Start With A Win - Post-Pandemic Preparation with Brian Buffini

Episode Date: April 15, 2020

Seeing the size and effectiveness of Buffini and Company now, you would never believe that Brian Buffini stumbled into real estate after a motorcycle accident when he was 19. He tells Adam on this episode of the Start With A Win podcast about that experience and how he built a business around speaking and coaching organically, solely based on the demand for his knowledge and speaking abilities at industry conferences and panels. He was already “on board” with real estate before that point, believing that it is the purest and fairest form of business, but from his first experience connecting with likeminded people at real estate conferences, he knew that this was where he was meant to be.Brian and his team build their business around a few key beliefs, among them: build relationships for life, be a good person, treat people well, and prioritize personal growth. While the way business is done has changed temporarily because of this pandemic, the foundations remain the same. In fact, Brian says that these abrupt changes are serving as a magnifying glass in our lives, pointing out issues at home, in your business, with your finances, with your health, etc. He says that now is the time to address the changes that need to be made and commit the time and energy to work on those issues while you have the time in front of you.When it comes to mindset during this time, Brian emphasizes the importance of keeping the right perspective of “this too shall pass” and being flexible. This is the time to reach out to your friends and business associates to check on them and maintain the relationships. This is the time to prepare through training and working on your systems to make sure you are ready to hit the ground running when we get the green light to begin business as usual. In terms of business adjustments, Brian says that those with strong foundations in the fundamentals will win this round and that it is important to utilize technology to enhance the connections with your clients. Don’t sit back and assume that you should be in “maintenance mode” until the pandemic is over. Take advantage of this time to prepare yourself and your business.Links:https://www.buffiniandcompany.com/resources/bc/https://www.nar.realtor/coronavirushttps://news.remax.com/Connect with Brian:https://www.buffiniandcompany.com/https://www.brianbuffini.com/https://www.thebrianbuffinishow.com/ Connect with Adam:https://www.startwithawin.com/ https://www.facebook.com/REMAXAdamContoshttps://twitter.com/REMAXAdamContos https://www.instagram.com/REMAXadamcontos/ Leave us a voicemail:888-581-4430

Every day is filled with choices. You're here because you're choosing to start with a win. Get ready to be inspired, learn something new, and connect with the win nation. And Adam Contos here. Start with a win from our unique remote studios we're experiencing right now during the COVID crisis. And we have coming to us from the brand Viva Studios in Meridian, which is just south of Denver, Colorado. We got producer Mark. How you doing, buddy?

The brand Viva Bunkers. I get enough beer to last me for through this thing i'll be okay get your hard hat i got my beer fridge right there stickers on it i'm doing i'm doing so good and i'm so excited for today's episode because we have an awesome guest with us in studio brian buffini the legend the myth he's here i'm super I'm super excited to have Brian on the line with us on video. We're all zooming in here. Brian's a longtime friend of the business, longtime friend of Remax, and probably just about every single human being that's ever crossed paths with our industry. I mean, this guy has made so much impact over the years. Brian, welcome to the show. Glad

to have you here, my friend. Thanks for having me, bud. All right. Well, let me give everybody just a quick lowdown on Brian. Some unbelievably spectacular numbers. So the Buffini & Company is based in California. So Brian, is that where you're coming to us from today? San Diego, hunkered down. From the Buffini bunker in San Diego, California. So uh, the feeding companies trained over 3 million business professionals in, I think it's close to 40 countries now and currently serves about 22,000 members of the real estate industry training more than really, uh, I think, I think you guys coach 22,000 and serve more than 60,000 a year.

Is that accurate? That's right. Yep. That's a lot of realtors. Man, that's a huge impact on the industry. Tell us, you got into this in what, 86 you emigrated? And then give us a little bit of your backstory, Brian. Well, like most people in real estate, I never intended to get in real estate, right?

