on that risk. So, okay, cool. Well, I think this sounds really interesting. I'm sure you'll get some people reaching out after they hear this episode. How can they find you? How can they reach out if they're a property manager that's interested in hearing more?
[00:20:16] Yeah. So our phone number's on our website, obviously, you can always call us. We'd love to talk to you. Send us an email to info@ourpetpolicy.com. We go to a lot of the state trade shows. We were just at Apartmentalize, so national shows. And so, yeah, we're getting out there, but feel free to just reach out to us at any time as well.
[00:20:37] So it's 'our,' O-U-R petpolicy.com.
[00:20:43] Yep. Yeah, ourpetpolicy.com.
[00:20:45] Perfect. All right, cool. So I recommend you check them out. Sounds interesting. I'll push maybe some clients your way and see what they think. And I appreciate you coming out and hanging out here on the #DoorGrowShow.
[00:20:57] Hey, thanks for the invite, Jason, I've enjoyed being here.
[00:21:00] Awesome. Anyway, Logan, appreciate you coming on the show. So check out ourpetpolicy.com and if you are looking for the best in growing and acquiring more doors and growing your business, check us out at doorgrow.com. We've got some really cool stuff that's coming down the pipeline that we are going to be doing for our clients. And we're really excited about this. So stay tuned. And until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye, everyone.
[00:21:24] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:21:51] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
At DoorGrow, we have some of the savviest property entrepreneurs on the planet in our DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind. Brannon Potts is a property management business owner in North Texas, who joined DoorGrow with only 71 doors. In only 3 months, Brannon was able to grow his business to over 100 doors with 70 more on the way!
Join property management growth expert, Jason Hull, as he interviews Brannon Potts, a DoorGrow client. Brannon shares his experience with DoorGrow and how he has seen it make a beneficial impact on his business.
You’ll Learn…
[01:12] Meet DoorGrow client Brannon Potts
[04:42] Investing in Yourself and Your Business with Coaching
[07:27] What Makes Jason and DoorGrow Different?
[13:09] DoorGrow’s Two Key Ideas…
[20:07] Finding Fulfillment by Growing and Scaling the Business
[22:49] How Brannon used DoorGrow’s Script to Add Doors
[27:08] How You can Grow and Scale Your Business
“We have these moments as coaches where we feel like-- it's similar to as being a dad and seeing your kid get an award or do something.”
“As you've been building your business, it could get uglier and more painful, but we always try to make sure that the client understands that's the wrong way to do it.”
“Good, coaching or good marketing or good anything that you're going to pay for should give you an ROI, right? That means it's a good investment.”
“A lot of people are thinking ‘I'd rather just spend money. I'd rather just spend money because it would save me time,’ That's a cost. That's not an investment.”
[00:00:00] Jason: For those that are on the fence, thinking about DoorGrow maybe they've heard about DoorGrow, what would you say?
[00:00:05] Brannon: You might not like this, but I think it's so good, sometimes I wouldn't want to tell anybody cause it's so good for people.
[00:00:12] Jason: All right. Welcome, DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you're interested in growing in business and life, And you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
[00:00:49] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management, business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.
[00:01:12] And my guest today is one of my clients, Brannon Potts. Brannon, welcome to the show.
[00:01:19] Brannon: Thank you. Thank
[00:01:20] Jason: you.
[00:01:21] So it's good to have you. So Brannon, you're a client that I really enjoy working with. 1. Because you just do what I tell you to do, and it works and you're doing the right things. So I appreciate you as a client because that's always fun for me is to have clients that like, believe in what we're doing, and get it. And do it. You know, starting out, why don't you tell everybody a little bit about how you got into property management in the first place?
[00:01:47] Brannon: Sure. I think it was back-- late 2016. We were actually doing well in our sales business but had a friend give us some advice about getting into property management and you say it, even in the intro: at first, I didn't have just a great perception of property management, but I said, okay, I'm going to get into this business, learn it. I didn't know it very much. I didn't know it really much at all. And we began to grow. And over these years, we just, we grew a little bit and happened to see one of your ads and started investigating and just said, you know what? I want to join this coaching. And I did. I just said, "I really don't know very much about the property management business, and you have a background in coaching this. I'm just going to follow what he says, not question it, and just do it."
[00:02:46] And then I was going to hold your feet to the fire because you promised it and committed that if I did, you would refund my money, and I began to do that and I still have so much more to go because in your coaching, the depth of that coaching that you give, I think I'm only maybe touching on 10% of it right now. And I'm looking forward to actually many years to come of getting deeper and deeper in implementing all the things that you provide in coaching because I've been coached before. I've been actually a coach myself for the sales side. And what we've always been taught is when you teach people, typically only 10% implement what you're teaching. And I said, man, "I don't want to be that 90% that doesn't. I want to be the 10% that does. And let the chips fall where they may and begin doing exactly what you said, trying to follow it as closely as I could."
[00:03:44] And what do you know? It happens. We grow, we have probably at this point, we're either from the initial investment of the coaching-- I bet you we're-- I'm trying to think-- three, four times, maybe five times now the dollars that we're generating from the coaching. So it was a great investment.
[00:04:04] Jason: You mean on a monthly basis?
[00:04:06] On a monthly basis.
[00:04:07] Yeah. So you've got way more residual income than what the program costs. So it's a no-brainer. And that's one of our initial goals with clients. Like we want to get them paid and make sure the program's double paid for within hopefully the first 30 to 60 days is the goal so that they can justify the expense and keep going. And then I guess you could say it's paying you now, to be part of the program.
[00:04:27] Brannon: It's-- I've made money off of this coaching and that's what everybody wants.
[00:04:32] Jason: That's what good, coaching or good marketing or good anything that you're going to pay for should give you an ROI, right? That means it's a good investment. So I'm glad that you're getting a good return on your investment. That's our goal. So you brought up something that I think it's interesting that you've worked with a lot of coaches. I've worked with a lot of coaches too. You know, I think one thing that's a little bit different from me than maybe other coaches in the industry, but there's a lot of coaches out there that don't have coaches. And they don't get coached themselves. And I think that's one of my competitive advantages, which is really simple is that I pay for really expensive coaching and masterminds and high ticket things to be involved in so that I can turn around and have value to give to my clients.
[00:05:16] Like I just came back from a mastermind, I pay a lot of money to be in it, and I shared an idea today with the group that you thought was pretty cool. We were talking about not focusing on referrals instead of referring to them, as in asking for– what did I say? I'll let you say it...
[00:05:32] Brannon: an introduction. And that is an extra benefit is not just taking the wisdom you already have. You're still pouring into yourself so that you have something to pour out.
[00:05:45] Cause I think a lot of people stop getting things poured into them and the great people, great leaders, and great entrepreneurs need something poured into them so that they can pour out to others. We need that relationship to continue. And that's what I appreciate of your coaching. It's your coaching, but you're still getting coached and I'm getting the benefit of your expense of coaching and you're handing extra value to us.
[00:06:14] Jason: Yeah. I'm not even going to say how much I spend on coaching a year right now, but it's a lot, it's a lot. I'm in two really high-ticket masterminds, but for me, I love it because I get to hang out with the best. Like I'm talking business owners that are doing millions and millions of dollars. I was hanging out with people that are doing millions a month in business. Some are hitting a million a month or more. And these are the kind of people I get to hang out with. And I love to be able to learn. It's fun for me. And having a program in which I get to share that stuff. That's just even more fun for me. Cause I love to share what I'm learning. That's just fun for me. So...
[00:06:51] Brannon: As soon as you brought that up, I went out and shared that with my team, the ones that were here at the moment, and then I'm going to share that again on another meeting of not asking for the referral, but asking for the introduction. There's just many layers to that, of how good it is.
[00:07:09] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. And we chatted about that on our group coaching call today. And for those that are not in our group, you're missing out. So Brannon what have you noticed since joining the program? I mean, You talked about some of the concerns you had coming in and some of the challenges you were dealing with, and you mentioned that you've made your money back, you've gotten some results. How does this compare or differ or relate to all the other coaching stuff that you've been involved in the past?
[00:07:34] Brannon: Jason, I don't want you to get a big head, but it has been the best coaching I've had. And I talk about it all the time. I've been through several different coaches, both in the real estate side, and just some life coaches, and the value you bring is multiple layers and genuinely appreciate that, because that's what you teach us is bringing value to people and you do. And I would share this with anyone. This is not a sales pitch. This is true value. You bring on so many different layers and that's why I've shared in the past, and I've shared it even with my wife. I said, "I see myself. I've only scratched the surface of the value you've already brought. And I see this for many years to come that I plan to be a part of this. Cause it's not a cost, it's been an investment," and yes, we're talking about growing doors, but there's many other layers to the coaching of growing the business and how you do that from operations to people who you hire, what their duties are. This was exactly what I was looking for 'cause I did not have that knowledge. Though I've succeeded it at higher levels in a lot of ways in the real estate industry, these were the parts I didn't know. And I feel like I've still got so much more to learn.
[00:09:01] Jason: I really appreciate that. That's-- that means a lot to me. I appreciate it. So for me, it's interesting to me because I've been in this business-- I founded it, and we had some tough times starting this business out and like me building a team I've gone through the entrepreneurial life cycle and journey that I coach clients on. And DoorGrow, our company has made so many changes, even in the last quarter. Like the slew of things that we get done that are on our list for quarterly planning is just amazing to me that we're able to accomplish. DoorGrow's not even the same company it was a year ago. Not even close. And some clients maybe worked with us in the past or knew about us in the past, or maybe we just did a website a long time ago. And DoorGrow is not even close to the same company. Some people are probably hearing you going "operations?" And like "this?" And like "coaching." And they're like, what? And it's funny because people, I think judge me and DoorGrow sometimes by who I was maybe five years ago or two years ago, or even a year ago.
[00:10:06] And my personal development aggression, I guess you could say, or my drive and the level of the team members that I have and the drive of the team and how quickly we're able to make changes and implement is I mean, I'm obviously biased, but I think it's pretty amazing. So yeah. And I think people could give us a chance that haven't been with us for a while. Our new mastermind is just really awesome and I think people are really crushing it, which is really fun to see.
[00:10:32] Brannon: And the connections you make in that coaching group. There's several people that I've made connections with that will be valuable for the future and just collaborating or, "Hey, I'm having this struggle. How have you handled it?" There's just, there's so much value and I agree it's even in-- what is it? Five months now I've been in the program it's changed and added more layers to it. But that's because of your growth. You didn't stay stagnant. You're still growing yourself and have something to pour out.
[00:11:07] Jason: I'd feel guilty if I took even the majority of the credit, like my operator, Sarah, also my fiance, she's moved the needle significantly in this business, Adam, over fulfillment, Ashlee who's over a client success-- like we've got some amazing people on my team and they're moving most of the objectives forward that we have each quarter, and it's been just awesome to see. And that's part of the DoorGrow OS planning system that we've got and that sort of thing. We've got 90 members in the mastermind, so I appreciate that you brought up community cause that's a big focus of ours moving forward this quarter is we're really trying to focus on improving the community aspect. A lot of people joined for the content in DoorGrow Academy and the material that we have and the ideas, and then the people win because of the coaching. But people generally in a program will stay because of the community and the connection and the benefits of having that comradery, 'cause you know, being an entrepreneur can be a lonely journey without being connected to others, so we're really focused on that, improving that, in fact, we've got about 90 members in the mastermind, 90 businesses. We probably have on average about two people per business. So we've got probably about somewhere close to 200 people in the program I think that are actively involved.
[00:12:17] We haven't really grown honestly for the last, maybe two, three months, which is weird, but we've been filtering a lot of people out. We've been really trying to make sure people are active and engaged and shaking the tree, so to speak and some of the people that weren't really engaged or active in our outreach and stuff have dropped off while we've been adding people, but we've cleaned that up. So like the program's really clean. And so I'm really excited about the community aspect because most of the people now are all pretty much engaged. And in at least on one of the calls and doing their check-ins and moving forward. So I think even though the group is still about the same size it's been for a little while, it's a lot mightier, so we're really excited about that. And now that it's cleaned out, now we're going to be adding, I think a lot of people that are going to be staying in the program a lot longer and it'll be, even we're going to be growing for sure. Yeah. So Brannon, what do you feel like are some of the most significant things that you've got out of it so far? Because a lot of people, they hear you probably saying, "Hey, DoorGrow's great. Coaching's great." And you mentioned you're making more money. What are some of the key things that really have stood out to you that you're like, "Hey, like this is different or this is interesting," or that you've really valued?
[00:13:29] Brannon: I think a couple of things. There are multiple layers, so I can talk about this for a while, but the key things initially were: how to lead generate that didn't cost money. And sometimes you hear that and you think, "oh, this is just a sales pitch." It was very genuine, and it was very good. And I implemented that. So the only cost was my time and following through with what the coaching did and that added the doors very quickly. The second was helping design a pricing plan and how to put that together. I implemented one of the plans, the hybrid plan that you discuss and implemented that and began to sell that. And through selling it, I've shared this in our mastermind, how I sell that. And I'm seeing how it resonates with owners and just those two things alone, those two changes that we made alone made money. Those are just the two things initially. And then you offer other things that we're beginning to tap into and
[00:14:40] there's so much there, the content, I can only absorb so much at the moment and I'm trying to fully implement those well, but that also gives me a path for several years to come things that I'll be able to dive deeper into different sections of what all you offer and implement those. So I see a path, but those two things alone were the big key movers, which you steer people to. Doing that lead generation first and then begin some pricing and other things. So those two are the big steps that made it an investment and made us money.
[00:15:17] Jason: Yeah, if any of my competitors are listening and they want to figure out how to steal some of the magic from DoorGrow, we focus on two main things with clients and you can probably feel this. I don't think you've heard me mention this Brannon, but one of our big goals within the first 30 to 60 days is we want to make sure clients have really strong clarity on what the future holds for them, like what direction to go in. So we have our clarity assessments we take you through, so you know clearly which path. We have three different paths we take people down depending on which thing is the biggest problem in the business right now. And we focus on pain first. So we get them clarity on what they want and where the pain is and then results. So we want to get them as quickly and as effortlessly as possible to the results. So we're giving you the scripts, the language, the outreach, like all the different things to do. And you mentioned lead gen without spending money, and I know a lot of people are thinking "I'd rather just spend money. I'd rather just spend money because it would save me time," is what they think. What would you say to that?
[00:16:18] Brannon: Yeah, boy, that's a cost. That's not an investment. This is a deeper level of long-term residual lead generation so that what you teach in the coaching pays dividends, not just now, but in the future, it continues to pay residual dividends and you haven't spent any money on it because the big thing in starting a property management company or starting any company is to generate revenue before expenses and it fit with the principles of that is, is generating that revenue before you have any hard costs, which help you get profitable better and faster, then you can have money to do other things to grow it even faster.
[00:17:04] Jason: Yeah there's several things we focus on with clients. We want to decrease the expenses in the business. So we talk about how a lot of property managers, we mentioned this on today's call, right? Like a lot of property managers... it's not about what they need to do more of, or add more of in the business. It's about some of the things they need to eliminate that they are doing. And then we get into, the lead gen piece. A lot of people mistakenly think that they can generate more leads by doing advertising or paid advertising, but that actually are colder leads that take more time. So we've actually decreased your time investment into lead generation and we've zeroed out the costs.
[00:17:43] Brannon: And usually it's a better quality person--
[00:17:45] Jason: --and it's an absolutely better quality lead, right? The conversion rate's way higher because we're focusing on warmer lead generation. And the other thing that I think is a secret is that you're creating market share while other property managers are fighting over the small amount of existing market share that exists. They're all in the red water. It's ugly and bloody, and there's a lot of scarcity. And I'm guessing you don't really feel much scarcity in growing your property management business?
[00:18:11] Brannon: Not at all. It's doing so well, there's moments we have to just pause for a few minutes to absorb all the new clients coming on board so that we handle them, you know? It's not from lack of business coming in now from this lead gen source, it's making sure that we handle them effectively. And we talk about this in the coaching too, of how to handle the operations when all this business comes and how to handle it effectively and efficiently.
[00:18:38] Jason: That's one of my favorite problems to do is make the growth become so uncomfortable and painful. And then we shift to solving that problem. Everybody wants that problem, but we want to create that problem for our clients that they're having so much growth that it's gotten uncomfortable and they have to start hiring and scaling their systems, so. And then yeah, pricing strategy. We talk about-- like you mentioned the hybrid pricing. Initially, I got the idea from Scott Brady. He's really sharp entrepreneur. And then we've put our own nuance and spin to it to make sure that people do it effectively. So it's psychologically really effective and that's been really really great for our clients that are starting to implement that.
[00:19:16] So, yeah, you're right. There's a lot more in the program. I'm excited for you to get into some of the other stuff and get through it. Because I love seeing clients get all these different pieces dialed in because the speed at which the company moves forward is rapid. Now, a lot of people, a lot of property managers are already burnt out. They're already burnt out in their business. They're not enjoying it, which I would normally say, they're just doing it wrong, but that's, I think also one of the key things that we focus on at DoorGrow is not just building a business that just gets more crazy and more hectic and moves fast, that you enjoy less and less, which is typical. Most get to 200 to 400 doors and they're burnt out. They're micromanaging their team. They hate their day-to-day.
[00:19:56] Brannon: You talk about both growing with quantity, but also growing with quality and creating a quality of life too.
[00:20:05] Jason: Yeah, it's a big deal. So our primary focus is on, I call it the four reasons. I've done a previous podcast episode on that. For those listening, you can go back and listen to that. That's our primary goal is to move people towards the four reasons of more fulfillment, more freedom, more contribution, and more support. And as you've been building your business, it could get uglier and more painful, but we always try to make sure that the client understands that's the wrong way to do it. Like we can get you more support and make it more fun and you do less and less in the business.
[00:20:36] Brannon: I like to learn and listen as it scales, how to scale it, and you share this in the coaching, how to scale it properly so that you don't get burnout. So I'm aware of that and want to make sure that happens not just for me, but y'all also share how to do that for your team too. The positions and the different times to hire and how to do that effectively. So it's not just for the owner, but it's how to create quality for everyone.
[00:21:06] Jason: So you've seen some results in the program. What do you feel like your team's perspective of all this movement and change has been, and maybe even your spouse, like how is this kind of rippling out around you? Is this creating some pain and problems for people around you? Or how did they feel about all this?
[00:21:24] Brannon: Jason, you'll appreciate that I use a lot of your quotes at home. But, when you're hearing good things, you want to share it. So I would say we're growing and I think the team, I know the team is all on board and they're excited about the growth, but as any good growth, there is stretching and you have to go through that stretching process that makes you better, but you've provided several good things that help the team that I'm using to help them get through the stretching with the growth that we're having. And we'll take this problem of growth, as we all remember the great recession and we were begging to be busy. I keep mindful of that, of being grateful that we are and would not take the other side of that of not being busy. I keep that in mind and I encourage the team, and they're encouraged by the growth too. They're very excited. Even our sales team notices it and they're like, "man, maybe I should be on that side of the business." They get really excited about it.
[00:22:25] Jason: What's one thing you feel like you could share maybe with the audience, people that aren't in the program that might benefit them, that is maybe something you learned in the program or, maybe just a mindset shift or a takeaway or something that might be helpful to those that are listening?
[00:22:41] Brannon: Boy. That's there's so many...
[00:22:43] Jason: There are those that are struggling. What feedback or idea would you want to share with them?
[00:22:49] Brannon: I think, you know, looking for referrals from agents that are working in the multi-family or property industry that are selling investments that has helped us quite a bit, but what's been beneficial in the coaching is you've given a great template of a script of how to do it that is genuine, that really flows well and is right in line with building high trust with clients and with agents. That's been the number one benefit of the coaching is not just that idea, but then even giving a practical script that really works. We've been in coaching. We've all been in different programs where we'll see a script that is just not realistic because that person doesn't do it. Your script is genuinely realistic, and it works. I tested it. It worked. I went line by line, even had the script in front of me as I'm going through it, and it really flowed genuine and real and generated referrals that day.
[00:23:58] Jason: That was actually one of those moments. We have these moments as coaches where we feel like-- it's similar to as being a dad and seeing your kid get an award or do something, but one of those moments for me was when you sent me your call recording, and you just followed the script. Because I get a lot of call recordings from clients and they don't follow the script. They either don't feel confident doing it that way, or they say it different or they think they're trying to be cute or clever. And then I'm coaching them like, "stop saying 'um' and stop saying 'kinda' and 'maybe' like show confidence." you just followed the script, and it went so beautifully, and that was just really rewarding to me to be able to hear that and go " yes! It worked." And hear that result like real-time is really cool.
[00:24:43] Brannon: I think I came into the coaching with the mindset and I thought of that 90-10 principle, and I said, "I'm going to be the 10%. Sink or swim, I'm going to be the 10% and I'm just going to follow it" and let it go where it went. But the beauty of it is, it went well. And it would for anyone that followed because we all know as we coach or teach, the ones that just say, "Hey, I'm going to be humble and I'm just going to do what you say, and let's see what happens." it generally works.
[00:25:16] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. I'd love to tell clients like, "Hey, it's proven. If Brannon can do it, anybody else can do it too. Brannon's not any smarter or cooler than anybody else in our program, other than the fact that he does the work and he does what we tell them to do. And that makes you, I think, pretty smart and pretty cool. So I appreciate you, Brannon. So, um, Cool. I, appreciate you coming and taking some time out of your day to be here on the #DoorGrowShow and on the podcast. For those that are. On the fence, thinking about DoorGrow maybe they've heard about DoorGrow, a year ago or five years ago or in the past. What would you say to them now? You're on the other side of the paywall. You see what's going on in the community. What would you say?
[00:25:57] Brannon: Well, You might not like this, but I think it's so good, sometimes I wouldn't want to tell anybody 'cause it's so good for people.
[00:26:06] Jason: I've heard that. I've heard that quite a bit, which is really funny. Like "I want everyone to do it except my competition."
[00:26:12] Brannon: That's it.
[00:26:13] Jason: So which market are you in?
[00:26:16] Brannon: We're in north Texas.
[00:26:17] Jason: All right. So if you're in north Texas, Brannon says, do not do the DoorGrow thing. It's not going to work out for you probably, but everybody else should totally join this program. Does that sound accurate?
[00:26:30] Brannon: North Texas property managers and there's plenty of business for all of us.
[00:26:35] Jason: There is. That's something, I think that we're really big on the program. You're not in the red water feeling scarcity fighting with other property managers. There's 70% are self-managing, there's tons of available potential business out there, and you've been able to tap into that tap and you're getting plenty from it and yeah, there's plenty of business out there. Very cool. Brannon appreciate you being a client. Appreciate you taking time out. And anything you wanna say before we wrap this up?
[00:27:03] Brannon: No, I think I've covered quite a bit myself.
[00:27:05] Jason: All right. Awesome. Thanks, Brannon. All right. So for those that have been listening to this and you're curious or interested in DoorGrow, you can reach out to us. And if you want to test the waters a little bit and get familiar with this, because this may be the first time you've heard about us for some reason, join our Facebook group, go to doorgrowclub.com. Videos like this get pushed into the group. I do live streams multiple times a week now. I'm sharing concepts and ideas. My goal and job is to prove to you that we have some value to offer to you. Once you get beyond the paywall, there's even more. And so join the DoorGrowClub. You can go to doorgrowclub.com to get to our Facebook group. The other thing that I would recommend is just go to doorgrow.com.
[00:27:52] If you're curious and you want to set up a call and talk to my sales team, they will listen to you. I have great people on the team. They really care about our vision of helping property managers. And so if you're struggling with some issues, some challenges, bring it up to them and talk with them and they will help you see if there's a path in which we can help you deal with those challenges, whether it's you're just not enjoying your day to day, you're struggling with your team and with operations, you're struggling to figure out how to add doors and grow your business, you hate your website, you don't like your brand. Like we can help solve these problems for you and they'll help you see how we can do that. And they'll also give you access to our seven frameworks training so you can see seven different growth frameworks and really shift your mindset out of the idea that you need cold leads and you need to do advertising and you need to spend a bunch of money on marketing.
[00:28:41] We'll shift you out of that and help you see why that mindset actually has been hurting your growth and will benefit you and get you moving forward. And that's it for today. So until next time, everybody to our mutual growth. Reach out to DoorGrow, and we'll talk to you soon. Bye, everyone.
[00:28:55] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:29:22] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe.
[00:29:43] Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
If you want to scale your business, you have to let go of controlling everything. How? Plan a vacation. Vacations are ESSENTIAL in owning and running a business. Yes, really.
Property management growth expert Jason Hull and DoorGrow Operator Sarah Hall explain why taking vacations is essential when running a property management business.
You’ll Learn…
[00:38] Where is Jason this Week??
[01:47] Why Should You Take a Vacation as a Property Manager?
[02:53] Schedule Your Vacation in Advance
[04:08] How to Prepare Your Team (p.s. You are Not as Important as You Think
[06:21] Making Sure Your Business is Scalable
“Vacations are essential. You've got to be able to take a vacation and relax, otherwise you'll burn out.”
“If you don't schedule time to make sure that you are healthy mentally and healthy physically and taking time to relax, the whole business will suffer.”
“It forces your team to step up and level up because they can't lean on you anymore. So by taking vacations, it actually improves your team.”
“I realized I'm not as important as I thought I was in my own business. Which is humbling.”
[00:00:00] Sarah: Vacations are essential. You've got to be able to take a vacation and relax, otherwise you'll burn out.
[00:00:05] Jason: All right. Welcome DoorGrow Hackers. So today's going to be a little bit of a different episode. I'm on vacation. And where are we?
[00:00:16] Sarah: Acapulco.
[00:00:17] Jason: Acapulco. So this is going to be a little different episode. I'm doing this from my phone. So hopefully this turns out. You're not going to-- I'm not going to read my manifesto, my normal intro. Just know that if you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to grow your business and you do things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker, so. And, uh, you want to do things differently, alright? That's like the short version.
[00:00:38] All right. So, we're sitting here at the Banyan tree resort in Acapulco, which is like the number one resort. It's really nice. We are by the little pool near the bay here. This is the ocean. And, uh, what are we drinking? We've got the best mojitos that I've ever had. Which really sucks because once we leave here, I will forever feel like all other mojitos are not as good because these are the best ones I've ever had, so we'll have to come back to get a good Mojito I guess, so. They're really good.
[00:01:14] Anyway, what we want to talk about on today's episode is vacations, the importance of vacations. So one of the things I've noticed in dealing with and helping and talking to thousands of property managers is that there's a general lack of taking vacations. And this is one of the things that I coach clients on doing. So I'll let Sarah talk. So I'm here with my fiance, Sarah, who's also the operator at DoorGrow. She's amazing. She's already helped us save hundreds of thousands of dollars and figuring out things and really getting operations dialed in. So why do you think managers should commit to taking vacations? Like I'm in such a state of overwhelm, I'm completely part of the day-to-day operations. I don't have the support that I need. How am I going to take vacations?
[00:02:02] Sarah: So I'm also a property manager and vacations are essential. You've got to be able to take a vacation and relax, otherwise you'll burn out. It'll just keep going, your business. You're always going to have things to do. You're always going to have your endless to-do list and your things that need to get done and you would like to get done and things that you know is gonna happen to move your business forward. So that will never end, ever. So, if you don't schedule time for yourself, then your business will suffer. If you don't schedule time to make sure that you are healthy mentally and healthy physically and taking time to relax, the whole business will suffer. So make sure you take some time for yourself. Plan family time. Plan vacations. Plan little trips.
[00:02:53] Jason: To really make sure we drive this home. I want to point out that just scheduling a vacation. Schedule it out in advance. Give yourself plenty of time to prepare. If you haven't taken one in the last two or three years, do it right now. Sit down with your partner, your spouse, whoever, especially if they're involved in the business with you and say, "let's just schedule it." Because just by scheduling it and setting that intention, you have to figure out how to make it work. Set it out 90 days out. You can pretty much change everything significant related to this in the business in the next 90 days. Schedule a vacation schedule six months out if you feel like there's no possible way you could do this. But schedule the vacation and then do everything you need to do to get ready for it. If you have a team, even better. You can start meeting with your team and say, "Hey, look, I scheduled a vacation. It's in the next 90 days. It's on this date and we need to make sure we are ready for when I'm going to be gone because I'm going to be gone."
[00:03:52] And I want you to be gone during your vacation. Like, "I'm not going to be available. You can't hand me escalations. I can't put out fires for you. I'm not going to be able to take care of problems. Like I'm going to be off grid. You'll need to figure out how to handle this." So if you have any team members at all, then you can do that.
[00:04:08] If you need more time, get at least one one executive assistant, one team member, an operator in your business. And if you need help with that stuff, talk to me, talk to our team at DoorGrow. We can get you in a place where you're ready for that and figure out how to build out a really good hiring system. But if you set that intention, you can figure it out. You can figure out with your team, "what processes do we need for me to be gone for a week? What systems do we need to have in place for me to be gone for a week? Who needs to know how to do what in order for me to be gone for a week?
[00:04:42] And so if you set that intention to do that, what I found was when I finally just started scheduling vacations, a couple of things happened. One, I realized I'm not as important as I thought I was in my own business. Which is humbling. Like my team actually stepped up and could handle stuff without me. And it forces your team to step up and level up because they can't lean on you anymore. So by taking vacations, it actually improves your team. The other thing I noticed was that leading up to the vacation, we got a shit ton of stuff done. Like we got a massive amount of things done: processes documented, things figured out, things changed. All this stuff that was on my plate, I had to start figuring out how to give this up in order to be prepared for it. So we had massive momentum and a massive amount of changes in the weeks leading up to the vacation Because stuff got real, and they knew I wouldn't be available, and everybody started to freak out a little bit including myself. So I started making a lot of changes. So this is an intentional way of forcing yourself to get out of the business, which is what you want. You want to have more freedom, more fulfillment, more contribution, more support. And in order to do that, you need to be able to lean on your team, and by forcing and setting an intention of a vacation, this will allow you to have a vacation. This will allow you to create distance from the business and be able to have a business that can run without you for at least a week. Very few things can really get completely destroyed or damaged in a week, right? You aren't going to lose clients in just one week.
[00:06:10] So set the intention, schedule a vacation, especially if you haven't done it in the last year or two. All right. My phone is saying we're on low power mode, so that means it's time to get back to vacation. So anything else we should add?
[00:06:21] Sarah: Yeah. We also want to make sure you and your business are in a position to scale. If everything is on your plate and you can't offload anything and you can't trust your team and you don't have any processes or any systems or anyone you can rely on you can't scale. You can only handle so much. Every person can only handle so much. So, if you want more out of life and you want more out of your business, and most of us do, you've got to be able to figure out what to do to get yourself out of the business.
[00:06:52] Jason: Yeah, you're not as important as you think you are. Like, that's one of the humbling things us CEOs or entrepreneurs need to realize and learn. And the more you are out of the business and less you're involved in it, and the more you're able to lean on your team, the better the business actually does. And I've heard this repeatedly from multiple business owners and entrepreneurs I've helped over the years that the business and the team are happier and things are better because usually us as entrepreneurs, we're not really good managers. Most of us are visionaries and we're not good operators. So anyway, that's all we're going to do for today here for those that want some FOMO and you can see here what we're hanging out and dealing with here in Acapulco. And until next time to our mutual growth, everybody. Check us out at doorgrow.com.
[00:07:35] We want to help support you and grow you in your business and help you have the business and the life of your dreams. And that's what we at Doorgrow all get a thrill of doing, to support our clients. And we want you to be able to experience more of this. All right, bye everybody. Until next time, to our mutual growth.
[00:07:52] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay per lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:08:19] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe.
[00:08:40] Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
After getting past the pure startup phase, property management entrepreneurs begin to face new challenges. Whether you have 1 door or 50 doors, you probably experience similar problems and fall victim to common mistakes.
Property management growth expert Jason Hull explains the common pitfalls and challenges that “seekers” face in the property management industry.
You’ll Learn…
[01:12] Seekers: the Next Phase of Being a Property Management Entrepreneur
[03:14] Falling Victim to Franchises
[04:34] Learning the Ropes: Product Research Interviews
[07:16] Getting that First 50 Doors
[08:11] Becoming an Expert in Your Field
[11:47] How to Collapse Time and Avoid Wasting Tens of Thousands of Dollars
[12:32] Getting the Right Kind of Leads
“One of the big challenges: you don't know yet what you don't know at this stage.”
“Get educated because the more educated you are, the more of authority you are”
“If you are a decent human being, you will experience imposter syndrome. Every entrepreneur goes through this state.”
“Remember, nobody wants to buy property management from you. What they really want to buy from you is peace of mind or safety and certainty.”
[00:00:00] Remember, nobody wants to buy property management from you. What they really want to buy from you is peace of mind Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow! If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing your business and your life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently than you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships and residual income.
[00:00:48] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses and the business owner. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I am your host property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.
[00:01:12] So on a previous episode, we started talking about this journey that the entrepreneur or the property management entrepreneur business owner goes through. And we started with the pure startup. The zero door crowd. So today we're going to get into the next level. It's barely beyond that. It's like one door beyond that. Like they've actually started. And these, I call seekers. Why? Because they are seeking a lot. They're seeking a lot of knowledge. They don't know a lot. They're trying to figure out like what they need to do. They're trying to get over all sorts of challenges. So when you first start taking action, that's a big leap. It's difficult. So a lot of times these might be-- and if this is you, you're likely a realtor, maybe with a few rental investment properties of your own. Maybe you have a little bit of experience managing properties for yourself, or maybe a little bit for others.
[00:02:14] These seekers are not yet even aware of how painful and tough it can be until they mature into kind of that next level we'll get into in a future episode. They are now wanting to start a property management business, and they are easy prey to making many common mistakes. They fall prey to a lot of potential pitfalls, such as selecting poor branding. Choosing poor branding that costs them a lot of leads, getting a website that doesn't convert and capture leads well, not pricing themselves effectively... like trying to be the cheapest in the market, no strategy for online review gathering and they start quickly earning a negative reputation just from their first few interactions taking on bad clients that costs them 10 times good ones. We talked about the cycle of suck on a previous episode. I recommend you review that if you're in this stage or any stage, really. And so that is a challenge. They're caught in the cycle of suck.
[00:03:14] A lot of times in this seeker stage, they fall prey to expensive franchises. And so, you know, you can check out DoorGrow, and just Google DoorGrow and "property management franchise alternative." and we have a whole page about the potential pitfalls of choosing into a property management franchise and all the limitations that that creates and why it may not be a good fit for almost anyone so. Paying for expensive and ineffective marketing channels, which franchises generally push you towards such as SEO, pay-per-click content marketing, social media marketing, pay per lead services, and you end up getting really poor results. So it's really costly, takes a lot more time, and you get way less results. A lot of times at this stage, they're seeking a broker. Uh, that's an issue with pure startups. A lot of times they're seeking a broker. They're working on getting their brokers license. They may be working underneath the broker instead of having their own brokers license, and they're just seeking a lot of tools and resources and ideas. And there's so many shiny objects, so many pieces of software, so many tools, and a lot of times they go down this rabbit hole of just playing around with all this stuff and not actually taking action and moving forward.
[00:04:34] So. I've seen a lot of clients come to me that were kind of at this level and at this stage, and one of the big challenges: you don't know yet what you don't know at this stage. You haven't learned yet how difficult certain pieces of the business can be. So there's a lot of decisions that need to be made. So one of the things that I teach clients just to throw a bone out is an idea or strategy called product research interviews. And without giving away too much awesome stuff just on our free podcast-- but I want to always give value-- is product research interviews are going to be a great tool for the seeker and for the pure startups to get ideas and to learn what they need to do to please investors. It helps them learn what objections, what challenges. So do some product research interviews. If you are going to create something new, a new product or service. Such as starting a property management business and offering a suite of services for property management, my recommendation is you do some product research interviews because you may not really know. You know maybe what you need as an investor, but you're one limited avenue for information. And so my recommendation is that you talk to at least minimum 20 or 30 investors. And ask them about their concerns, why they haven't used a property manager in the past, if they have, what challenges have they had.
[00:06:06] So you get connected to reality in terms of how the investor thinks, what their mindset is, what challenges they see, what their objections are. Once you've done this with about 20 or 30, you'll probably be almost as savvy as a lot of property managers that have been doing this for at least a handful of years, because they never did that, so they just waited until they had 20 or 30 solid opportunities. And then eventually they actually got wise enough to start asking really healthy questions to get feedback, which might've been, you know, a hundred people in after talking to a lot of investors. So I want to collapse time for you. Start doing some product research interviews. Real simple. Go out to some sort of real estate investor group. Start connecting and meeting people and just say, "Hey, I'm starting a property management business. It looks like you're doing some cool stuff in the industry or that you're an investor. I would love to take you out to lunch, pick your brain. I could really use some feedback on what I was looking at doing and offering to clients." And the secret that we talk about, even in more detail in our program is these are awesome leads. This is a really easy side door to get some leads for your business to get things started.
[00:07:16] So getting that first 50 doors. A seeker, may be like one to 50 doors, right. And this stage you are just learning. You're just learning, like "how should I handle a lease?" And like, "how should I handle contracts?" And like, "how should I like get property management software in place?" And like, you're just focused on some really basic stuff to get the business healthy and going, and you might get caught up on stuff that you don't really need to spend a ton of time on yet. Like if it's just, you, you don't really need to be spending a ton of time documenting processes or worrying about VAs or, you know, some of this kind of stuff. That's probably once you have 50 doors, then it's time to start maybe focusing on "how can I offload a little bit?" "how can I start creating some leverage?" Maybe there's some software and some tools, and then we'll get into that on a subsequent podcast episode.
[00:08:11] So if you are a seeker and you are figuring this stuff out, I mentioned this for the pure startups, but a lot of seekers need to hear this too. Make sure you really learn the laws and the rules in landlord tenant law, and get really connected to the local real estate board and just really be aware of what you can and cannot do or should and should not do in your market. Get educated because the more educated you are, the more of authority you are and the more you're going to kill what every seeker feels, which is imposter syndrome. Seekers have stepped beyond the fantasy and they're in reality and reality is uncomfortable. And the pain you will experience, if you are a decent human being, you will experience imposter syndrome. Every entrepreneur goes through this state. You suck during this stage, you're going to experience a lot of pain and a lot of people avoid the suck. You have to just start sucking to get over it. You have to lean into the suck and you have to be willing to look stupid sometimes and ask dumb questions.
