KGCI: Real Estate on Air - Win Listings or Die: Live Cold Call Role-Play and Scripts

Episode Date: January 19, 2026

Summary:This episode is a highly tactical and practical training session featuring live cold call role-play designed to help real estate agents secure more listings. The discussion focuses on proven scripts, objection handling techniques, and the non-negotiable importance of daily prospecting discipline. It breaks down the psychology of a cold call, emphasizing the need for a confident tone, a clear value proposition, and the ability to pivot the conversation from an interruption to a high-value consultation. This is an essential listen for agents committed to proactive lead generation.

Most real estate agents are a single-miss phone call away from what ends up being an empty pipeline. But the fear of being hung up on is the hang-up that keeps them paralyzed. I mean Wheatley from KGCI Real Estate on here, the radio station for Real Estate Bros, bringing you the most actionable and practical podcasts to get your real estate business moving in the right direction. Now, Chris Craddock hosts the Uncommon Real Estate podcast, and by the end of this particular episode, you're going to have the exact scripts and the psychological edge that you need. during cold interruptions into high-value listing appointments. Now, 2026, all indicators are it's going to be a banner year for sellers. So a wait-and-see approach is going to be in a death sentence to your commissions and ultimately your business.

So if you aren't proactively hunting for listings, you end up becoming irrelevant. And Chris is going to be taking you into the trenches with live cold call and roleplay. And we'll be breaking down how to handle the big three, commission objections, timing and competition and show you how you can build a daily prospecting discipline that's going to guarantee business growth. 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. Hey friends, welcome here to another episode of your uncommon real estate podcast with your host, Chris Craddick and myself, Jeff Safright. Today, we are going to discuss what every real estate agent's extraordinary out there wants to know is how can I get more listings? Let's chat this up, Chris. Let's help our people out, our friends out, and let's all do some extraordinary business together. Well, just a quick shift on that is not how can I get more, but how do I win more?

So yeah, it is the same, but how do you win more? Oh, it's a different mentality, right? Absolutely. Because almost everybody has some sort of listing appointments and we can talk about how to get more listing appointments. But at the end of the day, how do you close more of what you get? And the real key is, in my opinion, you've got to be able to win. in before you walk in the door. And if you don't have a strategy, you're just going in blind. So today was all about the pre-qualification call. How do we take that call and know how to win,

right? And it's interesting. I'll just start with this. There's a guy in our team who has the highest conversion rate by far over, I think he's over 70% now. Teddy, seven out of 10 appointments he goes on. And these are not sphere of influence appointments, right? Those are appointments that are a lot easier and not start for all you SOI people, referral only people. That's totally fine. You can say, no, it's not as easy. But I promise you, somebody that you're talking to cold is way harder than somebody that comes referred to you where they already know and trust you because the person that referred them basically has their edification of you going into it. So Teddy is literally closing over 70% and he changed from closing, I think he was closing less than 20% to over 70% when he started

taking this pre-qualification call super seriously so that he says at this point he walks in and he basically already knows that he's got it done because of that call. So that's what I want to get into today. I'm curious, Jeff, when you were a wrestler, how often did you go onto the out without a game plan. Always, man. Just went out there to wing it and see what I can do. Whatever the moment gives me. What would you do ahead of time? When you were at your best, what would you do ahead of time to be ready for the match? Yeah, well, it's funny because I'll put it this way. I think Patrick Mahomes said it best this week, right? Justin Tucker was warming up on the other end of the field, trying to mess with him and Kelsey. And Patrick Mahomes said he's had the same routine

the last seven years, right? The same warm-up routine preparation for the game. And that's it. Like, you've got to have routine, right? You've got to have a way to get your muscle memory going, get yourself into a flow state, allow your resets and your triggers and everything to kind of flow in the right direction. And so for my homes, that that dude is a professional of all professionals, right?

