The School of Greatness - 233 Make It Big, Lose It All, and Earn Back Even More with Josh Altman

Episode Date: September 28, 2015

"I knew if I could do it before, I could do it again." - Josh Altman If you enjoyed this episode, check out show notes and more at http://lewishowes.com/233

This is episode number 233 with Josh Altman from Million Dollar Listing. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin. Thank you so much for joining me today.

My name is Lewis Howes, and it's always fun to connect with other football players or people that played collegiate football. Josh Altman is a former college football player at Syracuse University turned real estate mogul and one of the top realtors in the country. He's the star of Million Dollar Listing in Los Angeles. He's sold homes of tens of millions of dollars, worked with some of the biggest celebrities, and has a new book out called It's Your Move, My Million Dollar Method for Taking Risks with Confidence and Succeeding at Work. My Million Dollar Method for Taking Risks with Confidence and Succeeding at Work and Life.

Now, I enjoyed this one a lot because sometimes people on TV can be portrayed as having certain personality types, and we may agree with them or may not agree with them, but something I really like about Josh is he's very real. He is himself, and he has a lot of confidence, right? He's got a lot of confidence, and he knows how to get results financially. And there's a lot of things you can learn from having this type of confidence

and knowing what risks to take so that you don't lose it all, which Josh has done, and so you can make sure that you continue to grow and increase your sales as an entrepreneur, make the right risks, and grow your business. So if you're looking to take your business and life to the next level, then you're going to learn some great strategies about how to do that in today's episode. But today's episode, again, is all about taking the right risks so you can build your business in a powerful way.

So let's go ahead and dive into this episode with the one and only Josh Altman. Welcome, everyone, back to the School of Greatness podcast. Very excited about our guest today. His name is Josh Altman. He's got a new book called It's Your Move. And I'm very excited about this. Good to see you, my man. Thanks for coming on.

Very excited about this. Good to see you, my man. Thanks for coming on. Very excited. We met like a month ago, not even, at the Colin Parker sock photo shoot, which isn't out yet, but we both have our own sock, custom sock. Yeah, talk about random meeting. Random, right? But I was like, oh yeah, of course.

I've seen the show. I don't watch too much TV, but I've seen a couple episodes on a flight or something. And I was like, yeah, of course, I'd love to have you on. That's where most people see it. On the airplanes, right? And it's Million Dollar Listing is the show you've been on for five years, correct?

Yep. And it's been on television for eight seasons. Amazing. But you got in three years after, I guess. Yeah, they needed some new blood. Some fresh, young, good-looking, former football player. You were a kicker at Syracuse, right? I was.

I was. I got two of the biggest diamond rings, an Orange Bowl championship and a Fiesta Bowl championship. And I never got it on the field. You never got it on the field? Nope. But I warmed that bench with the best one. So you were there for four years playing football? Yeah.

I actually only played for the first two years. Okay. And then I wanted to enjoy college a little more. Of course. But Donovan McNabb was my quarterback. That was super cool. What years were this? 90 – I'm sorry, 2000 – 97 to 2001.

So it was 97 to 99 is when I played. I had at least 10 big-time NFLers on that team. Of course. Yeah. Wow. That's insane, man. You never got on the field though? Well, during practice. During practice. But no stress though because kickers have the biggest stress i mean

i would have liked to kick i'm not gonna lie of course uh but the guy who was ahead of me his name was uh nate trout an all-american or something or all-american breaking every record every reported so we were up and you know with donovan mcn, we were winning games like 60 to nothing. So I'm like, Coach, let me get one extra point. No. He wanted him to break more records. Yeah. That's tough, man. Not even a preseason game?

Tough, but it makes for good stories. There you go. At least you got to play. Yes, preseason and halftime. That's cool. I mean, the thing is, college football is intense, man. It's a lot of fun. It's a lot of intense.

I mean, you still had to train like everyone else did, even though you didn't get to play. You were still doing three days. Oh, yeah. Still working your butt off. Yeah. How much would you say your success now with all the stuff you've done has translated from what you learned in sports? Oh, big time. Really?

Big time. Do you feel like you have an advantage over all the other players in the real estate game because you're a competitive edge? Absolutely. Yeah. And I think it's super important. And I always talk about when I have kids, you can forget about video games. Right. They're playing real games.

Real games. Yeah, yeah. Because you learn everything from teamwork to having ice water in your veins when you're in a difficult situation. I mean, especially as a kicker with the pressure. Oh, my goodness. you're in a difficult situation. I mean, you know, especially as a kicker with the pressure. Oh, my goodness. It's just like the same thing as sitting at a table dealing with the $25 million house

and lots of money being traded and you got to keep your cool. Of course. Yeah. Man, I'm excited about this because we have something in common. We've both been on a Bravo show. I was on a show for four episodes. What was it? Called Misadvised.

Okay. It lasted one season. It was a few years ago. It was probably a mistake, but it was a great learning experience. And it was like a dating show that three women were the experts on. Okay. And they were relationship coaches, but they couldn't take their own relationship advice and they didn't have any boyfriends or they weren't married.