[00:09:16] Cause you're not going to learn otherwise. And you need to be willing to experience that discomfort of imposter syndrome. And figure out how to overcome it, so you don't feel like a fake or phony or are worried whether or not they're going to know whether you know or don't know something. It's okay to admit that you're new. It's okay to admit that you might not know something, but that you will figure it out. You could easily say, "you know what? I don't actually-- I'm not totally clear on that, but that's a great question. Let me do a little bit more research and I will come back to you and let you know what I find out. You know, I have some connections with my lawyer. I have connections with my trade organization. I have connections with some of my investor clients. Let me ask around and find out a really solid answer for you on that."
[00:10:06] You don't have to know everything immediately. They want to know that you can figure out problems and solve problems for them. And you don't have to be the expert on everything, but I want you to become the expert. Like become the expert that they can lean on and trust because that puts you in much higher category in their mind of trust. And they will want to do business with you if they feel safe with you. Remember, nobody wants to buy property management from you. What they really want to buy from you is peace of mind or safety and certainty, as I've talked about before. I talked about on a previous episode, the four reasons for entrepreneurs to start a business. The fifth reason for people in motivation of why they are involved in businesses or that you need to focus on a business. That fifth reason is safety and certainty. And so that's really what people want to buy from you. So make sure you know how to offer safety and certainty to them instead of just offering a bunch of products and services and things about managing their property that will maybe create safety and certainty. Help them become certain in you that you're going to create safety and certainty and they will care a lot less about all the details and features and benefits and trying to micromanage you and trying to ask way too many questions. That's usually a clue they're not feeling safe with you and they are uncomfortable and they don't feel like there's a high level of trust or safety and certainty. And remember, sales and deals happen at the speed of trust. So the faster you can create authentic, real trust, the faster you're going to get results, so.
[00:11:47] If you are a seeker and you're struggling with some of this stuff and you're trying to figure it out and you don't want to make a ton of mistakes and you want to collapse time and you don't want to waste tens of thousands of dollars on marketing and signing contracts with marketing agencies, and you want to get some real solid wins, you want to grow your business without spending a dime on marketing and just investing time, but actually less time than it would take if you got leads through marketing-- which takes more time, by the way, than the warm lead strategies that we focus on at DoorGrow. If you want to spend less time and less money and get more doors more quickly, then reach out. One of my clients-- just had a call with him just the other day-- he's added 300 doors in the last year in working with us, about 300 doors.
[00:12:32] That would be impossible if you were focused on any lead gen channel or advertising channel, you know, if you were doing marketing or paying for SEO or pay-per-click or content marketing or social media marketing or any internet marketing, that would be impossible because those leads would have been colder. He wouldn't have had the time. He wouldn't have had the time to be closing that many deals and that many doors, but when deals come to you hot or warm and you're getting warm leads and referrals, and you've really optimized that sales pipeline for that, you built up really good partner programs and some of the stuff we talked about, this can go really, really fast because. The close rate on warm leads is super high. It's like 80, 90% typically. And the sales cycle time to close them is way shorter, so you're spending way less time selling. So if you want to get this business off the ground, build the right engine from the get-go. And then once it's built like this client, he's just injecting a little bit of fuel into this engine. He doesn't have to invest all the hours that he was putting in, and he was putting in like probably 20, 25 hours a week, I think, into this strategy. It is like a part-time job just to focus on sales and grow the business.
[00:13:45] But now, it just takes a little bit of fuel to keep that engine going now that he has really good connections, really good partners. He's built that. And there's some really easy, low hanging fruit that can get you a lot more doors than any of the really expensive cold lead marketing strategies. Some of them are so obvious, such a no brainer when I point it out to our new clients, they're just, they're just winning. It's just wins. We started doing in our mastermind, a new client call cause we had so many new clients that are in the early stage. And we started doing that on Tuesdays. And a lot of these are in this seeker category.
[00:14:19] They've started the business, but they're in this difficult sort of stage and they have to build the engine. And the call that we just had, the first two calls we did on Tuesdays were just sharing strategies. Right? But this last call yesterday was just wins. It was just really awesome. It was lots of wins. Everyone's sharing wins and they just couldn't believe-- like they're batting a thousand. They're making calls and they're getting zero on some of the calls that they're doing. They're getting no one saying "no" in building up these referral relationships. And I know that sounds crazy and ridiculous, and you probably don't believe me, but join the program and then you'll be like, "oh yeah, that makes sense." and "that is so easy." And "I can't believe, I didn't think of doing that. I would never say no to that either." Right. So, anyway, if you're interested in growing your business, you are a seeker, check us out at doorgrow.com. Schedule a call with my team and let's get you into the DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind.
[00:15:18] And our first goal with all of these seekers is to get them paid. We want to get them making double what the monthly cost of the mastermind is within the first 30 days, so that they're making enough money to justify the expense. Double the cost of the expense. They're making double that. So, and that's not too difficult to do. For most property managers, it's maybe like 10, maybe to 20 doors, depending on how much money they make per door, which later in our program, we will optimize and improve because everybody comes in with bad pricing.
[00:15:50] So, all right. So that's it for today. For those of those seekers out there, keep seeking, and you will find right. This is what the Bible says anyway. So it keeps seeking, you'll find it. And hopefully in your hunt or in your seeking, you find DoorGrow. We would love to help you out. And until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.
[00:16:10] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay per lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:16:37] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe.
[00:16:58] Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
How many times have you considered going into short term rentals as a property manager? Short-term and vacation rentals are enticing, but they can also be an intimidating niche for newcomers.
Today’s guest is Alex Jarbo, short-term rental developer and manager and CEO of Sargon Investments.He is the host of the Youtube Channel called Alex Builds where he teaches the ins and outs of short-term development and management.
You’ll Learn…
[01:08] Starting out in the Short-Term Rental World
[08:04] Useful Tools for Managing Short-Term Rentals
[12:13] Virtual Guidebooks: Providing a Unique Experience to Guests
[15:42] Dealing with Common Issues in Short-Term Rentals
[18:32] Some Extra Tips from Pro Short-Term Rental Manager Alex
[23:06] The Shifts in the Industry Since COVID
[25:34] Where to go to Learn More!
“And anytime I talk to someone they're like, "I don't know where to start investing." I was like, just start in your backyard.”
“It's easier to rent out these unique properties compared to, say, something like a normal condo or something.”
“I like the property to be an experience in itself on top of the city that the people are visiting for the attraction.”
“I talk to a couple of people a week then it's like, is it too late to invest in short term rentals? Like, no. It's not. Invest and manage both.”
[00:00:00] Alex: I talk to a couple of people a week then it's like, is it too late to invest in short term rentals? Like, no, it's not. Invest and manage both.
[00:00:06] Jason: Alright, welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow! If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you're interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships and residual income.
[00:00:44] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses and the business owners. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.
[00:01:08] And today's guest is Alex, Alex Jarbo. Am I saying your last name right?
[00:01:13] Alex: Yup.
[00:01:14] Jason: I did? Okay. I didn't know if it was like a soft, "h" sounding 'j' or something. So Alex, welcome to the show. You have a company called Sargon investments. You do a lot of cool Airbnb stuff. So I'm really excited to have you on as a guest. I think the Airbnb market is of interest to a lot of my clients and a lot of property managers. It's heating up. There's more interest growing. So, maybe to get started: tell us a little bit about your background and how you kind of got into dealing with rental properties.
[00:01:48] Alex: Yeah, absolutely. So I was originally, I served about four and a half years in the Marine Corps. And then I had gotten to a point where I just wanted to branch out and sort of do my own thing outside of the military. So, got out, and then the day I got out of the military, I actually moved down to where I live here in Asheville. Prior to that, I spent a couple months trying to figure out like where I wanted to move. I'm originally from Detroit, Michigan. And I wanted to get into short-term rentals. That was sort of the niche that I had chosen inside real estate. So when I moved here, got my real estate license, helped some people purchase and sell properties, but I saw a lot of people purchasing short term rentals that would just come to me.
[00:02:26] So I decided to purchase my first one or at least start to purchase my first one. And I originally wanted to use my VA loan and purchase like a duplex or a triplex, live in one, and rent the other couple out on Airbnb. But what I realized really quickly was that like it was just very difficult, even back then in 2017 to find good, cash flowing short-term rentals that weren't completely out of my budget at the time. So after maybe like three months of looking and getting outbid a lot, I decided to build my first short-term rental. And on top of a building I decided to take over the, uh, management. So that's where I decided to both start a development company and start a management company. And that one property turned into two, two turned into four that we're developing, and now we're developing 10 and then working on like a boutique resort.
[00:03:13] But yeah, that's the sort of the short of where I'm at now is just focusing on putting together these like boutique resort developments. And then we self manage in house.
[00:03:24] Jason: Awesome. So a lot of property managers listening might think "I would like to be an investor and maybe get some of my own." I know some of my clients dabble a little bit just in their own investments. Even if they manage long-term rentals, they want to get more into AirBNB. So why don't we approach that topic first? Like getting into it, you do some things that are a little bit different than the typical Airbnb investor. And one of which being cabins. So I'm really curious about this idea of: why cabins?
[00:03:59] Alex: So this is prior to COVID. My whole idea was like-- right now we invest in mountain communities, but every market has their own little area. And anytime I talk to someone they're like, "I don't know where to start investing." I was like, just start in your backyard. If you live in a Metro area, like a lot of areas, you're going to be renting out, like say condos, or you're going to be renting out apartments or something just cause you're in a busy metro city. I like to ask them like "where in your city or the market that you live in-- where do people like to take weekend vacations, maybe an hour to two away from you driving wise?
[00:04:29] And that's sort of the market that I recommend people sort of go into. People are fine with driving say like 15- 20 minutes away from like a Metro city up to an hour in some cases. So like a good example of that is like people in New York, like New York city are going to travel maybe two hours. They're used to traveling two hours north to vacation, same thing with, say like in California on the west coast. People in San Diego are pretty used to going up to Big Bear Lake and taking that drive. Land prices are going to be cheaper.
[00:04:59] You can also host some like, not parties, but like bigger-- you can host more people in some of these larger cabins and you have more control on the design and that's sort of the thing we really focus on is focusing on developing unique cabins, whether it be a frames, really nice log cabins... we're, we're dabbling in like tree houses. It's just difficult to find like financing on those right now. The reason we gravitated towards cabins over something like purchasing a condo in a Metro city is we have more control over the design, which just plays into the marketing. It's easier to rent out these unique properties compared to say like something like a normal condo or something where it's a little bit more difficult to differentiate yourself to like the condo next door or something.
[00:05:41] Jason: So it sounds like some of the key things you look at is proximity: like pick an area that's nearby. It needs to be something kind of where people take vacations and then novelty seems to be an aspect to this. Like cabins are a novel thing in the mountain area and making it somehow unique or different or stand out.
[00:05:59] Alex: Yeah, absolutely. And it's like, what I always like to say is: say, if you're not developing the property and you're coming into it, you want something unique about the property. I like the property to be an experience in itself on top of the city that the people are visiting for the attraction. So like, if you're looking at a market that has its attractions, but at the same time, it's like you sort of get rid of the seasonality part of it a little bit when the property itself is an experience in itself,
[00:06:24] Jason: Mmm, yeah, good point. The property kind of needs to be its own event or its own thing. Yeah. Cool. So let's shift gears and talk about property managers that might want to get into this game of targeting people. Like you have a portfolio or a small portfolio of investments that they can maybe get on as clients and what that might look like. And then maybe one of the things I think you're really good at is the technology. And so we could chat maybe a little bit about that.
[00:06:55] Alex: Yeah, for managers who are looking, before this, we were talking about like a lot of long-term managers are sort of starting to dabble in the short-term rental game. It sounds intimidating, but it's not as intimidating as it sounds. There's a lot of technology out there right now, plugins and then also CRMs that make the process pretty seamless. Depending on how many properties you have in the portfolio, you really don't need boots on the ground. It might in terms of like having a property manager in an area. Again, I would focus on one market at a time.
[00:07:25] But you can get away with a part-time maintenance person. The most important part is probably going to be your cleaning crew, and that's going to be up to you. There's pros and cons to either hiring your own, like managing the cleaning in-house or teaming up with a local cleaning crew in the area that can handle the cleaning stuff. Which again, the cleaning is definitely like-- I look at my cleaning crew as almost the manager of the properties themselves, because they're there at least twice a week or at least once a week, depending on what the booking looks like. So they see what needs to be replaced, what's damaged. If anything is damaged, they send me a picture directly, which I send directly to either Airbnb, VRBO, or wherever the property's listed.
[00:08:04] So the technology piece is going to be huge. And it, again, it's all dependent on how big you are. If you have 10 cabins, you can probably get away with, there are messaging plugins where it's like, I would say 80% of your messaging is automated. And then you can hire virtual assistants to sort of take over the other 20% of the messaging where it's like specific questions that are asked or say, if they're calling or something.
[00:08:26] Jason: So the cleaning crew is almost your inspection crew. Like they're doing somewhat of an inspection as well, not just coming in and cleaning. So they're identifying issues, submitting things to your maintenance team or your system for maintenance. And then you need people that are managing that. And then you've got VAs that can help facilitate some of these things happening right?
[00:08:48] Alex: Right.
[00:08:49] Jason: What are some of the actual technological tools that you utilize that help you to systemize the business and make things simple for yourself?
[00:08:58] Alex: The first one is-- and I'll talk about maybe four or five tools here. The first one is going to be a tool and a company called StayFi. And I've talked about this tool so much now that I've recommended it to anyone looking to get into short-term rentals. StayFi is essentially a little disk that plugs in the back of the router. And what that does, is it email captures any guests that's using your internet. That 1. Protects you from if the guest is doing anything illegal on your internet, which might happen. But 2. It captures everyone's email in the cabin.
[00:09:29] So, you're essentially taking digital marketing principles and applying it to brick and mortar business, which is the short-term rental stuff. Which is a little difficult to do, but if you can master that part, you can essentially capture your customers. So StayFi. Imagine like you're walking into a Starbucks, you walk into an airport and you have to enter in your email address to be able to get access to the wifi. It's the same idea here, but it's geared towards short-term rentals.
[00:09:52] So from there we use MailChimp to push out marketing emails, but we push out maybe seasonal emails, like three or four emails a year just saying, "Hey," like "this season's coming up" or "Valentine's day is coming up. Would you like to book with us?"
[00:10:04] Originally, when you're starting off, you can just put your Airbnb link directly in there. But as a manager who wants to build a bigger short-term rental business, you can use this to sort of take people off of Airbnb, VRBO where they book initially with the short-term rental sites, but then you can build a platform on the backend to sort of capture direct bookings where you're not paying both. The guest is not paying the processing fees. And then same thing with the host. You're saving money on that end where you're sort of-- you have more control over the guests, which is what we realized is very important.
[00:10:38] Jason: Yeah. So you're shifting from just traffic that's fed to you by Airbnb and you're taking that traffic so that it doesn't always have to come back through that and creating your own traffic. It's traffic you own now.
[00:10:50] And for those emails that you capture, do you have any, like, even anecdotal data or information on how many rebook at the same property? Is that common?
[00:11:00] Alex: It is pretty common. I don't have exact numbers on that. But we do see a boost in booking say like a couple days after we've pushed the email out. Right now we're still working on building out the backend platform.
[00:11:13] We're just pushing them directly back through Airbnb right now. But like, companies like Airbnb and VRBO have metrics that show like, "Hey, this person has rebooked with you this many times." And then people who are looking to get into more of an advanced system, we use Streamline, or we're going to be using Streamline. vacation, rental software is top of the line where you can syndicate all the top short-term rental sites, and then it sort of syndicates all the messaging too that comes from the different sites. So you have one platform which I really recommend doing. Like, if someone is coming up to a manager and saying, "Hey, I want to take over your property. What can you do for me?" The first thing I recommend is always: are they just on one platform? If they're just on Airbnb, if they're just on VRBO, there's already room for growth there by just putting it on a couple other platforms or putting more eyes on your property.
[00:12:00] Jason: Yeah. Very cool. So Streamline for syndication is one of the things. You mentioned MailChimp for getting emails out periodically do your list or some sort of newsletter. What other tools are you using to kind of simplify the business?
[00:12:13] Alex: Right now, a digital guidebook is very effective. We like to essentially plan-- I sort of stole this idea. My wife and I had a vacation in Taloon beach on a resort. And when we arrived, the resort had practically planned our trip for us, where it's like, "Hey, if you want to do a cave diving trip, this is this. If you want it, this is what your day would look like. If you wanted to go visit the pyramids, this is what your day is going to look like. If you just want a chill day and just want to go visit restaurants, this is what your day could look like."
[00:12:43] So we did the same thing there where we plan maybe three to four days. Like here we have like over a hundred breweries in the city, so we do like a brewery day. We do a hiking day. We do a waterfall chasing day, and it's like all that's in the digital guidebook where you could put links to different things in the digital guidebook. And it's just sent out. The link is sent out with the check-in instructions. Same thing with you can get with local restaurants or local providers and be like, "Hey, can you give me like a 10% discount, and then I'll put it in my digital guide book where the guests can use almost like a QR code where you can just generate a QR code. Yeah.
[00:13:15] Jason: So for the digital guidebook, is this just like a Google document or is this like..?
[00:13:21] Alex: We use a company called Hostfully. And Hostfully is specifically a short-term rental, digital guidebook.
[00:13:28] Jason: Host fully?
[00:13:30] Alex: Yeah, Hostfully. Host and then F U L L Y. Yeah.
[00:13:33] Jason: Okay. Great.
[00:13:34] Alex: Pretty cheap too, man. It's like, I think it's like 15, $20 a month per property.
[00:13:38] Jason: Got it. And so what advantages does Hostfully give you over just throwing it in a Google document, for example?
[00:13:45] Alex: The templates are super easy to use. You can also track like how many people are actually looking at it. I mean, I would say the templates, and then also, Hostfully does have a backend system just like Streamline. So. Streamline I believe it's a minimum of 15 properties if you're just starting off. Hostfully I believe is like $25 a month per property. Where it's the same type of syndication CRM, where it pushes out to the other short-term rental sites. So you can sync those two together.
[00:14:11] Jason: Got it. Yeah. I had a software company on one of my previous episodes. They were showcasing TripAngle. Tripangle.com. And he was talking about how they like reduce all the fees, connected Airbnb and all this stuff. So. Pretty cool. It might be worth listeners checking out that and checking out tripangle.com. I think he had mentioned something about Streamline the last time I talked to this gentleman too. So, some connections.
[00:14:37] Alex: Streamline's a company standard. It's been around before Airbnb. Before VRBO blew up too. People forget like short-term rentals is not a new idea. It's just the access Airbnb has made it so much easier and VRBO too. Short-term rentals have been around for a very long time where people have to pick up a phone and book So like, I mean, people aren't missing the boat on that. I talk to a couple of people a week then it's like, is it too late to invest in short term rentals?
[00:15:04] Like, no, it's not. Invest and manage both. It's continuing to grow, especially with COVID like people sort of stepped away from hotels a little bit, and they're more comfortable driving out a little further out where it's like, would you rather pay an extra $1500 to stay an actual house compared to a hotel? And same thing with like some of the larger properties that we manage. It's like we have families instead of booking, maybe two or three hotel rooms, they're just going to book one house and it almost comes out to be the same price.
[00:15:31] Jason: Nice. Yeah. For large groups it's hard to beat, you know, if you're doing a family reunion or something like that. It's pretty difficult. You're talking a whole bunch of hotel rooms or you get a 10 bedroom house. So,
[00:15:42] Alex: One thing going back to the tools that just came to mind. This has helped us a lot when it comes to-- cause we are in a very strict short-term rental market in terms of like laws and zoning and everything. And one of the things that's helped us a lot. And this can help a lot of the managers who are looking to get into the space is using a company called NoiseAware and stacking that with a company called Party Squasher. And we mainly use NoiseAware compared to Party Squasher. You can combine the two but NoiseAware sort of, it hears-- it doesn't listen to everything. It doesn't listen into conversations, but it monitors the decibel level inside of the property.
[00:16:17] So if the guests are being way too loud or screaming since you get their phone number at booking, even if it's through Airbnb or VRBO, they get an immediate text message "Hey, you're being too loud. Could you please like quiet down?" Or something like that. Maybe a little bit more tactful than that. But that's been a very powerful tool for us and especially approaching the county. It's like the biggest thing neighbors think about is like, oh my God, when they think Airbnb they think like, oh my God, there's gonna be just parties next door all the time. So.
[00:16:44] Jason: Right. Destroy the neighborhood.
[00:16:46] Alex: Right.
[00:16:47] Jason: So, yeah, that's pretty interesting. So they get a text message. Do they reply to this and do you see their messages? Or like, what the hell? You know,
[00:16:55] Alex: But what we do, there's like a whole list of things. So Stayfi, what I mentioned earlier also allows you to see how many devices are connected to the wifi. So.
[00:17:06] Jason: Right, so if there's like a thousand, you know there's some rager going on.
[00:17:09] Alex: Granted, you might have your laptop. Like one guest will have a phone, a laptop, So two, three devices, maybe an iPad too, a tablet. But if like the property sleeps six people and there's 30 people attached to the wifi.
[00:17:21] We also have like an outdoor facing camera just at the driveway too. So say if we do get a say, cause we can set it up to where we get the noise notification as well. So from there, we just look at our cameras and say, oh, okay. There's 50 cars in the parking lot, and this place sleeps six people. And then from there, we can either text "Hey, like you're not supposed to have..." or we can reach out to Airbnb directly. We've never really dealt with that issue, but the systems are in place just to make sure.
[00:17:48] Jason: And it's largely probably the screening process at the outset that you have in place to prevent that. Right. So you mentioned NoiseAware you couple it sometimes with Party Squasher, is that what you said?
[00:17:59] Alex: I personally haven't used it, but some other guests have recommended it to me. I haven't-- I have almost no experience in that, but I've seen it a lot mentioned on different short term rental podcasts and some of the books that I've read too.
[00:18:10] Jason: Okay. Cool.
[00:18:11] Alex: I Don't know what it does on the backend but...
[00:18:13] Jason: Yeah, I don't either. Okay, cool. But it probably prevents parties, which is probably a big concern, like, parties happening, the NoiseAware and the Party Squasher. All right. Cool. Any other tools or systems that you utilize in managing your rentals to make sure things go smoothly.
[00:18:32] Alex: Going back to the cleaning crew just a good line of communication is very important. Making sure that you are choosing a cleaning crew or cleaning company that can grow with you. A lot of the time, you don't want to be teaching your cleaning crew how to clean short-term rentals because what I realized initially, and just with the labor shortage that's happening right now is a lot of people, like my cleaning crew stopped taking on new clients, not new properties, just new clients.
[00:18:58] It's difficult to try to switch the mindset of approaching a cleaner that takes care of properties. Say for just cleaning people's properties like our property manager or our cleaning crew specifically deals in short-term rentals, a company that is used to turning a property two, three times a week if need be.
[00:19:17] Another thing I'd recommend is-- it might affect your bottom line a little bit, but it might outweigh the amount of time that you put on a specific property. Because of COVID, we stopped taking on one day bookings, which we were taking a lot of, one day bookings prior to COVID and that sort of just came out of my cleaning crew couldn't handle the work from the one day bookings, but what I realized is looking back, we've been doing that for four or five months since we stopped taking one day bookings, a lot of our problems, a lot of our questions, a lot of our bandwidth was taken up by one day guests. And I sorta understand it's like a lot of the times they were just coming in at like, say 8, 9, 10 PM. And they have to check in at 10:00 AM the next day. They don't really get to enjoy the property too much. You get those late night texts a lot too, from the one day guests compared to a guest staying 3, 4, 5, sometimes a week with you.
[00:20:10] Sometimes those are the quietest guests where you don't hear anything from them. Maybe a couple of questions here and there. But what I saw was a lot of my issues, a lot of my people requesting refunds or whatever was coming from one day guests. So for people who are already in the short-term rental space, I'd play around to see. And what I also realized too, was like, sometimes that one day guest will book in the center of the week on the Wednesday, which blocks someone from booking that entire week. So if someone's in the short term rental space play around with seeing, maybe just do it with one property and see how the property is affected.
[00:20:42] You might get a better tenant in there which is what we saw a better tenant by booking two, three days minimum compared to a one day. And what I also saw with if you're booking on Airbnb or VRBO, is the algorithm sort of adjusts based off that request of only accepting two or three-day bookings. They'll try to play with your schedule to show it to people who are only trying to book three days and sort of, like for most of our properties are fully booked up with no one day gaps in the schedule right now, after we've switched over from not taking one day bookings.
[00:21:16] Jason: Yeah, that's interesting. I would imagine that would be really effective. Plus if you're able to get two and three day bookings to fill it up for the most part, you probably rather than a bunch of one days, you're probably between a one day and a three day. For example, you probably have similar operational costs.
[00:21:34] Alex: That's been huge. And that's sort of just came that we discovered that by accident. Also, one of my mentors had told me, like we were operating for the first year, we were operating at like a hundred percent occupancy and he's like, "your prices aren't high enough. You shouldn't be at a hundred percent occupancy." And that rings true for any type of real estate asset. It's like, if you're at a hundred percent occupancy or hundred percent booked...
[00:21:53] Jason: yeah. You haven't hit the limit yet on what you could get.
[00:21:55] Alex: Right.
[00:21:56] Jason: If you're at a hundred percent,
[00:21:57] Alex: If it's multi family, self storage, whatever. It's like, if you're at a hundred percent, you got to raise your prices.
[00:22:01] Jason: Yeah what's the occupancy rate you go for now instead of aiming for a hundred percent.
[00:22:07] Alex: So we raised our rates by 30%, if we can stick to the 85%, which is, I mean, if you look at like companies that look at like what to price your property as like rdna.co is probably another good a good tool for the audience that sort of helps you price out what the short-term rental will rent for rdna.co they look at if a property is anything over 75% that's looked at, like you're in a higher percentile compared to anything below that.
[00:22:35] This is getting on the development side when we develop our properties, we underwrite them as long-term rentals. Just in case, if the zoning ever changed in the city, that it's an extra fail safe, it's an exit. That's worst case scenarios. If we have to book it out, has a long-term rental. It can cover the debt service and the expenses. If we need it.
[00:22:54] Jason: Smart. Yeah. I know when COVID hit, the short-term rental game got pretty damaged in the short term, right? And there was a lot of people like trying to shift and shuffle and get their properties into the long-term space.
[00:23:06] Alex: What I saw too is I had talked to someone. I realized that this was different. We use the term vacation rental and short-term rental pretty interchangeably, but sometimes people look at that as differently. If you're looking at the definitions of what I'm about to explain right now, vacation rentals is what I'm in right now. Sometimes short-term rentals can be looked at like 30 day plus stays, but not over six months. During COVID a lot of people were renting out to traveling nurses and they're still doing that is they're renting out to traveling nurses. Say you're not in a market where you have all these properties. You might be close to a very large hospital.
[00:23:40] If you're close to a large hospital, you can go. There are short-term rental sites that are specifically geared towards nurses. And that's a lot of hosts sort of pivoted towards that during, when they weren't allowed to do short-term rentals. But the 30 day plus stay is a gray area. Almost all cities and counties cannot regulate short-term rentals for 30 days plus which is interesting. A lot of people are making good money just on that route.
[00:24:06] Jason: Yeah. I've talked to some property managers. One property manager mentioned that they do a lot of that extended stay it's in the short term sort of space, but they get a lot of people from overseas that are coming over that need a place to stay in the interim or they're coming for some sort of work thing, you know, they might be maybe from India coming to work for a tech firm or some of these things, and they need an extended place to stay for a few months while they're doing some sort of training, you know, things like that. And so, yeah, that can be a very profitable business. They're getting a lot more money than the standard rate on a property.
[00:24:43] Alex: And you had mentioned COVID. It'll be interesting to-- I've seen different projections on like once international travel really starts to pick up again. Prices or occupancy might drop, but it's going to be interesting to see, every market's going to be different, how that plays out because a lot of people did start using. They picked up Airbnb and VRBO during COVID where it's like, instead of staying in a hotel, they decided to book through Airbnb and VRBO for the first time. So it'd be interesting to see if those people, if the occupancy and the rates sort of stay the same once, international travel picks back up.
[00:25:16] Jason: Yeah, that will be interesting. Well, cool. This has been really insightful and I'm sure those that are kind of dabbling or just getting into the short-term rental game will have picked up some cool ideas and some cool tips. Anything else that you think they might be interested in or that we could point out to property managers?
[00:25:34] Alex: Yeah. I talk a lot about this stuff on my YouTube channel too. Alex Builds it's a little logo of a blue tree house. If they want to sort of dive deeper into the management side of it and the tool side they can check that out. And then also my website, Sargoninvestments.com they can, if they can't find that YouTube channel, they could find it through there too.
[00:25:51] Jason: Awesome. Cool, Alex, I appreciate you coming on the show and thanks for sharing so many of your knowledge and insights, and I wish you continued success in your short-term game.
[00:26:03] Alex: Perfect. Thanks, Jason.
[00:26:04] Jason: You bet. All right. Cool. Check him out on YouTube. He's got a cool little YouTube channel you know, going over investments short-term rentals. He talks about some cool ideas. Lending loans like how to play the game of short-term rentals. So check him out on YouTube. And for those that are interested in growing their property management business, be sure to check us out at doorgrow.com we're here to support you and your growth. We're especially really good at helping you not just add a bunch of doors without spending a bunch of money on marketing.
[00:26:34] And we are helping. We have short-term rental clients, you know, in our program. Long-term rental clients are our most common target audience that we're helping build out their portfolio. But we also are helping on the operational side to be able to streamline the business and to become the entrepreneur that can run and have a team that makes your life easier so that you have more freedom, more fulfillment, more contribution, which means you're making a difference and doing things you really feel good about, and more support. And so if you feel like you're kind of scarce on those things, I call those the four reasons and you're really frustrated and you're banging your head against the wall with your team, then reach out. We can support you and help you in that.
[00:27:17] You might be a really good candidate for our DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind which is really awesome. So anyway, check this out. And for those that are listening to this on iTunes or on YouTube, be sure to also join our free Facebook community, which you can get to by going to doorgrowclub.com and until next time to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.
[00:27:42] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay per lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:28:09] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe.
[00:28:30] Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
At DoorGrow, we love highlighting client success and wins. The Schmitts are a great example of clients who put in the work and get the results. Since joining the program, they have DOUBLED their PM portfolio!
In this episode, property management growth expert Jason Hull interviews Jon and Sonia Schmitt from True Patriot Property Management in Florida and gains their valuable perspective on adding doors, growing a PM business, and being a part of the DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind.
You’ll Learn…
[01:06] Today’s Guests: Jon and Sonia Schmitt of True Patriot
[02:30] Discovering and Getting Started with DoorGrow
[04:39] The Results and Major Lessons: What Has Changed Since DoorGrow?
[07:28] Your Personal and Business ‘Why’
[12:29] Finding Clarity in Your Business
[14:17] What’s Next for the Schmitts?
[22:04] Where Would Jon and Sonia be Without DoorGrow?
[026:55] Wrapping up: How to Grow Your PM Business like Jon and Sonia
“The business exists to serve you.”
“Everything has to start with the sales and going after the right clientele that we want in our niche.”
“I find entrepreneurs, we have two speeds. We feel stuck or we feel like we're in momentum, and in momentum feels like life to us.”
“If you don't have the business of your dreams and the team of your dreams yet, you're not the person that can run it yet.”
[00:00:00] Jon Schmitt: You definitely changed me. You definitely did. Thinking, my focus, everything. I mean the name, just everything.
[00:00:07] Jason Hull: All right. Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others impact lives, and you are interested in growing your business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker.
[00:00:27] DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
[00:00:46] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow.
[00:01:06] Now, let's get into the show. And today's guests, I have two guests here today hanging out with me and it's the Schmitts, right? So I've got Jon and Sonia Schmitt, and they are clients in our mastermind program. And why don't I let you two kind of introduce yourself?
[00:01:27] Jon Schmitt: I'm Jon.
[00:01:30] Sonia Schmitt: I'm Sonia.
[00:01:31] Jason Hull: Awesome. So why don't you give people a little bit of background on yourselves, like getting into property management and what you've got going on currently.
[00:01:39] Jon Schmitt: All right. Well, getting into property management, you know, just all started when I started buying properties back, you know, 28 years ago. Just driving around in a station wagon with my lawn mower, cutting grass, that kind of stuff.
[00:01:52] And then, uh, you know, became a real estate agent a couple of years later started managing properties for some other out-of-state people 'cause the company I worked for allowed that. And I figured, you know, it's income without having to do any deals. So struggling to be a real estate agent, property management was a paycheck every single month. So that's how I got started. And then Sonia, she has been a landlord as well from way back. And once we met, I already had an established business, which was dwindling away. Then she came on board, and we kind of held steady and we weren't growing, and then here we are with you. So that's pretty much our background.
[00:02:39] Jason Hull: How'd you hear about DoorGrow?
[00:02:41] Jon Schmitt: I seen you on Facebook.
[00:02:43] Jason Hull: Okay. And so you saw some Facebook and then... what's that?
[00:02:47] Sonia Schmitt: I was saying, I think he seen you on Facebook for a long period of time.
[00:02:51] Jon Schmitt: I was stalking you.
[00:02:52] Sonia Schmitt: He was a stalker.
[00:02:54] Jason Hull: Yeah. Okay, cool. I like stalkers 'cause they're like nurturing themselves over time. And then when they come to us, they're really excited. I mean, you're not just going to sign up right away, right? So you saw us on Facebook, and how many doors did you have at the time you decided to start with us and what challenges were you dealing with then?
[00:03:14] Jon Schmitt: I think we had about, um, forty or so. Most of our business was from foreclosures, from homeowners associations, and condo associations. I made a contact with a couple of attorneys and they were just throwing it at me and throwing out the owners that weren't paying their fees, getting foreclosed on.
[00:03:35] And then I was turning the properties around, getting them rented and collecting rents and doing the maintenance because the homeowners associations and their managers, their management companies, are not landlords. So, I established myself as a landlord. So that's what they needed. And I exploded from there.
[00:03:54] But then when the banks were taking over and I was losing business, right at that time, Sonia came into the picture. We kind of stabilized, but then we needed to grow. And I said, "Hey, Sonia, look at this guy on Facebook." and here we are today.
[00:04:10] Jason Hull: What'd you think Sonia, like, who is this cat?
[00:04:13] Sonia Schmitt: Oh, I thought you were phenomenal from the-- from the moment-- from the moment I heard you first speak and I was intrigued and excited. You brought excitement back and direction.
[00:04:27] Jon Schmitt: I should leave you two alone.
[00:04:29] Sonia Schmitt: He's a card. He's always a card. You never know what's going to come out of his mouth.
[00:04:39] Jason Hull: So we love having Jon on the calls because Jon is so funny. Like you just, you say the funniest things. So John, Sonia, you started at that level of doors and you had some challenges. What's changed? Like what's been happening in the business since then?
[00:04:56] Jon Schmitt: Well, since we hooked up with you, you totally changed our direction. You change the way we think. You're changing the way we operate. You've changed our brand. We kind of did that immediately. I mean, you really pointed out a lot of my own personal flaws, which, you said one thing where I was beside myself. You called me low value. I couldn't believe it.
[00:05:23] Jason Hull: Did I call you low value?
[00:05:24] Jon Schmitt: You called me low value! Hence the TalkRoute. And now I don't like it, but I'm going to go back to low value, but I'll figure that out at a later time.
[00:05:33] Jason Hull: I don't, I don't know that I called you low value. I want you to be high-value.
[00:05:38] Jon Schmitt: And I want to be that. And when you did my son, Alex was laughing, and he keeps teasing me. He's like, "You're low value." And you'll love that.
[00:05:49] Jason Hull: You tell him to watch it. You tell him to watch it.
[00:05:51] Jon Schmitt: Oh yeah.
[00:05:52] Jason Hull: He needs to respect his elders.
[00:05:55] Jon Schmitt: You've changed our direction. You really made an impact and changed our direction, and it seems to be working. We have to do the work. You have the ideas. You tell us the ideas, we do the work, and we're starting to get results. Hence, Alex landed a deal through a realtor. And the lady went with our premium services. And that was Alex. He's very proud of himself.
[00:06:16] Sonia Schmitt: Yeah.
[00:06:17] Jason Hull: Awesome. Yeah. We revamped your pricing.
[00:06:20] Jon Schmitt: Yes, yes.
[00:06:22] Jason Hull: Right. So you're making on average more money per deal. You have more offerings that are a better fit for different types of clients.
[00:06:31] So how many doors are you at right now?
[00:06:33] Jon Schmitt: What do we have? Like 80?
[00:06:35] Sonia Schmitt: 79.
[00:06:36] Jon Schmitt: 79 doors.
[00:06:39] Jason Hull: Yeah. I mean we're getting close to doubling, right? What- what'd you start with? What'd you say?
[00:06:45] Jon Schmitt: Like 40.
[00:06:46] Jason Hull: I mean, we're just right there.
[00:06:48] Jon Schmitt: Right. When we met you, we kicked a couple of sisters to the curb. You know, we were talking about firing them and then after talking to you, we said, "You know what?" Sonia said, "We're done." Fired. They were a little pissed off, you know, when we gave him 30 days notice and they couldn't believe it, but we needed to do it. And it was probably-- yeah, it was like almost 20 doors. So we took a hit, but we were okay with the hit. We're better now.
[00:07:15] Jason Hull: Yeah. So you had 40. I told you to get rid of 20. So you were at 20 and now you're at 79. You're almost at 80.
[00:07:26] Jon Schmitt: Right.
