Embark on an enlightening adventure with me, Mark Jones, as we welcome the charismatic Ken Perry, president and founder of the Knowledge Coop, to the podcast. From his serendipitous pivot from bartending into the mortgage world to becoming an indispensable trainer and compliance specialist, Ken's story is one of passion meeting purpose. Together, we unravel the intricacies of real estate and mortgage, unpacking ethical dilemmas, the surprising edge ADHD can offer professionals, and the evolution of AI in enhancing training and compliance.
Ken Perry's journey is a beacon for all who seek to blend personal growth with professional excellence. Our discussion delves into the power of human connection and the necessity of ethics in mortgage practice, as Ken recounts his gripping transition from an often-criticized student to a master communicator. Discover how AI is reshaping our industry, from simplifying guideline searches to potentially redefining the roles of loan officers and realtors, all while grappling with the persistent threat of misinformation and the ethical quandaries it poses.
As we gaze into our crystal ball, the future of real estate seems ripe for revolution. From the demographic shifts in the mortgage industry to the advent of AI in property assessments, this episode is a treasure trove for anyone involved in real estate or seeking knowledge on the subject. We even take a moment to celebrate the realtors' undiminished value amidst technological disruption and share strategies for cultivating lasting client relationships that weather the market's ups and downs. Tune in for a session rich with anecdotes, practical insights, and the shared wisdom of two industry veterans navigating the fast-paced world of property and real estate.
Key Factors Podcast is Powered by ReviewMyMortgage.com
Host: Mark Jones | Sr. Loan Officer | NMLS# 513437
If you would like to work with Mark on your next home purchase or as a partner visit iThink Mortgage.
Embark on an enlightening adventure with me, Mark Jones, as we welcome the charismatic Ken Perry, president and founder of the Knowledge Coop, to the podcast. From his serendipitous pivot from bartending into the mortgage world to becoming an indispensable trainer and compliance specialist, Ken's story is one of passion meeting purpose. Together, we unravel the intricacies of real estate and mortgage, unpacking ethical dilemmas, the surprising edge ADHD can offer professionals, and the evolution of AI in enhancing training and compliance.
Ken Perry's journey is a beacon for all who seek to blend personal growth with professional excellence. Our discussion delves into the power of human connection and the necessity of ethics in mortgage practice, as Ken recounts his gripping transition from an often-criticized student to a master communicator. Discover how AI is reshaping our industry, from simplifying guideline searches to potentially redefining the roles of loan officers and realtors, all while grappling with the persistent threat of misinformation and the ethical quandaries it poses.
As we gaze into our crystal ball, the future of real estate seems ripe for revolution. From the demographic shifts in the mortgage industry to the advent of AI in property assessments, this episode is a treasure trove for anyone involved in real estate or seeking knowledge on the subject. We even take a moment to celebrate the realtors' undiminished value amidst technological disruption and share strategies for cultivating lasting client relationships that weather the market's ups and downs. Tune in for a session rich with anecdotes, practical insights, and the shared wisdom of two industry veterans navigating the fast-paced world of property and real estate.
Key Factors Podcast is Powered by ReviewMyMortgage.com
Host: Mark Jones | Sr. Loan Officer | NMLS# 513437
If you would like to work with Mark on your next home purchase or as a partner visit iThink Mortgage.
Welcome to Key Factors podcast, where knowledge meets ambition in the fast-paced world of real estate and mortgage. I'm your host, mark Jones, bringing you the latest insight, trends and expert advice to navigate this dynamic property market. In each episode, we dive deep into the heart of the industry, dissecting market movement, exploring investment strategies and unlocking the secret to real estate success. Whether you're a seasoned professional, an aspiring investor or simply looking to stay ahead of the curve, this is the ultimate guide to making informed decisions in the world of property and real estate. So grab a seat and let's uncover the key factors that make all the difference. Welcome to Key Factors podcast. Let the journey begin and welcome back to another episode of Key Factors podcast.
Speaker 1:I'm your host, mark Jones, and we are powered by ReviewMyMortgagecom, the largest index of mortgage programs in the nation, and recently we've given you episodes and discussions about commercial real estate. We've talked about NAR rulings for buyer representation, we've talked about marketing tricks, memes, humor and mortgage and plenty of other real estate knowledge that will help you succeed potentially in this business and even help you purchase in a market like today. But today I have the opportunity to meet with a gentleman that I inspire to be like in some ways and would love to continue to learn from in many other ways. You guys may know him from your training courses for CE, but I know him as a friend and as Ken Perry. Ken, how you doing, dude? That was a cool intro, not bad, huh? Yeah, well, now what I do is I actually let the guests talk about themselves now, so that I don't have to memorize all the different things.
Speaker 2:So, ken, tell these folks who you are Well first of all, I have to tell you I can't hear your name without, in my head, hearing Mark Jones, who and I know it's Mike Jones, right, but it's Mark Jones, that's right, that is right, dude always a pleasure. And then I'll get one of his songs on my mind, which is great. So, yeah, I'm Ken, I'm just Ken, just Ken.
Speaker 2:I like to say nowadays Dude, it's, how do I? I don't know if I've intro'd myself in a while. I was so worried you'd be like he's the compliance guy, because everybody calls me the compliance guy. I just love compliance. It doesn't make me just like. You can't boil me down to just being a compliance guy. There's more to the main. There's so much more to me than compliance Absolutely.
Speaker 2:And really it's not even where I started, like I didn't start to teach compliance or talk about compliance or know about it. I just I got interested and so after I, after I started the company, I started looking into these laws and finding out everybody's breaking them and I'm like, oh dude, somebody's got to stop this.
Speaker 1:There's a void here? Yeah, totally so, that being, I guess, the first topic of discussion. What I guess provoked you, what inspired you to start the Knowledge Goop? And, for those of you that are listening, ken Perry is the president and founder of the Knowledge Goop, and the Knowledge Goop provides loan officers all around the country with training, compliance courses and, in my opinion, a pretty fun and cool take on how you consume this information. So what inspired that? What triggered it?
Speaker 2:So for like three seconds I have to go back and tell you.
Speaker 2:I used to work for the police department. Okay, this is back in college. I was in a feeder program and I was going to be like my whole life was set out in front of me to be a police officer and a teacher. In college I was getting a 2.33 GPA. I really hated school, and so I actually had a teacher, kevin too. He pulled me aside after my first speech class, okay, where he got to hear me speak, and he's like dude, you've got something. And I'm like what? And he's like you could speak and I'm like what, I mean it's easy. And he's like no, no, no, like I want you on the debate team. He got me on the debate team. So it goes back to starting debating in college, getting really good at it, reading laws, reading everything and then defending it. You know, being able to have all that knowledge and it was the first time I was really celebrated for anything in my life, like I could do this and it was like my special purpose, and so any job I had was always training. You know I would start at something and then I would go teach people how to do it.
Speaker 2:When I got into the mortgage industry in 98 September a buddy of mine. I got in the same way Everybody else does. You're living a regular life, typically bartending. I was bartending and my buddy's like dude, tons of people make money in this industry, you should try it. And I'm like I don't want a desk job. And so I was like, yeah, but give it a shot. And so my wife it was. I got a salary when I started. So my wife's like we've never made that much money and I'm like, all right, I'll try it.
Speaker 2:And it wasn't that much money.
Speaker 1:Now, were you originating when you jumped in or were you just a part of the business set up processing? No, I was originating.
Speaker 2:I never dude. You don't want me in your setup too. You do not want me in your processing team. My follow up skills are nothing Like I suck. All I can do is I could sell a loan. I could help somebody understand it. I knew my guidelines better than my underwriters. I could win the deal every day and if I said it was getting done, it was getting done because I knew more than anybody else did.
Speaker 2:So I found like researching and reading would help me be the best loan officer in the place, and then I became their top producer. And then I got bored and then I went in and started working with other people that hadn't reached the production I was reaching and I was like, oh, no here's how you do it, like package it this way Right.
Speaker 2:And really helping other people find knowledge. And then my boss came in and goes. So here's the deal I can. I want to offer you this new job. I think you're bored. And I'm like I'm bored. He goes. I can promise you you will. He said you'll be twice as happy and you'll make about half what you make now. And I'm like what? And he goes. Financially, this is not a good decision. Yeah, for your life, this is the right decision. Sure, and I went home and talked to my wife and she's like do you know? Do your dream? And so I started training for them. I built a technology using Dreamweaver back then, oh wow I built a training website called the house of knowledge.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:And I really this is we're talking 1999.
Speaker 1:This is sub 2000. Okay, Right before Y2K. Do you think, after you built it, that it was just going to all turn to zero? I was totally concerned, yeah.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I built it and I'm like I really like doing this. Well then I, you know, got a job to move up to the Northwest as an AE. Okay, because we wanted out of California. I was in the area and so we moved up and my boss came back to me and he said you're going to go do sales and you'll be good at it, but you're never going to be happy until you find your way back to training. His name is Sam Hussein and he's still one of my biggest mentors I've ever had, and I'm like all right, sam. And so I got up to the Northwest, got into as an AE. But then I kept seeing people screw up, kept seeing people not be successful, and I would rather sit down with somebody who's like an OK producer and teach them how to be a top producer than go hang out with top producers who already figured it out.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And so I would spend all of my time with brand new people, which, as an AE, is a horrible idea because they're not, you know, banging out loans, Not yet yeah correct. So I was growing people because I'd rather do that than go help some rich guy make more money.