So it was called Misadvised. And one of my friends was like the leads who was on there and she asked me to come on one night as like a guest at one of the events they were hosting. And then the producer was like, we need you to have your ass this other girl out and blah, blah, blah. And I got roped in some lame thing. But I know what it's like being on Bravo, and I know that a lot of it is, let's say, manipulated in some ways. So let's talk about first, the reason you got into getting on the show. I want to backpedal a little bit after that, but why did you decide to go on the show in the first place? Good question. So I was doing pretty well in my real estate career. I had sold a few celebrity homes at that time. So I was in the

newspaper quite a bit. And they had three people on the show. One of them was bowing out or left or fired. I don't know. Nobody ever knows. But they were looking for somebody new. I got a call to come in. And obviously, first thing I'm thinking is probably what you were thinking. Nah, I don't think so. I worked my way up in this business. I'm not about to go on TV and be- My brand messed up. Yeah. So I went in almost as a joke.

And seven interviews later, they offered me the gig. And I still said, I got to think about it. Exactly. I said that for a month. I was like, I don't know if I'm ready for this. I asked everybody. And funny is my parents said, don't do it. Of course.

Yeah, Of course. My brother, who's my business partner, Matt, he said, Josh, you know, what's the most important thing about being in real estate? I said, what? He said that people know who you are. What better way for people to know who you are than be on a show that plays in 70 countries around the world. And who cares what they make you look like? Because at least you're known as the jerk realtor or the nice realtor or whatever realtor. Who gets results. And you're known as a realtor. Who cares if they like you or not? And today, it's even funny. I'll know when the show is playing in a place like Australia or Canada, because I'll wake up and

I'll have 10 emails from Australia saying, I want to buy a house. No way. Aren't you the realtor of Los Angeles? No way. They don't know. Yeah. And it's such, how many realtors are here?

Well, as far as I'm concerned, one. But I mean, how many are like registered? Thousands. Thousands. And some of these top realtors spend hundreds of thousands for billboards, for the bus stops, for everything, to get the signs in front of everyone, their photo. And they spend so much money and you get paid to have a billboard on TV, essentially. True.

But I also, in return, I gave away my entire private life. That's true. Yeah. And privacy. You give up that. You give up. And it's a lot of work and a lot of time. I know how Yeah, and privacy. You give up that. You give up, and it's a lot of work and a lot of time. I know how much time and energy it is to do shooting. I mean, I was actually driving up Laurel Canyon one day.

This must have been eight months ago. And I remember seeing the film crew up by a house, and I saw you walking down the stairs. I was like, they must be filming right now. It's funny. And I saw you just walking out there, and I was like, you know, in some ways, it seems like a great life. But in other ways, man, when you're filming, it's like you don't have a life.

It's extremely difficult. Your typical reality show is about three months. We film for 10 months straight. Oh. Yeah, for 12 weeks. That's it. Oh, my goodness. 10 months straight for 12 weeks on air.

And the good news is it is my job. Yes. So I got to do it anyways i have a partner my brother who actually can hold down the fort when i'm filming because it's extremely exhausting you gotta be 110 percent all times you're constantly texting calling people back making yeah you don't want to slip either when there are 10 cameras on you no yeah no not at all so between that uh and and the book and speaking engagements around the world, it's busy. Man, that's crazy.

It's busy. How many deals would you say you were closing before the show to where you're closing now? Are they just coming in left and right, or is it still kind of up and down depending on the market, or what's it like? Okay. Before the show was such a long time ago at this point, I remember it was, you know, it was five years ago in my career.

So naturally anybody who's going to grow 50 years. Yeah. So look, I can't tell you exactly where I would be if I wasn't on the show, but I can tell you that it's definitely catapulted our career a lot faster than it, than it would have been possible. You wouldn't be where you're at now, let's say that.

Absolutely. And we're blessed to be on it. We love it. We take the good with the bad. And trust me, it's not all good. I mean, yeah, when I first met you, I was like, you're not that much of an asshole. But they portray you in the two episodes that I saw. But I know because they did the same for me when I was on the show.

I was like, I didn't act like that, but they made me redo shots and they make you redo scenes and like say stuff that you don't want to say. You're like, what? We don't redo anything. They just kind of roll. But when you're rolling for 10 months, they're going to have a lot of footage. Yes. So I get that a lot because I'm definitely the alpha male on the show. I'm super – Agg male on the show. I'm super aggressive.

I'm very passionate about real estate. And so that can come off. All of those can come off as being kind of, yeah, yeah, yeah. But you know what? I talk about it in the book all the time. I call it calculated confidence, which is an important part about being successful in any business. And it is how it is. But eventually, after a couple of years on the show, people got to know me. They see me enough that they know, look, most importantly, I'm the number

one guy on the show that you're going to want to represent your money. You may like me or not, but trust me. I'm going to get you the right deal. Yeah. The best deal. You want me to go battle with you. Yeah. Yeah. Because you're going to hustle. Yeah.

And you've got the relationships and that's a lot of the success that you have. Exactly. Now, I'm interested. Confidence. It's something that, you know,

if you could bottle up confidence and sell it, you can make so much money off that. Yeah. How do you teach someone to be more confident? And how do you continue to be more confident without being, you know, because you need to be able to connect with people as well. And sometimes that can push people away.

Yeah. If you're too egotistical. So how do you continue to increase your confidence but also have humility and grace in certain deals and conversations? And then how do you teach other people how to do it? Got it. So that's a great question. First of all, which I talk about a lot in the book is how I got to where I am as far as my confidence goes. I moved out to LA with zero money.