I mean, a funny thing happened. I was a soccer player. We just won a national championship and played in the world under 21 championships in helsinki for ireland and uh came out on a vacation to california and i was selling t-shirts at the beach for you know i was going to have a four-month vacation and all that stuff and i ended up getting a motorcycle accident and very serious and gangrene and they're going to amputate my leg, all this crappy stuff.

And eventually they put rods and screws in and they're like, Hey, you got to stay and have a bunch of surgery. So I was 19 years old, 7,000 miles away from home with no money, no qualifications. What do you do? I saw a sign that says we trained realtors for free and I was in. That was that. So that was the beginning. How many, I mean, there's got to be a lot of was that so that was the beginning how many i mean there's got to be a lot of people around that that is the beginning in this industry for him it's it's truly amazing

how people fall into it well you know i mean we you know as you know and remax is has thousands of stories and you know people were you know their husband came home one day emptied their bank account and left them with four kids and a gal that was home by herself for 12 years got a real estate license. And within five years, she's making $300,000, $400,000 a year. It's an amazing business. It's the purest business there is. It's the fairest business there is. It doesn't discriminate on anything, any case at all.

You can be whatever you are and whoever you are, and you can make it in real estate. It's a remarkable business. You got into real estate, and you can make it in real estate. It's a remarkable business. You got into real estate and you were extraordinarily successful in real estate. How did that lead you to the speaking and coaching business? Well, you know, unbeknownst to me, there was this whole underpinning of seminars and classes and the national conventions. I mean, I started out at ERA and then I became a REMAX agent. I never even knew about these conventions or whatever else. And then finally, one year I was like top five in California or something. And they go, you got to come to the

national convention in Vegas. And I'm like, I have to. And they go, well, we want you on a panel. And I went, it was like this world opened up on me. What is all this? And they were asking me questions and I'm Irish, so I could tell a few stories. And I was doing well. And they go, well, tell us a few more. And then how do you do it? And after that, I was invited to speak at conferences of trainers and coaches. I was asked to speak at real estate conventions. And pretty soon, I mean, I would go speak. And I would just share what I was doing in my day-to-day business.

And there would be a line out the door of people wanting to ask me what to do. And there would be phone calls back to my office during the week that would literally blow up my phone lines because it seemed to resonate with people. Because at the time, it was cold call, door knock, and expired. The top trainer at the time, his phrase was, find them, fleece them, and forget them. And I was coming from a different place. And it was the early 90s. It was kind of the Wall Street look and people stand in front of their Rolls Royces. And I was like, build relationships, serve people, make customers for life, be like the family doctor in the

community for generations. And it seemed to resonate with a lot of people. And so finally, I did a seminar in San Diego. I said, I'm just going to do it for locals. And 460 people showed up. And most of them were people I'd done a transaction with in the past. And so we got hundreds of feedback. And so I, okay. So we started and, you know, it took year for the next 10 years. You start doing the math. We went from having 30 or 40 people at a seminar to 3, 4, 5, 8,000. And after the races, it went. Wow. And I've been to your seminars. And I have to tell you, some of the finest gathering of people I have ever been to. I mean, just between the speakers that you bring in, as well as the delivery of the information that you get up there and share. And then just the people that you run into there are some of the nicest human beings, but also some of the most successful human beings you'll ever run across. I mean, I really appreciate you saying that,

actually. It's an observation that a lot of speakers have when they come at our conferences, because, you know, the philosophy of working by referral is to be a good human being and to treat people well. And at the same time, like you're bringing along is you need to grow your business and you need to grow yourself personally. You know, I appreciate you doing this podcast because you're you're introducing people, you know, you can only grow your business as far as you grow yourself. So when you have people who are very successful in their business, who are also really trying to be successful as a human being, it does produce some pretty good citizens. And when we have these events, it's a great time. And again, we have a heck of a lot of Remax people as part of that program as well. I love it. You can only grow your business as far as you grow yourself. That is a huge takeaway already for this audience. And really, when you

think about, you know, it's 100% correct. You're the biggest barrier between yourself and success. Isn't that true? For sure. I mean, you know, you think about this pandemic, you know, like we were talking about before we started talking, right? Your kids are home from college and it's tough. You know, this is not the circumstances you want to have to have great family time, right? People die and people get sick. I have a couple of close friends who have a daughter who's 16 weeks pregnant. She was in a coma.