Speaker 1:Well, it's very gratifying when you see what time you've spent, what secrets you've bestowed upon them and them actually using it to become successful.
Speaker 1:I've got a loan officer, nicole in my office, that is an example of exactly that and it's a pretty cool feeling. I can't say that it's worth more than money, but it is almost equal in the feeling if you've got your stuff in order and I think it's worth more than money. Yeah, like I do, I can't disagree with that because I know the feeling and you get to do it a whole lot more and on a much bigger scale. Yeah, so the question that you brought up in what you were just saying there, when you're dealing with loan officers and top producers, one, obviously it's tough to change what a top producer is doing because they're already doing it. It's hard to change what or fix what is broken, if nothing is broken, so to speak. But have you noticed in your time that an understanding of the guidelines, the complexities, the ins and outs, or at least where to find the answer all the time makes the best loan officers thrive 100%?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, you see these top producers and I don't think anybody doesn't need to grow.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Who is it Socrates who said the wise man is he who knows that he knows nothing. That's like my slogan, right? I never think I know it all. And so there's top producers that have done it. But they've done it by pissing off every underwriter they've ever worked with because they never studied the guidelines. Now they're just burning team members out. That's right.
Speaker 2:And then there's some who know the guidelines. They're never going to waste the time of anybody, and so they're more efficient and they run a way better operation. There's a guy, mark Altos his name. He's in Portland and he knows every guideline way more than anybody. But that's why he's successful, that's right, and because it brings you confidence.
Speaker 1:Well, it kind of goes hand in hand with, in my opinion, becoming and being a loan officer successfully is two parts. You've got to have the marketing piece being able to go out and get it and then being able to do it. And those, in my opinion, that know their guidelines backwards and forwards don't necessarily have to be the best at marketing because they know how to do loans. They can be the second look king. They can take something that someone tried to do and put it together the right way. So message for those out there if you're struggling on the marketing side of things, maybe pick up a set of guidelines and know those inwards and outwards.
Speaker 2:Dude, I was always saying it's not your flyer, no, you're not worth it, not at all. And if you can't prove you're worth it, why would I ever go to you? It's exactly right, yeah.
Speaker 1:Boots on the ground, essentially, is what will get you there. The social media is what gets the attention, but you still got to have the proof in the pudding, so to speak. Right, and when I got into the business, I was making good money. I was actually a finance manager for a car dealership. Prior to that, I worked at a bank as a. What did I do there? Finance banker, first, I was a personal banker, et cetera. But the concept of becoming a loan officer when they put those guidelines in front of me, I felt like I was an attorney, like I felt cool, I felt important, like I'm going to know these things and I'm going to put the files according to this and if someone gives me pushback, I'll be able to go to the guidelines, copy and paste it directly to them. They're not a secret. No, not at all.
Speaker 2:There's a black box and you know Fanny Freddie have a black box, but for the most part all the guidelines are there. If you just, you know, manage them well and know what they are, then when and then when you go talk to somebody, you have those guidelines in the back of your head and it steers the conversation right.
Speaker 2:So, now it's like wait, I have something for you Did you just say you're thinking about building a home. I'm like a construction, you know, guru, yeah, and so one of your guys, by the way, reached out to me last week. You guys just got a new construction loan. We did. Oh my gosh, yeah, he's, so excited about it, but like it really is that guideline for me, at least when I was an originator, that guideline, you know, knowing them made me better when I was an AE, knowing them made me.
Speaker 2:You know somebody you want to call which has an AE, it's the best thing you bring to the table, right. And so I ended up. I ended up doing the AE job and finally I just couldn't watch an industry fail anymore. I started seeing some of the stated 80, 20 non-owner stuff and I was like this is I'll never forget. A guy called me and he said hey, I've got a borrower and he's W2 and I need to go stated. And I said well, why would you need to go stated if he's W2? And he goes because he doesn't make enough money to even make the mortgage payment. And I said why would?
Speaker 2:you do the loan. And he goes what are you talking about? And I'm like, why would you do that loan? And he's like, do you have a stated loan or not? And I go for that guy. I said you're going to give him a house, and then he's going to default. And he's like, right, but I need to fund this loan. Can you do it? Wow, and I'm like, no, and you shouldn't either. And he goes I'm calling this other lender and I think that was a big moment for me to go. I can't play in this game anymore. I need to get out of it and fix it from the outside. Which is funny because as an AE, I'd walk in and I'd be like I'm kind of the AE and they're like sales guys here right Soon as I started my company in 03, it was April 1st of 03, I quit on April 1st. My boss didn't believe I was really quitting, that's hilarious.
Speaker 1:I'm full gotcha.
Speaker 2:And so I quit the day before my daughter, aria, was born. She's our second out of three, and so I just I went in. I'm like I can't do this anymore. I just want to go educate people, and that's when I launched. It originally was called Broker Knowledge Group. Brokers were doing 67% of the business back then, and I really, as a lender, I mainly spent time with brokers, and so I started the.
Speaker 2:Broker Knowledge Group, and then in 2010 and 2011,. We were doing online education for the first time all videos. So I started doing video in 09 and 10. Very good, you were ahead of the curve. Oh, dude, you should go back and see.
Speaker 1:So I think you can still find them. They were so bad.
Speaker 2:I was doing it in my room because, like 08 happens, the market crashes, I'm training people who I have nobody to train anymore, and so I set up like we closed the office. It was me and my mother-in-law in that time and I went home and just I bought these green sheets and I bought some lights from Home Depot and I lit up a green wall and so if you watch the original videos, it's all hazy in the bottom corner, granular footage so bad and the audio is like totally off. Wow, yes, I was doing it, but the problem was there wasn't really a system I could run those through, because back then, if you talked to a learning management system company, those software didn't do video very well and YouTube would revolutionize the way streaming happens.
Speaker 1:All together, absolutely.
Speaker 2:We have clients in Alaska that were like I can't watch video where I am, but YouTube changed the game right and so we started doing video.
Speaker 2:And then I was like I wanna build a system where we can actually deliver that. At the same time, I was watching companies communicate horribly with their teams and I was like I wish we could just build something where we could have internal communication be in one place, and so the concept of KnowledgeCoup was if we could do our training and then give people a place to store their training and train their people, but also give them a place where they can find anything. So we found a company that was a startup out of Austin actually, and we started working through them, built the system with them, and then we ended up purchasing that company in 2020. Literally, as places were shutting down, the conference I'm at right now, or that I was at before coming here, that was the conference I was at in January of 2020, when we closed the deal to purchase that software company. How cool, and so I remember going like it was a nightmare that whole sale buying a company and so it's not easy.
Speaker 1:No, heck, no. A lot of steps, depending on who it is. A lot of hands in the jar.
Speaker 2:A lot of emotions, A lot of emotions absolutely Egos everything gets involved, so we closed the deal. I sat in a San Francisco hotel closing a deal on my laptop, like signing the paperwork, and we've owned it since.
Speaker 1:There was no docusign. Then we did docusign yeah, this was 2012. Okay, good, so we got it. That was when I got in the business 2012. No, sorry, 2012 was when we built it, so 2020 is when we closed it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, cause there was no docusign back then. But so yeah, we ever since we've just been having fun building and we build, we build a place they could all train. When I started in 03, it wasn't a compliance training, it was just let's help loan officers understand how to read credit reports, read appraisal reports. Who's Fannie and Freddie like? Get them launched correctly. So we kind of got back to that.
Speaker 1:So that I guess it's more of a we're not gonna teach you how to get business, but we're gonna teach you how to do the business the right way. I like that concept and I met you in Hawaii the first trip that I took with man Mortgage. Oh yeah, as a matter of fact at the last little trip that we all had as man Mortgage, I won a raffle drawing and it was the collage of all of the important moments that have taken place within man. And there you are. There you are with Don.
Speaker 2:Mann. How cool is that, don Mann?
Speaker 1:Yeah, man so.
Speaker 2:He's one of my favorite humans in the world. Like I, have so much respect for that guy, fall to the earth for sure.
Speaker 1:So when I met you then I had no idea who you were. I was with the previous company Academy that we didn't use the knowledge coop and jumping into this Chad introduced me and said, hey, you need to pick his brain a little bit and it was because we were rolling out a similar to what you're doing, but on a different level. They pair well together. It's basically mortgage education from a guideline perspective to consumers directly. Since then it's morphed into a customizable tool for those loan officers and I wanted to pick your brain back then and it gave me a lot of confidence to keep going and you've really got something here and I appreciate you for that.
Speaker 2:Dude, I loved it. That call was so great. When we got back from Hawaii and jumped on a call, I'm like, dude, this guy's got it Like that. You've done such a good job.
Speaker 1:So I respected it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, definitely, because it's not easy.
