The I Love CVille Show With Jerry Miller! - Scott Morris & Candice Van Der Linde Joined Keith Smith & Jerry Miller Live On "Real Talk!"

Episode Date: February 27, 2026

Scott Morris, Branch Manager at Envoy Mortgage, and Candice van der Linde, Owner of Buy And Sell Cville, joined Keith Smith & Jerry Miller live on “Real Talk With Keith Smith” powered by YES Realty Partners and Yonna Smith! “Real Talk” airs every Friday from 10:15 am – 11 am on The I Love CVille Network! “Real Talk With Keith Smith” is presented by El Mariachi Mexican Bar & Grill, Fincham & Associates, Inc., Free Enterprise Forum, Intrastate Service Co, Mejicali and YES Realty Partners.

Good Friday morning, guys. My name is Jerry Miller, and thank you kindly for joining us on Real Talk with Keith Smith. It's an absolute pleasure to connect with you guys through the I Love Seabold Network, kind of show that's presented by Yes, Relative Partners. You can trust the team at Yes, Relity Partners. They've been in this game we call Real Estate for quite some time, and honesty, and communication, and integrity are just key tenets for the entire outfit over at YRP. Judah Wickhauer is behind the camera. The man is moving mountains. He may not be, on camera today but he is a key component for this network folks that is literally it seems like on a weekly basis eclipsing metrics and viewership and listenership records which we're grateful for your support. Judah Wickhauer if you can go to the studio camera and we'll welcome then

Keith Smith and then a freshly manicured Scott Moores who you know this friend over here I got to compliment him is looking jacked dude the guy has been putting some work into the wait room. Word on the street is he's pumping out, what, 100 pull-ups a day? 150 pull-ups a day? What's the number? Once a week I'll do like 230 minutes. That's no joke. And how many, without

stopping? That's dead lifts. It's like sets of 20, 20, 15, 15, 15, 10. Kind of like a burnout like session. Yeah, that's legit. That's super legit. The results are showing over here. Candice always looks great. She's got fantastic

style. She's a fantastic human being. She's a great communicator, great mom. There's had a closed deals. Annis, I sincerely mean that. Thank you. Thank you. I know you do. I greatly appreciate it. Thanks. My pleasure. For a certain fee, he follows you around. I know.

I know. Only you, Keith. That's only for you, my friend. Yeah, I say that. This is the first time I've ever seen Keith Smith and a quarter zip. Yeah. Not wearing a suit on a business day. No, no. I've got a t-shirt underneath there, a quarter zip.

It is time to... I didn't know you. On the quarter zip, I think it looks great on you. As someone who's a huge fan of the quarter zip. I like it. We need it for our, big heads to get through, you know, because the thing's a little bit of a Well, the beautiful thing about the quarter zip is as you slide it over your head, it won't mess up your hair.

That's true. It's all about the hair. It's been a while since we talked about here. It's been a while. So there you go. Just drop that out there and just silence. We got real estate agents watching the program. I saw the promotional post you did, which was great.

So I'm excited. excited about today. Everybody knows Candace, everybody knows Scott, so we're just going to go past that, just go into the chats for today. We've been talking about for quite some time what will happen if all of a sudden we have a 30-year mortgage rate with a five in front of it instead of a six. It's high up there, five, almost six. But from your guy's perspective, real quick, let's just kick off with that. What is that doing to your guys' businesses. What are you seen in the market? Is this where I go refinance? Is that we go Keith Scott? So one of the things you asked me leading up coming in you were like, hey let's talk about

mortgage applications compared in relation to the market and we've seen a huge uptake in applications but a lot of that is tied to refinance interest. So not all of those people are necessarily purchase related.

However, one of the things that are starting to see is some people who potentially are seeing how much equity that they have when we talk about refinancing and then what that could convert to if they were to say, all right, well, what if I were to not refinance? Because one of the questions I ask is, do you plan to sell your home in the next three to four years? Because if the answer to that is yes, then refinancing may not be the best thing. Why is that?

Because the closing cost involved with a refinance, you're typically going to want to absorb within the first four years. when you do a VA Earl, which is an interest rate reduction refinance loan, or an Earl, which is a no... A guy no down the street. Yeah, there's a couple guys. When there's no debt to income involved, it's not a credit qualifying event. So it's a streamlined process. They have to recruit.

Well, whoa, slow down. Explain that a little slower. So there's no appraisal. There's no appraisal. and it's a non-income qualifying product. And it's only available to veterans. And they have to recruit. What about the rate?

The rate is they have to be 50, half a percent are better in rate, and it has to be 210 days from the, I think it's 2010 days, from the closing of the last loan. Got it. VA loan. VA loan. Got it. And they have to recoup those costs, the closing cost, title, any discount points,

anything associated, any lender fees with their, the first 36 months of the loan. Those are all qualifying events for the product. But at the same time, it is a fantastic product for somebody who's looking to quickly lower the rate with little work involved on their end. I got a question for you. This is just a businessman and businessman here. The refinance business, as opposed to the initial loan origination business, can you put

in perspective margins for folks in your business? So the margins are typically going to be thinner on the refi. The refi. I mean, you're staying competitive. Even if there is a relationship there, you're trying to do the best thing for the client. And you're also in competition with their existing servicer and the thousands of other online. Like they've been receiving things since closing that they could get the rate to 4% whether, you know, however.

Whatever. I've had, in the last three or four months, I've had people who were like, hey, I got this thing in the mail and I started doing it. Can you take a look at this? and they're getting to 4.99, but they're being charged like $25, $30,000 in fees. I'm like, well, your new loan amount is $15,000 higher than when you purchase the house. So are you comfortable with that? I can do this for you, too. I don't think it's a good idea.

I was going to say, I want you to talk about that because my style, right, I always like to give three recommendations for people. Then here's three different companies I recommend. Talk to them, feel it out, see what fits you. what the product is and in its contractors or lenders or inspectors or whatever the case may be. So people often ask, you know, why shouldn't I go to a quick and loan, or I don't know if we're allowed to say titles, but why should I not go to it? I don't know. Disregard the statement.

