How Bill Davis Went From 9 Years on a Team to Building One of eXp’s Top Teams

Host1 00:00

Everybody's looking for quick money and they want to have that easy client.

Host 00:03

How did you do it? Like, how did you get up there and start building relationships with the right people?

Host1 00:07

No, you're not reinventing anything and you're not having to figure it out on your own.

Host 00:11

I just want to do it my own. I want to make all the money. I want to do all the stuff and they don't they just flounder forever. If you try to do too many things, you're never going to be good at one thing because you're always thinking about like, well, I need money. Showing, not telling. What do I do? Because I need money. Like, how did you overcome the mental hurdle?

Host1 00:25

You don't know what you want until you reach a certain level and then you might want something else.

Host 00:29

What's up, everybody? Grant Wise. Welcome back to the Partner Puppet Podcast. Excited for my conversation today. It's a chat with Mr. Bill Davis. What up, Bill?

Host1 00:37

What's up, man? How's it going?

Host 00:39

Doing good, man. I'm pumped to have you on here and appreciative that you've taken some time. Uh it really means a lot.

Host1 00:44

Yeah, no, definitely. Glad to uh be be back uh in the saddle again.

Host 00:48

Yeah, yeah. Well, um, for the people that are listening to this and maybe don't know much about you, why don't you give us a bit of the backstory? How'd you get to where you are today?

Host1 00:55

Yeah, I I mean I'm I'm over here in the San Francisco, the Bay Area. We're more on the East Bay, so we're kind of having the view of San Francisco. I'm not in San Francisco, but we, you know, kind of where I started, like I've always been in sales. I've never had a W-2 in my life. It's always been 1099. And so I think what that looks like is I've always had that hunger for money and you know, building and growing and you know, selling everything from shoes at Macy's all the way to, you know, selling cars and you know, going door knocking and you know, all of these different experiences. And I think this is one thing that you've always said it's real estate is a fallback career. And so, you know, that's kind of what it was for me. It was nothing that I was really expecting myself to do. And I got into you know selling cars and I was flipping a lot of cars, making a lot of money on my own. I was like, you know what, I want to start my own dealership, but before I do that, I want to go actually work at a real dealership and see how it's ran before I go try to do this on my own. And so I did that, but then the market crashed. And so once that market crashed, I was on unemployment for about two years. And then my wife at the time was a girlfriend, and I saw she was making a lot of money in real estate, and that's what got me into real estate. I was like, you know what, let me try to do that, let me take these tests. And so here I am now, and uh 16 years later, I think what separates me from everybody else that's out there, and this is one of my recruiting pitches when I talk to other agents, is I was an agent on a team for like nine years before actually starting my own team. And it's kind of like the same philosophy of what I had when I wanted to flip cars and sell cars and you know, where I get a dealership first. And so, you know, now we're six years in and you know, growing and building. And you know, we're I think we finished number 32 last year at EXP as far as teams. So continuing to push.

Host 02:45

That's amazing.

Host1 02:45

Trying to chase the top dogs like all day, every day.

Host 02:48

It's like coming after them, man. I I love it. I one of the things that I um really appreciate about your story is that you spent some time on a team. I try to always say this in like a nice way, but like we've talked a little bit about like I think you mentioned it, like this is kind of like a fallback profession for a lot of people. It is so easy for people to get their real estate license, but 86% of people fall out of the industry in less than five years. And I wish somebody would mandate that you have to go sit on a team for two years as like almost kind of like an internship or past you know certain literacy or business uh uh financial literacy or business exams to be able to go like straight to selling. I think that being incubated on a team is one of the best things that you could possibly do because it really gets you in there, it helps you learn the business and you get to do it in a way where there's a lot of action happening. Whereas when people got on their own, most of the time they really struggle because you know, they don't have the contact, they don't know the business, they don't understand all the systems and processes and people and requirements. I think the average income of a first year real estate agent is still around $8,000. And the average income of a second year real estate agent is around $16,000. And it stays that way up until like year four, and people really start to have some breakthroughs if they stay in the industry. And so it's fascinating. I uh I guess I didn't realize that you were on a that you were solo for for still or uh on a team for so long, but I really commend it because it yeah, I'm sure it taught you everything that you really needed to know about the business.