Speaker 1:No, it's not, and that's kind of what I want to talk about with you, because I'm sure there's folks out there that are listening, tuning in, that maybe have an idea, maybe more than an idea, maybe they've got a prototype or a demo of something that they're wanting to get out there, and I haven't had the opportunity to have somebody on the show that has created something and seen it through to launch formation of company, et cetera. And now, to be honest, you're known as, like you said in the beginning, that compliance guy. You know what was that like, going through that process?
Speaker 2:Dude, it's such a great question. So I actually, when I came up with the idea for the KnowledgeCoup, I lost my salesperson. That was it for her. The problem was so I'm ADHD, diagnosed ADHD.
Speaker 1:My Instagram is ADHD CEO. I embrace it with everything, so let's pause the original question and talk about that ADHD. Adhd, because for me I have it as well, knew it all along, but parents were the type that were like that's an excuse, act right, et cetera, et cetera. So I went through life doing that, self-medicating with things, herbal things and they worked. But now that I've grown into who I'm going to be, so to speak, in my opinion, I consider it a superpower. It is.
Speaker 2:Well it's, you can do so much with it as an adult, as a kid, it is judged, it is. There's something called oh, what is it? Dysphoria it is. Oh, hang on, I can look, I can Google it. We got Google Rejection, sensitivity, dysphoria.
Speaker 1:Okay, gotcha yeah.
Speaker 2:So what it is is most kids with ADHD get like insane amounts of negative feedback. Sure, or they're like 10, because it's you're too loud, you're too much, you're sit down, stare at the teacher and I actually had a teacher in third grade that was so, just did not understand me at all, and it was so bad that I skipped fourth because he was going to be my teacher again.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:So my parents advocated for me and said he's not going through another. I mean that guy destroyed me emotionally.
Speaker 1:Because he just did not get it, he did it. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so I jumped and went into a new grade and which of course then with ADHD, puts me at a disadvantage in school. But you learn in school that you just have to be friends with your teachers. They don't want to give you a bad grade, and so my social skills started.
Speaker 2:So the advantage you have with ADHD is you're forced into making people like you at an early age because, you're not going to win them with your grades Correct, and so, as an adult, it is an absolute superpower, but it can burn people out For sure. And so you have to also pay attention to. I'm living my best life, but those around me hate their lives.
Speaker 1:Or hate their jobs.
Speaker 2:And I've done that to people. I actually found out I had ADHD because my salesperson quit and said this is just another idea and you're so full of ideas and you don't follow through, which is still fair.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's normal.
Speaker 2:And I had another person quit two years later and she gave me a list of all the things and both of them said I love you, but I can't work for you. And here's the reasons Cause I asked for a list. I'm like what is it Like? What do I do wrong? Yeah, I compared the list and I'm like something's here.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I sent it to my wife's aunt, who's an expert on ADHD. She's a therapist out of Princeton and I'm like what is this? And she's like where'd you get that? I said it's feedback I got, and she's like those are the symptoms of ADHD. And so I took the test. I scored so high on that test and from then I could deal with it, cause then it was like all right, if this is a thing, what are the positives, what are the negatives? Cause there's both right.
Speaker 2:And then you solve for the negatives by. For me, it's been surrounding myself with people that are amazing at those things that I suck at.
Speaker 2:Like if you as a loan officer, if you told me I had to fill out an application, send out disclosures and follow up for documents, I wouldn't do loans, because my brain would tell me, hey, if you take this app, it's going to trigger a bunch of things that have to be done that you're going to fail at, and so I'd be like, well then, I'm not. Like I'm not going to do it. No, but where I worked, I could take the app and as long as I sold the deal and they understood it, I never had to touch it again, gotcha. And so I closed that many deals because I had so much support. You had a great team yeah, which you need.
Speaker 1:I agree 100%. And there's a school of thought that says let's focus on the things that you're not good at to make you better. And then there's another school of thought that I adopt personally, which is let's take the things that you're not good at, write them down and get something to replace them. Let's fill those gaps in, give it to somebody that is, and then let's focus on the things that you're really good at and make them better. That's just kind of how I go through life.
Speaker 2:My favorite phrase is you're a fish being graded on how well you climb a tree. It's like I'll never get there. That last year was so tough because I had. Leading a company is not easy. Managing people is not easy. When business is great, it's easy Because you make a lot of mistakes but nobody cares about the mistakes because you're crushing it as a company right when the market tanked last year and decisions had to be made. I'm not great at that. I'm not great at I wanna make everybody happy.
Speaker 2:I wanna make everybody love their jobs and when it comes down to making tougher decisions and being the guy that has to sit across and say I don't have a spot for you anymore. I hate that and so I didn't do it. Well, and during all last year I was like dude, I am a brilliant shortstop being graded on how well I throw a curveball Like.
Speaker 2:I'm not gonna be that way, right, and so, yeah, that's the trick is knowing what you're great at diving into those and if you can live in those. Dude, this last three days have been so much fun. I'm at a conference. I love hanging out with people, making them laugh and smile and answering questions. Dude, that's my world.
Speaker 1:And now that you've said that, I wanna ask something that I wonder if it's similar to me, being that we are so good in front of people, entertaining, keeping people happy. You see somebody that's upset. You go over there and you're the person that brings their spirits up. That then is contagious. I'm the person that tries to spread the idea of if you hold a door for somebody, they're gonna get that and maybe they'll do it the next time, and it just continues.
Speaker 1:But that being the case, I mean, is it somewhat of a curse that we have in going this route? I mean, how do I put this question? I mean, you know what? Let's move on. It's not even working. It's not even working.
Speaker 2:So it's hard to not be understood Like that's definitely a thing, right? You could be frustrating for people, or I've learned that I have to be careful with if I'm always in a good mood or if I'm always Mr Positive or whatever. I don't understand why everybody isn't, and so I've had to do a lot of learning around what other people's experience might be, specifically with change, because with ADHD, all I want is change. If it stays the same, I get bored. I've owned a company for 20, will be 21 on April, 2nd years. Congratulations on that. And most ADHD people don't do that. There's no way. But it's because I keep making new stuff and so it keeps being. Look at you, continue doing your own thing you are making new stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you have to.
Speaker 2:I do, I'm gonna do a podcast. I bet I can make this software. And when you have the right team around you, you can do all that stuff. And the trick is figuring out okay, at what point am I burning people out or how do I get people on board for this idea? Because sometimes the idea is so big in your head that when people wanna have to, when they have to be the ones implementing it, they can be like I don't see it. And so that's been really hard with technology is going. I know you don't see it, but like, hang in there with me because it's gonna be freaking amazing, I promise you.
Speaker 1:you just have to believe You're right, and I think the answer to that is having good team members, that kind of see your vision and articulated a bit better and maybe blueprint it out. But I remember what I was gonna ask a bit ago, which is, since we are so extroverted, are there times, and frequently, that you just want to shut the world out? Yeah, most would call me an extrovert and that's just not the case. I would much rather be in my own world doing my stuff, getting things done when I have to. Of course, I can turn it on, and I can turn it on for long periods of time, but at a certain point it's like, okay, yeah, go away, everybody.
Speaker 2:It's so much energy. Yeah, it is. It's so funny you ask that right now because I just went to this conference. Yeah, yeah, I've been around it. We do. We went to 1902. It's called. You've been there, yeah so rad.
Speaker 1:I'm ready now for a compliance conference. Oh cool.
Speaker 2:So it was interesting. But, um, but yeah, we did that. It ends at eight and I just bolted. I'm like I don't want anybody to catch me on the way out the door. I'm going back to my room and I'm just gonna sit right, when I and by sit I mean I played Nintendo switch, mario Kart every night, oh, yeah, and. But, like, after I get done here, I'll go jump on a plane. And the beauty of them, the body is freaking amazing. Right, the body gives you the adrenaline you need to get through that thing and then it just dumps you on your head. Yeah, and so on the flight tonight I will be completely crashed. I will probably sleep from here all the way to Seattle on my first leg. I'll wake up and I'll fall asleep on my leg to Portland and then I'll get home at midnight and I will have rested what I you know then the rest I needed.
Speaker 2:And then tomorrow I golf it. I have a tea time at 7 30 very good. But that's because I can't say no to things. I but that. That downtime is what gets me to where I can show up the way I, the way I am. But it's so much energy I do need to. I don't even activate my phone on a flight. I won't take the internet.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's your chance to unplug for a bit. I don't want to be reached Absolutely. They're like can't you buy internet? Oh sorry, flight doesn't have it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we're the Wi-Fi's down. We're always down.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so now let's get back to the concept of what it took Going through the phases of you creating this business, and you can sum it up, because I've got some more questions and I know we're pressed on time, so let's, let's get through this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we launched the coop in 2012, got it off the ground, had our first clients screwed up on all of them. A book I would recommend for anybody doing something like this is the lean startup. Okay, oh my gosh, he talks about bugs and how bugs are normal. Yeah, and if you release something without bugs, you basically failed because you waited too long to release it.
Speaker 1:Mmm.
