Hello everyone and Welcome to another

episode of Selling Greenville your

favorite real estate podcast here in

Greenville South Carolina I am your host

as always Stan McCune realtor right here

in Greenville South Carolina and you can

find all of my contact information in

the show notes if you need to reach out

to me for any of your real estate needs

and if you want to support this podcast

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got a different look today I have no

products in my hair I worked out and

showered before and so I look like I

just came off the beach or something so

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comment you can like and and on Apple

podcast and on Spotify and perhaps some

others you can also leave a rating leave

a review review can't talk can do all

those things and I'd appreciate if you

guys could in fact do that today I'm

going to do a little bit of a different

episode

I want to talk about my job and I I

shouldn't say it's not super different I

have talked about my job a few different

times

but specifically I want to talk about

how my job has changed over the years as

a realtor

and there's been quite a bit of

changes and I feel like it's always

helpful and if you're a listener of this

podcast you already know that I like to

reflect on the past I feel like we can

learn a lot from the past and that that

can really guide us into the future and

so I'm a big fan of doing that and

looking back at what things were like in

the past and and and then that you

know really I feel like

for me specifically and for a lot of

other people kind of helps us to ride

the crest of the wave right because if

you're if you're prepared based on

what's happened in the past for what's

hap what's going to happen in the future

then you know you can never be fully

prepared for the future but you can be

more informed with likely outcomes

likely scenarios based on that

and so I do a lot of reflecting on

the past in this podcast we look at

historical data all the time we talk

about

you know what the Federal Reserve has

done in the past I'm going to do another

episode on that sooner than later

not specifically on the Federal

Reserve but looking at at interest

rates because that's a big topic right

now

but my job has really you know I've so

I've been a full-time realtor now

for well I've been a realtor for

seven and a half years I haven't been

full-time that entire time the first

year

I was part-time but I've been a

realtor for seven and a half years and

during that time it's really remarkable

just how much the nature of my job has

changed

and if you look at the history of

real estate

historically being a realtor has really

changed like when I talked to

realtors that have been in real estate

for 30 or 40 years it just blows my mind

some of the things that they tell me

like one guy one realtor from my office

told me that the first contract he ever

had was a verbal contract nobody did

any inspections or anything and after a

few weeks they closed well

that's an interesting story because even

30 40 years ago contracts were still

supposed to be on paper that actually

dates back to England and like the I

don't know like the 1500s or something

like that one of my history buff

listeners can can inform us on that but

real estate contracts specifically

have been on paper for hundreds of years

but nonetheless in Greenville South

Carolina people were still kind of

flying by the seats of their pants

apparently 30 40 years ago

but even just over the past seven and

a half years we've seen a lot of changes

as a lot of Industries have things

just move more quickly now

but for me it's very interesting and

very informative to think back on how my

job has changed and how just real estate

in general has changed now before I get

into this I want to make something very

clear okay

anytime I describe what I do I'm pretty

sure it's almost always going to sound

easier than what it is

and a lot of people already think

that being a realtor is a as an easy job

now I'm not going to pretend like it's

the hardest job in the world you know

this isn't rocket science right but

there's a reason why ninety percent of

of Realtors don't make it to their fifth

year of being a full-time realtor there

is a huge tremendous dropout rate

and it's not easy to to make it in this

world in in the world of real estate

it's not a difficult

job to perform per se but it's very

difficult to perform it well enough that

you can actually make a living off of it

we'll say it that way

at the company party for cdan Joyner

Realtors which is the company I'm I'm

with right now

I connected with with a guy at one

point who was married to a realtor

within the company and he had

partaken of some liquid courage we'll

say and and was very candid about how

his wife was was making basically no

money as a realtor I mean she'd been

doing it for about a year and he asked

me when it gets better and I was like

for to summarize I was like you know

years one to three are really really

hard if you can just grind it out get

some closings during the first three

years

then by year four you know hopefully

you've built a solid group of clients

that are referring people to you

that are now buying or selling

their second home under you and then

you'll start to see things kind of of

snowball a bit and then you'll you'll

start to see some some real action but

not everyone can just wait for three to