He's been to four of the last five Super Bowls. By the end of his career, we may not even know who Tom Brady is. But that's the same thing when wrestling is what I'm teaching my kids right now. is that we have to have the same warm-up routine. We got to go through all the same motion. So that way, as our muscle memory is taken over, as our body is getting into the flow, like it takes our mind with us and everything goes in one state.

In addition to that, then you have to prepare for your opponent, right? So you've got to know what strengths your opponent has, what weaknesses they have, how do they match your strengths and weaknesses? Because if I'm a wrestler that can be assertive and dictate the action, that I'm not as concerned with what my opponent can do because I'm confident in what I can do. Vice versa, if I have a stronger opponent that counters my strengths very well, then I have to know where to go from there, too. So that all flows into the first 15, 20 seconds, 30 seconds of a match in how we engage action.

And same thing with the NFL, right? They have a script of plays that they run through the first however long to figure out how the defense is going to react to them, what they've studied, what they haven't studied. That all goes into the same thing that we do with listing appointments, right? Absolutely. Yeah, being ready to go, like the appointment for the appointment. So today, what I want to do is run through the anatomy of the call, what you need to look for, what you need to understand before you walk in.

And then I'm going to also talk through the scripting that I use. And I know Jeff will share some of his scripting as well. So the anatomy of the call. Now, here's the key. This is everybody will say it goes without saying, if you want to win, you typically need to begin with the end in mind. You need to know where you're headed. Right. So the anatomy of the call means this.

If at the end of your pre-qualification call, you can't grab your cell phone and legitimately text your best friend, your spouse, your business partner, somebody that you know. and within a couple sentences say, this is how I'm going to win this appointment, then you didn't get the information you needed on the prequel call. It needs to be that clear and that concise. Clarity brings power, and those that make the complex simple are the ones that win. And so if you can't answer that question,

you don't have clarity, and I promise you, you are unlikely to win. So with that said, and if you do win, What it means is you're going in and thinking on your feet. And here's what I also want to say about this. Everybody, most people get into real estate because they're good with people and they're usually good at thinking on their feet. And because they have a mile, like a pretty good level of success,

some are like above average and some are average level of success. They don't see what is possible because they don't take the time to prep ahead of time. Right. And I saw that when I was doing ministry stuff. I see that now. I see it all the time. Is good is the enemy of the best because good results keep people from doing what it takes to make them excellent, to make them elite.

And they may say, oh, I'm elite because I'm better than other people, but I'm not elite based on what you could be. All right? There's the hard truth for everybody listening that feels like they think well on their feet and they go well. You know what? If you do, that's the curse. right it's the blessing and the curse right don't use that to keep you from being the best version of

yourself all right there we go next first question why are you sell why is this such an important question and what do we learn from this and i want to say there's there's only a handful of reasons why people are selling and if you can realize that again boil it all down knowing that it's only a handful of reasons then it helps you understand how to give them what they're looking for. So Jeff, when somebody says why they're selling, what triggers in your mind? What are the questions that you're asking? What do you think is a way to help them accomplish their goals? I guess based off of their response, right, because we have a whole foray of different ways that we can help them or we present ourselves as having a few different ways. When they share why

they are, why they're selling, it kind of, it helps you to determine their level of urgency, right and it helps you determine their level of pain is it a pain that's motivating them is it leisure or luxury what's the word i'm looking for there i'm missing a word there but some people move because they just want something nice or other people move because they have a pain point some people are moving or they're selling because there's something really negative happening in their life right i kind of tend to say like maybe a threefold right so you have the negative someone's dying someone like something is not going well maybe a divorce situation it's a deep pain. Then you have a growing pain, right? Well, we're, we've outgrown the house or the

house is too big force now, so you're either buying up or you're going down or you want to be near the beach or whatever it is. I want to throw this out there. What you just said is so powerful, and I think most agents miss this. People move because of pain. And Jeff, you just called finding the dream house pain, right? And most people don't see that. They think, oh, it's desire. But no, it's pain. Where they're living now. doesn't fit the dreams they have for their life. And so they're moving out of pain. And everybody thinks, no, pain gets us to move. People move away from pain more than they move towards pleasure. And when we understand that, then we're able to help people at a much greater level.