Speaker 2:Learning that I'm like, okay, let's make some bugs, like let's be okay with bugs, we just squash them when they happen, right for make sure our clients are happy with us. And so we launched it. It was a. Originally it was just for people to be able to upload all their stuff to be able to Train on it. We saw people there's guy, rich Jefferson from network funding, okay, who is one of my good buddies and he, during COVID, was releasing and from COVID till now, has released a video every single day for his team, wow, and he can see who's watched it. He can see Comments below those videos. And so we started seeing people like rich use it for these things that we hadn't even like. I'm Compliance brain, right, right, I didn't know they could use it to grow their company and engage with their people, I mean I kind of knew.
Speaker 2:But like I, wanted to build community. But when I saw it, I'm like, okay, this is working. And so we just kind of started building that and selling that. And then the CE was. Just, we've done CE since it started right, it's the beginning of it, the requirement. But what we started doing over the last few years is building. We built a hundred hours of content on how to do loans. So I'm back to that first stage of let's get people up and running, because I think, and I don't think, there's more people getting in this business and I want them to get in like a golf swing.
Speaker 2:Yeah if you start with lessons, it's way better than if you try to take lessons 20 years later.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because then you got to fix all the things that you did wrong.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's how it is with mortgage. So if we can create ethical, great quality originators, then we win. So we went back to doing that and then we just launched AI Two months ago very cool, I'm searching Fannie Freddie FHA guidelines via yeah, very, which is another thing that people could be like Well, what are you doing?
Speaker 2:And it's like well, we want to create the place that loan officers go to learn, grow and win. Yes, so whatever we have to do to get that, we will, and part of that is making using AI to make it easier for people.
Speaker 1:The one-stop shop to become the best loan officer you can be, and it's different for each person.
Speaker 1:Yeah but if you want to be the best in within your realm and your capabilities, this is the tool. This is the place to go to the hub, exactly. Yeah, I like it. Yeah, I really like it. And you mentioned AI. That was one of my questions down the road here. So now we've kind of talked about the sparking of why you created that, all that jazz. I was wondering, because you are so Beneficial to the sector of compliance and overseeing what loan officers are doing all over the place, are there ever times where you get called into certain cases, trials, things of that nature?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've never gotten to court yet. They've always settled. And an expert witness on cases Horrific ones really, uh-huh, not not horrific I mean. When you say horrific, I mean like abuse, massive abuse. Okay, yeah, I saw an elderly woman get her house taken by a loan officer who switched it from a Refi to a purchase at the last minute, bought her house from her without her knowing it.
Speaker 1:Holy cow, yeah so she was paying rent at her own house?
Speaker 2:Well, she didn't. Yeah, they were basically buying it. They were gonna flip it to somebody else with her living in it and then kick her out yeah.
Speaker 2:Wow, and so I got on that one. That one settled. I helped the IRS and the the I don't know if I've told anybody this. I helped the IRS and the Postal Service investigate a case that ended with 12 people going to prison. It was a mortgage case and so, yeah, I've done a lot of work on that. I do a lot of advising for people if they call. It's always funny when people are like do you have your stuff reviewed by an attorney? And I'm like not always, but I do review things for attorneys. Sure, because it just it's. It's how well do you know your subject matter? Yeah, and there's not a lot of. There's not a lot of gray area in laws. No, there's not.
Speaker 1:But people say there is we say, well, it's all the time. It's kind of great and I think the gray that they're talking about is the interpretation. But there is an intention behind what the words say and I think if people understand more so what they were intending to be, the interpretation is super clear and usually the gray is around whether somebody's getting busted for it.
Speaker 2:So if they say it's gray, it means nobody's been busted yet, right, it doesn't make it legal Correct. And so you have these waves of nobody getting busted, and so we start doing stupid things.
Speaker 1:And then all of a sudden, like right now, for example, mortgage industry doesn't have a lot of money right that money comes back you'll see a ton of enforcement actions Because they can't enforce on big companies if big companies can't pay those fines makes perfect sense, and so they hold on to these things and then, as soon as the market recovers, that's when you see the bombarding of, like you know, massive enforcement action and this is so Important because the previous episode that aired, matter of fact, this week Last week if you're two weeks ago, if you're watching this now had to do with misinformation on social media and the reason why any, oh my gosh and the reason why I called this Discussion.
Speaker 1:I had two additional. One was a branch manager Broker and the other was a top-producing loan officer to join me for that discussion and it sparked around a post that I saw, which a gentleman Won't name any names posted just one of those little put the words in the the picture type thing. There was nothing else, and it says I have access to DPA funds at 5.75 rate. I Looked at that and I said, hey, number one, we all have access to those funds. Number two this is the no DPA option. Make sure that you're specifying and if you're gonna put rates, you got to put all the other disclosures that you message in.
Speaker 2:Like you said, I put it. No, I put it in the comments. That's just me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm always about doing the right thing, because it's not this one thing or that one person. It's when you have that one person that the CFPB targets, and now we're all in that Microscope because of that thing and the media hits you like, look what's happening.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and it's out to be the villains, mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:When, in my opinion, it makes all of us look bad, right, it truly does, because you've got misinformation that borrowers believe and when you've got more borrowers that believe it, then don't, that becomes the truth, right? And it's hard to kind of combat that if you're the loan officer that's doing the right thing.
Speaker 2:Yep, you know which is partly why I do what I do. Yeah, I hate when people cheat Like if they're cheating to win the business, they will win the business correct and it sucks, cuz good guys can't and in order to compete, you have to cheat, right, which I'm having more of those conversations now than ever, where I'm having people blatantly say to me Dude, I know, I know, this is against the law and we have to do it. Wow, and it's multiple conversations like that.
Speaker 1:I believe it.
Speaker 2:It's happening all over the place, because when there's desperation, you know people do things.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, and when loan officers don't, you know, care about compliance, then they'll go. Hey, dude, if you don't do this, I'm gonna go to this other company, mm-hmm. And now they don't care about their own company because they're putting their company in a position where now their company could be Busted for it, which, as a loan officer, you just pop over to another company, right? Which is kind of the curse of this industry is people will just leave if it's not being done the way they want.
Speaker 2:Right the way they want is illegal. Tough to keep a loan officer, but do you want that loan officer if they're pushing the boundaries?
Speaker 1:and that's kind of the question that I ask is Do you want that loan officer? And and it's unfortunate because we're going through another cleanse of our industry and that's what I like to call it Necessary. In my opinion, absolutely, but at the same time, the ones that are doing top production are Some of the ones that are doing this stuff.
Speaker 2:So those are not the ones that are gonna be weeded out, right. You know, it drives me crazy. I mean, I've sat behind top-reducing loan officers and heard them talk about how they're doing different things. I'm just like do they even know I'm here? And they did. But I mean, I've seen it and it's like dang, like stop. You're the ones that should be leading this industry the right direction.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah and, by the way you mentioned, there's a Pufford people called a culling. There's like a Lessening of the amount of loan officers that are out there. Okay, do not believe anybody's numbers on that. Okay, the numbers were not released. So this conference I was just out as the animal s licensing conference. It's all of the real licensing numbers from the animal s directly. There's just under 200,000 originators that still have a license and it was at 200,000.
Speaker 1:What was it before?
Speaker 2:200,000, so it hasn't moved. It's just below 200,000, wow. So everybody's come out with these numbers. I just actually said something on yeah, cuz I'm like you right.
Speaker 1:I made a comment on somebody's pose. If I'm not right about something, but I want to know, I'll still ask or I'll still prompt that because, hey, it's time for a good discussion. Thank you.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, this guy posts. I just got done with the seminar from this other speaker in the industry and it turns out, you know, we lost it was something like 60% of the originators. And I'm like I Know, I know the nut, like I know that that's not real, because the numbers I know where they come from and I know they hadn't been released yet, right, so people just make stuff up to be on stage.
Speaker 1:Yeah, wow. And speaking of misinformation, jc, go to the a reference if you would. So I Googled that right before we started this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and this is saying obviously, this is generated by AI, but according to the National Mortgage Professionals, 14% of Producing loan officers have changed employers, which is different, right, almost 12% have left the industry. So if we were, let's say and I think we could have sworn we were somewhere around 300,000 loan officers, but I could be wrong. But if you're taking 12% of it, that sounds pretty accurate in regards. That's not a ton of that's, not anywhere near 60. Yeah, that's not that far off.
Speaker 2:But? But you'd want to know where they're getting their numbers, because the numbers from the numbers are sometimes just made up right right, so you can go back. Jc NLS is just under 200,000 as of just now. Pre-licensing we're still getting, you know, thousands of people getting back into this industry or getting into this industry, so pre-licensing is still there. I love it. Ce hours was just below where it was last year. Okay, it's low, like it's definitely low, sure, and a lot of that is people dumping a license, mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:And so if you have a license, in a different five states and you're like I'm only doing business in two states, do I want to pay the licensing fees in those three? So you're losing some of that CE business.
Speaker 1:But as far as LO's in the business, I was shocked when I saw the chart they released very cool, so it's just below 200,000 and I'm surprised that people are, once you've attained a license in a different state, why you would let it go, simply because our industry is becoming more of a. You don't have to be there in person, so why don't I spread my reach? Honestly, the reason why I haven't gotten licensed in multiple different states is because I took the test back in the day and I don't want to have to retake the test again to get a little test, yeah.