Yeah. From New York. From New York. I couldn't rub two dimes together. My brother and I lived in a fraternity house because that was all we could afford. I slept on the couch. He slept in the bed. Wait, we weren't even part of the fraternity. Really? We worked a deal with a buddy of ours. We gave him like a couple hundred bucks a month and that's where we crashed. Wow. So it wasn't always super confident, Josh, I can tell you that. But from a lot of the experiences and failing as well, which I did big time when the economy collapsed and coming back up and getting to where I am today, it's kind of you learn from your mistakes

and you become more confident I always say in order to be a successful salesperson you got to know your product that's the single most important thing you got to know it like the back of your hand otherwise you can't truly sell it and you got to believe in it as well because you don't believe in it if you don't know it

right exactly so I am very very good and I can look anybody in this business in the world in the eyes and say, I am an expert at Los Angeles real estate. I study it. I know more than 99.999% of the people out there. I flipped houses. I financed houses. I sell houses, buy them, all that stuff. So I'm very confident because I'm very good at what I do because I'm an expert and I work very hard at it. You do the work to become the expert. It's not just falling on the lap. I'm the first one in the office every day. I'm the last one

in the office every day. It's a passion of mine, real estate. So I don't consider it work, but I literally study it. They call me the rain man of real estate. There you go. I like it. It's like, how much is a house on the 900 block in the flats of Beverly Hills? And you can be within like $100,000 range. I can easily all day long. Right. Yeah.

Because you just know what all the other houses are selling for already. Now what is – do you feel like you're an expert at the whole LA area or is it more like five neighborhoods, the Malibus, the Santa Monica, Beverly Hills? Good question. I probably – the Platinum Triangle, which is Beverly Hills, Bel Air, and Homely Hills, as well as the Sunset Strip is kind of my bread and butter. That's your bread and butter. Gotcha. I live up there.

I'm walking my dogs up and down those streets, and I love it up there. Right. Gotcha. Okay. So if someone asks you Hermosa Beach, you probably wouldn't be as well-versed there. You'd be like someone else. You know what I would do? I'd put them in touch with, because I have a team of 12 agents, my agent who does specialize there. There you go. And we both do the deal. There you go. I like it. Now, what do you think is like, for someone who wants to be more confident, let's say they're struggling with their self-worth or

their career, they want to get a raise. What are some simple steps to being more confident? And I know you talk about it in the book, but what do you think are just some simple things every day to increase that for yourself? Well, I think number one, the most important is what I like to call surround yourself with your dream team. I call it Josh Alvin's dream team. And it consists of a good amount of support from people that I trust, value their opinion and who I surround myself with. I always say that you are the average of five people that you surround yourselves with, right? You ever hear that before? Yeah. Yeah, I totally did. I totally didn't make that up.

I just made that up right now. So I think it's super important to do that. So in real estate, for example, I have the best mortgage broker who's available 24-7 for me. And we've worked our way up in the business together. I have everybody from the best title guy and escrow guy and all that. I surround myself with this team of people who I can trust and they can guide me in the right directions of whatever I do. So that's one way, obviously, in any business is just surround yourself with people who support you. More importantly, though, is get a mentor. Okay.

I am big on that. I now am a mentor to many people. I even have a mentor program coming out soon, which I'm super excited about. Look, whatever business you're doing, unless you're inventing something that's never existed before, you're not typically reinventing the wheel. Someone's already done a great job at it. Exactly. So no matter how good of a realtor or how many billions I sell, there's always been somebody before me who's been very good at it. Get a mentor. Learn from them. When I started in real estate, I walked into the company that I worked for and I went up to the biggest,

baddest real estate agent in that company. And I said, my name is Josh Altman and I work for you. And he said, what do you mean? I don't need anybody. I'm not hiring. I said, listen. I said, I'm newer in the business. I think that you're amazing at what you do. I want to learn. I don't care if I need to get you coffee, your dry cleaning, whatever. If you have an open house that's been on the market for over a year and nobody wants to sit it, call me. I'll be your guy. And that's what I did. And I started sitting open houses that no one would even want to go to anymore. They've been on the market so long. Eventually I ended up working my way up for better open houses.

My first eight out of 10 deals were from people who walked through those. And then I had my own deals going. So then I was successful. And what year was this? This was 2008. When you were out in LA, right? Yeah, I came out in 2002 or 2003. Okay, gotcha.

Yeah. But that's how I worked my way up. Attach yourself to a mentor. Learn from them. And look, there's going to be good times and bad times in any business. And you're going to make mistakes in business. And what I talk about in the book is being able to bounce back from those mistakes and redirect your route and finish strong. It sounds like to me you could be pretty successful in anything you do because you're so driven. You want to achieve. Why real estate?

Oh, I love it. I was playing Monopoly before anybody else was, trading houses. What is it about it that you love? So real estate, let's say as opposed to, I don't know, stock market, right? I can drive and go see my piece of real estate right now and I can touch it and feel it. I like that. I like to do that when I'm investing in things as well. I invest in the stock market too,

but not like real estate. I've always loved mansions. Before I was a realtor, I used to drive around and look at houses in my neighborhood that I grew up in in Newton, Massachusetts. I'd be like, wow, that house is amazing. And I was just always fascinated by some of these houses.