Pleasure is the word I was looking for when I was saying luxury and leisure. I will say, though, and then that would be the third part for me is the more kind of pleasure side. And the reason I think that distinguishing between those three is important is because the one, on the extreme negative, right? It's going to, it's going to require a level of empathy and compassion and just, we were both in the ministry, right? So we would call it more pastoral care, right? But also, there's a level of urgency where you can move quicker. And they want to know that you can move promptly, that you can kind of handle things, whatever. Same if they're in a growing pain. But the one thing that I discovered, if they're moving more for pleasure, if they're moving more for pleasure and

you try to come in with a level of urgency, that's got your, it's, they're going to feel. feel like you're selling them, right? So you've got to match their pace and their speed. And oftentimes their pain point or their pleasure, if you want to decipher between those two, it's going to help you to identify the speed at which to move with, not just in action, but also in your tone and your voice tone, right? If I need compassion and empathy, I'm going to speak slowly. I'm going to speak with maybe a softer voice and I'm going to really allow time for listening. And if it's more of a growing pain. We've outgrown the house. We've got a job or moving jobs, whatever. Then there's going to be an uptick and a little bit of the speed and the authority of my voice, I guess you can say.

And then if it's more of a pleasure, at that point, there's a good level of rapport and just helping them dream. Oh, yeah, we're really getting into the things that they're lacking in their current home that they're excited to get in their next home. And it's maybe even a little bit more playful because anytime we dream it it's a level of play and it's a level of fun right so as we identify those things we can really help to know how fast and and what sort of tone to come with demeanor to come with absolutely and i think that's that's the super powerful thing identifying why to the next thing and this is if you hear nothing else it's begin with the end in mind understand why they're moving.

And then here is the thing that I'll tell you whether, no matter who you're talking to, if you go on a listing appointment and you don't know what they want before you walk in the door in terms of price, you are at a massive disadvantage. If I go in the DMV area, the average sales price is $500,000. So let's just pretend the house we're talking about

in question is $500,000. If I go on a listing appointment and the house, according to my numbers, is probably worth, like, in good condition, $500,000 and they say they want $600,000, my conversation is different at the appointment. If I go to the appointment and they say they want $400,000, my conversation is different at the appointment. And if I go and they say they want $500,000, my conversation is different at the appointment. And if you are not having a different conversation, then you are just not prepared to win at all, right? So if somebody wants, Jeff, if somebody needs to sell, now let's say they're not a tire kicker, right? Because if somebody says, I want $600,000 for my house, and I need to sell the house, and it's only worth $500,000. And we'll get into the scripting right after this on how you get people to tell you what they want.

Because sometimes people say, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. So we'll get into that in just a second. But, Jeff, how do you talk to and handle people if they want a price that is, say, 100 grand more than what it's worth? But they need to sell. They're not tire kickers. They need to sell. So sometimes there's a reason they need that extra money, right?

And I want to know, are they being unreasonable or do they have a reason, right? For me, that kind of helps me to know what type of person I'm dealing with. I may ask, okay, so is there a reason that that you're looking at that number? And they may say yes, they may say no, they may just say, they're going to tell me that they got bigger rooms or they got whatever their reason for it is. Right. And that's a good thing to know because now when we go and talk about that, we can because the other day, I had this, what was a 2,400 square foot home and it had seven bedrooms in it. Right. And because that had seven bedrooms, he felt like it was, he could get a hundred grand more for that house than the house that only had three or four bedrooms. but the same square footage, right? And his mind, bedrooms meant more.

So that gave me a, that was something I knew that I would need to talk to him about as we go into that conversation, right? So sometimes it's that. Other times they say, well, I'm going to pay off debt. I got to pay off some credit cards. I'm really hoping to do this, that, and the other. So now I understand why they're going at it. Or I just ask him, where did you come up with that number?

