KGCI: Real Estate on Air - The 'Wow' Factor: A System to Stop Losing Clients and Build Wealth

Episode Date: November 20, 2025

Summary:This episode provides a tactical blueprint for creating a "wow" client experience that stops clients from slipping away and builds a referral-based business for long-term wealth. Listeners will learn specific, actionable strategies to go above and beyond at key stages of the transaction, from the initial consultation to post-closing follow-up. This is a masterclass in turning satisfied clients into raving fans who become your personal sales force, ensuring a predictable and profitable real estate career.

Welcome to Uncommon Real Estate, where it's all about finding creative solutions for real estate agents and investors. In exclusive mastermind conversations with some of the brightest minds in real estate, you'll learn how to earn an extra six figures a year. Don't follow the herd. Be uncommon. Here are your hosts, multi-millionaire real estate agent and investor Chris Craddock and Jeff Saferight. to another episode of the Uncommon Real Estate Podcast. I'm your host Chris Craddick. I want to just dive into who we are, what we're about. So we run a team that I believe now is a billion real estate team. We're actually looking. We're right on that verge of the billion dollars sold.

So I believe that we've crossed that billion dollar threshold. We're talking about what it is to be excellent in our craft and to build wealth. And wealth is when your money works harder than you work. So a lot of people can get wealthy by inheriting money or winning the lottery, but for the rest of us, the way to get wealthy is to be excellent at what we do and then make wise investments. And then when our investments outperform the time for dollars that we spend, that is when we start winning. So today, we're talking about the front of that again. How do we, if you are a real estate agent, make money by being excellent at your craft. And so today, we are not talking about getting new clients. We are talking about wowing our clients that we already have,

getting them to say this is awesome so that at the end, we will get new clients because everybody says, oh my gosh, you're going to buy a house. You need to work with my buddy, Chris. He did an awesome job for me. So that is what we are going for. That's who we are and what we are working to do. All right. So with that said, here is the rule. Number one rule. If you're writing anything down, which one of my life principles is always take notes, sit in front and take notes. Those are some of the life principles. So if you're taking notes, here is the thing that you need to say. If a client ever calls you, you have not done your job. If a client ever calls you, you have not done your job. Here's why. There was a show,

that my wife and I, I love at night before we go to bed, my wife and I watch, you know, probably one or two episodes of some sort of show. And, you know, in the last few weeks, last week or two, we've been finishing Succession and I've been hitting play and play, as you can probably see when you see me that I've got bags under my eyes. It's because I've been staying up late watching Succession and just finished it. But the show The Bear is about a guy who has a who has who's working in a restaurant right he was i believe the chef at uh french laundry and and again it's a it's a fictional story so he was a chef there like one of the best restaurants in the world and his brother who owned this little dive shop passed away and left it to him

so he comes back and he's working there and you see the difference between where he was originally and where he is this dive shop everybody comes in they're like yeah what do you want All right. Take it. Take what you, this is what you're getting. If you don't like it, you can screw off, you know, like that kind of a vibe. And one of the guys that was working with him went and worked at a Michelin Star Restaurant and, you know, they're working at a Michelin Star Restaurant. And the whole idea is to give an experience that is incredible, you need to, you need to know what they want before they ask. Know what they want before they ask. And so the idea was, they're walking around the restaurant and they're just listening to what people are talking about.

And this one restaurant was in Chicago and they said, they overheard somebody saying, man, there's this deep dish pizza. I wish I would have gotten before I flew out tomorrow. And so he goes back and said, hey, they talked about this deep dish pizza from this other restaurant. And so one of the people in the back just starts running to the restaurant, orders a pizza, comes back. They, you know, cut up pieces of the pizza and then they garnish it so that they,

it's this amazing deep dish pizza with all the garnishments and everything else on it because that's what they do. They hear what people want and they give them what they want. So when we think about our job, we are in a customer, we're in a problem solving business, but we're in a customer service business. And I'm going to share one more thing before I dive into what we should be doing and how we should be looking at it. So for me, when I first started, I did a really good job. I'm high eye disprofile. So I want to make sure people had a great experience. We did it together. Super fun. Well, then I got super busy. And when I got busy, I wanted to make sure that the people got the best price. When they were buyers, I negotiated the heck out of the deal. So they got crazy

good deals. When they were sellers, man, I negotiated the heck out of it. Man, I was the hammer with a smile, the velvet hammer. But that was the hammer, which is another story when we talk negotiating. Never be a total jerk when you're negotiating. That is one way to lose every negotiation. And when you win, it's still losing. It's a small world out there. And so you want to be able to be likable. People want to work with people they like. But I was kicking butt for people. But the experience wasn't a wow experience. And so I wasn't getting people super, super, super happy about the experience for that period when I was so busy because I thought all they wanted was the best deal,

the best prices when they wanted also to feel good about the experience. And that was mind-blowing for me because I'm like, you got a great plan that should make you feel good. Are you kidding me? But it didn't. And so I had to go back and say, what would make them feel good?