And that's the start of it. My start in real estate, though, in general, was flipping houses. Wow. That's how I got there. I took- I'm fixing to flip them. Yeah, but it was by mistake. So my brother and I, I was in the mailroom.

Okay. I finally got a job, which was good when I was in that fraternity house. This is back in New Jersey, right? No, no, no. Back here. Here, here. Got you. Yeah, yeah. Here. Right when I came out here, I got a job in the mailroom. I worked in that mailroom for about a year and a half. I saved as much money as possible, which was about $5,000. So I had five grand to my name. And my brother took $5,000 of his,

and that's when you could get 100% financing. Yes. Okay. That time was a wild time, which got us into trouble eventually. However, we went out and we decided because people we had spoken to that were mentors to us were very successful, not just in real estate. They were always successful in their job, but they made money in real estate. And that was a common denominator was, I'm in the music business, but I also make money in real estate. I'm in the whatever business, but I make money in real estate.

But I put my money into real estate. Right. Yeah. So I looked at Matt. I said, why don't we take our 10 grand and go buy a place? And we did. 0% down. Yeah.

0% down. We bought a $400,000 condo. Wow. In LA. With 10 grand. Oh my gosh. And nothing in the bank. Here in LA. Here in LA.

West LA. Really? Yep. Right on Bentley. What happened with that? So we bought it for $400,000. Every week we got a paycheck. We ended up changing a fixture, painting a wall, knocking down a wall. You had a tenant in there?

No, no. It was us. We lived there. You lived there. We lived there. We bought it for us and we lived there. Oh, and you got a paycheck from your job. Yeah, from our job, we would fix it up. We literally were living paycheck to paycheck. And it was like three and a half, four months later, I look at my brother.

We're sitting on the couch. I go, Matt, this place looks awesome. Wow. Why don't we put it on the market? And we were kind of joking. We were throwing back some beers. We were like, all right, why not? Let's try it.

And you're not a realtor. You don't have your license. No, I'm delivering mail. Yeah. Okay, I'm delivering mail and broke. So we put it on the market for $600,000. About, I want to say four weeks later, we sold the place for like $590,000.

No way. So we made $180,000. You're like, we sold the place for like $590,000. No way. So we made $180,000. You're like, we're the richest people in the world. That was the most money you'd ever seen in your life. Oh, my God. That's so funny you said that. That literally is my next line. I know the feeling, man.

You're like, I'm retired. I'm done. I'm the richest man in the world. I know that feeling, man. So we took that money and I did a couple of things with it. First thing I did was I went to the Jeep dealership because I didn't even own a car. I was so poor. Oh, man.

And I bought a Jeep Cherokee. And the second thing was I jumped in that Jeep Cherokee, drove to my mailroom job, and I quit. And so Matt and I, we took that money. We started rolling into the next one. And then the next time, that's how we originally got into it. You just got into it by kind of accident. That was it. And you're like, wow, we can actually make some real good money.

This is fun. This is interesting. We're good at it. What's the biggest flop? The biggest investment you were like, this is going to be a home run. I'm going to put all my money on, all my chips in this one. And then it just tanked and it almost broke you. Oh, it broke me.

It made you cry for mommy and it made me cry. And yeah, I don't need to think about this one too hard because this is a very obvious one, an obvious point in my life that I will never forget, which turned out to be one of the best experiences ever because it happened a little early on. We had ended up flipping about, I don't know, let's just say a dozen houses right and at that point by the 12th one I was in the mortgage business because I didn't want to pay off any more people every time I buy or sell a house

so you're getting double commission or whatever so now I'm a mortgage broker and a house flipper and we were doing well I was a you know I was a millionaire by 26 I see this house in the Hollywood Hills right by Laurel Canyon. This is the coolest house I've ever seen in my life.

Okay. It looks like it's a castle. It's a Spanish castle. Coolest thing I've ever seen. Two master bedrooms. My brother and I are still living together. I'm like, this is the greatest party house in the world. All the bachelors.

Yeah. So we ended up buying it for $2.25 million. Okay. Now I was making a it for $2.25 million. Now I was making a lot of money as a mortgage broker. And that was never going to stop, right? Back in 2000. In 2005, 2006. People were making so much money as mortgage brokers back then. So much.

And then it just, boom. The parking lot at the mortgage company was an exotic car dealership. Wow. Okay, that's what it was. And all of us showed up with no money and within a few months we were all driving the fanciest cars you've ever seen. We got the house.

The economy stopped. All I remember is this because it was all a blur. Month by month my bank account was going down a huge amount because my monthly nut was like 30 grand at this point and with zero money coming in very quickly it was going down we ended up selling that house one year later and i lost six hundred thousand dollars on that house goodness

and uh yeah i was a millionaire by 26 I was broke by 26 and a half. Wow. Everything I had worked, all those dozen houses up to that point, took all that money, rolling all of it. To one house and then? Gone. All of it. So what was that? It was like my last six years of my life never happened.

Wow. So how did you bounce out of that? Man, that was tough. It was a very difficult time. I was down and out for sure. For how long? I was depressed. I mean, probably a year.

