Chasing Financial Freedom
Chasing Financial Freedom
Holiday Season Strategies for Real Estate Success and Balance
This holiday season, we're challenging the status quo. We're not slowing down, we're not stepping back – we're refining our strategies and preparing for an extraordinary new year. Join us, your hosts, as we reveal secrets from our journey in the real estate market, discussing the power of consistency and persistence in achieving financial freedom. Discover how we leverage this festive period to turbo-charge our financial goals, and how you can do the same. Let's dive into the potential of social media as a captivating tool for connecting and engaging with potential clients.
But success isn't just about relentless grind. We learned this the hard way from our corporate America days. We believe in the power of balance, the necessity to recharge to avoid burnout. Tune in as we unpack the challenges of managing multiple businesses and the art of delegating. We'll also share how staying active on social media and making in-person connections can significantly boost your chances of landing the right audience. Remember, success demands continuous effort and personal growth. So let's set ourselves up for a prosperous new year while staying safe, healthy, and balanced in our lifestyle.
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Hey guys, ryan Diment from Chasing Financial Freedom podcast, Hope you guys are having a great day. Today is December 4th and I wanted to give you guys a little bit of an update on what we're doing the last three weeks before we hit Christmas. But also talk about some rumblings in the real estate market, but specifically around motivation, and I know this is all about chasing financial freedom. But the piece that's really sticks out to me is a lot of people are shutting down and just saying I'm mailing it in for the rest of the year, and I just don't get that. Now's the time that you get to make a difference in your 2024. And that could either be through marketing or connecting with people in your database, looking for another job, doing something different in your household, changing your habits, something to that extent that will change the direction of your 2024.
Speaker 1:And for the next three weeks we probably it's probably been a week already, so let's call it. Let's call it three weeks, but we've been at it for a week already since we just passed Thanksgiving is. We're going hard on our marketing for our real estate, for our project on Bayard Park. I'm going hard on lending. I'm going hard on our nonprofit. I want to set us up and it's paying off. But it's taken a lot of persistence to get to that point. You don't start seeing success overnight, unless I don't even know if there's an, unless you just don't see success overnight. You have to put in the time and effort and more and more people I'm talking to in the real estate space, yes, I'm talking to other lenders, I'm talking to realtors, talking to some investors little less than in, I would say investors are still going full tilt. There's more of them going full tilt than realtors and lenders. It just seems, as the market has gone sour, we've slowed down. We're going to do, we're on pace to do less than four million transactions this year, which is less than what we did in the last great recession in 2008. It was 4.3 million nationwide.
Speaker 1:But there are people out there saying it and I believe it every single day there's closings happening. So why aren't you out there getting some of your closings done? I don't get it Sitting on the sideline and saying what was me Just doesn't work. And when it boils, when everything boils down, it really comes down to being persistent. And then, once you get the persistency going, you get consistent and then you're very consistent with what you're putting out every single day.
Speaker 1:On marketing, we're putting four to six pieces out every single day across all of our channels. We're connecting with like-minded people through Facebook and LinkedIn and Instagram and YouTube. Remember, guys, I've struggled with YouTube for the longest time. I've got a virtual assistant that is out interacting with people, helping us get to a better place. Are we growing by leaps and bounds? No, but from the time she started, I had about 250 followers. We're close to approaching 700. That's in 90 days, a little over. That. Is that a big deal? No, is it progress? Yes, but we're consistent every single day.
Speaker 1:We put out two videos on YouTube every single day, across the podcasts and also my personal platform. I just started a personal YouTube channel and I think I have 18 or 19 followers. It's coming along a lot quicker than the podcast because it started from scratch. We're doing shorts. We're doing some mid-term sorry, some mid-real videos where they're like two to five minutes, and then we've done some longer ones, where I do a true talk video twice a week, on Mondays and Wednesdays, to where it could be five to seven minutes, maybe a little bit longer, just depending on what's on my mind. It's the change that I'm starting to see and feel and experience is from the consistency I've been putting out for weeks. Let me give you guys an example. If I haven't spoken about it, I don't think I have.