Is there a house on the market that, or is there a house in your neighbor that sold for it that I don't see because I want to make sure that I'm prepared and that I know. know everything. So one of the things, especially with for sell by owners, sometimes they do have knowledge about their neighborhood that you don't have, but oftentimes they have false information, right? A couple months ago, I had this guy tell me that his neighbor sold his house for 1.6 million and come to find out, they only sold it for 1.25. And literally they were like, Lord, blown away, right? So I showed them the tax, the public record, everything else, and they were blown away by it. So sometimes they'll give you information that's vital and good information.

And sometimes you can help them to realize that maybe they got false information. Absolutely. That's interesting. Yeah, I just had a conversation with a friend. They thought their house was worth 1.22 because their neighbor sold for 1.22. But then when I shared with them that their neighbor's house was almost 700 square feet larger than theirs, they were blown away. They thought they had the same model. And then they solved the tax record.

They're like, oh, I guess the layout's similar. but the size is different. And here's what's important. You don't have that, you don't show them that until you get in front of them, right? You don't do that over the phone, right? Because you want to be able to handle the emotional kind of journey, I guess, that they're going to go on.

Because some of them are really set on this number. One of the things I always like to say is once you get a number in your head, you emotionally take that number to the bank. And you start making plans for all that money. So if you tell me my house is no longer worth 1.6 or 1.22 or 3,000, or 400, I've lost all that money in my head. That's an emotional, there's going to be an emotional response to that you're going to want to be present to help walk them through. And if you find out why they think the house is worth, $100,000 more because of the neighbor, then you can go armed

with the information to show them what that neighbor actually got or what the difference in sizes or why it's not apples to apples. Now, here's the next question. How do you handle it? So, Jeff, why don't we roll play? First one, I'll be the agent, ask, you the price and you be super simple, right? This is like the easy one. You're the easy client and you just give it up quick. So Jeff, just curious, how much do you own the house and how much you're hoping to sell for? I guess I wasn't prepared for. I don't know why you need to know that necessarily, but I owe $3.25. Okay. Okay, cool. And what are you hoping to sell for? My neighbor got $500, so I'd really like to get $500. Boom. All right. So that's the

easy one, right? And you always want to say, how much do you owe and how much you sell for? You don't ask two separate questions and you definitely don't say, how much do I owe where your voice goes up? You say, how much do you owe, which is a command, not a question and it gets rid of insecurity. How much do you owe and how much do you want to get for the property? Right. And you're asking it with the assumption that they're going to answer it. Also, it's not a big deal. Right. You got to, it's just a normal question. So it's going to be a command to, almost like a nonchalant command, right? And you want to know how much they owe because if they want to sell for 500 and it's

or 600 and it's worth 500, but they owe 525 because they refinance or they did had some sort of issue with the bank or had a forbearance or whatever, then you need to know that because if they owe 525 and there's no chance in which that house sells for over 500, then your conversation is probably just a phone call, not an in-person meeting, right? So you need to know what they owe as well because it's helpful. So now, Jeff, why don't you be the medium one? You're not super cagey. You're not going to be super hard, but you're the guy that says, well, I want you to come over

and tell me because this is what we get. Most of the time people are going to tell you the price when you ask and assume it. But about maybe 30, 40 percent of the time, you're going to get this where they want you to say it, but they're not going to be like super cage. So, Jeff, how much you owe and how much are you wanting for the property? I mean, I'd have to look at the mortgage statement to see what I owe. Okay. And how much are you hoping to give for it?

I mean, I was hoping that. I was hoping you could tell me that. You're the professional. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So how much did you buy the property for? I mean, we bought it at the height of the market. So we bought it for $6.25, I think. Okay.

Cool, cool. And how long ago was that? About three years ago. Cool. How much did you put down? Whatever. We put, we were a first time home buyer. So we did, I think we did three, three and a half, whatever the first time home buyer is. Okay, plus money down. So you probably owe high five.