four years for that to happen

and so

I want to to make sure that as I in

this episode I'm going to oversimplify

my job to a point where it might sound

like there isn't much involved with with

what I'm doing but just know that even a

basic task in real estate is often a lot

more complicated than than people

realize I I did an open house this

weekend this past weekend I'm recording

this on June 12th I did the open

house yesterday Sunday and open houses

are easy right you just show up Sunday

from two to four pm talk to people as

they as they go in there

wrong actually you start advertising

the open house and the days leading up

to it you have to come up with the

materials to put out at the open house

print them to to and put them in

folders binders or whatever look

professional

you have to put out signs for the open

house

on busy streets you have to do that

Friday night you're not allowed to do

that before 5 PM on Friday

and so that's what I did I was out

late on Friday night because I 5 p.m

wasn't good I had I had showings at 5PM so

I was at like 8PM setting up

setting up open house signs then

Sunday rolls around you have to to fill

up balloons

put them on the signs that is my

least favorite part of the entire

process is the balloons the balloons are

so finicky it's really easy to lose them

it's really easy to pop them I do not

like the balloon thing but they're super

helpful and I know from firsthand

experience when I'm driving by an open

house sign that has balloons on it it

like I my eye is immediately caught by

it right because your peripheral vision

sees the balloons moving around

and so they're really really

necessary

and then oh and I didn't even mention

it took me forever to put the signs for

the open house up because multiple the

signs I had to put straight into the the

classic red clay that we have here in

Greenville and I actually I I had a a

pocket knife that has like a longer

blade on it that finally it was like

okay I just got a I've gotta find a tool

that I can use and I hadn't thought to

bring like a screwdriver or anything

because I've not run into this problem

before and

I bet my pocket knife in the red clay

it was so packed down so that was that

was incredible it took me extra long to

put up the signs

but yeah then on Sunday you put put

the balloons on in the morning and then

you set up for the open house you host

it then you have to go back get the

signs gather them back up deliver them

back to the office

and all in all an open house takes

about nine to ten man hours not

including drive time now

some of that can be outsourced but

depending on the situation I may not be

able to Outsource it or I may not want

to Outsource this in in the case of the

one yesterday it was a little bit of a

both

I've I did the entire thing myself so

it took me around nine to ten man hours

which is

it's unusual that I do everything myself

because I I do have assistance within my

office but people just need to

understand

before I go into this that there's a lot

more into being a realtor than just oh I

just you know search for a house oh I

just go to a house and and have an open

house no there is even when I'm when I'm

showing houses I assuming that I have

time to do it in a standard situation

I'm doing a ton of research looking at

the house looking to see is in a flood

zone is it overpriced

is there activity on it right now are

there already offers doing all sorts of

leg work to make sure we're not wasting

our time before we even get there

and so I just want to lay that

Foundation hopefully I didn't get too

long-winded there but but

hopefully you kind of understand

where I'm coming from on that

I also don't and this will be the

last thing I say on this I don't tell my

clients all this happening behind the

scenes

there's a lot that Shield my clients

from and that's a big part of of how I

run my business so if I'm communicating

with attorneys lenders the other agents

whatever there's a lot of times if my

clients don't need to know something I

don't tell them I just I try to take as

much off their plate as possible most of

the time my clients are moving and if

they're not they're most likely

investors and investor Real Estate

Investors are always busy so I don't

want to add anything to them that's

unnecessary and so as much of the burden

as I can handle myself I like to do that

okay so with all that in mind and again

and sorry for for doing all that I just

wanted to to make it clear that I I am

going to be oversimplifying things a bit

and there's a lot more value that I or

any realtor brings to a transaction than

than only the few points that I'm

bringing up here

so I became a realtor back in I guess

was 2016.

and obviously the market was way

different we've talked about this quite

a bit on this show

the market was way different in 2016

than it is now

it was calmer it was Stella sauer's

Market

but it was calmer there's more

inventory

there's more demand you know

obviously demand has plummeted since

these interest rates have gone up

but Greenville wasn't attracting

as many Outsiders just yet

that's really taken off a lot more

lately with people coming here from from

out of state

and just a variety of things like

that

so when I first started working with

buyer clients really my job was about

finding just good deals for my clients

there were a decent and let's say the

date range from like 2000 16 to 18.