They put the medically induced coma, pregnant, terrible situation. And thank God she's come out of it. But a lot of things have come out of this that are very, very positive for a lot of people when they look back on it. But one of the things I think this pandemic has done, it's a magnifying glass. I think if you had challenges in your marriage, it goes on a magnifying glass with this pandemic. If you weren't taking care of your finances real well on the magnifying glass, it's exposed. If you weren't taking care of your health on the magnifying glass. So this pandemic has exposed that. Now, on one hand,

that makes people nervous and scared and insecure, which is why when the media are pumping out these sometimes crazy stories, it gets people really freaked out. But I think the next phase of this, when people get into the acceptance level of this, when we start to know what the country's going to open back up again, I think this, people should look at the areas that were exposed under the magnifying glass as the opportunities on where they need to grow. Boom. Okay. I need to knuckle down here with my relationship. I need to spend more time with my kids. I need to take better care of my health. My finances, I didn't have many reserves going into this. I'm going to build up six months reserves. My business didn't have reserves. When I go out of this, I'm going to take the next two years to build up reserves. So truthfully, this can be the ultimate like x-ray of your business and life.

And you go, okay, you got some diagnoses you didn't like, get to work the next two years. The next time something like this happens, I'm going to be fully prepared. I think we just took care of everybody's problems right now. That was just some unbelievable gold, Brian. So thank you for sharing that. I want to unpack a couple of ideas here, though. Essentially, we have two components that are challenging us. One is mindset, and the other one is business operations. So let's jump into mindset. I mean, how do you see agents looking at this crisis, and how should they be reacting to this crisis? Look, I mean, everybody's across the board, right? There's a lot of information, maybe a little too much information. There's no sports, there's no TVs, there's no new

shows. All we have is 24 hour news. And, you know, if you watch these press conferences, you see the filtration process that's going on. So a lot of people are getting very scared and nervous and so on and so forth. I actually did an interview with Dr. Lawrence Yoon, the chief economist in NAR, and it was entitled, This Too Shall Pass. And people have actually been sending that podcast. We have about 400,000 listens so far because people have been sending it to their customers. It's been saving transactions. Why? Because just a bit of a historical perspective where things were. You know, 40 days ago, we had the healthiest real estate market in 13 years. 40 days ago, we had record unemployment with the jobs report for February, 100,000 more than what was expected.

We had the best February in 13 years. So the thing is, we came into this in a very solid place. We came into this with the banks in good shape and the stress tests in place and a lot of stuff is in place and it's only 40 days. Now we might be about halfway through this. I think the bottom line is right now, people should be looking at this as a season of preparation. You know, we've talked about this many times before. Now is the time you should be reaching out to everybody. You know, now is the time you should be not talking real estate, but just how you doing, checking in with people. I chatted with Dave Linegar last night, you know, Dave and I haven't talked in a couple of months. And I said, Dave, I'm sorry it took a

pandemic for us to have a chat, right? Just chatting, just checking in with a friend of mine. So the bottom line is now on one hand, reach out to people. Number two, it's a season of preparation and your extensive background, you prepare in peacetime so you don't bleed in war. I believe the mindset you need to have is that nine months following the all clear, you need to get 12 months worth of business done. And the way you do that is prepare. And I've listened to some of your episodes and you're right, you're up

and I know you're doing your early morning workouts and reading and taking stuff in. That's crucial stuff. And so you need to be preparing yourself mentally, physically, but you need to be, I mean, doing the training. You know, right now we have brokers that are telling us, in fact, Remax brokers are saying they're having more participation from their agents. They're doing the training programs we put out there via Zoom. They're getting more agent participation than they ever had.