Host1 04:14

Yeah, I mean I stayed like one year almost trying to figure it out. And you know, like I was like, you know what, if I'm gonna go sell houses, I'm gonna try to go to the most expensive neighborhood around me. And if I'm gonna sell something, this is everyone's mindset. They all want to sell luxury right off the bat. And I figured out that it was not the way. I was door knocking, not knowing what to do. And then somebody was like, Hey, you know, this person, you know, opened up their own brokerage. And basically this this was I joined a team before teams were teams. Like it wasn't a team, it was like a boutique, a boutique company. And so, and then towards the end of it, that's when I started training a lot of agents. I started kind of running a lot of meetings and basically was kind of a sales manager without having that title. And so there were so many years at the end, I was like, dude, there's no way I'm running a team. I saw my broker's overhead, I saw what he had to go through, but then I think I got to the point to where I was like, you know what? Like, like I was selling 25, 30 years year after year, and that was my my balance. I didn't want to do more because I still like life, right? And I think you could always sell more, and but I think the only way to sell more and make more and to free up your time was to start to add to the team. And like that's I just got really good at social media and videos and started getting way too many leads. And then this is the problem that you know, it's not just brand new agents that we feel need to join a team right away. I also feel there's way too many people that think they could start a team and they shouldn't be starting a team. And I see so many fail. And so it goes that way also.

Host 05:41

Yeah, I think the success rate on teams is like sub-15%, meaning somebody goes and starts a real estate team, not everybody makes it, like the majority of people, the majority of people don't. And so I find it really fascinating. You know, this is uh this is such a relationship-based industry, and so I'm curious from your perspective, you know, when you want to sell a lot of houses, like you want to get out there and move, how did you do it? Like, how did you get out there and start building relationships with the right people so that you could grow your business?

Host1 06:08

Like, you know, one of the things that people always say is like putting clients first. And I think that's one of the things I for sure at the beginning when I first started, like I had bills to pay and like I was struggling to pay rent and all these other things. And you start to get a little money hungry and you start to put that money first and you start to make decisions and you know, say things based off of like I need you to do this because I need to get paid to pay my rent. And like that's when there's no relationship there, there's no customer service. Like, I there's no way I was getting referrals, like I was just trying to get them in the contract and move on. And like that's where I think people struggle, or it's like you gotta get to the points where you don't care about the money, you care about the people, and then the people that you care about are gonna feed you. And like that's I mean, my one of my my top agent, that's number one right now. He you could just tell, like, he doesn't care about money and he cares about just helping somebody, like it's literally like that's all we need to focus on, and so that's where I think it's it took a while to finally figure that out.

Host 07:04

It's a mental flip, isn't it? Like it it's kind of hard for somebody to go like to do what you're saying, I think, because you're always thinking about like, well, I need money. Like, what do I do? Because I need money. Like, how did you overcome the mental hurdle?

Host1 07:15

Well, I came from the car sale, so it was like we had to like sell them and close them that day, yeah. You know, like in it, because if they left the dealership, then we lost. So it was like coming from that side of things where it's like real estate, it's just it's so long term. And like that's all day, every day that I preach on our team is pipeline. The more people you have in that pipeline, the more you're gonna close. So then it's like if you have less in that pipeline, you're more on those people. And maybe you being more on those people are making them less wanting to do things because it's gonna take them longer now, you know, versus but when you have so many people that you're helping, there's gonna be more of those people that are gonna be making moves sooner rather than later. And that's where a lot of people struggle because you see that with these new agents that are, you know, agents that are out there, they have a couple clients and they're happy, but then it's like, and I learned this the hard way at the beginning, where it's like I had a couple deals in contract, I stopped everything because I was like, Oh, I'm finally set. I got these deals that are gonna close. I'm gonna be able to pay off all these, you know, my debt and whatever I had, and then those deals fell apart. And then that's the story I tell a lot of my agents. Like, stop relying on a few people. Like, you have to keep keep going.

Host 08:26

What is your process for that? Like, how how are you guys developing relationships consistently? Is it sit down making calls? Is it doing events? Is it, you know, like how are you guys developing relationships on an ongoing basis so that agents do always feel kind of like full? Like I've got a lot of people that could be referring me business.

Host1 08:44

Yeah, I mean, we have and I've been hearing this a lot more where it's like less less is more. So we don't want to have you don't want to have too many lead generations that are out there. So I mean, we found two. We got Zillow Partnership and we have Movado Partnership, which is you know, amazing online leads that we receive. But then it's it's the referrals that we get out of that, and then it's also the open houses and my SOI. And we're really big on marketing and you know, pushing out agents, brands with you know their own videos, and so we're teaching them how to get their own business at the same time. Like they need a jump start. It takes a while to build the brand and get your content out there to have people start reaching out. So it's like I feel like the online leads is definitely the number one way to get anybody busy quickly.

Host 09:25

Can extend to you, yeah, yeah.