So, you know, why should I not go? I get these ads from these big box banks. That's a great question, by the way. And I get these marketing things and all these, you know, prompts because you go on one time and look at interest or refi or rates, and now you get bombarded with all this detail and all these really attractive offers and options. So I know what I tell people. They're attractive because they're advertised rates.

Right, right. And it actually says it in the fine print. 100%. But no one reads the fine print. Never. Right. My wife's literally, we had the conversation this week. Did you see this?

I'm like, honey, did you see this right here? Yeah. It's like when people, and when you get the mailers that come in that are titled from the name of the bank that you originated with and then I get these screenshots like hey what is this I'm like go to the bottom you see where it says not affiliated with lender like in the smallest small like smaller than the small in the braille at the bottom yeah that's what that is but to answer the the question what what makes the difference well there's a ton of fees generally associated with those online lenders they have no relationship with that's what matters the client or the referral partner so as soon as something, if were to go awry, they just stopped answering the phone. They've got no incentive to compete. And also along those same lines, the referral, the relationship exists. And when you look at AI and where things are going in the world, AI is going to end up capturing some portion of what I do for a living. There's no question about that whatsoever. It are, like,

some of the things that I can show you in the home equity space, Essentially, they never talk to a human or upload a single doc. They tie a couple accounts together, and they get an approved loan that's funded within five days. It's amazing. It's amazing. However, if you are a business owner or somebody who has to do anything complicated inside of your process, the human aspect of what you get from a me or anyone like me as opposed to someone who's working in a call center at one of these banks is different leagues of operations. So before we kick the show off, what did we say?

63 years? What was the community? Combine U3, 64 years. 64 years, got it. So it's about equal to the time that I'm on this earth. I can tell you my portion of that 63, very rarely there is a transaction that doesn't require phone voice to voice. Voice to voice, hey, we need some help through this, right?

It's always, there's always a transaction that hits, hits that snare. Can we do a hint, hint, suggestion for the realtors that are watching the program that prefer to strictly communicate via tax? You should talk, please, please talk. There's a lot of them out there that do not want to talk on the phone. I'm going to get on a soapbox on this because I'm dealing with two right now that I cannot get the real estate agent. You know what? I am so blessed right now. in some transactions with the best agents on the other side.

And somebody, Keith, always says who on the other side matters. And it really does. So taking this back, segueing it back into the mortgage or the refi, why do you need a relationship whenever after the fact and after closing? It's going to be sold, likely. It's because you can pick up the phone and call. And we, as your partners in this transaction, getting you from point A to point Z, it's about the continued friendship and communication and ability to say,

you know what, I've got Scott's number and you're having a, yeah, he answers the phone. And during this transaction, why does it matter? Well, the dollar figure matters, yes. But the relationship really matters because it is the most expensive and most stressful process that anyone goes through. So this is not exclusive to our marketplace. We do a lot of referral work around the country.

and even in this around the car it just seems to be a thing i don't understand why i can't get a real estate age my counterpart on you guys are telling my agents like they're like the agent thing like i i totally sorry nothing drives me crazier than anybody in the industry when i go to a call and uh and their voicemail isn't set up yeah i don't even get that but judah that's you by the way just a friendly nudge nudge over there i better check my voice now because i don't think i got Why is the, or like the voicemail is overfloated and you can't leave a voice message? I don't get that. I got a phone call back from an agent on the other side that they left me a voicemail.

That frankly pisses me all. I literally called them right away and they go, wow, you call me back. I said, what the hell did you expect me to do? We interrupted, Scott. It's just disrespectful is how I see it. But the question is. People who like closing through attorney's offices and it's like, I've sent three emails and they won't get back to me. And then you can't get them on the phone and trying to get title,

getting title back from attorney's offices. Well, so we're talking about this. We're going off a little bit off topic on the Lee Thiamon. That's mine. That's mine. It's not Asian. But that is even thousand times harder if you're not actually dealing with the physical loan offices in here. So, you know, local agents matter, having a face-to-face phone, a voice-to-voice phone call.

I want to switch a little bit if we don't mind to data. You know, at the end of April, Jerry and I are going to be starting our eighth year of doing this together. And I keep it. I know, I'm sorry, Jerry. So I keep it. Older than my kid. Olds kid, yeah. Well, it's helpful, then I know how old your kid is.

I always think about things from the kids. Did I have one? Did I not have one? Was I pregnant with one? That's literally what we do too. Yeah. Well, other than the last one, yeah, I get it. But I've been tracking.

I take a picture of the seven-day tracker that I've been doing it for seven years. And it's really interesting, just to change, I'm going to let you chime in on this, Kansas. The tempo of the market is really picked up. So the same week ending as of the 26, which was yesterday, in 2024 versus 2026, we are 83% up in new active listings. So in three years, we went up 83%. And just one year, we've jumped 65%. So this same week that ended last year, we've jumped up. How are you seeing things out there?

You're seeing tempo picking up. And before you do that, week over week, same last year versus this year. Pendings are up 8%. And actual closed are up for that one week snapshot 26%. Has the spring market sprung? You know, obviously, you know, as a full service certified professional and do the coaching with the Buffini and with YRP, and the data, the information, the statistics, the 75-year tracking history that we have for real estate transactions and mortgages and everything, all

of this information really, it's not news to me. So the way I see the market is it's panning out the way I had intended. it to because of my information, education, and research leading up to now. What that means for the public, yeah, rates are great, but you know what? Rates and transactions sold and everything increased in December, that's before they hit the five-point, you know, five range. That's the point I'm trying to make. You haven't really got into five percent yet. No, but we haven't.

And so, you know, everybody got beat up. We've been beat up for five years now. in all aspects, in feeling out this world, in this market, in lifestyles, job transitions. Groceries? Yes, taxes. But like he said, it's gone down, but I just filled up. It's like 280 now. Oh, yeah, I'm so good.

Don't, geez it, Jerry, come. If you go to Costco. I know. I'm surprised it's not fine. But she's making a point. It's like we've, we've lived a life of a thousand cuts over the 36 months. So for the macro news cycle to now say five handle on the raids, it's not just going to be a light switch with inventory flooding the market. That's what you're saying.