So now's the time to prepare. Now's the time to get trained up. Now's the time to make emotional deposits in your customer's bank account. And when the R clear comes, you come out of here guns a blazing. So, Brian, you talk a little bit about the customer perspective. What do you think the consumer is seeing on this? Because you've talked to a lot of economists. You've talked to Dr. Ben Carson, Dr. Lawrence Yoon.

I mean, all these guys have both real estate side as well as public side. What's the consumer looking at this from? Well, let's think about it. Think about this. What was the one thing everybody was told to do? Go to your home. And everybody now, all of a sudden, three things have happened. Number one, they have an appreciation for where they live to some degree. Number two, they have an appreciation for the person who made it happen for them. And number three, some people found out their home is their castle. They're never leaving. And a whole bunch more are going, man, I am bouncing off the walls in here and I'm going to move. I think you're going to see this.

Look, we already saw some things happen. We know the northeastern states with the high taxes and the rough weather, there was an awful lot of people leaving out of those states. You think that's not going to accelerate when this clears up? People were in high tax states and considering a move to a lower tax state, that's going to accelerate. So there's going to be a lot of movement. There's going to be a lot of changes, but people now are going to be more acutely aware of their home and where they're living. You know, it used to be, could you see yourself living here? And now that it's kind of a poor taste joke is, could you see yourself being quarantined in this house is the new closing technique for a realtor. Yeah, I've seen it a couple of times. That's an interesting thought. I mean, it's true though, because this is not

going to be our last pandemic. I think everybody realizes that as well. I need to prepare for the next one. And if you have a bunch of kids, I mean, you and I both have kids and they're all home right now. You know, they're not seven, eight, nine year olds that are doing homeschooling that we have to be teacher and real estate agent at the same time. There are a lot of changes going on in our lives right now. Well, it's funny. You know, my wife and I last year bought a house we thought we were going to downsize

to, right? Our last two kids are twins. They're going off to college. So we've all six kids gone to college, yada, yada. And we decided not to move into that house, which is about half the size of this one. And we were walking around here going, my goodness, we are so glad we didn't downsize, you know? And so there's just a lot of recalibration going to be going on, a lot of reassessing. And I also think a lot of people

who put off making some changes are going to make changes both in their businesses as brokers, as agents, and then ultimately as consumers, people who, some people found out their home was their castle. Some people found out their home was a sandcastle and it's time to move. So true. So we talk about business adjustments. This've heard it called a sea change, a paradigm shift, a lot of different adjustments in business. And we've seen those over the years. We know about 9-11 was a massive shift. We know that the SARS epidemic in China in 2003 was a massive shift in how people did business. All the way back, World War II, things like that. There were so many different massive shifts in business. Everybody's looking at this as one also. What shifts do you think are going to be made in the business of real estate, what an entrepreneur needs to be thinking about going forward? Well, what's been interesting is the last three to five years, as you well know, in real estate, we have had a massive influx of capitals into the space, especially in regards to tech-driven disruptors.

And there's billions and billions of dollars have been invested in real estate. And as you know this, a disruptor comes in to disrupt the fundamentals of a business and then become the new fundamental. Dave Linegar was the ultimate disruptor 30 years ago. He brought in 100% concept, all that kind of good stuff. And years later, everybody had to follow suit with Remax. Well, all these companies that came in to disrupt real estate, for example, have you heard from any iBuyers lately? Okay. All took tail and ran. And why? Because they didn't get to establish a new fundamental. They tried to disrupt the fundamental and establish the new fundamental. There's real estate concepts that are out there that are absolutely not going to survive this. And so the disruptors are actually getting disrupted.

And it's actually going to be those that practice great fundamentals right now are the ones that are going to win. So there will be winners and losers. There will be companies that get bigger. There will be companies that get smaller. There will be agents who do better and there will be agents who don't survive. This business will change in the next 12 months in a very rapid way, I believe. I love that. And you're kind of one of those really, really insightful business observers. You talk to so many tens of thousands of people a year and really pull apart and refine what's working in business. So I would imagine that you've got a few points that you can give to our audience as far as, you know, give me three to five things of what can they be thinking about in their business moving forward? Well, I think brokerages better get bigger, get small.