there were good deals that were out

there and really most of my clients and

and again some of this was just the type

of clientele that I had to

probably my experience in terms of

how What I've Done how it's changed

probably wouldn't be the same for

every single realtor out there but a lot

of my clients they were my buyer clients

back then 2016 and 2018 they were

looking for good deals and they were

deals to be found a lot more than there

are now and so it was really just a

matter my primary

job that I felt like particularly for

my investor clients was was to Source

those good deals and was to find those

good deals for my clients to analyze

them to

help them to to assess what the deals

were and and all of that

and that was really a big part of of

the value that I was bringing at that

point in time

now I do want to clarify I've got a

hair on my face this drive me crazy

apologies to to all you watching on

YouTube I don't even know if that hair

will show up or not

I can feel it but I can't see it

obviously I still am doing that today

and so again none of these are like

exclusive of each other but that was the

the primary value that I was providing

back then for sellers my primary value

back then was helping them negotiate the

best deal possible

and trying to limit the number of

repairs that they had to do the number

of the buyer closing costs that they

had to pay all of this because sellers

back then

you know obviously they weren't

getting just like now as the market has

has kind of flipped back up a bit

they aren't weren't getting a hundred

percent of what they listed a home for

they were getting you know closer to 98

and that was after potential price

reductions and so

my job for my sellers what I saw and

what I found to be really the biggest

part of how I was able to help them

was once we got under contract

well for first off

negotiating while we were in an offer

situation while we had offers and offer

multiple offers was to start off with

just getting the absolute best deal for

them because we knew we know that buyers

are going to come in they're going to

ask for the sellers to pay for closing

costs we know the buyers are going to

come in and they're going to immediately

ask for a reduction on the price and so

there's a little bit of a give and take

that's kind of expected but some buyers

are not as reasonable as others and part

of the negotiation process for me is

actually to assess the other party how

reasonable are they going to be are they

willing to do a little give and take

there are some situations though where

and I had this happen during this period

of time where there I would have a

listing and we would immediately get an

offer from a buyer where they were

expecting to my seller to you know

give up the house for 5 000 hours less

than we listed it for and it's like and

we've got more showings coming up and

and all of that and it's like no we're

not going to do that I actually had a um

a person confront me at an open house

because they had made an offer and my

Cyrus was just like no we're doing the

open house first and and and you know

the it wasn't a bad offer that they had

made but they came and confronted me

at the open house and were like why

didn't you guys accept the offer and

it's just like well that's not my

decision this is what my sellers wanted

to do

and then of course after we went

under contract

you know

a big part of what I was doing back then

was just trying to keep my sellers

repair costs as low as possible you know

if people then if buyers then came in

and said you know hey we found you

know they're always gonna say we found

all these repairs that need to be done

so you know you guys need to to pay for

you know three thousand dollars of of

our closing costs

that was where

my ability to negotiate I would be

pushing back against that trying to make

sure that we held the deal together but

also didn't surrender too much that was

really the primary

those were the primary things that I

felt like I was doing back then that

provided value

not that there weren't other things

but those are the first things that come

to mind is like this is what I was

losing sleep over at night these were

the things that I was having the most

conversations with my clients about

these are the things that were front of

mind for me

during that period of time now from

2018 to 2019 right before the pandemic

we saw home prices really start to climb

quite quite a bit

and this caused a lot of my clients to

start gravitating towards new

construction a lot of my buyer clients

actually specified to gravitate towards

new construction and fixer-uppers now

you might think that those are like

opposite ends of the spectrum and they

kind of are so it's like okay why would

people gravitate that way

well

when there is

when prices are starting to go up

that is when new construction can become

more attractive because Builders if they

have homes that aren't selling or

whatever the case may be they are

willing to offer concessions Builder

concessions maybe they'll pay for

closing costs maybe they will offer a

rate buy down they're doing these types

of things right now in order to stay

afloat as the market has shifted

and then of course fixer-uppers are

the opposite end of the spectrum but

similarly they're cheaper and so this

is what people were were gravitating

towards as prices started going up it's

like okay we need fixer-uppers so a lot

of what I was doing was looking for

those fixer-uppers was helping my

clients interviewing new home

builders those types of things

helping them through the the new

construction process if if they did go

under contract with the with the builder