[00:07:28] Jason Hull: And so that's incredible. So that's awesome. What do you feel like for those that haven't been in the program, what do you feel like is the most significant thing that you've been getting out of this?
[00:07:40] Sonia Schmitt: Oh, I mean, for me and Jon handles most of the sales as of right now, but for me it was developing your 'why.' Why are you doing this? It's the weekly meetings that we have. We get ideas from you. We get ideas from other property managers that are located throughout the United States on things that are working, things that are not working. And it's the focus. I think, you know, you talked about the "5 currencies" and focus. And I think the focus has-- it's now laser sharp versus before it was very dull. Okay. So now we have focus. We're a little bit scattered because we're trying to do multiple different things, but we're laser focused in on the how and the why.
[00:08:37] And I also think accountability. Conversations. Where are you at? Tell me what you're struggling with. You know, what, what is your direction? I think that you come up with innovative ideas, which I think that is at the top of the game of different things that are gonna make us be able to succeed, make more money in collapsed time. And that's the one thing that I am working on is collapsing time so I can be more effective, more efficient. And I think with Jon, just-- gosh, it's the motivation behind it all. And like I said, being laser focused on what you're going after, why you're going after it. And you know, Alex and I went to a property and it's like, 'oh, I'm not sure. I'm not sure.' And I ended up and I liked it, but when I first seen him and I met him kind of like the location, and I didn't know what the inside looked like I just looked at him and I said, "I don't know if I'm going to take this or not." I said, "just be prepared," you know? But again, we don't want all properties. We want to know and go after our client health. And we want that to be narrowed in and focused on, which is going to give us the most bang for our buck.
[00:09:57] Jason Hull: Yeah. Yeah. Some of the stuff for people that are not in the program might sound a little fluffy and woo woo, right? Like "we figured out our 'why,' and like collapsing time... and you know, people in the program, they get it. So what would you say to those people that are not in this? Like, how has figuring out what your motivation or your 'why?' How has that shifted what happens in the business?
[00:10:21] Sonia Schmitt: We're just not going for anybody any longer. We're not taking on clients because those clients end up taking a lot of our time. You know, you don't want a homeowner, right? Or a landlord. You want a specific landlord within a certain location that takes care of their properties that cares about their tenants. So it becomes more focused. So, you know, and you then can drive your business with more focus in that direction.
[00:10:51] Jason Hull: Yeah. So you've got a lot more clarity on the avatar that you're kind of targeting and going after now. And so, surprise, you're getting more of that type of person as a client, right?
[00:11:02] Sonia Schmitt: Yes. Yes.
[00:11:04] Jason Hull: And really at the core, for those that are watching or listening to this now or later, understanding the 'why' may sound like fluffy sort of weird stuff, but understanding why you started as a business and the motivation behind it and what type of clients you want to be working with.
[00:11:21] I mean, the business exists to serve you. And I'm sure that it's starting to feel a bit more like that, like that instead of you serving the business, which doesn't feel very fun, now you're starting to shift into "the business is serving us and our needs and desires." Does that sound accurate?
[00:11:40] Sonia Schmitt: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:11:42] I think we were very scattered before all over the place. Now we are focused in on-- we have different buckets that we're going after. And we may not have everything checked off, but it brings clarity with the mastermind group of what needs to be done first. It's kind of like, yeah, I may handle the operations and the accounting, but without the sales, there is no operations or accounting. There is no maintenance. There is none of that. Everything has to start with the sales and going after the right clientele that we want in our niche.
[00:12:20] Jason Hull: Now I'm sure. Before you signed up, there was no shortage of a to-do list of things you felt needed to be done in the business, right?
[00:12:28] Jon Schmitt: Right.
[00:12:29] Jason Hull: I mean, every business we have endless to do lists. It's like a "to-die" list for us as entrepreneurs. So coming into the program, it sounds like just really helped you get clarity. And we talk about this a lot in the program, like really focusing on where's the biggest pain first and assessing things. I talk about going through the core functions of the business and figuring out which things are the weakest. Did you realize going through some of this and coming into the program, that you were focusing too much on some things that were already working well, and then maybe shifting to things that needed more attention?
[00:13:05] Jon Schmitt: Yeah, we were all over the board. Okay. We still are a little bit. But the things that need attention is new business at this point. The accounting is functioning good, bookkeeping's spot on, the maintenance? We're okay with that. You know, it's the sales. So I had a couple people that were referring me business, but you know, that kind of has gone away.
[00:13:29] Not that they don't like us anymore. They just won't throw us business. However, the type of business we had, the foreclosures, have dried up. So now we're just laser focused on the real estate agents, some other attorneys, CPAs, and insurance brokers. Alex and I are doing calls, you know, I have my calendar blocked from 9:00 to like 11:00-11:30. That's all I'm doing. Okay. And we do it nonstop one call after another. Some calls last 10 minutes, some calls last 30 seconds. So I want to try to make at least 30 calls a day. And Alex also, and that's our focus first thing in the morning. And then I'll take care of maintenance and everything like that afterwards, as it needs to happen.
[00:14:17] Jason Hull: Yeah. Awesome. So what are you excited about in the future? Because you're in a state of momentum. You can see the things are positively changing and shifting in the business. I mean a lot of property managers right now are losing more doors than they're getting on. They're like going down because the sell off that's happening in the marketplace. The market's generally hot throughout the U.S. Lots of investors are getting out and I'm sure you felt some of that as well. I doubt your market's immune to that totally. Correct me if I'm wrong. But you're growing and outpacing that attrition that's naturally happening with growth. So what would you say to those that are like thinking about working with DoorGrow? Because I'm sure a lot of people see my social media. They see the things that we put out and they think, 'yeah, who is this guy? Like this-- another guru out there who's trying to get money from people.' So what's your perception of me since you're on the inside, behind the paywall and we've had one-on-one conversations and you've been on our group things and you've been into the material. What's your perception of me, my motivation, and DoorGrow and the team? I'm curious. And you can be as honest as possible.
[00:15:32] Jon Schmitt: Oh, I'll be honest. I think you're a very interesting guy. Me personally, I'm not a woowoo type guy, but she's a woowoo girl and her friends are all woowoo. Um, you know, I think you're very interesting. You're very creative. And just your techniques that you pitched to us and your ideas and your way of doing things, I think it's spot on. I think that you know, people that aren't doing it the way you say to do it, it's kind of like they're old school and you know what? We're into like a new era, a new way of doing things. And you have to change with the times. If you don't change, you're going to die.
[00:16:12] The way we used to do it, you know, I would cold call landlords, I would send out mass fly postcards and stuff like that. I mean, I tell you I'd send out 10,000. It'd be 10,000, we'd get one call. Okay. You see what I'm saying? I mean, that's just like an old school way of doing it. And before we hooked up with you, I mean, I was printing out tax records of all out of state owners and just looking them up, calling them up, "Hey, Jason, you know, I see you've got these two duplexes over here. How's your management work and start talking to him and you'd get 'click.' Right? So I'm getting away from that, so people that are not in your group, I'm sure they're just old school and the ones that are losing business, aren't keeping up with the pace and the times and changing their ways.
[00:17:00] Sonia Schmitt: Hmm. I think you're very authentic. And I think that you have a lot of direction in many years of helping property managers throughout the United States. And I think what DoorGrow does is it brings focus whereas we could be all over the board trying to get new clientele from single family homes to quad quadplexes, triplexes, for sale by owners, property managers, people are getting rentals. You know, you'd go after the rentals and after all of that. But the nice thing is, is you establish relationships and trust with real estate agents. You have a big focus with that, right? Because that's your honey hole. I love that word. But anyways I think that having focus and going after certain groups. Real estate agents, CPAs... and you can take it out further and further. I mean, in Palm beach county alone, and in Florida, I believe we have the second largest or third largest real estate realtors associations.
[00:18:13] So I think that you're cutting edge. You stay on top of things. You're trying new things out. What works. You've tried it. Either you like it, you don't like it. If you'd like it, you pass it onto the group and then other people explore. So I think that adds a lot of value.
[00:18:33] Jason Hull: Cool. Yeah. I'm just wired that I love to learn and I love sharing good ideas that I learn. And I guess that kind of just is what we do. Well, I really appreciate both of you being the program. Oh, I wanted to touch on your son, Alex. So as part, like in this journey, in working with you at some point, you're like, "Hey, let's bring our son in on this."
[00:18:55] And by son, you know, some people might think it's some little kid. He's an adult, but he's come into the business and it's been rewarding for me to see him come in and be learning and stepping into new roles and doing things and getting success too. He shared a win on the call today.
[00:19:12] Now, Jon. Jon was chiming in from the background, making sure he said some of the right things being dad.
[00:19:19] Jon Schmitt: We received these doors this week from a realtor referral. So I was saying to him, "Alex, tell 'em--
[00:19:28] Jason Hull: Give credit!
[00:19:28] Jon Schmitt: Got them from where? And then he yells at me and says, "they're not realtors." I'm like, I'm not meaning what they are. I'm meaning how you got the doors, right? So he brought one in. The lady signed up for premium. And then I brought the other one in that Sonia and Alex closed the guy. Okay. I met him through another realtor referral. And then the other appointment that I was on, I was on actually two appointments that day.
[00:19:56] And they came off of people searching us and liking the new name.
[00:20:03] Sonia Schmitt: Rebranding
[00:20:04] Jon Schmitt: Right, they loved it, you know, the way we were branded. So that's why they called us.
[00:20:09] Jason Hull: Yeah. We've made a lot of changes in your business already. So in the fruit of all of those changes is going to start to really start to show up. You're just at the beginning of all of this, like the rebrand, the pricing, like all this. And as you build that brand in your market, and as you build that clout up, I'm really excited to see what you guys do. I mean, over the next year, I think you guys are going to be crushing it because once you really get into a groove with this... I mean, the sky's the limit. With the growth you've had, you could easily be adding a hundred to 200 doors a year, I would imagine.
[00:20:39] Jon Schmitt: You know, if we stay consistent, and that's what's going to happen, there's no other way to go. If we stay consistent, what we're doing and just keep doing what we're doing. I see that as well.
[00:20:50] Jason Hull: Does that sound crazy to you? Like if Jon pre-DoorGrow could listen to Jon now say that, would that sound a little crazy to that guy?
[00:21:00] Jon Schmitt: Yes.
[00:21:01] Jason Hull: Like impossible? Like there's no fricking way, you know?
[00:21:05] Jon Schmitt: You definitely changed me. You definitely did. Thinking, my focus, everything. I mean the name, just everything. Calendly the TalkRoute, which I'm getting rid of. I don't like it.
[00:21:16] Jason Hull: You don't like TalkRoute. Alright.
[00:21:20] Jon Schmitt: We'll find something that works for us.
[00:21:22] Jason Hull: Yeah. Right, right. I mean, you're old school sometimes. Right. So maybe just get a second phone. Right. Just get another phone, like the private phone and the public phone. Right? I don't know, but yeah. Yeah. So, well, it's been really great having you in the program, excited to see what you guys accomplish. Anything else you think people should know about door grow or about y'all before we wrap this up?
[00:21:49] Jon Schmitt: You're definitely a good coach. And we're happy with you and, um, we're looking forward to hearing about the invitation to the in-person meeting.
[00:21:58] Jason Hull: Ooh. Yeah.
[00:21:59] Jon Schmitt: We're looking forward to coming over to Texas.
[00:22:02] Jason Hull: Yeah? Alright. That'll be cool.
[00:22:04] Sonia Schmitt: We wouldn't be where we are today, if it wasn't for you and if it wasn't for DoorGrow. That I can tell you and our business is growing exponentially and we're very appreciative and grateful to be a part of your team.
[00:22:21] Jason Hull: Well, I appreciate that. Where do you think you would be? Where do you think things would be right now?
[00:22:27] Jon Schmitt: We would probably be-- we have a lot of investment properties of our own, so we would just be going off of that. And we would do some real estate sales and we would just, we'd probably get business here and there and we'd still be just old school, throwing out some mails every quarter. And you know, that's probably what we'd be doing.
[00:22:47] Jason Hull: I mean, that doesn't sound so bad. So on the personal side, what do you feel like has kind of changed like in your life? ' Cause I mean, really there's a reason behind this business, right? It's so you can have the life you want.
[00:22:59] Jon Schmitt: Right. My life basically changed. I've got new fire in me. I feel like I just came into the business again. So, you know, when you have something new? You're very excited about it. So I'm very excited every single day to see what I'm going to make happen. Okay. Sometimes the day before follows into the next day, but there's always something new now popping up. So that has been created again. It's like, I'm just, you know, the second week in.
[00:23:30] Jason Hull: Yeah. So you feel alive again. You know, I find entrepreneurs, we have two speeds. We feel stuck or we feel like we're in momentum, and in momentum feels like life to us. We're not so worried about whether we're happy or sad. That's everybody else on the planet, but for us as entrepreneurs, it's like, "am I in momentum? Do I feel alive and on fire and inspired? Or do I feel stuck or frustrated?" So Sonia, what's it been like seeing the shift in Jon, like with this?
[00:23:58] Sonia Schmitt: It's beautiful. It's absolutely beautiful. I'll tell ya, you know, for couple of years. I think that he was burned out at work, tired. It was pretty much on my shoulders. And, um, you have made a difference in his life and like you said, he has a new spark. He has direction. He knows what he's going to do. And he has his plan. He's scheduled. There's a little bit of everything that you've spoken about and taught that he has implemented into his daily routine. And you can see a difference.
[00:24:37] He would say that he called people before, he didn't call nobody. You know, he didn't make connections if they call him that's great. He'd take it, but he was just kinda, I think he was burnt out. And you brought the spark back and we see the momentum, we see it making the bottom line difference in our lives, and we're able to expand, looking to hire somebody. So it's been a positive all around.
[00:25:04] Jason Hull: You know, property management can be a grind. It can be really hard. I mean I've never done it. Right. But, the feedback I've heard from hundreds, thousands of property managers is that this is not an easy business. It can be really difficult. It's as difficult as you allow it to be. Right. And business in general is hard. Running a business is hard. Entrepreneurs are under no illusion-- if they've run a business for even a year that it's not an easy thing. So I think every entrepreneur has gotten to that point.
[00:25:35] I know I have where I'm burnt out. I'm done. I wake up and I'm like, basically "fuck it." I'm watching Netflix today. Like, that's all I'm doing. Like, I don't want to do it. Like I've had those moments and I feel like I'm living a dream right now that I get to do what I get to do, because it's in alignment with my 'why.' and that's what I want for all of my clients. I want them to have that clarity because we're all unique, and we all have a different purpose in life and a different thing we really want that gives us the maximum level of the four reasons as I've talked about on a previous episode of fulfillment, freedom, contribution, and support, and that's different for everybody.
[00:26:13] And I get to experience that in my business and in my day-to-day. And I want all my clients to experience that because I also want their team members to experience that. And ultimately you're helping your clients to experience a taste of that as well. And so I think the ripple effect that I get to have through amazing clients, like you is really inspiring to me and it really motivates me to keep going. And just having clients that do what I tell them to do and get results is like super rewarding to me. So, you know I appreciate that greatly so. Well, I appreciate you being here on the #DoorGrowShow and I'm excited to see your continued success.
[00:26:52] Jon Schmitt: Thanks, Jason.
[00:26:53] Sonia Schmitt: Thank you very much.
[00:26:55] Jason Hull: All right. So we'll go ahead and wrap up this episode. I really appreciate them taking some time out of the day to come help me plug DoorGrow so to speak. But I wanted to just share if you are property management entrepreneur that is struggling to either add doors or maybe you have hundreds of doors, but you're really struggling to dial in the operations piece. You're just banging your head against the wall. Why can't my team members just think for themselves? Why do I have to micromanage them? Why can't they just do what I need them to do? The hard truth is you are not yet the entrepreneur that can run the business of your dreams, right? If you don't have the business of your dreams and the team of your dreams yet, you're not the person that can run it yet.
[00:27:34] That's what one of my mentors said to me once, and that hit me hard. And so I want to turn you into the entrepreneur that can have the business of his or her dreams and can grow it and can have that fire and have that excitement in your day to day, because you are aligned with the things you really enjoy doing. And you have direction on how to get what you really want to be doing. And you're not stuck because being stuck sucks for entrepreneurs. It's really uncomfortable. It's frustrating. So if that sounds interesting to you, that you're dealing with-- maybe your business it isn't in alignment, which is like branding is off and maybe your pricing isn't optimized and your website isn't optimized, or maybe you're just not getting the growth that you want.
[00:28:20] And you want to know how to add doors without having to spend any money on advertising or doing SEO or pay-per-click or content marketing or social media marketing. And you could still outpace all the companies that are spending tons of money to do all of this. Or you want to just scale your operations, get out of the day-to-day, have more energy, more fun, more focus, more freedom, and figure out how to get a team that really supports you.
[00:28:48] I want to help you build that business and I want to help you become the entrepreneur that can have that business. So reach out to us. You can find us at doorgrow.com, and until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.
[00:29:00] Jason: You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC pay per lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:29:27] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe.
[00:29:48] Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have your own kid work with you in your business? Here at DoorGrow, one of our team members is the founder/CEO’s daughter!
Property management growth expert Jason Hull interviews his own daughter AND team member, Madi Sleight. Madi gives a unique perspective on Jason, DoorGrow, social media, and more. If you ever wondered what Jason is really like personally, this episode is for you.
You’ll Learn…
[01:15] Meet today’s guest: Madilyn Sleight with DoorGrow
[05:16] What does Jason even do? Madi’s perspective as a kid and as Jason’s daughter.
[07:45] Joining the team at DoorGrow and Madi’s role on the team.
[05:16] What does Jason even do? Madi’s perspective as a kid and as Jason’s daughter.
[17:45] The program is not a miracle cure… then who is the program for?
[22:15] Jason’s personality according to his daughter and how Jason’s “out there” beliefs benefit the DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind
[27:40] What’s next for Madi?
[32:01] More about Madi and her relationship with her dad
[38:25] Madi learned to mimic Jason’s voice on socials + how she does social media
“I love those clients. I love the ones that just show up to everything and they do everything that we say and they just get the best results.”
“For me, it's super rewarding to see clients winning and succeeding. Like it's worth more than money and getting paid to do what I do.”
“It's crazy that I get paid to just help people win, which is really awesome.”
“I think the first thing that people who are skeptical or unsure need to realize is you're not selling a magical cure.”
[00:00:00] Madi Sleight: You know, you've always kind of been out there in your beliefs or like what you're interested in. Like, And I mean this in the best way possible, you're kind of like a nutjob.
[00:00:11] Jason Hull: All right, welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow! If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others impact lives, and you're interested in growing your business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate. Think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships and residual income.
[00:00:50] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.
[00:01:15] All right, everybody, so today's interview guest that I have with me is Madilyn Marie Hull, my daughter who goes by Madi.
[00:01:28] Madi Sleight: It's also Sleight now.
[00:01:31] Jason Hull: Oh, oh, that's right. She's married now. So it's Madilyn Marie Sleight. So... no? Madi Sleight?
[00:01:40] Madi Sleight: You didn't have to put in the middle name in there, come on.
[00:01:43] Jason Hull: I know, but like I named you, and I gave you that name, so. Cool. So yeah, gosh, that's a old habit. Yeah, Madi Sleight. I got to get used to that last name. I'm still not used to it. So Madi Sleight... I wanted to have her on the show. I want to have my daughter-- she's my oldest-- and I wanted to have her on the show partially because her birthday is tomorrow. We're recording this here on February 1st and she was born February 2nd. And it's her birthday tomorrow.
[00:02:10] But Madi also has been working with me. How long have you been working with me?
[00:02:17] Madi Sleight: It'll be two years in I think July-- June or July.
[00:02:22] Jason Hull: Yeah. So she's been going to school, going to college, and doing work with DoorGrow. And so, she's become a critical part of the team. And so, I wanted to have her on the show because I think it would be really cool for those that listened to the podcast. Those that wonder who Jason Hull is and what's he really like, you know? I'm also a father, and I am a boss and Madi's gotten to experience both sides of those things the good and the bad. And I thought it'd be cool to have you on the show just to help people understand maybe a little bit more about me and that sort of thing.
[00:02:59] So Madi, why don't you introduce yourself? Tell people with the right name, since I screwed that up already and tell everybody what it is that you do at DoorGrow.
[00:03:10] Madi Sleight: Okay. Well, my name is Madi Sleight. Nobody calls me Madilyn, except for you apparently. But, I am our social media manager here at DoorGrow, and I also just do a couple other little things like I video edit and I create case studies/ testimonials of our clients, showcase their wins, post those to YouTube, and I hand those over to Kyle as well, our kind of marketing guy. And he makes those into these awesome Facebook ads that are our lead gen source right now.
[00:03:40] I sit in on all the weekly calls, the weekly coaching calls with our clients and I take notes and I capture their wins, so I kind of get to know all of our clients on maybe more of a surface level, but it's still really cool. I get to know their names and faces and backgrounds of their businesses. How many doors they add each call. And it's very insightful. I've tried a lot of different things in the last year and a half of being at DoorGrow. I tried sales followup for a little bit, tried a little bit of client success here and there. I've gotten to learn a lot of things, and I am an advertising major at the university of Idaho.
[00:04:17] And so it's kind of been cool learning, you know, things in lecture about advertising, SEO, sales, marketing, stuff like that. Being able to use that knowledge at DoorGrow. But then also learning things at DoorGrow and being able to put that towards my degree and use that in my classes.
[00:04:38] Jason Hull: Yeah. And I think it's really cool.
[00:04:40] So, I think the most important thing that I want that you do is more testimonial videos because it's proof, it's evidence that we're getting results and you get to see this stuff firsthand. You're not just behind the paywall and seeing what goes on, but you get to see the inner workings of the business. And so, maybe you could share with people what you thought I did in the business and what you thought I did before you became a team member of the business, what your perspective was and then maybe how that shifted, because I'm sure that was quite a bit different once you got in.
[00:05:16] Madi Sleight: I don't even know what I thought you did cause for a while, when I was a little kid, you were the website guy. And I thought, "oh, how cool," you know, "my dad made a website for Mr. Gas in my hometown." And I was like, "wow!" You know.
[00:05:30] Jason Hull: Wow, that's a long time ago.
[00:05:32] Madi Sleight: I know! And I remember that. And so, when you started making that transition into coaching, you know-- and it was kind of a subtle, smooth transition. You started in with your brother. You've got family members who are into this kind of stuff, but it wasn't something that you necessarily shared with me and my siblings all the time. You kind of just would disappear and turn on your busy sign, your neon, sign outside your door of your office. And we were like, "Yeah, he's working," you know, "he's doing what he's doing."
[00:06:02] And it was only until I think two summers before I started working at DoorGrow, when you came to me and were like, "Hey, you should try out making a couple social media posts for us." And I did 'cause I was into design stuff. Only then I was like, what is DoorGrow? What is-- what does that even mean?
[00:06:22] That is such a weird term doors and growing? Is it like a plant business? I got really into it. Like I was really curious and I actually like begged him for the remainder of those two years. Like, "dude, I'll do your social media. It's a travesty. I will fix it for you"
[00:06:40] Jason Hull: "Let me do it, dad."
[00:06:42] Madi Sleight: Seriously! I was like begging him. And even like my sister-- I would be texting my sister and I'd be like, "man, you know, he still hasn't gotten back to me on this." And she's like, "oh, I'll go talk to him. Hailey did. Hailey and I would text behind your back and be like, man.
[00:06:58] And that was one of the first things when I, was graduating high school and going off to college, your social media was still-- it was still not great. it was very inconsistent. You guys were probably posting... you posted mostly about the podcast episodes, which I still do. But other than that, you were posting maybe once a month or less, not consistently.
[00:07:19] And the branding, the designs and branding were kind of off and it almost made you look sketchy from a social media standpoint, and I honestly, when I was applying to work for DoorGrow, I still wasn't completely sure what you did. I knew that you've coached businesses to like become better businesses. And that's kinda what I told people like, "yeah, he's a business guy who makes other business guys do better."
[00:07:45] But it wasn't until I actually-- I was just desperate for a job at that point, but I applied to DoorGrow and you made me jump through all these hoops, personality tests. I was like, "this is so my dad." Cause you had made me take these personality tests before. You had, you know, human design stuff. This was stuff that he would make my siblings and I do, but I took them again and I was like, "he makes his applicants do this?"
[00:08:10] I was like, that is such a thing that my dad would do, but I'm going through. I do all the things. And as I was going, I just started getting more and more excited. I was like, "man, this a lot of hoops to jump through." I feel like if I get past all of this, I must be a really cool person.
[00:08:27] Like it started making me more excited to work for you guys, because it was like qualifying me as someone you were hiring. And then I made the little introduction video, and I tried to have fun with it and get like my personality involved. And I remember being so nervous. I was like, "Why am I so nervous? It's my dad. I'm trying to work with my dad." But I was so nervous all of a sudden. I was so excited. And I remember-- we had different team members at the time like Jon Ray-- and you were sending me messages that you had gotten from the team. Like, "Man, I love her video!" And I got so excited, and going through the trainings that you sent me-- you sent me like the company mission statement and the core values-- I went through those and I read it and I got to learn like what you do and what you stand for. And not only was it cool' cause I got to know you a little bit better on the business side. That was something me and my siblings never really got to experience when we were little, but I also got to know the business.
[00:09:25] And first of all, I learned you were not a scam because I wasn't sure. It's an expensive program. You know? Like are people getting value out of it? But people were, and the more like I dove into the client testimonials and I watched, I remember some of my family members at the time being like, "what are you doing?"
[00:09:44] And they're like, "come take a break and hang out with us." I'm like, "no, I'm watching all these videos." I was like watching them in the background while doing other things. I was watching them and I really got to know the business. And then I got even more excited and I was like, "you know, this company doesn't really need me for social media right now. I mean, you did, you needed some social media help, but also you guys were doing just fine. The value was there and people noticed that even without flashy visuals or a really well set up socials page. Although, and I can get into this later, but I do think the social media is helping from what I've seen now. I can get into that later if you want, but...
[00:10:23] Jason Hull: I don't, I don't have to mess with it now, which is really nice. It just gets done. So, yeah. And I don't really have to spend time on Facebook. I don't have to spend time on Instagram. So that really did add value. My favorite thing that you do though, is get testimonial videos. I love those and you do a really great job on editing those. So you had mentioned just seeing me work from, you know, I was working from home. Right? And most people, if they have a dad that works, which I guess most people probably do, their dad usually takes off, like leaves and comes back. Like they just disappear, but I was always there and working from home. What do you think that was like for you? Is that different than you think other people's experience? Was it weird?.
[00:11:05] Madi Sleight: Yeah, it was weird. I mean, when we were really little, and I mean like second grade, eight years old, you had an office for OpenPotion downtown, you know, and even then when you would go to work sometimes--
[00:11:19] Jason Hull: I forgot about that.
[00:11:21] Madi Sleight: Sometimes even then when you would go to work, you'd take me and my sister along with you. And we would like to play around--
[00:11:27] Jason Hull: Yeah, I did for a little while. In the beginning, I did have an office, yeah.
[00:11:30] Madi Sleight: And we would play around in the back with your workout equipment while you were working. Even when you had an office. It wasn't like, like a day job, like a cubicle. We were around. We would play in the shop windows, you know.
[00:11:44] Jason Hull: You have such a good memory. It's really wild.
[00:11:49] Madi Sleight: I really do. Well, I wasn't that young. I was like eight years old. That was when I was missing my two front teeth, you know? Yeah, no, I remember. You had the Roomba going around the office. We would tape stuff to it. Anyway, I'm getting off track.
[00:12:04] Jason Hull: I had a robot cleaning for me. So coming in from the outside and then seeing-- cause you get to see-- you're on pretty much every coaching call, I think every coaching call, right? And you take show notes and then you give those to the group in the Mastermind and everybody else. How would you describe what we do now? And like, what's your perspective seeing what goes on in the business?
[00:12:30] Madi Sleight: Even in just the last year and a half, and I know like we've really sped up the process of getting things organized with Sarah coming on, but even in just the last year and a half, like from when I started versus now-- The program has been polished and cleaned up the value and the coaching, modules themselves were always there, but now we're really like getting to polish and refine them and you get to work on making all the fine adjustments and tunings that you want to.
[00:13:00] And it's really cool seeing that happen because as we're growing and adding more clients, I also see our clients getting more excited. When we made changes to certain documents a couple of weeks ago clients went crazy for it. They were like excited with us over this nerdy formatting change or like changing the order of the program around. The clients get excited, and I've gotten messages from clients being like, "Hey, can you send me the link to this document? I'm excited to restart it or like to do it over again. I want the newest updated version." And so, it's not just something that benefits us on like a organization level...
[00:13:37] Jason Hull: You're talking about the Roadmaps roadmaps or the new scripts, or?
[00:13:39] Madi Sleight: I didn't know if I was supposed to like, go into details on the podcast.
[00:13:43] I don't know what I'm supposed reveal to the public.
[00:13:44] Jason Hull: Like it's a proprietary secret? Nah.
[00:13:48] Madi Sleight: It's a secret. It's for clients only. I don't know. But no, the clients love the updated grow roadmap. They really did. They found a lot more clarity. And I remember when I was reaching out, you know, "Hey, you're in this program, we updated this."
[00:14:03] They're like, "man, can you send me the notes for that call? I missed it." Or I get notes all the time because I've turned into like the weekly coaching call and note taker. People will message me like, "oh man, I'm so upset. I missed today's call." You know, they'll be on every other call like, "man, what did I miss? Can you send me the summary directly so I can like study it and take notes? I'm like, wow. Some of our clients get really invested and find a lot of value in just the weekly coaching calls. And some of our clients-- like we've got a group of them that show up to every single one.
[00:14:36] Jason Hull: Oh, I love those clients. I love the ones that they just, they show up to everything and they do everything that we say and they just get, they get the best results. They're like... they're the best. Like if I could just have all those kinds of clients, I would just have those and everybody would be rich. We would make tons of money. They would make tons of money. But yeah, I love clients that just do what I say.
[00:15:03] Madi Sleight: No, it's true. And it's nice to watch them, especially like from beginning to end. Sometimes they come in a little bit skeptical, like Jon Schmitt. I remember in the beginning he seemed a little stubborn. I dunno, he was intimidatingat first. But when I got on that interview with him last-- or a couple of weeks ago, he was the most excited and he was just going on and on about how much value he got out of the program and how he just decided to do what you said. And so he got the results and he's now like one of our biggest cheerleaders, he and Sonia and Alex come on the call and Alex as well, his son, Alex is always mentioning how much he's learning. He takes notes and he's learning and he wants to quit his day job and start taking over the property management business.
[00:15:47] And that's really cool to watch because I've been on and I've been able to watch a lot of the clients' journeys from beginning to now.
[00:15:58] Jason Hull: Yeah, you have, and you have a perspective or a lens through which you get to see the business that nobody else has because you're watching these videos over and over again, probably while you're editing them and piecing together, and you're like keeping track of different clips where they share wins on different calls, and then you're taking these together. So you get to see their entire journey in collapsed time. And so that's interesting.
[00:16:24] Madi Sleight: Well, I almost get like emotionally attached to these people that I've never met. You know, I've seen through a Zoom screen every week and I'm just quietly sitting there not talking back and I'm just recording them. Sometimes when I'm watching them and piecing together, putting music to their story and cutting out some "ums" or "and yeah"s or "and so"s and like putting together this really impactful video, sometimes I get emotional. I'm like, "wow, I'm so proud of them." You know, they came so far and it's so cool because I almost feel like I get to know these people on a personal level.
[00:17:00] Jason Hull: Yeah, I mean for me, it's super rewarding to see clients winning and succeeding. Like it's worth more than money and getting paid to do what I do and to be just even a guide and seeing all the success in their journeys. It's like really, I mean, it's really amazing. I think it's really amazing that I get to have this job. It's crazy that I get paid to just help people win, which is really awesome. So we like any coach or any business, I've had haters. There's people that just don't believe like we're real or think we just, maybe could be snake oil salesman or something like that. Maybe you could share with people what are you noticing clients are doing?
[00:17:44] Madi Sleight: I think the first thing that people who are skeptical or unsure need to realize is you're not selling a magical cure. You know, they're not going to go through the program and immediately they're going to have knocks on their door being like, "Here, take my properties." That's not how it works. And you know, at first I thought when I first joined the business, I was like, "How can you make that guarantee? How does this work? You know, are you helping them with SEO, helping them get referrals, but really the program benefits those who put in the work.
[00:18:15] It's not for people who are just going to watch the videos and then not do anything about it. In fact, most of the program is doing the work. The videos are almost just helpful content to get you going. The program is not the videos, but I feel like some clients come in and that's what they think, but our most successful clients, our most excited, our most-- I don't know-- just our best clients, the ones that get the best wins and successes. They just come in, they dive right into the content, they keep their three commitments. They put in as many hours of prospecting they can a week. They get right into it. They just do what you say. They attend the weekly coaching calls. They ask lots of questions. That is something that I've noticed is our best, most rewarded clients. They ask a lot of questions. They come on and ask where they're stuck. They ask really good, insightful questions.
[00:19:07] And sometimes they'll take up half the coaching call some of these questions, like 30 whole minutes or 40 minutes. We've been going over time a lot lately because we've been getting really good questions. And then they take what they learned from those calls and they just go implement it.
[00:19:26] Jason Hull: Yeah, it's true. Yeah, we spend a lot of time on those calls sometimes. And I love them asking questions. If they're doing the work, they always have questions. And I see my goal as mentor or as coach to just help them collapse time, point them in the right direction, give them enough information to get them moving forward in the right direction and then kind of get out of their way. So the training material in DoorGrow Academy helps them collapse time, especially because it helps them avoid doing the wrong things. Most people are just doing the wrong things or they're spending-- every business owner is spending tons of time in their business, but they're just focused on the wrong things. And so I think one of the greatest things I think that I provide is just clarity and helping them collapse time. So they don't waste so much time doing the stuff that isn't working.
[00:20:15] So they actually spend less time on the phones and less time talking to people overall. In relation to the amount of doors they're acquiring than they would, if they were focused on SEO or pay-per-click or content marketing or social media marketing, or pay per lead services. This is all the stuff that people try to do. And then they come to us and we say, don't spend any money on any of that stuff. In fact, you don't even need to spend money, and we'll get you growing faster, but it takes work. All of those channels take work. They all take time.
[00:20:48] But none of them could help somebody like John Babiarz add, you know, how many doors has he added in what period?
[00:20:58] Madi Sleight: Right now, our most updated testimonial, which is already out of date because you just had a call with him. He had hit around 200 in under a year of being in the program.
[00:21:10] Jason Hull: 10 months, I think you put on the video?
[00:21:11] Madi Sleight: 10 or 11 months.
[00:21:13] Jason Hull: Yeah, that would be impossible with focusing on lead gen, typical internet based lead generation, like SEO, pay-per-click, content marketing. How many doors did he start at? I can't remember.
[00:21:25] Madi Sleight: He said he started at 60 or 70. And so about six months into the program. I think he had doubled his portfolio.
[00:21:35] Jason Hull: Yeah.
[00:21:36] Madi Sleight: Don't quote me on that. Those dates could be wrong.
[00:21:38] Jason Hull: I think I remember our first video used to run ads was 60. He added 60 doors in 11 weeks is what it said. And we just got lucky that he would mention how many he had added so far in the program, which inspired us to actually start tracking with clients, like keep them conscious of that. Like how many doors total, since during the program, have you added? So that we can monitor that and speed it up.
[00:22:01] But yeah. So that's interesting. What else do you think people should know about. That don't know me from a perspective maybe as my kid or as boss, but how would you describe me to other people?
[00:22:15] Madi Sleight: I don't know. it's really interesting. You know, you've always kind of been out there in your beliefs or like what you're interested in.
[00:22:25] Like, you tend to-- and I mean this in the best way possible, you're kind of like a nutjob. Like you go out, you love to read books and learn. You're constantly on this like self-improvement grind. You're always like learning new things and that's something that you always, you've always been that way. You've always wanted to learn and try new things to figure out like, what's the best way to do this? What's the best diet to eat? What's the best workouts? You've always kind of got that like innovative mindset in a way. You're willing to try like out there experimental things if it's working.
[00:23:00] And I think that also translates into business. Like I wouldn't say that what we're doing is crazy here at DoorGrow. I think what we're doing is just something that helps businesses in general to thrive and to grow. But I don't think anyone else is really doing it like DoorGrow is. I don't think so.
[00:23:19] Maybe you would know better.
[00:23:20] Jason Hull: Probably not.
[00:23:20] I don't think anybody's doing anything the way that we do it. Not, not exactly. That's why all my trainings and with "secrets." We've got special, unique ways that I've come up with of doing things they're similar to what other people might do, but those little differences are where all the magic happens, I think.
[00:23:38] Madi Sleight: And I think in a way, you know, those kind of out there techniques in your personal life and in business, that's something that benefits DoorGrow and is kind of what this whole thing is riding on is your unique perspective and take on these processes that help property managers add doors and scale their businesses.
[00:23:59] It all kind of comes back to you being just a little bit crazy, just a little bit.
[00:24:03] Jason Hull: A learning nut job. So yeah, I think one of the most common things I heard you and the kids say to me growing up is, "you're weird" to me.
[00:24:17] Madi Sleight: You are! And you were, you really were.
[00:24:21] Jason Hull: So, what else would you describe about my personality? And then we'll probably talk a little bit about you.
[00:24:26] Madi Sleight: Well, another thing that I think kind of lends itself to the program and to DoorGrow, but it's totally your personality is you're very logical in thinking. You're very like process oriented. And so you take that crazy and you mix it with this nerd. And then you get this person who can not only come up with these crazy ideas, but can implement them. Like you spend hours in AirTable, creating spreadsheets and processes and crazy like interconnected, intricate spreadsheets and databases. And I don't know. I don't know if I could do that, but you're willing to figure that out. You think it's fun and it's 'cause you've kinda got that like nerdy side as well, but you're very logical oriented and I think that helps our clients as well.