Wow. Yeah. Yeah. So trying to find what the next step was going to be. I knew that if I did it before, I could do it again. But it was just getting over that hurdle. And eventually, I said, listen, I've flipped houses. I've financed houses.

Now I want to sell houses. I love real estate. So what better time to get into real estate than the worst time ever? There you go. That's the best time to get in the stock market too, right? There you go. There you go. So I learned when the market was down.

I learned a lot because there wasn't a lot going on. I didn't sell my first house for six months in the business. I didn't sell anything. And worked my way up to there. And now we built a company. We sell about a million dollars of real estate a day, which is great. We have our team. We're all over the place.

And let me tell you, it was a crazy learning experience. It was a very difficult time, but I'm glad it happened because of what I learned from it. Yeah. And I'll never overextend myself like that ever again. Really? Ever. Wow. Ever.

What was the biggest lesson you learned about yourself during that time? You know, it was just being so naive. Like, this was never going to end. Yeah. I mean, I was like, everybody needs mortgages. This will never end. Right. It will never end. Right.

It stopped so quick. So fast, right? I remember the exact day because it was only about eight months after I had just gotten an 11,000 square foot lease in Koreatown in an office. And I'm guaranteeing that lease. And it could have been... The whole thing was a disaster. I put change on the doors of my company.

Oh, my gosh. I couldn't make my house payments anymore. I saw each one of my three fancy cars being taken away. It was a nightmare. I mean it's funny now to laugh, to look back, to say – Oh, but you're so depressed then probably. It was the worst. Wow.

It was the worst. Yeah. Try going from a $2.5 million house to literally a $1,500 a month apartment. Oh, my gosh. Going back after you worked your way up from that and then going back to that. What's that do for your confidence? It crushes you. It crushes you. I always like to say to make light of the situation, there was a Seinfeld episode where Jerry and Elaine are walking down the tarmac to get onto

a plane. And the stewardess says, hey, folks, we have one seat left in first class. Do one of you want it? And Jerry looks at Elaine and he's like, I'll take it. And Elaine goes, why? Wait, wait, wait, wait. I'll take it. And Jerry goes, Elaine, have you ever been in first class before? And she goes, no, Jerry. That's why I'm so excited. He looks at the stewardess and he says, I'll take it. She's like, why? And he says, because you've never been there so you don't know

what you're missing. It's true. So it's tough because I knew what I was missing because I had gotten to that point and now it was all taken away from me. I had to figure out a way to get back there

and do it the right way this time. It kind of reminds me of sports in a way because I had an injury. I had to retire from playing arena football. And it's like a lot of athletes go through this depression mode where they're gods, right? You're playing in front of 80,000 people

in the Orange Bowl or Sugar Bowl, wherever you play, or 100,000, whatever it is. And you get that every week. You get this rush. And then it's taken away from you after you graduate or you don't make it to the NFL.

It's gone. And then people are just stuck. It's difficult. It's this rush. And then it's taken away from you after you graduate or you don't make it to the NFL. It's gone. And then people are just stuck. It's difficult. It's difficult. You know, it's interesting, actually, that you say that. A lot of the people that was in the mortgage business never bounced back. And what are they doing now? Struggling still.

Looking for that next get rich quick thing. Or working crappy jobs that they hate or something. Yeah. And that time screwed them up so much because they could never go back to working a normal job. And it was kind of like just they got lucky for a second. Like everyone was making tons of money. Yeah. But it's not that easy.

You can't just like get easy money without doing the work. You got to work. You got to work. You got to work. I love this. What do you feel like is the one home that you've always wanted to sell that you've never sold? Is there a home in L.A. that you're like, it's like your golden ticket that you've always wanted to get? Let's see.

There's one that's escaped you many times? Well, there was the Manor, which was the Spelling Mansion. The Manor. The Manor, M-A-N-O-R. The Manor. Where is that? That was Tori Spelling's parents' house. Aaron Spelling, the famous producer.

And that's in Homely Hills. And they were listing it for about $125 million. It ended up selling. My company sold it. How many? $125 million. It ended up selling for that much? No, no.

It ended up selling for $85 million to Petra Ecclestone, who's Bernie Ecclestone, Formula One's daughter. And you didn't get the deal. I didn't get the deal, no. But that was a beautiful home. And one day, hopefully, I can sell that. It was like 40,000 square feet. It was something ridiculous. But there are a couple of those monsters out there right now, off market, that are asking that $100 million price tag that I may just have a couple offers on and trying to put it together. But it's very difficult. It's difficult for overseas people to buy it too because you got to get your money in

the country. It's not that easy to get $100 million transferred into a country that you're not a citizen of. Wow. Yeah. What's the biggest, the most expensive home you've ever sold? So I just sold a $23 million house, Reba McIntyre's house two weeks ago. Nice. And that was an off-market deal. Randomly, I went to go see it and I was passing the guy who ended up buying it. I was like passing him on the road and I was like, I'm going to go see this house. You want to come see it with me? He came and he bought it.

No way. Seven days later. Just like that. All cash, $23 million. That bought it. It closed seven days later. Just like that. All cash, $23 million. That's it. Congrats. There it is. It's got to feel good.