And then he realized that the number one complaint that all, like across the board, if you look at every study, they say the number one reason, though number one complaint against real estate agents is always the same thing. Lack of communication. And so, when you think about it, let's say somebody is home and a showing happen. They're a seller. And a showing happened during this showing, the people came in, they stayed a little bit long, and then they left. You get a call from the agent, from your seller, saying,

hey, how did the showing, though, what happened in the seller's mind? Think about it for a second. They're sitting there. They're thinking, they're wondering. They're like, oh, my gosh, oh my gosh, is Chris going to call me? What happened? Why am I not hearing feedback? What's going on? There's an open loop. And so for me, one of the things that I all, like, I fight hard not to have any time I have a business call. Anytime I have any call, I say, what is the next step? Because if it's, hey, let's just circle back, there's an open loop. You never want to leave an open loop. Open loops are so terrible because it allows your mind to run wild. So what we say to the sellers is we set expectations in the beginning. And all of this communication stuff is through setting

expectation. So we say, hey, listen, when when buyers come through the property, if we call them immediately after they've walked through the property. It makes us feel desperate, seem desperate, and it cuts off our legs to negotiate. So what we do is we allow for the weekend to pass. They go through the weekend. And on Monday, we call through everybody. And oftentimes agents are off on Monday. They're not working on Monday. A lot of the properties will go under contract on Monday. And so we'll call through. We'll hear back from them sometime Monday or Tuesday morning. and we will do our call every week to review what happened over the last week every Tuesday. What that does is we don't say at 10 a.m.

We don't say before noon. We say on Tuesday. And if we say on Tuesday, it needs to happen on Tuesday. Because if it doesn't happen on Tuesday, if you get busy and it happens on Wednesday, you've lost trust with them unless you had told them on Tuesday, hey, can we connect tomorrow instead? But you cannot miss your call on that day. if you say Tuesdays or your call day.

Well, what that does is it keeps them from thinking through what's going on here, what's going on here and calling you. Because once they've called you, they're nervous. They're freaking out. So always, always, always called them before they call you. And then you've got to say, where are the areas that I know, that I know people are going to call me? Okay.

And so these are the areas when showings happen. after open houses when an appraisal happened oh that's a big one for sellers they're always like hey so what did it appraised for and then you've got to go back to them and say oh well it's the buyer's appraisal and you know they don't usually share it if they do share it it's bad news because it means they're going to negotiate a lower price so you tell them ahead of time hey just want to let you know the appraiser is going to come through but the buyer owns the appraisal because they pay for it and they almost never share their appraisals unless it appraises low, so we really don't want them sharing it. But they just almost will never do it. It's industry standard that they don't do it. So I just

want to let you know that we're probably not going to hear about the appraisal until they either say they're at value, but they won't tell us the price or if we do here, it means that they're probably low and we're going to have to, you know, work through that negotiation. But when you tell them that ahead of time, they may give a little bit of pushback, but then when they understand that's normal, then they don't, then they're totally fine. So, and I'll give an example of, of why it's important to hear that's normal. Everybody wants to know it's normal. So I have a, I have a lump on the top of my left hand. And so I went into the doctor because it was a little weird to have a bit of a lump there. And the doctor looked at it and he's like, oh, yeah, that's nobody, that's no big

deal. Then he was like, actually, let me send you to a specialist. And so he sent me to a specialist. As soon as he says, nobody, he said no big deal. And I was like, okay, good. Then he said specialist. And I was like, ooh, I don't like to hear that. That's not something that I'm, I'm happy to hear. And so when I went in, he looked at it. He's like, oh, yeah. He's like, you played sports and whatnot. Yeah, you probably just, you know, just the hitting of your hands all, all those years growing up. it's just a calcium buildup, it's really not a big deal. And he's like, it's normal, you know, for people that have played a lot of sports where their hands got hit. And I said, okay, good. But the fact that he said it's normal just made me feel really good. And so that's

what everybody wants to know. They want to know that it's normal. Right. And so when you say it's normal not to get the appraisal number ahead of time, that's great. But if you say it after they ask you, then their mind's going to run and be like, wait, that doesn't seem right. That's like, are you backtracking? Can I trust my age? can I trust my person? All of that stuff goes through on there. And so you want them to know that things are normal, right? That's the, that's the key. Okay. So that's it. It's normal. Now, the other places, where are the other places that, you know, buyers, right? If they're getting a good deal, most appraisers are lazy. So we want to tell them that it's normal for appraisers