[00:25:15] It's got pros and cons. You tend to think less emotionally and more logically. You don't bullshit or beat around the bush. You tell our clients what needs to get done. You push them to succeed and you're okay telling them the uncomfortable truth, even if they don't want to hear it.
[00:25:33] Jason Hull: Yeah. That's true. Do you think I'm too harsh?
[00:25:36] Madi Sleight: Um, you know, there are times where it's appropriate and times where it's not. In your personal life, sometimes I'd be like, man, you're just a robot.
[00:25:45] Jason Hull: Personally, I'm probably too harsh sometimes..
[00:25:48] Madi Sleight: Sometimes you're a little too logical. Me and my siblings come to you like, "oh my gosh, I've got this emotional problem." and you're like, "it's okay. Just read a book. Here, take this book on self-improvement. And we're like, "I just needed you to listen!" But I think your clients need to hear it, so.
[00:26:09] Jason Hull: Yeah, I think I've gotten better with that over time that, I mean, I used to be really, really analytical and logical and truth was all that mattered, you know, so. But yeah, I think the challenge of that is you're constantly bombarded by emotional challenges if you're too logical. So I had to learn how to feel things and empathize more and more over the years. So I'm up there in years now, you know.
[00:26:39] Madi Sleight: How old?
[00:26:39] Jason Hull: I think I turn 45 this year, so.
[00:26:42] Madi Sleight: You think? You don't know?
[00:26:43] Jason Hull: Yeah, no, I do. I turn 45 this year, so. All right, so that's enough about me. So let's just talk a little bit about you. So how old are you turning tomorrow?
[00:26:58] Madi Sleight: I'm turning 20.
[00:27:00] Jason Hull: 20? And your birthday's on 2/2/02. And you're turning 20 on 2/2/22.
[00:27:11] Madi Sleight: Yeah, it's also Groundhog's day.
[00:27:15] Jason Hull: Oh, okay. So what what's with the twos, Madi?
[00:27:19] Madi Sleight: I don't know. It's my lucky number. I was also married and I graduated in 2020, so.
[00:27:25] Jason Hull: Yeah, a lot of people did not like that year.
[00:27:28] Madi Sleight: You know what? It was okay I guess. I also did not like that year all the time, but hey, still the twos. Two is my lucky number.
[00:27:40] Jason Hull: Yeah. So what's next for you? Like you're going to school now. You're doing a little part-time with DoorGrow. What gets you excited about the future?
[00:27:49] Madi Sleight: I don't know. I've always been very future oriented, you know, even since I was a freshman in high school, I was getting 4.0 not because I want it to, or because anyone expected me to, but because I wanted to get scholarships for college and I accidentally became valedictorian by doing that. I was willing to give it to the other girl that was salutatorian. I literally said, she's student body president. She can have it. They said it doesn't work that way. I was like, okay. But I just wanted the scholarships. I was always very future oriented.
[00:28:23] And so I took a bunch of credits in high school, college credits. And so now I've kind of fast-tracked through college. It's only my second year, but I've got junior standing. And so I don't have a whole lot of college classes left to take, I don't have very many semesters left and at this point in my college career, I'm not taking any gen ed courses anymore. I'm taking all the fun, you know, journalism and mass media courses, taking a lot of graphic design, a lot of media ethics. And right now, I actually applied and I made it onto the school's national advertising competition team. So I'm working with a team of like nine or 10 other people right now, and we're working on a creative brief sent to us by Meta for the Meta Quest 2 VR headset.
[00:29:13] Jason Hull: Formerly known as Facebook?.
[00:29:14] Madi Sleight: Yeah, Facebook. You know, all that good stuff. And so I get to actually come up with a whole advertising campaign with this team and I was given the producer role, which basically means I get to boss everybody around, which is something I'm good at. I have been told.
[00:29:29] Jason Hull: You are. You're good at that. You used to boss around your siblings.
[00:29:32] Madi Sleight: I know, I know. And it's a little bit of a control freak. But I think this role suits me really well and I'm able to help our two presidents and I work very closely with them and they've already decided that I talk so much that I'm going to be the one presenting in person.
[00:29:51] I guess I volunteered by talking a lot in our meetings. But no, I'm excited and this is something that I feel like will benefit my future, my resume. And I was very excited to be working for DoorGrow and getting relevant experience toward the field I'm going into, the digital design space or the desktop publishing, advertising sphere.
[00:30:14] So I don't know. For a while, I feel like after I graduate, you know, Preston, my husband's still going to be in school, and so he'll still be going to school. So I'll just be sticking around and working with DoorGrow full-time and will stay.
[00:30:29] Jason Hull: Ooh, that'll be cool.
[00:30:30] Madi Sleight: I know you're excited. He keeps trying to get me to drop out by offering me a salary.
[00:30:39] Jason Hull: Yeah. 'Cause I'm obviously a huge fan of college. I went to college, but I feel like nowadays it's not really as useful as I don't really even look at applicants' college degrees. I really don't. I just look at experience and skills. Some people do, but yeah, I would love to have more Madi in the business because it's a good thing.
[00:31:03] Madi Sleight: After I graduate, I'm just going to be sticking around here, saving up money for whatever's next. We've got a good area. We're close to Washington advertising agencies and stuff like that. There's lots of internships and possibilities. So I don't know. I'm happy, you know, with what I do at DoorGrow right now, I wouldn't mind branching out and trying new things when I go full time. But for now, I'm just excited to stay within this industry of, marketing, advertising, graphic design area and I like working from home.
[00:31:34] And so that's something I've kind of gotten used to, but that's kind of what's next for me, I'm excited to keep taking classes at the university. It's a small college the journalism and mass media college, we're small. A lot of my classmates are the same in every class. A lot of my professors are the same, but they're very experienced.
[00:31:52] A lot of them are experienced journalists and advertisers, marketers, PR people, know what they're talking about, at least I think so.
[00:32:01] Jason Hull: All right. So everybody's like he's throwing her some like easy, slow balls. What do you feel like is my biggest challenges or my biggest deficiencies or whatnot?
[00:32:14] Madi Sleight: In the business or in general?
[00:32:17] Jason Hull: Oh, well either one.
[00:32:21] Madi Sleight: Well, I mean, like I said, it's something that you've been working on and something that you've improved upon, but the emotional aspect was something that I personally had an issue with growing up, especially being the oldest, being very hard-headed and stubborn and also very emotional. All of your kids are very emotional.
[00:32:39] So that's something that you're going to have...
[00:32:43] Jason Hull: Yeah, I think of all of them, you're the least emotional out of all of them.
[00:32:49] Madi Sleight: Which is funny because I've actually gotten more in tune with my emotions as I've gotten older, but I'm also just better at regulating, I think, than some of my siblings.
[00:32:59] Jason Hull: Yeah, perhaps yeah. I mean, you are the oldest. I'm also an oldest. Right. And I think there's a sort of a personality type attributed to the oldest child. But yeah, I know that the things that I've always seen in you, the gifts that I see in you is that you have a really great memory. Like you remember like history from even when you're really young, like you bring up stories and it sparks, like it helps me remember and I'm like, oh my gosh. I can't believe she remembers that. Even when you're a really young, it's really quite weird. You remember a lot of details. I think also you would always take control. If there were a group of kids playing-- we would go, I would take you to the community swimming pool, for example. And you would immediately just start meeting people and you would organize everyone into doing a game or doing something like you would immediately, you were taking charge.
[00:33:50] And it wasn't like something you were ever pushed to do, you just did it. You're just driven to do that. You're like, this is what I want. I want to have fun. And I want to be in charge and get everybody doing things and you would just do it. And every kid would then be playing and like doing what you wanted them to do. Even with your, you know, your sister right under you Hailey, you would tell her like-- You would play games, which would be like some sort of role-play like pretending to do stuff.
[00:34:15] And you would tell her what to say. You'd be like, "I will have a blah, blah, blah. And then you say blah blah blah blah..." and then she would be like, "blah blah blah blah." and she would just like, say it. Eventually, I think that wore thin.
[00:34:28] Madi Sleight: Yeah, she got sick of it real quick.
[00:34:31] Jason Hull: Eventually that wore thin. And she no longer tolerated that, but yeah, you would always like take charge. You were always really outgoing, like naturally, like talking to people and whatnot. And you were just, you were such a fun kid. You were just so fun. What was interesting about you growing up is you would just break out into song. You would make up songs while like, while we were driving or while we were doing things, you just sing about what you were seeing and what was going on. And it was really, really stinking cute.
[00:35:04] Madi Sleight: You want to know what's funny? You want to know what's really funny? So I remember that when I first came on at DoorGrow, you pulled up my DISC assessment. And you were like, "man, this is really interesting." It's something about like your natural or your taught personalities, you know?
[00:35:19] Jason Hull: Yeah. your natural score versus your--
[00:35:22] Madi Sleight: like adapted.
[00:35:24] Jason Hull: Yeah your adapted score.
[00:35:25] Madi Sleight: And you brought up something that was kind of unknown to me at the time that I was an adapted people pleaser, like my people pleasing score it was really, really high. I had been taught or expected to do that, but it was naturally pretty low. And that's, been in the back of my mind for like the last year and a half. And that's something that I've been working on. And as I've been like more myself and less worried about what people think... my poor husband. We have this inside joke. And I mentioned this when I was in Austin. The, "oh, is that your song? Is that your song?" Because I will be doing laundry or I'll be cooking and I'll be like, "it's time to do the laundry. I'm doing the laundry going to fold some socks." And like, I'll just start-- I'll just start like singing and dancing and he'll look at me and he'll go, "is that your song?"
[00:36:12] I'm like, "that's my song."
[00:36:13] Jason Hull: "That's my song."
[00:36:15] Madi Sleight: So now that I'm like getting more into like my natural personality, I'm like reverting back to how I was, singing and dancing and coming up with stupid little jingles when I was a kid, So it's really funny.
[00:36:30] Jason Hull: It's kinda like that inner child work. Like you're just, you're becoming more comfortable being that authentic version of yourself. It's funny. Cause like I wrote songs, and I would make up songs all the time, like about things. Like sometimes the kids will still, like, if they're making chicken nuggets, will sing "chicken nuggets."
[00:36:49] Madi Sleight: I do that! I do "the chicken nuggets."
[00:36:52] Jason Hull: "I want eat chicken nuggets, I like to eat chicken nuggets."
[00:36:57] Madi Sleight: I do that every time. I can't believe you remember that..
[00:36:59] Jason Hull: Yeah. I mean, as a parent, you've learned ways to get your kids inspired to do things because this is something that I learned a long time ago, but whenever we fail to inspire, we always control. And so it's hard to control people. if it were easy, everybody would do it. I'm going to control everybody and make the world around me, do what I want. But there's a lot less friction when you can inspire people to do it and song is sometimes a way to get kids to do things.
[00:37:24] So well. All right, cool. Is there anything else people should know? About you? About me? About DoorGrow?
[00:37:33] Madi Sleight: I don't know. I'm happy where I'm at. And I think as we're growing our team, you know, we just hired Ashlee and she seems like a really good fit. And I get along with everyone on the team super well. We've got a good, fun dynamic, even Adam, you know, Adam's a little more shy than Kyle.
[00:37:50] Kyle's a little rambunctious. Yeah. No, everyone like fits really well. And I get along with everybody and I like the company culture. I thought originally, you know, I kind of had this like inner fear that working with my own dad would be a nightmare.
[00:38:06] Jason Hull: Yeah.
[00:38:06] Madi Sleight: Yeah. That was something that I was worried about. But honestly, I think it's been good because I don't know how often we would get to communicate otherwise, but now we talk to each other on a daily basis. Sometimes I get sick of you. Sometimes I do. sometimes I'll be in the huddle at 7:30 in the morning and I'll be like, "I'm too tired for this," but I think it's helped us like grow together personally.
[00:38:28] And I also just learn a lot from you and from the business. And I think it's a really good opportunity for me.
[00:38:35] Jason Hull: Yeah. I love having you in the business because, you know, a lot of times parents-- I feel like I have a lot of stuff that I know that I would like to get into my kids, but there's not really a vehicle to do that, but getting your kid in business with you and in doing things because I want everyone on the team to grow, but of course I want my daughter to grow as well.
[00:38:56] And so, you know, it's being able to see you develop and grow. Is even more rewarding, you know, for me. And it's really rewarding to be able to share some of that stuff that's in me that I would love all my kids to have, which are heavily connected to values and the things that I care about.
[00:39:19] And. You know, interacting and dealing with people and what's effective and contribution and all the things that you've heard. Here's what's really genius about you that I should point out. So when you started doing social media posts, you had listened to some of my podcast and you'd listen to things. You've learned my voice, which is really weird. Like there's AI software out there now, which we now can play with a little bit that actually can learn our voice and it can speak. And it can make the sounds that sound like me, right? There's like an AI version of Joe Rogan out there. For example, it sounds exactly like them. It's like a deep fake, like, it's crazy. You can sound just like him and it's AI, people can type in words and it can spit out someone else's voice. Right.
[00:40:03] You learned to pretty much do that by just watching the videos, but in text, right. So when you're creating posts and content, every now and then I'll read something I'm like, well, that's kind of a little different than how I say it, but what's really weird is most of the time I would see posts or things that you would post and I would look at it and then I would feel like I needed to like it because I was like, that's great stuff. I love that. I mean, it's silly that I love like things you've gotten from what I say, but I didn't write it and I'm reading it going, "yeah. I resonate with this" obviously. And so it's really funny.
[00:40:40] And then I'm like, oh, that's silly. I shouldn't be liking my own stuff. That's weird, but I didn't post it, you know? So it's really awesome to see that you were able to encapsulate the voice. How are you able to do that when other people haven't?
[00:40:52] Madi Sleight: Well, the weird thing is I started out making this, like this kind of like a reservoir, like a doc of all these different quotes on all these different topics.
[00:41:00] So if I needed a caption for something about a topic, I'd look and I'd go, oh, and I'll just copy and paste it. So I really did just--
[00:41:08] Jason Hull: So you have a Jason's quotes database?
[00:41:11] Madi Sleight: I do, and I keep adding to it, but now I started off doing direct quotes and then I started like, "Hmm, I don't like the way he said that. I feel like that's inproper grammar" So I like tweak it a little bit. Yeah, no, "I feel that's not the right word. I think he meant to say this." And so I like put in little things that start tweaking it. And now what I do is I actually, like, I've gotten way more efficient and like more quick at getting social media posts out there.
[00:41:37] 'Cause I'll go into this reservoir. and I have pages and I know exactly where everything is and I'll be like, "oh, this is a good line. I'll throw that in there. This is also a good line. I'll throw that in there." you know, make something up as well to go along with it. It's almost bad because we'll be in the coaching calls and you'll be talking about something and I'll be like, "I could regurgitate this quote on this topic because you'll be trying to say it and I'll be like, "I know exactly what he's trying to say." because you've said it before. One thing that's helpful is your views on a certain topic, like let's say SEO, or referral partners or this or that, you say mostly the same things about the same topic in most of our calls. And so I kind of picked up on that.
[00:42:23] And so even if I don't have something in my beautiful reservoir, I just know what you would say. Like, I dunno.
[00:42:30] Jason Hull: You've heard me talk so much and heard me say so much, you know. I've worked with some coaches and mentors. I had one coach I worked with for like three years and it got to the point where on calls. I knew what he would say. Like, I could answer the question for people on his behalf. Yeah. So do you think you could coach clients? Do you think that's something that you could do? You'd be like, I know what Jason would say. This is like, what he would say.
[00:42:52] Madi Sleight: Well, it's funny because when I was doing like the client outreach for a little bit, you know, messaging all of our clients every week, sometimes I'd get a question and I would be able to confidently answer it. And other times, more rarely I would send them over to you but because I know your viewpoint on most of the things-- and that also helped when I was doing sales followup, because I started off and they'd ask me questions, like "how much does the program cost? What do you do?" And I couldn't confidently answer.
[00:43:17] But now I can. And I don't think I'm to the point where I could take over the weekly coaching calls yet. I think I need to go through our program kind of like what Ashlee's doing right now. And like actually go through, take notes and become more familiar with the content of the program itself. But I don't think I'm too far behind that honestly because I listen to you for an hour, twice a week, plus meetings and huddles. And I post to your personal and to our business, social medias every single day. And I'm looking at your quotes every single day. Every time I'm creating social media content, I'm going through. "Hmm. You know, what's a good topic for this post.""
[00:44:02] What's something we haven't, you know, put on social in a while." and I look at your podcast episodes and see what kind of content you put up there. And so there's a lot of information. If somebody wanted to impersonate you, I don't think it'd be that hard. There's enough information out there.
[00:44:20] Jason Hull: There's a lot out there..
[00:44:21] Madi Sleight: And the more that I consume just doing my daily tasks or weekly tasks, the better I get at, you know, mimicking your style, your voice on social media.
[00:44:32] Jason Hull: Cool. Yeah, I think it's just really kind of weird to see when I see stuff that looks like I did it, but it's actually you, but it's like I did it, which is really strange. Cause I don't remember doing it, which is the weirdest thing I'm like, "I don't remember doing that, but that sounds exactly like something I would say."
[00:44:52] Madi Sleight: Most of the time it is something you said.
[00:44:56] Jason Hull: That's why. Sometimes I don't even remember saying some things. You'll post something. I'm like, "that's really good! Did I actually say that?" Yeah. So, all right. Well, I think this has gone on long enough, and I appreciate you coming on and being willing to do this and kind of share your perspective on me.
[00:45:16] And I think it's probably fun for everyone to hear a little bit about you.
[00:45:20] Madi Sleight: I think that the people listening to this podcast should go check out our socials. You know, we don't get a ton of engagement. We've been getting higher numbers. I've checked the percentages. They've gone up. We've gained more followers, but I think our social media content is pretty good. So if you could go check it out, that'd be really great. You're gonna find a lot of regurgitated quotes from my dad, but a lot of it's good information, especially for property managers. If you're like struggling to grow doors or feel like you're stuck at a roadblock or you can't scale your business, there's a lot of little tidbits of sneak peaks of what we kind of talk about in the program on our socials, lots of short paragraphs.
[00:45:57] Little things, I take little gold nuggets from your podcast and put them on socials. So I think that's something that could be nice for someone to get into if they don't have a lot of time to listen to your podcast or to do a ton of research on DoorGrow,
[00:46:13] but also go check out our YouTube channel and our clients success videos. I'm going to be posting more this week as I get them refined to make some revisions and get them up there. We've got some really awesome client wins and people should expect a lot more client success videos in the coming year and in the next few months, especially because I've got a lot of content to get up there and to get out to people so we can show off how awesome our clients are.
[00:46:42] Jason Hull: Yeah. I just got to get you to quit college and make videos full-time so I can get more of them out of you faster.
[00:46:52] Madi Sleight: I'm too far in, at this point. I just gotta finish it. You don't have to wait that long. I promise I will work full time when I graduate.
[00:47:05] Jason Hull: Well, I'm looking forward to the time where you can go full time. Cause that'd be awesome and Madi, I love you. I adore you. A dad couldn't have had a better first kid and you were just, you've always been so fun. You always get my jokes and I really appreciate having you in the business. And thanks for coming on the podcast.
[00:47:26] Madi Sleight: Yeah. I don't know. I love working for DoorGrow and I like working with you, believe it or not.
[00:47:32] Jason Hull: I believe it. All right. And I think everybody else listening does too well, everybody else, I appreciate you hanging out with us. This is about an hour, this will be a long episode. And until next time to our mutual growth bye everyone.
[00:47:47] Jason: You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC pay per lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!
[00:48:13] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe.
[00:48:34] Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
How can you build the ultimate property management team for your business? Too many entrepreneurs build the wrong team. They have to micromanage their team, they can’t trust them, and their team members do not share the business owner’s values.
Property management growth expert, Jason Hull explains why business owners might get stuck with hires that do not share their values, how to attract the right team members with clearly defined company culture, and what to look for in the ultimate executive team.
You’ll Learn…
[01:13] Recap on the Four Reasons for Starting a Business
[02:22] Going from Solopreneur to Having the Ultimate Team
[04:24] Building a Team to Give YOU Fulfillment and Freedom
[6:19] The “Sandtrap” of Struggling to Grow Business
[7:49] Why You Might Have the Wrong Team and Company Culture
[10:26] The “Fifth Reason” for Starting a Business: Safety and Certainty
[11:05] The Key Team Members for a Property Management Team
[15:10] Creating a Core Executive Team of Thinkers
[18:48] The First Hire You Should Make and Job Descriptions
“If every team member is coming to you and asking questions on a daily basis, throughout your day, you do not have a very good team.”
“The reason you have the wrong team is because you are showing up in the business as the wrong person, and you are in the wrong role.”
“The goal is we're trying to build a core executive team that you can trust to make decisions for and on behalf of you, the business owner. Which means you need people that can think, people that share your values.”
“The very first hire that you get should be based on not what the business needs most.”
[00:00:00] If every team member is coming to you and asking questions on a daily basis, throughout your day, you do not have a very good team. You've built the wrong team.
[00:00:10] Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently... then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
[00:00:50] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses and their owners. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.
[00:01:13] All right. So today, we're going to be talking about this idea of the ultimate property management team, at least the basic foundational team that you would need in order to get to that ultimate level we all want to get to where we have the highest level of the "four reasons." and if you have not listened to my episode on the "four reasons for starting a business," Then go back and check that out.
[00:01:42] So for those that have not heard that, quick recap: the four reasons for having a business are to have more fulfillment in life, to get fulfillment out of your business, to get freedom more and more freedom, and more contribution so you feel like you're making a difference, living your purpose, and support. This is why we create the vehicle of a business. So it can also give us more support and related to that, you cannot have maximum freedom, maximum fulfillment, maximum contribution, unless you have the ultimate team. So let's talk about the ultimate property management team.
[00:02:22] Now, for most business owners, you start out as a solopreneur. This is this journey you start on. The transition from solopreneur to having a team is one of the most painful and difficult transitions. I see business owners go through. This was hard for myself. It's one of the biggest challenges at even multimillion dollar companies or large companies that have been in groups or masterminds that I've been in with... it's building that team and building the right culture and the right team. In building the ultimate property management team, usually you're going to need a few key strategic ingredients, right? So the ultimate team would be basically you as a business owner-- property management business owner-- having a team that allows you to not have to do anything you don't want to do in the business.
[00:03:08] So let's say, you just want to function as a business owner and maybe just hold on to a couple of little pieces that you enjoy or love doing. So here are some of the key people. So typically you're going to need at least probably about five team members, and in order to afford that most property management businesses usually are going to need to be around 200 to 400 doors typically.
[00:03:34] I know there's this model out there. And a lot of people will bring up Steve Crossland. He's a really cool guy right here in Austin... does property management. And there is this Steve Crossland model of property management where you do everything. You do every single thing in the business.
[00:03:52] You do every single thing in the business, and if you're doing every single thing in the business, that's cool. But, you might not enjoy that. You might not enjoy every single thing. Most of us as business owners, there's certain things we're really good at, and there's a lot of things we're really bad at. There's a lot of things I'm not good at, and I don't want to do those things. I don't enjoy doing those things. Those things, those things are not fun for me. So I want other people to help me do those things. And not only that, but it becomes really difficult to try and do everything on your own.
[00:04:24] Now, is it more profitable if you can do every single thing yourself and you're willing to just dedicate all your time? Yes. You can make a lot more money maybe that way, because you have very little cost, but you have to recognize on a previous episode, I talked about the five currencies. I think I talked about that. If I didn't, I'll do it in a future episode, but these currencies are time, energy, focus, cash, and effort.
[00:04:52] So, not all of them are money, right? Cash is only one of them. You want to hold on to as much cash as possible and you're willing to give up all these other sacred currencies, like your life time, your energy, your focus, and that's fun for you? Cool. But for most that's not fun.
[00:05:10] That's not freedom. That's not fulfillment. That sounds like hell right? It's just another job. And if you want to be the guy, or gal by the way, for every maintenance request and every accounting problem and every sales call, or any leasing situation, or every showing... or every operational challenge you are not going to really--- you're not going to have freedom, you're not going to have fulfillment. You're going to be in a prison of your own creation.
[00:05:39] So what's the ultimate goal? Like, if you start this business, usually for most entrepreneurs, the ultimate goal is going to be to have a team so that you feel supported and you feel like Iron Man in that super suit. You're a normal person, but you have this team that increases your abilities, your capabilities, allows you to provide a great level of service and to do a good job and feel like you're making a difference in the world, but you don't have to do all the stuff that's uncomfortable, painful, or you don't enjoy doing.
[00:06:08] So typically, maybe about five team members in addition to yourself. And probably 200 to 400 doors so that you can afford or justify that at least minimum, somewhere in that range or more.
[00:06:19] So we need to get you to that point, and if you're having trouble with that, that's something we help clients focus on is how to get to that point. Now, most people get to this point, and I call this sometimes the "second sand trap," or maybe the third sand trap.
[00:06:33] But, there's the initial sand trap of like: "I can't get on any clients" or "I'm starting my business." That's where a lot of people get stuck. I don't know if that even counts as a sand trap because they're not even going, they have a fantasy business. Right? The next is the first real sand trap is the sand trap of the solopreneur sand trap. Just breaking that a hundred door barrier... getting stuck, maybe around between 50 to 80 doors... can't grow any more. It's too painful. You can't manage any more properties than that on your own for most people and you're struggling and you can't afford to hire anybody and you end up painted into a corner and stuck, right? First sand trap.
[00:07:09] Second sand trap is you are in that 200 to 400 door range and you have a team, but it's the wrong team. And this is where a lot of property management businesses sit stuck and stagnant. They're in that 200 to 400 door range.
[00:07:23] The business owner feels like they have to micromanage everybody on the team, which, you know you're that person if you're like, "We just need more checklists! And we need more processes!" And you're trying to control everyone. And you are the person that every single person on the team comes to and asks questions. If every team member is coming to you and asking questions on a daily basis, throughout your day, you do not have a very good team.
[00:07:49] You've built the wrong team. You don't have a team of thinkers. You don't have a team of decision makers. You have a team that you have to micromanage, and these are people as process that you have to control. And this is the initial team most people build. When they start building a team, they build a team the wrong way. They build a team that they have to micromanage and control because at first it feels really cool.
[00:08:11] There's a lot of ego and everyone's coming in asking questions and they feel like they're really smart. And they end up quickly like the Emperor or Empress with no clothes. Everybody wants to say yes to the boss. They're not giving the boss valid feedback. And so you end up with a business that is struggling.
[00:08:30] And the reason you have the wrong team is because you are showing up in the business as the wrong person. And you are in the wrong role. You've created this role, holding onto all the things that you think you have to do as a business owner. You're like, "I have to do, you know, the accounting. I have to control the finances."
[00:08:53] That's like, "I'm the business owner. That's my job." Or "I'm the only one that can do the sales. I have to do all the sales and I'm the BDM too. So I have to do all of that because nobody else is as good as me," or whatever you tell yourself. Or "I have to handle the operations because that's running the business and it's my business and I'm running it.
[00:09:11] "I have to manage the entire team and do everything." Whatever it is that you are holding on to, if it's not something you enjoy, you are showing up as the wrong person. So we want to make sure that we build the right job for you, and then we build the right team to supplement you-- the right team around you.
[00:09:31] And most business owners are stuck at the 200 to 400 door range in this industry because they have the wrong team because they've been showing up in the wrong role and they didn't understand the four reasons and they weren't moving towards that consistently. And they didn't set up the right culture.
[00:09:49] Their team has no clue really what the company's core values are. They have no clue what the company's client-centric mission is to, to benefit clients. Then, you know, none of this is clearly defined. There's a lack of culture. And the business owner has a lack of clarity on themselves and never got clear on why did they even do this? How does this give them more fulfillment and more freedom? How's this helping them be more of themselves, create more contribution. How does this help bring them more alignment towards the four reasons? That lack of clarity means you're going to have team members that also are not in alignment with those four reasons.
[00:10:26] So there's the fifth reason. And the fifth reason is safety and certainty. Your team members are just people that want safety and certainty, they just don't want to get fired. They just want to keep getting paid. They just want their job and they become hiders, not believers in your business because you haven't given them anything to believe in. There's no real culture that's clearly defined, so the culture in your business is what actually is going on in your business.
[00:10:49] So if there's office politics, if there's micro-managing, if there's laziness, if there's confusion, if there's crappy processes, that's your culture. That's the culture that you have defined by not clearly defining it.
[00:11:05] So let's talk about these key team members that you would need once you get to that 200 to 400 door range, or as you're growing and scaling, if you wanted to offload things. So in most businesses at that stage, you're going to probably need a maintenance coordinator that handles the maintenance coordination.
[00:11:23] This could be an introverted person. That's just really detail-oriented and really good at remembering stuff and can facilitate tools like Property Meld and stuff like that. That was property meld, M-E-L-D. They can facilitate tools like this for communication and nothing falls through the cracks with them because they're on top of that kind of stuff, if they're the right personality. So you have a maintenance coordinator handling maintenance, it's a big piece of the business, right?
[00:11:48] You will probably need a property manager, somebody that handles the leasing side of things, that handles the onboarding of new tenants and new owners that the salesperson hands people off to, and that is the boots-on-the-ground person that goes out into the field and does certain things related to leasing and onboarding... that sort of thing.
[00:12:08] You'll also need an operator. This is probably the most important role, second to the visionary or the entrepreneur, which would be you, those listening to this. So the operator is going to be the person that handles all the operational pieces they're going to be very different than the visionary personality type. They have all the details, make sure the team are doing what they're supposed to be doing. They make sure that meetings are being run on time.
[00:12:34] And in a certain way, they're handling the strategic planning for the company, which we have a system that we teach clients called DoorGrow OS, which I believe is better than Traction or EOS or any of that kind of stuff that most of you are dabbling with out there. There's several advantages in DoorGrow OS over that system. Maybe that'd be another podcast episode.
[00:12:55] But you have an operator and they have an operating system and they're going to make sure process documentation and systems and everything are working well and that the business runs. And they're basically the key person that's going to enact your vision and make sure your vision is coming to fruition and they will ensure that it gets done.
[00:13:12] You will probably also need a BDM. You may love doing sales. And that may be one of the last things that you give up and maybe nobody would be quite as good as you. But if that is not your personality type and you don't enjoy it, or you just have part time availability to dedicate to that, you can only really do sales and follow-up maybe 10 to 20 hours a week or less.
[00:13:34] Then you may want-- if you really want to grow and scale your business, then you will need to get a full time person. That's focused on networking, connecting, building relationships, prospecting, and growing and scaling your business... referrals... all of that kind of stuff. So that would be a BDM, which is a business development manager. Basically a sales person in your property management business.
[00:13:59] The other role that you may need is maybe you don't enjoy– or are not an expert at the financial stuff. I've worked with financial coaches and things like that, because this was something I was not naturally good at because I didn't enjoy it. But I like making money and I like winning financially. And I like knowing that the business is sound and safe financially. So I got coaches and mentors on this, but I still have people and resources and a team to help with these pieces so that it's not something I have to put a lot of time and energy into.
[00:14:33] So you'll need somebody on the accounting side or financial side, bookkeeping, accounting, that sort of thing if that's something that you are not getting a lot of freedom and fulfillment from and contribution from.
[00:14:45] Then another role that you will probably need would maybe be a receptionist, somebody to just field the onslaught of all these phone calls that you're getting from so many tenants and owners and things coming in, to triage things and get them to the right people. You'll need somebody maybe to answer the phones because those low level calls can eat up a lot of resources for these higher level team members.
[00:15:10] Now, what is the goal that we're trying to build here? The goal is we're trying to build a core executive team that you can trust to make decisions for and on behalf of you, the business owner. Which means you need people that can think, people that share your values. You will never trust your financial person to make decisions, you'll never trust your BDM to sell and bring in people the right way and attract the right clients, you'll never trust fully your operations person to do the job the right way unless you deep down know they share your values.
[00:15:48] They might be skilled and can do those jobs, and you may have a team. If you're in that 200 to 400 door range and you feel stuck it might be because you have a team of people that don't share your values, or they're not clear on your values and so there's a disconnect.
[00:16:05] So you need executive team members that are part of this executive team decision-maker/ thinkers that can run pieces of the business-- additional engines in the business-- instead of everyone just being cogs or wheels that are turned by the engine. You need other people that can take these pieces off of your plate so you don't have to make every decision. You don't have to answer every question. You don't have to do every single thing in that, and they don't have to check in with you on every single thing either-- that you're able to trust them. And the only way you'll be able to trust them is if they share your values.
[00:16:40] And if you cannot trust your team members with those things, either you haven't made your values clear to them, or you just know already, which is probably more likely they don't have the same value set as you, You cannot create enough processes and checklists and systems to force executive-level-thinker team members to be effective at implementation and taking action and taking over pieces of the business. That's impossible. There's too much going on.
[00:17:07] They need to share your values, and those values need to be clear to them and need to be related to them, and they need to buy into them and be believers in those values and believers in you and believers in the vision of the company.
[00:17:21] If they don't believe in you, and they don't believe in the values, then they're just "hiders." they're just showing up to get a paycheck. They're going to just do their job. They will do the bare minimum. They're not going to do anything extra. They're not going to think or make decisions 'cause they'll probably just make a mistake or get in trouble, so they're going to come to you and ask you to do it for them. "Make this choice for me." And then you end up just with a whole bunch of people that are eating up your time instead of taking more of your time off of your plate because they're just eating up time, asking all these questions.
[00:17:54] So that's kind of the ultimate team. Now, if you have other ideas or other team members, feel free to comment inside our Facebook group, which is the community for those that are fans of this podcast and that are fans of DoorGrow. You can go to doorgrowclub.com which is our Facebook group, and you can join that group.
[00:18:16] Let me know: what does the ultimate team look like for you? I'd be curious to see if I missed something here, but this-- these are some of the key team members that I've seen people need in their businesses in order to offload and take things off their plate. So that's that. That's about the ultimate team. So in order to have the ultimate team, you need culture, you need a lot of clarity on what you and your role should be in the business and on your purpose in life and on what your values are and what drives and motivates you so that we can build the right ultimate team around you.
[00:18:48] And the next step: the very first hire that you get should be based on not what the business needs most. It should be based on what you need most in order to get to the next level towards the four reasons. This is why I have a strategic process for clients to do a time study, to figure out: what do they need next?
[00:19:10] And then we have a specific way of doing job descriptions that I call "Rdocs" to figure out what is the ultimate job description for the next hire that I need to get in order to let go of the things that are eating up the currencies that I don't want to be giving up, which you know, things that are stealing my energy, things that are stealing my focus, things are stealing my cash, that were preventing from making more cash things. They're stealing my time.
[00:19:35] What are the things that I would want to give up most? And how can I build the right job description around that? And what is my current accurate job description? Is this what I want? Or are there things I can just highlight on that, that I could eventually put onto somebody else's job description. So these are the things we get into more in the DoorGrow OS and into the scale program that's in our mastermind.
[00:19:55] So if this stuff is interesting to you, if you got some value out of this, you might be a good fit or interested in being part of our DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind. So reach out to us, go to doorgrow.com, schedule a call with our team, and we will give you a free training that will help you know everything about our mastermind and help you learn some of these cool frameworks.
[00:20:20] We give this free training away that has seven-- actually, it has probably like nine or more, frameworks that are gonna help you learn how to scale and grow your business more effectively, and we hope you get really excited about that. Realize you're a great fit for it. And it will also break down why most companies are struggling to grow and why most marketing ideas and channels like SEO and pay per click, Google ads and content marketing and social media marketing and pay per lead services are BS and are not helping you grow your business.
[00:20:52] And if you've been trying this stuff and struggling, they all can work, but there's a big, massive reason why they're not working. We can reveal that to you in that training and help you do something that's not those things that cost no dollars and we'll make you a lot more money, and it takes less time than using those strategies to get on a lot of business.
[00:21:14] So anyway, check this out. Doorgrow.com and until next time, to our mutual growth. And I hope you all build the ultimate team and have the ultimate level of freedom and fulfillment in your life and contribution and support. Bye, everyone.
As a property management business owner, how many leads do you throw away? These are leads that are outside of your service area or properties that are short-term rentals when you only manage long-term rentals. Every property manager turns away potential clients and leads. Imagine if you could work with the local property managers in or outside of your area and feed each other business.
Property management growth expert Jason Hull gets into strategies for connecting with other property managers and creating a referral system that is a win-win for both parties involved.
You’ll Learn…
[01:09] Referral Partnerships Between Property Managers
[02:04] Creating Strategic, Win-Win Relationships
[04:21] Most Property Management Companies Suck
[6:24] A Tip from One of Our DoorGrow Mastermind Clients
[7:39] Assume the Close!
[8:35] Get FREE access to the Seven Frameworks Training
“Just one strategic relationship in a neighboring city could be feeding you some doors every single month, and you could be feeding them some doors, every single month.”
“I really do believe a rising tide raises all ships and it will allow you to be more connected, more aware.”
“Plant those seeds that will maybe come to fruition that will lead maybe to acquisition, maybe lead to referrals, but create some relationships and get connected with other property managers in your market.”
“There are a lot of people that property management is a side hustle for them. It's not their bread and butter. It's not their mainstay. It's not what they really want to be doing with their life.”
[00:00:00] Jason: Just one strategic relationship in a neighboring city could be feeding you some doors every single month, and you could be feeding them some doors, every single month.
[00:00:08] Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference. Increase revenue, help others impact lives, and you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker.
[00:00:29] DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
[00:00:47] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses and their owners. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host property management growth expert. Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.
[00:01:09] All right. So today we're going to be talking a little bit about local referral property management partners. So, what do I mean by that? So one of the things that I've noticed in property management is there is some very low hanging fruit and a lot of property managers are overly competitive and they look at all the other property managers in their local market as these competitors that they need to somehow beat or avoid.
[00:01:35] And a lot of property managers have this general lack of collaboration. And I really believe that the industry needs collaboration over competition. I really believe in this principle of collaboration over competition. So in taking a look at this one thing that I would recommend that you do is you start getting familiar with all the other property managers in your local market, especially those that you're not directly competing with that are right outside of your local market.