What's a commission like after – because isn't it a different commission? The higher it is, it's like a lower commission or a percentage? Yeah, it's different. Your average commission is 5%, so two and a half to each side. They're representing the seller and the buyer. When you start going over $10 million, sometimes you typically see 4% total, so two to each side. Yeah, yeah. Still, two is not that bad on a $10 million, sometimes you typically see 4% total, so two to each side. Yeah, yeah. Still, two is not that bad on a $20 million deal.

Hey, my brother are partners and we got to pay the government. Of course. I get it, man. Book advances are like it's all gone. It's gone. It's gone. That was gone before I even – Did I hear you have a deal on the beach somewhere or a big development deal you're working on or no?

Oh, yeah. Last year, I was involved in a deal. It was a $100 million piece of sand, actually. That you're selling. It was an incredible piece of sand in Marina Del Rey that we were selling. It's still available. You're still selling it. And I left that company, so I'm no longer involved in that deal, unfortunately.

Gotcha. But it was a decision that we made together as a company to move on to another one. Still selling it. And I left that company, so I'm no longer involved in that deal, unfortunately. Gotcha. But it was a decision that we made together as a company to move on to another one. And we joined Douglas Elliman, which is one of the most famous brokerages on the planet. They sold like $18 billion last year in New York City alone. And yeah, we're the face of them out here. So we're excited about it. Yeah. Tell me about closing the deal.

How have you learned? You've got so much information inside of you for people listening or people watching. What are the secrets to closing a great deal where it's a win-win? Because I come from a place, obviously, you want to win. You want to get the most. Yeah, of course. But also, you don't want to make someone else feel like they just lost. Right.

So how do you do that where it's a win-win, but it's like you really won as well? Well, you're right. So some of the best deals ever done in any business in history have been where everybody wins. Yeah. Otherwise, it's like – Yeah, well, listen. It's nice to make a big check, but then if everyone else feels like crap – Yeah, and it's not about the check, by the way.

It's about – look, I like – when I sit down at a conference table i'm negotiating i prepare like i'm running out of that tunnel in front of 80 000 people to kick a football or i'm going to war okay yeah uh so i i get in that mind state that that and and and really you know yeah i put on the right suit i do i even do things that we used to do in football like put on a sock a different way or whatever i gotta be in the zone of Of course. Okay. So I got to battle with it. However, you know, if there are certain ways where you don't want to hammer on people too much, I mean, you always want to reinforce that they're getting a good deal, which I always tell people, by the way, you're getting a great deal. So excited for you. And, you know, when it comes to negotiating, which I've studied, I've studied it a lot and I've been through a lot of negotiations, it's really important to your approach to it, but also to a few key things.

One is you never want to talk too much. I like to sit back and listen. I think that's super important. And one of the keys to being a master negotiator is to sit back, shut up, and listen. Because no one likes to be sold. They like to buy. Well, the more you talk, the more information you give out. So if you're just talking, you're going to start saying stuff

that you might not have said before. So you've got to listen. And the second and most important other thing is that you never go into any negotiation needing to close that deal. Okay? You go in there ready to walk away at any moment. And that's also very important. That's powerful because then you're not making stupid mistakes.

Exactly. Listen, I can smell a buyer who is in love with the property all the way to the bank. Okay? They're emotional about it. If I know that you want that property, if I know that you or your significant others is- The dream home. The dream home. Watch out because as opposed to you just coming in and be like, yeah, I like it, but you know what? There's always another house that's going to come up.

And there's a couple of things that are wrong. Yeah. I'd like to put a deal together. If not, not a big deal. I appreciate your help. Although if so, great. I appreciate it. You know what I mean? Go in with that attitude because the second you start showing your desperation, I'm going to jump all over. It's game over. You'll be a shark. Yeah. Yeah. And so a lot of real estate is bluffing.

A lot of it is bluffing and you got to be able to read people and become pretty good at that over the years of reading people. I like that. Do you play poker as well? I don't. I don't. Do you play poker as well? I don't. I don't. Because you'll lose it all day. You're good at reading people in real estate, but you don't want to lose all your money. Well, now you're going towards the whole Vegas and gambling thing.

And it's probably better off that I don't. That's funny. I'm curious now, relationships and drive. Yeah. Because I have a lot of the most successful people in the world that come on here in various fields. lot of the most successful people in the world that come on here in various fields. And I like to dive into relationships because in my opinion, relationships are the key to success in life. Without being able to communicate with people and develop relationships, it's hard to close deals. You've got to be in relationship with every human you come into interaction with to close the right

deal. Now about being so driven, you've got your TV show. You've got zero time as it is. You're going after the biggest homes here in LA. You're trying to blow it up with your company. What's it like having a balanced relationship, intimate relationship life and chasing a big dream? Do you feel like you can have both? And how do you navigate that? Let me tell you, I get that question all the time because people want to know about

my relationship because it happens to be on the show. In fact, for everybody out there, I met my fiance on the show the first season, and she actually was the assistant of one of the other stars of the show. Made for some good TV for sure. Is he still on the show? He is not. She is.

And everybody who watches the show knows that last year I canceled our wedding on the show? He is not. She is. And everybody who watches the show knows that last year I canceled our wedding on the show, unfortunately, just because we have cameras all around us. So everybody's kind of involved in our relationship and we've gotten used to it now at this point. My brother is my business partner and my fiance works with us. So it's one of the most intertwined businesses you've ever seen. And it's a reality show. And it's a reality show.