Speaker 1:Back when I had to take two different tests, the federal and the state. Now it's one. So I'm like all right, loan officers, go get licensed in multiple different states, because we've got the ability to Expand your reach to those places. So, yeah, that's a, that's a odd that people would do that. But at the end of the day, if you don't have it, the fire in you to continue to do that, or if you lost your best referral source in that state.
Speaker 2:That makes sense. You know you got it because you had three loans at the time. But you've really never done another loan and you have no resources in that state to get you more loans makes perfect I think partly is just dumping. You know, in in times like this it's like okay, where can I cut? And I think, people cut that yeah what you're saying makes so much sense of like why not just do more business?
Speaker 1:They may. Why don't I just create a deeper out there and get that business?
Speaker 2:That's right, that's not what people think, wow.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean it's surprising to see what Others tend to do with that gift to originate more business. You know, yeah, who knows? So we talked about the loan officers leaving the business. We've talked about Compliance cases. What sparked the knowledge coop? I want to talk about the AI piece now. You mentioned it earlier that you guys incorporated that into what you're doing With Lonebot. We haven't infused it, but we used it to create the, the, the actual tool itself. How do you see AI coming into our industry and I'm not gonna say reshaping, but Assisting, because I'm a firm believer that technology, if used correctly, can help you grow. It can help you do more things, especially for someone like myself that ADD, adhd. It's like okay, if that can do this better than me, put it on autopilot, go do it for me please dude ADHD people right now, like people with ADHD, have such power because it's all in.
Speaker 2:Just what ideas can we come up with with it? With AI? Yeah, if you look at like Sir Richard Branson as ADHD, some of the best leaders, tony Robbins as ADHD. Like you can go. There's a podcast called Faster than normal. Okay, dude, you should listen.
Speaker 2:I've never heard it, it's only the positive of ADHD, where they focus on people who've done amazing things with it, and one of the key factors is we don't work. I have a shirt that says uncaged. It's a Montreux shirt. Okay, I'm on cage, like I don't have any boundaries in my head.
Speaker 2:And so we can come up with stuff that might be awesome. So, with AI, it assisting us in doing anything, it's a, it's the best assistant you've ever had, right? And so that you're only limited by what you can come up with, and so we can do so much to make AI do all the hard work in this industry. And then we are the relationship builders that go no, I make sense, and here's why. And we're introducing people to our process, right. So you're building a system with AI that is better than anybody else's system because you built it with the, the leverage of AI, right, and then you're still needed to be that, that gateway right. Absolutely. People won't know that you have this killer system unless they have loan officers out there on the street talking about what the system is.
Speaker 1:No, you're exactly correct. I mean, when creating, review my mortgage, giving it direct to consumers, and then that bird, the baby of loan bot, we honestly were like holy cow. If we added the right Integrations, the right tools to this thing, we could do away with loan officers eventually. But our, our Crazy idea of that was pulled back with the concept of we don't want to do that. Why? Because they're needed loan off.
Speaker 1:That people interaction, that Empathy that you get when you're helping a borrower, the advocacy that you have when you are the expert for the programs that you're recommending, all of them they can't come from a computer, they can't come from a system. If it does, then you're just going through the motions and I believe you almost shortchanged the borrower's experience in understanding that process of buying a home. I don't want to say it makes it too easy for a borrower to do that because, let's be honest, there's what 10% of home loans that go through, out of all of them that are a paper, go through without a hitch, right, etc. Etc. The rest of them, they all need that human interaction to do the thinking and Solution creating mm-hmm, you know, yeah, I mean.
Speaker 2:So we have to be careful, right, because in two years we're gonna go back and listen to this. Yeah, and, and we were either right or we were wrong correct.
Speaker 2:So everything's a guess, because I think with AI, you don't, I would have never guessed I could do things with AI that I can do, like I. I wouldn't have seen it coming, yeah. And so if you think about it, you know we're just guessing with what we know currently. So think of when the internet was formed, true? So you have all these brick-and-mortar businesses. Nobody was selling anything online because there was no online right right.
Speaker 2:So when people were guessing what the internet would be, a lot of people guessed wrong because you're like, I didn't think about the power I could have right when the internet launched. So in in 90, when I got married in 95, in 97, I built what eventually you know was I built Craigslist. Okay, but but it was for a project at school.
Speaker 2:I hated that, that they were selling books that were resold for so much money and I'm like what if we could just get people to sell it to each other but the internet had just you know, become available for that. Yeah so I I went in and started searching. You remember you can go source code. You could see the code absolutely. So I started doing that and writing HTML.
Speaker 1:Screw you knew that back then. Yeah, I just very cool, I had a passion, like I do now.
Speaker 2:ADHD is like I can go fix this, how do I do it? And then your brain just gets interested.
Speaker 1:That's right. We tend to go down more rabbit holes. It's good when they work.
Speaker 2:Yes, but yeah, I built this thing and it was called down with the bookstore website and had fire on the front page and it's like screw these guys and you're in college. Passionate and revolutionary, and so people started buying and selling books through my website. And then I was in Denver, and so I wasn't in the Silicon Valley. I wasn't looking for investors, I just shut it down make sense. It makes sense, but but nobody knew you could do stuff. That was almost like rebel-ish.
Speaker 1:Oh, totally that's. It was a rebel move.
Speaker 2:Yeah, college didn't like me very much because it started hurting, but but it's those types of things that you would have never said we can sell books to each other and then so you wouldn't have made those same predictions right. So if we're making a high predictions, you have to think, okay, it's probably a thousand times gonna, it's gonna be a thousand times more capable than we think it's gonna be right. Then our brains can currently imagine it to be right.
Speaker 2:So those things that you know. Yeah, a borrower's not, it's in the in the early stages. A borrower is not gonna go in and trust AI to go pick its loan for him Correct and just like in the. You remember you got in 2012,. Right, yeah, so remember your first time with a borrower on the phone and they're like I don't give my social security now.
Speaker 1:Absolutely yeah. Nobody would put it. Online banking came out Do nobody wanted to use it.
Speaker 2:No, like, that's not safe, that's not secure. When Facebook came out, I did a seminar and Facebook will revolutionize your ability to get business because, for loan officers like you're gonna build relationships using Facebook. Do you remember what year you did that? It was literally three months after Facebook came out.
Speaker 1:Okay, so I started using Facebook exclusively to gain business in 2012, the first two months in the industry, nobody else was using it.
Speaker 2:I'm not yet when the comments I was getting in that class were like nobody will ever put pictures of their family on an internet site, I'm like really yeah.
Speaker 1:I literally that's the first picture I posted was the closing picture and everybody's like what are you doing? I got like two likes. Nobody knew what it was. Then it continued, continued and then, lo and behold, it wasn't me posting those pictures, it was that family posting the picture tag in it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it just started full circle constant because your brain wasn't attached to some old way of thinking. Right, your brain can see new Ways of thinking, and it's the same thing with AI. So if you I'm careful not to say one of that job will never be replaced, right appraisals? You know, I know you probably have appraisers.
Speaker 1:Listen to this actually we had Robert Ogles be on here Not too long ago and he was talking about all the different changes that are coming in. Can you?
Speaker 2:bring up.
Speaker 1:AI, we did we did. It's gonna be interesting, it is, and there's not much that he can talk about, but he knows and he is in the process of Of creating whatever it is going to be yeah, and it's gonna change because we don't need.
Speaker 2:I mean. So Fannie Mae, a long time ago, created a claddle underwriter. I see you claddle underwriters been used for a long enough, where the code is actually written. So we're, we're dialing in every box on an appraisal. Okay, so it's all digital, right? It's all in the, in the internet, and so it's easy for you to go. Well, what do you think that house is worth? Now? It can figure all that stuff out. And then there's apps that can show you like. You've seen that real estate app.
Speaker 1:Oh, absolutely rad. What is the one that shows?
Speaker 2:you like the 3d image and then you can walk through it?
Speaker 1:What is it called? It's driving me insane now.
Speaker 2:The founders of that app are pissed at us, right. Oh, I'm neither one, because I remember whoops, I just got a link to one. We're looking at moving buildings to get a bigger space and and I was like dude, like I'm in Texas yeah, sometimes you realize technology is cool. I'm like I'm in Texas, walking down the hallway of this building. It's genius.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's very smart.
Speaker 2:So we have measurements on things, we have all that. All I need is somebody to look at it and and and confirm that it really is right. Right, so appraisers jobs, isn't? That's not gonna be Measuring out real you know rooms, correct? We have drones that can do that too.
Speaker 2:That's true, we have an iPhone app. They can measure your room if you just put that, the iPhone in the room and it'll tell you so. So it will change appraising. It will change real estate. Dude Zillow just launched Zillow with open AI, where now you can go and tell Zillow what you think you might want in a house and then it's just gonna constantly look for one for you, huh. And so buyers agents now are competing with it's every day, every upload of every house. It sees it and it's gonna go back and be like mark, like well, let me tell you my scenario. I want a house of the view. I'm ready to move, my wife and I ready to downsize. All two out of three kids are out and we think if we downsize we can get rid of the third man. So that's awesome. So I'm looking at downsizing. I want to view. I want something newer, like I've got all these things, yeah, and every day, here's some advice.