Speaker 1:Every Saturday I put out a video a short, less than a minute out to realtors to saying, hey, I'm here if you need an approval over the weekend, when your lender's out sipping my ties and not taking your phone calls and you're waiting to Monday to try to get an approval. I'm here Saturday and Sunday. Probably the first several weeks I did those videos nothing, crickets, absolutely zero. Really didn't get any traction, didn't get any likes, didn't get any views. Then, all of a sudden, the last probably three to four weeks, I'm averaging anywhere between two to four calls every single weekend where realtors are testing me to see if I pick up my phone.
Speaker 1:I do. Sometimes I can't. I'm on the phone with somebody else and I text them and say, hey, are you inquiring about needing a loan? They say, yes, I'm a realtor. Okay, great, I'll call you back. I'm on the other line. They say thank you. Then I follow up with them. Is it going to lead to a deal every single time? No, is it creating a connection. Yes, that's what I'm doing, which means then I can then have that person engage with me on social as I put more content out that's relevant to them, to where I get the engagement back and start getting feedback, whether it's positive or negative.
Speaker 1:Guys, I'm not looking for that. I'm looking for the engagement piece, to where they're seeing my information, they're working with what I'm putting out there, and then they contact me Whether they agree with what I'm putting out there or not. Who knows? I can't tell you that, but all I can tell you is more and more realtors are calling, which I'm like. Then why can't I add a layer?
Speaker 1:This past weekend, we had an open house on our Bayard Park. Not a lot of foot traffic. I said we need to do something different. I'm going to start putting out a weekly video on Bayard Park to where it's talking to renters, time home buyers, people that are sitting on the side of the market because they think their home that they're looking for today is going to be cheaper tomorrow, which, in all case, I've never and by all means, guys, I'm all about finding deals.
Speaker 1:I'm a real investor. Excuse me, but how are you going to time it? I guess the question is, if you're able to time the market, you're going to be one of the very few people that can or actually want to probably the only person that can and at that case you're going to become a billionaire. And I'm not trying to be sarcastic. There's just no way to time the market. You have to take what the market gives you today and then you figure out yes or no, and if you're, if it's no, then you continue to wait. But even if you look at where we're at on interest rates, housing prices are still steady where they're at Now.
Speaker 1:There are some markets that didn't have that COVID launch that are actually still appreciating and going up in value. But some of those markets that saw a huge COVID launch are coming back down to earth, which those would be great to go after, but again, they were at all time highs. So there needs to be some type of correction because at this time of the year every year, if you go look at the data, sales go down, prices go down on real estate because it's the slow time of year. No one wants to move during the holidays. But you will see, in January you start seeing an uptick in contracts and you will start seeing transactions jumping up in February from those contracts. So when do most of those people start looking? Probably in December.
Speaker 1:I actually was able to help a client get preapproved over this weekend and they're going to go out shopping. They got preapproved for more than what they thought they could afford and it's still healthy ratios. They still have enough money. It's not stretching them, but I explained to them now's the time to get a house under contract, because no one wants to move during the holidays. And if you can find a deal that works for your budget and for that seller, there's some concessions that could be had, whether it be seller concessions towards a buy down on your interest rate. Maybe it's seller concessions for closing costs. Maybe you assume the loan. Maybe it's an FHA, usda or VA loan that you can assume, where you can assume that low interest rate. But you're going to have to come in with some cash to tidy up the seller.
Speaker 1:There's just different ways to really play this market right now, but most people don't see it that way. They see it as they don't want to jump in because they don't think it's right, which is fine, but they're going to continue to wait and wait, and they're the type of people that don't take action unless everything lines up and then, once that happens, they're too late. When the sentiment of the majority of people that are in these housing data surveys when they're telling you it's a horrible time to buy, that means it's a great time to buy. When they tell you it's a wonderful time to buy, it's time to pull back. What's the old saying? When there's blood in the street, you need to take advantage of it. I'm sure that's wrong, but that's the gist of the actual saying.
Speaker 1:But we don't seem to want to go against the grain. We tend to lean towards being a herd mentality, a sheet mentality, and that's sad because it's okay to be a free thinker and to be able to do something different than others without worrying about everybody else's opinion. That's where I'm at with social media guys. I don't worry about other people's opinion. There's a guy that put some comments on a short that I put out the other day and he basically said did you ever graduate high school? You're full of crap of all the stuff you put out. I try not to work. I live off of two investments that are giving me 30% return. I said that's great. If you're so smart, why don't you share that with all of us so we can actually do the same thing? Crickets, it's just BS, it's just some scam, but at that time I don't care. I'll respond to them, but I don't put any effort into what they're saying, because they're just full of crap. If they have so much knowledge and so much experience, why aren't they sharing it? Are they afraid that everybody else will get it and there won't be enough for them? No, they're just scammers.