Yes, and this segues into the new construction as well. However, the jobs, the municipalities and their zoning and allowances, the ability for people to actually, you know, a lot of the stuff, the reason it takes 8,000 years to get anything approved, is because there isn't, there's so many requests and not enough people to do the work, to see it through, right? So, and we see this with all aspects of construction,

from building, land, wells and septics, pavers, all of these wonderful reasons why home ownership and sales make up, is it, 13% of the U.S. economy, because of the number of jobs and people we keep throughout all of this transaction. So, I mean, this is a major part of everybody's life, and it has not been dormant. We've just been, you know, we, the public, the buyers, the sellers, they've just been on this roller coasters.

And as the professionals, our job is to give tangible information, references, resources, stay calm. It's all good. I love, again, the friends like Pivot with Ross and the couch and the sterile pivot. We have had to do that so many times. We are accustomed to that. We being the professionals within the industry. So for the general public, yeah, they've been through bidding wars. They've been through released contracts, meaning something was under contract and before it went to closing, it was canceled.

In the home, either went back on the market, stayed off the market, got rented, but it did not go to a successful closing. That was 60% up in 2023. People forget because things were going under contract in less than three seconds. So we've had this unsustainable, unrealistic market for so long. people are now kind of like, okay, why is Keith going in his quarter zip to play with little babies because of family? Because that's where your heart is. That's where your passion is. That's where your energy flows.

And we're seeing so much, again, all this information and statistics on people moving to be closer to family one way or another. That's great take kids. So refies, new construction, all of that is now coming to afford, to people go, okay, this matters. This is important to me. this is where I'm going to put my devotion, my energy, and my focus, and this is how we're going to make it happen by calling Scott, by calling us, by watching your shows, and by getting the information to make the decision to be the best in your future. That's great.

My soapbox, thank you. That was fantastic. Scott, I'm curious to Scott's take on that. On anything here, that was fantastic. I mean, that, you know, we've always talked, like, why do people, over the past few years especially, what is the incentive to move? It's always lifestyle choice over everything. And people make decisions based on some meaningful thing that they want to do,

and then they come up with other reasons to justify it after the fact. But yeah, being close to family is a big part of what we've seen. It's one of the things we've seen the growth of ADUs. That's the number one reason. When you take a look at the Nar statistics, the number one reason in 2025 where people move was to be close to the family. I don't remember the number, but it was a substantial, substantial numbers. And then, you know, I've always got my five Ds, right?

Diamonds, diamonds, diapers, divorce, downsizing, and death. Right. So those are always, you know, but we've been talking about this for a while because we've been asked the question all the time, is all of a sudden with a five handle and it's super high up, all of a sudden is everything going to break loose. Now, we're up, we're up, 80. So 2024 for a one week snapshot, we were at 65 new.

We're now at 119 as of last night on it. You know, are you thinking that number is going to, tell me what your crystal ball is telling you going through the rest of 2026, assuming we stay with a five handle. So I think, especially when we're looking at week over week, we're going to go through, I've talked to a ton of agents who've, there's been a big amount of delay in, uh, properties coming to market due to the weather that we just went through. So I think we get, you know, like everything else, ebbs and flows. We see some spikes here for probably the next three weeks. We'll see things settle in a little bit. Then we see as we get it more into the spring of spring, you know,

walked outside, I got stuff that's popping up in my flower beds. So along with that, you're going to see, you know, how people want those listings to look in photos. You're going to get a second round in May. So yes, 100% right, but I've been tracking week over week for a reason. I want to take a look at what the absorption rate has been. So that's what's came on active and what went pending. But I will say if we get a can if rates continue to drop like today, which I thought was interesting, we got some hot CPI numbers. So inflation came in 3.6 versus the 3% projected. But we saw a continued fall in the US tenure. Now what will happen is I'll say that right now. And then at 2 p.m., everything will shift. I'll be like, well, what Scott said. And because that's what always happens.

I'll post it on Facebook and 30 minutes later. How does that go? Yeah, that's the universe typing. I thought it was like that. But, okay. We'll continue to see, if we continue to see a downward trend in rates, which foreseeably we should to probably the upper fives, 5.75 and above, we'll continue to see more people who couldn't qualify, who can qualify,

who are then, and also some pent-up demand in, well, is this the time for me to go ahead and try to buy a house from people who've been iced out of the market for the last three to five years, three years, to come in to enter in, and that gives some opportunity to come after some of this inventory. So real estate, I've said it numerous hundred million times, right location, right price, right features, right condition, right timing. I think what's happening here is we've got a timing thing. that's hitting it perfectly, right? One is the interest rates are below six. Look, mathematically, 5.98 versus 6.1 isn't a huge difference,

right? But it's a psychological thing. It's that on it. One, you got your flowers popping out. God, you know, thank God the snow is gone. Now that I just, to your interest rate, now that I just said that we'll probably get snowed this weekend. Right? You know, and people are just done

to Candace's point, right? You know, they've either been rate lock, in their home for so long and they want to move but this I think this perfect timing is about ready to come in. It's not just the one thing. It's just not the 5.8 or 5.7. This is

the rest of the pieces of the puzzle coming together at the right time and this is why for many reasons I've never been this excited about being in real estate because of that plus the level of professionalism I think is one of the things to... I think the level of professionalism

has increased because you've seen a number of people who could not go away, and the professionals are largely what's left in the room. Well, I know statistically speaking, there's nationally, not locally. I won't speak on local stuff, but nationally, it's a 14% decrease in realtors assume this year. Now, ours is different than that. I don't know how much I can talk about that.

But realistically, the professionals who've made it through... Well, I think the real number to talk about, and I don't have the data with scandas is how many are doing deals right oh yes oh yeah we want to talk about that too that's incredible that's that pool is shrinking yeah so you they may be a lot of agents but who's actually doing transactions and actually who's doing transactions at a level to come close to what the area medium income is well there's you know the changes in the contract too so we've got a lot of changes you know typically every year four times a year they change something because that's what they're going to do.

Yeah, it's like the dentist. Oh, we have to do poke here. No, thank you. But so there's a lot of changes. There's a lot of opportunity for the pros to be pros. And I think that will also add to the investment in people who think that real estate is just something to fly by and have fun with, to actually leave it to those who have dedicated their efforts for their clients and their and understanding all this.