Host1 09:27

And then, you know, working with you for so long and helping us dial in a lot of our, you know, a playbook, right? And like having our standards set. And so now it is calls, and it took so long. And last year, you remember last year at this time, we were just getting a new system rolled out in February, like and we literally flipped all of our systems and have new systems. You know, we have the best systems that's out there that work, but it's getting, you know, my top agents, the new agents, getting everybody to get used to this new system. It took almost a year, and we finally have everybody using it, but our calls are up, our conversations are up, and so now we have proof, and now we have you know agents that didn't know any of our old systems, that only know our new systems, and they're actually at the top of our leaderboard right now, yeah, starting this year.

Host 10:15

That's awesome. How do you take those relationships that you're developing and turn them into revenue? What's the process?

Host1 10:21

I mean, it's more so of just helping people, like uh kind of goes back to don't care about the money, like just care about just helping them. Like a lot of people, like especially like even like with the Zilla lead, they're like, Oh, I don't want a Zilla lead because I'm gonna only make X amount of dollars like after splits and stuff like that. It's like, yeah, but you just got a new person that's gonna work with you forever now.

Host 10:41

Yeah, I don't think enough people pay to the L pay attention to the LTV, the lifetime value, because one real estate client is worth potentially, you know, thirty to fifty thousand dollars over the lifetime of the client, not to mention the referrals that they can they can bring in, which is how most real estate agents grow their business still.

Host1 10:58

Yeah, like it's for us, it's more so of just we gotta just help them and not care about money. But it it's hard to teach the new agents that.

Host 11:06

How are you helping them? So I guess, you know, like digging in a little bit more there, what are all of the ways that you help clients? And that may sound like a silly question, but like what's what's the mindset there? Like, how are you helping them? What are you doing to help the clients like as you're developing that relationship?

Host1 11:21

Well, it's making sure that you know, they you know, from day one, right? That first script, that first conversation, you know, and making sure that you know, we got to get in front of that person faster than anybody else, number one, but you know, to be able to get that client. But then once we have that client, like so, like we have you know, a swag bag that we put together that has so much, you know, like just have a stand out. Like we have a testimonial book and like like we have uh fire game plans and chapsticks and all this other swag. And so we show up with a gift, you know, that's like our first like initiation of like, hey, here, you know, here's some stuff that you know, a little bit about our team, and that's how we started. But then after that, now it's having a consultation, and that's the biggest thing. Like everybody's looking for quick, quick money, and they want to have that that easy client, but you have to like in order for you to get any client to be loyal to, you have to sit down and go through the entire process, the consultation. And that's I learned that when I first started, like I had to get buyer broker agreements signed, and the only way you could get buyer broker agreements signed is by doing a consultation. And so, like, a lot of people skip doing consultations and just go out and sh and show homes, and that's it. But like, you know, full service, like literally, like sit down, like let's have coffee, like let's go over. Has anybody ever sat down with you and showed you the process?

Host 12:42

Be interested, like be curious, actually genuinely want to develop a relationship with them.

Host1 12:47

Yeah, the right questions, and then it's not you know pressuring them to write any offers, it's showing, not telling, it's you know, trying to educate them. You know, I have a three-strike rule though with my agents and like with clients, is like the first strike, it's I'm gonna try to suggest some things that you need to do to move forward, but then sometimes they need to learn the wrong the the way that they feel that is the right way, and then they need to fail. That second time I push a little bit harder and get a little bit more direct. And if they still want to do what they want to do, then I I'm like, look, we try to do that before. Then third time, if they try to do it again, then that's when I get super direct and say, Look, you guys probably aren't ready to make a move. Like, I don't think I'm the right realtor for you. Basically, you're firing them before you fire them, and like that's I think a lot of agents will give up on somebody but not fire them and then give bad service.

Host 13:35

Which is not something you want to do.

unknown 13:38

Yeah.

Host1 13:38

So, like, I mean, to help our agents, like we do a lot of trainings, like you know, roleplay calls, and then I do objection calls every week, and like that's where a lot of this stuff comes up, where it's like, how do I move the needle with this with this lead and teaching them the right way so they don't do the wrong things?

Host 13:55

Do you have some stories of of agents that have made this like mental transition, you know, like stopped worrying about the money and just started serving and and helping and contributing? Do you have a couple of people that come to mind that have have been able to successfully do this? Maybe they struggled with it a little bit in the first. I think everybody that's like new at this does struggle because it's like, well, I want to make money. It's like, yeah, you will. Like, this is a making money is a byproduct of what you do, but if you don't do the first part right, like the money's like it's it's never gonna come. So, do you have some stories that come to mind of agents that are in your organization that were struggling with this philosophy? And then they made this switch and have have gone on to just crush it.