Speaker 1:The big scam that's going around right now is Bitcoin and cryptocurrency, to where all these people are paying off hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt through cryptocurrency. Go look at some of the posts. They're just, they're spammy, and God, I hope people are not falling for them because they're going to lose a lot of money. I'm not saying cryptocurrency can't be invested in. I don't know enough about it. So I'm not saying yes or no Doesn't mean you can't research it, but these posts that are going up, they're spammy and I'm hoping people don't fall for them. And I probably get now thinking about it. Two to three of those a week across social media platforms maybe more of those spammy people that want to be friends, especially on Facebook, and all you got to do is just look at their page and you can tell that it's totally spammy and it's just stupid. So, guys, being able to put your foot on the gas pedal for the next three weeks is huge.
Speaker 1:To change your business, to change your life, to change your. Maybe you want to get a new job, I don't know. But packing up and sending it on its merry way and saying I'm done for the year is crazy. And I remember when I worked in corporate America I had saved up so much vacation time PTO pay time off that I could take off most of the month of December. And when I did that, I came home and worked, even though I was still managing my business, since I had a large group that I was managing. I could do emails during the morning, get those all situated. The rest of the day I was working on my side hustle. At the time, my business and I was probably working 50, 60 hours. And there's a downside to that. I wasn't recharging my batteries enough and I learned that in a short period of time of just burnout, you do have to take time off. Today I'm working seven days a week, but on Saturday and Sundays I typically only put three or four hours in, maybe five, on the outside, and I rest the rest of the day, spend time with family, with Moose, try to go out and do something to be able to recharge the battery.
Speaker 1:I still get up early, it's just a habit. Am I getting up at 4.30? No, I'm probably getting up around 5 or 5.30 most days on the weekends, even going out and doing what needs to be done. But I like to have consistency in that because it makes it very easy so I don't slack off on the weekend and get up at 8 or 9 o'clock and then it's oh my God, how do I get up on Monday morning? I don't have that problem. I can get up Monday morning and go, and Mondays are not bad for me. They're great days, they truly are, and I feel very blessed that I can have a life that I'm creating. My family's healthy, moose is healthy and happy and I'm building multiple businesses.
Speaker 1:Has it been a struggle? Yes, it's still a struggle. Slow time of the year we're trying to get houses sold. So we've got to find creative ways to get houses sold, got to get creative ways to close loans, creative ways to raise donations for true community. It's just part of the grind, but that grind evolves and changes because, as I can find out, the who in this process as in who can do a lot of this.
Speaker 1:For me, it's getting better, it's getting easier and I'm working less in the business and more on the business. I'm the face of the business, but I'm also really the backbone of the business right now, and that's tough. I'm doing it all and by doing it all it wears you out and it's not effective. You can't do it all. I think if I was just a social media person and I was running social channels and I didn't have any, I guess, real world businesses to worry about and I say that guys, I'm not trying to downplay it how about physical businesses to run? I think it would be a lot easier because I wouldn't have to worry about that. But also, at the same time, being able to balance both of them out is a blessing because it allows me to turn one off and walk away from it and refresh my mind and then get on to another project, get it finished and I can bounce back and forth. It keeps my day. Interesting is what I'm trying to get at. I'm not doing the same thing over and over again.
Speaker 1:And now being able to layer in and being a loan officer with Nexa has been great. I've had to reinvent myself from a marketing perspective, which has been a challenge in itself, but it's been fun because I'm able to find different ways to engage but also get a message out there that still resonates with me inside of me, and I'm finding my tribe on social media to connect with those people that are looking for a loan officer that understands both sides of the equation, not just the loan but also the acquisition piece. Maybe there's construction involved, maybe there's rehab work involved. All those things I do and I've done and I've had failures with and I've had successes with. But what can this all lead to? I really think it's going to lead to another growing inflection point for myself, for the businesses, but also I'm going to attract the who's or I should say the whom into the businesses, to where I can further pull myself out of the weeds on a daily basis and really focus on the 30,000 foot view and being the face of the businesses, to where I'm out glad handing and doing those social connections. More in person we can always make. If you do real in-person stuff, who stops you from recording video. All those can get translated into social media posts, to shorts, to social media interactions. It's just a matter of doing them.