I did want to ask, and I don't know if this is segueing a different direction, because I know we have the statistics and things, but whenever people, like, I find, and this ties into what Keith was saying too. So right now I'm seeing, again, the slow shift, not just the light switch happened and now out of the blue, out of nowhere people came running. This has been a slow, steady churning kind of under the surface.

And now, when, when, when someone is thinking, you know what, I think I do need to sell my house. I've waited it out a few years. Now I can actually find something where I want to go that I can afford and the rates are good. My house is actually worth enough for me to buy something else and I'm not going to be underwater. And they're making the calls to get inspections done or to call and get preemptive information about refinancing or about where they can move next and what they can do. can they buy a home or buy a property without selling first?

And then new construction, tying this into that kind of play, there are so many local opportunities with builders. We did at car, our women's council of realtors had an event. It was builder speed dating. It was really fun. So we had nine different. Yeah. It was awesome.

So still not enough time to talk to everybody. But it was a great segue into getting contact information. and details about all of the areas around our community and the different builders. And I'd say the big box builders are what they are, and they serve a need. The ones that are really building a lot of product are all semi-custom,

because they understand and they see the need and value of somebody that either wants to have their own land built on or wants to look for land to build on. So getting people involved in the process, process, site work, you know, all of the different things and costs associated with the ability to build on your own land or find land if you can to build on. These builders have been amazing. So we are in a location that has these opportunities. So from Scott's perspective, and I don't know if you want to talk about constructive perm or building with a builder and competing against, you

They have all these incentives, but again, you don't know what the product is until you talk to other lenders and find out what your options are through the process, what appraisals cost, what kind of ways to expect that. Again, so if somebody is in a home, they need to sell their home to get the money to buy, but they're like, well, what if we build? So how does that look like from your point of view? I love this. I don't have to do a job. So there's a couple. Well, I'm curious. I want to hear about it.

there's a couple different pass here. If it is a large national builder who also owns the mortgage company. Say that second part. If it is a large national builder who also owns the mortgage company, they do some things that mid-sized regional builders, although some of them are kind of getting to the point where they will, in some fashion, have a relationship like this. But smaller builders, let's say they do 30 units a year, probably do not have this relationship.

But when you get into the larger ones, they build into the price of the unit, monies that are then allocated in concessions as advertisement, but also sometimes in forward commitment to rate. So they will say, we're going to sell this 20-unit block of these homes at X price with these incentives, and we're going to take an additional $150,000, and we're going to put that to the mortgage company as a forward commitment to say, you can buy these houses with a 4.99% rate for a 30-year fixed mortgage lower than any of our competitors

because they took that $150,000 for these 20 units that have to be sold within 90 days. So what they're doing is it's a forward commitment to buy the rate down, they pay that to the mortgage company. They've already accounted for that money in the cost of the actual units being sold. And on top of that, we're going to give you an additional $5,000 in closing costs in a total of 10 if you use our mortgage company and our title company. And they bundle that and they sell it.

So this is mass retail, like when you go to buy a cheap shirt at the store and this is how they market it. I think they call that a bulk discount. A bulk discount, but they also then, you know, they're going to pack in and they're going to build their upgrades. when you go into buy the house, and that's all part of the process. You're also, I'll jump in there because you're starting to see less and less opportunity in upgrades nowadays. Depending on the builders. Like GM to where you could build a car with a thousand different things, has gone to the Honda model of you can get an LX.

Yeah, yeah. That's exactly what it is. The other thing most people also don't know, and I just throw this out there, they have baked in the buyer broker fee in it, right? So if you don't have representation, you know, that's still in the price. But anyway, I'll let you finish your train of thought. So then when you get into your smaller builders who say share a relationship with someone like me and go, hey, if you use our guy, our preferred lender, they're going to give you this much in closing cost assistance.

And sometimes they'll protect that relationship in the contract to say it's only if you use that lender. There's no other way to get that. And it's almost impossible for you to compete against something like that. It becomes possible when you get into the smaller relationships, because especially depending on where the market is and how long they've had the property on. At a certain point, if they go, look, hey, look, we've come with our guide, we trust him, we're doing this, and we're willing to forego the builder incentive in order to do this, which people will sometimes do.

But at the same time, it's about knowing all of your, options and seeing what's competitive. The other thing, if you're someone who is buying a house who is listening to this, do not go to any of these builders. Some of them, some of them, the sales rep still operates under a little bit of an ethics policy to where they will go, they will ask, do you have a realtor? And if you do, they'll say, hey, well, can we get them involved in this? Some of them do not operate from the same ethics policy, and they will write a contract and

eliminate the realtor while you're sitting there in front of them and then you're still paying for it and then and then you'll have questions through the process and the realtor will go i can't i'm not you know unless you're willing to pay for my services i can't represent you in this and now you have left yourself without you're in a pickle anyone who's going to protect you in the process as you go through this well that's a matter of it's a big deal there's a just caveat this and we can continue there's a lot of those builders that are watching yeah and a lot of okay And a lot of the real estate agents is well. That's fine.

I didn't say that they were, I said it doesn't have to do with the builder themselves. It is the specific sales rep that is sitting there at the table. Well, I can tell you because I'm pretty sure I know who you're looking at over there. Everybody on there will do it. There's nine of them that I counted. And I just did a quick count. And that will, they will go ahead and say, you know, are you represented by a real estate agent? It's also our job as real estate agents to make sure our client knows to go ahead and do that.