and

and and just kind of managing all of

those different things when it when it

came to fixer-uppers in particularly

because I've got

Fix and Flip experience and things of

that nature a lot of other similar

experiences

I would even sometimes if my clients

were kind of struggling with a vision or

or needed some ideas I would be there as

a sounding board to try and to try to to

bring ideas to the table as well

and of course again I still do that

today but that was a major part of what

I was doing back then

now for my sellers the really the

most important thing for for sellers

that I feel like during this time period

was selling quickly

because the market was getting hotter

and so you kind of had two buckets right

those that sold quickly and that got top

of the market and those that different

that didn't and then their homes you

know would not only not sell for top of

the market but would actually get

probably less than what they should have

because they didn't sell quickly

and so my job shifted to more for my

sellers to Consulting how to be one of

the ones that sold quickly as opposed to

one of the listings that just lingered

on the market so a lot of this had to do

with Consulting on staging prepping a

home pricing strategies things of

that nature we need to come up with a

plan so this home doesn't just sit on

the market and and so that was

what I was doing more than anything else

during that period of time or again

that was the thing that that I was

thinking about and focusing on most

often during that period of time now

the crazy Market 2020 through mid

2022ish however you want to say it

or yeah mid-2022 all these all

these years are Gone by kind of crazy

but particularly 2021 and we'll just

call it 2021 and kind of the half years

surrounding it okay

this was the craziest part of my

career by far absolutely by far nothing

compares to this for me and for any

other realtor I've ever talked to this

is where we started having ASAP showings

is what I called them an ASAP showing

was a home came on the market that fit

exactly what one of my buyer clients

wanted and it was like I had to drop

everything I was doing to go show it to

them because it might be gone in like an

hour

that was incredibly stressful for

everyone for for my clients for me

And but that was super important I

had to make sure that I had a level of

built-in flexibility in my schedule to

make sure that I could just okay I'm I I

can put I can drop what I'm doing and

return to it in a couple of hours it's

not going to inconvenience everyone

anyone

so yes I will hop over and show you

this house real quick

there was a few times where I

couldn't and you know maybe someone from

my office was able to

in those instances and so that was a

big part of of the value was just my

availability massive part of my value

during that period of time

and then another

thing that I felt like was really really

valuable because there were so many

multiple offer situations for my buyer

clients was just crafting the perfect

offer right and and crafting an offer is

is a lot there's a lot of nuances to it

there you know is the obvious thing

which is just the price but there are

multiple different ways to approach how

you price an offer

there's a lot of terms that can kind

of get buried away that people will

forget about

there are ways of crafting those

terms in a way that are really

attractive to a seller

there are ways of just tightening up

the terms to make to make things more

attractive

usually a listing agent will put

little clues in their offers as to or

sorry in their listings as to what they

would like to be what things they would

like to have in their offers and so I

would try to find those Clues and try to

incorporate those things and also just

have conversations with the listing

agents as well so that was a big part of

the value that I was providing for my

buyer clients during that period of time

was just my availability for showings

and then trying to craft the perfect

offer so that we would finally went out

in one of these multiple offer

situations

for sellers really a big you know people

think oh it was super super easy to to

be a seller in that market and to an

extent it was

but there were still plenty of work

that I had to do as a realtor in that

market working with sellers

and a lot of it was

on the front end determining how high to

go on a price without a lot of comps

right

we you know what inventory became up

started to become a problem during this

period of time and so

it became a real challenge of like

okay there's not really any comps we

don't exactly know what this house is

going to sell for

but I'm I've done a bunch of research

I've looked at what's on the market

currently I've looked at what's sold

here's what I think we we could

get

and here's why I don't think it's too

high here's why I don't think it's too

low

and that would be how we would

approach it

and and that was really really

crucial because

a lot of people during this time period

were just all over the map people were

just listing their homes for way too

much or

you know I saw a lot of instances

where homes were were underpriced and

and then it was just kind of insane the

amount of activity people would get and

that would be stressful

you know sellers like to get multiple

offers but they don't like to get 40

offers right

it sounds awesome Until you realize

that you have to have every single offer

presented to you by your realtor that's

a legal obligation I could lose my

license if I didn't do that

and not to mention having to be out

of your home for that entire time it's

just a lot of a lot more stress than you