I think don't be limited by brick and mortar. We're meeting today via Zoom. And so is half the world. I mentioned we have brokers who are holding classes via Zoom that are training more agents than they ever did. They're having more agent participation. So the ability to have flexibility with technology, the ability to be able to be this hub as a real estate office and direct people from a distance. I think you're looking at agents being more connected with their audience. I mean, we have people, just so you know, we have people who are doing five and six

deals a week right now who are doing virtual open houses. They're doing virtual client mixers. They have their clients in small groups. We have one gal, she sets it up, she connects, she works with the other agent. And when they get somebody interested, they have the seller do a FaceTime with the buyer, do an in-depth tour of the home, and they're writing up contracts subject to a physical inspection of the property. And she showed up there wearing gloves and a mask. We actually put a resource together on how to show a house. And so fascinating stuff happening. People are being very creative and getting stuff done. So I do think a lot of the disruptors are being disrupted. I think a lot of the fundamentals are going to be exposed. I think brokers and agents better be watching their margins. And absolutely, positively, it's time when the gate opens, this is going to opens at the Kentucky Derby. So that indicates

to me that you better be in close touch with your customer base. Is that a safe assumption right now? Yeah, it is. And again, look, I think the other piece to this, I mean, one of the things we're doing right now is we're working with some very high-level statistical organizations because the way the country is going to open up, it's going to open up in different places at different times and different seasons. And so there's different emphasis as our organization supports our members. So we're going to be helping people with different resources in different areas. So we kind of have a 60 city plan right now of the cities that are going to open up at different times. And we're going to help our members here with this, you know, okay, now is

the time for you to be pushing, getting your buyers up, getting your listings up, getting this going. And these guys, you're in a pre-listing season. So I really think it's going to open up. It's going to be a little patchy and then it'll start getting into some flow. There will be some changes, but here's the thing. There's a difference between maybe putting on an R4 and having 8,000 people in a room and having one family come through a house. You know, when stuff opens up, the real estate business, I believe, was last into this recession and we're actually going to be first out. We went through the worst of it in 2008. You know, our recession lasted six, seven years for most people. So most of us in this business, we prepared, we learned from the tough times. Real estate actually gets the blessing this time. We're going to be last into the recession.

We'll be the first industry out. I mean, people are going to buy a house before they go on a cruise ship. You know what I'm saying? People are going to do that before they go to, you know, some big Justin Bieber concert or something. So there's other industries that are going to trail. There's some industries going to lag. I think what you're going to see is a lot of first-time buyers because of the unemployment,

there'll be less competition, but there's still people going to buy and sell homes. You know, we were having situations. We had one of our clients had 59 offers on a house in San Francisco in February. Well, in August, they won't be getting 59 offers. They'll probably get two. And it'll be actually a more reasonable paced market in some regards. Amazing. And you mentioned some resources for the listeners. You want to pass along some locations? I really do. And thanks for that, Adam, because we've been working with

Shannon McGann, who's the lead political, if you will, the lobbyist for NAR on the Hill. We did a podcast with her, Ben Carson, Secretary Yoon, and the CARES Act that came out. And most people are not, you know, what you're getting on the news is a very fragmented piece. So for the first time ever, independent contractors, we don't think in terms of availing something of a government program or kind of independent people. But I would just say now is the time to do that. And for bigger companies and independent contractors, it's the first time ever an independent contractor is able to apply for unemployment. And there's a special type of unemployment you file for. If you just go to your state and file for unemployment, they won't give it to you.

So if you go to buffinicompany.com slash bcbonus, we have a whole bunch of resources. We have worked in conjunction with the National Chamber of Commerce to come up with this coronavirus, the loans program. We've laid out from Shannon McGann exactly all of the different programs that are available for realtors to take access of. The ability to manage your cash flow, put your taxes back till July 15th. I mean, that's huge for all of us in the industry. In the past, they go, yeah, file your taxes, pay us the money, and then you can file later. They're saying now, hey, file later, pay later. You know, that extra two months of cashflow is just critical for people in the real estate business. And also NAR has put out some great resources at nar.realtor.coronavirus.