In the world that we live in today, everything is a client. click away. And for the same thing that you, the buyer broker agreement protects you from them clicking on Realtor.com or Zillow or one of them and then another agent getting involved. And then you're going, no, I have this. It's just a level of protection and it's something that you, you know, you would hope that everyone does. Yeah. So at the end of the day, the builder has it baked and they're going to protect you. I want to pivot a little bit on this because get back to more Candace's question because I actually have three clients that I'm talking to that are custom builds or semi-custom builds and we're trying to find them a lot which is an extremely

difficult thing to do and try to pull it together so from that perspective tell me what how I'm supposed to walk this through with you so I've got a buyer that we're talking to a couple of builders we're looking at a couple of different lots we're trying to tie the package together so they can purchase a lot and do the build. What's my next step? So, with you? We haven't actually purchased anything at this point? We haven't purchased anything. Okay. Two ways. One of which is, are we going to be buying the land separately from the builder? And do we have plans and total costs from the builder? Let's say yes at this point. Let's say we are going to be buying the land.

independently of the thing. These buyers particularly have cash. I just can't find them something to buy, but they have cash to acquire. So let's say they go buy the land. They own the land out right now. We would then use the land as 10% equity to cover the down payment for the total cost of the build. So let's say they wanted to do a million dollar build and they had a $100,000 piece of property. The equity in the land would cover that they own outright would cover the 10% of the million dollar house that they want to build.

We would then set it up and close under normal financing, and it would be paid out in a five-draw schedule as they progressed with the builder. They would get a lump sum at closing. They would get foundation, framing, drywall, and a final. So when you say that, I know people will have these questions. So, okay, we go to closing. What percentage or what down payment besides the collateral of the land, the 10%, what is due at settlement, how often are the draws done and who is signing off on them? And what is the process? Are they paying, and I know some of these answers, I just want to put it out there.

Are they paying on the entire end construction price? Are they paying on their draws? give an idea of what those costs actually look like and how many appraisals are done? It's better than I could do right now. So you're typically going to have typically two appraisals done. There is going to be a subject to in the very beginning going, okay, we assume that subject to all of this work being complete, this is the value. And that's what we would base the value of the entire loan structure off of the beginning.

And that's out-of-pocket upfront cost to have that initial appraisal to say, yes, we think this land will do the end. value of what you want to have and we we think that in the end picture this will price out absolutely you're probably a total upfront cost of somewhere around 750 to a thousand dollars assuming and they're going to be they're going to go out they're going to look at the land they're going to walk around all of that they're going to look at the plans and they're going to go through all the plans and what the building is supposed to be like on the property with the driveway and all the things and the well once it's complete and generate that value now assuming that you didn't own the land

but this was all being sold to you as one project from the builder. You would bring that initial 10% as a down payment and then your closing cost to the purchase at that point. And then that 10% that loan amount would grow as each draw is issued. So you'd start out with a small payment that would eventually escalate to the lump sum of the total monies being in the pool and you have a full mortgage payment. And then that would convert to fixed,

30-year loan at the end on closing. And I want to also help people understand, too. And this is what in the builder speed dating, it was so much fun. Thank you, women's counsel, for putting that on, and all the builders and all the sponsors and everybody. However, the site work. So people get all excited. We see the pretty plans.

We found the land. We met the builder. We're getting this. Yay. The site work. Oh, my God. Yay. Right.

So everybody's all excited. And then on the back end, we're all hot. and figuring all this out and making sure timing's right as well as obviously the builder. So they find the land, they get everything started. Now we've got to go through zoning and approvals and make sure that what you want to do is actually going to be approved and able to be done for your end result. But the Earth actually has to be modified. So whenever you're talking about, whenever Scott's talking about draws, what that means is, okay, here's your total cost that the developer, builder, all of that is going to need to get you your end result. your end result, your finished product. This is what the loan is going to be for.

Now, a portion of that, say, 30 to 40,000 is just going to be like getting a road big enough in to get to the site of the house. Now, there could be rocks and hills and valleys and creeks and all kind of stuff, we know this area, to deal with, right? So that cost could be varied. So the draws up front are your development just to get the earth ready to do what you want to do to it. Then the next set of draws, and those could be. multiple contractors. You have to have utilities. Is there going to be enough water? Is it a well in septic? Is it an alternative septic? Where is the septic field? Well, these places, guess what? Remember that whole thing I said earlier about people being overworked and, you know, it might take

nine weeks just to get a well driller out there? What we're saying is what kind of flexibility do we have in the low-and- interest rates are flexing and there's so many steps of the process. We get hit with a surprise. You know, maybe you're the driveway, the temporary drive that was put in, can't support your drywall truck when it comes in. You get a $2,000 tow bill attached to like, yeah. That sounds a little personal like it's happened before.

I just happened to be talking to a builder who was venting about something yesterday. So comments coming in. And I seem to remember paying you once to pull a truck out. But, anyway, I mean, you know, when I work for you, my, my mom No, that's what his pull-ups have been for, to pull the truck out. He used to work for me, so. I did, I did. And my motto was, it looks so nice because I did it twice.

Scott, I think you used that one before. That still makes me chuckle. Monica Gibson's watching the program. She says, I absolutely love all this information. You can speak to the quality of this builder. He's in your neck of the woods. DJ Morbrily is watching the program right now. He's got a fantastic design build team.

100%. And I love following his content. on social media as well. Inspired homes. Yeah. Does a great job. They do an amazing job. They've got a couple of properties right now, some specs that they've listed.

They look amazing. Yep, yep. He says that's why we do a full site evaluation on day one and we factor land cost upgrades into our fixed fee contract. He's also giving props to the panel. I'll highlight some of the brokers that are watching the program. Jeff Gaffetti's watching the show. Matt Neese was watching the show.

Katie Mullins, who's got a fantastic. listing in Belmont is watching the program as we speak right now. Lonnie Murray is watching the show. Vanessa Park Hills watching the program. You got supervisors and counselors, elected officials, city planners, builders, finance folks, all watching the program as we speak right now. Here's an intriguing. Barbara Bossick is watching the program. Your business and how it pertains, this question's on the feed, to new construction versus existing construction. and the percentages of what you guys are doing. Who wants to start with that?

You want to go first with that, Scott? Like the percentages of new construction? Yeah, versus existing, the stuff you're financing. The deals you're doing. I do more existing than I do new construction. But again, that's in part because the majority of the units of construction come from these large-scale developers who also have ownership in the mortgage company. So helping smaller builders, like one of them,

I work with frequently. They actually take my pre-approval in the beginning, prior to doing any work, as the commitment that this is going to get done, they build the house, they don't borrow any money, and it's a turnkey loan at then, so it looks just like a regular purchase. That's how I used to do it.