Host1 14:29

Yeah, I mean, the one that I was just mentioning before, I mean, he's probably he's our number one agent right now. And I think he just like he was a teacher, and then you know, he was teaching while he was still trying to do real estate. And I think that's one of the things too, is a lot of people think like, okay, I'm gonna quit my job 100% and then go full-time real estate and then not realize how long it takes to actually get paid. And then what happens is they they feel that pressure, and then it's harder for them to actually do things because now they're not doing what they should be doing, and now they're focusing on the money, and then they have to go back and find another job. The moment that I see anybody go back into their job, I think you've even said this, like they never come back, and like we see that time and time. So, so like for this guy though, like for somebody to not give up and just keep understanding, like you have to just trust the process. Like, it took him like I want to say like nine months to finally sell like because he got a couple deals in contract, but then they would they were falling out, but I think it took him almost nine months from the day he got started. But now, I mean, last year, I think was his full second year or third year, and he you know sold 25 million, I think, or you know, like he's he's up there. I think that's the thing. It's like you have to trust the process and just know you're not reinventing anything and you're not having to figure it out on your own. And you just have to make sure you're you join a group that has the right recipe for you and keep just keep plugging away at it and know once it because I tell you know, my team is like once it hits, it doesn't stop. As long as you don't stop, but once it hits, like we don't know when that time is. Like my goal for any agent that that joins our team is nine months or uh 90 days. So within 90 days, you should have a deal. As long as you follow the recipe, follow the execution. But you know, for him, it took longer to finally get the closing. But then because of what he did that first nine months, like it blew up after that.

Host 16:18

Yeah, that's amazing. You seem to um have a good knack for like finding opportunity, like the intuition to go just work on a team instead of go out on your own, the intuition to start buying leads to accelerate growth instead of a where do you think that comes from? Like what what uh what about you know your your story is like giving you the patience to say, like, oh, okay, I need to do this first and I need to learn this first, and then it's like okay, now that I know how to do this, I can sell accelerate my growth. Because I think so many people come into this industry and they're like, No, I just want to do it on my own. I want to make all the money, I want to do all this stuff, and they don't they just flounder forever. But doing it the way that you've done it seems to have accelerated your growth and put you in a position to just absolutely fly.

Host1 16:54

Yeah, I mean, I don't know. Like, I feel like I'm not moving fast enough. Like, you know, I feel like I need to, I there's so much more I could do. I'm just trying to keep up with other people and like they just keep going while I think I like I feel like I'm catching up and then like they're still going. I'm like, god damn it. Like, um, I don't know. Like, I like I've seen friends, you know, even just growing up, I've seen people try to do too many things to try to make one thing work, and then they just never got anything done at all. And like, you know, like it's just everything that they did was mediocre. I see some people, you know, on the team, or you know, like if you try to do too many things, you're never gonna be good at one thing. And so I I think I've seen that just and so it's just focusing on one thing at a time of like, before I move to that next thing, I need to get this dialed in first. And I still run into that where it's like, you know, I'll go to a conference and come back with a million ideas and throw it at my team and say, hey, let's do this, let's do this. And you know, we're trying to use Monday and all these other trackers. And I just I wake up every day, I feel like there I'm not doing enough. But then I think, like, you know, my first hire was, you know, a VA that I had for almost four years that ended up kind of running the team, the back end. And but she started out as somebody that just helped us with, I don't know if you remember Pede's when the COVID was around, like we had to get like a form signed saying that we didn't have COVID to go show homes. Like that's all her job was. And then over over time, we started giving her more and giving her more, giving her more, and then she got too busy, and then we added another person under her, and then you know, that person got too busy. And then so I think the way people come in is not how they become, but you know, you need somebody, and I'm not afraid to I think that's as being an entrepreneur, you can't be afraid to just jump and without figuring out how to do it, but not jumping too many times, and I I I hear I hear what you're saying, but I feel like I do that still.