[00:02:04] Now, connect with these property managers and get familiar with them because. You know how often you're getting phone calls from people with properties that you just cannot manage. They might be too far outside of your service or coverage area. They might be different types of niches of property management that you do not service like commercial or associations or storage units or whatever, right.
[00:02:27] There may be other companies in your local market or just outside of your local market that you might be able to refer business out to, and you know how often you get contacted for things that you can't handle. So what do you do with that? You just tell them no, and you basically, essentially take that potential lead and you throw it in the garbage can, right?
[00:02:45] There's a lot that tends to go into these garbage cans in business. And so those things that are in the garbage can could be useful to other people. Well, think about all these other people, you could be connected to that they have their own garbage can full of stuff that they could have handed to you.
[00:03:02] Just one strategic relationship in a neighboring city could be feeding you some doors every single month, and you could be feeding them some doors, every single month.
[00:03:11] "Hey, do you manage in this area?"
[00:03:12] "Actually, no, but I know this gal, Susie, who's really great at that. She's just outside of our market and covers that area." Right?
[00:03:20] So you can then be referring business back and forth. This is obvious. It's low hanging fruit, but there's so many property managers, especially newer property managers that do not do this. So think about how often you're receiving stuff that you can't use or do anything with, you could give to other people.
[00:03:37] Well, other people have that, that they could give to you. So get connected to these other property managers. Call them up and start reaching out and creating these relationships. So you can join the local NARPM chapters. You can start a local group of property managers, but I really do believe a rising tide raises all ships and it will allow you to be more connected, more aware.
[00:04:00] And even if you view your competition as an enemy, for some reason, you know, the old adage, which is. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. So stay close to them and be aware of what they're doing anyway if you're that type of person, that's that competitive. So get connected to them because, you know, having these local referral partners, some of my clients are getting doors, you know, on a monthly basis, just from people that they're connected to and sending it. Now, here's where this gets even more awesome.
[00:04:30] So if you're connected with these other people that are doing property management, you're going to identify some people that do property management that don't like it. I know that's crazy. And I know you're really surprised at hearing that there might be people out there that don't enjoy property management.
[00:04:46] But There are. There are some people that do not enjoy property management. Most property managers out there suck. This is the reality. Most property management businesses suck. And that means most of the business owners probably are not happy. And most of the property management businesses aren't doing a great job.
[00:05:04] There are a lot of people that property management is a side hustle for them. It's not their bread and butter. It's not their mainstay. It's not what they really want to be doing with their life. They would rather be doing more real estate deals, or they would rather be doing something else, but they feel like they need to do it in order just to keep their existing clients happy or to maintain something or whatever.
[00:05:26] You can create a win-win with these people. And you can call up these companies or these people that are doing property management, and you can suggest if you create a relationship with them, you can plant that seed, thought that, "Hey, we would be willing to acquire or offer you X number of dollars per unit, and we would take over these portfolio, we would do a really great job doing it. And you won't have to deal with this anymore."
[00:05:48] And ask them, "do you love this? Or would you rather do more real estate?"
[00:05:52] And if they're honest with you, they would probably say, "I would love to just really do more real estate deals if I didn't have to do this, but I don't want to lose the real estate deals."
[00:05:58] "What if you could keep the real estate deals, keep the clients, but give up the property management, not have to do that. And any time you gave us property management we'd give you some sort of referral kickback or something, and I could help you turn them into maybe even more real estate deals?"
[00:06:12] So This is stuff that we talk about a bit more in our Referral Secrets training, but I wanted to share this idea with everybody: connect with other property managers. Plant those seeds that will maybe come to fruition that will lead maybe to acquisition, maybe lead to referrals, but create some relationships and get connected with other property managers in your market.
[00:06:34] So I don't know if there's a whole lot more I need to say about that. I think this is a pretty simple idea, pretty simple concept, but get connected with other property managers. If you want to be connected with some of the best property managers that are crushing it all over the U.S. we have over 80 businesses that are in our mastermind that are crushing it, sharing wins, getting on our calls, doing great stuff, adding lots of doors, they're sharing all kinds of tips.
[00:07:01] Just to give an example, what's a good tip that somebody shared today? One of the tips that was shared on the call today is they would call up other potential referral partners, and they would just say, "Hey, we just want to be an asset on your team for you to refer out to people. You know, you have a team of vendors that you probably refer out to people. We want to be on that team."
[00:07:23] I thought that was a pretty smart little idea. I shared a tip one of my clients on cold calls was asking if people would be interested in getting on a call with him so he could explain his program or his product or service or whatever. And I shared the tip of, don't ask for the call.
[00:07:39] Don't ask if they'd be interested. Assume they'd be interested. Sell them on being interested, and then assume that they're going to want to be on a call with you and then just give them times. So for example, instead of saying, "Hey, would you be interested in getting on a call where we can talk about..." like sounds really not confident, right?
[00:07:56] Saying, "Hey, I've got this really cool thing. I love to set up a time with you. When would be a good time? How's Thursday at two? Would that work for you? Right. Just assume they would want to and give them a time. So then they can say, "Yeah, that would work" or "No, that doesn't work for me."
[00:08:12] "Cool. How about this time?"
[00:08:13] That's going to be far more effective in closing people on things. Right? So anyway, there's lots of really cool tips. If you're interested in being part of something like this, join the DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind. Reach out to us at DoorGrow.Com.
[00:08:27] We do not let everybody into this program. We have some qualifications. We have our three commitments that are required in order to be part of this program.
[00:08:35] If you would like to get free access to Seven Frameworks training in which I share seven frameworks, plus some additional ones that can be game changers for how to think about your business and how to become a better entrepreneur, and I share my top three strategies on how to grow a property management business and an overview of our program. This is basically our big sales pitch. If you want access to the Seven Frameworks training, reach out to us, we'd be happy to give you access to this for free, explain everything transparently... pricing for the program, everything's in that.
[00:09:06] And then you can apply and get on a call with our team. So just reach out to us at DoorGrow. We'd be happy to help you do that. You can find us at doorgrow.com, and that's all I have to share for today. So I hope that's helpful. And until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye everyone.
[00:09:24] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC pay per lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow! At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news, subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe.
[00:10:12] Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.
As a property management entrepreneur, your cell phone number is sacred information. Not everyone should have access to it. How can you implement and utilize phone systems in your business? Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull talks about the importance of protecting your personal cell phone number and using systems like Talkroute to make and receive business calls instead.
[01:16] The Challenge of Dealing with Phones in the Business
[04:54] The Frustrating Issue with Many Phone Systems: Latency
[09:02] Why we Like to Use Talkroute here at DoorGrow
[10:59] Why Should You Protect Your Cell Phone Number?
[15:07] Comparing Other Examples of Phone Systems You Can Utilize
“One of the first things property managers learn really quick in starting their businesses: you don't want everybody to have your cell phone number..”
“As a business owner, in order to leverage a team and have this dream of only having the four reasons, you need to have leverage.”
“One of the ways to have leverage is you can't be reachable by everybody by phone immediately, you need to have protection and support.”
“I recommend that you utilize those tools, protect and insulate yourself and get a really good phone system.”
[00:00:00] Jason: So one of the first things property managers learn really quick in starting their businesses: you don't want everybody to have your cell phone number. So if every tenant and every owner has your cell phone number, your business-- you're going to be the biggest bottleneck in your business, and it's going to be a nightmare.
[00:00:13] Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the #DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others impact lives, and you're interested in growing your business and life-- and you're open to doing things a bit differently-- then you are a DoorGrow Hacker.
[00:00:31] DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high-trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships and residual income.
[00:00:52] At DoorGrow we are on a mission to transform property management, business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change the perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow now let's get into the show.
[00:01:16] Okay. So. This question came up on my Wednesday coaching call today with the group, with the mastermind group. And, um, it was right at the end, but this is such a common question. And this isn't even a growth-related question. Our Wednesday call's a growth call. We usually focus on adding doors.
[00:01:34] We had some great wins and things shared, but at the end, one of our clients is like, “Hey, I got a question. I don't know if I should wait until Friday to ask this during your Scale call, where it's operations, even though I'm focused on growth, I've got a problem that I need to deal with. And I said, “what is it about?”
[00:01:50] And it was about phones. So we're going to talk about phones today because this comes up-- I'm just surprised how often this comes up and it comes up. It's a common challenge is how do you deal with phones? Why phones are expensive. How do we do phones with our team? What phone system should we use? So I'm going to tell you a little bit about what I've used in the past, what we use currently– what I recommend to property managers that could make sense.
[00:02:17] So let's talk about phones. Okay. So the challenge is most people nowadays are using-- they don't have just a standard phone. They have a phone system, they have a cell phone and they might have some standard phones in their office, like normal office phone system. but all of these things can get really expensive.
[00:02:39] So we used at DoorGrow-- OpenPotion-- we used RingCentral for a while. So we had this voiceover IP phone system, the challenge with systems like most phone systems nowadays, even if their voiceover IP used to be, Hey, get a voiceover IP and it could be super cheap. Right? But it's not nowadays.
[00:03:01] Nowadays, it's like, you have to have a device and they sell you these devices. So you got to buy a phone, you have to have multiple phones for each desk and each person and each line. And each person usually is like $30 or sometimes $40 a seat. And so if you have a team, like, of five, you could be shelling out like $40 a person for each line then, you know, that adds up.
[00:03:26] So let's say you've got a team of five-- $40. You spend 200 bucks just on your phone system. Well, in our business, we were spending. Anywhere from two to $300 a month, something like this a month on phones. And it was really costly. And we were using RingCentral, which is a popular one. It works really well.
[00:03:45] It gives you tons of features, which is really nice, but we didn't-- we didn't need-- we had so many team members that needed to make phone calls, but not-- they weren't on the phone like 24 hours a day. They didn't need unlimited calling. They were making calls all the time. And what was really ridiculous is we all had cell phones.
[00:04:02] We had unlimited calling on our cell phones. We all have plans where we had unlimited cell phone plans. So it's just-- it felt really weird that we have unlimited cell phones that we already have, but we just didn't want everybody to have our cell phone numbers. Cause that would have been a mess, right?
[00:04:17] Having a business where everybody has their cell phone number. So one of the first things property managers learn really quick in starting their businesses: you don't want everybody to have your cell phone number. So if every tenant and every owner has your cell phone number, your business-- you're going to be the biggest bottleneck in your business, and it's going to be a nightmare.
[00:04:33] So you need to get rid of that phone number, right? You need some sort of solution. So you could port that number into a phone system like RingCentral. And then if anybody calls that number, they're going into your phone system and then you can leverage your team and whatnot, right. That's one option, but here's what we switched to.
[00:04:54] So we were using RingCentral and we switched to a system called TalkRoute, which you can get to by going to TalkRoute R-O-U-T-E .com. The reason I like TalkRoute is: I tested a lot of different phone systems. One of the biggest challenges with modern phone systems or voice over IP or VoIP or digitally based phone systems is latency.
[00:05:18] Latency means like a lag, delay. If you've ever been on a bad phone system or bad VoIP system and experienced delay, it feels like you say, “hi,” and then two seconds later, they hear it. And so then what ends up happening because of that latency, that lag of even a second, it causes you both to speak over each other.
[00:05:39] So let's say we're having a conversation. Somebody who's like, “Hey, how's it going?”And they're like, then you, if you don't hear them respond for like two seconds or a second, you're like, that's uncomfortable. It's weird. That awkwardness that's because of there's lag, there's latency, and then they're going to start talking and you might not realize they start talking.
[00:05:57] So you start talking and then you're going to end up talking over each other all the time. You'll think there's a gap and you'll start talking, but they won't realize that you didn't say anything. And so they'll continue talking and then you're talking over them and then you end up stepping on each other's toes, and it's a really awkward way to have a conversation.
[00:06:13] And so what I did when I was looking at phone systems is in testing them, I would do a trial, do a demo, do a test, and I would set up the phone system. So I could call my cell phone with that system or call the system with my cell phone and, and talk. And I would say,”hi,” and I listened to other one, I say, “hi” and listen to the other one.
[00:06:32] And I wanted to see how quick or how long it took for me to hear what I just said. How quick was it? If it's like:”Hi.” “Hi.” “Hey.” You know, that's pretty fast. That's low latency. You can have a conversation, and it's routing through the magical internet or wires or whatever, and they're getting it quick enough that you can have a conversation and it's not going to cause that delay of stepping on each other's toes.
[00:06:57] Now, very few phone systems passed what I call that delay or lag test. So that's the first thing I would recommend when you're looking at a phone system is do a test and see what the lag is. See what the delay time is. Now, sometimes their servers and your internet are gonna play a factor to this. So sometimes some phone systems were better just simply because you have better internet, you have a better router, some of these ping times or latencies or lags or whatever it could be caused simply because you have a crappy device running your internet in your office or at your home.
[00:07:34] And so you need to have a really good device that can handle a lot of connections and a really good internet connection. So sometimes it's just about getting a better router and not just using your internet modem, that's like providing the service. A lot of times, internet providers nowadays will give you a modem that has a router built into it, and it's doing everything.
[00:07:54] It's your wifi, it's a router. And it's your modem connecting you to the service for internet. And usually it's crappy. It's like, they're doing the cheapest thing. They can get all put together and it's a Jack of all trades and a master of none.
[00:08:11] And usually most homes nowadays, or offices have multiple Apple watches and iPhones and iPads and phones and, like, cameras and all sorts of things utilizing this network with the internet of things everything's connected and it's just a lot, my house has a ton of stuff. Even light bulbs are hooked on the wifi. So I can talk to my phone and tell things to turn on and off. Right. So. There's so many devices connected, usually routers, struggle to handle all the device connections and to deal with that.
[00:08:46] So it's usually just the chipset on the router is not strong enough to handle all of these devices talking at the same time and communicating, even if they're not using very much internet bandwidth. And sometimes that's a bottleneck. So first make sure you have a really good internet connection.
[00:09:02] Now, TalkRoute. Why I liked TalkRoute-- TalkRoute is a phone system, you pay one flat fee for their entire service. And then instead of them giving you a bunch of devices, they give you an app that you can install on your phone and you can make calls through your cell phone using your cell phone minutes.
[00:09:24] So if your outbound calls, cell phone calls are good and you like how they sound and they work fine, which everybody's cell phone calls generally work really well, those are great networks. That's what you're going to be using. You're just going to be making a cell phone call and there's no latency at all. Inbound calls will route through the TalkRoute system then to your cell phone, and you can choose to accept that call... if you have them route to you, right? So you can have an auto attendant. You can have unlimited extensions, you can assign extensions to every cell phone in your office, or every person in your office.
[00:09:55] Some real estate offices, for example, will use TalkRoute. And I think they give you unlimited extensions, something like this. So you can assign an extension for every available property with, and put a little Voicemail voice message on there saying, Hey, this property is really great. You should walk around in it, blah, blah, blah. Right? So you can put record messages and then you can put these extension numbers on every single property. You can just put a number up on the yard sign or on the brochure or whatever, and people will call this number, dial this extension to hear a message about this property.
[00:10:28] So you can build it out really awesome. You can port your numbers in, so if you have a cell phone that too many people have port that number in once it's ported and that number is in that system, now nobody can reach you. They can reach the system, go get yourself a better cell phone number that nobody knows, and only, only give it out to sacred, well, trusted people. Treat this number like it's sacred. Only give it out to family, maybe really good friends. Nobody else. You need to protect and insulate yourself and protect yourself from giving out your phone number to everybody.
[00:10:59] As a business owner, in order to leverage a team, and have a team, and to offload and have this dream of only having the four reasons as I've talked about on a previous episode of fulfillment, freedom, contribution, and support, where you get to do the things you want to enjoy and not do everything in the business you need to have leverage. And one of the ways to have leverage is you can't be reachable by everybody by phone immediately, you need to have protection and support.
[00:11:28] You need to protect yourself. How do you protect yourself? when it comes to phone calls, you have to set up barriers so that people can't just reach you directly. It's cool. They should be able to reach somebody directly. That's fine. Or at very least an auto attendant and it can route to people. They should not immediately all be able-- nobody should be able to just reach you directly if you want this business to scale and business to grow.
[00:11:52] So, TalkRoute has an app on your phone. You can choose a number to dial it also can-- you can get text messages at this number. You can choose which of the phone numbers you have linked to TalkRoute you want to show up on the caller ID for your outbound calling, and that's the only number they're gonna see. You initiate a phone call, it calls in via your cell phone to TalkRoute and then dials that number, initiates the call. TalkRoute knows that it's you, that you're going to be calling that number, so it just makes it all happen magically and they don't see your cell phone number, your personal cell phone number. They only see on their caller ID that they're getting a call from XYZ property management or whatever the caller ID thing that you have set up for that number. They just see that number.
[00:12:35] Your main business number, or you could even assign a phone number to each of your team members, or just assign an extension and have that outbound number always be the same number. And they call in and they can hear an auto-attendant, ”push 'one' for sales, 'two' for support,” et cetera. Right. So I recommend you check out TalkRoute.
[00:12:52] When I did testing, we've had no problems with latency. All of my team used that for phone calls, except for our sales side of the business and myself. We use our sales CRM, which has calling built into it. I use a CRM called Close, which is really expensive on a per seat basis. But for most of my team, we use TalkRoute and that's how we can get business and send business text messages. We can do phone calls through that. We have extensions. We have auto attendants. We have multiple 800 numbers for different businesses.
[00:13:28] So, all of that. Feeds into one system and it's very easy to manage through TalkRoute's web app. You just go to talkroute.com, I log in and then I can just customize everything. I can make sure everybody has their voicemails and voice messages recorded. And I have the tree structure mapped out and it's easy to record. It's really well thought out and it works really well, and the audio quality is fantastic. So highly recommend that you get TalkRoute.
[00:13:57] So TalkRoute... I think we spend-- I have a lot of phone numbers and a lot of things going on on that now for all the stuff that we have going on underneath all my OpenPotion companies and including DoorGrow-- I think our bill is like still under a hundred bucks a month. Like it's a fraction. And I think initially we were spending like maybe 70, 80 bucks, like it was really cheap. So we were saving you know, probably two, maybe even 300 bucks.
[00:14:26] I don't know. We're saving hundreds of dollars over our previous phone set up because we had a large team and everybody had to have extensions and they were charging us 30 or 40 bucks per person. And now it's a fraction of the cost. So, and most of you operate and live off your cell phones. Anyway, you just want to protect that cell phone number, and then you can make those outbound calls, but not give out your cell phone number. And you can still receive and send text messages through the TalkRoute app, if necessary. Some of you have sales CRMs that will shield and mask your phone numbers as well, maybe like lead simple. So I recommend that you utilize those tools, protect and insulate yourself and get a really good phone system.
[00:15:07] Now, there are other phones, voice-over IP systems out there. Some require more work on your end. Some are going to give you a lot more hand-holding and have really good reviews for taking care of people. There's Nextiva, which I always found had really aggressive sales tactics, but they had really high ratings.
[00:15:27] There's, um, Jive, which has really great ratings for a long time. And maybe still is number one because their customer service level is top-notch. It would really hold your hand. I didn't find they had really aggressive, annoying salespeople. And so I really liked them and they would walk people through it.
[00:15:45] And then there's RingCentral, which gives you a lot of features and benefits. they're, they're affordable, but still it's a lot more expensive than something like TalkRoute. And so TalkRoute is the winner for us because we're a virtual company. And I think any companies where you have a lot of team members on the go, everybody has cell phones, they're on the move. TalkRoute would be a great system for most property management businesses. So that is my recommendation. So nobody has to ask me about phone systems anymore. I can say, watch my episode on phone systems and protecting your cell phone number as a property manager. That is this episode.
[00:16:21] So, anyway, if you're struggling to grow your business, you are wanting to implement best practices.
[00:16:27] You're wanting to set up a business that's scalable. You want to be adding doors quickly and easily. Instead of losing doors right now, due to the sell-off that's happening, our clients are adding doors. Clients are showing up on Wednesday calls and they’re– our growth call and they're celebrating, sharing their wins.
[00:16:43] And a lot of them are only investing a part-time level of hours a week towards growth. That's it, like, my bare minimum requirement if you want to join this program is you have to be willing to block out at least 10 hours to grow your business. That's basically two hours a day. It'll take you less time doing the strategies I give you than it would take to follow up if I gave you a bunch of leads. If I gave you a bunch of leads, that would be terrible because it takes a lot of time. These are cold. You'd have to nurture them and you'll spend far more than just 10 hours a week. If I even gave you 10 leads, a follow-up in time to nurture and you probably only get one deal a week.
[00:17:21] My clients are adding multiple doors very quickly. And the bare minimum that I tell them is just do two hours a day. It's 10 hours a week using the strategies that give you to grow. And it's really effective. yeah. So anyway, reach out. If you're interested in growing and scaling your business, if you're a larger company, I love working with those.
[00:17:42] If you are in the two to 400 door range, what I call the “second sand trap.” You're trapped. You're stuck. You feel like you're the biggest bottleneck in the business. You wish just everybody would just be smart enough to do everything on your team and you're frustrated. You are the problem. I know that's the sad news.
[00:17:58] So let me help you figure out how you can become the entrepreneur that has the business of your dreams and the team of your dreams so that you can trust them. You probably have a cultural mismatch. You probably have, maybe people that know how to do a job and follow a task, but you don't trust them. You don't trust them because you don't have the right cultural foundation in your business. You don't have believers. You don't have people that you can trust to do things the way that you would do them, which is why you haven't given them more or handed things off to them or relegated or delegated or given up your decision-making in certain areas of the business. And you're holding onto it too tightly.
[00:18:33] I will teach you how you can offload those pieces, let go of those things and trust people to run your business-- pieces of your business for you, especially the areas that they would be better at than you. Because you don't really enjoy those pieces. And then we can get you closer and closer in alignment towards those four reasons so you really love your business. So
[00:18:51] if you're dealing with that, we can also help you with that in our DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind. And so reach out, chat with us. I'd love to help you grow your business. And we're making some big changes right now. DoorGrow is just really exciting and we're going to be, we're improving our programs that we're constantly improving, but we're making some big changes to them.
[00:19:13] And clients are getting even faster momentum. And if you'd love to be part of that, you want to have a coach in your corner, you want to feel like you're not all on your own, you want to feel like it's not just you against the world and trying to get your business going, and you feel stuck. If you want some support, reach out, we'd be happy to help you. This is what we do. We love helping our clients succeed and win here at DoorGrow. So reach out and you can find us at doorgrow.com or reach out to us on any social media. Just search for DoorGrow. You'll find us. Anyway, that's it for today. So make sure you get a really good phone system in place to insulate and protect yourself and present a very presentable professional image.
[00:19:53] And until next time to our mutual growth. Bye, everyone.
[00:19:57] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the #DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC pay per lead content, social, direct mail, and they still struggle to grow! At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge, getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog at doorgrow.com. And to get notified of future events and news, subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow hacking your business and your life.
Take a look at your portfolio, investors, who you're targeting, and methods used to find out how they line up with the 4 Ds to revenue in property management—deals, doors, duration, and dollars. The 4 Ds is a framework/concept that helps you figure out how to grow your business and improve it. Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull talks about the 4 doors (or numbers) that equal the gross revenue of your company when multiplied by each other.
[02:19] Why the 4 Ds are so important in your property management business.
[02:43] 4 Ds to Revenue: What are they?
[02:47] Deals: How many deals are you getting on?
[03:15] Doors per deal: How many investors are you getting that have 2 or more doors?
[04:20] Duration: How long can you keep them as a client? Connects to lifetime value.
[05:45] Dollars: Money is needed to generate revenue. Revamp pricing structure/model.
[08:00] Identify Ideal Prospects: What would their situation look like regarding the 4 Ds?
“We need some money in this equation. Otherwise, it's not going to equal revenue.”
“You want to make sure you're getting paid really well.”
“Price sensitivity is created artificially by my clients. They don't realize they're creating it and how.”
“Colder leads are going to have a much higher price sensitivity than warmer leads.”
Welcome, DoorGrow Hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, help others impact lives, and you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings.
Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it, you think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high-trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses and business owners. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.
I had a hard time coming up with what to talk about today. We just had Christmas and New Year's is coming up. We're sort of in this time period where I think for a lot of business owners, we tend to start focusing on our business because we've got a little bit of downtime, a little bit of free time, and some quiet moments maybe. Then we're also spending a lot of time focused on family and spending time with family.
One of the things I wanted to talk about today is what I call the Four Ds to Revenue in Property Management. I also sometimes call this the Four Doors to Revenue and sometimes visually, we'll showcase four doors when I'm explaining this, or coaching clients on this, or teaching this. The Four Ds to Revenue is really four numbers that when multiplied by each other, equal the gross revenue of your company.
Just to drive this home with multiplication, each number is so important that if any one of these four numbers—metrics-wise—in your business is zero, you make $0. That's how important they are. If you move any one of these numbers, if they're a one, for example, and you move it to a two and you double it, you double your revenue. That's how important multiplication can be in generating revenue in your business.
Let's go through these Four Ds to Revenue. The first D is Deals. In looking at the revenue of your company and trying to grow your business, you want to get on clients that are bringing to the table multiple deals or deals on the regular, and you need to calculate how many deals we're getting on roughly right now. That would be some sort of number. You're getting on a certain number of deals.
The next number, the next D would be Doors per deal. The reason I separate this is a lot of clients, especially in single-family residential property management, equate these things to the same thing. They're like I get on a deal, it's a door. Now that second D, to separate that out is important. That second deal of doors means doors per deal. If you move the needle on this just from like a one to a two, you double your revenue.
For example, this could mean that you're getting on more investors that have two or more doors on average. Maybe your average moves from a one to a two, or maybe to a four. That can be a significant multiplier in your business. If you're getting on clients that are bringing on lots of deals or doing lots of real estate deals, they have multiple doors, and maybe each of their doors or each of their deals has multiple doors, then these numbers tend to add up quickly.
The third D is Duration. This is how long can you keep them as a client. This connects heavily to lifetime value. There is a 10 times difference, for example, between an accidental investor that's only going to stick with you for a year and a 10-year buy and hold. There's a 10 times difference. If somebody is going to keep their deals and the rental properties in place for a decade, that's massive.
Where I see a lot of property managers really struggling in terms of growth is that they have so much attrition that they have to replace almost every door that they get on every year, or at least half. If half of your portfolio are accidental investors, for example, or one-year shorter term that they're not going to stick with you, then you're going to have trouble growing your business because you have to replace all of those doors every year.
I've seen clients have is a majority of their portfolio when they came to us, were these accidental investors that couldn't just sell the property and they decided to rent it out just for a year until they could get it sold. Or they might have half their portfolio as this, but even still, usually the number of doors they're adding every year equates the number of doors they're losing every year and, so they end up not growing.
The last D is Dollars. We need some money in this equation, otherwise, it's not going to equal revenue. The last D is dollars and what's important to note there is you want to make sure you're getting paid really well.
One of the things I do with every client that comes through our program at some point or another, usually is to revamp their entire pricing structure and their pricing model. Most property managers only have one major fee that they charge, it's one sort of percentage, something typically like 10% or something like that in lower-end markets. In higher-end markets, it might be maybe 6%, or something along these lines, 7%, 8%, whatever.
Or they'll have a flat fee like $99 or $79 in really low rent areas where it's really tight. They'll just have one major fee though. They might also have a lease-up fee for when getting the property rented out. That's pretty typical as well, but that's about it.
If that is the case for your business and you only have one option that clients can choose from when signing up, then you're leaving a lot of money on the table. There are probably a lot of other leaks in relation to pricing as well and then there are a lot of psychological hacks to decrease price sensitivity.
If you've ever been frustrated and dealt with a potential prospect that came to you and pushed back on the price—I'm sure this has happened to you—or they ask for a discount, a lot of times that price sensitivity is created artificially by my clients. They don't realize they're creating it and how. A lot of times it's created artificially by their acquisition source, so how they're getting these leads. Colder leads are going to have a much higher price sensitivity than warmer leads.
If you want to reduce the number of people that are asking for discounts, or eliminate your temptation to fold on your pricing, cave on your pricing, and give in order to get business, my clients don't have to do that. You need to be more effective with your pricing. Dollars is really significant as well.
If we take all four of these things together—this is a secret, this is one of the secrets in property management that I teach—if you work this backward, this will help you identify your ideal prospects. It takes just as much work to get on crappy clients, maybe more, than it does to get on good clients. If you want to sit down and figure out what's my ideal client, look at these Four Ds. What would their situation look like in relation to these?
Well, ideal client, right? If they're helping you maximize deals, that means they're probably bringing multiple deals to the table, they're doing real estate deals on the regular, they are an investor, they want to do more deals in the future. Doors, they probably have multiple doors, maybe each deal they do has multiple doors, multiple doors per deal. The doors metric is high.
Duration. They are in it for the long game. They want to invest. They want to grow a portfolio, so their duration is lengthy or high. That's a high metric.
Then dollars. That means they're willing to spend money with you to make sure things are taken care of. They're not the cheapos that exist out there. They're not so price-sensitive. They want a better experience and maybe they're more of a premium type of buyer. These would be your ideal prospects.
This is one of the tools I go over with clients to help them recognize who are your ideal customers. What would they look like? Then we can work backward and figure out how do we connect with these people? What resources do they currently have? Who would be good referral partners that connect us to these people? That might already get some wheels turning.
Take a look at your portfolio, take a look at your investors, and take a look at who you're targeting and the methods you're using to target new clientele and get new business on, and see how it lines up with the Four Ds to Revenue—deals, doors, duration, and dollars. These are the four doors that you need to open to make the magic happen in order to grow your business and identify and attract really great clientele.
If you have any questions about this, feel free to comment or hit us up inside our Facebook group at doorgrowclub.com or reach out to us by going to doorgrow.com. We'd be happy to help you grow your business and maybe sit down with your team, as you're planning out things here at the end of the year.
It's almost New Year’s here as I'm recording this. I just want to let everybody know I really am grateful for our clients and grateful this holiday season for those that spend their money with us, that have allowed us to help them increase the amount of money that they're making. It's really exciting for me to show up each week on the group coaching calls that we do as a mastermind group and see clients winning and sharing their success, talking about the doors they're adding, talking about how they're closing more deals at a higher price point, talk about how they're no longer offering discounts and how they're establishing themselves as an authority and as an expert and that these clients are willing to spend and pay more money.
I love this. This is so rewarding for me. I really enjoy getting into what I do and I'm really honored and grateful that I get to do this. Those of my clients who are listening, I really appreciate you and I'm grateful for you.
Anyway, for everybody else, I appreciate you listening to this show as well and I hope that the Four Ds to Revenue is a helpful framework or concept to help you figure out how to grow your business and improve it. And that's it for today. Happy New Year, everybody. Until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye, everybody.
What can property managers, entrepreneurs, and business owners say or do when leaving a voicemail to ultimately get somebody to return their call? Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull talks about doing and saying less to add more doors. Property managers need to work at finding opportunities and setting effective boundaries to get referrals and grow results.
[01:46] Onboarding: Revamping roadmap help clients add more doors.
[02:06] No Distractions: Stay focused and do the most important actions to add doors.
[02:41] Check-ins: Clients are still getting amazing results by setting more boundaries.
[03:03] Deciding Factor: Outbound referral partner program is a competitive advantage.
[05:29] Promotions/Opportunities: Follow criteria, attend trainings, show up, rebrand.
[06:11] Nextdoor: Pay attention to hub as a review channel and lead generation source.
[07:08] Sales Assistant/BDM Role: Hire person who will speed up the amount of deals.
[09:13] Existing Customers: Now—in real time—is the right time to target your clientele.
[09:35] Vanity Metrics: Make numbers as big as possible to highlight benefits/results.
[11:21] Voicemail: How to leave ultimate message to get somebody to return your call.
[13:09] Most Effective Messages: Leave only name/number and be emotionally honest.
“Doing less is more.”
“There is a link that you can publicly access through the web, where somebody can go to leave your review on Nextdoor, then yes, we can put that link into GatherKudos.”
“Anything that's been sitting on your to do list for too long is an indicator that you're not the person that should be doing that thing.”
“Sometimes, a little bit of mystery is more enticing and more attractive.”
Sign up for Talkroute
DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind
Welcome, DoorGrow Hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others impact lives, you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, the daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings.
Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses and their owners
We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.
I was on my coaching call today. It was a great call. I love these calls. It ran longer than the normal call because I give a little bit of leeway of about a half hour after our coaching group call to just make sure that I'm taking care of clients, anybody else that wants to check in, anyone that's stuck or has questions as we go through. We have a pretty good group on our Wednesday call.
I love hearing clients that are doing the work, doing stuff. We're starting to revamp our onboarding. We just revamped our Grow program, our roadmap for how we help clients add more doors to make it even more effective. One of the things I'm noticing from that is doing less is more.
We're actually taking things out of that program so that property managers will stay more focused. These entrepreneurs will stay more focused on doing the most important actions that they need to do in order to add doors. Removing any rabbit holes or tangents out of the program that might distract them or get them focused on the wrong things, which is very tempting for business owners. We've made it even more effective and I'm really excited about it. I went over the changes with everybody.
That being said, clients—even with the old roadmap—are still getting amazing results, and we had some great check-ins today. Clients that are setting more effective boundaries, with potential clients being willing to walk away, they're actually attracting more business because of that. Clients that are focusing on our referral programs so they're creating more referrals, and how other real estate agents that also did property management, were not able to get the deals.
One of our clients said that they were one of four or five companies that a potential client was vetting. He told this client like, hey, basically set some boundaries and told them, I'm not going to do things your way and if you're interested in doing things our way, then we're here for you and you can work with us.
Surprisingly, they chose him and I want to ask, what was then the deciding factor why they chose you out of four or five different companies? He said the one big competitive advantage that he had is that he had this outbound referral partner program with the agent, and this person's agent was kind of the deciding factor.
People trust the real estate agent. These investors trust the real estate agent. They're not going to want to connect to you or talk well or make a relationship happen between themselves, their client, and a property manager that also does real estate because it doesn't feel safe.
My client also does real estate, but we've recently rebranded his company as a property management company, new logo, new website. This new perception allows people like this real estate agent that wants to protect her relationship with a client allowed her to feel safe, and allowed him to be the one that the client and the real estate agent both felt safe with, and he was selected. So because of that and because of setting boundaries.
Another cool thing is this client got an opportunity. Because he is no longer branded as a real estate company, which is one of the key things we do with a lot of clients is help rebrand and get them so they don't look like a real estate company so they can get more referrals, he with his new brand and his new website, a friend of his who runs the entire real estate association in the greater metro area that he covers, said that you are going to be our preferred partner for his business. He's going to be their preferred partner.
He's going to announce this at this black tie event at a real estate event. He's going to promote him, allow him to have a table there, and he's going to push this property management company of my clients as they go to that everybody, every real estate broker agent should be using for referring out to for property management.
That is a massive opportunity and that opportunity wouldn't have been available unless he had built out a really effective partner program based on the criteria that I teach in our referral secrets training, and been showing up to the calls, and gone through our C program process of rebranding. Awesome, awesome wins for that client. John, you know who you are, when you listen to this, kudos to you and all that you've done. I appreciate you. That's super awesome.
Another thing that came up during today's coaching call, there were other clients sharing wins, which was awesome, but one little tidbit that was really interesting is one of our clients pointed out that he's getting some decent results from next door. I wanted to point this out to listeners of podcasts. You may want to start paying attention to next door as a review channel and as a lead generation source.
He just goes on next door monitors and every now and then, he sees people on next door, the social network, posting in the neighborhoods and communities that he's active on saying, does anybody know of a property manager? Does anybody have a property manager? He then is responsive to those in that's getting him some business.
We then talked about adding next door to his review funnel, which is gatherkudos.com, which is a service we provide, and whether or not that was possible. Basically, the answer was if there is a link that you can publicly access through the web, where somebody can go to leave your review next door, then yes, we can put that link into GatherKudos.
Another client just hired somebody to step into almost a BDM role, but first, initially, as a sales assistant. This gal was very outgoing, showed up on the call, and charismatic. My client that I'm working with is not that personality type, so this is going to be a really awesome game for her. I told them to just get a sales assistant in place. This is going to speed up the amount of deals and opportunities. Maybe eventually, this client will graduate this new sales assistant to a full-fledged BDM role, which would be fantastic.
I think they would be able to add a lot more doors because the client I'm working with is more of an operations and operator personality–type, more of an introvert. The comfort level of this team member that she brought on, came on the call and she was just introducing herself, and chatting, and most people are quiet and waiting until it's their turn. She was really comfortable checking in and communicating, and she'll be great in this sales assistant/BDM role, which is exciting.
It goes back to what I've said several times in the past. If you're not the person that should be doing or anything that's been sitting on your to-do list for too long, is an indicator that you're not the person that should be doing that thing. If you're avoiding it, there's too much friction. If you have so many questions about it and you're not just taking action on something, you might not be the person that should do it.
A lot of business owners think I have to do this, I've got to learn this. I've got to figure out how to do this, even though it's really uncomfortable. As a business owner, you don't really have to be the one that does the things you really don't enjoy doing, at least not in the long run. So those were some wins.
The other cool thing we talked about on today's call was about targeting your existing clients. It's the holiday season right now. It's Christmas. I don't know when this will actually be released as an episode, but for those that are watching the live recordings or the live calls that I'm doing—I'm doing this in real time—now is a great time to target your existing clientele.
There's always some low-hanging fruit. There's definitely some gold inside your portfolio of people that would be willing to get into an additional investment, or additional properties, or maybe have some referrals they can offer you, know some friends that are investors that they're retired. You could reach out to them and point out all of the vanity metrics.
Vanity metrics are where you take numbers and you make them as big as possible by coupling them all together. For example, you can reach out to an owner and say, hey, owner, I wanted to check in with you, just let you know how things are going. Over the last year, we've collected X number of dollars in rent for payouts to you. We have done X number of maintenance requests. We've been doing all these vanity metrics, these big metrics. We've done this many in aggregate over the years of you being with us. This is how much rent we've collected. This is how much we paid out to you. This is how many maintenance requests we've dealt with that you didn't have to.