Speaker 1:Move to Texas. I know totally for your book. I want to.
Speaker 2:I said I want to view, so I'll show you after I haven't seen a mountain since I landed.
Speaker 1:I'll show you, okay, so.
Speaker 2:But like I have these things, so every day I go on Redfin and I go on Zillow and I go try and find that house that I'm looking. For sure Zillow can do that for me, yeah with their new plug-in and real estate agents can use that AI to be able to do the same thing. So so don't fight a bar where wants to use AI. Be part of a bar we're using that's what I like to hear.
Speaker 1:Yes is is for all of those that believe it's doom and gloom, for all of these new technology tools that are coming in way. It is your level of resistance that is gonna keep you from excelling to that next level with your tools that are AI.
Speaker 2:Yep, I would have people focus on how to leverage versus how focusing on what it's gonna replace 100%, 100%, because if it's replacing something, wouldn't you want to be on the team of the one replacing it? Yeah, like, why stay and be on the team of ones getting replaced?
Speaker 1:Yeah, that makes perfect sense. Yeah, here's that view you were looking for, by the way. Oh, that is beautiful. That's off the back porch of here of my house.
Speaker 2:That's off. Your do okay.
Speaker 1:You can't say so, casa, all right next time you're in town, holler, I'm gonna open up my search. I'm telling you, maybe we'll start looking here. Texas is cheap, maybe you get two homes. You have hills. Oh yeah, hill country, the real thing that is rad.
Speaker 2:Okay, all right. All right, I stand corrected.
Speaker 1:So you actually kind of provoked a new conversation With the fact that Zillow is providing more and I like to call it value to the consumer directly. We can't deny that everybody wants to piss on Zillow, but if you piss too much they might just buy you. Okay, and the concept of where this is going is Back to the NAR ruling of buyer representation. Yeah, I asked the previous guest about this and I've asked just about every guest about their thoughts on the ruling, why it came to be. What do you think's gonna do in the future for it? Because, let's face it, they did rule on it, mm-hmm. Of course they're going to Appeal it and appeal it and appeal it, but it doesn't change the fact that they've already got one in the books, that this is what they view it as 100%.
Speaker 2:So yeah, and it changes the game. Yeah, for sure, yeah, um, so I have, I have. I hope people still listen to this after I say this.
Speaker 1:Actually it's not even controversial.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think everybody needs to be able to communicate why they bring value. Right and how much value do they bring right if you're, if somebody's joining the coop or taking our classes? I mean our, our new subscription models 360 a year buys you every content we create, plus the AI is part of that so Wow so it's not that expensive right now, but I can tell you why it's worth it, right?
Speaker 2:So when we have somebody call and go well, you guys, are our price too high, I'd better to be able to respond and go yeah, let me just tell you why and I can outline exactly why we are. That's right. We create education. You want to watch what? Do you want to watch education or do you hate it?
Speaker 2:Right but I can define it for you. A buyer's agent has never had to do that, right? I mean a little bit, because they want the business, right, they want you to commit to me that I'm gonna go find you a spot. So I have to pitch to you, right, but I'm not including the price because you never have to pay me. Correct, the sellers paying me, which is technically the buyer paying me through paying more for a house, that's whatever yeah, I'm right there with you on this.
Speaker 2:They're purchased. So if I don't have to spend the money, right, if you were gonna get me some new shoes and I'm not paying for them, yeah, like sounds good, I knew that right. But if you were gonna try and sell me shoes and be like now you have to pay and these shoes are $7,000. I'd be like why are they seven?
Speaker 1:what am I getting for seven thousand? Right, it's right.
Speaker 2:So. So that's what every realtor needs to do right now is go back and define their value. We had a realtor when we bought our current house. When you walk into any house with this guy, he disappears. He goes crawling into the crawl spaces. He's like climbing up onto the roof. He's like dude, okay, this one's okay, but I'm really worried about this. Like he just knew houses, yeah, and then he'd be like okay. So I've looked at every single house that's been sold in the last six months. They've got it overpriced by just a little bit, but here's why. And like he just crushed it for, like that.
Speaker 2:And so I love that, like I love that he showed me why he's so good. So how do you communicate that in a way that proves you're worth it right Right now? The problem is if you're at what's your average home price here?
Speaker 1:I think it's now just under 300, maybe 289 to 90, right at that range. Honestly, are you serious? Yeah, I'm dead serious. I do need to open up my. I'm telling, okay, yeah, million dollars goes a long way in San Antonio, wow. Okay so let me just take and and to further that our Average credit scores about 670 or so, average median income maybe, and combined about 70 grand. Really, yes, sir, yes okay so I'll be your neighbor. That's why a ton of people are still moving here.
Speaker 2:Are we on a?
Speaker 1:golf course. There's golf course right behind us.
Speaker 2:Okay, yeah rock and terror, okay so. So let's say you're buying in our area and we're in the Northwest and Camus Washington, so we're averaging like six hundred thousand dollars. Seven hundred thousand probably would get your house and that's for a first-time buyer. It's a fixer. Yeah, that's crazy.
Speaker 1:Yeah well, you can get a fixer up or like two, one, two bedroom, one bath for like 400, 350 so for all of you out there listening that are San Antonio or Texas natives for that matter, listen up closely. We are nowhere near Overpriced. We are nowhere near a crash. We are nowhere near the concept of spreading fear to your buyers. At this point, education always top of mind, but when you've got folks in the north that their first-time home buyer pool is starting 400,000 for your tiny home, I think we need to be grateful for what we have.
Speaker 2:Can I add?
Speaker 1:to that.
Speaker 2:Here's the thing, I didn't know that.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:The interesting thing for me is here I am in Washington looking to downsize. My son is Is looking for a house. You know he's 23. Okay, with that six hundred thousand dollar price, there's no way he's getting house right. So they started opening up their view of the country. Okay, so how can a realtor in Texas? If you want to maybe you don't want Washington living here, but if you do and you want the business, knowing that I this is real, absolutely I will seriously call my son we get out of here and I'll be like dude San Antonio, yeah, like I will send him here because it's gorgeous here.
Speaker 1:It really is. The people are great. It's amazing, is outstanding. Yes, so good.
Speaker 2:So I will say he'll probably move down here, because I always kind of look at Austin to see what they're out there, austin's another world. Yeah, but like I'll tell him that and he can move here and probably you know a lot of jobs will let you work remote still Absolutely you can still have a job in any area and live here, raises kids in a school that he wants to raise his kids, because you know, some areas have really good schools right.
Speaker 2:Correct some okay schools, but actually we have some fairly good schools, but they're not in line with where he wants to go, right? He's probably looking at maybe a private school or something like that. But but dude, that's the thing is, how do you get me to know that so I can tell people?
Speaker 1:and for me, being the tech nerd that I am and very Engulfed in the concept of lead generation, I I haven't paid for lead generation to a third part, third-party company, like a Zillow real for comm boom town, any of those and I would say about seven years. The. The concept is understanding where your target audience is and going to them. Like I always say, fish where the fish are. Totally, if your pond grows, go find where your fish are and then stick your pole in. And, that being the case, I don't understand why there aren't more individuals that are taking, let's say, their social media, their Google ads or YouTube marketing and targeting people in California, oregon, new York, all these places that are coming this way. Yeah, you can literally hone in and say I want to search for people in California that are searching San Antonio, right, boom?
Speaker 2:dude, you're welcome. My neighbor moved to South Carolina. He had never been there. Okay, so he's just like, yeah, this is dumb, and I, we have so many friends that are like this is done, where are we gonna move? And I mean, seriously, we would be looking at something like that's crazy, yeah, anyway. So where I was going with that is, if you're buying a six hundred thousand dollar house, the buyer's agent fee is gonna be eighteen thousand dollars, right, so now you go. Okay, what about? What you do is worth eighteen thousand dollars if the buyer has to pay for it up front, like those shoes we were talking about. And you're like here's some shoes for eighteen thousand dollars, cool, what do you do? And and I'm not saying that to say that people can't justify an eighteen thousand dollar fee right.
Speaker 2:I'm saying I want to see that be justified, because what they've been doing is charging the eighteen grand without being able to say, yeah, this is why, because they never had to defend their price correct.
Speaker 1:So that's what I'm looking for. They've almost piggybacked on the concept that the sellers are Inherently going to foot that bill.
Speaker 2:Right, right which I mean, dude. Don't get me started on title companies, sure, but I'm Briefly. A title company does not market to consumers. No, they spend all their money violating RASPA, in many cases by paying for things for you guys and for realtors to Try to make them like them and send them more referrals correct.
Speaker 2:But if a title company was to go, what if we went after the consumer, then they? They're not dependent on everybody in the industry, they're going after it themselves and going Consumers. You might want to close here, and here's why we have an arcade for your kids, we have a climbing wall, we have good point. Just drop a ton of cool stuff and be like. This is why you close with us and then advertise the consumer like you're supposed to. Wow that's.