to just come back right around contract price. So I got a property right now. was an off-market deal from a seller of mine, a friend of mine, who he just wanted an off-market deal. And I guess some investors that were looking for a great deal. And they got a deal like, I mean, all the comps are in the high fours, low fives. They got a great deal on this property. But I also knew that appraisers are lazy. So the appraiser, I just said to him ahead of time, hey, want to give you a heads up. Oftentimes appraisers are lazy. So don't be surprised if it comes back at value. And sure enough, it was a 425 purchase and appraised at 426. All the comps are in the high fours, low five. And it was, it was crazy. But I knew it was going to happen because so

often appraisings are lazy and they just rubber stamp the price. If it looks good, yep, contract price. So that's, that's the deal there. But you need to tell them ahead of time. So the whole goal here is everybody, everybody, everybody needs to know what to expect. Expectations are important. And when they call you first, it means they're thinking about stuff. They're worried about stuff. And it's just not a good place to be. So that is it.

You want to give your clients a wow experience. That's it. Now, let's talk last thing, closing gifts. A lot of times people will give closing gifts of like a gift card or something else like that. Well, if you give somebody a gift card, it's gone, done. But we use branded cutting boards. Why do we use that? So that every time they pull it out, they see our name over and over and over again.

We used to do cut cone knives. I love cut cone knives. I bought a cut cone knife set. Like, I think they're awesome. I don't sell cut cone knives, but I probably should because I do love them. but we used to do the cut kurnak branded a knife because every time they pulled out that red knife they saw the redux group on it but when you give them something like flowers or whatever those they die when you give them something that's gone it's gone you want to give them something that

lives in perpetuity in their house every time they pull it up boom there it is you know a picture of their house with you know the redux group you know sign you know there i don't know whatever it is but but do something that lives on with your client maybe the cutting board breaks or other things happen there, but just know that this is a good way to build lasting memories in their mind where they say, wow, and they're super thankful for that. Last thing is this. There is a law of reciprocity in the universe. When you give somebody something, they want to give you something back. So I called a steakhouse that is one right near where we live. And I asked them if they'd be willing to give us some gift cards that we could hand out, right? The guy ended up giving me $10,000

worth of $25 gift cards that you could only use like you can't, can't use more than one of a medicine, but you could use that plus a gift card, but you can only use one of the $25 per sitting. And so I just started handing these out to all my friends and everything else. And the reciprocity that comes where people are like, oh, man, like we've all been given a gift before where we're like, oh, this is, this is nutty. Like, I owe this person something. I actually heard Alex Ramosey talking about that with gum, and I told my kids to start doing this.

He said that, you know, he didn't really have that many friends. And I don't know that he's phrased it like that, but like he, he wasn't super popular in his class. He started bringing gum and panning out gum to everybody. And everybody's like, man, it's hard to hate somebody that, like, gives you for stuff, right? Like, that's it. You know, all right, well, this got pretty cool. He gave me gum, right?

My wife used to say, for me, you know, I, you know, I get hit up by lenders and stuff all the time. And if I didn't have something going on, I would go and I would have lunch with them and, you know, get a steak or coffee or whatever. And I'm like, I really like that person. My wife's like, you literally are so easily bought by a steak. Are you kidding? And but that, that's that whole idea. It's like, when somebody gives you something, it's hard not to like them. It's really hard not to like them.

So with that said, if you want to wow your clients, just go to the different places. Like there's a mission barbecue right near our place, right? So I would go to the mission barbecue. And I said, hey, any chance, you know, we give stuff out. I got like 25 little free sandwiches. The people will give you stuff to just hand out for free. You don't have to pay for it all the time.

So those are just little things you can do for clients to make them say, wow, to like you. I want to give you more stuff back. So with that said, I hope that helps. You want to make your clients say, wow, never let them call you first. You want to make your clients say, wow, give gifts that you don't even have to cost you anything. You want to make your clients say, wow, make sure that you're thinking ahead of them so that

you are anticipating what they want, what they need, and working to give them that. So hopefully that helps for you. Hopefully that serves you. If I can do anything for you, please let me know. Pop me a DM at Crab Rock and, you know, jump on our Facebook page. if anybody wants to discuss, if you want to discuss any topics that are helpful there, it's Uncommon Real Estate. Until next time, go Kid Butt, take names, make people saying, wow, I cannot believe this.

Go get it. Bam. Thank you for tuning into this episode of Uncommon Real Estate. Subscribe to the podcast to stay up to date with the latest mastermind conversations from Chris, Jeff, and other Uncommon Real Estate Industry Leaders. If you love this podcast, please write us a review. And to fast track your real estate career, go to chriscratic.com.