It helps the invisible to become visible, so they can see what you've been doing for them, to see that there's been a benefit and there's a result, and you're highlighting this and pointing it out. That's a great time to then say, hey, would you be willing to give us a review and ask for feedback? How do you think we've been doing as you pointed out? Then they'd be likely to give you a review if you ask, you might be able to get a referral, you might be able to ask, hey, what are your long term goals? Are you wanting to get into another investment? Cool, let's get you connected to a real estate agent and get this going.
If you're a real estate agent, then cool, you have another deal (maybe) in the works. Capture that low-hanging fruit, reach out to people, and show a little care. You have an excuse. Hey, it's the end of the year. I wanted to assess things and where they're at. Or it's Merry Christmas or whatever you want to do. These are some awesome opportunities that we were chatting about on our call today.
Now, the point of today's call. One question that I keep getting asked—I want to put this out on the podcast; this is that the point of today's episode—is voicemails. I get asked this a lot. My clients are making calls to potential clients, potential referral partners doing outreach. One of the things they get is they get voicemails a lot of times. How do you deal with voicemail? What am I supposed to do with a voicemail?
What's the most effective thing? What should I say? I don't know if what I'm saying is right. When I'm working, a lot of times we tend to overthink it. Here's my response on how to leave the ultimate voicemail that's going to do the primary goal and get somebody to call you back.
This is not what you might expect. Let's talk about what could be effective. You could call up and say, hey, this is so and so, and I'm interested in managing property or I'm interested in creating a referral relationship with you. If you're going to go that really obvious direct route, then you might want to mention a story or a result really quickly.
For example, in my business, we would reach out. We did some calling and we said, hey, we helped one of our clients in the last year to add 200 doors. If that's something you might want as a result, give me a call back, I'd love to chat about that with you and see if we might be able to help you do something similar.
Mention some sort of result that they might be interested in, depending on the target of who you're going after. If it's an investor, mention something you've done for an investor that's pretty impressive, that they might be interested in. If you want to offload this property and no longer be dealing with maintenance and stuff through the holidays, give us a call back. Give me a call back, this is my number.
That's obvious and can be effective. Now, here's what I find to be the most effective way to get people to call you back. You just don't tell them anything except your name and your phone number. I know. It's really simple. Here's how that might sound and then I'll tell you how to make this even more effective.
Hey, this is Jason. Hi, Fred. Give me a call back at blah-blah-blah-blah-blah, and you hang up. They're not going to know what it's about. They're going to be a little curious to give you a call back. Leaving voicemails is frustrating and you're just trying to sound so nice. So here's my plus one on this. Here's how to really maximize getting a return call on a voicemail. Be very emotionally honest.
Voicemails are frustrating for you. This is how I would leave voicemails, and I found I would get a high rate of callback. First thing you do is you sigh. You get the beep, and it's annoying, and you hate it, and you leave a bit, you let out a big sigh of frustration. Or even a groan or a moan. I know.
This is what this might sound like. We leave a message at the beep. Beep. Hey, Fred. This is Jason. Give me a call back. My number is da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. Click. They're going to listen to this and be like, oh, my gosh, obviously this person's a little frustrated. What's going on? Who is this? I don't even know what this is regarding.
They're going to call up and they're like, hi, yeah, is Jason there? We got your voicemail. Oh, hey, Fred, man, thanks for giving me a call back, man. I hate voicemails. You don't have to say that, but then you can start a conversation. Yeah, I was reaching out to see if we could build a referral program. I've got this really cool program going, blah-blah-blah or whatever you're trying to do with this person, and then you go into it. Now you have a real person you can communicate with and you've got them on the phone.
So there has to be a little bit of mystery. Sometimes, a little bit of mystery is more enticing and more attractive. Rather than giving them all the details, please leave me a message with the nature of your call, and the best times to reach you at, and blah-blah-blah. Sometimes, less is far more effective. You're getting them to play your game instead of playing the game they are telling you to leave. Do it their way in the voicemail.
Sometimes that works really, really well. Sometimes it doesn't. I've left voicemails and I'm like, hey, Fred, I'm trying to reach you. I've had a hard time getting a hold of you. Here's my number. Please give me a call back. Maybe I've called him three or four times. I can't reach this person. Sometimes I might even say, hey, I don't know if you're still alive. We've talked in the past. I'm having trouble reaching you. Hopefully, you're doing okay. I know you're busy, but give me a call back as soon as you get this.
These are honest voicemails. They say honesty is the best policy. I think when it comes to reaching out to clients and connecting with people, being really real and really honest sometimes inspires or creates a lot more curiosity, a lot more engagement, and helps you stand out from all the people that are all shiny, fluffy, and always trying to be so nice and smiley when they're making a phone call. When you're not being nice, which is a pleasing trait, when you're not trying to please people, you're often shifting into a state of power and they see you in a position of power. Like, oh, my gosh, this is the person I need to talk to.
Anyway, that is my real simple hack for leaving a really effective voicemail. Again, I had mentioned you can mention some results, you can mention a benefit of why, you could talk about something they might be able to give you back or that you might be able to give them, something you might be able to give them. If they call you, I'll help you with this or could do this or this. Potentially, a good thing could happen.
You could pre-frame them. Hey, give me a call back. Another effective strategy would be to say, give me a call back, I think you're really going to be excited about something I have to share with you. Just give me a call back, here's my number.
Try those out, try those strategies out. Let us know how it goes. You can comment inside the DoorGrow Club. Go to doorgrowclub.com, which is our Facebook group. If you're running into some issues or you're having some success with this, I'd love to hear about it from you guys. When I say guys, that's guys and gals, all y'all. Just say it like a Texan.
I appreciate everybody hanging out with me and listening to the show. Until next time to our mutual growth. I hope everybody, if you're watching this live, has a Merry Christmas, which is just coming up in a few days, and I hope you have a Happy New Year.
If you want to kick off your business this coming year, and you want to get out of that rut you've been in for the last two, three years, you want this next year not to look like last year, that's your default future. Your default future is this coming year is going to be similar, so the results you got in the last year, or the year before that, or the year before that. You know what your future looks like. You can pretty well guess.
If you want to create a different future with me, and with my team, and with DoorGrow, and have success like the clients I'm seeing on my coaching calls, and the clients that I'm working with, the 80+ businesses that we have in our mastermind, I want to help support you. I would be honored to be your trusted coach, mentor, advisor to help you scale and grow this thing.
I love doing this. It's a lot of fun for me to reach out. We would love to help you. Hopefully we're talking soon and you're my next great success story. Maybe I'm talking about you here on this podcast soon.
All right. Until next time, everyone, to our mutual growth. Bye, everybody.
What unscalable things are you doing, but none of your competitors are doing, to scale your property management business? Do the unscalable things because that’s the strategy that scales companies.
Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull talks about doing the unscalable to help your business grow. If you want to scale your business, do the unscalable things that nobody else is willing to do but what the customers want.
[02:25] Secret to Scale: Grow your business by doing the unscalable things.
[03:00] Real World Examples: Blanketing adverstising strategies, such as PPC, SEO.
[04:06] Top Strategies: Do unscalable things to grow and add doors via referrals.
[06:25] What is unscalable? Personal one-on-one interactions to make more money.
[06:50] Referral Results: Online reviews grow your business, reputation, retention rates.
[08:25] Opposite Direction: Build relationships and scale systems to get revenue results.
[13:15] Unscalable Things: What’s the least scalable thing you can do to add doors?
“The problem is that everybody is looking for the scalable solution.”
“It’s all about creating more depth and connection on a one-on-one individual basis with potential referral partners.”
“If you do warm, personal outreach, you’re going to create a lot more reviews.”
“Do the unscalable things, and that’s what scales companies.”
Welcome, DoorGrow Hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others impact lives, you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings.
Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.
For today's topic, what I wanted to talk with you about is doing the unscalable. A lot of times in businesses, everybody's looking for what's the scalable option, which means what's the shortcut? What's the hack? What's the fast way to do this so we can just do as little work as possible? How can we just hit a whole bunch of people? Here's how that tends to look. We do that in our advertising, we do that in marketing a lot of times.
A lot of people are trying to figure out, how can they create some sort of shortcut? Let's direct mail everybody. Let's see if we can just blanket text message everybody. Let's set up automation. A lot of people come to me and they're like, what's the secret? How are you helping your clients add 100, 200, or more doors in a year?
How are they growing right now because our company is down about 200 doors over previous years because all the owners are selling because the market's hot right now? They want to get out of these properties and cash out of their investment. But the problem is that everybody's looking for a scalable solution, and here's the secret. If you want to scale your business, do the unscalable things that nobody is doing.
If you want to stand out in the marketplace, do what nobody else is willing to do that the customers really want. If you want to scale your business in sales and improve sales, do the unscalable things that nobody else is willing to do. Instead of automation, go in the complete opposite direction. How can we have more depth and connection? Let's throw out some practical, real-world examples of this.
One example that I refer to a lot is a lot of people will try to grow their business through these blanketing strategies of advertising. They want to blanket the world and just spray and pray. So they'll use strategies like let's focus on pay per click, content marketing, or SEO. Why? Because these are the things they can throw money at and have somebody else maybe do for them, they hope.
The challenge is when you try and create a system where you think you're going to have a lot of leverage, hey, we'll just throw money at this problem, the challenge is, usually, you get more work in exchange. For example, those are all cold leads. Cold leads take a lot more time to deal with. They take more nurture, they take more follow up time, there's less trust involved.
If there's less trust involved and there's more follow-up time involved, then it's actually going to take more work. It's going to take more time. Advertising is expensive, so it costs more money. One of the things that our clients do, our top strategies for growing and adding doors is to do the unscalable things. For example, something that usually people try to do to grow the business is they go and get referrals from other people, from real estate agents, for example.
They try and just say, hey, if you ever run into somebody that needs property management, refer them to me. Here's the problem. The best prospects, the people that actually might need property management, most of them are not looking for property management. They're not going to go up to a real estate agent and say, hey, I need a property manager. That just doesn't happen.
Usually, by the time they do think they need a property manager, they're in a world of hurt, they’re in a crappy situation, something you won't even want to take on. Then you're getting the garbage, so then they're connecting you to the garbage that exists in the marketplace and the biggest problems. The best clients are people that don't even yet know they need property management, capturing them way earlier in the sales cycle before they become price-sensitive, and you're the first person they've heard of or talked to related to property management. Maybe that's a better idea.
You're closer, it's going to be a lot higher. There's a lot more trust in that relationship, and that's going to be more effective than doing cold leads and spending time prospecting directly to potential investors, for example, where the close rate is typically really low like maybe 1 out of 10 or worse. Why not create an outbound prospecting program towards real estate agents?
This is one of the things that we share in our program of how to make that really effective and how to create the right incentives so that people are actually referring business to you. Without going into too much detail, it's all about creating more depth and connection on a one-on-one individual basis with potential referral partners.
Other people are like, hey, I'm going to go present to a whole real estate morning office meeting, high leverage, lots of people, and you're going to talk to all these people in pitch, and then guess what happens? They're all looking at their phones, nobody thinks about you, and you never get a referral. But hey, you got to talk to a lot of people. It sounds very scalable, high leverage.
We want to focus on what is unscalable. That would be the personal one-on-one interactions with each of those agents. That would be the goal. I would love to meet with each of you individually, let's set up a time, and connect with them and create a deep, personal, and more intimate relationship and connection, that's where you make more money because it's the thing people are not willing to do.
Let's talk about online reviews, for example, a great strategy for growing your business. A lot of people will just use something like tools like our GatherKudos tool, they'll use something like Birdeye, or some sort of system where their goal is like, hey, we'll just send out emails, text messages, or whatever. What I teach in our program, in our Training Reputation Secrets is if you do warm personal outreach, you're going to create a lot more reviews.
It's not scalable, but you get a much bigger result. Is it worth the time investment? Is it worth the additional staff and resources you might need to implement that strategy? Absolutely. And you will crush your competition. There's a lot of other stuff that I talk about in Referral Secrets of how to make that really effective, how you can set it up so it increases retention rates with your clients, et cetera.
The general principle in each of our most effective growth strategies is to do the unscalable things, and that's what scales companies. If you want to grow your business right now, take a look at what are you trying to do right now that is a scalable version, a scalable solution? Like you're trying to hit a lot of people through some sort of email newsletter where you got a list of thousands of people. Or are you trying to just go and throw out an advertisement on Facebook or Google ads where you're trying to just hit tons and tons of people and get lots of eyeballs?
What if you went in the complete opposite direction and you did something that was the most personal, the most intimate, the most connecting way of reaching out and creating relationships with people in order to achieve the same result? What if you went the complete opposite direction and then you started to build and scale your systems related to doing more of that? Which means hiring more people instead of more technology and automation.
I have a friend, one of my mentors. He has a business that does a lot in revenue—really, really big company. I believe they do like $100 million a year in their business. It's ridiculous. He has really savvy skills, is a really great marketer, great with technology, and yet, he could automate his whole sales process. He can't have a funnel, have videos, and all this stuff, yet he has a really large sales team. Why? Because that's what's most effective to get to that level of revenue.
He has a large sales team of setters and a large sales team of closers because it's the most effective. It's more effective than having a funnel, a video webinar, and trying to automate all this stuff. And you'll hear lots of people saying you're just one funnel away, you just need this marketing piece, if you just do a newsletter, or just do social media. These are all scalable solutions. They're scalable. You can get people in place, you can hit a lot of people really quickly.
Scalable solutions can be effective. Some of them can be effective. But in general, if your business isn't growing, I'm guessing you're already doing some of these "scalable things", but you're not doing the unscalable things. What are the unscalable things that none of your competitors are doing? Are they doing warm personal outreach with every new tenant and every new owner to get a review?
Are you doing warm personal outreach with every real estate agent, lender, handyman, attorney, lawyer, anyone that helps investors in your market to create a referral relationship and partnership with them? Probably not. That's not scalable. We don't want to do that. Let's go do advertising. And yet the companies that are doing advertising right now, they're usually spending about $300–-$5000 a month, and they're probably down about 200 doors over previous years.
If you have between 600–1000 doors, my guess is you've lost maybe about 200 over the last year because you're not doing the unscalable actions that are more intimate. So focus on greater depth and greater connection. That's really what property management is. It's a business of connection, depth, and relationships.
People are trying to turn it into a business of automation, technology, and tools. I do like technology, don't get me wrong. I do recommend that you use and create leverage where you can technologically, however, if you want the biggest result when it comes to getting referrals, with getting reviews, with getting on more deals, the more personal approach and the more depth is going to be the most effective strategy, and nobody else is doing it.
This allows you to create market share while everybody else is fighting over this red bloody water where everybody's trying to spray and pray and hope they're going to get some sort of return on their advertising dollars. Stop falling prey to marketers that are just selling advertising. What I teach is to do the right actions and you will spend less time than you would dealing with cold leads, and it costs you $0.
I had a client today on our coaching call, a really cool guy, Michael Sullivan. He was talking about how he added eight properties in the last 24 hours. His phone is ringing, he said, constantly. And I said, how are you doing? He's just doing the strategy that I told him to do and doing this outbound method. I said, how many thousands of dollars in marketing have you spent to get on all these doors that you're adding right now?
He looked really confused because it was a loaded question. But he looked really confused and he was like, I don't understand what you're saying. And I said, you've spent $0 in advertising, correct? And he said, oh, yeah, $0. How many of you are spending $0 and you've added eight properties just in the last 24 hours and your business is growing really fast?
Another client showed up, he had added 13 doors. Another client showed up and said he added eight doors on that call. This is a weekly call, weekly check-in. How many doors have you added this week?
If you're not adding doors as quickly as you want to, and you don't trust me enough to come into my program and let us help you, that's cool, but start just focusing on what's the least scalable thing I could do. It's probably that thing you're avoiding. Maybe it's too personal, maybe it's uncomfortable, go do that thing. What you'll find is your business will start to grow really rapidly.
Anyway, if I can help you go faster, focus on the unscalable things in business. The reason I want to talk about this today is it keeps coming up for me. I get questions all the time. Even a client today is like, how do I leverage this list I have of 4000 emails. I've got this other list of this. Again, what I taught him was to figure out what's the least scalable thing you could do.
What everybody else would do is do a newsletter. He says, I'm doing a newsletter. How often? Every week. Cool, are you using a system to do that? Yes, MailChimp. Okay, cool. In MailChimp, what are your stats on the open rate? 10%. That's email, right? It's scalable, but it's really [...] results, 10% open rate? That means 90% are not even opening the email.
The challenge there is I said, cool, what if you took all of those email addresses of different either investors or real estate agents on your list and you send out a personal email to each individual one? You did like maybe 50 a day or whatever your email system, but you do it from your personal email account, not from an email system, and just reached out to them and said, hey, how are things going with your rental properties?
Hey, do you need anything from me today? Or hey, would you be interested in getting a call to find out how I could get you some more real estate commission because I have this cool new program? These kinds of things, like if it was to a potential referral partner. Give them a Calendly link or something to schedule with you and that sort of thing. That's the kind of conversation. How can you take this thing you're trying to do that's not really working, but it's very scalable and do the unscalable thing?
Even if it's a little bit of that, you're going to get a much bigger return on that time investment, and you don't have to spend a whole bunch of time drafting up a big newsletter. Just do a little bit of outreach with a really short one-sentence email and you may start getting some real responses and initiate some conversations.
It keeps going back to this. My own mentors, every method that I tend to hear or see that works, it's always going back to what's the least scalable thing. It's not, how can I do this with less people? It's, how can I do this with more? You can sometimes double your close rate like I talked about on a previous podcast episode, just by getting a setter involved. That's adding more people.
Having a setter and a closer increases the conversion rates and increases the close rates, even though it's more people and you're spending more money on staff. But a lot of people are looking for a way, how can I decrease the need to talk to people or how can I systemize this or how can I automate it or leverage technology?
I hope this was a helpful conversation. Do the unscalable things. The unscalable things are where you show care. It's where you invest in people. It's where you're human. It's where you love people. This is where you build relationships.
I think it was Grant Cardone, he said, "The difference between a contract and a contact is the R, and that's relationships." Focus on making relationships and you're going to get a lot more contracts. This is what most business owners and businesses are unwilling to do. If you do it, you're going to have results that other businesses are unable to achieve. That's my message for today.
I hope this is helpful for those of you. If you want a little bit more help, if you want some accountability, if you want some new ideas, if you want to inject some life into your business, reach out to DoorGrow. We'd be glad to help you. This is my passion. This is what I love to do. I love coaching and supporting clients and helping them grow their companies.
My goal is to turn you into the entrepreneur that can have the business of your dreams. If you don't have the business of your dreams right now, one of my mentors would say, you're not yet the person that can run it yet. So let's turn you into that person. Reach out to us, check us out at doorgrow.com, or join our Facebook group doorgrowclub.com. We'll get you to our community and that's it. Until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye, everyone.
Business owners and entrepreneurs make mistakes and take risks that other people are unwilling to do. However, they learn from them because nobody’s perfect!
Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull talks about one of the biggest mistakes he made in his business. He calls it his $2 million mistake, although it was probably even bigger.
[01:37] Validation: Everyone makes mistakes, even entrepreneurs are human.
[02:20] Growing Company: Be super cautious and picky when selecting clients.
[03:23] Start Small, Not Big: Conference idea requires everything a business requires.
[06:54] Lesson Learned: Big deal turned out to be a $2-million or more mistake.
[08:27] Results: Clients got the best results, but a lot of team members left business.
[09:08] Change to Grow: Focus on clients, not sales, marketing, website, or branding.
[11:00] Dilemma: What should I do? Something new? Expand? Go after shiny objects?
[11:30] Premature Problems: Why expand business into new niches, markets, or areas?
[12:29] Hand Holding: Some people are not willing to put in the effort or do the work.
[15:16] 3 Commitments: 1 hour for strategy, 2 hours to implement tactics, and show up.
[17:45] Coaching Calls: Clients access calendar to work through problems, challenges.
“I recommend you to be very picky about the clients that you take on.”
“We weren't able to focus on the main thing, which is our customer and which is our product.”
“I have fired clients. I have just refunded clients. We've let clients go. Some just quit.”
“The lessons end up always being worth the risk. So, take a risk, invest in yourself, invest in your business.”
Welcome, DoorGrow Hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others impact lives, you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings.
Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it, you think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses and business owners. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.
For today's show, I wanted to talk with all of you about what's been going on at DoorGrow. Over the years, I've made some big mistakes in business like most business owners, this is part of how we learn. We take risks that other people are unwilling to take. One of the biggest mistakes that I made in my business was, I sometimes call my $2 million mistake, but it was probably even bigger of a mistake.
A lot of people probably would not tell you their mistakes in business. But one thing that I think is super validating as an entrepreneur is to hear about some of my mentors’ challenges and some of the mistakes that others that I have worked with that they have made, it makes me feel safe. It makes me feel like they're human, I'm human. It helps entrepreneurs also to see that you're not supposed to be perfect all the time. It's not always going to be great or perfect in business.
One of the big mistakes that I made is I had really great growth in my business. Things were going really well. We were bringing out a lot of clients. We had some clients getting great results. We had some clients not getting great results.
Usually, in most coaching programs, what I've learned is that about 20% will be bad clients. They're not going to do it, they're not going to take action, they're not going to get results. No matter how hard you try or how good you do, that's generally going to be the case if you're a growing company. If you're not a growing company, then you can be super cautious, super picky, and that sort of thing. But we are in high paced growth.
One challenging factor is we had some clients that were a bad fit, and over time, we were always trying to filter, be more careful, raise our pricing, and be pickier about the clients that we take on, which is what I recommend to all of you. I recommend you to be very picky about the clients that you take on. But we had great growth. I started working with the coach. We had 300% growth in a year.
We were really moving. Things were going really fast. Things were really good. There was a lot of momentum. I built out a really awesome team, it felt really exciting, and then I had this great idea that I thought would be a great idea. I had always had this dream of doing a conference.
So I came up with this idea to do this big conference. I didn't want it to be small. I was looking at all the other conferences that were going on. I saw what they did and this has to be next level. It's got to be as good as this.
Even my coach at the time was like, hey, do something small, just start small. I'm like, no way, I'm going big, I'm going to make this awesome. We're going to have the best food, Paleo food, and gluten-free options. Even the food was going to be really nice. We're going to do this really ritzy venue. We did it at this really nice hotel.
This conference cost us well over six figures. It was, I think, $150,000 or something like that all in we spent on this conference. That's not that bad if you're a business that's doing about a million in revenue, I guess that's okay as long as you make revenue from it, if you're just doing simple math. Anybody that's done a significant event knows how challenging these are to put together.
But here's the caveat to this or the challenge is we had 300% growth in the year. Then the year we decided to do a conference, we then had to shift all of our attention towards this conference. The thing that you don't realize when you launch a conference or you get on the hook for a conference is you have to get this venue and you're on the hook with the venue, which means you owe them money. You have a contract with them.
If you don't sell enough tickets and you don't sell enough people getting there, you're not going to get enough people into rooms, you're responsible for a certain group rate and amount of people, and there's this big expense. The other thing is they usually want that money upfront, a lot of it or in big chunks, and then there's this whole racket hotel. They are a monopoly on food.
They don't allow outside food vendors or outside food to be brought in. You have to pay thousands. I think we spent like $8000 or $9000 just for coffee—it's crazy—for two days, I think it was, three days. It just gets really crazy, and then they do things like some of these venues will charge by the plate.
Say it's like $50, $60, $80 a plate, but what they do is they go around. They pick up the plates, and then people go and get another plate to get another item or another food and they're charging you per plate. There are just little things that are a little bit shady in how that industry can work sometimes. I was completely blind to a lot of this stuff.
I was really nervous about putting it together, but here's the real problem. Launching a conference like this required sales. It required marketing, it required organization. It requires everything that a business requires. It's like starting a business.
We have this business that's doing really well. We're moving really fast. It's going really rapid, 300% growth in the year, hitting about a million in revenue. We hit a million in revenue and things were moving really fast. We probably could have continued that trajectory.
Things were really good. We had a really good team in place and everything and then decided to do this conference. That year, we had no growth. We stayed flat at about a million in revenue because we did the conference. So that's why I call it my $2 million mistake because we easily could generate probably $2 million more in revenue just that year. But we also stayed flat the year after and the year after as a result.
As a result, things got really crazy because we did this crazy conference, it took a massive amount of work. All of our time and attention had to shift towards that as a team, sales, marketing, everything because we were on the hook to make this work.
The conference went well and we had some great speakers. I got great feedback, but to me, it was massively stressful. I wasn't really able to enjoy it. I have kind of an introverted side to me. It wasn't quite the dream that I thought it would be, but I'm glad that I did it as a learning experience. It was $2 million tuition for this learning opportunity.
Maybe, if I really did some math, maybe it was a $10 million mistake, hindsight being 2020. Not only that, but by shifting our focus towards this conference and so much attention having to be placed on it, we weren't able to focus on the main thing, which is our customer and which is our product. So I had to shift out of some of the coaching stuff that I was doing. We tried to go more towards just getting people to move through the program and follow the material. We had people that weren't getting as good of results.
Really, that's the piece that I enjoy the most, the one-on-one personal depth and interactions and coaching clients. Those are always the clients that get the best results. We realized that. Now, we lost a lot of team members as a result. It took a while for us to get back in momentum.
I was working with a coach at the time. I got a lot of personal growth through that time period, so it was a good time period. It caused me to wake up to a lot of things in my life that were really challenging or frustrating. I ended up ending my marriage of 13 years also. This is in the last several years and becoming single again after like two decades.
There was just a lot, a lot of change, a lot of growth. Now we're getting back into a nice growth mode in the business and I've got some really good team members building up our team back up. My focus is really just on clients. I'm not even doing sales anymore. I'm not having to do the marketing stuff. I'm not doing any of the website stuff, branding stuff.
I really just get to focus on coaching clients, which is really what I enjoy. It's the fun part for me. So I built this awesome team. What's interesting is due to these painful situations, the COVID, and all these things which were causing cash crunches or constraints, it forced us to tighten the business up.
My team is smaller than it's ever been. We're more effective than we've ever been, and our product offering is better than it's ever been. We're able to deliver more value than we've ever been able to deliver at a much lower price point. Overall, these things made us, these difficult situations, these problems, and these challenges like a conference and team members quitting and leaving as a result of, then financial challenges in the business, and divorce.
These kinds of things are the refiner’s fire that improves us as human beings if we allow it, and improves our businesses if we allow it. Now, I'm not saying you're going to go jump into problems. I'm not saying that that's a good idea either. But I am grateful for the lessons and I'm grateful to have learned those things that I've learned. I wouldn't give up those lessons in hindsight. It enables me to have conversations with clients.
This is a common entrepreneurial dilemma. Should I do this new thing? Should I expand into this thing? Should I do this cool, new idea? Should I go after the shiny object? I have this really powerful story that I get to share with clients and say, look, let me tell you about my $2 million mistake, why the main thing always needs to stay being the main thing, why focus equals power in your business, and why your attention shouldn't be diluted.
Some of the concepts that I teach and some of the ideas like premature expansion, a lot of property managers prematurely want to expand their business into new niches, new markets, or new areas. They do that prematurely, they're not really ready to do that, and they just dilute their focus, which dilutes their potency and their ability to grow and scale, for example.
There's a lot of lessons that came out of this. Personally, business-wise, that came as a result of that. There were clients that went through our processes and came on board as clients during some of these challenging time periods. We had some that got phenomenal results.
We had some great success stories, clients that just did what we told them to do, but not every client is like that. Not every client will just watch all your videos, show up to every call, invest all the time that you tell them to do, and do the work. Most need a lot more hand-holding, I've realized.
We weren't able to really hold people's hands very effectively during that. So there were people that sort of fell through the cracks, and I felt bad about that. Some became very vocal about me and my business online. But the most vocal people, ironically, that are negative about DoorGrow and about me are people that have never worked with me in a lot of instances.
They love hearing that the decision they made to never work with me is so validated by the few [...] clients that really don't like us, that didn't get a good result, or didn't put in the effort and didn't do the work. As a property manager, you're going to have these situations too. You're going to have an owner that you shouldn't have taken on. You didn't realize it.
Maybe you had pretty good qualifications and you qualified them during the sales process, but they still made their way into your business. Unbeknownst to you, maybe they're wolves in sheep's clothing or whatever, but you realized it and you fired them. I have fired clients. I have just refunded clients. We've let clients go. Some just quit.
That is a situation that comes up, and so we've gotten much better over the years at qualifying clients. We have an application people fill out just to work with us to make sure that we can help them. We're looking for certain qualities and we make them jump through some serious hoops. We give out.
We give away a two-hour training currently called The Seven Frameworks for Growth or DoorGrow Secrets that we give out of free material teaching a lot of my frameworks and the secrets that I love to share with clients. I just give that away because I know if the right people will go through this and they'll see value in it, and the wrong people will go through this and they won't find it valuable. So they sell filters, or they just won't even invest the time to do that because it's kind of a prerequisite.
If they're not willing to watch all that and do that, they're not going to really watch all the material, take action, and do the things that we tell them to do in the program either because they're lazy, so they're not going to get the result. There have been zero clients that I've had that have actually done what I've told them to do that have not won and gotten results and benefited from the program.
The one quality or one characteristic that I have to have in a client if they're going to get a result is that they're willing to do the work and take action. So now, in our program, just to become a client, not only do they have to watch a two-hour training, they have to fill out an application. We also have a requirement I call the three commitments.
This is something that I would recommend that you implement in your own business. But we have this framework we call the three commitments. The three things they have to commit to in order for us to guarantee that they're going to get results, and we offer a guarantee. If you are willing to spend one hour being a business owner of your business, this is the first commitment.
One hour of strategic time means you actually operate like a business owner. Not doing all the tactical stuff, which a team member or an employee could do—emailing, calling, or whatever. Strategic stuff: planning, scheming, watching the material that we have in DoorGrow Academy. This needs to be done early in the morning before work, before you start your day, before kids, before pets, and before your day runs away from you.
You need some quiet time for strategic time, the best time, after you've had a good night's rest and your brain is full of all the brain decision-making chemicals that it needs to think strategic time. Give you the best time. The king or queen needs it first. Otherwise, you'll always have a starving kingdom, I like to say.
The second commitment that's required is to be willing to dedicate at least two hours each workday, five days a week towards implementing tactically the strategies and tactics that I give you. Doing the work, making the calls, outreach, dialing in operations, or whatever is the big challenge that we're solving or working on.
Really, that just means, for people that want to grow that are on the growth path, because we have three different paths in our program, that means that just being a part-time salesperson for 10 hours a week. I mean, that's really a [...] salesperson. That's it. Just at least do that. Ten hours minimum a week. Track your time, be accountable, check in on our weekly check-in, and let us know how many hours you've done and at least do 10. That's it.
Third commitment is to show up to the weekly coaching call. I find that clients that don't show up to the call don't have any pressure, they're not accountable. I can't coach them. I can't check in with them on how they're doing. I can't redirect them away from some of the things they might be thinking, doing, or that are holding them back. I can't really coach them if they're not reachable by me.
Those are the three commitments. Now we give them even more support than that. We have a Telegram group. I give all my clients access to my calendar to schedule one-on-one calls. This is all I do now is coach. They can schedule one-on-one calls with me.
We work through problems, challenges, objections, things they're dealing with, or whatever, to make sure that they're in momentum and moving forward. How does that apply to your business? Could you have maybe three commitments and could you also keep your focus as I talked about on your main thing a little bit more? These are just some things that I wanted to share just in my struggles as a business owner and in my journey in developing my business.
If you are one of those clients that struggled in the past, you worked with us, you didn't get a great result, I'm perfectly willing to coach you for free. We'll do a 30-day trial between the two of us. If you're willing to commit to taking action, I'll coach you for free. We'll get you a result, and then at the end of that 30 days, we'll both have a conversation and it will be, yes, I want to do your program and I'll pay for your mastermind. I've been getting great results and I've been keeping the three commitments.
Or if you're not keeping those three commitments, then we'll part ways and I'll kick you out, but you'll probably choose that. You'll realize, hey, this isn't for me, I'm not really going to do this stuff.
We've got clients that are adding hundreds of doors to this program, and they're not spending any money on advertising. They're not having to deal with cold [...] leads, they're able to charge more money, the potential clients are less price-sensitive because we're capturing them earlier in the sales cycle. So I'm going to teach you how to do the unscalable things that actually scale your business. It's all about more depth, more personal connection, and creating more relationships, and we'll scale your business.
Most property management companies are losing doors right now. They're down. Mostly, the larger ones are down about 200 doors. A significant chunk of their portfolio is selling because the markets are high, investors are getting the itch, and they want to get out, sell, and make some money. They're cashing out.
Our clients are growing and they're adding doors. They're net positive. They're making money and building up residual income. They're not even spending money on advertising. That's my client. That's pretty powerful and it's true. It's working really well.
I'm going to teach you how to do unscalable things. SEO, Google ads, all that kind of stuff, that's scalable. It's something you can hand money and whatever. I'm going to teach you how to do the unscalable things that actually are really working in the marketplace right now to help you grow your business, so you can capture more businesses that are less price-sensitive, that are captured earlier in the sales cycle, and your close rate is infinitely higher with those warmer leads, and it is with cold leads through those other strategies.
We'll give you that free training that you can watch—our Seven Frameworks training. Just reach out, we're happy to give that to you and get you hopefully on as a client in our process. I don't know if there's anything else I should say about my $2 million mistake.
All of us as entrepreneurs are going to have experiences and challenges that we make a bad decision or business. Maybe you've never had one, but that probably means you're playing a game that's too small or you’re being too cautious. The lessons end up always being worth the risk.
So take a risk, invest in yourself, invest in your business, reach out if we can help you, and keep your business focused on your main thing, which is your property management business. Grow that thing and keep the focus tight. It's so tempting as an entrepreneur to be distracted and to go towards other things.
Let's start a roofing company. Let's start a pool cleaning company. Let's start a carpet cleaning company. Let's start a maintenance company.
There may be a place for these and maybe it will help you add some revenue. But in a lot of instances, adding more to the business ends up actually taking away from the main thing. So you have to get to the place where you've got a solid team that you can trust to make sure everything's running smoothly before you start to add additional pieces and start additional companies.
Anyway, that's it. I've had this on my agenda for a while to share my $2 million mistake. I just had other topics that were a lot more exciting for me to share, but I wanted to share this. If you have any questions, if you are a client that went through some of that stuff with us and you felt like you didn't get results, reach out to me. I want to make sure that we take care of you.
If you're bitter and upset and you're not open to that, then that's cool. Don't reach out. I know there's always some of those out there. The more successful we are, the more we attract. We build up a little group of haters because we've worked with thousands of clients, and I've talked to thousands of property managers.
We've got hundreds of clients right now. We've got 80 businesses in our mastermind right now, which is just crazy to me. It's really awesome. People are getting great results. Today's call was a really good call since I'm just kind of riffing and chatting here. I love hearing our clients get results. Yeah, it was a good call today.
Anyway, each week we start by sharing wins on our Grow call. Anyway, that's all I have today to share. Feel free to hit me up on social media if you want to check in with me. My username is @kingjasonhull. Happy to have a conversation because this is all I do.
I love coaching my clients. I really enjoy helping people grow and win in their businesses. If you want to know if I'm the real deal, set up a call with me. Let's chat.
I will say I'll point out that I'm in every property management group and every real estate group probably that exists on Facebook. There's a property management group that has a kind of a culture of negativity towards me and they don't like me, which is cool. It's not my group.
I chime in every now and then to try and be helpful. I'll admit, as a business owner, it hurts, just like it probably hurts you when you see an owner bad mouth your business or whatever. But when I see a past client maybe that really I didn't even know or they didn't really talk to me, they didn't show up to the calls, they didn't really work with me, they didn't really take action, they just signed up with us and hope the website would magically do the work for them for some reason, something like that, yeah, it hurts.
It hurts to see people complain. Especially, it's frustrating to see people that have never worked with me tell other people to work with businesses. I saw one guy mention like, somebody said, hey, should I work with DoorGrow? One of my past clients was like, yeah, we had a good experience, but he knows the culture there and was afraid of really saying too much like talking to them directly.
Then there were a bunch of people that were negative. One guy was like, hey, you, don't use them, use this other company. So I reached out to this guy directly and I said, hey, what was your experience with that other company? I'm always looking for ways to benefit my clients and they're like, oh, I've never worked with them, but the people seemed cool there.
I was like, okay, so you've never worked with me. You've never worked with this other company either, but you're telling people not to work with me and to work with this other company. To me, that is a massive lack of integrity. I'm not going to recommend somebody go do something or work with something unless they've done that themselves or gotten a lot of feedback from other clients or people that have done this so that I can share that, but that's just me.
Anyway, that made me sad. That's part of the challenge we have to deal with as business owners. You're going to have some haters and you just do what you can. That sort of inspired this episode. I hope this was helpful. I hope hearing my situation was helpful.
I hope you stay focused on the main thing and you win in business and life. If I can support you in any way, reach out. Anyway, until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye, everyone.
What is the secret code to powerful communication? Be real, get raw, and stay relevant with a ruthless commitment to get results.
Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull talks about how to deal with uncomfortable conversations In property management.
[02:10] Qualifying Questions: Do you feel uncomfortable and taken advantage of?
[03:05] Communication Code: Practice the four Rs - real, raw, relevant, and results.
[04:57] Step 1 - Real: Be honest. Tell the truth. Just don’t lie.
[06:02] Step 2 - Raw: Be vulnerable, which is powerful and not a weakness.
[07:35] Step 3 - Relevant: What matters to others, not what matters to you.
[08:49] Step 4 - Results: Know your and your communication targets’ wants and needs.
[12:41] Built-in Liar: Your brain tries to protect you from pain and problems.
“You have to tell the truth. Be honest.”
“There’s power in being vulnerable.”
“Stay relevant with a ruthless commitment to results.”
“What is your desired outcome?”