And so there's a bunch of, they have a lot of data and a lot of good stuff there. We've tried to put it in presentation form, make it simple, almost like infographics. So go to both places and you'll get a lot of resources that you need. Just one more resource location. So at news.remax.com, Remax is also put out on our public facing web newsroom, some extra coronavirus resources. And that's what I think is so beautiful about how everybody has come together on this. And thank you so much to Buffini and company for putting these resources

together because this takes a lot of manpower and a lot of effort to do these things. And you spend a lot of money gathering this information for everybody and you're willing to give it away for nothing. So thank you for helping the community. Well, look, I mean, we are all in it together. And like I said, I mean, you guys have been so good to my organization over the last 15 years. Obviously, I wanted to come here and provide value if I could. And, you know, I just think right now, like instead of watching the latest Wolf Blitzer outrage over something, you know, go to news.remmax, go to NAR, go to Buffini and

Company, get these resources, become a student, become a student. By the way, there's money on the table for you. There's business loans available to turn into grants. There's an ability to defer taxes. There's ability to defer payroll taxes. There's all kinds of stuff available for you to be smart and be wise about. The government asked us to stop practicing our business. And because of that, the government has actually stepped up. And I'm a person who's never received a government dollar in my life, but it's time to be wise and use these programs to manage your cashflow because here's what happens. The government wants us with a very healthy real estate business coming out of this cranking on all cylinders. Totally agree. Yeah.

The government wants a pretty strong economic rebound out of this. Remember, it is an election year. So there's some things at stake here. So Brian, appreciate you so much. Your friendship, your kindness, your time. It's so nice to hear that your family is healthy and you're using this extra time together that so much of us, when we have kids off to college, we see them leave and we're like, I wonder if they'll ever come back. Well, we're blessed to have them back right now.

So we get to wrap our arms around them and love them and hug them and obviously socially distance as well. Brian, I do have one question that I ask everybody on the show. Brian Buffini, how do you start with a win? You know, for me, it's, my bride and I have had a pretty disciplined start to the day. We pray together, we read together, and then what we've been doing lately, we actually do FaceTime workouts with our trainer.

So we set up a stand and our trainer, we wanted to keep him employed. So we go on FaceTime and he works us through the workouts. And it turns out, by the way, the few days I didn't do that, my little joking workouts, you know, I'm done. So when he's there, the coaching works, he drives us hard. Then I sit down, my daughters and I get together. We make breakfast for the whole family. And then I'm in at eight o'clock and I'm pounding the Zooms and the calls and the podcasts and everything else. So that's how I start

the day. I love it. Thank you so much, Brian. Ladies and gentlemen, please help me thank Brian Buffini, Buffini and Company. Make sure you check out their resources. Also, Buffini and Company is one of the most amazing coaching companies you will ever run across. So be sure to check them out for that as well. Thank you so much for being with us today. I know our audience got a lot out of this. Brian, where can people follow you and find out more about what you do? Great. Well, the Brian Buffini Show, we're podcasting twice a week right now.

They can check that out for free. I'm also doing a Facebook Live every Friday. Just go to Brian Buffini on Facebook. And we're providing all kinds of free resources for people until they get the ball rolling. And I just want to say, I appreciate you. I appreciate what you're doing here and everything you're bringing to the table.

I appreciate our relationship at Remax. And you know what? This too is going to pass. And we're all going to remember the good guys and good gals that invested in people at this time. And that's who we're all going to be loyal to. And I appreciate what you're doing for the real estate community as well. Thank you, my friend.

Great to have you on the show. Thanks, bud. Thank you so much for listening to Start With A Win. If you'd like to ask Adam a question and potentially be on our next episode, give us a call and leave us a message at 888-581-4430. Don't forget to go on iTunes and subscribe, write a review and rate the show. For more great content, follow Adam on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. And remember, start with a win.