So right? Yeah, maybe. Yeah, somewhere in there. Okay. Cool. Cool. And then, uh, you said, how much were you guys hoping to get for the property again? I mean, we want to get what it's worth. We want to get market value, but that's what we'd like you to come over and tell. So we've talked to a couple other agents and we know what our neighbor's houses have sold for. Yeah, yeah. And listen, I'm going to be doing the homework before we get together so we can talk through those numbers. I'm just trying to just see what you were hoping for.

It's just so that we can be on the same page when we're discussing. What were the other houses in the neighborhood going for? You know, a neighbor's house went for seven, I think a couple months ago. Cool. And do you know if that house was bigger or smaller than yours? I think it's about the same four plan. I mean, I think we have some nicer upgrades. We have a deck in the back and it's got the just real nice deck and their deck is a little bit older.

And yours is a little bit nicer. So you're hoping to get a little bit more than $7.25 or right around that same price? Yeah, I mean, I think we should get a little bit more. Okay, cool. So you see that? And so, like, you're asking what the neighbors went for and everybody knows what their neighbor went for. Anybody that says they don't know, right? And then I would have said, hey, so the other, what were the neighbors?

the other agents telling you because you want to know what the other agents have said, I would have gone into that. But we're running low on time. So I wanted to get to the final piece when Jeff is like a total punk and won't give me any information. And I have to, I have to resort to my last, my last resort method to get what they want. But with that said, that was, that's one of the big things there is you want to know why they're thinking, what they're thinking. You always say, what do the neighbors go for? Is it bigger or smaller? Are the upgrades more or less? And then when they say it's, If they say it's bigger, then their house is bigger than the neighbors. You say, okay, so how much more do you think yours is worth than that?

Then they'll tell you. They always know, right? They all, like all of these sellers, they have a script and they call and do script practice with each other saying, hey, you're the professional. You tell me. Hey, I want you to tell me. I don't know what it's worth. But if you offered them $100, they would not sell because they know it's not worth that.

They do know what it's worth. They just don't want to tell you because they feel weird about it for whatever reason. it. Right. And so here we go. Now Jeff's going to be a lot more KG. He's going to be super KG and just really want me to tell him because some people think that it's in negotiation with the real estate agent that, you know, and they really do believe this, right? And understand this that if another agent tells them that their house is worth 50 grand more than what another agent says, then that agent must be right. And the other agent that says it's worth less is an idiot, right? And you come against that with bad agents. And this is why it's,

so important to be armed with this information. All right. So, Jeff, how much you owe and how much you're hoping to get for the property? I mean, I don't think that's relevant. I don't, I mean, what I owe doesn't really matter, right? All right. Sure. Yeah, yeah. I just was wondering what you're hoping to what you're hoping to walk away with. No, no worries on that. How, how much are you hoping to get for the property? Well, that's what I was looking for to you telling me. Cool, cool, yeah. I mean, I'm, listen, I'm going to be doing my research later today. before our appointment tomorrow, and I just was just wanting to see whether we're on the same page, see where we are with everything.

And so did you have any idea, like, what the neighbors are going for and what their houses are, like what their houses are going for? Yeah, I mean, yeah, our houses, we've got a lot better upgrades. Our kitchen's significantly nicer. I mean, we've got some very customized craftsmanship done in our house. So it's not really a good comp. Our houses. It's very unique.

Sure. The neighbors sell for it just out of curiosity. Again, it's a smaller house. I don't think it doesn't really comp well, I guess. They're at 700. Okay. Cool. Then we go from there. How about this? So I've gotten this a bunch where they just keep saying, I don't know. I literally haven't taken, I haven't looked, I haven't kept up, which is bogus. They do know. They do know. Don't believe that. But go ahead. Now, Jeff, go ahead and straight lie to me that you don't know. Don't know. Don't know. Okay. Hey, listen, Jeff. Most buyers go to this and they look at this and zestiments are oftentimes zest are wrong, right?