“We all have a built-in liar and that’s our brain. It’s always trying to help us avoid pain.”
Radical Honesty by Brad Blanton
The Power of Vulnerability by Brené Brown
Welcome, DoorGrow Hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others impact lives, you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings.
Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses and business owners. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win.
I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.
Today's topic, friends, we're going to be talking about a code of communication. During my weekly coaching call with clients today, a client got vulnerable and asked, how do you deal with an uncomfortable conversation?
The situation was this particular client of mine has a potential client that keeps calling him up and asking how they should do things. He really wants this person's doors. He really wants to get them on as a client. He's being nice. But now they're starting to say, hey, I really need a concrete vendor to do this and I need somebody.
He's being helpful and he's giving out some info. I know a lot of you listening are like, do not give out your vendors. I'm freaking out, but he doesn't want to give out anymore and he feels like he's being taken advantage of. Now I asked some qualifying questions. I said, how do you feel about this to get clarity on that? I'm guessing by bringing this up, did you feel taken advantage of? Do you feel like it's uncomfortable? His question was, how do I have this uncomfortable conversation, or how do I move them forward towards maybe becoming a client? It was kind of the question.
My feedback to my client is that you need to get really honest. When we get really vulnerable and honest, it allows other people to see that we're human beings, it allows us to have much more effective communications.
As I said, rather than tell you exactly what to say, let me share with you the principles because this is generally how I like to work. Because how he says it might be unique to him, but I said what you need to do is practice a code. I learned this years ago from a coach named Setema Gali Jr. He was part of a coaching program that I was part of. He was my coach.
I believe he's the first person that explained this to me. I've heard lots of coaches share this idea. I'm not sure where it originally got its start, but the idea is this code of communication called real, raw, relevant, and results. This is also connected to Wake Up Warrior and Garrett J. White. That's who Setema was working for at the time.
Setema, just let me tell you about this guy, a 300-pound Polynesian. He played for the New England Patriots. He has a Super Bowl ring, I believe, won a Super Bowl. He is a really big guy and a really powerful speaker. I really enjoyed working with him.
This concept I'm going to share with you is this code of communication that will improve your communication in your relationships personally. It'll improve communication between you and your potential clients. It helps you with challenging situations, challenging communication. This is the mode of how you should always approach communication. In general, this is a code for life. It's four R’s, four R words: real, raw, relevant, and results.
Let me explain this code of communication and we'll go through each of these four items. When you're communicating with somebody, the challenge is you need to be honest, and this particular client of mine had not yet been really honest with this potential client that he was speaking with about how he was feeling and what he was experiencing.
The very first thing is you have to tell the truth, be honest. That's a factual truth. This is the mental logical side of things. What you say should be factual, it should be truthful in your communication with somebody. That's step one. Just don't lie. If you're saying, oh, it's okay and it's not okay, you're lying. The very first thing is to honestly communicate, and that's just telling the truth. The first is real, be real. Be real with people. Just be real with people. Tell the truth.
Now the second is closely related. But not only is there logical, honest communication. There needs to be emotionally honest communication. This is where a lot of people fail in their communication. It's not fully honest because you're not really sharing how you feel about things. Logically, what you're saying may be true, but we're being dishonest if we're not honestly expressing how we feel about something emotionally.
The second R is raw. So be real, get raw. Most people don't want to get raw. This is what we call being vulnerable. There's power in being vulnerable. There are books written on this subject like Brene Brown, I believe, is her name. The Power of Vulnerability was a big TED Talk, YouTube videos, and whatever.
Getting vulnerable is a source of power. A lot of people see it as a weakness. But the most powerful person is the person who has the confidence to get the most raw with people and to be the most emotionally honest. It allows other people to feel safe being honest with you as well because it's at a deeper level.
The real thing is that they felt taken advantage of. That's factual, but expressing how that makes them feel would deepen that conversation like, hey, I feel uncomfortable. We've had lots of conversations, facts. I've helped given you some freebies and given you some access to some vendors that I use, facts. I'm feeling though, that I'm being taken advantage of. It makes me feel uncomfortable.
I run a business. I care about my clients. I want to take care of them. But then when I have somebody that is not paying me, asking for this information, and I'm helping them out, it makes me feel like whatever you feel. That's getting raw and expressing the honest emotional side of things.
The next is to stay relevant. Be real, get raw, stay relevant. Keeping things relevant is important. It's easy to start whining and sharing all your feelings about whatever's going on in your life, but they don't care about that. Whatever the conversation you're having—whether it's kids, spouse, potential clients, existing clients, tenants, whatever—it should be relevant to them.
If they don't care and it's irrelevant to them, they're not going to pay attention to it anyway. You're wasting your breath, you're wasting your time, and you're probably gossiping or emotionally manipulating. It's not relevant, so make sure it's relevant. The communication should be relevant to what the real situation is. It should be relevant to the feelings and thoughts that you're having around that thing that you're currently talking about, not other stuff.
It's one thing to just get really real and honest and go up to some random person or even a potential client and say, oh, yeah, how are things going? And you start blabbing your whole life story and problems to them. They don't care about that, it's not relevant. So make sure your communication is relevant.
Now the next is results. It's real, raw, relevant, and results. So be real, get raw, stay relevant with a ruthless commitment to results. If you are committed to results, that means you need to know what your communication targets, wants, and desires. You need to know what you want. You have to have that clarity. Otherwise, it's not going to be relevant. What you want are results. So if it's relevant, it's going to be focused ruthlessly on getting towards the result. What's the outcome? What is your desired outcome?
This is why on my Calendly link, it always asks the question, for appointment scheduling with me, what is your desired outcome? What's the outcome you're hoping for during this conversation? Maybe I can move towards that. What is your desired outcome?
If you're going into a conversation that's going to be uncomfortable, you need to be clear on what is true, what factually happened, what do you know for sure, how do you feel about that? You need to have that clarity of how you feel. You need to know what's relevant to them, what's relevant to the conversation, and what's relevant to you.
You need to know what you want. What results or outcomes are you hoping for? To honestly express, in this instance, this example, it would be very honest, real, and raw to express.
Let's say this potential client was named Suzie. We're talking to this potential client. Hey, Suzie, I've helped you with this, I've done this, and I'm starting to honestly feel like I'm being taken advantage of in this relationship. I want to be honest with you, my goal and being helpful in talking to you, all these multiple times we've had calls is because I want to get your business. I want to get you on as a client. So I need to know, that's what I want, is that going to happen? Is that a reality?
Do you see that you potentially will become a client, or are you just taking advantage of the fact that you know that I know some of the things you might need? If so, then maybe we need to have a different conversation. But are you interested in becoming a client or working with me for property management or letting me take over your units?
This is expressing what you want and that you might be able to express what Suzie wants. You can say, Suzie, what is it that you are wanting? My understanding is you want this property to be taken care of. You probably don't really want or enjoy dealing with finding contractors and dealing with these challenging and difficult situations. I would love to take that off your plate. I want to do that for you.
That would be much more effective communication and it'd be far more honest because the reality of the situation is this communication leading up to this point, this client of mine had not yet been honest with Suzie or whatever their name is. Had not yet been fully honest with them and hadn’t lived according to this code of communication. Everything gets better and easier if you're willing to live.
It's uncomfortable sometimes to have this communication, but it's less uncomfortable, I believe, than dealing with feeling taken advantage of, feeling misaligned internally, feeling frustrated, feeling annoyed by people. Honestly, express.
There's a really good book I'm listening to right now. I really love this book so far. It's called Radical Honesty. This guy is really refreshing to listen to. I appreciate it. It really made me take a look. I've always prided myself on being a very honest, open person. That's always how I've wanted to run my business. One of the core facets is transparency that we subscribe to in our core values. That's why I created my original business, it was called OpenPotion.
We all have a built-in liar and that's our brain. It's always trying to help us avoid pain. So if our brain is saying, well, it'll be an uncomfortable conversation that our brain lies and comes up with stories around this. Maybe they know or maybe I shouldn't bring this up. Maybe that'd be uncomfortable if I brought this up or set it this way. Maybe I need to be nicer, more diplomatic. That's our brain lying.
We have this built-in liar that is always there in the background creating stories and filtering our perspective and our view from past pain and past history trying to protect us from future pain and creating more problems in our life. We have to confront that, and we have to deal with that and get even more honest.
This is something that I remind myself of and that I hope is helpful to you is to be real, get raw, stay relevant with a ruthless commitment to results. If you focus on this mode of communication with family members, potential clients, or anybody that you care to communicate with, you're going to have a much better result.
You're more likely to get the results out of this that you want because you're communicating honestly. You're going to create more safety. You're going to create more trust, sales, and deals happen at the speed of trust. Relationships, the foundation is trust. This is going to help you build more relationships and improve your close rate. I hope this has been helpful to those listening. That is all I have to share today.
If you would like to have an objective perspective in your business because you're too close to the fire as all of us business owners are and you want a mentor, coach, or somebody that can help you move your business forward, I would be honored and happy to help you grow your business. We have clients getting fantastic results in our Mastermind program. You can check us out at doorgrow.com and set up a call with us to learn more about our DoorGrow and Scale mastermind, how we are helping grow and scale companies. That is what I will leave you with today.
I hope this has been helpful to those listening. If it has, please give us some positive feedback on the various channels in which you may be listening to this, whether it's YouTube, iTunes, or wherever, we appreciate that. It helps us get the message out to others and benefit more people in the industry, which is our mission at DoorGrow. That's it. Until next time to our mutual growth. Bye, everyone.
Do you need a business development manager (BDM) to double the close rate and double the amount of deals and business you get in the property management space? Maybe you can’t afford or find a BDM. Maybe you like doing it yourself or want to double the amount of deals faster.
Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull talks about how to get help closing deals for your property management business and selling people on using you for property management.
[03:22] Simple Secret: Get a sales assistant to help with follow-up to close more deals.
[04:10] What would an assistant do? Schedule appointments and make calls.
[05:00] Sales Assistant Requirements:
[06:12] Onboard and Train: What are they going to do for you? Help you qualify people. [06:24] Qualifying Questions/Criteria: Where’s the property? What’s the address?
[08:26] Preframe: Creates future emotional state, positive sales call/pitch experience.
[10:25] CRM Follow-up: An assistant can take notes, make calls, and enter updates.
[11:03] CRM Requirements: Needs to sort and track deals, opportunities, leads, sales.
[11:55] LeadSimple: Initial follow-up for texts, emails, campaigns, workflows, and drips.
[12:54] Process Street: Facilitates tenant and owner onboarding processes, checklists.
[13:10] Calendly: Scheduling tool handles calendars, appointment settings, scheduling.
[14:28] Zoom: Face-to-face sales is far more effective and video sales calls create trust.
[15:37] Prospecting: Give good sales assistant scripts to start functioning in a BDM role.
[16:34] Double-Barrel Close: Someone who does both sides of deals - finds and closes.
“It’s nurturing these leads and opportunities to get them warm enough, to where they trust you, know you, and like you enough that you can get the deal closed.”
“Having somebody that can help to nurture these along, follow-up, and get appointments scheduled can be really powerful and effective.”
“Nobody wants to buy low value, so having an assistant can establish you as high value.”
“This can eliminate the biggest time-suck in sales, which is all of the follow-up they can do. All of that follow-up for you.”
Welcome, DoorGrow Hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker.
DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you’re crazy for doing it, you think they’re crazy for not doing it because you realize that property management is the ultimate high-trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I’m your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let’s get into the show.
Today’s topic came up on my group coaching call today. We were talking a little bit about sales, and I don’t mean real estate sales. When I talk about sales, I’m talking about closing deals for your property management business, selling people on using you for property management, just to eliminate any confusion.
My topic today is going to be how can you double your property management close rate without a BDM. A lot of people think, gosh I would need a BDM or I need a business development manager. I need somebody that’s out there hustling and acquiring business. I’m going to assume you’re doing the sales in the business or you already have a BDM or you have somebody, but you want to speed things up. You want to go a little bit faster. You want to double the close rate, double the amount of deals and business you’re getting.
I’m going to share with you a secret today, really simple. A lot of clients come to me and they’re like, gosh. I just need somebody doing sales all the time, but I can’t afford a BDM or I can’t find one. Now, there is sort of this waystation in-between, getting a full-time BDM, offloading it completely off of your plate, and doing it yourself.
If you’re doing it yourself, you’re probably doing it part-time. You’re maybe dedicating two hours a day, maybe less. But you should at least be doing two hours, five days a week, which means 10 hours a week. Somebody is doing sales or focused on that side of the business. It’s the lifeblood of the business. That means, you’re at least a [...] part-time salesperson for at least 10 hours a week in your business. You’ve got at least that going on.
Now, if you have that, this waystation in-between, really simple, you can’t afford a BDM, maybe you can’t find one, maybe you like doing it, you just want to go a little bit faster, and you want to double the amount of deals.
One of the things I did when I got overwhelmed in my own business, back when I was doing all the sales, is I got an assistant. And they were like, what do you need? Well, I could use some help with the sales follow-up. Getting a sales assistant is this secret, this little waystation in-between, that can help you double your close rate. It can help you double the amount of deals that you’re getting on.
The most challenging thing in sales a lot of times time-wise is just follow-up. It’s nurturing these leads and opportunities to get them warm enough, to where they trust you, know you, and like you enough that you can get the deal closed. Having somebody that can help to nurture these along, follow-up, and get appointments scheduled can be really powerful and effective.
What would you have this person do? A good sales assistant, really, is just an appointment setter. They’re calling these people up saying, hey, this is Jason Hull’s assistant. He just wanted to get back together. When would be a good time? Do you have some time on Wednesday at two o’clock, or would Thursday maybe at three o’clock be better? What works for you? That would be really effective.
Me, getting a sales assistant or an assistant that was facilitating this at the time back when I needed it really badly, helped me double the amount of business that I was able to acquire. My revenue doubled, my gross revenue in the business. So this could be very effective.
The thing you’re going to have is a really good sales assistant. Let’s talk about the requirements. They need to be somebody that really loves making phone calls. This is a challenge nowadays because a lot of millennials and younger do not like talking on the phone. They don’t like talking to people. There’s a lot. They opt for text messaging, they rather send an email, so they’re always trying to shift away from having a conversation, as if that’s uncomfortable.
You have to find somebody that actually enjoys talking to people. On a DiSC profile, they’re going to show up as probably a high I, they’re going to have a lot of conversational skills, they’re going to like to talk or feel comfortable talking about themselves and with other people. They enjoy connecting with people. They probably also need a certain amount of D in the DiSC profile, which means they’re somewhat driven. This is the stereotypical sales profile as a DI.
Now, they can have other attributes. They might have some S for stabilizing, which means they want to take care of people. They don’t have to be an aggressive, natural salesperson. They just need to be somebody who’s comfortable making phone calls.
If you find this person, now you need to onboard and train them. You want to make sure that this person, what are they going to do for you? They’re going to help you. One, they’re going to help you a little bit with qualifying people. They can ask qualifying questions. Hey, I’d love to get you on a call with Jason. In order to do that, he’s really careful about his time. I’ve got a couple of qualifying questions just to make sure you’re going to be a good fit. Does that sound fair? Then you say, yeah sure.
Then you have some qualifying questions that they can ask. For example, if it’s for property management instead of my business model, you would say maybe, are you current on all your house payments? Where is the property located? What’s the address? What are your long-term goals? Okay, cool. I really appreciate you giving me all this info. I think this will be a really good fit.
Give them some criteria so they can help with the prequalification question. What that does is it places you—who is going to be the closer—in a position of being kind of the sexy girl or guy at the bar. You’re the one that gets to make a choice. Instead of them being the prize, it shifts. It’s them realizing that hey, this person that I’m going to talk to—which is the business owner—is the prize. They don’t work with everybody. They’re careful about who they take on, which suggests they’re high value. Nobody wants to buy low value, so having an assistant establish you as high value.
Not only that, but assistants get a pass when it comes to follow-up because they’re not the salesperson. Just by them being able to reach out and say, hey, this is Jason’s assistant. He wanted me to reach out, it sets me on sort of a level of value that’s higher because I’m an assistant. It will make you look even more valuable.
Back when I got my first assistant helping with sales, that was almost my only team member. It was just me and I had an assistant, and I was doing pretty much everything. But people perceived me differently and they treated me differently when I would get on the phone with them.
The other thing that your sales assistant can do is to preframe. Preframing or some might call this future pacing, but is really effective, like you having a better sales call or sales pitch experience.
Preframe might look like this. Hi, this is Suzy, calling to get an appointment scheduled for Jason. I’m his assistant over at DoorGrow. He was really wanting to meet with you again to chat about X, Y, and Z. I think you’re really going to love talking to Jason. That’s a little preframe.
Now, if you schedule a time, when’s a good time? Thursday at 2:00 PM or would 3:00 PM be better? He has some time then. Which would work for you? Oh, not that? Okay, how about Friday? Giving them time is going to be more effective.
Once you book a time, cool. You schedule that time, then you can use a preframe. They’re going to say something like, Fred, you’re really going to love talking to Jason. It’s going to be an awesome experience for you. Bring your questions if you have some problems with your rental property, or in my case, your property management business. I think you’ll really love what you’re going to hear during that call.
That’s a preframe. It creates this future emotional state, they’re imagining this while you’re saying it, and they’re far more likely to experience that one when they talk to you. Make sure that they’re educated and trained in this art of preframing the call. Some sort of positive experience or outcome.
They might even let them know future pacing. Yeah, he’s going to get on a call, he’ll talk with you about this and about this, and he’ll talk all about our pricing, how things work, and what we’ll do for you. I think you’ll really be excited to hear what he has to say and how we’re different from other companies. That’s a really powerful, effective thing to do as a preframe.
Now, they also can handle all of the follow-up in your CRM. But keep your CRM tight. Make sure all the deals have good notes, follow-up with people, making text and email as you if you want them to do that. Or they can reach out and say, hey, this is the assistant, and they can follow-up. They can feed all this data into the CRM. They can keep notes. If somebody says they’re not interested, they can update that so you don’t waste time. This can eliminate the biggest time-suck in sales, which is all of the follow-up they can do. All of that follow-up for you.
Let’s talk about some requirements to really make this work. What do you need? You already have somebody else helping you do sales, assuming you’re doing this all by yourself. At the very basic level, you’re going to need a CRM. You need some sort of sales CRM to keep track of the deals, opportunities, leads, and sales.
Each of you can keep notes so that you’re not stepping on each other’s toes. You can see what communication has occurred, and you need to use it. You need to put in your notes from your calls and conversations. You need to mark this deal or opportunity at a certain stage. They know what the next stage is that they need to help move this towards, so that they can call and get an appointment scheduled, to move it to that next level. You want to be able to use this with your assistant and yourself. You need separate logins for this so that you could see who did what.
The most common recommendation in the industry is LeadSimple. You can check that out at leadsimple.com. They really should be giving me some sort of affiliate, commission, or something. I’ve sent so much business over to them, but I don’t get paid. But anyway, check out leadsimple.com. And tell them they should send me a kickback. I’m just kidding.
Check out LeadSimple. I get really positive feedback. It’s a cool CRM. It can initiate a phone call once a lead comes in to you, which makes it look like you followed it up right away, like you’re just on top of things. Leads are only good for maybe the first 10–15 minutes, and then conversion rates can drop dramatically, maybe even 80% on a lead. It helps you with that initial follow-up, and then you can build out text message, email, nurturing, campaigns, workflows, and drips.
LeadSimple also has kind of a process street, sort of clone that can facilitate some of the onboarding tenant and owner onboarding processes and checklists that you want to build in your business. So you’re going to need a sales CRM.
Another tool that I would recommend is that you have some sort of scheduling link. This makes it a lot easier to handle calendars, appointment settings, and scheduling, so get something like Calendly. I really like Calendly. You can check it out at calendly.com. They do have a free version, I believe, but you want to get Calendly set up.
You can have some different appointment times. You can have separate links for these. I have a 15-minute, 30-minute, and 1-hour appointment link. My assistant knows initial things will be 15 minutes, maybe a lengthier call after that will be 30 or an hour, depending. They know at various stages in the sales pipeline to skip the scheduled, what kind of timeframe.
You can also assign follow-up tasks in your CRM to your assistant instead of to yourself as a reminder. And it can be for the same day to (say) get them booked for a 30-minute call, or follow-up and see if they’re ready to schedule another call with me for an hour or whatever. You can book that in using a follow-up task you can assign VA your CRM. So get the Calendly link.
The other thing that I would recommend is face-to-face sales is far more effective. I would rather be on a call face-to-face on Zoom, so I would get a Zoom account set up. I believe Calendly has free Zoom integration during COVID. They set this up. I don’t know if it’s still available. You may have to have a paid account in order to connect Calendly to Zoom.
Get Zoom. I believe there is a free version of that as well. I have a paid version because I like to be able to record calls to the cloud using Zoom, for coaching, and stuff that I do for later. You can integrate Calendly and Zoom, so they can book a call. They’ll get the Zoom call details and they can show up.
People are pretty used to face-to-face. It allows you to read and see their body language. It allows them to see yours. It creates trust and relationships a lot easier by using video, so recommend you try to have video calls, if at all, possible. That could be part of the preframe and the expectation set by your sales assistant.
If you want to be able to leverage your sales assistant, somebody has to be dedicating some time through prospecting and growing the business at least 10 hours a week. A really good sales assistant, if they’re not just doing inbound and follow-up, they might be able to do some outbound.
If they are a bit more driven and they’re comfortable kind of interrupting people and doing the prospecting side, you could also give them some scripts and have them start to function in a BDM role, and they can graduate to that. You can come up with a commission structure and you can give them half of the commission. You can give them half commission if they initiate or find somebody and then you close them.
Later, you can graduate them to a full commission if they do both sides of the deal. Finding them and they close them. This allows you to use a strategy that I learned from one of my mentors, Alex Hormozi, which he called the double barrel close, where you have a setter and a closer, and it can be really effective.
Anyway, that is my tip for today. Get yourself a sales assistant. Even if you want a BDM or you’re hiring somebody as a BDM, it’s a great way for them to start to learn your sales process, to start with the follow-up, to just help you go a little bit faster initially. And eventually they can graduate to being a full-fledged BDM. So, starting them as a sales assistant.
That can be very affordable, even somebody just stepping in part-time to assist for an hour or two a day can do a lot of follow-up and probably double the amount of deals (at least) you’re getting right now.
If you need some help learning how to prospect effectively, you want us to help onboard or help you figure out your sales process, you want to help your BDM or sales assistant figure out how to prospect and help you grow your business, reach out to us. This is the stuff that we do in the DoorGrow & Scale Mastermind.
I’m your host, Jason Hull. I hope this has been helpful. And reach out to us if there’s anything that we can do for you. Let us know in doorgrowclub.com, which is our Facebook group. If you’ve gotten yourself a sales assistant and be curious, leave in the comments. As always on our iTunes, please leave us a review if these podcast episodes are effective for you. We would really appreciate it.
That’s it. Until next time, to our mutual growth. And I’m out. Bye, everyone.
What is the most important currency when assessing whether or not we’re doing the right things or making really good decisions in the business? Time, energy, focus, cash, or effort? It’s not money, but time that is limited and scarce.
Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull talks about the five currencies for property management entrepreneurs. It is a concept that he was taught by his mentor, Alex Charfen.
[01:50] Five Currencies: Time, energy, focus, cash, and effort.
[02:58] #1 Currency: Time - most important commodity.
[04:44] #2 Currency: Energy - some things give us energy and others drain us.
[06:19] #3 Currency: Focus/attention - whatever you focus on tends to grow.
[08:10] #4 Currency: Cash/money - Buy back more of your time and other currencies.
[08:41] Four Reasons: Fulfillment, freedom, contribution, and support.
[09:15] Six Core Functions of business. Which function is your weakest?
[09:48] #5 Currency: Effort - put in more than anyone else; your results are assured.
[11:20] Currencies: Assess and evaluate yourself related to the five currencies.
“We trade money in order to get back some of our own time.”
“Do less and less of the things that drain you and do more of things that give you energy. You only have so much energy in a day.”
Focused Equals Power: “The more focus you have, the more power you’ll have, which means you can go faster.”
“If we have enough cash, we can buy other people’s time and get more of our time back.”
Welcome, DoorGrow Hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker.
DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you’re crazy for doing it, you think they’re crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high-trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I’m your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let’s get into the show.
My topic today is we’re going to chat about the five currencies. This is a concept that I was taught by one of my mentors, Alex Charvin. He would probably explain it differently and he has a great podcast, by the way, for entrepreneurs. It’s (I think) really validating for us as entrepreneurs. I really look up to Alex. He’s a mentor that really helped me take my life and business to another level, which is a goal I aspire to do with all my clients.
This is something that I was taught by Alex. These currencies—write them down; these are one through five—I like them in this order. This is just how I’ve always set them and how I like them. This is probably not his order but time, energy, focus, cash, and effort. Let’s get into each of these.
Let me just give you an overview. We have five different currencies that we can invest into our personal life and into our business. When assessing whether or not we’re doing the right things or making really good decisions in the business, we want to take a look at it. If I’m investing, you should be getting a return if it’s a good investment. But a lot of business owners are not making a very good decision, they are not investing correctly or well, so they’re not getting a return. If you’re not making enough money in your business, you’re not having enough growth, you’re probably not doing the right things in investing these currencies correctly. Let’s go through each of these.
Time. Time, in my opinion, is the most important commodity, is the most important currency, hands down. Why? None of us know when we’re going to die but we’re all going to die. Time is a scarce, limited resource. It’s the most important, your personal time. Now, what’s cool is you can buy the time of others. This is why we have team members, pay employees, pay people to do certain services for us and stuff like that. We trade money in order to get back some of our own time. That is the most important commodity.
When we’re young, we do crazy stuff. We work at a job, trading our time, giving up our life, chunks of our life for money. We don’t realize how valuable it is. Eventually, hopefully you’ve realized or starting to realize right now that money is not the most important currency. It’s time. You’ll realize that as you recognize that it’s the one that’s truly limited and scarce.
Related to time, you want to take a look at where’s my time going? Is it towards the things that feed me more life, or make me feel joy, or are the things that I really find fun or enjoyable? This goes back to my podcast episode about the four reasons. Make sure you check that out if you haven’t listened to that. I want to make sure that if you’re investing your time, it’s towards those things; you getting more and more of those. When it comes to time, this is why I have clients do things like time studies, and we have a very strategic way of looking at your time so you can assess that.
The next is energy. We all have things to give us energy and things that drain us. Me coaching clients energizes me. It’s fun. I woke up like 3:00 in the morning, I was super tired and just before this I got off a coaching call, and I feel bit pumped up. It just gives me life. I enjoy being able to teach. I enjoy being able to share cool stuff. I learn. That’s my why, is to inspire others to love true principles. I love being able to learn cool stuff, share with other people, and see them get it. That’s just so fulfilling for me. It gives me energy.
But there are things that drain my energy. I also run a web design agency designing logos and building websites that’s not super energizing for me. It used to be kind of fun for me, but I really did it to make money. That was a job when I was a solopreneur. All of you are doing and wearing hats that you don’t want to wear and doing things you don’t want to do.
Over time, moving towards the four reasons, I want you to do less and less of the things that drain you and do more of things that give you energy. You only have so much energy in a day. That’s a currency you can protect, you can work to be healthy, you can do some self care, you can protect yourself enough load things, but you want to pay attention to your energy levels and the things that are energizing you or the things that are draining you.
Next is focus or attention. Whatever you focus on tends to grow. Those that are into the law of attraction stuff, recognize this, but wherever they say energy flows where attention goes. If you want more of your energy to go towards more positive things, you need to place more attention on those things.
Focus is also one of the greatest secrets in business. So many business owners get diluted in their focus and their attention, and they wonder why they can’t go as fast. A good analogy is to look at light. You can have a flashlight. It’s helpful. It’s more helpful than maybe a candle in some instances, or maybe something’s really dim like a fire. And you can move it around. A flashlight’s really cool.
But if you really want to have something really powerful, and you focus that light, you then end up having a laser. A laser can cut through things. It can do really cool stuff. It can cut machinery, it can do some really powerful stuff. It can do dangerous stuff.
Focused equals power. This is a principle in the universe. The more focus you have, the more power you’ll have, which means you can go faster. In the property management business, for example, if you are diluted in your focus—you’re doing lots of different types of management while you’re small—you’re not going to be able to grow as effectively in any of them. It’s like trying to run multiple races at a time. You’re scattered, you’re diluted.
A lot of entrepreneurs lose focus and get distracted by opportunity. You want to make sure that you can determine, where’s my focus going and is it giving me more of the things that I want? More all of the other currencies maybe or more towards the four reasons?
Currency number four is cash. Cash also, like all of these, is a limited resource. But if we invest our currencies correctly, we can get more of it and we can turn that cash into more of these other currencies if we’re investing correctly. If we have enough cash, we can buy other people’s time and get more of our time back, and then we can do more of the things that energize us.
A lot of business owners, as I said on a previous podcast when I talked about the four reasons, make more and more money and they have less and less of the four reasons. Just to recap, just real quick, fulfillment, freedom, contribution, support. These are the things we want to get from our business. We want to make sure focus is tight.
A lot of business owners, the reason you’re not growing right now is because you are focused on the things that the business is already doing well and you’re not putting the majority of your focus as a leader and as a business owner on the things the business is struggling with currently. So go back and listen to my episode about the six core functions of business. That’s where you can determine where should our focus be as a company right now. Which function is our weakest.
Cash. It’s also important to recognize cash. You’ll need cash flow. You need some space and some padding there that’s going to give you a lot more ability to focus and have attention. Cash can affect all of these other functions.
The next is effort. This is the last one, number five, effort. We only have so much physical energy, physical strength that we can do. After that we can put into something. But if you’re willing to put in more effort than anyone else is willing to put in, your results are assured.
A great book on this is Grant Cardone’s book, 10X. I like the audio book because you get to hear him talk about it and share these principles. The basic principle is if you do 10 times the effort—it’s very focused on the effort attribute—you put 10 times the effort towards something, you’re going to get the result. And it’s 10 times more than what you’d typically think you’ll need, and the results are assured. There’s no way you’re not going to hit that goal.
Now, all of these five currencies will show up on a time study, except cash, really. Time study will reveal to you where your time, your energy, your focus, and your efforts are going currently, so that you can figure out how to reinvest it. It’s a cheat code to having greater productivity.
But my goal for you is not to become just more productive. I don’t need you to do more stuff if you want your company to grow. You don’t really have to do more. In fact, the ultimate goal is for you to do less things but spend more time and attention doing the things that you really enjoy doing, that give you energy.
Take a look at yourself through the lens of these five currencies—time, energy, focus, cash, and effort—and figure out where is this going. If you want to work with me as a coach, go through my proprietary time study process, to identify your plus and minus signs energetically, figure out how to reinvest and eliminate the interruptions in your business that are stealing money, focus, time, and effort, and improving that.
This is something that I coach clients and doing once a quarter. So reach out and let’s connect. We’d be glad to help you. This (I believe) is the greatest secret to offloading, figuring out how you can get out of being the biggest bottleneck in your own business, is just starting with assessing your time and seeing where these currencies are going.
Take a look at your currencies, assess yourself, evaluate yourself related to these currencies, and figure out how am I doing in each of these? Give yourself a rating. Am I deficient? Where am I weak? Am I weak on cash? Am I weak on time? Am I weak on energy? Am I weak on focus or attention? Am I weak on effort? And then start to dedicate a little bit more of those currencies towards what’s weak so that you can improve that.
If you’re weak on time, maybe you’ve got good cash. So invest some of that cash towards time. Maybe you’re weak on effort. You’re like, I’ve kind of floating and coasting right now, and I really would like some more of these other currencies. Cool, invest more time and put in some more effort towards it. More attention and focus, that if you want more cash, certainly a way to do that is invest more of those.
All right. That's what I'm going to say about the five currencies. If anybody has questions about these, feel free to hit us up in our Facebook group, doorgrowclub.com which is our free community. Make sure to apply. We don’t let everybody in. Once you’re inside, you can ask questions related to these things.
Or send me a message on Facebook or through any other social media platform. I might see it. I try to monitor them all. We’d be happy to help you move your business forward. So take a look at your currencies.
That’s it for today. Until next time, to our mutual growth. I hope everybody has an awesome week and success. Bye, everyone.
Most property management businesses suck because they have miserable business owners, but it's not because of the industry. There are unhappy business owners in any business, in any industry, or in any business category. What would you do differently now that you run a property management business?
Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull talks about 13 common mistakes made and tips on how to avoid them when starting a property management business. These are things that you should know or wish you had known. Some are really practical and some are a bit more high-level recommendations.
[02:23] Out of Alignment: You’re in the wrong role, doing wrong things in the business.
[04:00] Mistake #1: Not using or choosing cheapest property management software.
[05:49] Mistake #2: Don't give out your real direct cell phone number to tenants, owners.
[07:03] Mistake #3: Learn how to win the online reviews game before starting to play it.
[08:17] Mistake #4: Do not be the cheapest in your market. Price yourself at the top.
[09:51] Mistake #5: Your business name should always end with property management.
[10:50] Mistake #6: Save time and money - grow a business without paid advertising.
[12:39] Mistake #7: Cycle of Suck - don't take on shady clients or properties.
[13:57] Mistake #8: Do not hire until you’re clear on what matters - culture, values.
[16:36] Mistake #9: Everybody has a fantasy when starting a business. Kill the fantasy.
[19:20] Mistake #10: Make property management the focus, especially in startup stage.
[21:24] Mistake #11: Protect your time; offload emergency/after-hours calls, eventually.
[22:27] Mistake #12: Distraction of Opportunity - reduce variations and focus on niche.
[24:48] Mistake #13: Don’t be a know-it-all; collapse time by getting a coach, mentor.
“Choose property management software that you can live with forever.”
“You need to insulate, protect yourself, and not be reachable all the time by cell phone.”
“It's better to be the most expensive than the cheapest, in my opinion.”
“There's one thing that without it you don't have a business—clients.”
“When you start to value yourself and value your time, other people will start to value you and value your time.”
The Myers and Briggs Foundation
National Association of Residential Property Managers (NARPM)
All right, we are live. Welcome, DoorGrow hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow hacker.
DoorGrow hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.
Okay. Today, what we are going to be talking about—this was prompted by a question that I saw posted on Facebook. Somebody asked a question like, what do you wish you could do differently now that you run a property management business? If you could go back in time, what would you do differently? There were lots of jokes, hahaha, from people saying I would start a pizza company or pizza place, or I'd do something else like I wouldn't do it.
It is a common joke. There's pain underneath those statements because there are a lot of property management businesses that a) suck, and that b) because they have miserable business owners. They're not happy. I just want to point out that I don't believe it's because of the industry. There are miserable business owners in any business, in any industry, or in any business category.
I think the challenge is that the business owners that are not happy out there, which there's a lot in a lot of industries, there's a lot in the property management industry. But the ones that are not happy are the ones that are not in alignment with the four reasons, which I talked about in an earlier episode. Go back and check that out. If you're out of alignment with that, the real issue is that you are doing the wrong things in the business. You are in the wrong role. So that's the challenge.
I want to talk about 13 tips that you should know if you're a startup property manager. These are probably 13 things you wish you had known or should know if you're starting a property management business. Some of these are really practical and some of these are a little bit more high level, mindset, or whatever.
I just made a list of the 13 most common mistakes that I see people make starting property management companies. I've made a pretty decent living in helping property managers either start up their businesses or most of the time, helping clean up the mistakes they made during the startup process. It's a lot of what I do at DoorGrow.
So I've talked to thousands of property managers. I've gotten to see inside a lot of businesses. I get to hear what actually goes on behind the scenes—the pain, the sorrow, the sadness, and the joy when we get things figured out and dialed in. So let's get into these. These are in no particular order or priority. These are just how they came into my head.
One of the biggest mistakes that I see, number one, is choosing property management software based on what's cheapest. That's a mistake. A lot of times, property managers either don't use the software in the beginning or choose something cheap or less expensive. My recommendation is to choose property management software that you can live with forever.
The reason being, if you can choose software that you can live with forever, that software is going to save you a lot more money in the long run. You're going to end up spending a lot of money on staffing costs instead. So if you go cheap on software in the beginning because you're like, hey, this is a lower price, those costs get translated and pushed on to staff.
Don't pick it based on what's cheapest and the same, get the most expensive software but get the software that can do the most, that's going to give you the most leverage. I typically like to recommend Rent Manager simply because I hear the most positive feedback on it. It's not an investor-backed company where their primary goal, if they're honest, is to please their financial backers. That's not their goal, some software out there.
It's not owned by some bigger conglomerate or company, as far as I know. They have one of the best property management conferences I've heard in the industry. But clients seem to just really love Rent Manager. They love that software.
I've seen it used by really large enterprises that have thousands of doors in multiple markets. I've seen it used by startups. It seems to work for a variety of different types of management. It has an open API. It connects and integrates with everything is what that means, generally. So that would be my recommendation. Don't push the cost on the staff because staff are far more expensive.
All right. Number two, don't give out your direct real cell phone number to tenants and owners. It's so easy to do early on. Real estate agents are absolute horrors with their cell phone numbers, that happens all the time. Every guy or gal in real estate just gives it out to everybody, puts it on park benches, puts it up on yard signs.
For property management, that's a whole different game. You need to insulate, protect yourself, and not be reachable all the time by cell phone. So you need to get some other service or you might get something like Talkroute, which works great with cell phones, low latency, voice over IP system that allows you to use your cell phones. It works really well and it's low cost. You can build out a phone tree, protect yourself, and route it to different services that you bring on later.
You can even go and just get some sort of phone app in the App store to get a second phone number that can allow you to do text messaging, phone calls. I've heard of some people using an app called Burner and some of these. Have a different phone number than your real cell phone number and just save that for those that you really want to be able to reach you—family, friends, not clients and customers.
Number three, learn how to win the online reviews game before you start to play it and are losing, which is the default. If you're a restaurant in the restaurant industry, this is critical. You start up a business, you're hoping that it's going to make money, you put on some investment into it, you start getting some bad reviews initially because you make some mistakes, and suddenly, it just compounds, piles on, you just get more and more bad reviews, and you're not getting good reviews. The business could die.