And then there are builders who, we start with the construction loan and then go through the process. But just as overall, I would say 10% of what I do is some form of new construction in comparison to 90 percent of existing homes. Me personally.

Now, you get people who are, say, with a lender who is directly tied to a builder, it could be inverse, where they do 90% of what they do is new construction and 10% as existing homes. You want to tackle this, Candace? Yeah, sure. Always. So it's interesting.

What was, I think your stats were saying, and maybe I read this wrong, that this, in a one-year projected forecast for 2026, there's going to be over 3,000 homes bill. Was that it? 33.48. So I was going to go into that a little bit, a little bit late, but I'll jump into it now. So I've been tracking, and this is my projection, this is Keith Smith's projection, that I think we're going to be grow somewhere between 10 to 15%. But I was going to throw this question out. But the median sales price has gone down on. That's what I wanted to throw out to you guys and see what's going to, you know. Now that's just a snapshot of, the first two months versus the end of 2025, we have lost on the average about 1.5%. Now keep in mind, this is a two-month snapshot versus a 12-month snapshot, so those numbers could change, and we're starting the beginning of the year, and we're about 1% down on the median. You know, I've always said as long as inventory is increasing, you're going to see average

and median start kind of stabilizing in a little bit. Are you guys seeing that in the field? Are you seeing prices stabilizing? Well, I had a conversation with someone yesterday, actually, looking for a home in the city and like, oh, can I find anything? Yes, yes, you can. Well, there's 119. Yeah, the listings are improving. Yeah, so, I mean, there are incredible opportunities right now.

Again, as we spoke earlier, the rumblings have already been going on for a while now, now that this perfect timing is just kind of a and the motivation of buyers and the motivation of people ready to sell has kind of come together. So I really love having increased inventory, more months of opportunity, and that's where this new construction is also coming along so well. And people, I believe, like over, you know, especially Waynesboro, Fishersville, Green County, Fluvana. There are so many opportunities even, you know,

South 29. There are so many opportunities right now for new construction and for people to do what they want to do. But I'm seeing also a lot of people, there are specific needs. So some communities, new construction is datter than a doornail,

not moving people, you can't pay people to come through a new construction property. And then other communities, and other areas are just bursting. So I think people wanting a little bit more of a custom product, as the Builder Speed dating thing showed with a lot of their communication and willingness to be semi-custom. And then with new construction, I know I did a fabulous build

with a wonderful, very intelligent, knows what he knew what he wanted, he knew exactly what he liked and all that. And still, you know, I had the opportunity to, represent him because they do deserve, you know, all people deserve somebody to look after their needs. And I had a great ability to work with the builders, um, uh, agent on the other side. Yeah. So it was a fantastic thing. Um, and that, that fits a need. But there are a lot of people, too, that are really looking for something, um, like Keith said, you know, there's a lot of land opportunities and the smaller builders are now getting four or five, um, division

rights out of parcels and they're now coming to fruition and getting wells dug. You're going to see the smaller developers. Yeah, I think last year a lot of developers and smaller builders have been preparing. And again, now the buyers are ready, sellers are ready. Can I, because when you guys were talking,

I actually did some math that did some research on this question of new construction versus existing. So year to date, from January 1 to today, sold in pending, so I'm just counting stuff in pending that is under contract is, 400,000, 34 units out of that 434 120 of them a new construction so if I did my math right and Jerry will check me that's roughly 28%.

So it's over a quarter almost a third that's Keith's math of the 434 new construction. That answers your question. That answers your question that new construction is picking up. I think you're going to hit ceilings, right? Well, I'll just say this. Fulvana's got about the end of this year and it's done. Green's out at its ceiling. Well, no.

With the units that are coming to market, after that, there's no more coming through the pipeline. Stanley Martin's doing a ton of those. But it's got 2,000 lots that are going to come online. It's a long way out. Fulvana's capped out. You're not going to see a lot happening in Alamoire. The ceiling for the small builder is and will continue to be land. Yeah.

And where you get these approved large developments that a larger builder goes and buys, and it doesn't happen to happen year one. It can be year eight before they get it done, and everything checks all the boxes for them to do it. And then as counties limit those developments moving forward, you'll see less and less of that. But it's still harder, even with different counties changing how, what their land division rights are going to be. Our county did that. Provada did that. it took out, it took, you only can subdivide in Fulvana County now five times maximum.

Well, think about what Jimmy Evers said yesterday, General Sales Manager last Friday on Real Talk. He said, we have dry powder on hand and we can't find land to buy. 100%. Exactly words. So every time we talk about affordability, it becomes also accessibility. And if we don't have access to build more homes, we will continue to struggle with affordability. Yeah, 100%. I don't think there's any argument, at least at this table, on that.

I'll quote Neil Williamson. You get a bunch of people who are going, you get a bunch of people who talk about, why don't we have this, but at the same time, they're also going, we don't want more houses. So you can't have more houses and cheaper inventory. Well, I want to know, so we've got people online listening right now. What I want to know is from, what can we do? What can we do to help proceed the process in a forward momentum, efficiently and effectively, because it is, again, going out and finding larger parcels of land,

identifying the zoning rights and ability, and going through the division process. First, I've got a client right now looking at three lots, right? Going through the process. Well, the well was less than 1 GPM. So, different things, yeah. So, okay, now we have to frack. Now we have to do this. Well, can we get?

There's a lot involved, right? So from our, not counselors, from the elected officials, thank you. What can we do? Is there an ability to come in and help? Like if there's a courier that needs help, let me jump in my car and run and do it. So how can we as the professionals, help the builders, help the county officials and get through these municipality kind of zoning issues or projections on smaller divisions throughout? the areas. Well, I'll push back. So I'm the only one at the table here that does not feel like

the development area should be expanded. And I'm speaking specifically to Almore County. Yeah. Okay. The, yeah, a Wednesday, the county executive, Jeff Richardson, presented a budget for fiscal year 27 to the Almore County Board of Supervisors. And he asked for a year over year 13.5% increase on the Almore County budget. The Amore County budget is now over $700 million. $725 million. So here's an interesting tidbit that came out. For every new unit that comes to market in Al Morrow County, it brings in $1.25. For the $1.25 it costs.