Speaker 1:I mean, that in itself is one of the main reasons why Six years ago, seven years ago, we started the process of building, review my mortgage. Because we got I'll be honest, we got tired of having to chase realtors around and we went okay, what do cuts consumers want from us? Yeah, they want to know what we know before we actually talk to them. Let's figure out a way to get it to them Because, let's face it, what does a loan officer have to give to their customers that is with them always, that keeps them engaged, that keeps them Potentially educated, interested in moving forward with this home purchase, especially those that are first-time home buyers? Yeah, just realtorcom app, zillow app, the pretty things, the, the sex sells. Well, the house is the sex park that, essentially, is gonna sell itself.
Speaker 2:That's such a good clip. You have to clip that out for the Facebook. The house is the sex part.
Speaker 1:That's right.
Speaker 2:It's gonna be a great reel. I love it, but you're but you're also thinking of it as a transaction, right? Yes, so many people say I'm your loan officer for life, but the only thing we focus on is the transaction. And it's like why do we not stay in touch with our clients after that? Why don't we stay constantly communicating? Why don't we give them resources? Mm-hmm. Like, what I love about what you're doing is you're educating people who have to make tough decisions, mm-hmm. So if you're worried that they're gonna go choose the wrong professional to give them that advice, you could just train them like you're doing, right, teach them what they need to know about getting a mortgage and stay in their lives Correct, so that when they need you they don't have to go honey, who's that loan officer we used? Correct? That's stupid. Like, why are we? Why are we and, by the way, I don't know if you've seen the numbers on people that that don't remember who their realtor was, or do.
Speaker 1:it's crazy. One reason they forgot their name yes, I know these stats.
Speaker 2:I've had friends who's your loan officer. They're like oh you're, you're in the mortgage business. Oh, we did a loan, you know, three years ago we had a great loan officer. I'm like what's his name, what's her name? No, I don't remember. She worked for a company in, was it? Portland?
Speaker 1:It's like oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:And it's because people walk away from their, their clients, yes, and so you've got to do things that keep you engaged with.
Speaker 1:I mean, the concept is top of mind and I took that quite literally when I was heavily producing, before I opened my own branch and had loan officers to train, was mentoring Top of mind? And I'm like, okay, stay top of mind, I'm gonna wrap my truck, I'm gonna wrap my boat, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna. I had a moving trailer that I would give to the customers if they needed it to move. Right, had it had me all over, yeah. So it was almost impossible for somebody to forget about me, yeah. And then parlaying that with the fact that after closing, if those customers had social media, bet your butt I was friends with them. Moving forward, I was also hey, invite me to your housewarming party. I'd love to come and meet some more people. Matter, I'll bring the beer, don't worry.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that type of concept to Get into their circle. Because, just like when you go to a car dealership and buy a red car, you drive off and all of a sudden there's bunch of red cars everywhere. The reticular activator there you go. Yeah. Same concept with having a baby or buying a house, yep.
Speaker 2:Dude I there was a loan officer in California that bought a margarita maker like a margarita machine, yeah. And so when they closed the deal, he go hey, when's the housewarming party? Because I want to come over. And they'd be like I don't know if we're gonna do one. He would take over and be like I got you, wow, I'm gonna make these cards, I'm gonna get those out to your people. Give me the list and I'll send out those cards. That's lighting them. Let's pick a day. I've got this margarita machine, I'm gonna make some margaritas. And he would just stand there making people margaritas, which you get to talk to people.
Speaker 1:That's pretty cool. It's what?
Speaker 2:a bartender does right. Talk to people and build relationships, and so he crushed it because that was his move, instead of walking away from them after closing or some people don't even call and say how are things like correct?
Speaker 1:You're exactly correct.
Speaker 2:What about the next day now when I get my bill like how do you know that my servicing is going correctly? Call me and.
Speaker 1:I'll even go a step further. I believe those are the ones that are in this market today for the last year and a half, almost two years, that are struggling, yeah yeah, they truly are, they're getting their onesie-toosie loans because they're still fighting for the business that came from the realtor Versus creating a relationship book of business that will feed you for the rest of your career, totally, so, yeah, okay. So we've talked about quite a bit already. Let's see here NAR ruling. Did you just?
Speaker 2:build value Very good, you're worth it. And if you're worried that you're not worth it, then you've got a bigger problem.
Speaker 1:So, all right, we're doing good on time. I've got one last question for you. Okay, and it? There's no wrong or right answer to it. It's, it's truly let's. Let's get into Ken's brain for a moment. All right, it's scary. I'm not mine to me. From your perspective, what challenges do you see our industry facing as we move forward? And I mean, there's so many things we can talk about under this umbrella, but from your perspective, because you get to, you get to communicate with loan officers across the country a matter of fact, before we started this, you were showing me your suitcase in all the places that you've already been, and it gives you the best perspective, in my opinion. I think the more that we experience, the more we're able to do in life, go further in life, mentor, coach, share and that's what I believe people like us tend to eventually do is share our stories, because they only do so much being in here, you know. That being the case, what challenges do we face as an industry?
Speaker 2:All right, so let's see when do I begin. So, globally, challenges for companies, number one enforcement actions are coming down and they're going to come down strong. There's already one, there's a couple on LO Comp that you'll see soon, that I just heard about on changing your lead type from in-house to lead gen or whatever.
Speaker 2:That one. There's already cases on that, so that's going to be a big one. It'll rattle the mortgage industry when those things start happening. So enforcement's going to be big. But we've been through enforcement, people will get through it, companies will pay fines. The AI is probably the biggest thing that I look at. That's a concern for the mortgage industry because some will use it correctly and do really well. Some will dig their heels in and they won't and they'll suffer because they're not part of the change. There's an interesting thing I don't hear a lot of people talking about, and that is the mortgage industry is made up of a lot of 50 plus year old white males.
Speaker 1:That's true. I think we were talking about that. What was that Yesterday that that came up? The average age of a loan officer is now 50-something. It's incredibly high, but at the same time I get it. It makes sense, yeah.
Speaker 2:And what's going to happen is a lot of these people are leaving the business. Right, because when the business gets tough, you hang in. You're like, yeah, let me see. It's almost like when you win a bunch of money in Vegas at a poker table or whatever and you're like should I walk away right now?
Speaker 1:Kenny Rogers in your head, you got to know when to fold them.
Speaker 2:But imagine last week you were in Vegas and you put $1,000 in and you lost it all. This week, when you're in Vegas, you put $1,000 in and you remember losing it all and you hated that. Now you get up to like $5,000 and you look at that and you go. I remember when I was at $1,000 and then went to zero, and now I'm at $5,000. I'm going to get out on top this time. So you let yourself go maybe down to $4,000, and then you go, nope, and then you pull it off and you take your winnings right.
Speaker 2:That's what mortgage industry is having happen right now is loan officers have been crushing it. They're kind of doing it now because they know how to do it. They're going to take their last ride and then they're just out, and so you're going to see a lot of those professionals in the business that have been doing it a long time just hang it up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that reason that you mentioned, in addition to the drastic change that our industry has taken. So you're just talking about the fish. Where the fish are? Well, they're online. They don't want to meet you in person anymore. Why? Because they don't have to in their mind. So, yeah, they're having a tough time in adjusting to the technology that's being incorporated.
Speaker 2:They don't want to get on that social media and yeah, they're going to die. Either they'll quit or they'll be ushered out by what's happening with social media.
Speaker 2:So I think that's going to happen and there's just a ton of business to be picked up by other people or starting to see that swell. Interestingly, some of them are the kids of those people that are retiring, it's true, and so in pre-licensing education right now, we get a lot of kids that go well, my dad did this and finally I'm going to do it, and my mom did this and I'm now getting into the business. So they'll take a lot of that and in other cases they're raising up people in their company that can come in and do that.
Speaker 1:Makes sense.
Speaker 2:So that's kind of an interesting shakeup in the industry. It's already fun to watch. The names are changing in the people that we respect in the industry, the people that we listen to. Sure, we've got a group of speakers that I'll be at Momentum Builder next week and we've got a lot of speakers there and a lot of them have been there for a long time in the industry. And then you have some that are like the newer crew that's coming in with some new ideas. You represent this new group. It's people that are younger, that are like oh, but you could do it this way, and so I think we have new ideas that are coming into the business as well. That's a good point.
Speaker 2:And some of those older ideas like, if you just do this and if you just do that, well, you'll probably lose your business, right? And in the new days, if you just do this, you just do that, it would work. But in the new day, like you didn't mention social media in your conversation. That's exactly right. How are we not talking about going out there and utilizing AI, social media and some of these tools to grow the business? I think you'll see that too. So that's it'll be an interesting shakeup. I don't know about the massive growth of some of these companies, I mean the acquisitions that are taking place.
Speaker 1:You mentioned Academy.
Speaker 2:They just got popped by Guild, like this week right Like three days ago correct.
Speaker 1:That was a big splash on social media. My phone blew up, did you know? Did you know? I'm like yes, we knew, yeah.
Speaker 2:And just the bigger getting bigger, which is so you've now got kind of two camps you have these giant mortgage companies and you have the smaller broker shops that we're seeing really rise up as well, right, so we're going back to that. That's that happened before, where you have brokers and you have the larger mortgage bankers, and so I think that's going to continue. But the middle guy is the one getting squeezed right now, right. The other guy, I think, it's just hanging there a little bit longer and you'll probably be okay, because nobody wants to get out of the game right before the touchdown, right?