It's very important to find balance in life. I've struggled at this many, many times myself. There's no question about it. I'm very open about it. I'm a workaholic. I like to call myself a real estate-aholic. All I do is work. And I wake up in the morning.

I'm super excited. I can't wait to get to work and close deals. A lot of my clients are overseas. I'm on the phone till sometimes one in the morning. I mean, whatever it is. My fiance is also a real estate agent. She works with us. And there's been dinners where we're both on the phones where we don't even talk to each other.

You can't do that and have a healthy relationship. You got to shut it off at some point. And this is something where it's definitely something that we work on together. It's very difficult to shut off the phone. I'm sorry. I'm in a situation where I'm 36 years old. I'm at the top of my game. And knowing just because I've lost it all before, I've learned that you hit while it's hot and you work hard. So it's difficult to put it down. But you got to find that balance.

And I talk about that a little bit in the book. And it's an ongoing work. That's what it is. It's ongoing work. But I couldn't do what I do without her. She's my support, not only mentally. And I bounce ideas off of her all the time because she's in this business. So she understands how I think, but we help each other because we're both on show.

And you see a lot of that play out this year on the show, which starts actually Wednesday. Wednesday. Yeah. September 2nd. And how many episodes is it? So it's 12 episodes. And the other thing, which is really cool, which I think you would like, is in the book, we talk about this mentality that we live by, which is we call it the ready, fire, aim mentality. Yeah, I saw this in here. Okay, ready, fire, aim as opposed to ready, aim, fire. And what that is is being able to identify an opportunity when it's in front of you, being able to capitalize on that opportunity and take it to the next level.

But also, if you fail, be able to bounce back like we did in our dark times when we lost everything and kind of get back on the road and keep punching at it and then eventually becoming successful with it and see it all the way through. I think that's important. I've lived by that for a very long time. I have lots of people that I've dealt with clients who can tell me stories about an opportunity in front of them where they waited, they hesitated. And that's when calculated confidence comes into play because you're confident enough to make that decision at that moment and run with it as opposed to waiting and possibly losing out on it. Sure. Yeah. So you're, she's your fiance still? Yeah. Fiance five years now. Fiance. Cool.

Yeah. Um, and she's cool with the whole reality show, you know, with everything's happening, she's okay with it. Or I guess there's still challenges, you know? Well, listen, there's still challenges. Uh, she's okay with it because we've both been on it. So it's a lot better than if one of us was on it. And yeah, she comes with me on a lot of my speaking engagements. Everybody actually wants to see her. They want to see her probably more than you.

Hey, we'd like you to come speak to a thousand realtors. Oh, by the way, can you bring Heather too? We'll get you a ticket too for her. They love her. They love taking pictures of it. Plus, we balance each other, our personalities big time. That's great. What would you say is your biggest fear right now?

My biggest fear is my next step in my business. We've grown our business to a point where it's huge and it's amazing. But my fear is getting too big where I lose some of the things that got me to where I am today and where I don't have time to be a realtor anymore. What are those things? Well, listen, I love showing houses. I love being on the ground level of dealing with people face-to-face. I mean, I've had people in my car from first-time buyers to Kim Kardashian to billionaires to heads of states. And you're driving around showing houses. I'm driving around talking to these people and hearing about their experiences.

And I always like to learn from them. These are people that are so interesting, especially when you're talking to a billionaire, it's like, do you know how much money that is? Tell me, what's it like? How did you get there? So I learn from those experiences. It's like you get to have your own podcast when you're driving people around.

That's it. You're interviewing successful people. I mean, maybe I should put that in my car. You should record it and then have that be Josh Altman's road to success, driving. I like that. That's done. There it is. Hey, by the way, I'm going to show you $10 million houses today and I'm going to be recording it. Exactly. So I don't want to lose that. I don't want to get to a point where I can't do that anymore. You're too big and you don't have the

time to do that anymore, right? Yeah. The book was something that, it was a passion project. It's taken me about three years. It's a lot of time, man. A lot of time. And I did that not so much to sell. I did that because it was something I wanted to put on paper to, you know, allow people to kind of look into

how I got to where I am today and learn from some of the experiences that I failed on. Yeah. Man, know what you want. Trust your gut. Succeed at anything. When was there a time that you want. Trust your gut. Succeed at anything. When was there a time that you didn't trust your gut and you made a big mistake from it?

Oh, man. Let's see. I'm trying to think of the best one because there's been many. You know, there's been many from, you know, getting involved in certain businesses to, you know, not pulling the trigger on a house when I had access to it to buy it. You always go through those feelings. It's a war that you're fighting in your gut, but you got to go with the first instinct. What would you say is your main vision for yourself?