Now in property management, the default also is that you're going to get bad reviews from tenants and owners. They're going to be frustrated, tenants especially, if they don't get their deposit back or whatever. You need to know how to play this game.
In DoorGrow Academy, we have a training called Reputation Secrets and then teach clients how to win at this game, but you need to have a strategy for this before the reviews just start to happen. Because the default is you will lose and that is a significant impact.
A lot of people mistakenly assume they'll just get good reviews if they just do good service, and that is not the case. That's not how the review game works. So before you start to play that game, you need to know how to win that game, and it's not a hard game to win.
Number four, one of the biggest mistakes I see, my really big tip here is do not price yourself as the cheapest. Do not be the cheapest in your market. Do not price yourself at the low end of the market or at the bottom. There's already a race to the bottom.
This is a fast track to building a business. It's not sustainable, that's painful, that's uncomfortable. It helps you attract more and more of the bottom of the barrel, the worst clients, and residents. That's not the type of business that you want to get caught up in. Price yourself at the top of the market.
It's better to be the most expensive than the cheapest, in my opinion. There's a lot more nuance to that and pricing psychology and strategy that we get into in our Mastermind program that I love to coach clients on because I have not yet had a property manager come to me that had really effective pricing. It's always something we can optimize, improve, and then they can close more deals at a higher price point more easily.
That price sensitivity, that sense of scarcity that they're getting pushed back on, that price sensitivity and pain that they're dealing with with owners, there are lots of ways to mitigate that, remove it, or capture better prospects that are not like that, like the cheapos of the world. That's the default. That's what most property managers do. They try to be the cheapest or they try to charge what everybody else is charging in their market. They're all making similar mistakes.
Number five, make sure your business name ends with property management. It's one of the most common mistakes. Almost every startup seems to have real estate or realty in the name, or they choose something generic so they can do it from multiple industries like properties. They might even put rentals, which is weird.
So real simple, when it comes to branding, we've helped rebrand hundreds of companies—redoing their names, redoing their logos, hundreds. We are the world's leading property management branding and design agency. Nobody's done more rebrands than us in the property management space.
The most common mistake that we see is just not ending your name with property management. Just end your name with property management and be a property management company. Be a master of one trade instead of a jack of all trades and a master of none.
All right, number six. Learn to create a business without paid advertising and you'll never struggle with growth, and you will save a [...] ton of time and money. Cold lead advertising takes a lot of money. It wastes a lot of time because you have to nurture these leads. There are far better strategies for growth.
What do I mean by cold leads? I'm talking about SEO, pay-per-click like Google ads, content marketing, social media marketing, and pay-per-lead services. You do not have to do these things in order to grow your business. In fact, there are faster and better ways. I'm not saying don't do those.
All of those can be effective if you do the right things, but they can be costly, and that's not where you should start spending your time and energy. The number one way that almost every business owner I've talked to ever in property management, I asked, where have you gotten the majority of the doors you have now? It's always word of mouth. So figure out how to play that game, figure out a way to create it. to intentionally make it, and to be outbound about it instead of just inbound, which means waiting for stuff to just come to you.
So we have an outbound partner prospecting program that we teach in DoorGrow Academy and in Referral Secrets in our Mastermind program. This has helped some of our clients to have hundreds of doors in a year's time without spending any money on advertising. It just takes time, but it takes less time than it would be if they were just being spoon-fed a bunch of cold leads. It takes less time and they get more doors. It's a no-brainer.
The next item, number seven, don't take on shady clients or properties. I've talked over and over again about what I call the cycle of suck. Take on a shitty owner, you have a shitty property, you have a shitty tenant, you're going to get a shitty reputation in the marketplace. This is the cycle of suck.
Escape the cycle of suck, filter at each stage, and the most important is be careful about the types of owners that you take on. This is the most important thing because this starts the entire cycle. Be careful about the properties that you take on. Of course, screen the tenants—you all do that, and have a strategy in place.
We've already talked about reviews. Have a strategy in place to get more good reviews and to mitigate, filter, or prevent negative reviews. If you are able to do this, you will have significantly lower operational costs than most property management companies, which means you'll be more profitable and you'll be able to invest more into growth, into your team, and into scaling your operations. So don't take on shitty clients and properties. Really simple.
In the beginning, a lot of people think they need to take on everybody. This is one of the most common mistakes and they do it at too low of a price point. They're needy, needy is creepy, and it prevents you from getting on a better business.
All right, the next item. The next tip for startup or starting a property management business is do not hire until you are clear on your culture, which means your values, what matters to you, and you've created that in a tangible way, which means it's written, it's documented, and you are clear on what you should be doing in the business. Meaning, you are clear on the things that bring you those four reasons. You know what gives you more fulfillment, more freedom, and more contribution so that you can get more support.
You need to understand yourself. Because if you don't understand yourself, you're going to do the wrong things as a business owner. You're going to wear every hat in the beginning. The hats you need to get rid of are the ones that are minus signs for you. They are not energetic plus signs. They do not give you life and energy.
You need to strategically focus on that. I talked about time studies and things like that in our program, ways of figuring out which things energize you versus draining you. I talked about the five currencies of time, energy, effort, focus, and cash. Figuring out what is going to give me the most fulfillment and freedom. What's going to bring me more joy? You need to understand what that role is that you're going to be moving towards.
You don't have to do anything in the business in the long run. You could offload everything, but there are certain things that are going to bring you joy and fulfillment and that's why we have businesses. That's one of the main reasons. So you need to figure out what is that for you so that you can build the right team around the right person.
If you're showing up as the wrong person, you start to build a team, and you don't have the culture, and you only have yourself clear, you're going to build the wrong team. You're going to be frustrated with them, and you're going to be like most of the 200–400 door companies that the business owner is in a state of constant burnout and frustration. Just frustrated that they cannot get their team members to think and make decisions because they've set up their business the wrong way, they are annoyed, and they are micromanaging everybody even though they don't want to admit it.
So make sure you get clear on that. That's something that we help clients with. Clients give me feedback. They dial this stuff in that that was the most important training and material they went through in our Mastermind program, which is what I call Purpose Secrets and getting that clarity. It helps them build their dream team so they can have their dream business. If you don't have the business of your dreams, as one of my coaches and mentors would say, then you are not yet the person that can run it yet. That means you just don't have clarity on yourself.
All right, the next thing is number nine. Tip, starting a business. When we start a business, we all have a fantasy. It is so sexy, it is so seductive that we're willing to take a risk against the advice sometimes of family and friends, and we start a business. We spend money, we spend massive amounts of time and energy to do this, to go towards this fantasy. Everybody has a fantasy when they start up a business.
You have to be willing to kill the fantasy. So this tip is to kill the fantasy early. You know that you're delaying this death of the fantasy. What I mean by killing the fantasy is if you want a reality, if you want a real business that actually pays you, because fantasies are sexy, nice, and they make you feel good, but they don't pay you. They don't actually give you a real-life result.
The fantasy just makes your brain feel good and gives you some chemicals. But if you want to have a real business, you have to get a reality business, you have to kill the fantasy if you want that. You have to let it die. So kill it early. What I mean by this is some business owners delay this. They mentally masturbate as one of my mentors or coaches would say.
They don't take the right action and they spend a lot of time doing all the action that's safe. I'm going to work on my branding, my business card, my logo, or my website for 100 hours. They're doing all this stuff, and they're not getting clients and they're not getting paid. You don't need any of that stuff.
The only thing that you need in order to have a property management business. There's one thing that without it you don't have a business—clients. That's the one thing and you can just get clients. I've seen people have hundreds of doors without a website, without a good brand name, without a logo.
Certainly, these things can help improve things and make things go faster. But you don't need t-shirts printed, you don't need a cool brick and mortar building. You just need some tenacity, some work ethic, and to take the right action.
That's the first thing I start clients on if they're in a startup stage or they want to grow their business, we start them down to what I call the Grow Program First. It lets you add doors. Then we can clean up branding, website, and your sales pipeline, and then it'll go faster. But there's no point having something that's going to help you go faster if you're not even moving yet. Let's get you moving and making some money first.
Kill the fantasy early, do the uncomfortable hard stuff first. If it's uncomfortable, if you're avoiding it, if you don't want to do it, it's probably a sign that that's where you should go. Lean into the pain early in the business and the business will be less painful forever.
All right. What is next? Number 10, make property management the focus. At least during the startup stage. I've seen so many that have it as a side hustle. It's a side hustle for years where they sometimes come into my program, it's a side hustle, and they don't even choose to focus on it. Then after about three or four months, they realize they finally get honest and connect to reality, they're not going to do the work.
Because they don't really want to invest in that business or focus on it, and then they just give up, quit, stop the business, or just leave it where it is, and they don't make it a focus or priority. So if you want just to succeed and go fast, give it a real chance of success. If you have a baby that's born, you need to take really good care of that baby, at least for the first little while, first few years. Because otherwise, that baby is not going to be able to feed itself, change itself, take care of itself.
That's your business. Your business is this baby. You need to take care of it in the beginning. Eventually, you can build a team, you can build systems, you can offload things, you can focus on other passions or other businesses if you want to, but it needs to be a focus if you want this to work.
One of the biggest challenges I see is they don't make it a focus and they artificially keep feeding into this business from the resources, revenue, and staff in their existing healthy business. So then you end up with this cancerous tumor on the side of a healthy real estate company, for example, that's a property management business, and it's not profitable.
I had one client that had 600 doors when he first came to me and was making $0 in his business. That's painful. Too many expenses, too much staff, too many resources, and a cycle of suck. All these things were going on, lack of technology, et cetera because a healthy company would have had to make significant changes at about 100 doors or so or earlier just to break the 100 door barrier.
They were able to artificially skip past that in terms of door count because they had another business they could siphon resources from. Make sure your business can stand on its own two feet and make it the focus.
Number 11, protect your time and offload as early as possible emergency or after-hours maintenance calls. You need to value yourself and protect yourself. You could get a service like Abodia, Latchel, or EZ Repair Hotline I've heard good things about. You could sign up, eventually, once you get maybe 50–100 doors.
It might make sense to get a service like Property Meld and they work really nicely, I guess with EZ Repair Hotline under their full-service plan. I've heard great things about Property Meld service over and over again from clients. But as soon as possible, offload emergency or after our mains maintenance calls. You're the business owner and protect yourself, protect your time, and protect your time with your family.
When you start to value yourself and value your time, other people will start to value you and value your time. That means they’ll want to pay you, they’ll want to give you money because you're valuable. You have something to offer them. Don't be low value.
All right, so the next thing is the number 12 tip when starting a property management business. One of the biggest problems I see with entrepreneurs is this distraction of opportunity. We see opportunities everywhere as entrepreneurs. So my big tip is to reduce variations as soon as possible. Variation, what do I mean by that?
I mean shift your focus towards simplicity and doing as little as possible, like one thing, one main business. You will go faster. Reducing variation means having less types of management that you offer. Don't try to do commercial, residential, multifamily, trailer parks, and storage units. Pick a niche and really focus on it, reduce variation.
Don't have custom contracts that you're trying to negotiate every time. Get a lawyer, get your contract tight, determine this is what it's going to be, and improve it over time. Don't fold on it. They're looking for an expert that they can trust. Be that expert that they can trust. Don't fold. Don't cave in.
Reduce variation in the business. The more variation you have, the more side hustles you have, the more random things that you're trying to do, the more service you think might be a good idea that you're trying to incorporate, if you do those at the wrong time, it just creates speed bumps. It slows you down, so try to reduce variation.
My business, we basically have one product, one service, one sales pipeline. Our growth has skyrocketed as a result. In the beginning, I had this company called OpenPotion. It was OpenPotion Website Design and Business Solutions.
I was like, I'm going to set up computer networks, set up businesses' phones. I could do their websites, I can help with logos. I was going to do everything because I thought I could do all this stuff. Overtime, we've done less and less and less and made ourselves more and more focused.
Even focusing on a niche in becoming DoorGrow so that we can become more effective and reduce the amount of variation in the business. It allows us to go deeper, help our clients even more, and reduces the complexity so that we can service more clients more quickly and provide better service.
Number 13, do not be a know-it-all and collapse time by getting a coach. Now I know you're like Jason, you're a coach, come on. This is biased. Transparency time here. I was that guy. I tried to do everything myself in the beginning.
I tried to watch the YouTube videos and read every book. I thought, I'm so smart, I can figure anything out. I am smart enough to probably eventually figure everything out, but it takes a decade to go that route when you could collapse time in a year if you worked with somebody that already has invested a decade into this.
I started this business in 2008. I've been helping property managers since then. It's over a decade. I've also been able to incorporate knowledge, wisdom, and ideas from hundreds of clients, thousands of property managers that I've talked to, and being able to pull in the best ideas. I'm really good at piecing together various pieces, ideas, and creating new things. It's just kind of my area of genius.
As an ENTP, if you're familiar with Myers Briggs, I'm always looking for truth and looking for what works. That's kind of my skill set, but the trap in that is I always thought I could figure it out. But when I got coaches, I started actually go fast. Nothing helps you collapse more time than getting mentors or coaches that know what they're doing. They can help you move forward a lot faster.
When I started getting coaches and mentors, and I'm very careful about who I choose as mentors or coaches nowadays because I'm at a level to where a bad coach or a bad mentor could do a lot of damage. One of the things I look at is, do I want to be more like that person? Do they have a lifestyle that I would like to have more of in my life? Do I feel like they're a good person? Do they have values? That's important to me.
Do they have knowledge that they can share? Are they sharp? Get a coach, get resources around you, get mentors. It's going to help you collapse time far faster. This takes humility. It's hard for us as business owners, especially early on because we think we know a lot.
Over the years, a lot of pain, failures, and mistakes helps us learn we really have no clue. We're all just winging it. There's a lot of people that are far beyond where I'm at that I could learn from. Don't be a know-it-all. Get a coach and collapse time.
If you feel like I might be able to be that coach and might be able to help you grow and scale your business, we have over 80 businesses in our Mastermind, which means over a hundred people in our Mastermind program that we are coaching, mentoring, and helping move their business forward. You'll get access to me with one-on-ones. You'll get access to me through video, voice, text message through Telegram messenger.
We do two weekly calls each week, and we have a repository of training material I built out in doorgrowacademy.com that you get access to as well. Then you get the support and help from my team. We included a website in the program and branding. All this is just part of this mastermind experience.
My goal is to keep clients forever so that I'm adding value. It's very easy for me to help a client offset the cost of this program by double, so that this program feels like it's now paying you. Very easy, no brainer. So if you're interested in the DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind, reach out to us, reach out to us, reach out to my team, check us out at doorgrow.com. Join our Facebook group at doorgrowclub.com.
We would love to talk with you and see if you might be a good fit for our culture, for our program, and for the types of clients we want to help and service. There's nothing I enjoy more really in my business than helping coach the clients. It's super fun.
It's Wednesday. I got to do one of those calls today. It's super rewarding being able to hear all the wins, people adding doors, hear the questions, and be able to support these people in growing their businesses. I'd be honored to be able to support you. It's my passion. It's what I love doing.
With that, those are the 13 tips for those that aren't in the startup stage. If I were to add a bonus one here, I would say, get around other people doing what you want to be doing. Join NARPM, get around other property managers, get to know your local competition. It's a friendly space. Create some relationships and be connected.
Don't be an island in your business. Our mastermind can be a support or channel for that as well, but make sure you're connected to people. I'll leave it at that and until next time, to our mutual growth. Bye, everyone.
Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull talks about three dominos that you need to knock over to close more property management deals.
Jason discovered the three dominos concept in sales from Russell Brunson, a New York Times bestselling author that popularized sales funnels and co-founded ClickFunnels to help entrepreneurs get their message out to the marketplace quickly.
[01:25] Three Dominos Concept: How to pitch property management services.
[02:19] The three dominos are the vehicle, internal beliefs, and external beliefs.
[02:39] Domino #1: The vehicle is your service to get to what people want.
[03:29] Competition: What are all the alternative vehicles for property management?
[04:55] Lead Gen: Cold leads are costly and warm leads cost time but less money.
[06:33] DIY Option: Takes much longer to do everything and get the same results.
[07:12] Domino #2: Tackle all of the customer’s internal beliefs by offering support.
[09:58] Domino #3: Deal with all external and false beliefs that concern customers.
[11:05] Logical Conclusion: Only thing left is to sign up with you and your service.
[13:45] What is sales? Helps people get what they want, and what you desire, as well.
“There’s three dominoes that you need to knock over in order to get somebody to buy your services and to sign up with you as a client.”
“If you knock over all three dominos, the magic that happens is the only logical conclusion they have left and decision they have left is to work with you.”
“Safety and certainty is really what these people want.”
“I’m building trust, creating relationships, and I’m helping them see reality, and really, I think that’s what sales is all about.”
Welcome, DoorGrow hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow hacker.
DoorGrow hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.
So today's topic, I was hanging out with my coaching clients today. We had a great call, lots of people, and we had a brand new client. He was asking about, how do I pitch? Basically, the question was, how to pitch property management services? One concept or principle that I related that I would like to relate to everybody listening today is the concept of the three dominoes.
I don't think I've chatted about this before. If I have, then you can hear it again. Anyway, the three dominoes concept in sales, I got that idea from Russell Brunson. I've heard him talk about it. I just grabbed one of his books off the shelf here. In this book, he mentions it. He probably mentions it in his others, but there are three dominoes that you need to knock over in order to get somebody to buy your services and to sign up with you as a client.
These three dominoes are the vehicle, internal beliefs, and external beliefs. If you can knock over all three dominoes, the magic that happens is the only logical conclusion they have left and the decision they have left is to work with you.
Let me explain these. So the vehicle is the first domino. This is important. The vehicle is your service. Your service is the vehicle for them to get to what they want. If you're selling property management, the vehicle that you're selling or offering is your business doing their management. For me, the vehicle is our DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind, that's the vehicle that we offer.
Now when looking at vehicles, if you want to knock this domino over and accomplish the goal of them recognizing it, your vehicle is the best vehicle for them to get into. You have to throw stones at all the other vehicles. You have to destroy all the other vehicles in their mind so that the only logical vehicle left standing is your vehicle.
So if you want them to use your business for property management, you have to look at what are all the alternative vehicles? Write these down, figure out what are all the alternatives. They can self-manage. They could go to a real estate agent and ask them to do it. They could go to the big box company and franchise company down the street. They could go to the small mom and pop company that competes with you that's down the street. There are lots of different vehicles.
After you've looked at what are all the possible vehicles that exist for management and you make a list of these, you have to figure out, how can I throw stones at these? Why is my vehicle better than them self-managing, than them using the big box company down the street, the small mom and pop shop down the street that I compete with, or whatever?
If you don't have a good answer to that question, then you don't have maybe the best vehicle. How can you make your vehicle better? Sometimes you just need to work on your product and improve it. So you need to have the best vehicle.
With my vehicle, the DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind and the coaching program that we offer, the alternative vehicles people have for growing their management companies could be hiring some other coach, it could be doing SEO, it could be doing pay-per-click, it could be doing content marketing, it could be doing social media marketing, or it could be pay-per-lead services.
In my training that convinces people to sign up with us and work with us, I go through and explain why all of these vehicles generally are all cold lead advertising, and why cold leads are not as effective as warm leads. Why the close rate is typically 10%, or worse for most property managers with cold leads. Why cold leads are really expensive. You have to pay for these marketing services. You have to pay agencies, then you have to pay for ad spend, and it's really costly.
I contrast that to our opportunity, our vehicle, which is based on warm lead generation, which is based on things that don't really cost you money. It does cost time, but it actually takes less time than dealing with cold [...] leads and prospects that are just time wasters and tire kickers, that are at the end of the sales cycle, that are searching on Google, that are super price-sensitive, and are the worst. They're the scraps that fall off the warm lead or word-of-mouth table that my clients get to eat at.
This is how I attack the vehicle. For me, that's easy because it's true and it's obvious, I feel like. So I explain it, and then when people get it, they go, wow, that vehicle does sound better than these other vehicles and you might have written in some of these other vehicles. You might have tried them and you know from experience, they're not working really well.
In fact, most of the companies that are trying to do those other vehicles to grow their business are losing more doors than they're getting on right now due to the sell-off that's happening in the marketplace. A lot of the larger companies are down at least 200 doors over the last couple of years. That might be you. So the vehicle, so you have to know how to attack all the other vehicles.
I also have the alternate vehicle that is challenging or that I deal with, that clients will focus on which is DIY, just like you as property managers. We have people that are like, I can just read business books or I can just watch a bunch of videos on YouTube, I'll do it all myself. Awesome, I used to be that guy too. You could do that. And it will take you 10 years longer to get the same result.
I've seen it and I've been that guy. I've been that guy that thought I knew everything and could do it all on my own. Until I started getting coaches and mentors that collapsed time. So I'm attacking that vehicle. You have to figure out how do I destroy and attack all the other vehicles.
Once your vehicle is the only vehicle left standing, the next domino that needs to be knocked over in order for them to work with you is the internal beliefs. These are beliefs about their own internal self, beliefs about their own abilities to execute on this opportunity, beliefs about their concerns internally. You need to figure out what are all the internal beliefs and concerns that might prevent them from becoming a customer and from working with you, becoming a client, and signing the contract.
Any internal beliefs like, well, I don't know, maybe they have a need for price anchoring. They don't know what the price should be for property management, you've told them your pricing, and they don't feel safe. So you need to solve that challenge. Maybe they don't know what your values are or things like this, and they're nervous that they might be blind to something or missing something.
You have to figure out, what are all the internal beliefs that come up for your prospects? Make a list of these and you have to figure out, how can I throw stones and knock all of these internal beliefs down during my pitch? You've already knocked down all the external, third-party, and alternate vehicles. Now you need to deal with all those internal beliefs.
A lot of times, internal beliefs have to do with levels of support. In our program, we deal with the internal belief, concern, or challenge like maybe I can't do it. Maybe this works for others, but maybe I'm not good enough, maybe I'm not charismatic enough, maybe I'm not cool enough, maybe I'm not smart enough, or maybe I'm lazy. We have to figure out how can we attack those internal beliefs.
One of the ways is we focus on support. You get direct access to Jason. You can schedule a one on one with Jason as part of the mastermind. You're going to get telegram access to Jason so you can send him messages through Telegram—video, voice, and text throughout the week.
If you get stuck or have questions, we also have Adam, Maddie, and others on my team that are supporting you as you move through certain processes like branding, web design, or some of the things that we help clean up in a business. They're there to support you as well. What other internal beliefs?
Maybe I need to learn more. Awesome, we have DoorGrow Academy. We have a repository of training material we built up over the last decade of stuff that you can learn if you need to learn more in order to get the results. Cool, what about action? We have accountability and we have weekly check-ins that you're filling out each week to figure out whether you're doing it.
We've taken a look at all the internal beliefs that we could think of that clients had challenges with or that were preventing clients from getting results, and we figure out, how do we tackle that and how do we deal with that? We're always looking to improve in that area. Once internal beliefs are handled, there are no internal beliefs left, then people tend to go external.
So now the last domino that we need to knock over are all of their external beliefs. These are all the false beliefs they have about outside forces that could keep them from having success, things beyond their control. This could have to do with time, which keeps rolling on. It could have to do with the economy, which could be shifting. It could have to do with the real estate market at large. It could have to do with local laws and municipalities. It could have to do with the federal government.
All of these are external beliefs, COVID hitting. What if this happens? What if that? All these external things that they might have concerns about, how will this be dealt with? What will happen here? If you can tackle all the external beliefs that this investor might have and knock all of those down, you make a list, like I said, of the previous two dominoes. Make a list, figure out what all of them are, and figure out how am I going to deal with these so that I can make them feel safe.
Once you've eliminated all the external beliefs, you've thrown stones at all of those, the only logical conclusion left. They know that there's only one vehicle that makes the most sense. You've dealt with all their internal beliefs and concerns. You've dealt with all the external beliefs that they might have. The only logical conclusion left once those three dominoes are knocked over is to sign up with you, is to use you. There's nothing else that would make as much sense.
So if you build trust through this process, safety and certainty are really what these people want. This is a big secret for sales and property management. Nobody gives a shit about property management. This is not what they want.
They do not want to buy property management. They don't wake up in the morning and say property management is sexy and awesome. They don't read blogs about it and follow social media accounts about it. Unless they're property managers, they want safety and certainty. They want peace of mind. That's important for them.
So having the best vehicle, having dealt with all their internal beliefs, and dealing with all their external beliefs, they're going to have a high level of trust, safety, and certainty in you and in their ability to work with you. They know that you're going to be able to deal with all the external factors that they were concerned about. So there's nothing left to really prevent them from signing up.
Then you just say, if I can deal with all your concerns—internal beliefs and external beliefs—and I can explain why our vehicle is the best, would it be fair to say that you'd be wanting to sign up today? Is that fair? They'd say, yeah, probably.
If I can help you see how we're the best company in the market for you, how we can make sure that you feel safe and taken care of, that we can make sure that all of your external concerns are dealt with, and we have answers to those, would you be willing to sign up today? Is that fair? Then you say, yeah, that makes sense.
That's basically it. So put together your pitch. Go to the drawing board, you could write out each belief on a post-it note and get a whole list of all the internal, whole list of all the external, and figure out where all these vehicles—internal, external. Get clear on this.
You could build it out on a Trello board on trello.com and have each of these. This is how I put together my framework and my training for DoorGrow Secrets or the Seven Frameworks training that we give to potential clients for free that sells them on signing up. Some watch that training and then they just sign up.
It's like two hours long and I'm teaching a bunch of concepts, frameworks, and ideas for free, and adding value. I'm building trust, creating a relationship, and I'm helping them see reality. Really, I think that's what sales is really about. Sales isn't about manipulation. It isn't about control. It's about helping people see the real issue, the real problem, and helping them see the real path and how you can help them get what they want.
Sales really isn't about you getting what you want. It's about them being able to get what they want and you get what you want. This is that mutual thing. Your business is this magic bridge between your desires being fulfilled and their desires being fulfilled.
Hopefully this is helpful if you want to compound this. Once you have your pitch put together, add some images to it to drag this home. Don't fill it up with a lot of text, but some people have a hard time digesting all of this. So you'll notice in my training, I have slides and I have images to help people see and get these concepts quickly. So making a visual can help them understand these things quickly.
Have an image for each vehicle, have an image for each internal belief, each external belief, and you can crank right through these, explain them, and they'll get it. By the end, they'll feel like they have a lot more clarity than if you had no visual imagery. So you can put together a little slide deck or pitch based on these three dominoes. Then, of course, you can end it with a close or a call to action to solicit that.
Hopefully, this has been helpful for those listening. If you're wanting to take things to the next level, you want to become a badass at sales, you want to feel like you could close anybody that you talk to if you want them, and you want to shift from being the person that's trying to get everybody on to being the sexy guy or girl at the bar that does not feel the need to get with everybody, but you're a high value and people want to be with you.
If you want to shift that, then reach out to us at DoorGrow, and let's get you that Seven Frameworks training and our DoorGrow Secrets training and get you moving into our program hopefully. You'll be learning how to be really effective at closing more deals more quickly and doing things that are far more efficient than all those other vehicles.
I'm Jason Hull. I hope this was really helpful for those of you that are struggling during your pitch, losing deals. If you're dealing with anybody that is not a hot, warm lead, and your close rate is lower than you want it to be, then try applying this three dominoes principle to point them towards your ultimate opportunity or vehicle to help solve their problem. That's why businesses exist, to solve a real problem in the marketplace.
What if they don't have a problem? Then they don't need you. So you don't even need to pitch to them or sell to them. So identify the problem and then go into this pitch with your three dominoes. Knock them over and get some doors. I'm Jason Hull and I'm out. Bye, everybody. Until next time to our mutual growth.
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Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull explains the cycle of suck in property management. It’s incredibly costly, stressful, and competitive.
The “cycle of suck” is a phrase and concept inspired by one of Jason’s clients that noticed as he got rid of bad doors and bad properties, he actually became more profitable. The cycle of suck concept is true, powerful, and effective. What are the four steps of the cycle of suck in property management, and how can you avoid, escape, and reverse it?
[02:32] Step 1: You take on any client/owner or you take on a crappy client/owner.
[03:05] Step 2: You take on crappy properties, which means you have difficult tenants.
[03:37] Step 3: You have crappy tenants to manage if you have pushy property owners.
[04:44] Step 4: You have crappy reviews and a bad reputation in the marketplace.
[06:26] Don't get with everybody. Attract people you want because you are the prize.
[07:25] Protect Yourself/Team: Set standards, boundaries, limits when selecting clients.
[08:24] Sense of Scarcity: When competing based on price, it creates artificial industry.
[09:21] Reverse Cycle of Suck: Qualify clients, properties, tenants/owners, and reviews.
“The reality is, you don't want every client or you shouldn't want every client.”
“The owner is causing you to have more problems, more drama, more stress, and more challenges that are unnecessary simply because they're making things difficult.”
“You're going to have crappy tenants that are difficult, frustrated, and unhappy.”
“The best way to ensure that you're going to have really great tenants is to take on really great properties and really great owners.”
The Pumpkin Plan by Mike Michalowicz
All right, we are live. Welcome, DoorGrow hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, you are interested in growing your business and life, and you are open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow hacker.
DoorGrow hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses and business owners. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.
All right. It was tough for me to read that intro this time for some silly reasons. I have a bunch of things going on in the background on my computer and it distracted me. All right, so let's get into this. I was trying to think about what to talk about today. I want to go back to a concept that I've talked about for a long time now. I've mentioned it in several episodes, but I don't have an episode dedicated to it that I can push people towards, and that is the cycle of suck.
This is a phrase and the concept that I put together after talking to some clients. It was inspired by one of my clients who had mentioned that he noticed that as he got rid of bad doors and bad properties that he actually became more profitable. I had clients tell me about when I started to relate this idea of the cycle of suck. People would tell me about this book called The Pumpkin Plan by Mike Michalowicz, which is a good book, and an author that's been on the podcast before.
This concept is true. It's powerful. It's really effective. Let me explain to everyone the cycle of suck in property management. If you google cycle of suck, it tends to be that my old DoorGrow article about it comes up. Let's talk about this. The cycle of suck is pretty simple. It's four steps.
The first step is you take on any client or you take on a crappy client. That's one of the big challenges. If you take on any client, the challenge then is that you're going to end up with a door. You're going to end up with bad clients. The reality is you don't want every client or you shouldn't want every client. If you're taking on every client, your operational costs are going to be a lot higher. So the very first step in the cycle of suck is crappy owners. You take on crappy owners.
The second step is that you take on crappy properties. If you take on crappy properties, you're going to have a much more difficult time. That means you're going to have much more difficult tenants. You're going to have a difficult situation. If the owner’s pushing back on things, even if the property is a nice looking property or a nice property, that property becomes a crappy property in your portfolio.
If you have crappy owners and crappy properties, which is the second step, third step in the cycle of suck is you're going to have crappy tenants. It doesn't matter how much tenant screening you do if the tenants have A-grade credit. If those owners that you are representing are pushing back on things, delaying things, and making things difficult for maintenance, coordination, and getting things taken care of in the property, these tenants are going to become bad tenants for you to be managing.
These residents will be super frustrated at you. You then end up becoming basically a [...] show for a slumlord, which means now you are in between the tenant and the owner. But the owner is causing you to have more problems, more drama, more stress, and more challenges that are unnecessary simply because they're making things difficult.
At this stage, you're in the cycle of suck. You're going to have upset and frustrated owners and difficult and challenging owners. You're going to have difficult properties, challenging properties, and sometimes just actually crappy looking and crappy maintained properties. You're going to have crappy tenants that are difficult, frustrated, and unhappy.
The fourth step is you're going to have crappy reviews. You're going to have a bad reputation in the marketplace. This kind of sums up the entire property management industry in aggregate, as a whole. There's a lot of property managers that are just taking on any client. They're trying to get on any property they can. Most people know that most property managers suck. Most come to me and they say, I'm going to start a property management business and all the other management companies in my market suck, which is why I'm going to start a property management business.
The challenge is this is the default for the industry. A lot of people fall prey or fall into this cycle of suck. The temptation is, they feel a sense of scarcity, and they feel like they need to take on every client. How do you escape this? How do you escape the cycle of suck?
To consider, the cycle suck is incredibly costly. Your operational costs on a bad property and a bad owner could take how much more time? Ten times the amount of time. Can one of your bad owners and one of your bad properties easily take 10? Maybe even it's 100 times more stressful, or 100 times more effort.
I don't know if it gets that extreme, but it can be significant. It adds up if you have multiple doors, multiple properties, and multiple owners that are part of the cycle of suck, that are not really what you deserve, what you should be managing, and what you should be dealing with. If you had the business that you wanted and the business of your dreams and types of clients you really wanted to be with and work with.
You have to recognize that you are the prize. I want all of my clients to recognize that they are the sexy girl at the bar or the sexy guy at the bar, meaning they don't get with everybody.
Here's the reality. Let's compare this to dating. If you get with everybody, you're low value. You're not going to attract the type of people that you want or the type of clients that you want in business. So don't get with everybody. Don't be that type of person. You know what they call somebody that gets with everybody, right? You don't want to be that. That's not interesting to the really great people that you want to be working with.
The cycle of suck is stressful. It's really stressful. It means you are forcing and subjecting your team—if you have a team—to really difficult people and really difficult situations. It’s a display or it's you showcasing to your team that you don't care about your team. If you really cared about your team and you protected your team, you would have standards. You would have boundaries. You would have limits. You would not take on every client.
If your team members aren't protected, if your team members don't feel supported, they're not going to stay. You will keep some team members, but they will not be the kind of team members that really can help you grow and scale your business. The type of team members that you really want to be around, these are going to be people that are willing to be walked all over or willing to take garbage and deal with difficult situations constantly.
I get that property management can be difficult, and I get that there are going to be difficult situations. But if you are artificially inflating that by taking on situations that you know deep down you shouldn't be, you're not going to be able to keep and retain team members as well.
The next thing I want to point out is how the cycle of suck is competitive. If you have a reputation online, then you compete with all the other such property management companies rather than being the standout. Because the good ones are all taking all the best clients and you're stuck getting everything at the bottom of the barrel. Then at that stage, you compete based on price. If you're competing based on price, that's not really a great place to be.
This is what drives the entire industry to feel artificial like there's a sense of scarcity. You don't want to be in a situation in which it feels like there is scarcity. Scarcity is what causes the entire industry to have pretty not great pricing, and property managers are not getting compensated well enough. It causes the entire industry to have a bad reputation. Most of the property management businesses in your market, it's why they suck.
How do you escape? If we reverse the cycle of suck, if we take this in reverse, and add each of the four stages, that means that you're going to qualify your clients. In the sales process, you're going to determine what are you willing to take on and what you’re not willing to take on. What do you really want? How do I build the business that I want to have instead of the business that I can build? Those are two very different businesses.
The second thing, the next step is you need to qualify the properties. What type of properties am I willing to take on? What situations are we willing to take on? What do I want our portfolio to look like? You need to be the sexy guy or girl at the bar that does not get with every property.
The next is qualifying tenants, so step three. Everybody tends to screen tenants. You know that even if you do all the tenant screening in the world, you're going to run into some issues, but you need to qualify tenants.
The best way to ensure that you're going to have really great tenants is to take on really great properties and really great owners. Even if the property is amazing, if you put a tenant into it that has A-grade credit, you've done all the screening in the world, and they are not able to get taken care of the way that they want.
The owner’s pushing back on things. They’re dragging their heels, things are difficult, it takes two weeks to get a water heater replaced. It takes over a week for the heater in the winter to get fixed. They're going to be upset and you're going to deal with a lot more stress and a lot more phone calls. Your team is going to be battered by this. It's going to be frustrating.
Then the fourth thing is you need to figure out how to play the game of reputation or reviews. You need a strategy in place for filtering. Each of these is filtering—filtering clients, filtering properties, and filtering tenants. You need a strategy for filtering out the negative reviews and getting more good reviews, which means capturing feedback proactively and preemptively before they get to the heightened state where they go nuclear and want to destroy your business online.
Also, by taking on really good clients, really good properties, and really good tenants, you're going to end up with a lot better reviews, by having a process in place to consistently get good positive reviews, which we talked about in our reputation secrets training that we have in DoorGrow Academy for our clients. We talk about how to implement a strategy of warm outreach to facilitate that and make sure that you're getting good reviews. Good reviews can be more effective than having the top spot on Google because it's going to feed you warm leads that have a really high close rate.
Then guess what happens. If you're getting really great reviews, and you have a good reputation in the marketplace because clients are happy with you and telling people about you, tenants are happy and telling people about you, and you have great properties, then you have a good reputation. You're going to attract more quality clients. You're going to attract more quality tenants. You're going to attract more quality properties to deal with in your portfolio.
I remember when I was living in Santa Clarita, there were two major property management companies that seemed to have all the doors there. It was very clear in talking with people in the community, they knew one company. They were talking about being really bad, and another company they were talking about being really great.
They had very different experiences. I talked to people that had dealt with one company for maintenance versus the other when they moved into a new property and how dramatically different it was for them as a resident. These kinds of things get around to owners and show up on their reputation as well.
Moving forward, if you want to get free from the cycle of suck, which means you need to come into your business and your sales process with a lot more confidence with recognizing that you have value, with recognizing that you are the prize that solves their problem, and you want to be more effective at sales, reach out to us at DoorGrow.
This is one of the foundational mindset things that I like to push into clients' heads to get them to recognize that you can have the business that you want. But you have to become the person with the right mindset, with the right thoughts, and with the right sales process that can have the business of your dreams. If you don't yet have the business of your dreams, as one of my mentors would say, then you're not the person that can run it yet.
My goal as a coach in this industry, in property management, is to help you become the entrepreneur that can have the business of your dreams. If we can support you in any way, if you would like some help with your business, reach out. You can check us out at doorgrow.com. Bye, everyone. Until next time, to our mutual growth.