Host 18:44

Man, I heard a story um not too long ago, I think it was like a year ago. Some I think it was called Mind Valley. It was like a it was some mindset app by Vision Kiani, and he was telling a story, and he was like, Imagine if you went to a restaurant and you sat down and the waiter comes over and asks you what you want, and you say, I would like to have the spaghetti. And he's like, Amazing choice. Runs back, tells the chef. The chef starts making the spaghetti, and then you say, You know what? I think I want the spaghetti. You flag the waiter back over and say, I'm actually gonna have the lasagna. And he goes, Ah, our lasagna is amazing. You're gonna love it. Runs back, tells the chef, stop the spaghetti, he wants lasagna, starts making you some lasagna. And then you you change your mind again. And you say, you know what? Mr. Waiter, I would actually love to have the pizza. And he's like, Oh my gosh, our pizza is the best in the world. You're gonna love this. Runs back, tells the chef, and the chef starts making some pizza again. I think so many people do that with their dreams. I want this. And then all of this stuff starts happening, and like they're gonna get what they want, but they change their mind or they stop or they give up and they go, uh no, I want something different. And then the this whole like whole thing just like kicks back off again. Oh, I I want this. I th this is gonna be amazing. Uh-uh, no, actually, I've changed my mind. I want this. It's like I have so many real estate entrepreneurs, real estate agents, and I see it all over the world. I don't see it just in real estate. I see it in home services, I see it in e-commerce, I see it in internet marketing. They uh they do that. Like they I want this, and then they change their mind and they they try something else. And it's uh it's um yeah, it takes a lot of patience, it takes a lot of perseverance. But I certainly commend you guys and and the work that you're doing. You are right, like you can't be jumping from thing to thing to thing. You gotta have the patience to see it all the way through. Ultimately, you're gonna be successful. Most people would get what they want if they would just stop trading what they want most for what they want right now. And uh, I think you guys are doing an amazing job.

Host1 20:37

Yeah, and one thing that I tell people, and I learned myself, is like you don't know what you want until you reach a certain level, and then you get to that level, and then you might want to go to another level. And then like like I'm telling you, like when I was on a team for that many years, like I told myself so many times, I was like, I'm never gonna have a team. I I'm good, like I don't need that. And then, you know, you start a team, and then I was like, okay, I'm gonna have a small team, I'm gonna keep it at Navy SEAL, and then everybody's like, don't do that, and you know, and like I figured out the wrong way, uh, the way it didn't work. And then I was like, okay, you need to have this many agents to be profitable. Okay, let me get to that. And and I sat at this table, I I joined EXP, and then I went to John Chetlack uh conference for the first time. It was all on recruiting. And I never recruited agents, everybody was all attract, you know, people reaching out to me. And I sat at this table at lunch with uh and Veronica Figueroa was there, and then she, you know, I started telling her a little bit of like what I'm doing, and then she was like, Why are you thinking small? And then like that, like honestly, like you know, like you know, that's what really opened it up to where it was just like, you know, think big. Like, why am I thinking you don't have to do that? Like you could go as big as you want, and so you don't know what you want until you reach a certain level, and then you might want something else.

Host 21:51

So I say never say until you get to that level, right? Like you don't know until you actually get there, and then you can have the discussions, the decisions. So, yeah, keep persevering, keep going.

Host1 22:00

Yeah, never say, never say never, I'm telling you. Like, I like for years, I was like, I'm never running a team. It's like now we got you know one of the largest teams out there.

Host 22:08

So yeah, that's awesome, man. I appreciate you spending some time with me today, man. I want to respect your time. I always like to ask this question at the end is how can the listeners of the podcast, how can they partner with you, how can they support you, what's going on for you right now that we can we can help you with?

Host1 22:19

Yeah, I mean, follow me on Instagram, I'm an open book. Everything that I've learned is what everybody else opened up their books, and I think that's where it's like the recipe is there. It's more so everybody's at different levels, and I've gone through a lot of levels, but there's a lot of levels that I haven't been to yet that I'm still you know reaching for and needing help with. But I think anybody that's you know at my level or even like a little bit you know, less of a team or it's trying to start a team, I do reach out because I'm here to help and uh build and grow and kind of goes back to like you know what makes you know the relationships. It's like you know, we're now I understand the giving part because running a running a real estate team is not about money. It's we're not making more money. I was making more money, you know, when I was uh an agent on a team, you know, versus being on a team or you know, running a team now. And we're here just to help and give back. And you know, the more we help and give back, then we start to win ourselves. So I mean, we're in the Bay Area. So if you want to partner and collaborate with us, and you know, you can share our offices and masterminds and our fast forward movement group at EXP. It's it's not about the company or anywhere you join, it's about who you join with and the group that you're around and who's gonna help you.

Host 23:26

So who you partner with 100%. Couldn't agree more, man. Appreciate you a ton. I'll make sure that we link up the ways people get in connect with you in our show notes. And uh as always, you know this. If there's anything I can do to support you guys, I'm I'm here to do it. So thanks for spending some time with you today. I appreciate it a lot.

Host1 23:39

Awesome.

Host 23:40

Cool, cool. Thank you guys for continuing to listen to the Partner Profit Podcast. It's been another epic conversation. I'll see you on the next one. Peace.