Because Zillow lost a billion dollars buying houses at the price of their Zestimates a few years ago. And the reality is Zestimates are great idea to get close to a number, but they're not always right. So when you're looking at it, the Zestimate here says your house is worth about 700. Do you feel like Zillow is right or is Zillow way off on that? No, I'd say they're off. Okay. How far off do you think they are? I don't know.

Look, like I said, we have a very unique house. We've put a lot of care into it. We've done a lot of upgrades. We've maintained it well. I want to know what you think it's worth. I know what I think it's worth. I want to know I want to work with somebody that knows how special and unique our house is. And so I'm looking forward to you telling me what you think it's worse.

And then we can discuss it. Okay. Yeah, that's totally fine. I just know that everybody, whether Zillow is, right or wrong, everybody's going to go to Zillow to look first, right? Like most people go there first. And so if Zillow says 700 and we're going to be marketing for way more than the 700, then we're going to have to create a very special unique marketing plan.

But yeah, just working to figure out what the best fit there is for it. And again, I won't hold you to it, but how far off would you think Zillow is? I'm, again, I don't know why you can need me to tell you what the price there needs to be. you've got, you just got to come and see it. And I think you'll agree with me. That's probably your own price. Okay. All right.

So here's the deal. If I were to go on to Jeff's house and I said 700, he would think I'm an idiot. Right? Even if it's worth 700, he thinks I'm an idiot. Right. I know this. So the information he gave me is that it's, he thinks it's worth well above 700. Right.

Now, here's the thing. If I would have said, hey, the comments look like, Jeff would say, he would say you don't know anything about real estate. But the fact is now he can be mad at Zillow's number, not your number, right? It's called an anchor when you say a number first. You want them to say a number first, but it's a third party anchor. So you want him to be, you want them if they're going to be mad at somebody or if they're going to love somebody, they can be mad at Zillow and you both can be mad at Zillow together or you can both love Zillow together

if they like Zillow's number, right? Oh yeah, Zillow's great. whatever. But bottom line is, you don't want them to get mad at you when you say the number. And that's, that's anchoring. And if you've never read Chris Voss, I never split the difference, this is straight from that book. It's a book about negotiating. And it's how to anchor with a third party anchor so that you're not the bad guy giving the anchor. So we're out of time now. But if you can know what the end in mind is, why they're selling, and know what they want for the house before you walk in, then you can craft a strategy that works. So Jeff, you want to take us home? Absolutely. A friends, this does

conclude another episode of your uncommon real estate podcast with the host Chris Craddick, myself, Jeff Saferight. But before we let you go, for those that are listening to the podcast, wherever you are, you know where you're at, whether you're at iTunes, Spotify, any of the others, if you can go there, give us a rating, hit that one star, two, three star, five star, whatever it is you think it is. We'd love some honest feedback and reviews because we're here to help you build your business and do what we can there. Also, leave a comment. Let us know what topics you'd love to see covered, what guests you'd like to have us on. Anything that we can do to help you level up in your business. Again, that's what we're here for. So go there. Give us a rating. Give us a review.

Send us a comment. Join us on Facebook, Uncommon Real Estate Group. And I would love to interact with you there as well. But this does, again, conclude another episode of your Uncommon Real Estate podcast. We'll be back same time, same place, live every week. Until then, have a great day. continue winning. 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 Chris Craddock.com.

All right, we pulled back the curtain on what it actually sounds like to go win on the phone. Now, remember, consistency beats talents every single time. You could have the absolute best script in the world. But if you never pick up the phone and use it, it never works anyway. So don't let the fear of no stop you from getting a yes. That could change your year. Now, your challenge today is going to be a simple one. Take the objection handling techniques that we've covered.

To practice them in the mirror a couple of times and then go make 10 phone calls. I believe in you. I know you can do it. Now, you've made it this far. Hit that subscribe button and leave us with a review with the one thing that resonated most with you today. Now, we go out the sidelines and go win some listings.