might realize when you get you know

dozens of offers

and then another big part of what I

was doing was upfront negotiation

particularly in multiple offer

situations I remember specifically there

was one time that I was I was literally

at the pool with my kids and I got a

call from a buyer's agent wanting to

negot associate with me with with one of

my Sellers and so you know

here we go you know I it's not

something that all of these things again

during that pandemic environment

everything was very tense so it wasn't

the kind of thing where it's just like

you know hey I'm at the pool you know

we're gonna be here until 10 o'clock let

me call you back at 10 30. it was like

no it had to happen right there and and

right then

and so

and those were the types of things that

I found myself doing quite often was

these late night negotiations

trying to you know make sure that I

was there for my clients

now let's get into today's market

right from mid 2022 basically a year ago

until now you could you could probably

go back a little bit further than a year

ago but roughly the past year

for my buyer clients I think a lot of

what we're doing right now is is

thinking long term and strategizing

right I mean we don't have as many ASAP

showings as we've talked about

home prices

are obviously very high but

people are there's a lot of of debate

going on with what's going to happen

with those home prices are they going to

Flatline are they going to keep going up

are they going to go down

and so I try to educate myself on on

the economy and and what's happening in

in the real estate market

and so I tried to bring that knowledge

to bear for my clients so we think

through the long term what what is our

long-term strategy here

where are interest rates going

well more homes be coming on the

market will we be able to even find what

you're looking for are you looking for

something that's realistic are you

looking for something that's going to

come on the market the next six to 12

months these are the things that right

now in addition to all of the other

things these are the things that right

now I'm spending a lot of time with my

buyer clients trying to consult with

them trying to be you know almost like

an advisor to them to try to think about

their real estate strategy

for my sellers

really I'm my focus right now is

is on marketing because you know as the

market has shifted

homes are obviously sitting longer than

they have in a while we've seen the days

on Market till sale Skyrocket the in

in you know the past year but

particularly the past few months

and so

we need to obviously I have to amp up my

marketing I mentioned about doing an

open house I haven't done a whole lot of

open houses the past few years and the

reason is that oftentimes homes would

just sell before you even had the

opportunity to do it now not everyone

even wants an open house that's a whole

separate thing

and there's debate with whether open

houses actually sell homes but it at

least brings a certain level of Buzz to

a home makes people aware of of a home

it reminds them that it's on the market

and and so I do think that it it has

value even though it's pretty rare that

at an open house that a house actually

sells

but the last open house besides this

last one that I did

it did not have a ton of activity but

then within a week we were under

contract with someone so you just never

know what will happen so I'm focusing on

my marketing and then as far as when

homes do sit and and they don't go under

contract for for several weeks there's

this balance of determining if patience

is required if we just need to wait for

the right buyer to come online and for

the the market to settle out in a way

and what I mean by that is sometimes

the dynamic with

with a home that's listed to sell

literally the dynamic is can be as

simple as just waiting for certain homes

to go under contract and then the the

right buyer to come on it's really just

a timing thing you know and you just

don't know exactly how to time things

perfectly

and so

that's where there's kind of a constant

constant assessment going on with okay

it's been a few weeks since this home

has been on the market do what do we

need to do do we need to lower the price

do we need to change up our marketing

strategy what exactly needs to happen

in order for us to get more activity and

to get this under contract now a lot of

research goes into that research on the

market as a whole but also just research

on what's Happening locally what's

happening in that neighborhood

etc etc

and so

the job my job will continue to shift

this is just the way it's a

very interesting job again that's

another misconception Is that real

estate isn't interesting I think it's

super duper fascinating

and you guys know I love doing this I

I enjoy nerding out on all these on

all these different things I enjoy the

fact that

from year to year my job is different

and I have to keep on keep myself on

my toes I don't even know if if that's a

phrase but I just made a phrase I have

to keep myself on my toes to keep up

with the way real estate is

constantly changing this but that's

exciting I enjoy it

it's a lot of fun and I hope you

enjoyed hearing a little bit about how

some of my focuses and some of the

things that have brought value to my

clients have changed over the years

it will like I said it'll continue to

change but I would love for you to be my

client if we haven't worked together so

my contact information is in the show

notes if you need to reach out to me

please rate review subscribe make sure

you don't miss any future episodes and

we will talk again next time