$1.32. $1.5 years ago I was on the show talking about how it costs $1.5 and a quarter for every unit that goes in and you only collect a dollar in tax revenue. Yeah. So new units, and Neil Williamson will push back on this, and I'll give you the pushback and get out of your way. new units are financially net losers for jurisdictions. $1.32 in infrastructure. Where does it come from? Higher taxes.

Exactly. Higher taxes. Now the flip side of that argument, we have to be honest when presenting things. A ton of effing people watching here. The flip side of that argument is if you want to have a diverse community, that's not just homogenous and wealthy like Almore County is, you have to create new housing. And I want our two sons, my wife and I has two kids. to live in a diverse community, and the only way that's going to happen is if we have more doors and more roofs out there.

But we should emphasize that every new unit that comes to market is a net loser financially for the jurisdiction, which means the jurisdiction is going to have raised taxes on its people, which means it's going to gentrify the county one way or the other. Here's where my, you know, so I grew up doing building in construction and then restaurants for 13 years. the small business owner and the commercial opportunity to have jobs, income, gas stations, convenience stores, opportunity for people to make more money and have jobs and conveniences. Why do I want to live out in Eurelesville? Is that where you live? No.

But I'm just saying, you know, a small gas station, that's a mom-and-pop gas station in the middle of Dyke, let's say. And they want to sell a bit larger company wants to buy and improve it and make it larger and have more food options and coffee and bring in more revenue, create more jobs. And then they're turned down. They're not allowed to do it. So these different things, the commercial, and this is where I really like that Louisa, what, 15, 20 years ago, did it. And unfortunately, Fluvana didn't. That's why at Zions you see the difference.

40 years ago. Okay. It was like yesterday, Keith. but you know infrastructure roads that's what our taxes are for and yeah maybe the residential side doesn't work but how about we have more

infrastructure and growth in residential and we also have to correlate that to the commercial and the conveniences because if I can work from home but I've got to go in to the office two or three days a week fine I can live out further however do I have internet do I have water and sewer do I have

a gas station close by or some kind of you know coffee shop whenever I want to meet somebody or take the kids because they're driving me crazy and we want to go get a snack. So having the conveniences of life at a readily available pace when you are expanding into further rural areas, the commercial tax growth and base employment opportunities and all around like betterment of that gentrified, you know, diverse community, I think that's where we're missing the mark. And, okay, build 300 houses, but where are they going to get gas? Where are they going to get groceries?

Where's the CVS? Thanks for dropping this. No, keep going. Keep going on. Because you know I'm going to have a bunch of pushback on that. But this is about you two guys. I'll let you chime in. Before you do that, what we're going to do, you and I,

and I'm going to get two pro-housing from your perspective, and we're going to have a debate on the show about this. Because there's a lot of stats that you're not catching. So there's a caveat to that. And it is this. And it is people operate from a point of convenience. And what ends up happening is developers who try to push retail into these developments in a more rural area end up having to shrink the commercial space because the actual overall need and usage

ends up in empty space because the people who live in this area and work in this area, grocery shop and get gas outside of work. And then they come home. The exact example of that. It's a good example of it. But it's not just there. I see it in other areas as well. And the retail space that you want for convenience doesn't get used and you see those

businesses turn over and fail over and over again because they don't get enough community participation. And you get a great example. is like look at the deterioration of what has happened in the town of Fork Union in the last 40 years. Because nobody wants to live there. No, it's not that. That's not it. Scott's point is saying the people are working in Charlottesville and doing their shopping there and bringing their groceries to Fork Union.

That's what he's saying. But they also, Ruckersville was. And that's actually, that's 100% true. But, you know, 40 years ago, Rutgersville was a two-lane road and it was so far out of town, nobody wanted to go there. Forest Lakes was out in the middle of nowhere. Why would anybody want to live there? So there's like a phenomenon about how expansion happens north. And not just here, Lynchburg, Roanoke, all of it, like Culpepper. When you look at the 29 corridor, the expansion

typically happens to the north. So the south side end of town, unless you're going to go to Dr. Hose, praise B, I love the fact that there's outside. Their ranch is so bad. This whole It's just not the same. So you don't see the same type of growth on that end of town as you see towards Rutgersville. And whether that be just phenomenon or the intersection of 33 and how they put so many developments out there in those areas that are now feeding that. But it has continued to be, even though it's on a smaller scale, a more successful commercial space than you've seen in other areas due to the traffic that it gets.

because of its location. So, man, I got all kinds of stuff. I want to pick a part on this stuff and we're at 11. We're out 1118. Statistically, it's incorrect. And we're going to come back with the stats

on the show. I'm just relaying what the top county executive and Almarl County presented to elected officials on the record on Wednesday. And I can tell you for 40 years, I've had debates with them. They only look at it very narrowly. They do not look at the induced.

The man who determines the budget is presenting this to the elected officials who really determine the budget. But that's in line with what I've been saying for years on the show. 100%. That's in line with what Chris Fairchild says on the show. A dollar and a quarter. Now it's $1.32 now. Yeah. And some of the things that are raising the... I mean, that's only because the dollar's worth

that punch less. And also because of unionization of teachers and staff and all that. But, you know, Keith and I, one of the few things we disagree is on this. and one of the reasons is kind of sticks in my crawl is because in a lot of ways

and this may be you as well my wife and I are paying twice for education we're paying the county and then we're paying a private school tuition how much is your public school decreasing in students in Almore County Weldon Cooper suggests that public schools in the area enrollment's going to drop fairly dramatically

and Al Morrow County is going on the record at school board saying give us $250 million for a high school in the fourth late Tali meet area Yeah, they're down about... Make that make sense. They're down about 2% since thing. Our county, Fulvana County's down 8%.

And don't get me started on the SOL scores. Why don't we go into the... Nelson County is down 15%. The schools are... Yeah, make that the score. But they look at this... It's great at... Jerry, they look at...

Believe me, communicate with these folks on a regular basis. They look at it as a monolith. They look at it as it dollars in and dollars out. But what they're not talking about is the dollar ins from either their commercial and back on the traffic stuff to talk about Fulana County, you guys are 100% right. 80% of Fulana County was built prior to 2016, the Vime it got built out.