You see yourself. We're back here five years from now doing this podcast again. What do you want to achieve in the next five years? So for me... What's the next five years? So for me... What's the impact as well? So I love making people money. I've made many, many, many people multimillionaires by guiding them in the right direction as far as what real estate to buy. And it's at the point now where

I have access to more money than you could ever dream of by just making one phone call to one wealthy guy saying, you got to buy this, trust me. And he'll write that check without even seeing it, knowing that my word is gold because I've worked my way up to that point. My next step, as well as obviously selling houses, is I've started partnering with a lot of my clients on some of these properties and developing. I feel that I love doing it because it's fun. And when you can partner up with someone who you become friends with while making them money, it's almost like a game. It's a game of chess with different houses. And obviously, it's not an automatic. If the market switches,

you can lose money. But I've spread myself around enough where if it does switch a little bit, the market, that I'll be okay. But I love the fact of getting in development. I think it's fun. I have a house that I'm finishing flipping right now that I've been working on for a year, and I'm putting it on the market in three weeks. I love it. Yeah. What's the thing you're most proud of that most people don't know about you? Oh, well, I'm just, let's see, most proud of, you know what?

I'm just a really good son to my parents. Where do they live? They live in Colorado and we have a very tight family and I love nothing more than just hanging out with my family. Oh, that's cool. You know, they don't care about any of this stuff.

Right, right. You know, I'm still the little brother and I'm still the baby to my mom. Yeah, me too. And, you know, I'm just proud of how we've stayed tight together and haven't let anything get between us no matter what it is. And, you know, my dad is one of my mentors. My mom is the most amazing woman in the world. And I'm blessed with that, and I'm so happy for it.

A couple questions left, but I want to make sure everyone goes and gets this book. It's called It's Your Move by Josh Altman, My Million-Dollar Method for Taking Risk with Confidence and Succeeding at Work and Life, forward by Damon John. Make sure to check this out. It'll be in stores September 29th. 29th. And you can get it at www.thejoshaltman.com. Thejoshaltman.com.

Make sure to follow him on Instagram and you're on Twitter and everywhere else as well, right? All the Josh Altman. But also check out the show, Million Dollar Listing. It's on Bravo at what day, what time? Yeah, it's Bravo, Wednesdays, 10 p.m. Wednesdays, 10 p.m. You can check out all the great deals you're doing and all that stuff.

But this will be in Barnes & Noble and everywhere else as well, September 29th. So make sure to go pick up a copy and support him. It's coming out right now when this episode comes out. It's coming out. I even got a shark to write the foreword. You did. Damon John, it's great. Yeah. It's coming out right now when this episode comes out. It's coming out. I even got a shark to write the foreword. You did. Damon John, it's great.

Yeah. It's great. A couple final questions. And this was great. I want to have you come back on at some point maybe next year. And we'll talk more about negotiating. One of the questions I like to ask people at the end

is the three truths question. Okay. And this is if it's your last day and the book has been deleted, all your properties are gone, everything is gone. Your show has been removed from TV forever. No one gets to watch it anymore. Oh, God. And you got to leave – you have a piece of paper with three truths about life, of everything you've learned about the world, about life. And you got to

give that as your legacy for people to see. One piece of paper. Okay. Three truths. What would those three truths be for you? Money isn't everything. Oh, interesting. Money isn't everything.

That would be one. Number two is be true to yourself. And number three would be be 24-7. I like that. I like that. That's good. Next question is, what are you most grateful for in your life? My family.

Yeah. Yeah. Easy. Okay. Easy. Yeah. Before I ask the final question, I want to acknowledge you for a moment, Josh. Okay.

And I acknowledge everyone. Okay. At the end of my show. But I get to acknowledge you for a moment Josh and I acknowledge everyone at the end of my show but I get to acknowledge you for your realness because you could come across for a lot of people as probably a douche bag on the show and this egotistical driven guy who only thinks about money but you know I've got to connect with you twice

now and I love your authenticity man I love how real you are at least around me and you and seeing you behind the scenes. You're real. You say it how it is and you work your ass off. That is true. And I acknowledge you and appreciate for your hard work because I know you're doing it not just for money. You're doing it to fulfill something in yourself as well.

It's fun for you. It's your passion. And I think everyone should be following their passion and doing it with the extent of the energy that you do it. Because if we all follow what we love and we make money around it, we're going to be happier. So I want to acknowledge you for the gifts

that you bring to the world and for your real energy. And I love that you don't really care what people think about you. That took a few years to learn. That's not easy. That's not easy. That's not easy. That's not easy,

but you keep sticking to who you are and even if it makes you look bad sometimes, and I appreciate your realness. Cool. Thank you very much, man. I appreciate it. That's very nice. Final question.

It's what's your definition of greatness? Ah, definition of greatness. For me, it's because earning everything you have is definition of greatness. You know what I mean? It's so much sweeter for me because nobody gave it to me. And when I came out here, I had nothing and I worked my way up. Even when I lost everything, I worked my way back up. I did it myself. I don't owe anybody anything. I did it myself. I don't know anybody, anything. And so that for me is definition of greatness. If I succeed or if I fail, it's no one's fault but my own. Josh Holtman, thanks for coming on, bro. Appreciate you, man. Absolutely. Thanks, brother.

There you have it, guys. I hope you enjoyed this and got some great strategies out of this. Make sure to check out Josh's new book as well that's out today everywhere online and in stores. And share this with your friends. If you have a friend who wants to generate more income, but they've been struggling, they've been struggling to build their business, maybe they lack the confidence, maybe they lack the risk-taking, and they want to grow and they want to build it,

then make sure to send them to lewishouse.com slash 233 to listen to this entire episode with Josh Altman from Million Dollar Listing. So thank you guys for showing up, for playing big in life, and you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great. Outro Music