Speaker 1:But if you're not putting yourself out there, guys, and you're mailing it in, how are you supposed to change your trajectory of life, whether it be personal, professional or both? How do you change it if you're just mailing it in for the rest of the year saying, hey, I'm done, I'm packing it up? Why would you pack it up now, january 1st, you start all over again. Are you one of those type of people that say, say, january 1st, I've got all my goals and then, two or three weeks later, they're done? Maybe that's not working. Maybe you need to find a better way to go about what you're trying to accomplish. I don't know. I can't tell you this.
Speaker 1:If you're willing to put it out there and start working on yourself, life starts changing very quickly. You start becoming not lucky, but skillful. Maybe there's some luck in there too, because you're putting the word out there. Maybe it's a both. You're getting from your leads, your marketing. You're getting leads and you're also getting luck because people are seeing what you put out there. And once you start putting it out there, it changes. But I can tell you this it doesn't happen overnight. You can't expect to put out a post and then be a sensation overnight. Boy, get that out three times, ryan. That's tough, it takes time and effort and I think we've not think I know we've lost some of that. That's work ethic.
Speaker 1:The internet and social media, unfortunately, are double-edged swords. They're great because now you've got this huge population of people that you get exposure to. The bad side of it is you have unrealistic expectations because you see all these other people posting their life is so beautiful and they're so perfect, they're living in this great house and they've got all these cars and they got all this money. Most of it's bullshit, guys. It really is. It's just BS and you just have to be real and I think that's part of where I've struggled in this process is I'm just being real with who I am and I don't think people like that and that's fine. But that's just who I want to be. I want to be real, I want to be honest to myself, but I also want to share real things with you guys so you guys can have some insight and then, but also some value. I want to share value with you guys and be heartfelt from what we're doing, how things are going, and when I screw up, I tell you guys I screw up. But at some point all the effort that you put in pays off. But you have to be consistent and persistent with it and I'll leave you guys with this. If you don't know your why, you've got to go find it.
Speaker 1:Why are you doing what you're doing today? Mine is to support my family, give them a better life, give myself a better life. I do have financial freedom and part of the financial freedom is to be able to help others, impact others through my financial freedom. That means giving back to others. I'm not just talking about time, I'm also talking about money. That's rewarding. To fill somebody else's cup up is the best feeling I get by all means.
Speaker 1:Earning a million bucks in a deal great. But now take a hundred thousand dollars of that million bucks and go put it to use. Go help others that are less fortunate than you are and give them a helping hand up and let them succeed and then pass it on Once they are on their feet and they're moving. Have them pass that on. And now look at the impact that you're starting to create. That's one of the biggest things that it's not the biggest, it's not one of the biggest thing. It is the biggest thing that we're focusing on. True community is impacting a hundred thousand people. It may sound small, but it's a starting point. Once we can elevate and get past the hundred thousand, I'd like to go to half a million With the 250, let's go to half a million and let's go.
Speaker 1:But how do you do that? Being persistent and consistent and messaging, being out in front of people, talking to people, connecting. By all means, guys, I'm not telling you not to recharge your battery. You have to do that. But if you're going to mail in the rest of the year, that's not recharging your battery, that's giving up and that's not where we're at. That's not where I want to be and I know that's not where you want to be. But in the end you have to be okay with it and if you're not okay with it, now's the time to change.
Speaker 1:You got three weeks before the next holiday. Push as hard as you can, make those phone calls, put out those social media posts, send emails. Do the things that you're uncomfortable with to push your business forward. Do those things that you're uncomfortable with in your personal life, to get you in a better place mindset-wise. Do those things that you're not comfortable with, to get your house in order so you can start 2024 off right. But it all boils down to you. You've got to do the work. Surround yourself with like-minded people and you will succeed. All right, guys. I hope you guys have a great week. I'll see you guys on the other side. Stay safe, stay healthy.