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:So there's people that are just hanging in there hoping, you know, with all their hope that they can make it. If they make it through, then good. Well, we need three levels. Right, we need the broker shops, we need the big mortgage banker shops, we need that mid-sized mortgage banker, because there's business for each one of them.
Speaker 1:I have to agree with you on that.
Speaker 2:And they have different models, like they have different models with that which has a different, you know, potential, buyer potential, you know borrower, and so getting rid of them doesn't make any sense, because the brokers need the big mortgage bankers to create that challenge for them. Correct, the mortgage bankers need the brokers to keep them on their toes and make them compete, right, right. So if you take out all the mortgage brokers, the rates can be incredibly high.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:If you take out all the mortgage bankers, then we can be incredibly unregulated and in trouble. It's very true, and so you need both of those things.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and they're all free technically. You're exactly right with that. I mean the concept of if there were no brokers, you're on the money. It would drive rates through the roof because there's nobody to keep that compression down with the thinner margins and whatnot.
Speaker 2:And you need the model of somebody, mid-sized, being able to reach the broker side Right and broker some loans and be able to have some of their in-house stuff.
Speaker 1:Well, I mean, in addition, kind of like what I was talking about before, is you've got 10% of the buyers every year that are A paper.
Speaker 1:They can go to the credit union, put their 20% down here's my documentation, W2, perfect, et cetera and not have a hitch whatsoever. And then you've got the massive population that may be self-employed, maybe had credit challenges, maybe don't know how to use a computer the right way. I mean, there's all of these different sectors of demographics that if you rid the brokers and the bankers and just leave the credit unions or the big banks, there'd be a ton less loans.
Speaker 2:It's a 180-day refi, absolutely yeah, good luck. I mean, everybody serves a purpose and so being able to have each group have their space is awesome.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so I hope we can continue that we ride this out. Mid-level people get their footing. Larger companies continue to do their thing. I mean, the beauty of a larger company is they have the ability to fund a massive compliance department. Try and do things as right as they can. When you trim out all the margin, then you start losing your ability to fund your compliance department, which I always cry when that happens because it's like no, no, because you're opening yourself up to more?
Speaker 1:Yeah, finds more scrutiny, all of the things. It's exactly right. Yeah, well, I mean I'm optimistic about the future, but at the same time, I'm also a top producer mentality. I mean, there's no business, I'm going to go find it. I'm going to change and adapt to the markets. I'm going to dig my heels in deeper. I'm going to understand that the fact that from the end of 2019 to 2022, it was shooting fish in a barrel, it was fake. Exactly. It's not a real market and the real days are coming back to basics building value truly and we will normalize.
Speaker 2:We always do. If you want a normal industry that never changes, get out of the mortgage industry.
Speaker 1:Boom. I love that.
Speaker 2:We have the boom, we have the bust. If you don't like either of those and you're in trouble, you've got to be able to swing with both of them, because eventually it just goes back to normal. Then it's going to boom again, and then we're going to bust again and that's just the world we live in.
Speaker 1:That's right, that's exactly right. Well, Ken, I want to thank you for joining me on this discussion. Is there anything else that you'd like to let our listeners know? And that's a perspective of loan officers, realtors, buyers, sellers, homeowners. They're all listening.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So we did one thing I really want to share In last year. I did not make it through 2020 very well and I've been very open about my experience in facing depression and anxiety for the first time in my entire life. I was always the guy who was like, dude, just smile more, you're fine. Like just why are you mad?
Speaker 2:Look how much money you have, look what a house you live in and I faced that and I got through it and I remember my therapist. I started seeing a therapist to get through and he said what do you do if they lock you down again? Because I don't like being locked down. I travel for a living, I live for adventure, correct? He said what do you do if we lock you down, if the governor locks you down again? I said I won't make it and I still don't know what I meant by that. But when I said that he goes yeah, you will, I'm like what? And he goes you're wrong, you will. And I go what are you talking about? And he goes you made it through this and now you have these skills you've learned and you could use those skills the next time you go through something. So last January, I'm in the shower, we're all. Great thoughts happen.
Speaker 2:And for some reason, that's where all the best thoughts are that or the other place?
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly, and I just it occurred to me because I've always wanted to start a podcast and but I never want to do something just to do it. I always want to have a reason or else I'll let it die. And I was in the shower and it occurred to me just in popping my head. Lessons from last time, like what if we take people's lessons they made? And at the time I said, what if we take lessons from 08 and then, like, interview people who went through it and talk to them about what lessons they're using now? So we did it.
Speaker 2:The first episode was super cool. The second episode we get into her family life and she lost her husband after seven years of cancer that he battled, oh wow. And at that moment I realized this isn't going to be a mortgage podcast. And so I dug in and I just said my first comment was you were in a park Parking lot of a hospital. And she goes what? And I said you lost him in 2021. You were in the hospital parking lot, because I remember, during the lockdown, thinking that was the one thing I looked at and went. They have it the worst right.
Speaker 2:To not be able to see your loved one. Well, not see your baby born, stuff like that. And so we just I said, how do you, how can you tell me, as a friend, what to do? And she's like, don't ask me what I need. And she just gave all these tips and I was like, dude, that was so powerful, wow. And then it became less about how did you make it? For the mortgage is not that hard, right? It sucks sometimes, of course, and it's awesome sometimes, but in the scope of life, right, you get to make it to all your spouses. You know we've got to make it to our wives, you know the kids.
Speaker 1:When the babies were born. Sockers, games, all of those things yes.
Speaker 2:And so we have a pretty good world, but what people have dealt with is just different and it's deeper. And so since then I've just been every Monday we release an episode where we just talk about somebody who's made it through struggles, and then what are the tips and tools that they took away from those struggles? And it's just been fascinating. And so I would say for anybody going through it right now, feeling like mortgage is hard go check out the podcast lessons from last time. The one we're about to release, craig Davis is one of my favorite interviews I've ever done, because he just made it through stage three colon cancer and he worked for Finance of America at the highest level when they shut down, and so he got through cancer and then, like two weeks after recovery, he found out he doesn't have a job, and he breaks that out on the podcast. And so it's just what I want to bring to people is just that perspective of okay, we all go through stuff right.
Speaker 2:Everybody gets broken at some point. Everybody picks themselves up and gets back out there, and what we've always told our kids is it's not how many times you fall, it's how fast you can get up. Absolutely, and so that's what we're trying to do with the podcast is get people tips for getting up and going back out there.
Speaker 1:I love that. I mean, I go back to this, I mentioned it yesterday but Rod Rodey, who you know, I love that guy. He's going to be on the podcast, by the way. Yeah, is he? Yeah, that's awesome. He's been on mine before. He does a great job. He's a guy's a great speaker. He played a clip from Jocko at the end of a presentation and the principal concept of this was bad things happen. Good, yeah, You're still alive, and that gives you the opportunity to reshape what you're doing, dig deeper, hone in all of the different things, but you know what? It could be worse? You could not be here anymore, and that's kind of the emphasis on that. It's a powerful statement and it kind of goes hand in hand with what you're talking about. Instead of moping, seek assistance, seek answers. There's others that have gone through what you're going through, I promise you, and they're willing to share their story in most cases.
Speaker 2:When you go through something. What we've worked with our kids because our kids have struggled high school 2020 wasn't easy, right and what we tell our kids when they go through tough times is we go okay, cool. When you're through this, I want you to be looking for the people going through what you're going through right now, because now you understand them, and then, as soon as they can reach out and go, oh dang, I see that because I recognize it, because I've been there and then just be there for them Absolutely. And then what that comes from of if something sucks and you went through it, you almost take back that power. When you're able to help somebody else through that same thing, I agree, so that's very cool.
Speaker 1:Very insightful. Some great stuff from Ken Perry Dude. Thank you so much Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1:Absolutely so. Those of you listening, I hope you got a lot out of this. There's plenty of nuggets to choose from. A couple of the things that I took from this is number one. Kind of going chronologically backwards is if you're going through hell right now, keep going. You might as well not stop here. There's plenty of folks out there that are willing and available to help in any way they can, but if you don't ask, no one would know. Just like Wayne Gretzky said, you miss 100 percent of the shots that you don't take. And, from the mortgage aspect of things, great insight to what is to come. And the one thing that I hold as a highlight to this is kind of the same thing that I learned when I first got into this industry the only thing consistent is change. That being the case, guys, I hope you enjoyed this. Make sure to like, subscribe, share with a friend because, again, you never know who could need this information right now. Hope to catch you on the next one. Until then, peace.
Speaker 1:Welcome to Key Factor's podcast, where knowledge meets ambition in the fast-paced world of real estate and mortgage. I'm your host, mark Jones, bringing you the latest insight, trends and expert advice to navigate this dynamic property market. In each episode, we dive deep into the heart of the industry, dissecting market movement, exploring investment strategies and unlocking the secret to real estate success. Whether you're a seasoned professional, an aspiring investor or simply looking to stay ahead of the curve, this is the ultimate guide to making informed decisions in the world of property and real estate. So grab a seat and let's uncover the key factors that make all the difference. Welcome to Key Factor's podcast. Let the journey begin.