It's only built a few hundred homes. I remember I was looking up for the stats. I actually been preparing for a show for this. I just don't have it in front of me. Over the last four to six years, there's been a very small percentage of the growth. But the traffic's increase. Why is that?

they're coming from Buckingham they're coming from Fork Union driving through Fulvana County to either go shopping and or go into Charleston. That's why the traffic is picking up. Not because of the growth in Fulvana County, it's because it's the growth around it. But this is

a whole show and to itself. I wanted to give these guys an opportunity to talk a little bit about it but I think it's time for us to do one of our fun shows where we push back a little bit. I'll take one side and you take take the other. Again, you got to wear the Batman

and Rockets. In my opinion, it is extremely disingenuous from the elected officials to use that math. Well, this isn't the elected official. This is the county executive. So, also, he's not the one that votes on the budget. It's the Board of Supervisors that does that. Our county,

Fulvana County budget is like through the roof. Same exact reasons, same stuff. But we're only at 10 to 12% of commercial. Almore County is closer to 20-something percent of commercial. County is at 11%. Amar County is trying to get to 17% commercial. Emily Kilroy is the economic development director and she wants to raise taxes collected from commercial from 11 to 17.

Louvanna County is like 8% commercial. No, no, I just looked at it until day. We're up to, because we've got a couple other things coming on. No, trust me, I looked at the numbers. It's close to 11. For fiscal year 2026? No, this is projected. Yeah. So fiscal year 20206 is 8% commercial and 92% tied to residential. I've said this all along. I am paying on my house in Volvanda County the same amount of cash in taxes if I was to live in Glenmore. That's just not right. But that's a whole different topic, a whole different conversation for it. I wanted to give everybody an opportunity to chime in, but I really want to talk about that at a future show.

Fantastic show. Viewers and listeners, we didn't get to comments from Lonnie Murray, who is in the game. He's the planning commissioner. We didn't get to comments from James. We're going to get to comments from a bunch of brokers here, someone in finance, one of the builders, a prospective buyer here on your feed. You may want to follow up with Sarah Williams, who's talking about first-time home buyer loans and or somebody that's trying to get a house, Scott. This is an hour and 10 minutes straight without stopping. Shout out to Lonnie.

He's a pretty awesome marathon runner. So track him every once in a little. He's a pretty awesome guy. And he does a lot of work on Mark County Planning Commission. So a little hats off to hand. How about our closing thoughts for Scott and Candice? Anywhere you want to go, Scott Morris? Just that we are in a much different rate environment than we've been in for the last three years.

Essentially, we're at the lowest point that we've been since September of 2022, which is very opportunistic for people who have been feeling like they couldn't get into the market because of rates. Now at the same time, I got somebody else. I was on the phone week yesterday, who is in the mid-sixes, who said, you know what, I'm not ready to refinance yet. Let me know when we get to four. I said, okay, bud. Well, we're just going to, hey, this did you say,

we're just going to need another COVID? Is that what you told them? Is that another pandemic? Hopefully we don't. No, what we need is, God forbid it'll happen again, is the government that dump too much money into the market. Well, I think, you know, that's what's causing a big part of what we're seeing right now.

unrelated to anything that we're talking about is like this AI bubble fear which has you know kind of like dragged down the stock market for the last two days and pushed some money into equities so we'll see you know how long that sticks do you do you buy the AI bubble fear I certainly do not do you buy it I think that they're talking about the bubble fear on the market not not in people afraid of it take a stock like in video or AMD they're saying that it's overvalued that's overvalued that it's going to there's a bubble tied to the AI category. So what's crazy is there's two, like there's two different fear classes here. There is the, it's overvalued and it's going to work so well that it's going to put everyone out of jobs.

And then we've got a whole other. Unemployment issue. So as far as the value goes, this is like, all the, what we're paying to use AI right now is a teaser rate. Trust me, as we become more dependent on it, that number. is going to go up. That stock is going to go through the roof. I did a post about AI. I personally love AI. I now

can write. I've never been able to do that before. He knows that. The engagement that's being pushed by this teaser rate right now, the corporate side of things, they're paying millions upon millions of dollars for usage that the low in consumer is not

seeing costs for because they want that adoption just like it's still free to Google stuff. So at some point, like where's that cost? So what's where that brick wall, and I know we're over. But where that brick wall is going to be, you know where that brick wall is going to be on AI? They're not going to go get the power. All these data centers that are now not going to get approved because they don't have power to come in.

I saw a meme about this, that all the people that are going to lose their jobs tight, this is a meme. That's not true. Let's hope to God this isn't true. That all the people that are going to lose their jobs because of artificial intelligence will then find new jobs basically being the hamsters that power the artificial intelligence, like riding stationary bikes, creating kinetic energy to power the AI, that then is the one that's driving the economy? That's effing terrifying. There's a power wall.

Isn't it already happening? There's a power wall about ready to come up on that. You know, my thing, I'm a face-to-face person. Call, communicate. Communication is absolutely key. Let's dive in, let's get deeper. Let's find out what you independently. have for yourself what you want to do and your goals, and I love helping people. I love

communicating and hearing and conversing with pros and amazing colleagues, and I love having pros on the other side. So the agents that I'm working with now, thank you for being who you are and being professional, and yeah, let's talk. I've got to go take care of a couple of toddlers and an infant. I still think they're taking care of you, honestly. They're smarter than me. I know that much. So since we've been talking here, six more homes went on the market. So just in a little over an hour and a half, the inventory just grew by six more homes. Keith Smith, Scott Morris, Candace, you're absolutely amazing.

Keith, Scott, you're amazing too. Judah is amazing. He's behind the camera. This show was fun. I thoroughly enjoyed the show. It's archive wherever you get your podcast and content and your social media content. It's also archived at Real Talk with keith.com. We'll catch up with you guys in an hour and two minutes on the I Love Seville Show,

and we certainly appreciate your viewership and your listenership. So long, everybody. Thanks, guys. Thanks, everybody. Thank you. Thank you. I love it when I just sit here and shut up.